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New anti-prostitution laws will put women in danger

Jill

A guest post by Caroline Shepherd.

Hi Feministers, I’m Caroline Shepherd and I blog at Better burn that dress, sister. Jill has very kindly given me a guest spot to tell you all what’s happening to the prostitution laws in England and Wales right now – they’re set to change, and not in a good way.

Let me tell you about the laws as they are now: selling sex in England and Wales is legal, but the associated activities are not. For example, ‘causing’ or ‘inciting’ prostitution is illegal. Loitering on the street, soliciting basically, is illegal too. So is running a brothel and persistent kerb-crawling. Wiki has a useful page if you want a bit more info. These laws as they are far from ideal; a look back at the attacks of sex workers in England reported in the media this year alone very clearly demonstrate their vulnerability –

These are the cases that made it to court and the papers, God knows how many attacks happen that don’t even make it to the police station. Clearly, there is a group of women in society that are being completely and utterly let down by the law.

And it’s set to get worse.

Home Secretary Jacqui Smith proposes to introduce new legislation that will give councils the power to close down brothels, “name and shame” clients, outlaw paying for sex with someone controlled for another’s gain and make kerb-crawling punishable as a first offense.

This press release written by Catherine Stephens of the International Union of Sex Workers is good for beginning to understand how these laws further endanger sex workers’ lives –

The Government could have made sex workers safer, but they’ve failed. The measures they are proposing endanger us all… Increased raids and closures of brothels will directly endanger the thousands who choose to work in this way, and indoor sex workers will pay the price if this measure is introduced…

Cari Mitchel of the English Collective of Prostitutes is also dead against this –

If they make solicitation illegal and start outing clients, men are going to be more nervous and women will be forced to make hasty decisions to survive economically.

Douglas Fox, also of the IUSW, draws attention to the fact that, once again, sex workers rights are being cast aside –

It is disappointing that the government has chosen to ignore the legitimate rights and aspirations of sex workers by ignoring our calls that our human rights be recognised… The government’s proposals to criminalise our clients if we are controlled for gain will effectively deny the vast majority of us our right to earn our living as we see fit.

There’s lots being said by sex workers in the UK. See the IUSW‘s site for more. Problem is? Well, no one at Number 10 seems to be listening.

And let’s be clear – it’s not only sex workers who don’t support this. Commander Allan Gibson, head of the Met’s anti-trafficking unit, said to the Commons home affairs committee, said he felt the laws would be very difficult to enforce.

There are also other MPs who have expressed their doubt. The Liberal Democrat’s Shadow Home Secretary Chris Huhne believes,

The proposal to close brothels runs the risk of driving already vulnerable women underground and into the hands of pimps and pushers.

Dominic Grieve, Shadow Home Secretary for the Conservatives, says –

Yet again, the Home Secretary’s rhetoric is defied by reality. The Government wants to rush through new criminal laws without any consideration as to whether they will work.

In the meantime, it neglects the basics of law enforcement – funding for the Met’s human trafficking unit has been slashed, whilst the conviction rate for trafficking for sexual exploitation has plummeted.

And if I may quote Grieve further,

Take the blight of those trafficked into forced prostitution.

Last week Jacqui Smith proposed yet another law. But what has she actually been doing about the problem?

Upper estimates of the number of women and girls trafficked into Britain for prostitution have quadrupled on her watch.

She’s not provided any extra places in rescue hostels.

And convictions of those who perpetrate these barbaric crimes are down by 40%.

We don’t need yet another Home Office Bill.

If you need more convincing, let’s see how Scotland have managed with their new laws following the Swedish model:

Ten prostitutes were raped in Edinburgh between January and September this year, more than double the number of rapes reported in 2006 – the year before the new legislation was introduced.

Figures released by support charity Scot-Pep to coincide with the International Day to End Violence Against Sex Workers revealed the number of reported attacks on prostitutes almost doubled between 2006 and 2007, from 66 to 126, while there were 92 attacks in the first nine months of this year alone.

…

Ruth Morgan Thomas, project manager for the charity, said there was “not a night goes by” where support workers in Leith did not hear of an attack taking place.

She said: “There has been a dramatic increase in attacks since the kerb-crawling legislation came into force.

“The legislation has, to a certain extent, been successful in that some men have chosen not to seek to purchase sex in public places.

“However, we have not invested significantly in the alternatives and what we are left with now is women who have to work longer hours and take more risks.

[Edinbirgh
News]

So what do you want to do with this? Sex workers are vulnerable – yes.

Swedish model? Not working out so well. The danger that prostitution may be pushed underground is real and it’s effects are seen in Scotland and Sweden.

The advantages of decriminalisation are shown in New Zealand (h/t to
HangBitch). It would seem logical to talk about what is most advantageous to sex workers. We talk about definitions, semantics. “Sex worker” or “prostitute”.

Is it work? We talk about the ickiness of prostitution as though that justifies all these crimes against women. We debate the morality of it, is it right to sell sex? We place ideology above the safety of these women. We don’t question ourselves. UK radical feminists do not read that which disagrees with them (from blogland to parliament, who has been listening to the sex workers themselves?). Why not do all that after we’ve supported women’s rights not to be raped and assaulted?

Back to Jacqui Smith and how to stop her proposals getting through parliament. Well, now the Bill is drafted there will be readings in parliament so that every single word of the Bill is agreed. The second reading will be on the 12th January and we need to get as many MPs as possible to speak out against these changes. If you are concerned about these changes then I would urge you to write to your MP, or if you’re not in the UK, if you could pass this on, blog it, post it on your website, whatever to encourage your British readers to write to their MPs. Here’s a draft from the IUSW –

I am writing to you as a resident of your constituency who is (a concerned member of the public)involved in the sex industry. The Policing and Crime Bill, that has its second reading on 12 January, contains proposals which will make people in the sex industry less safe and increase our social exclusion. The proposals make it more likely that street sex workers will be forced to work in greater isolation and as a consequence be hurt and killed, and less likely that victims of trafficking will come to the attention of the police. The proposals directly play into the hands of exploitative and violent criminals and traffickers by decreasing the ways to work safely and making sex workers less likely to call the police if they are the victims of crime and abuse.

The Home Office has failed to consult with sex workers’ organizations during the preparation of legislation (neither the International Union of Sex Workers or the English Collective of Prostitutes are considered to be stakeholders on this issue according to the Home Office report on Tackling the Demand for Prostitution of November 2008; neither is the UK Network of Sex Work Projects which provides frontline health and support services to people in the sex industry through 63 projects across the UK).

In addition, the proposals completely ignore an enormous range of academic research which shows that increased criminalisation has a negative effect: we need evidence based policy to create effective change and protect the vulnerable. The magnitude of the Home Office’s misinterpretation of evidence is shown in the Regulatory Impact Assessments associated with the Bill, which state that Pentameter 2 (a nationwide police operation) identified 800 brothels containing trafficked women. In fact, the police’s own figures for Pentameter 2 show raids on 822 premises located 250 victims of trafficking: the Home Office has confused the number of premises raided with the number of actual victims found.

I ask you to condemn these proposals during the second reading debate, and call for policy on the sex industry to treat our safety and human rights as the highest priority. This can only be achieved by meaningful consultation with those most effected: we are the experts in our own lives.

I look forward to hearing from you.

Also, there is a petition that has gone up on Number10.gov.uk – to defer any bill on prostitution until after the next general election. Signing this would also be a good start to stopping Jacqui Smith’s proposals coming to fruition.

As the petition states, you must be a British citizen or resident to sign it. If you are, I would urge you very strongly to sign it. If you’re not, but you do support it, as before, please do spread the word.

If you want more, there’s information on the IUSW page. There’s also a blog about Prostitution Law in the UK, only recently started, which will be an excellent resource on this. I also have a page on my blog including links to further commentary. I’ve written many blog posts on my blog, some on Shiraz Socialist and I have a post up at Sex In The Public Sqaure.

These laws will put women’s lives in danger, there’s no two ways about it. It needs to be addressed and discussed; awareness needs to be raised. If you support sex workers rights, women’s rights and human rights then this is of great importance to all sex workers, and particularly sex workers in England and Wales.

88 thoughts on New anti-prostitution laws will put women in danger

  1. Pingback: Two things of note - « Better burn that dress, sister.

  2. “Is it work? We talk about the ickiness of prostitution as though that justifies all these crimes against women. We debate the morality of it, is it right to sell sex? We place ideology above the safety of these women.”

    I’ve got to disagree with you, Caroline – feminist objections to prostitution are not about whether it’s right to sell sex, but about whether it’s right to buy sex (or sexual services, or women’s bodies). You’re writing as though radical feminists (and others who don’t agree with your viewpoint) don’t care about these crimes, but that’s obviously not true.

    All disagreements between feminists on this issue, in my experience, focus what is the best method to stop violence against sex workers/prostitutes. I think it’s a misrepresentation to frame supporters of something like the Swedish model as endorsing or not caring about violence against sex workers.

  4. Years ago, I expected a demand-side approach like the Swedish Model to work. On paper, it looked to me like a good idea. Since then, as it has been adopted in a few places, I have not seen much reporting a positive practical effect. Is it actually reducing trafficking, and more so than simply actually caring about trafficking enforcement? Maybe I’m looking in the wrong places, but I have not seen that. Is it, as opponents said it would, increasing violence against sex workers? There is an increase in the reporting, and while alone that might be a reporting effect, the folks who work with sex workers say it’s a real effect and I credit that.

    On paper, demand-side policies looked like the best of all worlds: freeing the sex workers themselves from prosecution while putting the burden on the johns. In practice, I increasingly see little to recommend those policies.

    Full decriminalization sticks in my craw, because I hate what johns do. I think that paying for sex inherently commodifies sex, which I have a problem with. When one can purchase something, one is entitled to it, and I don’t think that can be changed. But that, ultimately, is a conceptual issue that has to work around the effects on the ground, and not the other way around.

    I cannot accept the prosecution of sex workers for what they do to make a living, so full criminalization is not something I can support. Increasingly, I cannot believe that the Swedish Model actually improves anything for anyone. And I’m always skeptical of a scheme of regulating women’s sexuality, because it gives male power structures very direct control over women’s sexual conduct. Full decriminalization sits poorly with me, but I think I’m reluctantly becoming a supporter of it. Which I don’t like, but it’s tough for me to see an alternative that doesn’t have bigger practical problems.

