Strip shows have been banned in Iceland following a vote in the Althingi parliament yesterday.
A total of 31 of Althingi’s 63 MPs from across the political spectrum supported the bill. It was enthusiastically supported by all parties except The Movement and two of the Independence Party MPs abstained. No votes at all were cast against the bill, mbl.is reports. Some MPs chose not to be present to vote.
According to the new law, it is forbidden to offer strip shows or to offer the nudity of staff or others on-premises by any other means.
It was former Left Green MP and minister Kolbrun Halldorsdottir who first put the proposal forward. But the bill’s key backer now is Siv Friedleifsdottir, a Progressive Party MP. Steinunn Valdis Oskarsdottir of the Social Democrats described the parliamentary decision as historic.
Are there any other western countries that have banned this? Or is Iceland the only one?
The questions isn’t whether or not there will be strippers, because as we’ve seen with other countries, banning the profession will only push it underground. The questions is really whether or not the Icelandic government will provide a safe, legal, visible, and regulated environment for sex workers.
Ananas,
I appreciate your sentiment; but be careful not to mix stripping up with prostitution.
As a gay man who spent an unusually large amount of time in Icelandic strip clubs (because of a friend who used to be a barman in one), i can perhaps give an unbiased account.
I never particularly enjoyed myself in these sleasy places….but what i saw there were (seemingly) happy young women who took their dancing very seriously and earned a lot of money for doing it.
They were not prostitutes and the clientele seemed to respect the rules nearly all of the time.
Today I am feeling very conflicted because my left leaning political views are clashing sharply with the way left wing governmnets keep wanting to ban stuff. Sometimes it’s okay to just let people be!
But then again, that’s not true at all because the bill was not pushed through by a government MP and not a single MP voted against it.
Do you think the 30 MPs who did not turn up might have actually had an opinion and simply stayed away to avoid villification by feminist groups?…..
Just saying is all…
I would have guessed that the Alting had more pressing problems to deal with at this point in time.
I once had a few of these dancing girls as neighbors, while they were very sweet, they were not well paid. The had been brought in from over sees and just wanted to go home. They worked very long hours and when they finally did leave, it was with out the money that was owed to them.
Not saying they should be banned, but there was problems.
More left-wing nonsense regulation.
“I would have guessed that the Alting had more pressing problems to deal with at this point in time.”
Its like running out of your house when its on fire and start pulling up weed in the garden, insane.
“The questions is really whether or not the Icelandic government will provide a safe, legal, visible, and regulated environment for sex workers”
There are no sex workers, all the local councils have banned strip dancing long time ago except Kopavogur, this eliminates the last and only strip club.
Prostitution is legal in Iceland, but pimping is not, when that law was passed, prostitution vanished.
More distractions!!
The volcano, Weed growers, stripers, bla bla bla…..
By the way, whats up with the foto of the married man? Single people also enjoy the dances to mention some
A very unrealistic resolution with out facing the actual problem. Will this be the end of it ? Awaiting for further developement as this seems to be the first anywhere. Any probitionary clauses ?
Personnaly, I am not infavor of striptease but in a progressive society with modern “Art”, unconsumated, a little leniency would have been better. Fair to all. Ath.: Prostitution is different but even then this is legalized in other countires. More productive. Any other opinion or is this just another escape goat ?
Axel said:
” Prostitution is legal in Iceland, but pimping is not, when that law was passed, prostitution vanished.”
So you are claiming that there is NO prostitution in Iceland?
LOL, would be the ony place on the planet!
“So you are claiming that there is NO prostitution in Iceland?
LOL, would be the ony place on the planet!”
Well, if you dont take into account most members of parliament selling their bacside to the big corporate busyness, bankers and such then no, we dont have this problem,
the banks have a monopoly on the slave busyness here in Iceland as pimps have been eliminated.
More ridiculous illiberal from this crazies that are the Red-Green government.
Another one of they pet projects gets passed ( but little could be worse ridiculous insulting law forcing 50% women onto boards of public company that they did copy from Norway ).
To add to what runestone did say here is reality income and other conditions of working in strip club in Iceland from advert April 2009 :
http://www.icenews.is/index.php/2009/04/14/majority-want-to-ban-striptease/#comment-72451
Who is exploiting who in these clubs ?
….no prostitution in Iceland….
Yes sure, and in Holland nobody smokes pot :-)
“More distractions!!
The volcano, Weed growers, stripers, bla bla bla…..”
hehe, the weed i meant is not the type you smoke, just the original.
“….no prostitution in Iceland….
Yes sure, and in Holland nobody smokes pot :-)”
It probably exists, but its not visible, some African woman set up shop here not long ago and forced some other women to work for her using some known criminals to persuade the victims to cooperate, she was arrested and convicted and all her customers were picked up by police to give statements, a group of E-Europeans tried this also and are behind bars, this is not tolerated, by police or by the public.
Axel,
Yes it probably exists and not just with foreigners. I am quite sure that icelanders are both customers and sellers in this business too, otherwise it would mean that they are different from any other people in this world.
IMO prostitution also takes other forms than girls walking the street in short skirts .
In a previous job I worked in a company that was doing very badly, running big losses.
As a result costs were cut in every possible way and ordinary souls like myself had to work really hard. They constantly fired people and those left had to take over the work of others.
I had to do the work of 2 or sometimes even 3 people and at a certain point we even had to start paying ourselves for the tea and coffee that we drank during office hours.
Now , surprisingly, there also was a young woman working in this company who had a very big salary and a very nice car (audi) paid for entirely by the company.
Her working day never started before 10 in the morning and when she entered the office she would start with chatting with some of the managers for at least half an hour.
What she was doing was completely unclear to us. Apparently she was responsible for ‘ maintaining contacts with other departments’ (whatever that might mean), and indeed, sometimes she needed to deliver a paper to another department (whenever this happened she forced one of my colleagues to write this paper for here- once this colleague protested because she was really very busy and this girl made sure that a manager punished her for this) .
But after some time I noticed how this girl really earned her money. By chance I saw how 2 leading managers were groping her and later I noticed (a fact that was very well known amongst experienced employees) that she would go to hotels with these guys almost every weekend…
Now this is also a form of prostitution,…it just exists everywhere
sorry for the off-topic.
http://www.nu.nl/lectrr/999896/popup.html
translation: Striptease banned in iceland
” why should we take off our clothes for money….if we can also get money by undressing others?”
This would be more accurate statement despite what Red-Green government and MP would like us to believe.
>no * forced * prostitution in Iceland….
is tolerated.
“It probably exists, but its not visible,”
Indeed it is not visible. Does anyone remember the article about the “working woman” who spoke on the media about her big business some time around 2003 or 2004? By law still a legal profession as long as it is not your main income.
Also keep in mind that you dont want to be label as the ” hooker lover” or to hear
” Hey , there go’s Tota, the call girl”
Another thing, it would created a lot of noise from women when their men say
” dam girl!! I must say that there is nothing like a pro”
LOL!!
only 31 of Althingi 63 MPs voted. Who were the 32 MPs that didn’t vote? Where can I find this information so I can email them to tell them to remove the law.
I think the worst form of prostitution is when MP’s are re selling their services to parties related to busyness, in many cases going agaist the peoples best interests.
If i was a general in some army and some of my officers started firing at their own men, i wouldnt waste any time on courtmartial or firing squad, i would shoot them my self.
Politicians need to be reminded who pays their salary, and what is expected of them.
who needs to get saved today in iceland? RayConder@hotmail.com