This sting operation is deplorable. Hiring Alexander will remain consistent with values of Brown University regardless. We like racial diversity, especially in STEM. We like perverts. We like people who take foolish risks. And lastly, we aid and abet illegal behavior. Well done, Brunonia!

The police say they are doing this to combat sex trafficking. But is it effective?

Lets look at analogous policy around the war on drugs. How does picking up someone for buying a small amount of Marijuana do anything about the drug distribution networks? Our prisons are full of low level drug offenders. Meanwhile the drug gangs and cartels are still making mountains of money and drug use has not been abated.

Just like any job, there are risks of harm and exploitation, which is why we have laws to protect the workers - provided they feel free to seek help. That's definitely not the case here with sex work. Police and US laws are capricious - sometimes they go after the Johns but more often they go after the women (and some men).

We should all agree that sex trafficking is wrong, but that's different from two adults who willingly engage in sex for money under their own free will. This was precisely the point behind the Canadian Supreme court ruling that decriminalized sex work. The court reasoned that criminalization also increases the exploitation and risks to the workers.

If the police were really serious about helping victims of sex trafficking, their focus would be on finding and helping those victims. Even if they are somewhat successful with their recent approach (unlkely), sex traffickers will just move their victims to another location.

[ NEW ZEALAND - A campaign against loan sharks operating in
low-income communities was launched at a meeting last night. "One person
in particular, who works with young people on the street, talked about
how many of them are selling their bodies into prostitution because of
addictions to gambling, or to pay off borrowed money,"...]
Oh -so-respectable TV and radio news celebrities pimp the state lottery every hour of the day, then report these stories of prostitution busts with a moralizing smirk on their cosmetic perfected faces.
Asked " What makes a great scientist ? " on NOVA TV physicist, Stephon Alexander said: " Thinking the Unthinkable ".
Decriminalizing prostitution in Rhode Island should not be so " unthinkable ". We do need a " sense of sin " in thinking about human depravity. But we do not need a fascist police state to regulate personal morals.
Why not put the innocent victims of the reckless U.S. " war on terrorism " on the Providence Journal's " Operation Front Page " ? [ http://radicalrons.blogspot... ]

Back in '87 Glenn Loury was charged with assaulting a 23-year-old woman who was not his wife. Later on he got caught with cocaine and marijuana. Brown hired him just the same.

I hope he is not "under review." I hope he will no longer be considered for any
position.

He's been hired! https://www.brown.edu/acade...

Banging on a SJW for banging on hookers? No, we bang on Republicans for banging on hookers.

This is simple stuff. Do it better next time.

I hope this deplorable Providence Police prostitution sting operation does not add another negative experience to Dr. Stephon Alexander's career as an African-American physicist:
" When I nervously walked into the office of Robert Brandenberger, a white cosmologist, to ask him if he would take me on as his doctoral student, I saw many intimidating physics books, but tucked among them was “The Autobiography of Malcolm X.” Robert accepted me as a student and devoted himself to developing me into a physicist of whom he could be proud. " [ words of Stephon Alexander ]