  5. Regardless of how you feel about decriminalization, history has shown over and over again that the criminalization of consensual behavior (drug use, drinking, prostitution, etc.) causes more damage that the behavior itself — alcohol prohibition gave us organized crime, drug prohibition gave us gang warfare, and prohibition of prostitution turns sex workers into targets for murderers, rapists, and the like and removes their legal protection.

  6. Jess – I meant “we” as a society. I’ve been writing for non-feminist blogs too, and those were the objections I was getting. Should have been clearer.

  7. Right. The problem, though, is that a lot of sex work isn’t consensual. I also support decriminalization, but I wonder what can be done about the fact that in places where sex work is decriminalized (Amsterdam, Hamburg, etc), human trafficking skyrockets. Sex work is different from drugs or alcohol in part because a decent number of people seem to get off on power exchanges. Men from all over the world flock to places like Thailand and Cambodia in order to have sex with children and with less-than-willing women; I suspect that a fair number of men seek out sex workers because of the power imbalance inherent in paying for sex. So I think the “consent” issue with sex work gets stickier, because some number of people who pay for sex don’t want 100% full, enthusiastic consent. They want the power that comes with coercion, which is part of why they’re paying for it.

    Not arguing against decriminalization, just throwing it out there that sex work involves some trickier social issues than other “vices.”

  10. Jill and Ren, yeah, one would think that at least in developed countries that already spend tremendously on prosecuting crimes, there would be some will to prosecute trafficking. It’s just plain lazy, as well as harmful, to do sting operations to arrest sex workers — more so to just arrest folks for standing on the street in big sweeps. That kind of prosecution ends up busting transwomen just to walking in public; it ends up criminalizing minors who, if they are turning tricks, need help instead of more hardship. Going after people who trick, trap and force women to do sex work seems like it ought to have widespread support, and that the opposition would be entirely behind-the-scenes. Yet have there been serious strides to target traffickers? AFAICT, here in New York, the police have been much more serious about prosecuting pro dommes, who often don’t even violate the letter of the law, than about freeing women who are captives. My perhaps uneducated view attributes this to equal parts laziness and an all-too-often unconscious but powerful view that sex workers don’t deserve the full protection of the law. Neither of those are good reasons for public policy.

    I agree with Jill that I don’t think decriminalization is all upside. I don’t see any policy options that are good; just a set of very bad choices. If there were a way to legislate that men not think they were entitled to purchase sex, I’d be for it. But that’s a cultural change, and I’m not sure how to engineer that.

  11. Yeah, I hear ya, Ren. The problem is that gets into a lot of cross-border dealings and legal issues get really complicated, especially when it involves nations with histories of instability and corruption (a lot of women, for example, are trafficked through the former Yugoslavia). And how do you crack down on traffickers without starting at the lowest levels? In that sense it is like the drug trade — you start on a street corner and have to work your way backwards up the chain before you can get the big guys. Where else do you start? Sometimes you get lucky in a border check, but that doesn’t solve the problem. But of course, as we see, what ends up happening is that the low-level people — whether they be corner drug dealers or sex workers — get targeted and abused repeatedly, and it rarely leads to any sort of higher-level investigation.

    Also, what do you do in places like Cambodia, where a lot of the sex trade focuses on foreigners coming in to abuse local women and children? The U.S. has recently started cracking down on American citizens who travel abroad to have sex with children, but that’s problematic jurisdictionally (do we really want to say that the U.S. government has the right to prosecute U.S. citizens for crimes they commit anywhere, regardless of the legality of the act in the place it’s being committed?). There are lots of local organizations doing amazing work, but they’re impeded by a corrupt police force and a government that doesn’t seem to care much (plus an economy that greatly benefits from the cash flow).

    My only point is that we need some new, creative solutions on top of decriminalization, because while I do think it’s the best of the limited options, it’s not a panacea. One of those solutions has to be major cultural and social change in attitudes about sex, women and male entitlement. But that’s going to be an awfully long time coming.

  12. Thomas: I think New Zealand has the right idea…

    WRT to trafficking, well, here I go sounding cynical, like often, but paranoid too, which is newer…heavy duty human trafficking is often the work of heavy duty organized crime…and those guys are scary…and pay people off to look the other way, and have deep pockets, and well, it’s easier to bust the prostitutes and johns than take on those scary guys with guns and money and have no issue killing other people to make a point about how scary they are. Governments and Law Enforcement go after the prostitutes and johns and such because it is easier and more profitable…that’s my theory anyway…

  13. When one can purchase something, one is entitled to it

    does that mean i’m entitled to a Ferrari, now?

    seems to me you’re making a fairly basic assumption there, and it’s one i don’t think is at all universally accepted. i certainly don’t agree with it in the slightest, and i doubt i’m the only one.

    no more do i feel entitled to anybody’s sexual services, even though in theory i could (and might even be able to afford) to buy such. no merchant, in goods or services, is obligated to sell to any one particular customer, are they?

  14. To Jill and TomFoolery:

    I do agree with you to a point that decriminalization alone wouldn’t be enough; particularly in situations like Cambodia and Thailand where there is an established trafficking regime, and that social and economic egalitarianism as well as transforming attitudes about sexuality will also have to follow in order for decriminalization to work.

    I do, however, want to challenge just a bit your statements about “male entitlement” and “power imbalances” being the main motivation for men seeking sex workers. I don’t necessarily think that the majority of men who seek sex work are motivated entirely by “male entitlement to sex”; or that simply desiring to have sex with women necessarily amounts to a negative “entitlement”. Unless you happen to think that sex should be only reduced to acts of bonding or deep personal intimacy (or simply used as a tool for reproduction), I would find it quite limiting and reactionary to always reduce sexual desire to such a low denominator. This assumes that women have no desires of their own to engage in sex with men, and that men who do seek sex are only motivated by the most baser instincts.

    I’m not talking about direct acts of coercion or actual violence here, but simply men and women who might want to use consensual adult sex work as a means of sexual release. Should they be lumped in with the actual abusers and traffickers to be defiled as “pimps” and “johns” merely because they seek sexual services??

    Also…it is apparent to me that any law that is passed that attempts to use criminal statutes and shaming of those using sex work and sexual services (those involving negotiated mutual consenting adults, that is) will simply end up the same way as most criminalizing statues go: to be used by the powerful to oppress and control the less politically powerful. It is no accident that in the US, local attempts to impose some form of the Swedish Model through “john schools” and other methods of targeting male clients have been used only against working-class and poor men and especially men of color…while privileged Whites are given mostly a tap on the wrist. The only exceptions usually come during “moral panics” or “sex scandals” where a politician or high businessman is exposed as a client to fuel the usual media hype….and even then, the politician is given the right of redemption while the women who serviced him get the full brunt of public humiliation, shame, and even arrest. (Elliot Spitzer/Deborah Palfrey, anyone??)

    I do agree that decriminalization alone is not a panacea, only the beginning….but it still would be, in my view, a massive improvement over imposing the Swedish Model worldwide, or simplistically targeting men for having incorrect sexual thoughts. We already have existing laws against rape and economic abuse that can be extended to the sexual services industry; and legal and health protections could just as easily be established as well.

    Only my opinion, of course.

    Anthony

  15. I think it’s a misrepresentation to frame supporters of something like the Swedish model as endorsing or not caring about violence against sex workers.

    When it comes to the point of ignoring the voices of actual sex workers in favour of abstract theory; when it comes to ignoring the evidence of the lived experience of those sex workers; when it comes to putting the demands of theory above observed data – actually, yeah, I would go out on a limb and say that the people doing those things don’t actually care about the violence as much as they care about their theories. And that’s what I see happening whenever anyone endorses the Swedish model. Either they don’t care enough about the violence to find out what’s actually happening in Sweden form the point of view of the victims or potential victims of that violence, or else the do know about it, and they wilfully ignore it in favour of promoting ideology.

  16. Nomen, that’s not entirely true. If you pay for a Ferrari, you absolutely are entitled to it. Could they refuse service? Perhaps, if not for a discriminatory reason. But that’s purely theoretical. In practice, if you can afford a Ferrari, you can get one. I don’t like the idea that, if a man can afford pussy, he can get some.

  17. “I don’t necessarily think that the majority of men who seek sex work are motivated entirely by “male entitlement to sex”; or that simply desiring to have sex with women necessarily amounts to a negative “entitlement”.”

    Um. Look, if you want to have sex and nobody wants to have it with you, and you feel that it’s okay to pay somebody to make them change their mind on that stance (not wanting to have sex with you), I do think there’s some entitlement going on, there.

    Most people (I hope) don’t do that. Most people don’t think it’s acceptable to buy another person’s body just because they’re horny and alone. Most people shrug and say “Well, hand, it’s just you, me, and the shower.”

  18. “do we really want to say that the U.S. government has the right to prosecute U.S. citizens for crimes they commit anywhere, regardless of the legality of the act in the place it’s being committed?”

    Yes. Absolutely. 100%. Harms-based crimes by U.S. citizens in foreign countries should be punishable under US law, particularly when those crimes are not punished under the laws of the foreign jurisdiction. Otherwise we create markets (like Cambodia – a country that we have caused untold amounts of harm) for illegal, harmful behavior.

    Re: Trafficking.

    I tend to think (I’m open to being wrong on this) that a large part of the reason we criminalize things the “vices” is less about protecting people and more about the politics of soundbites.

    For example, if we wanted to stop drug trafficking, we’d address the issue that started it…farm subsidies that ran Columbian (and other) farmers out of business. Give people something more profitable to do and they’ll probably do it (and americans like sugar more than we like cocaine).

    This solution isn’t new or novel…people have been talking about it since I was in college, and its almost universally regarded as a solution to the problem. But explaining complex solutions to complex problems has become almost impossible. Hell acknowledging that problems are complex has become a problem.

    We want it short, simple and fixed without too much energy on our part. And if those things aren’t possible we want to paint everyone involved as criminals and send them to jail. (Because making things illegal always works!)

    Right now we’re in the midst of a multi-faceted economic crisis and people are looking for a scapegoat, rather than looking to address the serious fundamental flaws in the system that may take a decade or more to resolve.

    Similarly, with human trafficking, resolving the problem would take time, energy and the political will to tackle a problem that most likely can’t be fixed in a year or a decade or maybe even a generation. It’s easier (although not necessarily cheaper) to hire police officers to harass sex workers, once in a (great) while stumble upon a trafficking ring, and announce the indictments as proof of your tough stance on crime.

