It is easy to remain confused about the importance and sometimes even the basis of a well formed opinion these days! Although maintaining a fixed perspective is of course a very constrictive means of living as well, but the level of personally biased information we are constantly being fed can be enough to eschew even a well informed yet open minded opinion.
Personally ...... I love the Girls of the Red Light District ...... every single one of them !
Its easy to forget that aside from the services they provide for the braying members of the British , American and German stag parties ......cheering and jeering in their alcohol and drug induced manias at the pretty little creatures that adorn the windows and doorways of Amsterdam's Red Light District.
Unfortunately, no! The watered down , Walt Disney , everything for recreation and indulgence has led us far astray from the functionality and importance of the original purpose..... kind of in the same way that organized religion , or even the military complex abandoned their lofty ideals for the glitz and glamour, pomp and ceremony of the mere ritual , the presence and the visage.
When it comes to the girls of the Red Lights , it is of course important to keep in mind that there are some fairly macabre elements at play in this world , I also know that the machinations of evil and greedy people ..... certainly in this day and age, tends to hold the perverting sway to to the formation of common policy! but remember this ...... hell hath no fury like a women scorned !
Unfortunately what the great middle class tourist trade tends to forget, is that the city center of Amsterdam,Venice or even London, Paris or Berlin Have become are ready rendered scenes for you your selfie stick and your facebook page. These places are now filled with minimum wage service staff, for the students and tourists that occupy these once proud hubs of culture and enterprise !
All so the great middle class tourist can for a week or so of their meager existence are able and enabled to feel superior to their fellow human beings , under the insane justifications of working hard and deserving this !?
If we remove the attitude of being perpetually hard done by ......of all of those preconceived notions that ' we work as hard if not harder than anyone we know' and the idea that we simply deserve all of the little superficial treats and indulgences that our ill gotten wages will afford us !
Let us try to remember that a young women selling an intimate experience foe a mere fifty euro's, is a person. A person that went through a youth an adolescence and a whole lifetimes experiences, prior to you drooling at her and daring your mate to ' have a go ' because his wife or girlfriend or whatever isnt here on holiday with them ! from an impartial observers point of view ...... it is all a terribly tawdry mess !
Personally I liken these girls more to nurses than the Hollywood nympho whores from our warped western porno interpretations.
I am sure there are some girls that are being exploited, but these days especially in places like the Netherlands this is becoming a much less common occurrence.
Which is exactly why the natural fabric wearing feminists ideals , and common argument that these women need to be saved is so misguided and in truth dangerous !
Let is just imagine for a moment that the world is not like the advertisements we attempt to build our lives around, that not everyone has perfect teeth , perfect hair and a perfect sense of well being to match the balance of some high interest account and a perfect balance of work and home life !
lets for the sake of this little story , imagine that we are.... perhaps a little older than we are ..... or less attractive than we are ........ maybe we were divorced widowed or even perpetually single ? Hard to imagine for some ! but thsi imaginary position of loneliness is very real to some ! And it is for these people that the ever welcoming embrace of the Girls of the Red Light District will remain ever important !
In an age where the internet offers poor substitution for genuine human contact and interaction, it is all the more important for these girls ...... those strong enough ..... or weak enough ( depending on your own warped preconceived notions ) to be able to carry on representing one of , if not the oldest professions any of our ramshackle cultures have been able to maintain for millenia
The things that continue to bring foreign tourists to foreign cities was never the guarantee that they could get their usual Starbucks coffee or MacDonald happy meal at the destination that they could get from tye point of origin !
This is the great mistake of the contemporary consumerist culture.
Its fine being able to visit Armani or Luis Vuitton in any city ...... but it wont be a reason to go there, so lets not forget this as the speculators lay waste to the last interesting spaces , and as the elected authorities attempt to ' clean up ' the Red light District in an attempt to turn it into another hellish clone of Kalverstraat ..... or SoHo ....... or rodeo drive ......... or Saint marks square ...... with no new legacies of excellence being forged, just the regurgitation of easily identifiable brands controlled by the perpetual greed of the shareholders that come to look at and take photos of the cities that used to exist around their investments!
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