A prostitute in Germany, 1999

Prostitution in Germany is legal and widespread. In 2003, the government changed the law in an effort to improve the legal situation of prostitutes. However, the social stigmatization of prostitutes persists, forcing most prostitutes to lead a double life. Authorities consider the common exploitation of women from Eastern Europe to be the main problem associated with the occupation. ImageMetadata File history File links Download high resolution version (1368x1712, 456 KB) Ein bißchen genervt. ... ImageMetadata File history File links Download high resolution version (1368x1712, 456 KB) Ein bißchen genervt. ... Whore redirects here. ... 2003 (MMIII) was a common year starting on Wednesday of the Gregorian calendar. ... Social stigma refers to severe social disapproval of personal characteristics that is against cultural norms. ... Double Life is a 2-CD compilation album of songs by Värttinä. It includes the entire 6. ... Regions of Europe as delineated by the United Nations (UN definition of Eastern Europe marked salmon):  Northern Europe  Western Europe  Eastern Europe  Southern Europe Pre-1989 division between the West (grey) and Eastern Bloc (orange) superimposed on current national boundaries: Russia (dark orange), other countries of the former USSR (medium...

Forms and extent of prostitution

Studies in the early 1990s estimated that about 150,000 - 500,000 women and some men work as prostitutes in Germany. The prostitutes' organization puts the number at 400,000, and this is the number typically quoted in the press today. From other studies, it is estimated that between 10% and 30% of the male adult population have had experiences with prostitutes. Germans dancing on the Berlin Wall in late 1989, the symbol of the cold war divide falls down as the world unites in the 1990s. ...

Street prostitution. ('Straßenstrich') Regular street prostitution is often quite well organized and controlled by pimps. Some prostitutes have a nearby caravan, others use the customer's car, still others use hotel rooms. With the recent economic problems, in some large cities "wild" street prostitution has started to appear: areas where women work temporarily out of short-term financial need.

Eros centers. ('Bordell, Laufhaus') An eros center is a house or street ('Laufstraße') where women can rent small one-room apartments for some 80-150 Euro per day. They then solicit customers from the open door or from behind a window. Prices are set by the prostitutes; they start at 30-50 Euros for short-time sex. The money is not shared with the brothel owner. Security and meals are provided by the owner. The women may even live in their rooms, but most do not. Minors, and women not working in the eros center are not allowed to enter. Eros centers exist in almost all larger German cities. The most famous is the Herbertstraße near the Reeperbahn in Hamburg. The largest brothel in Europe is the eros center Pascha in Cologne, a 12 story building with some 120 rooms for rent and several bars. To meet Wikipedias quality standards, this article may require cleanup. ... Entrance to Herbertstraße; sign to the right of the gate reads No entrance for juveniles under 18 years of age and women. The Reeperbahn is a street in Hamburgs St. ... Hamburgs motto: May the posterity endeavour with dignity to conserve the freedom, which the forefathers acquired. ... Cologne (German:   ; Kölsch: Kölle /ˈkÅ“É«É™/) is Germanys fourth-largest city after Berlin, Hamburg and Munich, and is the largest city both in the German Federal State of North Rhine-Westphalia and within the Rhine-Ruhr Metropolitan Area, one of the major European metropolitan areas with more than...

Pascha brothel, Cologne, 2006

Escort services. (Begleitagenturen) Escort services, where you hire a girl for "entertainment" or companionship - followed by sex - exist in Germany, but are not nearly as prevalent as in the U.S. Image File history File linksMetadata Pascha. ... Image File history File linksMetadata Pascha. ... Motto: (Out Of Many, One) (traditional) In God We Trust (1956 to date) Anthem: The Star-Spangled Banner Capital Washington D.C. Largest city New York City None at federal level (English de facto) Government Federal constitutional republic  - President George Walker Bush (R)  - Vice President Dick Cheney (R) Independence from...

Bars. In bars, women try to induce men to buy expensive drinks along with the sexual services. Sex usually takes place in a separate but attached building. Prices are set by the bar owner, and the money is shared between the owner and the prostitute.

Apartment prostitution. (Wohnungspuffs) There are many of these advertised in the newspapers. Sometime run by a single women, sometimes by a group of roommates and sometimes as safehouses for traffickers.

Partytreffs and Pauschalclubs are a variation on partner-swapping swing clubs with paid prostitutes in attendance, as well as 'amateur' women and couples who get in without paying the flat-rate charge of about 80 to 120 euros that men pay, including food, drink and unlimited sex sessions, with the added twist that these are performed in the open in full view of all the guests.

