France: Student Prostitution on the Rise

[Jimmy H.]

Unfortunately, I cannot write anything more, but I wanted to put the information and the link out there. I was directed to this article in Le Figaro by a Trotskyst website:
according to the leftist student union SUD-Etudiant, an increasingly significant number of University-level students (almost exclusively women) are prostituted in "borderline" businesses like hostess bars, massage parlors and "escort" agencies, to pay the rent and finance their studies.
There is no study available at this point, but the union estimates that about 40 000 students (this is one in 57) are in this situation. The article has an account of a woman living near the Belgian border who "worked" in a Brussels brothel each summer for seven years, until she finished her studies. Students who become street prostitutes seem to be the minority.
As a reminder, prostitution is not illegal in France, but proxenetism, and, since a few years, "hooking" (trying to attract customers by making gestures, calling and wearing "typical" prostitute attire) are.

[sunnysmiles]

Jimmy,
I am not sure if you are saying that the source of this information was from a 'student' newspaper or not. But by your example provided (the belgian woman) it seems to be a very similar situation that we have here in Canada with our student newspapers. Nearly every single year most student papers in Canada have stories about students working for sex.

In the case of the Canadian student newspapers there are NEVER any studies cited in these articles. It's usually just a bunch of interviews with students and then students talking about other students who participate in the industry. Then someone puts a statistic to try to equate actual prostitutes to student prostitutes by using an estimate.

I would go as far to say that many of these students or the student editors of the paper are probably very familiar with 'pro-sex work advocates/feminism' and do their best to 1) push their papers (and gain much needed advertising revenue, from the sex issue) 2) push their pro-sex agenda by 'putting a human face on a happy hooker'.

I think 'communications' and 'marketing' are areas in which 'pro-sex work' advocates are savvier (before oag/sam/twisty etc...)

I guess I would need to know about the study more.

[Jimmy H.]

sunny,

I am sorry for being so unclear. SUD-Etudiant is the most radical leftist nationwide student union; they are affiliated to the LCR (Ligue Communiste Révolutionnaire), a political party which supports the Swedish model*. SUD does cetainly not present prostitution as a "job opportunity" for female students in need. On the contrary, they present this as a preoccupating situation that is the consequence of students' impoverishment.

The article was published in Le Figaro, one of France's two most important daily papers; it has a right-of-center to right-wing leaning (the other one is Le Monde, which is more or less left-of-center).
The context in which this has been discussed is that the Ministry of Education has announced a drastic reduction of all students scholarships. SUD's data do not come from a real study, but are probably on empirical results given by their local branches. I agree that one cannot use the numbers as such, but it is important to note that this phenomenon is usually underreported by the social agencies regulating student life. Fee were traditionally low in France, no comparison with the USofA or Japan, so people don't expect to hear that it also happens here. This isn't new for foreign students (especially from Third-world countries) whose scholarship gets suddenly cut by their government, but you rarely see this about students who are French citizens.
The journalist asked the Observatoire de la Vie Etudiante (Student Life Observatory), a governmental agency, for "balance": they say they cannot confirm the numbers, but they are aware of the situation. According to them, over than 45 000 students live in extreme poverty, while 225 000 have difficulties financing their studies.

I have a few issues with the way the article is written myself (I cannot develop them because of language problems), but they do not "try to equate actual prostitutes to student prostitutes by using an estimate". In fact, they stress the difference with young prostitutes who "pose" as students and link it to the male customers' demand for "student girls in need" (they give Craigslist-like examples of "sex as rent" scenarios). The last paragraph mentions a recently dismantled ring that used young Moroccan women who all had a student ID but were in fact "full-time" prostitutes. This is not the situation SUD-Etudiant refers to.

Added later: the woman in the article is not Belgian; she is a French woman from the Nord (North) départment, which is close to Belgium. The fact that there are French prostitutes in Belgian brothels is not new; I think they took her example because she did it while studying, but they don't make her sound like a "happy hooker".

*The Figaro article was referred to on the website of yet another organisation, the Parti des Travailleurs (Workers' Party, which I also have issues with, but that's a long story): http://www.parti -des-travailleurs.org/index.php

[deedle]

I'm halfway into planning a post about the funding of women's education. If I get it together could you two provide some sourced stats for me?

Big ask, I know...

[Jimmy H.]

Deedle,

I realised that I did not answer your request. Sorry about that. I will be very short on time until at least January 2007, but it really depends on what you need: if it is something I can find on line, it will not necessarily require too much time (though this is very far from my research topic, but I suppose some of the data can found on the websites of state institutions). Just tell me, and I will see what I can do; if it seems too difficult, I will be honest and tell you right away, but it is worth a try.

[deedle]

Thanks Jimmy

There's no rush as I'm still only halfway into the planning