Poverty and abandonment, not choice, drive most women into prostitution

Evidence

However, the girl rarely decides to be a streetwalker immediately following her defloration. In some cases, she remains attached to her first lover and continues to live with him; she takes an “honest” job; when the lover abandons her, another consoles her; since she no longer belongs to one man, she decides she can give herself to all; sometimes it is the lover—the first, the second—who suggests this means of earning money. There are also many girls who are prostituted by their parents: in some families, like the famous American family the Jukes, all the women are doomed to this job. Among young female vagabonds, there are also many girls abandoned by their families who begin by begging and slip from there to the streets. In 1857, out of 5,000 prostitutes, Parent-Duchâtelet found that 1,441 were influenced by poverty, 1,425 seduced and abandoned, 1,255 abandoned and left penniless by their parents.* Contemporary studies suggest approximately the same conclusions. Illness often leads to prostitution as the woman has become unable to hold down a real job or has lost her place; it destroys her precarious budget, it forces the woman to come up with new resources quickly. So it is with the birth of a child. — Simone de Beauvoir, The Second Sex, 1660

Categorization

• XREF: Data parallels the economic-coercion analysis Beauvoir develops against the ‘prostitution as free choice’ myth; connects to later claims about marriage as a parallel economic institution. — connects to: Prostitutes’ misery stems from material exploitation, not moral character — Simone de Beauvoir, The Second Sex, 1680; Prostitutes’ moral adaptation reflects social demand, not innate depravity; Prostitution rose because conscription uprooted families and abandoned women (+1 more)
• DEFINE: The slip from ‘belongs to one man’ to ‘belongs to all’ is the existential logic behind the prostitute’s status as the extreme case of woman-as-Other.

Broader Connections

• Prostitutes’ misery stems from material exploitation, not moral character #corroborates (0.90) — Simone de Beauvoir, The Second Sex, 1680
• Prostitutes’ moral adaptation reflects social demand, not innate depravity #expands (0.85)
• Prostitution ends only by eliminating its economic and social causes #expands (0.85)
• Prostitution rose because conscription uprooted families and abandoned women #qualifies (0.80)