FKK and Sauna Clubs the four to five-star establishments of the business, but not much more expensive, or sometimes even cheaper due to intense competition among the numerous clubs concentrated in North-Rhine-Westphalia (=NRW: Cologne, Duesseldorf) and Hesse (Frankfurt). These are brothels formatted after the typical German nudist resorts and public saunas that have existed from times immemorial as 'Frei-Koerper-Kultur-Anlage', 'Nacktstrand' and 'Badehaus'. As such the emphasis is more on wellness and relaxation than on 'nightlife': the establishments open before noon, everbody is naked and many offer park-like outdoor areas, swimming pools, whirlpools, saunas, therapeutic massage services, porno cinemas, dining rooms, private and public 'play rooms', bars ect. Both, clients and service providers pay an admission charge of from 35 to 65 euros, including use of all facilities, food and drinks (some do not allow alcohol or smoking). Prostitutes charge anywhere from 25 to 100 euro for a 20 to 60 minute pleasure session and get to keep it all. Proponents of legal prostitution hold this business model up as example for an ideal working environment for the women.

History

German prostitution was officially mentioned and lauded for the first time during the Council of Constance in the 12th century, was legalised and regulated in the 1920s to control venereal diseases (STDs). Prostitutes had to be registered with local health authorities and submit to regular STD tests. Sexually-transmitted infections (STIs), also known as sexually-transmitted diseases (STDs), are diseases that are commonly transmitted between partners through some form of sexual activity, most commonly vaginal intercourse, oral sex, or anal sex. ...

During the Nazi era, street prostitutes were seen as degenerate and were often sent to concentration camps. Several of these camps, including Auschwitz, contained brothels, to reward wardens and cooperative inmates, and prostitutes were forced to work there. National Socialism redirects here. ... It has been suggested that Internment be merged into this article or section. ... Auschwitz, Konzentrationslager Auschwitz-Birkenau, KL Auschwitz, Nazi German Concentration Camp of Auschwitz was the largest of the Nazi German extermination camps, along with a number of concentration camps, comprising three main camps and 40 to 50 sub-camps. ...

After WW2, the country was divided into East Germany and West Germany. In East Germany, as in all countries of the Communist Eastern Block, prostitution was illegal and according to the official position it didn't exist. However there were high-class prostitutes working in the hotels of East Berlin and the other major cities, mainly targeting Western visitors; the Stasi employed some of these for spying purposes. -- Street walkers and female taxi drivers were available for the pleasure of visiting 'Wessies' or 'Westprinzen', too. GDR redirects here. ... East Berlin was the name given to the eastern part of Berlin between 1949 and 1990. ... Logo of East Germanys Ministerium für Staatssicherheit (MfS or Stasi) / Ministry for State Security This article is about Stasi, the secret police of East Germany. ...

In West Germany, the registration and testing requirements remained in place but were handled quite differently in the various regions of the country. In Bavaria, in addition to scheduled STD check-ups regular HIV tests were required since 1987, but this was an exception. Many prostitutes did not submit to these tests, avoiding the registration. A study in 1992 found that only 2.5% of the tested prostitutes had a disease, a rate much lower than the one among comparable non-prostitutes. The compulsory registration and testing was abandoned in 2001. Since then, anonymous, free and voluntary health testing has been made available to everyone, including illegal immigrants. Many brothel operators require them. The Free State of Bavaria  (German: Freistaat Bayern), with an area of 70,553 km² (27,241 square miles) and 12. ... Human immunodeficiency virus or HIV is a retrovirus that causes Acquired Immunodeficiency Syndrome (AIDS), a condition in which the immune system begins to fail, leading to life-threatening opportunistic infections. ... 1992 (MCMXCII) was a leap year starting on Wednesday. ...

Anything done in the "furtherance of prostitution" (Förderung der Prostitution) remained a crime until 2001, even after the extensive criminal law reforms of 1973. This put the operators of brothels in constant legal danger. Most brothels were therefore run as a bar with an attached but legally separate room rental. -- However, many municipalies built, ran and profited from high rise or townhouse-style high-rent Dirnenwohnheime (= whores' dormitories), to keep street prostitution and pimping under control. These are now mostly privatized and operate as Eros Centers. -- In 2001 a one page law sponsored by the Green Party was passed by parliament that made most aspects of prostitution and promoting it legal. Only pimping and trafficking remained illegal.

