Harlots Parlour

I’m normally a fan of Laurie Penny’s writings about socialism and feminism, but I think she has a tendency to see only what’s on the surface when it comes to the debate about sex work between prohibitionist feminists and those who campaign for decriminalisation.

Her latest offering on the subject seems to fall into the same trap as Laurie attempts to find a “middle ground”.

Ms Penny’s thesis seems to be based on the idea that the sex workers’ rights movement is purely focussed on saying “Hey, it’s a free choice! Don’t tell us what not to do!” and casts the anti-sex work claim that all sex work is non-consensual sex as being a response to that. I’m not well enough researched on the history of the debate to say which came first, but my experience of it is rather the opposite – that sex workers’ rights campaigners want to focus on practical matters and only talk about choice as an attempt to refute the claims of the other side. When you look at the quotes from Finn MacKay (of the Feminist Coalition Against Prostitution) included in the article, it does seem as though “choice” is more central to the anti- position than to the sex workers’ rights side of the argument.

The theme that Laurie develops is that prostitution should be analysed on economic, not moral, grounds. But in making this claim, I find it hard to find very much evidence of background reading into the sex workers’ rights position. She claims that there was almost no opposition to the new laws “such as those that gave police greater powers to raid brothels and confiscate any earnings found on the premises”, because everyone focussed on Clause 14. But it seemed to me like everywhere I looked in the sex workers’ rights blogging there was discussion of the whole deal at some point as it was debated in Parliament! Similarly, there have certainly been discussions about the economic realities and necessities surrounding sex work on this side of the debate.

Perhaps the most disappointing thing, though, was that Ms Penny at no point discusses exactly why it is that sex workers, and sex workers’ rights activists, find it impossible to work with the prohibitionist side of the debate. Finn MacKay is quoted explaining why the prohibitionists won’t work with those who favour decriminalisation: “Equality for women is a farce in a society where it is considered normal for men to buy our bodies. We can’t be free while so many of us are literally for sale. As long as I believe prostitution is a form of violence against women, then how can I work alongside anyone who promotes it as a job like any other?” But no space is given for the voices who have reason to feel disgust at the Finn MacKays of this world. And a couple of the reasons why it is so hard to work with the prohibitionists are actually given right there in MacKay’s quote: as long as they cast sex work as “selling bodies” and women being “literally” for sale, debate is impossible because of the fundamental denial of agency involved; what’s more, by claiming she knows what is or isn’t violence against sex workers, she denies the very humanity and right to determine the meaning of one’s own experiences, to anyone involved in sex work. At no point in Ms Penny’s piece is this assumption undermined – not even from the quotations from sex workers’ rights activists at the “Women’s Question Time” event; inasmuch as it is debated at all it is only in the context of the simplistic “choice” debate that Laurie thinks is the end-all, beat-all of the way people approach the issue.

Ms Penny’s wish for people to stop shouting at each other long enough to have a revolution is all very well, but until the people shouting at sex workers acknowledge their humanity, there’s no way for sex workers to be a part of their revolution. This is the fundamental problem with the debate.

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Avaaz, are an internet campaign group who I often support. They normally involve themselves in very worthwhile campaigns. They seem however to have gone off track in a big way with regard to their latest campaign (not yet officially started) ‘Against the rape trade’ (see email below). The language used is appalling and insensitive and discriminatory and reflects a worrying ignorance about the reality of sex work and the reality of some of the proposals they endorse. Sting operations, raids on brothels and lobbying officials to make these operations a priority can have devastating and even tragic results for sex workers.
This new campaign is in its final stages of preparation but they are noting any negative responses. Please email them with a letter voicing your concern. I have included a template (after email) for a letter but please write using your own words if you can. Hopefully we will be able to stop this campaign or at least alter the wording being used.

The email from AZAAZ

Dear friends,
Millions of women and girls are sold for rape every year — 2 every minute. We can save these young girls from horror. Click below to donate to Avaaz’s new drive to stop the rape trade forever:

Please email AVAAZ at..

campaigns@avaaz.org

Dear Avaaz,

RE: https://secure.avaaz.org/en/fight_rape_trade/?cl=514852811&v=5675

I am extremely concerned about the wording being used and the possible implications of your recent publicity for your campaign to raise money to struggle against ‘The Rape Trade’. For AVAAZ to use language in this campaign that is reminiscent of the very worst tabloid headlines or of the worst fundamentalist anti sex work campaigner is dangerous and worrying. Referring to being “sold into horror” and the “most evil problems in our world” in reference to sex work simply perpetuates negative stereotypes.

