Originally published at: https://boingboing.net/2020/02/20/amsterdam-may-move-red-light-d.html
…
1 Like
Bah. It remains normalized when it’s right out in the open. Normies can wander through and not feel out of place. They could post a couple of bouncers in the street zone to move the assholes along instead of creating a ‘separate’ place where entry is controlled.
This does nothing to clean up the wharf side gigs, and feels more like a prime real estate grab on the awesome red light district.
13 Likes
I remember feeling a little odd wandering past all the… window displays to visit a historic cathedral smack-dab in the middle of the Red Light district, but that’s what touring new places is all about!
21 Likes
“prime real estate grab” <— THIS!!
“post a couple of bouncers in the street zone to move the assholes along” <— SUPER THIS!!!
ETA: Drunk and Rowdy is drunk and rowdy, on the street or in the “mall” <yech…feels dirty just saying that; and not in a good way>
5 Likes
It certainly is a weird experience walking through all of that.
“Yeah, I’ll be fine with this.”
Closely followed by
“I feel really weird about this.”
11 Likes
vowed to clean up the city’s red light district as her staff complain that throngs of tourists, often drunk and rowdy, “disrespected both prostitutes and residents”.
Due to the context, I read that as “thongs of tourists”, briefly (heh) leading to an interesting image of what foreign visitors do in the red light district.
10 Likes
Some might say that’s the perfect place for a cathedral. 
14 Likes
It’s a surreal place. Last time that I was there was a barge party nearby for what looked like neighborhood kids complete with balloons, clowns and guitar playing.
6 Likes
“Erotic Mall” makes me think of “Erotic City”
4 Likes
I know that Jesus was theoretically all about preaching to the downtrodden and the prostitutes and such, it just felt weird to see all the flesh for sale right outside his house.
I guess I wasn’t cut out to be a hedonist because the most risqué things I could bring myself to do during my visit were buying a joint at a coffee shop and taking a tour of the Sex Museum.
10 Likes
Ew. That will make it seedy.
5 Likes
In some places, tourists in thongs pay to be disrespected by prostitutes, so this seems like a fair reversal.
6 Likes
I remember feeling a little odd wandering past all the cathedrals on my way to the Red Light district…
21 Likes
I wonder what the public restrooms will be like in that mall.
2 Likes
I’m wondering about the Bed, Bath and Beyond.
19 Likes
Seemed odd to me, too. But that was perhaps the most interesting part, the juxtaposition, the mainstreaming. I’m still not sure what to think about the district, though. I think sex work should be legal, and, preferably, regulated for worker safety, but it’s also an industry that is ripe for exploitation of workers, even in a regulated, legal landscape.
3 Likes
The “beyond” costs extra.
12 Likes
If you’ve ever seen them make lemonade at “Hot Dog on a Stick” it should work.
3 Likes
Ewww…
Unionization could help mitigate that as well, although no system under capitalism will ever be free of all exploitation.
10 Likes
