The money hand-off is wrong. But as Viv. said, many factors surrounding the transaction which can make it worse, less bad or much worse.
These factors (drug, alcoholism, mafia, human trafficking, deseases etc) must be addressed rather, or more urgently, than prostitution itself.

I also agree with her that thanks to the lack of emotional involvement, a prostitute is less a danger for a married couple than a misstress. Under two conditions however: that the man doesn't fall in love with the prostitute (crazy but I'm sure that happens) and that his whife understand the nature of such transaction and she would have to be extremely tolerant anyway.
It's also a matter of case-by-case. One situation can be acceptable, not another.

In this respect, I consider that the act of masturbating with porn is akind to using prostitute: A man can start to ignore his real sex life with his whife in favor of a virtual one. The danger is even greater that virtual sex is easy. Much easier than go for whores.
In both case there is a problem in the couple's sexual life and both has to think about a solution to solve this problem instead of blaming the immoral actions.

ImMe (and others)

What's worse? Working in the porn industry or in the prostitution industry?

I think any guy who prefers to use his hand when he can have real sex has a real problem. You are right that the couple has a problem with their sex life and I don't think porn is to blame.

The two are interlinked in any case. 

OK, here we go.

What do you think is more demeaning to women, being forced to go about their business covered from head to foot and treated as a possession for a man's ego, or being encouraged to go about like a prostitute for everyman's enjoyment?

There are threads here in which people express outrage at the lack of civil liberties for women in Muslim countries. These Muslim women are only being abused by one man.

In western culture it could be said that women are abused by large numbers of men who couldn't care less about their civil rights so long as they can have a leer at a naked woman.

You may say these women have the right to choose whether to be photographed naked or not and that they're making a living. Do you seriously think any woman who is right in the head would choose that life?

These women therefore, are likely to be low intellect, from underprivileged backgrounds, have fallen on hard times, have no prospect of making a decent living, have no idea how to protect themselves and are abused and you should reconsider how you view them.

In a civilised society the strong protect the weak and these women are unprotected. By leering over their pictures, you are encouraging their abuse:

I hope that they do care and perhaps I have been a little ferocious in the quotes you highlight.   

But I have discussed this issue with a few men and the idea that viewing porn is supporting the abuse of  women, as demonstrated beyond question by that article, seems to be completely alien and a big surprise to the majority of them.

I am not sure how these comments correlate...men care about the civil rights of women/women willingly choose that life...is that not sticking your head in the sand?  Men who care about the civil rights of women might support women to escape those industries.  Patronising porn whilst pretending it is not harmful to women supports abuse IMO.

Those who enter that line of work are many things.  Happy, fulfilled, respected, successful, not in the list IMO...conned, unprepared, uninformed, coerced, disadvantaged, gullible, vulnerable, addicted, read the report, what percentage do you really think end living the good life?  Success is minimal or imagined...

That is seriously patronising to women: the idea that they are not capable of deciding for themselves whether they want to be a prostitute or not, whether or not they consider it demeaning (it actually doesn't matter what we think) and whether or not they want to exercise their rights as human beings and custodians of their own bodies to engage in consensual sexual activity that happens to have a price tag.

You have essentially said that these women are too stupid, or too poor to make these decisions for themselves. This was the dominant view in the pre-suffrage era - I would have thought we'd moved on.

Sex trafficking and child abuse are different issues entirely. Sex trafficking is slavery (and is wrong because slavery is wrong, not because prostitution is wrong) and child abuse is wrong because it is child abuse (not because it is prostitution).

I have used porn - and I totally resent the accusation that I am some sort of abusor.

Part of the reason that I advocate legalising prostitution is to protect the women involved. Once it is legal, you can regulate it: you can ensure the women have access to checks for STDs (and provide ways for clients to check too, to stop the spread of STIs and STDs), give them the statutory right to form trade unions, put in place inspectors to ensure they have a decent work environment and to ensure no human trafficking is going on. The present situation (where it's illegal, but the police kind of tolerate it) only plays into the hands of violent criminals and contributes to a situation where women are abused.

The idea of pornography "abusing" women is quite hysterical. With the exception of the sub-genres where people are literally being abused (I'm sure I don't have to go into great detail of what those are), there is nothing wrong with it.

First off, for all you feminists, stop acting like women are the only ones in the movies. I'll take a quote from Orgazmo (don't watch it if you're on the other side of the fence here):

Lisa: You pig, you're responsible for degrading all of those women.
Clark: Men are equally degradable in pornographic films.
Lisa: Men are always in a position of power.
Rodgers: They're the ones who want the product so bad, they're the victims.
Lisa: Well, it exploits men by exploiting women.
Clark: Hence, it exploits people.

Not to mention how many pornographic movies there are in this world where women can't be found in any scene. This all goes for prostitution as well. So I don't want to hear anything about how women get treated and the rest of that nonsense, because it doesn't make any sense.

And second, Patton:


Who says these occupations are virtuous? Would you say an alcoholic is a morally wrong person, or that he has a disease? Would someone who watches porn all day a pervert, or does he have an addiction?

And what of someone who has a drink every now and then? Is he morally wrong? What about someone who opens a Playboy every now and then?