00:00French politics, money and sex was the answer of the Europe Today team to your reporter when he asked about today's explainer.
00:10Easy to mock and laugh at as you cannot imagine a more powerful trio.
00:15But maybe this topic needs a more mature take. Let me explain.
00:21Brothels have been banned in France since 1946.
00:25But French far-right lawmaker Jean-Philippe Tanguy wants to bring them back.
00:30His pitch? They would not be run by pimps.
00:34The plan would be to create cooperatives managed by the women themselves.
00:39And as Tanguy poetically put it, sex workers would be empresses in their kingdom.
00:46It sounds almost progressive, but let's look at the reality.
00:51According to the French authorities, there are 40,000 people in prostitution in France today.
00:58And here is the dark side. 97% of victims are exploited by pimping networks.
01:05Critics argue you cannot simply turn a trafficking industry into a cooperative overnight.
01:12And finally, there is a massive irony. The national rally is considered to be strictly anti-immigrant.
01:22Yet the majority of these workers are foreign nationals.
01:26So the question is, is the French far-right really planning to build kingdoms for the very people they usually want to deport?
01:35To be continued...
01:37To be continued...
01:39To be continued...
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