  19. Thomas….not quite Nomen’s point, I’d say.

    When someone pays for a Ferrari, they are getting the car that they have already seen, and probably already test-driven, and they’ve already negotiated the terms of the deal.

    I’m sure that in most cases of sex work, the man has already met the worker, and has already negotiated the terms before any money changes hands or any sex is engaged in. And I’m sure that the worker herself does have at least some say on establishing limits on what she will or won’t do at the particular price.

    Hardly supporting the idea that “if a man can afford pussy, he can get some.”

    Especially that said man could just as well proposition women to give up said pussy for free. Would that be your preference??

    And….just as just because you can afford a Ferrari doesn’t necessarily mean that you will automatically be able to get one, just because you might be able to afford to pay a prostitute or travel to Cambodia or Thailand for their sex services (the latter option being beyond the pale for about 98% of most humanity unless they lived near those two countries) doesn’t mean that you will be induced automatically to take such advantages.

    Is it the financial transaction that so squicks you..or is it merely the sex??

    Anthony

  20. Anthony, regarding entitlement, I am not saying that sex must be, for any person and for any combination of partners, a part of a longer relationship; only that I believe it ought to be a personal interaction rather than a commercial transaction. I’m entirely comfortable with anonymous sex, for example. A lot of this is corollary to the view I expressed in my essay in Yes Means Yes: Visions of Women’s Sexual Power and A World Without Rape, titled “Towards A Perfomance Model of Sex.” The full text isn’t online anywhere, but I quoted part of it on a recent post on the Yes Means Yes blog, here. I said:

    We live in a culture where sex is not so much an act as a thing: a substance that can be given, bought, sold, or stolen, that has a value and a supply-and-demand curve. In this “commodity model,” sex is like a ticket; women have it and men try to get it.

    YMY at p. 30.

    To pick up a term from Zuzu, who was at this blog for a long time and now can be found here, it’s as if men are looking for access to a “pussy oversoul”, and women are merely the inconvenient barriers to it.

    As long as sex is, to use a legal latin, a res, a thing instead of an interactive process, consent gets defined as the absence of no, not as the presence of yes. As a society, once we adopt that model, all the burden is on women. I, and having read her essay in Yes Means Yes (I’m sure she’ll correct me if I misunderstand) I’ll say that I read Jill as agreeing with this, and a lot of other folks who are very pro-sex, think that the standard of consent ought to be “enthusiastic participation.” But enthusiastic participation is the exception, rather than the rule, in commerce. People perform their commercial obligations because they are supposed to, and because doing it well will bring in more business, and if they like the process that’s great, but that’s not an element of the bargain. Folks like Dennis Prager, the subject of the post I linked above, are in favor of sex as obligation. I’m not, and I don’t see how one has sex in the stream of commerce without sex as obligation.

  21. When one can purchase something, one is entitled to it

    I’d like to know why this is trope is always trundled out wrt sex work, but not other forms of work. When a sex worker is involved in a transaction of hir own free, full consent, sie is selling a service – not hir body – a service.

    When I go work for some corporation somewhere, are they not purchasing the use of my brain power? And is there some magical force that prevents them from exploiting me as a worker? My answer from experience is no, there isn’t, and there’s a hell of a lot of workers, in all fields, that are being exploited. But we raise the issue of exploitation only when it comes to sex work. There’s a reason that progressive union organizers talk about wage slavery – the whole notion that we have to sell our labor to ensure we can eat and have a roof over our head is fucked up. What it means is that every person is objectified – our worth is measured by how much product we produce or consume, instead of considered as intrinsic to every person. It makes no sense that we discuss objectification / commodification / exploitation only wrt sex workers, and then continue with our lives in this capitalist society where we are encouraged – forced, really – to objectify / commodify / exploit others.

    That kind of prosecution ends up busting transwomen just to walking in public; it ends up criminalizing minors who, if they are turning tricks, need help instead of more hardship.

    To add to this, many trans women of color (particularly Black trans women) are forced into sex work in order to survive, at least in the US (obviously I can’t speak to the situation in the UK). Proposals like our dear Ms Smith’s will take away these people’s only means of survival and throw them onto the street, to be at the mercy of homeless “shelters” that are extremely hostile to trans folk. Hence, Smith’s proposals are racist.

    Sex work is work. It has its risks, problems, skill sets, and rewards just like any other line of work. I have to say that I’m really sad to see so many people who call themselves progressives and feminists continue to express “discomfort” with decriminalization. I don’t understand why we let our butt-hurtness about “ooh, icky” interfere with finding solutions to make the lives of sex workers safer (including seriously cracking down on trafficking), and even better, listening to what sex workers have to say. Y’no, coal miners are pretty freakin’ exploited and exposed to danger, too — maybe we should criminalize buying coal.

  22. Oh..here we go.

    [quoting akeeyu]

    Um. Look, if you want to have sex and nobody wants to have it with you, and you feel that it’s okay to pay somebody to make them change their mind on that stance (not wanting to have sex with you), I do think there’s some entitlement going on, there.

    Ahhhhh, ma’am….did I ever say that I was for men forcing themselves on women that way?? Nope…never did. After all, said woman can still say “Hell, no” and simply refuse his offers…and that would be perfectly fine by me.

    And most sex workers, I assume, really do want to engage in sexual encounters with their clients; so it’s not really about “paying them to make them change their mind”, now isn’t it?? Those who don’t want to be there should be given the option and the resources to get out, and those men who insist upon forcing themselves on such women even against their stated disapproval should be shown the door..in an instant.

    Most people (I hope) don’t do that. Most people don’t think it’s acceptable to buy another person’s body just because they’re horny and alone. Most people shrug and say “Well, hand, it’s just you, me, and the shower.”

    Ah, yes…back to the “buy another person’s body” meme again….as if that other person has no say whatsoever in offering her services to that horny man; and as if that other person isn’t the one who’s getting the better end of the transaction, as well as getting paid AND the sex???

    One more time, akeeyu: ALL SEX WORK IS NOT SLAVERY.

    Anthony

  23. Anthony, you may want to reread my comment.

    I may have used the letters individually in other words, but I never used the word slavery.

    What I was talking about was male entitlement. Reading comprehension is super cool.

  24. First, I take offense at the notion that I’m squicked by sex. If you didn’t mean that as an insult, you should clarify. I self-identify as a sadomasochist. I’m a kinkster. I am in favor of sex.

    It is the commercial part I take issue with, yes. Are you really saying it’s a bad thing if guys go propositioning women to have sex with them for “free”, i.e. only because they want to, than pay someone? Really? Because those women have fewer reasons to say “no.” Ideally, the only reason they would say is that they want to. And I’m for people only saying yes if they want to.

    When you talk about sex workers meeting clients, negotiating arrangements and having choices, do you recognize that you’re talking about a subset of sex work?

  26. GallingGalla, I do think sex is different. I’m okay with people digging ditches for pay, or washing dishes for pay, even if they don’t like digging ditches or washing dishes. I do think there is some coercion inherent in any post-scarcity economy and I can live with that. I don’t accept that there has to be that some coercion regarding sex. It’s a different kind of interaction that I think ought not to be subject to exchange for money. That’s not the same as saying it’s “icky.” That’s a view on sexuality and culture.

    Like I said above, I think the practical has to be put above the theoretical concern. But I don’t accept that that means we should stop talking about the theoretical concern.

  27. Oh, and while I’m here:

    “…as if that other person has no say whatsoever in offering her services to that horny man; and as if that other person isn’t the one who’s getting the better end of the transaction, as well as getting paid AND the sex???”

    Your position on sex work is that prostitutes do it for the joy of having sex with random strangers, and the money is just a perk? I’ve heard a rumor that many, if not most, prostitutes do it for the money, and frequently because they are desperate and/or feel that they have no other choice. And yes, some women and girls ARE forced into it.

    So, without putting all prostitutes into the classification of “victim,” I still find your idea of the happy frisky having-orgasms-at-work-and-the-money-is-just-a-nice-extra model of prostitution a little…uh…simplistic.

  28. Anthony, there’s another bit of my essay that I quote in the blog where I put it better than I did above:

    This argument works only if consent is simply acquiescence, even grudging acquiescence. Because they cast sex as commodity, rape apologists can easily make the same caveat emptor arguments about sex that one makes in used-car sales: that a deal is a deal, however reluctantly, grudgingly, or desperately one side accepts it … What naturally arises from the commodity model is a tendency of property transactions: They are often not equally advantageous, and depend on bargaining power. Since some duress and coercion are common, in order for commerce to flourish it is necessary to have rules about when someone is stuck with the bargain they made, even if they regret it or never really liked it in the first place. This is what rape apologists do every time: defend the transaction by holding the unhappy participant responsible … and insisting on the finality of bargains.

  29. Right on, Caroline!! This post is AWESOME. This is not an issue feminists should have any “debate” over. Safety of sex workers is a human rights issue and, as most sex workers are women, a feminist issue. “Debates” about whether it’s right to buy sex, sell sex, etc., have no place in the conversation when the point is *ensuring safety for sex workers.* This is basic.

  30. Thomas @ 20: When I go work as a software developer for pay at Company X, do you think that somehow there’s not a sense of entitlement on the part of my paymasters at Company X? Believe me there is – that salary that I get comes with a huge heaping of “you do what we tell you to do, regardless of whether it’s right or not”. I don’t see the difference between corporate execs (overwhelmingly men) “buying brain” from johns “buying pussy”. If one is problematic, so’s the other. But we demonize only “buying pussy” and give a pass to all the other entitlement that happens, that drives our capitalist economy. I’ve been working for thirty years and I’ve not had one shred of autonomy on the job during that time. But that seems to be ok, whereas a negotiated contract between two consenting people to exchange sex for money is Teh Only Ev0l.

  31. Yes, Thomas, I do realize that that I am talking about only one subset of sex work….but it seems that you are implying that that subset should be simply ignored in the attempt to liquidate ALL sex work as the equivalent of “sex slavery” and “trafficking” to be expunged through such legislation as the Swedish Model.

    And yes, I am not stupid enough to ignore that there are forms of sex work where the workers don’t have nearly as much leeway or autonomy…which is where I say that decriminalization and destigmatization alone is not enough, and that general economic and social egalitarian reform is needed along with sex work reform.

