Talk:Prostitution in the People's Republic of China

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Prostitution in the People's Republic of China is a featured article; it (or a previous version of it) has been identified as one of the best articles produced by the Wikipedia community. If you can update or improve it, please do.

This article appeared on Wikipedia's Main Page as Today's featured article on May 13, 2006.

Article Milestones
Date	Process	Result
December 9, 2005	Peer review	Reviewed
December 15, 2005	Featured article candidate	Promoted
Current Status: Featured article

This article is part of WikiProject China, a project to improve all China-related articles. If you would like to help improve this and other China-related articles, please join the project. All interested editors are welcome.

This article has been rated as FA-Class on the quality scale. (add comments)

[edit] Female Pronouns

Is it appropriate to use female pronouns to refer to prostitutes in China...I know that the vast majority are probably women but are there transgendered and cross-dressing male prostitutes like in much of the rest of the world?

[edit] Scope and NPOV issues

Prostitution has existed in China for centuries. Why start only with the Communists?

Parts of the article seem to be written from the point of view of the PRC government. It presents prostitution as a problem that clearly needs to be eradicated. this is not npov. For example, instead of stating "governmental authorities of mainland China have acknowledged that prostitution has not only reappeared, it is also becoming an endemic problem", we can state something like "since the loosening of government controls over society in the 1980s, prostitution has reappeared..." --Jiang 04:56, 20 November 2005 (UTC)

The Communists brought a particular approach to the eradication and now the control of prostitution, which was sort of a mixture of Confucian moralism and Marxism. Their strategies for the elimination of prostitution are quite particular and different from that of previous regimes, so it is appropriate to write an article particular to the period after 1949. Also, by using the title of "Prostitution in mainland China", the article focuses on mainland China, at the exclusion of Taiwan, Hong Kong etc., where the environment is completely different.

I appreciate your concerns about NPOV. I don't see a problem with stating the position of the Chinese government, but I agree that the introduction needs rework. As per your suggestion, I've changed the offending sentence to: Since the loosening of government controls over society in the early 1980s, prostitution has not only reappeared, it has also been associated with a number of endemic problems. I think all sides of the prostitution debate would agree that a lot of problems are associated with prostitution.

I just started the article. As other parts come together, I'm sure there'll be a better sense of balance. Yeu Ninje 05:07, 20 November 2005 (UTC)

How about renaming to "Prostitution in the People's Republic of China" like we have economy of the People's Republic of China, education in the People's Republic of China, etc.? and add "Prostitution in Hong Kong" and "Prostitution in Macau" as "see also" links. This way, the scope of the article is clearly from 1949 onwards.--Jiang 12:28, 23 November 2005 (UTC)

Since the PRC includes Hong Kong and Macau, distinguishing these two areas within the article is a bit problematic. I'm inclined to stay with the term "mainland China". I'm thinking along the lines of Internet censorship in mainland China. I think the same principle should be applied to the two articles you mentioned. What's the point of disambiguating at the top of the page when you could more easily do so within the title? Yeu Ninje 14:29, 23 November 2005 (UTC)

The problem I have with the title is that it does not clearly imply that the chronology begins in 1949. This article is history-heavy, unlike "Internet censorship in mainland China" which only applies to the last decade. There's no need to use a disambiguator at the top. links at the bottom will do. Besides, prostitution has existed for a long time while 1997/1999-2005 is not a long time. --Jiang 02:25, 24 November 2005 (UTC)

In that case I agree. Yeu Ninje 04:03, 24 November 2005 (UTC)

I'd have to oppose the move. From a geographical aspect Hong Kong and Macao are not within the scope of this article. Furthermore there's little reason not to cover prostitution in mainland China before 1949. Same for the economy article. — Insta ntnood 07:20, 24 November 2005 (UTC)

we haven't mentioned Tibet or Gansu in the article either. Articles for HK and Macau can be considered subarticles and unavoidably must cover the period before 1997 or 1999 when these territories were not part of the prc. Prostitution before 1949 should be covered in a general Prostitution in China article, not in an article limited mainland China. --Jiang 08:57, 24 November 2005 (UTC)