Politics

The coalition of Social Democrats and the Green Party that ruled until late 2005 attempted to improve the legal situation of prostitutes in the years 2000-2003. These efforts have been criticized as inadequate by prostitutes' organizations such as HYDRA, which lobby for full normality of the occupation and the elimination of all mention of prostitution from the legal code. The conservative parties in the Bundestag, while supporting the goal of giving prostitutes access to the social security and health care system, have opposed the new law because they want to retain the "offending good morals" status. SPD redirects here. ... Bündnis 90/Die Grünen (literally: Alliance 90/The Greens), the German Green Party, is a political party in Germany whose regional predecessors were founded in the late 1970s as part of the new social movements. ... The Bundestag (Federal Diet) is the parliament of Germany. ...

The churches run several support groups for prostitutes. These generally favor attempts to remove stigmatization and improve the legal situation of prostitutes, but they retain the long term goal of a world without prostitution and encourage all prostitutes to quit.

Alice Schwarzer and her branch of feminism rejects all prostitution as inherently oppressive and abusive; they favor a law like that in Sweden, where the ruling Social Democrats outlawed the buying of sexual services but not their selling. Alice Schwarzer Alice Schwarzer (born December 3, 1942 in Wuppertal) is arguably the most prominent contemporary German feminist. ... Feminism is a collection of social theories, political movements and moral philosophies, largely motivated or concerned with the liberation of women. ...

Legal situation

Prostitution is legal in Germany, though it doesn't quite have the same status as a regular occupation. Income from prostitution is taxed at a slightly higher rate than income from normal occupations. Prostitutes even have to charge VAT for their services, to be paid to the tax office. In practice, prostitution is a cash business, and taxes are almost never paid and rarely enforced. A tax (also known as a duty) is a financial charge or other levy imposed on an individual or a legal entity by a state or a functional equivalent of a state (e. ... vat can be a type of barrel used for storage. ...

Since 2001 prostitutes and brothels are allowed to advertise. Many newspapers carry daily ads for brothels and for women working out of apartments. Many have websites on the Internet. In addition, sex shops sell magazines specializing in advertisements of prostitutes.

Early in 2005, it was reported that a woman refusing to take a job as a prostitute might have her unemployment benefits reduced or removed altogether [1]. A similar story appeared in mid-2003; a woman received a job offer through a private employment agency. In this case however, the agency apologized for the mistake, stating that a request for a prostitute would normally have been rejected, but the client mislead them, describing the position as "a female barkeeper" [2](German). To date, there have been no reported cases of women actually losing benefits in such a case.

Every city has the right to zone off certain areas where prostitution is not allowed (Sperrbezirk). The various cities handle this very differently. In Munich, street prostitution is forbidden almost everywhere within the city limits, in Berlin it is allowed everywhere, and Hamburg allows street prostitution near the Reeperbahn during certain times of the day. In most smaller cities, the immediate city center as well as residential areas are declared off-limits. Munich: Frauenkirche and Town Hall steeple Munich: St. ... Berlin is the capital city and one of the sixteen states of the Federal Republic of Germany. ... Hamburgs motto: May the posterity endeavour with dignity to conserve the freedom, which the forefathers acquired. ... Entrance to Herbertstraße; sign to the right of the gate reads No entrance for juveniles under 18 years of age and women. The Reeperbahn is a street in Hamburgs St. ...

The only city in Germany with an explicit prostitution tax is Cologne. It was initiated early in 2004 by the city council ruled by a coalition of the conservative CDU and the leftist Greens. The sex tax applies to striptease, peep shows, porn cinemas, sex fairs, and prostitution. In the case of prostitution, the tax amounts to 150 euros per month and working prostitute, to be paid by brothel owners (the eros center Geestemünder Straße owned by the city is exempt). Containment of prostitution was one explicitly stated goal of the tax. Cologne (German:   ; Kölsch: Kölle /ˈkÅ“É«É™/) is Germanys fourth-largest city after Berlin, Hamburg and Munich, and is the largest city both in the German Federal State of North Rhine-Westphalia and within the Rhine-Ruhr Metropolitan Area, one of the major European metropolitan areas with more than... This article needs cleanup. ... Bündnis 90/Die Grünen (literally: Alliance 90/The Greens), the German Green Party, is a political party in Germany whose regional predecessors were founded in the late 1970s as part of the new social movements. ... A stripper near the end of her performance. ... A peep show or peepshow is an exhibition of pictures or objects viewed through a small hole or magnifying glass. ... Pornographic movies Pornography (from Greek πόρνη (porne) prostitute and γραφή (grafe) writing), more informally referred to as porn or porno, is the representation of the human body or sexual activity with the goal of sexual arousal. ...