    Sorry about my question about squeamishmess about sex…it was not my intent to offend or insult you: that wasn’t the point of it. But, if you are so offended by the notion that women should be offered the right to offer sexual services in a safe and sane and controlled manner to other men and women in exchange for a negotiated fee, and you don’t apply that standard to other means of work-for-exchange, then why can’t I assume that your objection is merely about sex?? Or, to put it more accurately, the commercialization of sex??

    For the record, I’m mostly a vanilla, working-class sex-poz Black male who does NOT believe that men are necessarily entitled to get “pussy” whenever they want it (unless the woman or women or man he is soliciting happens to consent to it). And I do actually believe that a woman’s “No” should be respected, and that that should be the default value as well, in the absence of explicit consent.

    Hopefully, that clears up my position.

    Anthony

  32. Thomas, not quite my point, no. maybe i shouldn’t have used the purchase of a tangible good as my analogy; perhaps substitute hiring a personal trainer instead.

    just because i could afford an hour or three of a personal trainer’s time does not guarantee that any of them will agree to the service transaction, nor should they be obliged to. i don’t have any basis to feel entitled to making such a transaction, not even though i’ve got the cash; if all the trainers i can reach turn me down flat, i have no basis to feel slighted. (unless they do it for discriminatory reasons, as you noted. but if they each refuse me for the stated reason that they think i’m a jerk, i’ve got no cause to blame them.)

    pussy, or muscles; sex, or personal training. they both involve two bodies and the rental of some time’s worth of professional expertise. whoever felt entitled to the services of a personal trainer? probably some men feel entitled to hookers, but they’re not being any more sensible or realistic, and they need to have some common sense and respect slapped into them.

  33. It sounds like the UK needs to make up its mind whether it wants prostitution to be legal.

    But I understand the difficulty of the issue. There’s no getting around the fact that a vast majority of sex workers, women and men, do what they do because they’re desperate and feel they have no other options. That’s why I would never use a prostitute, because coercion and sex are a bad mix. And that’s why it’s so hard to finesse the issue with the blunt instrument of the law.

  34. GallingGalla, I agree that your employer has a sense of entitlement. Like I said, I think sex is different — for the reasons I’ve stated above. I just don’t agree that they are problematic in the same way, and though I can spend a lot of pixels explaining why, but I doubt we’ll agree. I accept that there is coercion in employment, which it seems you find problematic. You think that pay for sexual interaction is no more problematic, while I think it is more problematic, for the reasons I’ve stated.

    I certainly did not say that sex for money is “Teh Only Ev0l”. That’s a caricature and a strawman.

  35. Thomas, not quite my point, no. perhaps i shouldn’t’ve used the purchase of a tangible good as my analogy; substitute hiring a personal trainer instead, maybe.

    i’ve got no reason to feel entitled to the services of a personal trainer, not even though i’ve got the cash. if all the ones i can reach refuse the service transaction, i’ve no sensible cause to feel slighted. (unless they do it for discriminatory reasons, as you noted. but if they each say they’re turning me down because they think i’m a jerk, i’ve no call to blame them.)

    pussy, or muscles; sex, or personal training. both involve two bodies and some time’s worth of professional attention. whoever felt entitled to the services of a personal trainer?

    probably some men feel entitled to hookers, but they’re just as badly mistaken, and need to have some sense (not to mention respect) knocked into them somehow.

  36. One last attempt to rebuttal, since I don’t want this to get away from what Caroline was trying to say.

    akeeyu again:

    Your position on sex work is that prostitutes do it for the joy of having sex with random strangers, and the money is just a perk? I’ve heard a rumor that many, if not most, prostitutes do it for the money, and frequently because they are desperate and/or feel that they have no other choice. And yes, some women and girls ARE forced into it.

    Once again, you put words and ideas into my mouth that I simply didn’t say or think. No, I don’t say that ALL sex workers (and I mean “sex workers” in the broadest sense, not just prostitutes but also porn models, strippers, and others who exchange money for sexual services) are in it just for the fun and the orgasms and the sex. Most are in it for the money and for just plain survival.

    And never did I ever say that women weren’t forced into the profession against their will, either…how you imply that I did is a mystery only you can solve, or a figment of your imagination.

    My main point was that while those who are forced into sex work against their will and consent should be given resources to get out, and those who do the forcing and coercing should be targeted to the full extent of the law, we must also respect those who are sex workers who do NOT suffer from abuse from their clients or those clients who do follow the rules and respect them.

    Next up, Thomas (from his quote):

    This argument works only if consent is simply acquiescence, even grudging acquiescence. Because they cast sex as commodity, rape apologists can easily make the same caveat emptor arguments about sex that one makes in used-car sales: that a deal is a deal, however reluctantly, grudgingly, or desperately one side accepts it … What naturally arises from the commodity model is a tendency of property transactions: They are often not equally advantageous, and depend on bargaining power. Since some duress and coercion are common, in order for commerce to flourish it is necessary to have rules about when someone is stuck with the bargain they made, even if they regret it or never really liked it in the first place. This is what rape apologists do every time: defend the transaction by holding the unhappy participant responsible … and insisting on the finality of bargains.

    OK…so that justifies….what?? That the exchange of money for sex under capitalism basically denies the worker the right of redress over what is offered??? And this is different from every other means of exchange of labor??

    All this says to me is that workers (whether sex workers or otherwise) need to be empowered with greater power to set the terms of any labor exchange in order to eliminate the more grievous abuses and to offer better health standards and compensation. It no more concludes that their exchange should be outlawed and the recipients of the services be shamed and humiliated merely for wanting such services. As I said before, not all sex work amounts to slavery.

    But, as Amber and GallingGalla have noted, this is still a diversion from the main issue that Caroline has pointed out so well: Schemes as The Swedish Model have been proven to be a distinct failure when it comes to actually reducing the abuse and harm of actual sex workers…but it has been quite successful if the real intention was to simply displace the humiliation and shame from women to men. Otherwise, it’s simply the same old tired sex hate and repression with a fresh patina.

    Anthony

  37. I do think there is some coercion inherent in any post-scarcity economy and I can live with that.

    Why? Why is coercing poor brown people from Latin America into picking produce for 14-hour days in one-hundred-degree heat with no water or bathroom breaks ok? You can live with that? It’s only sex work in which you concern yourself about coercion, and then to such an extent that you universalize across all sex workers, and won’t listen to those sex workers who say that they are not being coerced, that they are doing their work out of free will?

    When you paint a class of women with such a broad brush – by telling sex workers that they are being coerced when they are telling you they are not – you are denying their autonomy.

    Yes, there are a *hell* of a lot of women coerced into sex work, and a hell of a lot of men who willingly and knowingly seek out coerced women and are therefore raping them. There’s a damned lot of men getting away with rape that belong behind bars.

    But there are women who enter sex work willingly. If they are doing so because they need the money rather than for the sheer joy of it? Well, most of the people that I know, including me, work because we need the money. Do you think I do software development simply because it brightens my day so much? Uhmm, no — I do it because I need the money.

    I’m sorry Thomas, maybe I’m being dense here, but I just don’t see the difference. Perhaps I’m getting my back up so much because when I hear one group of women -sex workers – being told that they are universally being used and exploited, regardless of what they themselves experience – I see another group of women – trans women such as myself – being told that we are universally men in dresses invading women’s space, regardless of what we ourselves experience.

  38. Anthony, I explicitly disclaimed that we can legislate away sex work. I said I am coming around to decrim as the practical solution to protect sex workers, and that I think the evidence is against the Swedish model. Did you miss that the first comment I made said I think the evidence is against the Swedish model?

    What I want is a culture where nobody would want a sex partner who did not want them back. I don’t really have an objection to a universe where there is a transaction for money around sex that folks would otherwise have anyway. Whether that can exist, I’m not sure.

    You don’t have to assume that my objection is to the commercialization of sex — I have said so. My objection is not to sex. My objection is to the commercialization of sex. Some people think it’s intellectually incomprehensible to say, “sex is a different sort of interaction that should not be commercialized,” and other folks think sex is a different sort of interaction that should not be commercialized. I am the latter.

  39. Fair enough, Thomas….I can get what you are saying.

    We just have a different view of how to deal with sex work, that’s all.

    I really don’t think that sex is that much different that it deserves special treatment…..but I’ll respect your view and agree to disagree.

    Anthony

  40. GallingGalla, I think you read me as saying things that I don’t say.

    I don’t assume all sex workers are coerced of miserable. There are those who like their work. I absolutely take, for example, Ren, at her word. Sex work is not a monolith. Some sex workers really like their jobs. I don’t assume otherwise, and I’m not in favor of ignoring those women. In fact, (in case you missed it) I’ve come to agree with their policy proscription.

    We all live with poor brown people picking our food and making our clothes in coercive conditions; unless you’re doing some extreme things to avoid participating, that means you, too. I want to change the degree of coercion in the economy — but not the fact of its existence, which I claim is not possible. I’m not okay with sweeping sex, which on my account ought always be a personal interaction, however fleeting, into that. I am fine with you doing software because you need to pay the bills. It may be unavoidable that some folks will do sex work because they need to pay the bills, but I think that’s a bad outcome in a way that I don’t think you having to design software is. I am okay with negative consequences for you if you decide you can’t keep doing your job tomorrow – though we ought to have a safety net to ameliorate the severity. But I think people ought to be able to just decide, in any sexual interaction at any time, “I want to stop,” without any negative consequences. As a practical matter, maybe the way to do that is to create a special extra super social safety net for sex work.

    The bottom line is, I say “sex is different.” I read you as rejecting that notion out-of-hand.

    One thing I’m going to explicitly disclaim: I’m not arguing that sex workers ought to stop doing sex work if they want to keep doing sex work. I want their customers to stop wanting the service.

  41. The bottom line is, I say “sex is different.” I read you as rejecting that notion out-of-hand.

    You read me correctly.

  42. Anthony, one more (final) time.

    THIS IS WHAT YOU SAID:
    “…as if that other person has no say whatsoever in offering her services to that horny man; and as if that other person isn’t the one who’s getting the better end of the transaction, as well as getting paid AND the sex???”

    So the “other person”, the sex worker, is getting the better part of the deal? This is what YOU SAID that I think is completely absurd. Do you really believe this?

  43. And, typically, this comment thread has veered from the entire point Caroline was making. Again, a bunch of people online are “debating” whether sex work is OK, under what conditions, etc. No one is talking about sex workers’ right to safety as a human right. AS USUAL.

  44. An actual Swede chiming in!

    Yeah, the Swedish model isn’t perfect, about the only good thing it did was making the sex workers safe from getting arrested when going to the police, in my opinion at least.