The scenario may be better illustrated with economy. The economies of Hong Kong, Macau and Taiwan were separated from the mainland since they became colonies. Although Taiwan was for a short period under the same government as the mainland, It's far from integrated with the mainland. I'd suppose cultural elements like prostitution was also quite different over that short period of time. Post-1997/1999 prostitution issues in Hong Kong and Macau remains different from the mainland. — Insta ntnood 09:38, 24 November 2005 (UTC)

Given the long period of separation, the period of "prostitution in the People's Republic of China" is largely synonymous with the "Prostitution in mainland China (after 1949)". Hong Kong and Macau can be subarticles whereas under the title "Prostitution in mainland China" we cannot all of a sudden add in the pre-1949 prostitution. I think we should make it clear that the article is on the mainland in the lead, though. --Jiang 06:20, 25 November 2005 (UTC)

I don't agree the time frame of the term "mainland China" is 1949 (although it's true the term has become useful after 1949 and after 1997/1999, when simply saying "China" became ambiguous). — Insta ntnood 11:35, 25 November 2005 (UTC)

It is true that the term "mainland China" isn't confined to the period after 1949. That's the main reason I agreed with Jiang to move the article to "Prostitution in the People's Republic of China" - so there would be a more clearly defined time frame. The problem which arises from this is that Macau and Hong Kong are now part of the People's Republic and so strictly speaking, for the period from 97/99, they should be included. But to do so wouldn't be all that meaningful, since these two SARs still operate under different legal regimes and social conditions to the mainland and partially as a result, prostitution activities differ very widely. I'm not sure how appropriate the links to Prostitution in Hong Kong, Prostitution in Macau and Prostitution in Taiwan are in the see also section since these articles don't exist at the moment and probably won't be created in the near future. I'm more in favour of placing a disambiguation notice at the beginning. As I come closer to finishing the article, I'll also make it clear in the lead paragraph that the article refers to mainland China. Yeu Ninje 11:03, 29 November 2005 (UTC)

In fact I'm interested to know why the time frame is set at 1949. :-) That's not a critical time of the history of prostitution that things changed drastically. — Insta ntnood 17:16, 29 November 2005 (UTC)

In 1949 the Communists began enforcing controls on prostitution activities. In Beijing, all brothels were closed down and in other cities like Tianjin and Shanghai regulations were put in place which would eventually eliminate prostitution activities. So I would say that things did change very drastically and also quite dramatically. Yeu Ninje 19:45, 29 November 2005 (UTC)

Thanks. IMO it'd better to include the history of prostitution in modern (mainland) China, including the time before 1949. If Hong Kong, Macao and Taiwan are to have their own articles, history of prostitution in China after they became colonies would still be better covered by this article. — Insta ntnood 21:41, 29 November 2005 (UTC)

The reason the period is confined to 1949-present is that the Communist Party brought a specific social policy on prostitution, which is markedly different to anything beforehand. Chinese regimes before 1949 were generally liberal on brothels and prostitution, representing what the Communist Party would call the "old society". Because of this, they should be treated separately. I'm not sure what your proposal on HK, Macao and Taiwan is. Are you saying they should be included in this article? If so, why? Yeu Ninje 22:36, 29 November 2005 (UTC)

Actually I said if there are articles for prostitution in Hong Kong, Macau and Taiwan, prostitution in China after they became colonies would still be better covered by this article. — Insta ntnood 08:02, 30 November 2005 (UTC)

I understand Yeu Ninje's concerns on why this article should only cover prostitution in mainland China from 1949 onwards (see peer review). Would prostitution in mainland China after 1949 (or perhaps prostitution in mainland China (2/2)) an acceptable title to everyone? — Insta ntnood 07:33, 10 December 2005 (UTC)

