The Alliance against Sexual Exploitation yesterday urged the government to put to a referendum a plan by the Ministry of the Interior to legalize prostitution in designated areas.
“We are opposed to making prostitution an industry and a job, because the sex trade is essentially exploitation of the female body,” Lee Li-fen (李麗芬), secretary--general of End Child Prostitution in Asian Tourism Taiwan, one of the alliance’s member groups, told a news conference at the legislature yesterday morning.
“The ministry is trying to shirk its responsibility by saying it respects local governments and authorizing them to decide whether to create prostitution zones in their city or county,” Lee said. “If the ministry really cares about what local residents think, they should put the issue ... to a referendum.”
Photo: George Tsorng, Taipei Times
Taiwan Women’s Link secretary-general Tsai Wan-fen (蔡宛芬) said that creating red light districts would not resolve social issues related to the sex industry, such as crime.
Taipei Women’s Rescue Foundation executive director Kang Shu-hua (康淑華) said if the government cared about economically disadvantaged women’s right to work, it should come up with other solutions.
“Rather than legalizing the sex industry to open [work opportunities] for the economically disadvantaged, as government officials have put it, the ministry should come up with actions to improve women’s welfare and ameliorate employment conditions for women,” Kang said. “Allowing women to sell their bodies isn’t helping.”
The ministry announced on Wednesday that after a clause in the Social Order Maintenance Act (社會秩序維護法) banning prostitution expires in November, it would allow local governments to set up special districts in which the sex trade would be permitted, while selling or buying sex services outside those areas would be prohibited by law.
The policy has drawn sharp criticism from groups that support and oppose the legalization of the sex industry, with one side saying the measures are too restrictive, while the other said the sex industry should not be legalized at all.Economically disadvantaged women need jobs, but not sex jobs,” Democratic Progressive Party Legislator Huang Sue-ying (黃淑英) said. “The sex industry neither satisfies the needs of economically disadvantaged women, nor does it protect the rights of sex workers. It only satisfies men’s desires.”
Huang has proposed legislation penalizing clients, rather than the service provider, in the sex trade.
The Taipei City Government yesterday said contractors organizing its New Year’s Eve celebrations would be held responsible after a jumbo screen played a Beijing-ran television channel near the event’s end. An image showing China Central Television (CCTV) Channel 3 being displayed was posted on the social media platform Threads, sparking an outcry on the Internet over Beijing’s alleged political infiltration of the municipal government. A Taipei Department of Information and Tourism spokesman said event workers had made a “grave mistake” and that the Television Broadcasts Satellite (TVBS) group had the contract to operate the screens. The city would apply contractual penalties on TVBS
National Kaohsiung University of Science and Technology (NKUST) yesterday promised it would increase oversight of use of Chinese in course materials, following a social media outcry over instances of simplified Chinese characters being used, including in a final exam. People on Threads wrote that simplified Chinese characters were used on a final exam and in a textbook for a translation course at the university, while the business card of a professor bore the words: “Taiwan Province, China.” Photographs of the exam, the textbook and the business card were posted with the comments. NKUST said that other members of the faculty did not see
A new board game set against the backdrop of armed conflict around Taiwan is to be released next month, amid renewed threats from Beijing, inviting players to participate in an imaginary Chinese invasion 20 years from now. China has ramped up military activity close to Taiwan in the past few years, including massing naval forces around the nation. The game, titled 2045, tasks players with navigating the troubles of war using colorful action cards and role-playing as characters involved in operations 10 days before a fictional Chinese invasion of Taiwan. That includes members of the armed forces, Chinese sleeper agents and pro-China politicians
The lowest temperature in a low-lying area recorded early yesterday morning was in Miaoli County’s Gongguan Township (公館), at 6.8°C, due to a strong cold air mass and the effect of radiative cooling, the Central Weather Administration (CWA) said. In other areas, Chiayi’s East District (東區) recorded a low of 8.2°C and Yunlin County’s Huwei Township (虎尾) recorded 8.5°C, CWA data showed. The cold air mass was at its strongest from Saturday night to the early hours of yesterday. It brought temperatures down to 9°C to 11°C in areas across the nation and the outlying Kinmen and Lienchiang (Matsu) counties,
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