    That said most of the people I discussed this with (a whooping three of them), wonders if one couldn’t make some government sanctioned brothels, or something. You know with actual health benefits (might be hard to get, but at least try?!) and other things a “normal” job has. What do you all think?

  45. Why is sex different from other intimate relationships like parenting, caring for parents, breastfeeding, food preparation, cleaning up your human waste products… you can pay someone to do all of those things for you as well, of course, and we never bat an eyelash. The sacrosanct barrier around sex either suggests that all those other things (like child-rearing) are not as important as sex, or that sex is somehow super-extra-special.

    I think that sex workers, like other workers who do jobs that involve potentially risky and potentially intense bodily work, should be compensated more than “mind workers.” I believe that everyone should work consensually instead of being forced into their labor through slavery, trafficking, or lack of any other options. I believe that everyone has a right to work safely and without fear of threat, coercion, or harassment. I believe that we should remove patriarchal gender inequities in all fields of work, and I believe that some people shouldn’t do some types of work because it’s really not a good or healthy idea for them. But none of those principles are explicitly about sex.

  46. In regards to trafficking,

    The problem just isn’t being tackled in a real manner. If anything, it’s just getting swept under the carpet. Ren is absolutely right – trafficking is the work of global syndicates that are also involved in the drug and arms trade. Taking them on is an actual challenge. So the problem is shifted. Especially seeing as so many of these organizations are in bed with government officials back home.

    Many people from poor countries see trafficking as a “necessary evil.” This happens in the upper echelons of society, but it also happens to the people who set about trying to get abroad illegally as well. People are desperate. They see all these folks in the West (and elsewhere, like Dubai) living the good life, and they risk themselves for a piece of that. For themselves, for their kids, for their elderly grandmas.

    And for as long as these people have no real opportunities, many of them will end up getting smuggled out with fake papers and put to work in some horrid place with bars on the windows. It’s not just women either – it’s also men. It’s people who are essentially second-class citizens in their own countries, under corrupt governments. And they will continue to do what they have to do, and they aren’t going to give a crap about any laws, though I would wager that laws that make them visible, as opposed to invisible, may at least save some.

    It’s a problem of several levels. It’s poverty, corruption, greed, and the world’s collective inability to deal with organized crime.

    Organized crime isn’t just some burly guy in a leather jacket who rapes and punches the latest “import” of women into his basement. It’s also the suave guy in the three-piece suit having dinner with the ambassador of an EU nation. But few want to make trouble. Few want to make real, big waves. Not on the side that “supplies” the slaves. Not on the Western side either.

    At least people in the Netherlands are trying.

  47. Those who think that sex work is different do not realise or accept the diversity nature of sex work or the diverse reasons why people work in the industry or the diverse reasons people choose to purchase sexual services.

    People still think that you must be either coerced or forced to be a sex worker but in my opinion perhaps one has to be mad to work in a nine to five job where you are trafficked daily and coerced to work for others profits.

    I am being tongue in cheek of course but coercion, exploitation only exist where labour is unregulated and worse treated as criminal which enforces societies stereotype of the abused victim or the abuser.

    Douglas

  48. There is more debate raging on over at the F-Word about this topic, where the “sex is special/not special” theme is not quite as prevelant.

    For some people doing sex work is no big deal, for others it is or would be a living hell….I think we can all see that?

    My gripe with this law and laws like them is…guess what? No one has bothered to ask the sex workers/prostitutes what they think or needs, as always, they don’t matter…what everyone else thinks they need does, and in the mean time, this sort of shit is getting them killed or making their lives worse.

  49. I support decrim as one response among many; my initial infatuation with the Swedish model has not been supported by the evidence, and I’ve switched to an admiration for the New Zealand model. But as Jill and others have pointed out, decriminalization is only one part of the puzzle — there is a culture of male entitlement that is profound, running right down to the core of how we construct masculine sexuality in our society. And though prostitution doesn’t exist solely because of that construct, the darkest and most abusive aspects of sex trafficking are made possible because of it.

    And as a UK/US dual citizen, I signed the petition.

  50. Hi. I’m an actual sex worker, and I kind of thought that England’s laws re: prostitution were pretty good. I don’t think sex workers should be on the street (that encourages violence and the self righteous outrage of residents) or that they should work in brothels (pimps exploit.) From what I can tell, the laws encourage sex workers to work from a safer place under their own volition.

    Violence against sex workers is awful… but I don’t think the laws have caused these cases. Or that a change in legislation will stop them. The stigma against prostitutes is what makes them less than human to their attackers, and what makes the powers that be turn a blind eye.

    My suggestion would be to offer help to those who lack education. Give them a way out so that they don’t take the risks that get you hurt.

  51. Holly, I don’t think it’s a matter of “level of special” orhowintimate it is. I think we don’t have a problem with people feeling that they are entitled to forcibly stick others with their parenting duties, or their personal hygene; but we have a huge problem with men deciding to force, coerce, or trick their penises into other people, mostly women. On my account, a lot of that has to do with construing consent as the “absence of no” rather than enthusiastic participation; and on my account, consent as the absence of no is pretty much unavoidable in commerce.

  52. Nicole: I’m an actual sexual worker too, and if the news that Caroline posted out of Scotland and the words of actual Swedish sex workers that are out there are any indication, these sorts of laws have made it worse. I tend to take those women at their word, rather than the words of politicians who think they know what is best.

    But hell yes, better education, social programs, and actual AID would go a long way.

  53. Nicole you know if you are a sex worker that the majority of sex workers choose to work through the agency of another for very good reason. Security, anonymity and general comradeship. These are rights other UK workers take for granted.

    Managements or Pimps (which shows a huge disrespect both to good managements who are often ex sex workers themselves) often offer the best facilities they can at great risk and actually very little reward. Not all are good but many are despite oppressive laws and are often the best placed to inform of areas of concern such as trafficking.

    Street work is actually on decline. They are survival sex workers often although not always. I agree they need help but the law is now forcing them into dangerous working environments and away from out reach workers who can offer them the very help they need.

    Sex workers working alone is more dangerous and why should sex workers be expected to work alone when others can work together?
    Also if this law is passed there is every expectation that the Swedish law or worse the Norwegian law will be next and that will make even using the services of an independent illegal. Of course the people pushing this law also want to make illegal lap dancing and stripping and ultimately porn.

    The stigma you talk of is enforced by criminalisation and isolation and exclusion. Recognise rights and you start to tackle the abuses associated with sex work. The real abusers are not traffickers but the government that in the UK are targeting a marginalised sector of its community quite shamefully.

    Douglas

  54. Douglas – Working for an agency, in my experience, is a good way to have someone else take 50%+ of your earnings for doing little. A woman working on her own can screen clients just as well as an agency, if not better: I’m independent, so I know.

    Legalizing prostitution might take money out of sex workers’ pockets. In fact, it definitely will. The going rate will go down. Taxes will go up. I can just imagine all the licenses and bullshit that will follow.

    And in the end, there will STILL be the wild west of sex work. The unlicensed workers will undercut the licensed and take on dangerous clients who refuse to give up their personal info.

    In my opinion, sex work is fine when the workers aren’t desperate. The illegality gives you an excuse to ask for more info from clients than they might otherwise give. Generally, if you run your business quietly– keeping it off the streets, paying some semblance of taxes, call yourself the vague “Adult Entertainer” — nobody actually cares what you do. There are no stings at the Ritz. The problem is the women on the bottom: and their issues are wrapped up in addiction, lack of education, etc.

    In terms of ideology, it’s ridiculous that it’s illegal. You can’t tell a woman that she can’t use her body to make money. But in terms of business, making it legal would cut into profits, still wouldn’t do anything about the stigma, and as I said before, there would still be people operating outside of the law and endangering themselves.

  55. Sorry Nicole but I have to disagree with you.

    I work independently and sometimes through an agent. A good agent is worth their money just like any good management. Working through an agent is safer it is simple fact. Some people can be successful independents but they are the few. Plus you have not answered the question of why should sex workers be treated differently from other workers?

    I agree with you that legalisation leads inevitably to a two tier system which is why I support decriminalisation. Decriminalisation requires no expensive licenses but rather allows sex workers to form businesses with the same restrictions and freedoms as any other business and it allows the industry to establish along with authorities good working practises and codes of conduct quite the opposite from a criminalised system which favours abuse and coercion.

    Prices in the UK have remained fairly stable for the last ten years and in New Zealand where decriminalisation has happened there has not as far as I know either been an increase in sex workers or a decrease in prices.

    At the bottom end of the market by which I assume you mean street workers it is complicated and far to simplistic to assume that it is simple lack of education or abuse that leads to sex work. It is a simplistic argument. Even if lack of education was a contributing factor and substance abuse then the answer surley is not criminalising these people but rather allowing them rights and offering them choices. The UK is offering gaol.

    Being a gay man I remember when I was younger that the stigma attached to being gay was partly because it was until 1956 (I think) still a criminal act and it takes time for that stigma of illegality to subside in the public conscience. Now gay men/women can marry and few social stigmas remain. In the UK polls show an overwhelming support for decriminalisation and recently a poll surprising showed for the first time that a minority would be happy for a family member to be a sex worker so things even now are changing which makes it so annoying that the government is proposing further criminalising the industry.

  57. Great post, Caroline! Good to see you here!

    Anthony and Thomas: Your discussion has nothing to do with Caroline’s post.

  58. Prices in the UK have remained fairly stable for the last ten years and in New Zealand where decriminalisation has happened there has not as far as I know either been an increase in sex workers or a decrease in prices.

    According to Government surveys the total number of sex workers has remained about the same with a slight possible reduction in street workers.

    In 2003 a sex worker working off street in NZ could expect to get $160 – 180 before deductions. Most places would deduct $60-80 with a shift fee of approx $35.

    In 2009 the equivalent numbers are $195 – 210, deductions are $80 – 95 shift fee remains the same.

    This is slightly better than the rate of NZ inflation. Most (but unfortunately not all) Brothels have abandoned the system of fines and bonds that existed before 2003. (that is a good thing for the workers)

    Sb

  59. Anthony and Thomas: Your discussion has nothing to do with Caroline’s post.

    Exactly.
    Glad I’m not the only one who felt like I was taking crazy pills.

  60. I don’t understand the commodification objection at all really. I mean, providing bodily pleasure as a service isn’t something people consider “commodified” — people buy massages all the time, including people who would never buy the “happy ending” sort.