The current moral panic surrounding trafficking (although you do not use that word) has had extremely detrimental consequences for sex workers. In Cambodia for example anti-trafficking laws were used as an excuse to round up voluntary sex workers and to detain them in camps indefinitely. Human rights abuses with in the camps have been reported and include stories of rape and beatings and even worse. In the UK exaggerated claims about trafficking that were not supported by evidence were used to justify new laws that will have potentially dangerous consequences for sex workers. The real result of sting operations is that illegal migrant sex workers have been detained and deported, without evidence of forced migration or forced sexual exploitation. Women are hurt by sting operations more often than they are rescued.
Trafficking does exist as sadly does the sexual exploitation of children, women and men. However the independent evidence suggests that most women, children and men are not deceived or tricked into working in the sex industry. The most coercive force of all is poverty and that is where your campaign perhaps should focus. A negatively and naively worded campaign will do little to end rape but will further alienate and stigmatise an already vulnerable group. Sex work is not evil rather it is the societal problems that force some people into sex work and the criminalising of those individuals that is truly evil.
Many sex workers like my self are involved with other sex workers who self organise and campaign despite our often criminal status. We will be further isolated by your campaign and our battle for the recognition of our human rights will be made more difficult. If you truly wish to do something positive then connect with and work with sex worker groups to help them in their struggle for rights and dignity and freedom from negative laws that try to deny us our voices. To give us a voice and help us in our struggle would be a far more effective campaign against rape and exploitation. Sex worker activists and groups will be very happy to work with AVAAZ to produce an effective and positive campaign against rape.

Douglas Fox

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Eliot Spitzer, Mary Magdalene – and the condom in modern fiction. On WJFF’s Catskill Review of Books, Ian Williams interviews Tracy Quan about her latest novel, Diary of a Jetsetting Call Girl. You can listen live Saturday, 27 March 2:30-3:00pm Eastern USA time. That’s 18:30 GMT. Or wait for the Podcast/download to post.

Tracy adds:

The Catskill mountains, a few hours north of Manhattan, are little known outside the US. If you’ve heard about Borscht Belt humor and wondered what that might be, the Catskill resort area is where lots of Jewish comedians got their start. Think Jerry Seinfeld.

When I was starting out in the sex business, my customers told me stories about the Catskills. Some of my clients had summered there as children, or worked in the Catskills as young men. One, I recall, worked as an entertainer, another (more typical) had been a waiter in law school. The area has changed radically; the resorts are gone, but the Borscht Belt isn’t completely forgotten – yet.

(If you tried to listen last week, the show was canceled to make room for their pledge drive. This is a listener-supported radio station.)

UPDATE on 3/27: Here’s the audio link on Tracy’s website.

You can follow Tracy on Twitter.

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http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/2010/mar/23/france-prostitution-sex-worker-protection

Thierry the president of the IUSW/GMB London adult entertainment branch has had an article published in CIF. Most of what he says I support. He is talking about the ideas being discussed in France to reopen bordellos, an issue discussed previously on this blog. He is however also heavily involved with French sex workers unions who have a particularly left wing agenda which is often reflected in many of the statements made by Thierry. This paragraph in the CIF article for example:

“To many, Brunel’s proposal to reopen brothels seems the ideal solution. But like most French sex workers, I remain sceptical. On one hand, brothels could bring a certain safety and guarantee police protection instead of repression, but on the other, it means more control over our lives. I doubt our community will easily consent to working in brothels when traditionally, French sex workers have fought since the beginning of the movement in 1975 and the occupation of churches to remain independent from pimps and state control.”

This is the sort of statement that I as a fellow sex worker have issues with. Sex workers are part of society. They communicate and interact not only with other sex workers but with members of the public. Sex workers go to bars, theatres, restaurants. Like most people sex workers work for money, it is a job. Most sex workers in France as well as the UK employ the services of a third party to represent them and/or to provide services that will/do make their work and lives easier and safer. Thierry refers to these people as pimps which is wrong. These people he refers to as pimps suffer the most from oppressive laws. Many are retired prostitutes or indeed still work. Many of my fellow sex workers for example share flats and charge small fees to other sex workers to cover the costs involved in running a flat. Are they pimps? The law says they are and it is wrong for Thierry who claims to speak for sex workers to publicly further stigmatise fellow sex workers because of his personal politics which often seem more important than the rights of sex workers. To refer to a fellow worker as a pimp is as bad as referring to a prostitute as prostituted. It infers stigma which as a movement we should be resisting not encouraging.

Thierry claims that sex workers do not want to be controlled by the state. As a sex worker I want to be recognised by the state and I accept that if the state recognises my right to work and protects me rather than persecutes me then I will have to accept a degree of state control. Of course I will resist certain controls such as forced health tests which are unnecessary as is state registration. I also will resist attempts to force brothels into isolated areas. As a sex worker I am part of society and to fight stigma we have to be seen to be a part of society and not an embarrassment to be hidden away. I will however understand that some regulations will have to apply and that I will have to compromise and perhaps accept things that I may disagree with. Every business and every worker has to do this to a degree. The issue is will sex workers compromise and negotiate? Thierry is president of the IUSW GMB London adult entertainment branch and in that position he has to attract sex workers not isolate sex workers and he has to be prepared to both talk to and negotiate with not only fellow sex workers but with any agencies that offer areas of compromise that will allow sex workers to work safely.

