Statement from Julissa Brisman's mother

I don't think Kaz's expressed sentiments are too unusual.

I think that a *lot* of people in Boston were brought up in good, solid "moral values" families where they were taught that things like prostitution were morally wrong, and represent a failing of character and upbringing. That might be where Kaz is coming from.

Other times, people have an experience with a loved one being in a situation like that, or being in that situation themselves, and have strong feelings about it as a result.

(I'm more from the "try to understand everyone's perspective" camp, myself.)

Swirly, go back and quote one thing in an earlier thread where all I do is hate on "female sex workers". Make sure you capture the context. Be sure not to trip over all the places where I make it clear that she didn't deserve to die, that her death is a shame, that prostitutes should get out of a business that attracts violent clientele, that the johns are just as responsible for the sex crime, that selling sex for cash isn't a moral act but it's not murder either...

You know, all the stuff that basically says you're harping on a single bit of what I said (I'm pretty sure you're just in a snit that I called her a whore...something I wasn't even alone in saying about her) as if it's the underpinnings for an entire DSM-IV diagnosis and ignoring everything else because you want to keep painting me as a psycho misogynist on the brink of violent crime. You couldn't be more wrong. I don't hate women and I don't hate female sex workers. You're an ass for continuing to act like I have said that I do. What I hated from the very moment this story hit the airwaves is that everyone wants to hold the dead erotic services masseuse up on a pedestal just because she's a victim. Coddling her doesn't focus on the real problems and doesn't do justice to every other downtrodden women out there addicted to alcohol and getting cleaned up who DIDN'T turn to selling her body for cash (which is what ultimately put her in front of a gun to die)...or do justice for every other innocent murder victim who doesn't die in a posh hotel room at the hands of a whacked out med student leading a double life.

Absolutely, some of my comments have been intentionally insensitive. Sometimes sensitivities have to be stepped on to address the real problem, especially when sensitivities are being wrapped around the problem out of pity instead of addressing the root causes. The emperor has no clothes. The victims here were trading their safety, dignity, and self-respect for money. Plain and simple. Unfortunately, one of them also died in the process. It shouldn't have happened, but pardon me if I don't cry over it. She was in AA but it sounds like she was even picking and choosing the lessons she was learning from the Steps whenever it was convenient for her financial bottom line. Disappointing. But she was what she was and dressing her up as some sort of just down on her luck psych student about to help people as a counselor (and that's all she was!) is no more true than calling Markoff just a med student down on his luck after a few losses at the casino trying to afford a nice wedding (and that's all he was!).

Oh, and in case that last line is ambiguous, he's STILL and BY FAR the bigger blight on society than any of his victims ever were.

What Kaz said up top here is mean. I didn't like it. I found it particularly ungraceful.

But indicative of some kind of psychological problem in Kaz? Pathologically hatin' on the hoors? Nah, that's just the Swirl making up her usual weird, hateful, ad hominem bullshit. She's decided the "sex workers" (erotic service providers?) are on the better side of PC, so she's off on her hobbyhorse, trying to think of the meanest things she can say in the name of nice.

But Kaz doesn't need my help here. He's a big boy (a reeeallly big boy). He's more stable than Swirly, certainly, for whom the countdown to frothing at the keyboard has clearly begun.

Pass the popcorn. I don't want to miss one of Swirly's epic freakouts.

Many men make a lifestyle out of patronizing escorts. They call it “the hobby,” not prostitution, and they are “hobbyists,” not johns. They consider themselves connoisseurs of fine women, and they are eager to learn from their fellow hobbyists who will provide exactly what they want.