TED演讲:一位性工作者的诉求(9)

 This is a lesson of history.  历史的经验告诉我们

If you try to prohibit something that people want or need to do,  如果你想禁止民众想要或者需要的

whether that's drinking alcohol or crossing borders or getting an abortion¹ or selling sex, 无论是饮酒还是跨越国界，无论是堕胎还是性交易，

you create more problems than you solve.  总有解决不完的问题。

Prohibition² barely makes a difference to the amount of people actually doing those things. 禁令对于正在做这些事的人基本没什么用。

But it makes a huge difference as to whether or not they're safe when they do them. 但是禁令对于他们在做这些的时候的人身安全影响巨大。

Why else might people support prohibition?  还有民众支持禁令的其他原因么？

As a feminist³, I know that the sex industry is a site of deeply entrenched⁴ social inequality. 作为女权主义者，我知道性产业深刻地反映了社会的不平衡。

It's a fact that most buyers of sex are men with money, and most sellers are women without. 事实上大多数买春者是有钱的男性，大多数卖春者是没钱的女性。

You can agree with all that -- I do -- and still think prohibition is a terrible policy. 你我都同意这些，但我仍然认为，禁止性交易是一个糟糕的政策。

In a better, more equal world, maybe there would be far fewer people selling sex to survive, 在一个更加美好和平等的社会，将会有很少的人为了生存进行性交易，

but you can't simply legislate⁵ a better world into existence.  但是你不能简单地通过立法改善世界。

If someone needs to sell sex because they're poor or because they're homeless 如果有的人因为穷困，或者无家可归而选择性交易

or because they're undocumented and they can't find legal work,  或者他们因为没有身份，不能找到合法的工作，

taking away that option doesn't make them any less poor or house them or change their immigration status. 禁止卖淫不能让他们富有，也不能提供他们住房，或者改变身份状况。

People worry that selling sex is degrading.  人们担心卖淫是可耻的。

Ask yourself: is it more degrading than going hungry or seeing your children go hungry? 扪心自问：它会比挨饿更加可耻吗？它会比看着你的孩子挨饿更加可耻么？

There's no call to ban rich people from hiring nannies or getting manicures, 没有政策禁止富人雇佣保姆或者修指甲，

even though most of the people doing that labor⁶ are poor, migrant women.  尽管做这些苦力活的大多是贫穷的女性移民。

It's the fact of poor migrant women selling sex specifically that has some feminists⁷ uncomfortable. 只有当那些贫穷的女性移民进行性交易时，才让一些女权主义者不安。

1 abortion   

n.流产，堕胎

参考例句：

• She had an abortion at the women's health clinic.她在妇女保健医院做了流产手术。
• A number of considerations have led her to have a wilful abortion.多种考虑使她执意堕胎。

2 prohibition   

n.禁止；禁令，禁律

参考例句：

• The prohibition against drunken driving will save many lives.禁止酒后开车将会减少许多死亡事故。
• They voted in favour of the prohibition of smoking in public areas.他们投票赞成禁止在公共场所吸烟。

3 feminist   

adj.主张男女平等的，女权主义的

参考例句：

• She followed the feminist movement.她支持女权运动。
• From then on,feminist studies on literature boomed.从那时起，男女平等受教育的现象开始迅速兴起。

4 entrenched   

adj.确立的，不容易改的(风俗习惯)

参考例句：

• Television seems to be firmly entrenched as the number one medium for national advertising.电视看来要在全国广告媒介中牢固地占据头等位置。
• If the enemy dares to attack us in these entrenched positions,we will make short work of them.如果敌人胆敢进攻我们固守的阵地，我们就消灭他们。

5 legislate   

vt.制定法律；n.法规，律例；立法

参考例句：

• Therefore,it is very urgent to legislate for the right of privacy.因此，为隐私权立法刻不容缓。
• It's impossible to legislate for every contingency.为每一偶发事件都立法是不可能的。

6 labor   

n.劳动，努力，工作，劳工；分娩；vi.劳动，努力，苦干；vt.详细分析；麻烦

参考例句：

• We are never late in satisfying him for his labor.我们从不延误付给他劳动报酬。
• He was completely spent after two weeks of hard labor.艰苦劳动两周后，他已经疲惫不堪了。

7 feminists   

n.男女平等主义者，女权扩张论者( feminist的名词复数 )

参考例句：

• Only 16 percent of young women in a 1990 survey considered themselves feminists. 在1990年的一项调查中，只有16%的年轻女性认为自己是女权主义者。 来自辞典例句
• The organization had many enemies, most notably among feminists. 这个组织有许多敌人，特别是在男女平等主义者中。 来自辞典例句