We all have to accept some degree of control over our lives. The skill is to negotiate the degree of that control and to learn sometimes to compromise for the greater good. That means putting our personal politics and beliefs to one side especially if you choose to take a representative role.

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http://vimeo.com/9829336

This is a prohibitionist propaganda film from Canada. It more or less reflects the prohibitionist arguments used world wide to justify their attacks on sex workers.
If you take out the parts in the film dealing with the sexual exploitation of children however which obviously has been included to evoke an emotional reaction the film is filled with dangerously simplistic exploitation of questionable statistics that fail to stand up to scrutiny. The subject matter is emotive and presented in a way that will tug at the heartstrings of politicians too lazy to research the truth.
Many of the issues raised such as aboriginal exploitation are very real but that exploitation has to be viewed in context, especially a historical context and not as specifically a sex industry issue which the film suggests. Both child exploitation and aboriginal exploitation are separate subjects that are here being abused to profit an ideologically motivated political pressure group.

I cringed when a female spokesperson told us with a straight face that it was Ok to refer to someone as prostituted but not as a prostitute. I cringed when one of the female speakers said that she would tell middle class prostitutes (read sex workers who spoke up for their rights and for an end to state persecution) not to work because they made the industry look respectable. I cringed at the financial claims made that again do not add up even in this report and certainly do not reflect my 11 years in the industry. I cringed when it was claimed that 96% of sex workers were trafficked or desperate to leave the industry but were trapped. I cringed that once again male sex workers and trans men and women sex workers were totally ignored. In fact I found the whole presentation cringe worthy but then as a sex worker I know my industry and I know that although my industry is not perfect it is not what these moral crusaders would have politicians and the innocent public believe.

Of course the prohibitionists in this film would claim (as they do in the film) that either I was a spoilt middle class sex worker, a tiny and unrepresentative minority or that I had been brainwashed into thinking that I had freely made my choice to be a sex worker and therefore need psychiatric help to recover from my years of abuse. I think however that the brainwashing is in their camp.

The statement that legalisation encourages trafficking is outrageous and ignores totally the well researched and documented reality of decriminalisation in New Zealand and NSW in Australia. Statements about Holland and the closing of brothels and windows in Amsterdam for example conveniently ignores the political situation in Amsterdam or the pressure of other non sex worker businesses to move into the very popular and attractive historical centre of Amsterdam where the red light area is situated. Talk of disease again ignores that where sex work is legalised access to health services is safe and easy and encouraged and therefore stds are much lower in the sex worker community than in the general public.

Sweden is praised for its exit strategies (which they really don’t have). The reality however in Sweden is that to access any assistance you first have to accept the role of victim. The state otherwise criminalises your clients and outlaws every way in which you can work together for safety. Despite all of this sex work continues and thrives if in secret (use Google and you will find plenty of sex workers advertising both in Sweden and in other Nordic countries who have adopted variations on the Swedish law). Sex workers in Sweden and their representative groups continue to demand very loudly and very bravely decriminalisation and recognition of their rights. Recent opinion polls in Sweden suggest that their demands are being heard by the general public if not by the politicians who spend both time and money exporting their ideological driven legislation to anyone who will listen with dangerous results for sex workers.

Trafficking statistically appears to be a very small if disturbing reality with in the sex industry. It does however attract huge amount of monies and media interest compared with other industries such as agriculture or domestic service because it is well, sexy and therefore media friendly. Trafficking has become the popular stick with which to beat sex workers and the excuse used to deny us our rights. The tragedy of trafficking is being used as an excuse to turn old prejudices into bad laws. The result of bad laws is that the real victims suffer. Trafficking is presently the sexy and fashionable cause to support and monies are being thrown at the rescue industry in which careers are being made. It is a weird world where the denial of rights is presented as justice.

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We hear so much negative talk about the industry either about clients or bad managements. The prohibitionists of course hate the industry and everyone in it. We are all either exploited or exploiters. Simplistic garbage but it sells and makes the abolitionist industry lots of dosh.
What we rarely talk about is the sex industry as it is seen through the eyes of those in the industry warts and all.
I received this viewpoint from an agency owner which turns the tables a little. Instead of talking of bad managements or clients he points out another side of the sex industry which is rarely mentioned. In fact he talks of issues some consider perhaps bad practise and even impolite to talk about. But this blog is for all views and is for all of the industry. It will be interesting to read some of the comments.

