Sex Workers' Rights - Sex Wars

These pornography debates gave leeway to the debates referred to by feminist scholars as the Sex Wars. These debates began in the 1980s and centered upon ways that women were depicted in heterosexual sexual relations. The main premise of the anti-pornography movement rests upon the argument that pornography is degrading and violent towards women. These feminists also believe that pornography encourages men to behave violently towards women. However, liberal feminists argued that this argument does not take into account the pleasure that women can experience and states that these arguments could backfire against women and leave them actually more subordinated. Thus, the debates began to become centralized on the role of dominance within heterosexual relationships and how this dominance is transferred to other areas of women’s lives. These theories of male sexuality and female objectification and sexuality are controversial because they framed more modern debates about human trafficking in which coerced workers need to be distinguished from voluntary workers.