A difficult question

I read at the start of the week in the New York Post (via a short, flippant piece in the UK Sunday newspaper, The Observer) that Dominique Strauss-Kahn is once more in trouble with the authorities, this time being investigated by the French police in connection with procuring prostitutes for his notorious sex parties, which may expose him to possible charges of 'misuse of corporate funds' or 'aggravated pimping'.

I learned that his lawyer, Henri Leclerc (it was not stated whether M. Leclerc had himself attended any of these parties), had some months ago made the following facetious statement in an attempt to make light of the matter:

“He could easily not have known [that the women were being paid]... because, as you can imagine, at these kinds of parties you’re not always dressed. I defy you to tell the difference between a nude prostitute and a nude classy woman.”

Google's image of 'classy'

... and not so 'classy'...

It would serve this asinine lawyer and the loathesome DSK right if the judge in the case accepted this argument along with its implied corollary that one can easily tell the difference if one sees these women at any time clothed: that would lower the evidential threshold required to secure a conviction very substantially.

I would have thought that a willingness to get naked with such a priapic old sleaze as DSK was in itself strongly suggestive of being a paid sex worker.

Perhaps France should follow Italy's lead in creating signs to increase public awareness...

Although, you know, M. Leclerc, prostitutes can be "classy ladies" too (and non-prostitutes decidedly 'unclassy'). That was such a monumentally inept and tactless remark, betraying so many smug patriarchal prejudices, it really did make me choke on my muesli. Funny, yes, but horrifying at the same time - especially when one reflects that people like this are running the country, running the world.

[I have also just discovered that DSK - rather than his buffoonish lawyer who made the remark - is now inextricably linked with the words 'naked prostitute'. A Google search on that term (innocent research for this post, I assure you!) currently returns mostly pictures of the lecherous old git.]