Foreign women from most countries can obtain a three-month tourist visa for Germany without problems. Many of them then work in prostitution. This is technically illegal, as the tourist visa does not include a work permit. MubIF

High profile crimes and scandals

There was a murder of six persons in a brothel in Frankfurt am Main in 1994. The Hungarian couple managing the place as well as four Russian prostitutes were strangled with electric cables. The case was resolved soon after: it was a robbery gone bad, carried out by the boyfriend of a woman who had worked there. Frankfurt am Main [ˈfraŋkfʊrt] is the largest city in the German state of Hessen and the fifth largest city of Germany. ... 1994 (MCMXCIV) was a common year starting on Saturday of the Gregorian calendar, and was designated as the International Year of the Family and the International Year of the Sport and the Olympic Ideal by United Nations. ...

In 2003, Michael Friedman, popular TV talk show host and assistant chairman of the German Jewish community, became embroiled in an investigation of trafficking in women. He had been a client of several escort prostitutes from Eastern Europe who testified that he had repeatedly taken and offered cocaine. After receiving a fine for the drug charge, he resigned his posts. 2003 (MMIII) was a common year starting on Wednesday of the Gregorian calendar. ... Cocaine is a crystalline tropane alkaloid that is obtained from the leaves of the coca plant. ...

Also in 2003, well-known artist and art professor Jörg Immendorff was caught in the luxury suite of a Düsseldorf hotel with seven prostitutes (and four more on their way) and some cocaine. He received 11 months on probation and a fine for the drug charges. He attempted to explain his actions by his "orientalism" and his terminal illness. Jörg Immendorff (born June 14, 1945 in Bleckede near Lüneburg) is one of the best known contempory German painters; he is also a sculptor, stage designer and art professor. ... Düsseldorf is the capital city of the German Federal State of North Rhine-Westphalia and (together with Cologne and the Ruhr Area) the economic center of Western Germany. ... Cocaine is a crystalline tropane alkaloid that is obtained from the leaves of the coca plant. ... Orientalism is the study of Near and Far Eastern societies and cultures, languages and peoples by Western scholars. ...

These cases were only deemed noteworthy because they involved murder and drug trafficking. Generally whore-mongering by celebrities and public figures is not viewed as very titillating by the German public and largely ignored by the media, the general attitude being: "So what, it's only sex...". On the contrary, followers of the German boulevard press will often find pictures of male and female celebrities (including foreign ones) posing happily with naked prostitutes in FKK clubs. Name pop bands have performed at the Cologne Pasha brothel's disco. All the major FKK-clubs have been 'exposed' in positive newspaper stories due to their effective public relations efforts.

Sources and external links

• B. Leopold, E. Steffan, N. Paul: Dokumentation zur rechtlichen und sozialen Situation von Prostitutierten in der Bundesrepublik Deutschland, Schriftenreihe des Bundesministeriums für Frauen und Jugend, Band 15, 1993. (German)
• HYDRA, support organization for prostitutes, also has the text of the new prostitution law
• Scathing criticism of the new prostitution law, by Doña Carmen, a support group for foreign prostitutes working in Germany (German)
• Feministinnen gegen Prostitution, criticism of the new prostitution law from a feminist perspective
• Bundesverband Sexuelle Dienstleistung e.V., association of brothel operators.
• Freiersein, information site for prostitution customers, run by prostitutes' support organizations. Has a section with "10 rules for fair play" outlining proper behavior of customers.
• Reports on human trafficking, by the BKA, the German equivalent to the FBI, in German
• Discussion forums on prostitution in Germany: 21orover.com (English), Römerforum (German), bw7.com (German), Rheinforum (German), OWLforum (German), Sachsenforum (German) World Sex Guide, International Sex Guide, Bordellcommunity (German), Hurenmagazin (German), http://www.bremersex.de/, Lusthaus.com (German), Verkehrsberichte-Forum(German)
• Snopes Debunking the claim that "Women in Germany face the loss of unemployment benefits if they decline to accept work in brothels.".
• Pascha brothel website for their houses in Cologne, Munich and Salzburg
• Fkk Guide information, German-English glossary, prices and pictures of FKK brothels and other forms of legal prostitution in Germany, guided tours. (English)