Then there's the problem of what date to start from if you're talking about "mainland China". Maybe the landing of Hong Kong or Macau? Choosing a date like that is pretty arbitrary since it didn't signal any major changes in prostitution in mainland China. Prostitution in China can be meaningfully split into three periods: 1) pre-Republican China; 2) Republican China; and 3) People's Republic of China (excluding Hong Kong and Macau). Each period had a particular way of dealing with prostitution and its own culture of prostitution. (Although prostitution before 1911 probably was subject to changes, I don't think there's enough information to write more than a single article.) Because of that I think this article should retain its present name. Yeu Ninje 08:41, 10 December 2005 (UTC)

Nevertheless the current title creates confusions on why Hong Kong and Macau after 1997/99 is not included, and may lead to allegations of separatism. It is for this reason I suggested prostitution in mainland China after 1949, suggesting the geographical and time frame in the title. — Insta ntnood 10:05, 10 December 2005 (UTC)

I don't how there's any confusion here. The page has been properly disambiguated already. It's fitting that the article reside here given how small (population/geography-wise) and how insignificant (from a broad historical perspective) HK and MO are compared to mainland China. What we need is an article on the Prostitution in China, not more articles on "Prostitution in mainland China"--Jiang 10:16, 10 December 2005 (UTC)

Don't think there have been enough connections, not to mention integration, to cover prostitution in Hong Kong and Macau in this article. The two territories remain different enough from the rest of the PRC. — Insta ntnood 10:24, 10 December 2005 (UTC) (modified 12:08, 10 December 2005 (UTC))

That article would use wikipedia:summary style. prostitution since ancient times would be included--Jiang 10:26, 10 December 2005 (UTC)

This article is titled "prostitution in the PRC", but Hong Kong and Macao are clearly excluded, and there's little reason to have them included. That's the reason why I proposed to have an even better title. — Insta ntnood 16:47, 10 December 2005 (UTC)

I can certainly see Instantnood's point. His proposed article title is much more clear, but I don't think we should get bogged down with semantics. If we were to be so precise about everything, we'd end up with something like this:

Prostitution in China before 1911
Prostitution in mainland China before 1949 (without a clear starting date); or Prostitution in the Republic of China before 1949
Prostitution in mainland China after 1949
Prostitution in the Republic of China after 1949; or Prostitution in Taiwan
Prostitution in Hong Kong
Prostitution in Macau

I suggest that this would confuse things rather making them more clear. As Jiang points out, prostitution in Hong Kong and Macau are relatively insignificant historically. The present title makes a small sacrifice for the sake of simplicity. The disambiguation makes clear the scope of the article. Yeu Ninje 20:24, 10 December 2005 (UTC)

I understand why the current title should be preferred. My proposal above was based on my experience that some certain editors would try their way to force the inclusion of Hong Kong and Macau, using the title as an excuse, say, list of airports in the PRC (edit history), list of companies in the PRC (edit history) and economy of the PRC (edit history). Even worse was that the latter two articles were previously titled ..in mainland China. When I tried to restore them to what they were like by removing the materials on Hong Kong and Macau, I got labelled as sinophobic, advocating Hong Kong's independence and POV pushing. I know "prostitution in the PRC" as a title is good enough to most readers, but I sincerely don't want the same nightmare to be repeating. — Insta ntnood 21:48, 10 December 2005 (UTC)

Do you have some proposals as to what the other articles on prostitution in historical and present day China could be named? Yeu Ninje 21:56, 10 December 2005 (UTC)

Do we need separate articles for the time before and after 1911/12? — Insta ntnood 22:00, 10 December 2005 (UTC)

They could all be covered in a general article on prostitution in China before 1949. But if we were to discuss them in any detail, I think they do need to be differentiated. The cultures of prostitution in traditional and modern China were reasonably different. Just compare for example the often swanky brothels of Shanghai, often frequented by foreigners, to one in Beijing during the Qing dynasty. Yeu Ninje 22:10, 10 December 2005 (UTC)

I'd say the period of modern China before 1949 (let's say, after 1911/12) is far less a matter of confusions or ambiguity comparing with to-day situations. Taiwan, Hong Kong and Macau were all colonies by then, a fact the then government had to recognise or acknowledge. For traditional China, we can simply say China in the title.. and stop talking about those territories starting from when they were ceded (if there's much to talk about them before they were ceded ;-) ). — Insta ntnood 07:37, 11 December 2005 (UTC)

