Jack Shafer is one grumpy critic, but Stacy says he often calls people on poor research and in the end turns out to be right. Upon reading Landesman article I referenced below, Shafer wrote “Doubting Landesman”. The Magazine editor, of course, responded immediately, and Shafer rebutted.
Surely politics, and the American emotional need to uphold a moral standards image, plays into the debate. (We wouldn’t have a booming sex slave industry because there isn’t enough clientele for one in our family-values-oriented nation, right?) I’m certain that some of Shafer’s points are valid; his friend the Coastal Expert sure is convincing. It still chills me to the bone to think that this is going on, regardless of its scale.
I finally read the article. I’m amazed NYT ran it in the form they did, because I think the critics are right that there’s big shaky holes in the point Landesman is trying to make, that this practise is ‘sweeping’ and ‘ubiquious’ in big American cities. Which is a shame, because all the flap is going to detract from the point NYT could quite easily have focused the article to make: On whatever scale, this *does happen*, and that it happens at all to anyone is horrifying.