Today is International Sex Worker Rights Day
If you’re unfamiliar w/ International Sex Worker Rights Day, here’s some history:
The 3rd of March is International Sex Worker Rights Day. The day originated in 2001 when over 25,000 sex workers gathered in India for a sex worker festival. The organizers, Durbar Mahila Samanwaya Committee, a Calcutta based group whose membership consists of somewhere upwards of 50,000 sex workers and members of their communities. Sex worker groups across the world have subsequently celebrated 3 March as International Sex Workers’ Rights Day.
Durbar Mahila Samanwaya Committee (2002): “We felt strongly that that we should have a day what need to be observed by the sex workers community globally. Keeping in view the large mobilization of all types of global sexworkers [Female,Male,Transgender], we proposed to observe 3rd March as THE SEX WORKERS RIGHTS DAY.
Knowing the usual response of international bodies and views of academicians and intellectuals of the 1st world [many of them consider that sex workers of third world are different from 1st world and can't take their decision] a call coming from a third world country would be more appropriate at this juncture, we believe. It will be a great pleasure to us if all of you observe the day in your own countries too…We need your inspiration and support to turn our dreams into reality.
Find events going on in various cities on the SWOP-USA site.
I wish there were something happening in Atlanta… *sigh*
Adult sex workers arrested in child prostitution sting
In the latest “WTF??!!” news, the FBI is fighting child exploitation nationwide by… wait for it… arresting and brutalizing adult sex workers.
Same old, same old.
And naturally, the mainstream media is complicit. Check out the CNN.com headline: “Operation frees dozens of child prostitutes.” Not, as Cara points out, “Over 500 Prostitutes Arrested Under Guise of Saving Children.” Interesting choice there, CNN.
I just don’t know what to say anymore, about this shit. As I said at Jane’s:
I try to avoid reading places that I know aren’t sex worker supportive, but part of me also feels compelled to educate people. But, that usually ends up biting me in the ass. Bringing the argument around to consent and who makes a free choice to do sex work just makes me want to bang my head against a freakin’ brick wall. I have no response other than to gape in astonishment while my mind screams, “Seriously?? THIS is what you think is relevant?? OMG HOW FAR UP YOUR ASS IS YOUR HEAD???”
I have to find a balance, because this shit needs to be exposed. Women are being actively harmed. I just CANNOT COMPREHEND how this is always a “debate.” This is not about trafficking. This is not about consent vs. coercion. This is not about whether prostitution can be a free choice. This is about the fact that, under current laws? WOMEN ARE BEING HARMED. Your views on prostitution? Irrelevant. And if you really care so much about the women who have no other choice, then trying to form ANY JUSTIFICATION of this shit is that much WORSE coming from you. How will a criminal record help women with few options? How will being beaten and brutalized by law enforcement “save” them??
It also does absolutely nothing to stop trafficking – since so many people seem intent on conflating trafficking and sex work. But, as Ren has noted many times, going after actual traffickers is dangerous and difficult. So much easier to just lock up the hookers, right?
There is no debate here. “Operation Cross Country” and other schemes like it HARM WOMEN. And I won’t stop raising these issues until people actually PAY ATTENTION. Progressives? Where are you? Please join the fight for sex workers’ human rights! Conservatives – at least the fiscal variety – should be able to get on board, too. As SerpentLibertine points out, this shit ain’t cheap and guess where the funding is coming from? Yep, taxpayer money.
SEX WORKERS’ RIGHTS ARE HUMAN RIGHTS.
Which reminds me… March 3 is International Sex Workers Rights Day. How apt.
Today is International Sex Workers’ Rights Day
So far I’ve been too busy to write anything, but Ren has a great post that everyone should read, because it talks about something that I think a lot of people fail to consider in the discussions of decriminalization and destigmatization.
How’s my credit? Well, what credit? I have one, exactly one, credit card that I use for emergencies and travel (air miles). It is paid off on time, because oddly enough, while many credit card companies will bend over backwards to give you a credit card, somehow that changes if your occupation is “stripper”. So I try to keep the thing paid off. I have primarily for years used cash for everything: down payments, daily living, medical expenses- cash in full often- because it is easier often to hand over x amount of dollars for a dental visit or a car or any number of things when on all those little forms they ask name, age, occupation, job title, company…and your answers include stripper, porn performer, or god, goddess and all the little deities…an illegal aspect of the sex industry- a job you cannot write down at all. In the case of the window fellow…I handed him cash for the down payment, did not answer any of those little questions, and Mr. E is the one whose occupation, job title, and credit information went on those little forms…
You see, cash works for us, because you hand cash over and take your purchase. Qualifying for a car loan, a home loan, a home equity loan, a line of credit period, getting approved for an apartment or rental property, even if you do make good money in the sex biz? In many parts of the US, and the world in general, no easy task. Nor is getting insurance of any sort, or any other manner of little things a lot of people take for granted. And not only do you often not get those things, you get to deal with the looks, questions, and speculations of the people who you are filling out those little forms for. It’s lovely, really.
How about when you apply for a second straight job, or leave the sex biz for a straight job? Invariably, potential employers want to know what your other or previous line of work is/was…and my my, can’t that be interesting! Sure, in some fields, no one really cares. It’s easy enough to grab a gig in retail, or as wait staff, or a bartender, even as an office hand in various businesses, but a real office position? In a “straight” industry? Even if it is a job a trained monkey can do? You lie. You don’t tell other people what your other/former job is. You make up previous employment if you have too, and hope they don’t bother to check references. How about school? Well, I can tell you both professors and fellow students look at you oddly if sex work is paying the bills. And sure, sometimes one can hide what job they are in…in fact…most people can for a time, but sooner or later, people find out. And they talk.
And I suppose I don’t need to go over the just generalized opinions people have about sex workers again, do I?
She says “it’s the little things,” but I would argue that this stuff is BIG.
This is the stuff that folks in the middle-class “straight” world take for granted. You buy a new car and write down your occupation on the loan application… no big deal, right? It doesn’t get a second thought. See, the fact that this is almost never discussed – because it’s never thought of to begin with – is the very definition of privilege. And all of us who don’t work in the adult industry have that privilege.