[edit] International Sex Guide

I'm a bit concerned about the inclusion of the International Sex Guide in the external links section. The site is basically an instruction booklet on how to engage in prostitution in China. On that site, the subpage "The debate about the legal situation" is very limited and in any case outdated. Each of the individual city pages include specific venues, prices etc. Some of the posts also seem to be mildly racist. For example, "Frankly, if you have to pay for it in China you are well and truly a loser." Leaving aside any moral objections, I don't think it's appropriate for Wikipedia to refer to an external link which is encouraging illegal acts. Also, the content of the site isn't serious academic discourse, a lot of it seems to be hearsay and more seriously, a lot of the language is demeaning to women (e.g. "whores", "sluts"). Yeu Ninje 03:21, 2 December 2005 (UTC)

Well, if you want to see the truth about prostitution, a booklet written explicitly to guide you to brothels would provide much more information than say, a government sponsored report. And prostitutes ARE whores... its not derogatory... a whore, by definition, is a prostitute..

see Wikipedia:What_wikipedia_is_not#Wikipedia_is_not_censored_for_the_protection_of_minors. We are not responsible for the content of external links. The site provides useful practical information on prostitution, about how to obtain prostitution, what the experience is like, etc. This article is titled "Prostitution in the People's Republic of China" and not "Legal status of prostitution in the People's Republic of China", so I don't see why you would want to exclude a site simply because it is lacking in legal discourse. Furthermore, we dont exlude sites just for not being "academic discourse". We would find none of the information there in an academic paper, but the information is still relevant. Leaving aside the slang used there, I think the site sheds good light on the practical aspects of prostitution. --Jiang 20:21, 9 December 2005 (UTC)

The site you've now linked to is slightly different to the one before. Whilst I still have some reservations though, I'll leave them for now to concentrate on getting the article up to FA status. Yeu Ninje 23:44, 9 December 2005 (UTC)

[edit] Thanks!

Just thought I'd say thanks for the interesting article. I had originally intended just to translate the first two paragraphs or so (since I was doing it myself) but it was interesting enough that I decided to do as much as possible in one go and ended up doing about half of it. The seven levels and the bit about the GDP being reduced by a full 1% in 2000 were the most interesting parts. Mithridates 18:27, 12 May 2006 (UTC)

Thanks for translating so much of the article into Ido. Great job. Yeu Ninje 02:04, 13 May 2006 (UTC)

This 'Prostitution in [country]' article is bizarre in that it is vastly larger than any of the other ones. Unusual. Skinnyweed 22:38, 12 May 2006 (UTC)

" Prostitution has also become associated with a number of problems, including organised crime, government corruption and sexually transmitted diseases. " I find this line either naive or endorsing of the criminals that create the supply side of the prostitution market. Organised crime earns money from prostitution ( in any country ), corrupt officials receive the pleasure of prostitutes in any country and a fair proportion of the stds in any country are there because of those who use prostitutes Jeremy P Lewis 01:40, 13 May 2006 (UTC)

When I wrote the article last year, I tried not to take a moral stance on the subject. There is an argument that prostitution is a valid form of work servicing a valid need, which is why in some Western countries it's been legalised. In the interests of NPOV, it makes sense to focus on the problems that are associated with prostitution. As for those who create the supply side of the prostitution market, it's up to the reader to decide how they feel about them. Yeu Ninje 01:52, 13 May 2006 (UTC)

[edit] One Child Policy?

Perhaps would it be appropriate to include something on the speculated link between China's One Child Policy (and resulting gender imbalances) and prostitution? StaticElectric

[edit] Focus of article too narrow?

"They are almost all female, though in recent years male prostitutes have also emerged." "Since 2003, male homosexual prostitution has also been prosecuted under the law."

