I don't agree. Decriminalization is a better approach than legalization and regulation. If it is decriminalized, then victims don't have to live in fear of the police. Legalization and regulation often makes things worse, not better.
Whatever policy we choose, it should have a clear goal and be evaluated against how well t achieves that goal. “Fewer deaths by tainted drugs” and “fewer sex workers living with abuse” is a good place to start. I think decriminalization work further both of those goals.
Isn't this the same as with legalization?
Legalization and regulation often makes things worse, not better.
Do you have examples of this?
This article seems to be generally in line with my understanding:
http://time.com/3005687/what-the-swedish-model-gets-wrong-ab...
Example of making it worse: From what I gather, prostitution in Las Vegas is mostly run by the mafia and legalization has not led to women being free to be their own boss, set their own hours, etc. Legalization of prostitution often means sex workers are subjected to a lot of rules and regulations such that it becomes akin to wage slavery rather than freedom to pursue work independently like a small business owner.
I will suggest Obamacare as another example of regulation making things worse. I'm quite poor and being hit with harsh financial penalties on my taxes this year for failing to have full coverage for all of last year. Prior to Obamacare, I could just forego having healthcare and the government did not get all up in my business about why I did that and whether or not I was allowed to do that, etc.
My support of decriminalization of prostitution comes from having read Working: My Life as a Prostitute by Dolores French. Prior to becoming a prostitute, she was a political activist.
Legalization has always meant "making it legal", which in most societies means "removing laws that make it illegal" (though it might mean something different in North Korea, if you see what I mean).
Decriminalization is a wishy-washier idea, that includes lightening or removing criminal penalties, while potentially keeping other penalities. For example, changing indictable offenses to non-indictable offenses (in the U.S. that'd be roughly equivalent to changing felonies to misdemeanours).
Prostitution should be legalized, not merely have the penalties lightened. And that alone is not sufficient; legal regimes that legalize the actual act of sex-for-money, but still force most prostitutes to hide from the cops (I'm looking at Canadian law, here) are still inadequate, because such regimes still victimize sex workers (consensual or otherwise). It's simply a human rights issue.
I also think it's clear that some degree of regulation is desirable, but I think that reasonable people can disagree on this.
I don't think it's just me. It's a little more complicated than that.
I do try to be mindful that the words get used inconsistently and I do try to make a point of clarifying my intended meaning. I'm human and I don't always remember that this is an ongoing issue.