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| In today's article, Ed takes a more serious look at the world's oldest profession. |
NOTE: This article continues my coverage of Ed Wood's When the Topic is Sex (BearManor Media, 2021).
The article: "Prostitution—A Problem." Originally published in Swap (Pendulum Publishing), vol. 6, no. 1, March/April 1972.
Excerpt: "The convention members stepping out of the Belmont Plaza barely have time to seek out some pornographic paper or book before they are captured by any number of these girls who are all bidding for his wallet. The man at a convention is the fairest of all game for the streetwalkers. And they are professionals. They know the likely subjects, therefore little time is spent on duds. They know the ones who will fall prey to their wiles."
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| Ed Wood consulted this exact magazine. |
Reflections: As I said yesterday, prostitution is a major motif in the career of Edward D. Wood, Jr. There are hooker characters in a few of his films—Orgy of the Dead (1965) and Take it Out in Trade (1970) come to mind—but he truly explores the theme in his writing, both short-form and long-form. Back when I was reviewing Eddie's short stories and it seemed like every third or fourth one was about hookers, I speculated that perhaps Ed Wood himself felt like a hooker because he was prostituting his talents by writing smut for Pendulum Publishing. Maybe I was overreading.
"Prostitution—A Problem" is an example of Eddie's nonfiction writing about the topic, and he approaches it from an evenhanded, almost clinical viewpoint. The material presented in When the Topic is Sex often captures Ed Wood at his most serious. When he's in full-on professorial mode, he keeps his stylistic quirks in check (for the most part) and sticks to the facts, only pausing occasionally to philosophize or editorialize.
So what does Ed Wood have to say about prostitution in this article? Here's a brief rundown:
- The profession has been around for nearly all of human history but is still capable of causing controversy today, as though it were something new.
- The police and the courts have largely been powerless to stop it, though a few crusading judges like New York's Morris Schwalb are doling out stern punishments to prostitutes.
- The modern-day streetwalker is likely to be young (because that's what clients want) and addicted to heroin (because that's how pimps control them). Even after they are no longer able to support themselves by hooking, the girls still have to commit crimes like robbery to feed their drug habits.
- New York City has a lot of hookers. Some prostitutes in Manhattan actually have fancy, expensive apartments where they do business. The neighbors tolerate it unless the prostitute and her pimp have noisy, violent arguments.
- Many experts feel that our prostitution laws are antiquated.
What can Eddie add to the topic? Not much, except this extremely generic attempt at drawing a conclusion, which I like to imagine being delivered by Bela Lugosi in Glen or Glenda (1953):
The problems of prostitution may have some of that same truth connected with it. The activity, as stated earlier, has been with us all down through history. . . . It is not going away simply because one might wish to turn their head. It is possible there might be a lesson to be learned that the world's oldest profession really has been with societies since the beginning of time.
Eddie actually did his homework for "Prostitution—A Problem." He cites a New York Times editorial as well as an article by William S. Ruben called "Pimps, Prostitutes and Pornography" from the December 1971 issue of Sexology magazine. What's really interesting is that one of the quoted experts is a Democratic congressman named Edward Koch. After serving in the House of Representatives from 1969 to 1977, Ed Koch became the mayor (and de facto face) of New York City from 1978 to 1989. Here's Hizzoner on the prostitution problem in New York:
"You hear the man hitting one of the women a lot. And she's screaming, 'Don't kill me!' and there's furniture falling and those marbles falling constantly, and finally you hear her hit the floor and him walking away, and the moaning and groaning. And then you wonder, is that girl in there bleeding to death, or are they going to kiss and make up and go out to eat, or is it all an act for the customer? The police today hear such horrors that it's minor to them."
Later, Koch had to withdraw his support of New York Governor Eliot Spitzer when the latter was involved in a prostitution scandal. Whoops!
Next: "Sex by Mail" (1970)