Canadian Strip Clubs Seek Permission to Run Legal Brothels

CANADA—In the aftermath of the historic ruling late last year by the Canadian Supreme Court striking down three anti-prostitution laws, adult entertainment businesses in Ontario, Canada, saw an opportunity to expand the opportunities available to them, though it's unclear if anyone anticipated their latest attempt to get approval to operate legal brothels. According to the National Post, "An organization representing the Ontario adult entertainment business pitched a plan at city hall Thursday that would see legalized brothels operating alongside strip clubs in the province as part of a year-long trial. The recommendation came in a report prepared for the Adult Entertainment Association of Canada’s Ontario wing by former city hall bureaucrat Rudi Czekalla. "Under the plan," it continued, "strip clubs, which are already zoned for sexual entertainment, would have the exclusive right to sell all sexual services." The argument by the association is that strip clubs are already regulated, so it only makes sense to add brothels, which will inevitably becomes legal, to the existing businesses. But not everyone thinks it is a good idea, though opposition to the plan is thus far coming not from the courts or the government, but from club dancers queried about the plan by Czekalla for the report prepared for city hall. According to the Post, "Ninety per cent of the 159 dancers asked said they felt their employers do an adequate or better job keeping them safe. By a more than two to one margin, however, those same dancers told Mr. Czekalla they were opposed to any plan that would see sexual services sold in the clubs where they work." The article does not specify why the dancers were opposed to the plan, but it's possible that they feel that having a brothel on the premises would either increase the pressure on them to engage in prostitution or present unwanted competition from the dancers that do. Or maybe they just feel that brothels have their place and strip clubs have theirs, and never the twain should meet.