    So… I’d like someone to lay out for me, right now, carefully: Why is it degrading to sell pleasure of one sort rather than another?

    Does it just have to do with genitalia, and the meanings that touching, penetrating, or enveloping them carry? In our culture? In our world? To all of humanity?

    Someone please break this down for me, as I’ve been hearing “commodifying sex is wrong,” said as if this were fundamentally self-evident, for years… but I still find the statement nearly incomprehensibly bewildering.

    There are all kinds of reasons that sex as a transaction, in the present day world, strikes me as often worrisome. There are reasons I would not buy it. There are reasons I would not sell it.

    But the idea that there is some magical little flag sticking out of sex that reads “UNCOMMODIFIABLE FORM OF PLEASURE BEEP BEEP ALERT ALERT” is… not one of them.

  61. Douglas – We’ll have to agree to disagree on the agency thing: my experience has been that that they can’t do anything for me that I can’t do for myself at a higher profit.

    I don’t think that having an agency is really working with others. It’s someone using you to make money for them. In my experience, the only times I’ve ever been in a dangerous situation was when I was sent there by an agency. I’d rather do my own screening, rather than leave it to someone who just has dollar signs in their eyes.

    Also, sex workers certainly have the option of getting together with each other. I’ve worked with other women and have friends who are colleagues.

    As you say, only a few can manage to be indie. I think that this is the ideal setup for sex work, and that anything else is exploitation. (If I wanted a boss, I’d go back to the office!) And it seems to me that by the time society gets to a point where prostitution can be totally decriminalized, it won’t really be much of an issue: because on that day, women won’t be thought of as sale-able items.

    And I just don’t agree that the stigma against most types of sex work is going anywhere. People want to watch “Callgirl Diaries” or whatever for titillation, but they’d be horrified if their daughter was a whore.

  62. Hi Caroline.

    We will have to agree to disagree over sex managements because from my experience of over ten years in the business is that yes there are good and bad but most do their best to provide a good service and take a fair proportion which in the UK is usually around 30%. Most independent sex workers started work and learnt the ropes as it were through agency work before taking the step to become independent.

    In the Uk girls working together (or male or transgender sex workers) would class the premises they work from as a brothel and the person who owned/rented the premises would be charged. Being independent may be the ideal set up for your personal circumstances but it may not be the ideal set up for others. Just as some people are self employed while others prefer the easiness of working for others. It is about choice and that is the argument.

    Women or men will only stop being saleable items when they as individuals make the choice not to sell themselves. I don’t think that day will ever come because we all choose in some way to sell ourselves every day in some way. If I or you choose to sell our body (which is an over simplification of our work) then we are making that choice ourselves. The fact that men (and some women) choose to buy our services (and the reasons are varied and complicated) is because they like us are sexual human beings. We are not sex slaves as some would argue but rather choosing to sell with limitations a service. Some can do this others cannot not just as some can be doctors others cannot. As long as sex work provides a better income than washing dishes then people will choose sex work and even if it didn’t you would still have sex workers.

    Using the gay ref again many would prefer their son or daughter not to be gay but life often does not do what people want. Sex workers are the daughters and sons of people despite the stigma attached to the job. The stigma attached to sex work will not go overnight even if decriminalised tomorrow and will never go while we have a romantic illusion of sex and love being one and the same (it is not).
    But slowley if the work looses its criminal status and associations people will accept our choices and accept that we deserve rights which again is the argument.

  63. Pingback: Being Amber Rhea » Blog Archive » links for 2009-01-07

  64. Great post, very comprehensive.

    Renegade Evolution: A brilliant idea would to be to go after the traffickers, but it seems world governments find that too scary, dangerous and expensive.

    I went to an Amnesty International presentation about traffickers, and you appear to be right.

  66. Douglas Fox is a millionaire who runs an escort agency which has given away time with their ‘girls’ as competition prizes. He and his partner were exposed as pimps by newspapers and a channel 4 television programme.

    There seems to be a conflict of interest here. That is, there is a conflict of interest if you think a Union should represent and be represented by the worker and not the ‘management’.

    links:

    http://www.thenorthernecho.co.uk/news/866713.we_dont_sell_sex_for_a_living/

    http://www.sundaymail.co.uk/news/tm_objectid=16693573&method=full&siteid=64736&headline=internet-pimp–name_page.html

  67. “My main point was that while those who are forced into sex work against their will and consent should be given resources to get out, and those who do the forcing and coercing should be targeted to the full extent of the law, we must also respect those who are sex workers who do NOT suffer from abuse from their clients or those clients who do follow the rules and respect them.”

    It is the same people, the idea of a good purchasing constituency is a fallacy, words like ‘forced’ are terribly loaded. If one is going to campaign against the abuses of prostitued females, at Abu Graibh relative to ‘fluid consent’, or jail guards, then it is a similar kind of prospect, words like ‘forced’ are so wrong, we didn’t specify violence as a prequisite with spousal rape. What we have is anti-feminism by people who fringe it out like the Jews the Nazis allowed to live, in order to catch other Jews.

  68. Dear Britfem

    You should not believe all you read in newspapers:)
    My civil partner runs an escort agency. I am an independent male sex worker or escort if you choose. My partner is also a member of the IUSW/GMB branch and so are many of the escorts he represents. We were not outed as you suggest but rather do many interviews and we both agreed to the TV documentary quite willingly. I regularly speak on local radio and as an activist for Amnesty international speak on sex workers rights. I did so at the last Amnesty conference in Nottingham. We are both very open about our work and extremely proud. The Daily Record which is wrong on many points not least being millionaires sadly oddly happened while Ch4 were making their documentary. Despite popular fiction as an agent he is employed by the escorts. He is not a boss. I know this is a big misconception but true. Many of the escorts have been with John for several years and are very close friends.

    It is part of the strength of the IUSW that it is run by sex workers and represents the diverse nature of the business and therefore free from the prejudice that stains popular preconceptions of our work. Those who despise clients and managements and want them criminalised while decriminalising what they call prostituted women fail to understand that they are themselves victims of the caricature of the abuser and the abused. They fail to even consider the opinions of the sex workers they claim to care about because they simply are too blinded by their own misconceptions. I actually feel they are themselves victims of self delusion. And they wonder why sex workers refuse to want to be saved.

    Douglas

  69. I don’t really believe in selling sex at all. But then again, that’s my belief. If someone wishes to do that with the right protection then so be it. However, I also don’t believe that someone should be raped, even in a case where a woman or a man is selling sex. Everyone should have the right to say no, no matter if it’s their profession or not.

  70. Pingback: Being Amber Rhea » Blog Archive » Wednesday

  71. ‘Sex workers’ do not all think alike. Many do not identify as sex workers, many even take offence at the phrase. Many who do identify as sex workers have not ever been in prostitution. Most of the physical support available for the most oppressed and exploited groups of sex workers has been, is, provided and pushed for by feminist organisations, not by sex workers rights lobbyists. The former group just are too busy and broke to spend time shouting about it, what with them having other priorities and all.

    The situation is complicated by the fact that without full disclosure, those who speak against prostitution are automatically assumed to not be talking from experience; to be irrelevant; assumptions are made about their sexual preferences, religions, class. This is rarely called out.

    And those who talk in favour of it, are assumed to be speaking from experience, or assumed to be relevant regardless. Noone cares if youre a wealthy white woman who has never been anywhere near the sex trade, as long as you speak in favour of it. Express a squeal of happiness over some pole dancing classes or put as picture of yourself in your scanties online and you apparently become qualified to speak on behalf of sex workers and against all those awful repressed vanilla prudes trying to like take away our freedom man. I even have some sex worker friends! And they all agree with me!

    There are different opinions within category sex worker. So why are we forced to use the language and support the agenda of only the most powerful?

    You know what is killing prostitutes? Men who use prostitutes. You know who is raping prostitutes? Men who use prostitutes.

    This is not a difficult concept. The change in law is designed to hold those men accountable. That’s what it is for. It does not criminalise prostitutes in the UK. It certainly doesnt criminalise the other mass of people who identify as sex workers but who are not in prostitution.

    Any argument that it will drive them all underground is a red herring. You know why? Because the most shitty end of that industry is already underground. Because that harm is already happening because we sit here doing sweet FA about it. You know what happens when legalisation does? Two tiers. Gangsters and pimps get to look like business professionals for their above board operations, and meanwhile they continue to run the even less pleasant ones in the dark.

    Using the names of people who have died at the hands of prostitute using men, who have died as a result of prostitution, to push an agenda that would not have helped them and would have legitimised the exploitation they were already subject to, thats messed up. I wonder how the people they leave behind, their lovers and children and friends and family, I wonder how they feel about that.

  72. BritFem:

    Well, the woman at a DC sex workers rights gather was pleased that someone remembered her lover as a person at all and got up to speak about it. Granted, selling sex is illegal here, but why yes, sex worker orgs all over the place do have things to work for, and even support exit programs.

    And true enough, I think the people who should be heard most one the issue are those who have done the work, from ANY AND ALL sides, and yes, sure enough saying “hey, I am or have been a prostitute” has consequences, but don’t expect some folk to be willing to show their creds and history if other folk are not going to show theres. The words of sex workers/prostituted people should matter the most in these issues…yet I have seen all too often that one side is always expected to prove their bones and out themselves while the other deserves privacy and respect.

    Well, I’m pretty out, so whe other folk figure they get to tell me what is best for me and the other sex workers I know, work for and with ad decide what is best for us, well, you bet I am going to want to know why they think they have that authority and where they are coming from.

  73. You infer that ‘other folk’ are trying to decide whats best for you, RenegadeEvolution. But you do not know who these ‘other people’ are, do you? You do not know that you are more qualified to speak than they are.

    Are you in England or Wales, RenegadeEvolution?

  74. Britfem: Nice try. No, I’m not. I travel to Leeds everyone in awhile though,I have some friends and family there, be that as it may, just as the UK has looked elsewhere to get ideas for its nice new law, other countries might look towards the UK for ideas…so often we people in the US are accuesed of not caring what goes on in the rest of the world, well gee, look, someone in the US concerned with what is going on in the rest of the world.

    And do you honestly think I do not know any sex workers in the UK or elsewhere? Incorrect.

  75. Do you not think I do?

    But Im interested – if you have holidayed somewhere can you claim that you represent the people who live there?

    Perhaps not. Not even if “you have a friend who is” there.