Except for these two lines, to read this article, one would think there's no male prostitutes in the PRC. Are there levels of male prostitutes, also, or do they exist so far outside "normal" society that there's no concept for them? And males are the only buyers? There's no real mention of child prostitution or sexual slavery, either. --Markzero 03:30, 13 May 2006 (UTC)

I agree. I don't think this should be a featured article because those are very important aspects of prostitution in China, and they don't even get mentioned at all. Theconroy 01:56, 16 May 2006 (UTC)

"These tiers highlight the heterogenous nature of prostitution and prostitutes."

Okay, so homosexual prostitution never exists, at least not in China? Seriously? --Markzero 22:35, 4 September 2006 (UTC)

I agree that there should be more on homosexual prostitution. However, when I did research for this article late last year, I found very little information on its existence or its practice. I'm not aware of any statistics or any study done in the area. All I found were some isolated reports of criminal cases involving male prostitutes. If there is information available, then by all means it should be added. This article made featured status because it was judged to be complete as far as the information was available. Yeu Ninje 09:58, 5 September 2006 (UTC)

[edit] What is there no article prostitution in the United States?

Or any other country? Prostitution only exists in thePRC now?

If you look at Category:Prostitution, you'll see we have articles on prostitution in 13 countries and one continent. You're welcome to get an account at Wikipedia and start an article on Prostitution in the United States.-gadfium 09:20, 13 May 2006 (UTC)

Prostitution in the United States does not exist, hence there is no article on it. Skinnyweed 15:17, 13 May 2006 (UTC)

have you ever heard of the term "hooker"?Osmo250 04:44, 14 May 2006 (UTC)

I hope you're joking. I really do. --Joshuagross 05:16, 14 May 2006 (UTC)

Ever heard of the moonlight bunny ranch? --monte 05:16, 14 May 2006 (UTC)

Those hookers portrayed in Grand Theft Auto (series) aren't Chinese - they are all American girls. Skinnyweed, I put to you that prostitution exists in every inhabited place on this planet. DanielBC 07:36, 16 May 2006 (UTC)

Hello folks, did you notice the article exists???? pfctdayelise (translate?) 12:03, 16 May 2006 (UTC)

It exists now. It didn't a few days ago. Henry ^Flower 12:10, 16 May 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Ref links

Each ref link at the bottom links to a reference number corresponding to one less, e.g. number 40 on the list links to #ref-39. Why? --Falcon9x5.com 13:35, 13 May 2006 (UTC)

The ref links start counting from 0 whereas the list starts from 1. --Cherry blossom tree 17:08, 13 May 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Unsourced statement

I realize that one is tiny and not of too much importance to the article as a whole ... which is all the more reason it should have been either sourced, taken out or rewritten before this was on the Main Page. It is terribly embarassing when what we hold out as the best we can produce, and in what is otherwise IMO a very well-done article on a subject bound to attract some controversy, has an unsourced statement. Daniel Case 20:34, 13 May 2006 (UTC)

I see it's been fixed now. Good. Daniel Case 23:14, 13 May 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Misleading statement?

"Despite lobbying by international NGOs and overseas commentators, there is not much support for legalisation of the sex sector by the public, social organizations or the government of the PRC."

As far as I know women's rights groups don't support legalization. They support decriminaliztion and treating prostitutes as victims rather than criminals but there's very little support for legalization. Indeed most NGOs are happy with treating orginizers and even clients as criminals. At the very least this sentence needs some citations to back it up and even then the correct wording would be some international NGOs or even a few internation NGOs. Smallfish 01:04, 14 May 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Added relevant links

I added some relevant articles, citations & links to the page and by accident my computer selected the wrong header and said to avoid NPOV. sorry about that. --Nikkicraft 22:52, 24 August 2006 (UTC)

I've removed those links you created on the basis that they aren't related to prostitution in China. Whilst they might be useful on the general article on prostitution, it really isn't relevant here. Yeu Ninje 11:23, 25 August 2006 (UTC)

[edit] NPOV

"The illegal activities and problems associated with prostitution point to the benefits of legally recognising it" is unsourced and sounds like the writer's POV. 86.16.96.92 23:03, 20 January 2007 (UTC)

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