There is so much talk these days about Dodgy Punters, guys who habitually time waste, guys who get to the area and don’t show and if they do show, they tend to be the guys you wouldn’t wish to meet again.

Spare a thought for the dodgy escorts. They’re not as common as dodgy punters, but for every 50 dodgy punters, there’s a dodgy escort. When it’s an indie, then the client is “buyer beware” after all he doesn’t always know what situation he’s walking in to. This lady (or gentleman) may have sounded wonderful on the phone but when they arrive at the address, the reality can be a completely different experience.

In my experience of “dodgy escorts” (and there have been many) most tend to be be the ones flitting from agency to agency, leaving behind a trail of unpaid agency commission, changing their name, hair colour and ages to suit and happily move onto the next unsuspecting client or agent.

In a day and age where escort agencies can be seen as “controlling” it’s more often the case than not that escort agencies are the ones being controlled. Girls who demand this and demand that and then never give anything back in return. I’ve met, and heard of, one or two rogue indies too who think it’s acceptable to be 2 hours late for an appointment, turn up rolling drunk and forget their manners on a dinner date. Many agencies end up picking up the pieces with these clients, when they ring with their tales about past experiences with dodgy escorts and how they’d rather use an agency than sit in their hotel room for hours on end waiting for the 8pm high class escort to turn up 2 hours late pissed off her nut.

Every month, I will get a phone call at 11am from a guy who has travelled 20 miles to see an indie, only to find that her phone is switched off when he arrives. He’s in the area, he’s horny and so the best way to get an escort there and then is to ring an agency who are likely to have a selection. These ladies don’t spare a thought or care about the client who has booked in advance and then made that 20 mile trek across town, they’ve often got a self induced crisis going on and decided to switch their phone off.

So for every 50 or so dodgy clients there is usually a dodgy escort.

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Catherine Stephens an activist for the IUSW and an editor on this blog was interviewed on local radio in the UK last week. If you would like to listen the links are below. It is worth listening not only to hear Catherine’s voice of course but to learn a little at least about what sort of questions are asked on radio. I have done some radio work myself and it can be tricky especially when they ask questions that you have not prepped for or questions that are more personal than you may feel comfortable with.
It is annoying that as a sex worker activists you almost always have to justify yourself in so many ways that that are really irrelevant to the subject. It is all part I suppose of the prejudiced views that are so common sadly. How can a nice, educated person ever be a sex worker? Well the answer is lots of nice educated people are and the reasons are varied; perhaps however because it is well paid and versatile hours and very rewarding in so many ways. These in my opinion are some of the very good reasons that would never cross some people’s minds because of some of the media and some politician’s obsession with sex workers as the abused victim.

March 19th radio Bristol.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/p006xyfg

Graham Torrington : 19/03/2010
Catherine is on 9:03 to about 9:35, then involved in an ongoing discussion.

March 20th Somerset radio

http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/p006vy5n

Catherine is on for about five minutes after nine am.

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I came across this on youtube and thought it answered many of the accusations thrown at sex workers who demand rights.

Enjoy

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http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/europe/france/7473343/France-debates-the-return-of-bordellos.html

It appears that while dreary British politicians impose dangerous laws based on moral presumptions compounded by prejudiced ignorance about sex workers and their labour the French are showing signs of taking a different direction.

France and Paris in particular were once famous for having some of the most glamorous bordellos in the world. In a pique of moral panic after the war France closed the doors of its whore houses and consequently drove the industry underground. The result predictably was that sex workers found themselves working in dangerous conditions, fearful of the police who should in any civilised state be there to protect all of its subjects with out prejudice.

There are of course dangers in states becoming too zealous in licensing the sex industry. The tendency has been in some states such as Holland for example for governments to impose regulations that do not reflect the nature of the industry that they wish to regulate. The result has been the creation of legal and illegal markets which simply exacerbates perceived issues of exploitation with in the industry which allows the moralists to collect more biased misinformation to fuel their dangerous arguments that endanger sex workers lives.

The push for this debate to at least to be taking place appears to be led by opinion polls that show that the French public support legalisation. Similar opinion polls in the UK also show that the British public also support legalisation. Sadly the present labour government chose to ignore both the British public and the collected factual evidence collated by numerous academics over decades of research. The result was the policing and crime bill previously discussed on this blog.

It will be interesting to see how these proposals are received by the French government and if they are acted upon. If bordellos once more become part of Parisian and French life it can only be positive (depending upon the wording of any legislation) both for French sex workers and for the struggle for sex workers rights here in the UK.

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Just back from the MSNBC television studio in Rockefeller Center. Today I had this exchange with David Shuster & Janice Crouse of Concerned Women for America. Concerned about what, you ask? Good question!

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