  76. I am a sex worker in the UK Britfem. My partner runs an agency big deal. We work with and talk to sex workers all over the UK. I am open about who I am and and what I do at great personal risk to myself.
    The real issue over the new proposed laws in the UK is that they will put sex workers in danger.
    The result of the new laws will not be protecting the vulnerable and the abused because as you state they are already underground and despite (if you believe the propaganda from government and anti’s) existing in huge numbers remain very difficult to find. This is despite raids at huge expense tot he tax payer during pentameter 1 and 11 through out the UK. One would think if the abusive punter can find these victims the police might read the same papers and also find them.
    The real result of the policies you subscribe to however is that real women suffer. In one case a single woman with three young children is being prosecuted for controlling. There was no sign of trafficking or coercion of any kind and taxes were payed. This is what the IUSW and sex workers are campaigning against because real lives are being destroyed because of bad law that denies rights and excludes the choices of the majority as having any validity. The girls who worked safely in the brothel? who knows and I doubt anyone cares. The children well if the mother is sent to gaol as an evil pimp of course should be well; who cares. A political ideological point has been scored and an evil brothel closed. This is what criminalisation means to real people leading real lives.

    Douglas

  77. I don’t claim to represent anyone in the UK. I am still allowed to have an opinion and concerns about what goes on there and how laws affect sex workers in general. Don’t like it? No one here is forcing you to.

  78. Quoting Kristin:

    Great post, Caroline! Good to see you here!

    Anthony and Thomas: Your discussion has nothing to do with Caroline’s post.

    And quoting Amber Rhea:

    Exactly.
    Glad I’m not the only one who felt like I was taking crazy pills.

    Ahhhh..excuse me, Amber and Kristin, but my comment WAS about Caroline’s post, and Thomas’ response to her statement that criminalization such as that proposed by Jacqui Smith would be ineffective in preventing abuses of sex workers…and it was in direct response to Jill’s statement about “male entitlement”.

    I really don’t think that you have the right to decide whether my (or Thomas’) posts are relevant to the topic…only Caroline or Jill have that right, since it’s Jill’s blog and Caroline’s essay.

    If you are going to accuse us of threadjacking, then at least be honest and open about it. Or…have Jill moderate our comments out if you feel they are irrelevant.

    Anthony

  79. And BTW…why accuse me and Thomas of threadjacking Caroline, while saying nothing about Britfem’s smears and ad hominens against Ren Ev and Douglas Fox, which are even more off the topic than our discussion was??

    Anthony

  80. Pingback: Sex Workers: Once again, what’s best for us? « Bound, Not Gagged

  81. “And BTW…why accuse me and Thomas of threadjacking Caroline, while saying nothing about Britfem’s smears and ad hominens against Ren Ev and Douglas Fox, which are even more off the topic than our discussion was??”

    Is it possible to smear Douglas Fox and who has ever done such a thing?

    Gregory Carlin

    Irish Anti-Trafficking Coalition

  82. Plesse can you post this information on your site. thank you.

    Rape and Prostitution –
    A Question of Consent

    Tuesday 3 February 6pm
    Committee Room 6
    House of Commons

    While government feminists and religious fundamentalists equate prostitution with rape and claim most sex workers have been trafficked, rapists continue to get away with it – the conviction rate for reported rape in England and Wales is a shocking 6%. But a growing international movement for women’s safety is demanding the decriminalization of sex work. In England it has defeated government attempts to “rehabilitate” sex workers and is opposing proposals to raid brothels and criminalize clients. In San Francisco 41% voted for decriminalization in the last elections.

    SPEAKERS from the Safety First Coalition, Women Against Rape, the International Prostitutes Collective, and from GUYANA, INDIA, PERU, TRINIDAD & TOBAGO.
    ________________________________________
    Dear Friends,
    We have already sent you information about this meeting on 3 February which is part of an International Gathering organised by the Global Women’s Strike and the International Women Count Network.
    Rape and Prostitution – a Question of Consent, which we are helping co-ordinate, will bring together opposition to anti-prostitution measures in the Policing and Crime Bill (PCB) which is coming up for Second Reading in Parliament on 19 January. We will have the added advantage of international speakers who can enlighten us about the situation in other countries, including the US PROStitutes Collective which was recently involved in an impressive ballot campaign on decriminalisation.
    The Cross Party Committee which looks in detail at the legislation following the Second Reading is likely to be sitting by the time of our meeting. We want to be prepared in order to be as effective as possible.
    All proposed measures would drive prostitution further underground and sex workers into even more danger. They include:
    o criminalisation of paying for sexual services of a “controlled” prostitute
    o criminalisation of kerb crawling as a first offence through removal of persistence
    o enabling police to close premises at 24 hours notice
    o introduction of compulsory “rehabilitation” under threat of imprisonment – similar to proposals thrown out a year ago
    o tightening (and increasing the cost) of licensing of lap dance clubs.
    But the truth is beginning to emerge. Figures we have always questioned – that 80% of women working in the sex industry are “trafficked” and assumed to be “controlled” are being discredited. On 9 January, Radio Four, More Or Less programme resoundingly exposed that there is no evidence to support these figures. By the end of the programme MP Fiona Mactaggart was forced to admit that most women are not trafficked, and the Home Office that they do not endorse or use the figure that 80 % of prostitutes are controlled by others.
    Listen Again http://www.bbc.co.uk/iplayer/episode/b00gdz3t/More_or_Less_09_01_2009/
    We shall have information at that meeting about writing to the Select Committee as well as to your own MP and networks. When proposals for compulsory rehabilitation were thrown out of the Criminal Justice and Immigration Bill in the Lords this time last year, it was very much as a result of the flood of opposition MPs and Peers received.
    We need your help both in terms of time and skills as well as financially to defeat this latest repression. Please let us know if you can help in any way. We’ll contact you again nearer the time with details of speakers.
    Yours for Safety First,
    Niki Adams and Cari Mitchell

    BRIEFING on the POLICING AND CRIME BILL 2009
    Aspects relating to prostitution

    We urge you to oppose Clauses 13, 15, 16, 18, 20, & 25 at Second Reading today, 19 January. The measures target anyone involved in prostitution whether or not there is force or coercion. They would drive prostitution further underground and sex workers into even more danger.

    CLAUSE 13: “Paying for sexual services of a prostitute controlled for gain.”

    1. Clients face “a hefty fine and a criminal record” through no fault of their own. Paying for sexual services will be a strict liability offence, committed regardless of whether the client “is, or ought to be, aware that any of [the sex worker’s] activities are controlled for gain.”

    2. Any sex worker who receives help may be considered “controlled for gain”. The Bill defines it as “an activity which is controlled by [a person who is not the sex worker or client] in the expectation of gain” — no force or coercion needs to be proved. A co-worker, receptionist (usually referred to as maid), partner, even a taxi driver may be considered to be “controlling for gain”.

    3. Safe premises are already being targeted. In December, police raided premises in Soho threatening receptionists with being charged with “controlling prostitution for gain”. (See separate statements.) Research shows that it is 10 times safer to work indoors than on the street. Receptionists are sex workers first line of defence against violent attacks and exploitation. If they are prosecuted women will be left to work alone. Who will such criminalisation benefit?

    4. Trafficking figures are flawed. Trafficking has been used as the main justification for these proposals. But the UK charge of trafficking for prostitution, unlike trafficking for any other industry, does not require force or coercion. This enables every woman with a foreign accent to be falsely labelled a victim of trafficking! The widely used claim that “80% of women working in the sex industry in the UK have been trafficked” was recently discredited on a Radio Four programme : even if 80% of women working in brothels, saunas and massage parlours are not British, “foreign does mean forced”. In response to questions by John McDonnell MP, the Home Office has disowned these figures. And its latest estimate that 4,000 women are trafficked into the UK a year cannot be verified as the Home Office claims they come from an “internal Home Office document”.

    CLAUSE 15: Soliciting is persistent “if it takes place twice over a period of three months”.

    1. Such soliciting would more appropriately be described as occasional. To call it persistent shows an intention to criminalise. It makes a mockery of the abolition of the term common prostitute (Clause 15 (2) (a)) as it will bring no reduction in the number of women arrested.

    2. Criminal records prevent women from getting out of prostitution. Women end up institutionalised as they cannot get other jobs, even when they are qualified for them.

    3. Criminalisation breaks up families. Mothers end up in jail separated from their children, with disastrous consequences first of all for the children.

    CLAUSE 16: Compulsory “rehabilitation” under threat of imprisonment.

    This was thrown out of the Criminal Justice and Immigration Bill a year ago. Why bring it back? Anyone arrested for loitering or soliciting would have to attend three meetings with a supervisor approved by the court. It is not an alternative to a fine as failure to comply may result in a summons back to court and 72-hours in jail. Women could end up on a treadmill of broken supervision meetings, court orders and imprisonment. Imprisoning women goes against recommendations of the widely respected Corston report (March 2007)

    CLAUSE 18: Soliciting “another for the purpose of obtaining sexual services”.

    The only safeguard against false arrest would be removed. Kerb-crawling is an offence if it is “persistent”. Removing the requirement to prove “persistence, annoyance or nuisance” would increase police powers to arrest anyone on ‘sus’. Victims of institutionalised police racism and other prejudice are likely to be targeted. With a conviction rate for reported rape at a shameful 6%, why isn’t rape being prioritised over prostitution?

    CLAUSE 20: Extending closure orders to brothels

    1. This charge is modeled on “crack house closures” which has been condemned by Release as “insidious”, based on “tenuous evidence in which hearsay evidence is admissible.” Like ASBOs, Closure Orders are part of civil proceedings, but breach of an order is a criminal offence carrying a six month prison sentence. Release’s found that “the court will never refuse a police application for a Closure Order.” They have witnessed “numerous cases where vulnerable people become displaced, eventually homeless and face the threat of criminal charges.”

    2. Most brothels are small self-help ventures. The word brothel conjures up images of big exploitative establishments, yet by law two prostitute women sharing premises to work constitute a brothel. Many women prefer to work in small self-run brothels because they offer greater safety, companionship and lower running expenses. Working indoors is 10 times safer than working on the street. Even Fiona McTaggert admits that. In January 2005, as Home Office Minister, she announced that two women should be able to work together from premises. Why has this been dropped in favour of punitive measures that drive women out of premises?

    CLAUSE 25: Lap-dancing to be reclassified as “sex encounter establishments”.

