Hello fellow advocates/allies/sex workers/academics/curious readers!
I just want to remind everyone about the facebook group that is associated with this blog- Sex Workers Outreach Project CT. I moderate the group, and it is a closed group. This means that people outside of the group cannot see the comments inside of the group. If you are someone who frequents this blog, whether you are an ally or a sex worker, please feel free to join the facebook group. The FB group is where I post updates about the formation of the SWOP-CT chapter, as well as discuss future events. In coming months, I hope to recruit as many allies and workers into the group as possible, and begin a formal chapter. I will be meeting with women from other SWOP chapters, and holding brunches where everyone can come together and discuss the groups goals. The link for the group is posted as part of the blog title on the front page.
xoxo,
Page
Tuesday, January 24, 2012
Monday, January 23, 2012
Sex Worker's Rights are Rights for All Women
This is a fantastic 2010 article from Jezebel:
http://jezebel.com/5571081/sex-workers-rights-are-rights-for-all-women
Another GREAT article from the Ms. Magazine blog:
http://msmagazine.com/blog/blog/2010/09/02/how-to-respect-sex-workers/
"Don’t diminish or mock sex workers’ agency. When discussing a person coerced or forced into sex work, a sensitive recognition of the violation they’ve suffered is definitely in order. However, it’s important to let individuals themselves make this distinction, rather than automatically assigning them a label that indicates lack of agency. For instance, referring to all sex workers as “prostituted” or “used” can be violating in and of itself if the person identifies their work as a free choice.
Similarly, language implying that sex workers are defiled or disgusting will quickly alienate them—for instance, calling porn an “institution that systematically uses the bodies of subordinate groups as sheer sexual objects at best, and open toilets at worst,” as this Ms. blog comment does. Even abused workers don’t want the public analogizing them to waste receptacles.
There’s a way to recognize the indignities wrought upon another human being without furthering those indignities. For example, insisting that every paid act of sex is rape, regardless of how the person being paid labels it, implies that her failure to label it rape is a personal failure. No sex worker deserves to be demonized for asserting the nature of her own experiences."
THANK YOU!!!!!!!!!!!!! Monica Shores put it much better than I ever could. I am SOOO sick of hearing the following argument: "Even consenting sex work is wrong, because most of the people who engage in it are doing so as a result of childhood sexual abuse." People who support this "argument" apparently feel that adults who have suffered abuse as children have lost the ability to make informed decisions as adults.
http://jezebel.com/5571081/sex-workers-rights-are-rights-for-all-women
Another GREAT article from the Ms. Magazine blog:
http://msmagazine.com/blog/blog/2010/09/02/how-to-respect-sex-workers/
"Don’t diminish or mock sex workers’ agency. When discussing a person coerced or forced into sex work, a sensitive recognition of the violation they’ve suffered is definitely in order. However, it’s important to let individuals themselves make this distinction, rather than automatically assigning them a label that indicates lack of agency. For instance, referring to all sex workers as “prostituted” or “used” can be violating in and of itself if the person identifies their work as a free choice.
Similarly, language implying that sex workers are defiled or disgusting will quickly alienate them—for instance, calling porn an “institution that systematically uses the bodies of subordinate groups as sheer sexual objects at best, and open toilets at worst,” as this Ms. blog comment does. Even abused workers don’t want the public analogizing them to waste receptacles.
There’s a way to recognize the indignities wrought upon another human being without furthering those indignities. For example, insisting that every paid act of sex is rape, regardless of how the person being paid labels it, implies that her failure to label it rape is a personal failure. No sex worker deserves to be demonized for asserting the nature of her own experiences."
THANK YOU!!!!!!!!!!!!! Monica Shores put it much better than I ever could. I am SOOO sick of hearing the following argument: "Even consenting sex work is wrong, because most of the people who engage in it are doing so as a result of childhood sexual abuse." People who support this "argument" apparently feel that adults who have suffered abuse as children have lost the ability to make informed decisions as adults.
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