    This would increase the cost of licensing and the stigma. Lap-dancers have described working collectively with other women with good safety systems, and earning more than they would in other jobs. Is this what the government finds objectionable? (See statement below.)

    Proceeds of Crime – Profiteering from raids and the prosecution of sex workers. Since the Proceeds of Crime Act, raids have become profitable: the police keep 25% of any assets confiscated both at the time and from subsequent prosecutions; the Crown Prosecution Service keeps another 25%; and the Inland Revenue the rest. It is common for police to seize any money found on premises they raid. Even if no one is charged, the money is rarely returned as police take advantage of sex workers’ reluctance to go public. Women who have worked for years to put money aside lose not only their livelihood but their home, car, life savings, jewellery, etc. This theft by law enforcement is the worst form of pimping. We believe it is a main reason why anti-prostitution raids are now high up on the police and government agenda.

    Forcing Prostitution Further Underground Endangers Lives. The proposals claim to offer protection and safety, and “support those involved in prostitution to develop routes out”. They do not. As the economic recession hits, more women, especially mothers, are likely to resort to prostitution to support their families. If prostitution is forced further underground women will be exposed to greater dangers and be less able to come forward to get help. In Scotland, since clients were criminalised in October 2007, the number of assaults on sex workers has soared. Attacks reported to one project have almost doubled from 66 in 2006 to 126 last year, including eight reported rapes and 55 violent assaults.

    English Collective of Prostitutes
    230a Kentish Town Road, London, NW5 2AB, Tel: 020 7482 2496, 07811 964 171, ecp@allwomencount.net http://www.prostitutescollective.net

    Co-ordinates The Safety First Coalition which includes anti-poverty campaigners, church people & residents from Ipswich & elsewhere, the Royal College of Nursing, the National Association of Probation Officers, members of the medical & legal professions, prison reformers, sex worker & drugs rehabilitation projects.
    Statements from women working in various areas of the sex industry.

    Cindy — working from premises
    I started working because I couldn’t live off benefits. Doing this work I wasn’t having to worry every day how I was going to pay my bills.

    A women like me who works for herself, whether on the streets or in premises, classes her situation as a business not a burden. A lot of women have repeat clients and build up a rapport and a trust. Not only do the women provide company and maybe sexual favours but they become a counsellor and even a friend!! Criminalizing clients would scare these men away. We would be pushed further underground forcing us to take more risks by having to find ways of contacting clients secretly. Women will be left on their own because you don’t want to expose yourself by working with others.

    Prosecuting a man would mean that the women’s job would come to light. The media coverage would affect her family in many ways as it did with mine. Years later this is still a major strain on me. I had to move home and change my children’s school as I didn’t want what I did to provide for my children to tarnish them. And people judge you long term. It is even worse if you get prosecuted and end up with a criminal record. What chance then do you have to get out of prostitution.

    Michaela – convicted as a “trafficker”
    I’ve been a victim of sexual abuse and domestic violence and believe every woman should be protected. I come from a poor rural area of Brazil. At age 12, I was forced to work as a domestic servant to help support my family. I was repeatedly sexually assaulted by two sons in the family.

    I came to Britain to marry, after many years the relationship broke down, and I became a sex worker to get an independent life for me and my children. The wellbeing of people around me has been the focus of my life. That is why I opened a place to work indoors where it’s safer. I saved to open a health club in Manchester. I had all the health and safety checks by the council, and a receptionist to make sure women who worked there would be safe. I had a few women who came from Brazil and other countries. All were over 25 years, had been working in prostitution and were in no way forced. But because I am a woman of colour, and from another country, I was targeted.

    I was arrested in October 2005, and convicted of trafficking. I pleaded guilty because the police threatened to charge my 18 year old daughter if I didn’t, and because my solicitor and barrister strongly recommended it. They told me that because the trafficking law does not require proof of force or coercion, only evidence that you helped someone from another country come into the UK who then works in the sex industry, then I was guilty.

    The judge agreed I had treated the women “kindly”. He accepted “none of the women was coerced by you into acting as a prostitute . . . none was actually deceived as to the nature of the work they would be required to undertake . . .each had previously worked as a prostitute . . . You treated them in a kindly and hospitable way, inviting them to your home and social occasions. The police often frequented the premises and went out socially with women working there. The judge used this against me saying that it “undermined the public’s confidence in the police” as if I should be punished for the police’s behaviour. I was convicted because the police and CPS wanted to look like they had cracked a big criminal case — to get promotions and build careers.

    For this, I was put in prison for nearly three years and separated from my children, the youngest was only six at the time. Children at that age need their mother’s protection. I was terribly distressed, and my children were deeply affected. Their behaviour changed, and they are still recovering from that separation. My ex-partner tried to deny me the right to see my youngest, and has tried to get custody. I was also prosecuted under the Proceeds of Crime Act. We lost everything – our home, savings, even personal gifts and belongings – which I’d worked so hard for. I’m 45, a single mother with two children to support, having to start again with nothing. Me, my family and friends were vilified by sensational and false reporting in the local press before trial. Any friends who tried to help me were either charged or threatened with charges by the police. My address was put in the local paper, and my daughter had to move home and could not attend college. Now the Home Office wanted to deport me. Legal Action for Women found me a good lawyer to try and stop the deportation. My British citizenship was revoked, yet I’d never committed a crime.

    All I did was run a flat where women were able to work safely – why is that a criminal offence, did I deserve to spend three years in prison for that and to have my life and my family’s life ruined

    Chloe – working as a lapdancer

    “I’ve worked all around the country. I do three minute dances which cost the guys £10. I pay towards the cost of the venue, security and the DJ; after that, whatever I earn is my own. We work as a collective and prioritise safety. We have a good support network of door and bar staff. Someone always knows where I am. I take a lot of responsibility for the new girls as I’ve been around a long time.

    “I can earn £250 for four hours. Worse case, I walk out with £50 and that’s still more than I would earn in a day job at £5 an hour. Nine out of 10 women turn to prostitution or lap dancing because there’s not enough money to survive. I work with students, mothers and all kinds of other women. Recently my mum couldn’t afford a pair of school shoes for my brother and sister. When I worked a day job I couldn’t help her, but now I can. If the government is offended by the work we do, then give us the financial means to get out of the industry.

    “There is no pressure to have sex with men, only opportunities. I could go to a nightclub and have 10 times more of an opportunity to sleep with a man than I do in my workplace. In any case, if I want to have sex with a man, and if he wants to pay me, then so what? If I had kids and sleeping with a man for money meant my children could have food in their mouths, I would do it. And tell me one woman that wouldn’t.

    “I haven’t met any women who were forced to work in clubs. Some women from other countries come here for salvation and help because it is terrible for them back home.

    “They say we are degrading ourselves. Actually no. The issue is what kind of protection we get from the police and courts. My friend was raped in a supermarket car park. Some one very close to me was abused as a child. The cases got thrown out of court.

    “If you bring in more regulations and criminalize the sex industry, you make it harder for women to work. Girls can’t insist on good working conditions or their rights. The industry will go underground and it will be much worse.”

    Another woman complains:

    “If the re-branding goes through, the stigma will increase and some women will be forced out of work or underground into the hands of pimps.

  83. “SPEAKERS from the Safety First Coalition, Women Against Rape, the International Prostitutes Collective, and from GUYANA, INDIA, PERU, TRINIDAD & TOBAGO.”

    They want to make Britain into what?

    ‘“I haven’t met any women who were forced to work in clubs. Some women from other countries come here for salvation and help because it is terrible for them back home.’

    That is utterly untrue, the UK lap-dancing sector is unambiguously connected to terrorists, gangsters and sex traffickers.

    Gregory Carlin

    Irish Anti-Traffiking Coalition

  84. Criminalizing clients will not stop violence against sex workers. It will cut down on the number of clients, making workers more likely to take on dangerous clients b/c of lack of choice &economic need, when in any other situation a worker might follow her instincts and decline a client she senses is dangerous.
    Decriminalizing sex work, or making sure it *stays* decriminalized in countries which are more enlightened, will stop violence against sex workers. Making sure police are open and sensitive to sex workers coming to them to report violence will stop violence against sex workers. As an activist, a feminist, and a sex worker myself, I beg you to see the reason in that.

  85. “It will cut down on the number of clients, making workers more likely to take on dangerous clients b/c of lack of choice &economic need, when in any other situation a worker might follow her instincts and decline a client she senses is dangerous.”

    Caty

    That’s nonsense

    Risks are taken regardless of whatever & differing circumstances, most prostitute murders are by violent men, who who are going to do it anyway. One doesn’t become a serial killer merely because of legislation.

    If you want legal prostitution just say so, don’t do palpably silly theories which are an insult to the intelligence of your readers.

    “Decriminalizing sex work, or making sure it *stays* decriminalized in countries which are more enlightened, will stop violence against sex workers.”

    That is total fantasy, violence against prostituted people exist *everywhere* and only the most childish of people would pretend otherwise.

    So that means on the millionaire boats at the Cannes film festival to the bet hotels in London, or Paris, to the streets of Nottingham. Men that buy sex, are generally a suspect category.

    I can tell you something else, I’ve never met a pimp who wasn’t a pedophile.

    Gregory Carlin

    Irish Anti-Traffiking Coalition

  86. “SPEAKERS from the Safety First Coalition, Women Against Rape, the International Prostitutes Collective, and from GUYANA, INDIA, PERU, TRINIDAD & TOBAGO.”

    With all due respect, one can’t sell developing world prostitution to the first world, one could do sex tourism in the other direction, but not sensibly the reverse.

    I give you the same advice, as your ideas-colleague, just tell people you want X for the sake of X, and gilding the lily with ideas or propositions which are bizarre or impractical.

    I can tell you a non-secret, nobody will legalize brothels in a recession, even if they wanted to. It would look terrible, the only place they talk like that is Las Vegas, and they never do it.

    I already *know* Jacqui Smith MP is not going to give you the time of day.

    Your campaign is lost already.

    Gregory Carlin

    Irish Anti-Traffiking Coalition

  88. Thierry

    I don’t think real feminists ( any at all) agree with you.

    Didn’t the audience at that Harman meeting have to tell you to decaf a little?

    Harriet Harman warns of BNP threat in European elections
    guardian.co.uk, UK – 24 Jan 2009
    Thierry Schaffauser refused to be silenced by the chair, Jon Cruddas, the MP for Dagenham, as a he launched a multi-pronged attack on the minister, …

    Jeepers, try to chill out

    Gregory

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