Coyote Beauty

To make a great distinction between being paid for an hour’s sexual services, or an hour’s typing, or an hour’s acting on a stage is to make a distinction that is not there.  -  Margo St. James

Forty years ago today (on Mother’s Day of that year), Margo St. James founded COYOTE, the very first sex worker rights organization.  Ironically, she was set on that path in 1962 by a cop who decided she looked like a streetwalker and a judge who convicted her of prostitution without any real evidence:  “I said in court, ‘Your honor, I never turned a trick in my life!’ he responded, ‘Anyone who knows the language is obviously a professional.’ My crime was I knew too much to be nice girl.”  Once she had a criminal record, she found that she could not get any other work, and so decided she might as well do what she had been accused of.  And though she only worked for four years, she continued to identify with the hookers and eventually founded an organization called WHO:

…Whores, Housewives and Others.  Others meant lesbian, but it wasn’t being said out loud yet, even in liberal bohemian circles.  The first meeting of WHO was held on Alan Watt’s houseboat.  The name COYOTE came from novelist Tom Robbins who dubbed me the COYOTE Trickster…Richard Hongisto, a liberal sheriff elected in San Francisco about that time attended my parties.  He had been a cop, and had a sociology degree.  I…asked him what it would take to get NOW, and Gay rights groups to support prostitutes’ rights…He said that we needed someone from the victim class to speak out…I decided to be that someone…and I hoped the hookers would join me.  The PR people responsible for getting the sheriff elected volunteered to help me with COYOTE…I started organizing internationally with…Jennifer James, an anthropology professor…[who] coined the word decriminalization and was responsible for getting NOW to make it a plank in their 1973 convention.  COYOTE published a newsletter from 1974-79 and the Hooker’s Ball became popular, attracting 20,000 people in 1978…

Let that sink in:  the largest mainstream feminist organization actually supported sex worker rights for a short time, though the neofeminists destroyed that within just a few years.  Still, it looked for a while as though there was nowhere to go but up.  COYOTE chapters sprang up in Sacramento and Florida, and similar organizations were formed elsewhere; there was PONY in New York, PUMA in Massachusetts, CUPIDS and PEP in Michigan, KITTY in Kansas City, PASSION in New Orleans, OCELOT in San Diego, KAT in Los Angeles, ASP in Seattle and DOLPHIN in Hawaii.  On June 2^nd, 1975 French whores in Lyon held the protest which led to the formation of the French Collective of Prostitutes, and a sister organization soon formed in England; they and several others joined with COYOTE “to form the International Committee for Prostitutes’ Rights (ICPR), the organization whose work and example helped to win prostitution law reform in a number of European countries and provided an example which inspired similar campaigns in many other parts of the world.”  In 1976, COYOTE filed the lawsuit which led to decriminalization in Rhode Island, and by 1977 even well-known journalists and politicians were listening.

Had HIV not arrived on the scene a few years later, criminalization might have been merely a black period of history by now.  But arrive it did, swinging the balance of power to the neofeminists and their fundamentalist Christian allies.  Margo moved to Europe to help sex worker rights efforts there, and COYOTE was directed by Samantha Miller and Gloria Lockett, who worked to make the organization more responsive to the concerns of minority sex workers and those who weren’t escorts (including strippers, phone sex operators, etc).  During the AIDS panic of the ‘80s and the neofeminist ascendance of the ‘90s, COYOTE was too busy fighting disinformation and stigma to make any actual progress, and by the time new organizations like SWOP started to appear around the turn of the century it had run out of steam.  Margo (who had returned to the US in 1993) decided to concentrate on sex worker health, and in 1999 COYOTE became the St. James Infirmary, which provides free medical care and social services for sex workers.  The only other remaining chapter is the Los Angeles one, which has been inactive since about the same time.  But though the mother of all sex worker organizations has ceased to exist in its original form, every current activist group owes it – and Margo – a debt of gratitude for showing that it could be done.

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Fictional Interlude: Genius Loci

The southwest furthers.
The northeast does not further.
It furthers one to see the great man.
Perseverance brings good fortune.  -  I Ching, hexagram 39

Every policeman in Central Headquarters had avoided the Chief Inspector yesterday; he had arrived at work in a nastier mood than usual, collected a number of files and then left on a trip to the capital to meet with the Commissioner of Police.  And though he had abominably maltreated everyone who had the misfortune to cross his path, nobody really blamed him because they knew the reason for that meeting.  And now, as the Chief Inspector waited to be called in to his superior’s office, he was fervently wishing that he could be almost anyplace but here.

Fortunately, he did not have long to wait; he was admitted to the beautifully-appointed office he had last seen just after his promotion five years ago and bowed deeply.  The Commissioner acknowledged him with a perfunctory nod, gestured toward a chair in front of his desk, and began speaking as soon as he was seated.

“As I told you in our communication yesterday, I have observed a most strange anomaly in the figures for prostitution arrests in your city,” he began, pointing at a computer screen to his left.  “You assured me that you could explain, but that it would be better for you to do so in person.  Accordingly, I have made time for you in my busy schedule.  Please proceed.”

The Commissioner always spoke that way.  He was a former Professor of Criminology, renowned for his erudition and problem-solving ability, and had been rewarded for years of distinguished service with this choice political appointment.  So although he was not a large man, he could be extremely intimidating, especially to a lower official with an apparently-insurmountable problem.  “Yes, sir.  Well, sir, I’m afraid I must begin by telling you that the situation is actually worse than the official figures make it appear.”

“Oh?” he asked, with the barest trace of annoyance.  “Considering that your city has the largest red-light district in the entire country, yet for the past several years has had the lowest number of prostitution arrests by a considerable margin, I am at a loss to understand how it could be worse.”

He swallowed hard.  “Well, sir, those arrest figures have actually been, ah, inflated somewhat.  They’re not even as high as reported.”

“And how many have there been, actually?” That last word was as menacing as a gun-barrel.

“Um, well, it’s been dropping for a long time, and in the past six months there have been very few, but then this month we reached an all-time low of, ah, none.”

“None whatsoever?”

“No, sir.”

“Considering that your performance of your duties has been exemplary in every other way, I am absolutely certain you have some credible explanation for your pronounced deficiency in this particular area.  As you well know, our foreign aid from the Americans requires the production of sufficient human trafficking arrests to satisfy their moral crusade.”

“Yes, sir, I’m aware of that, and when I first took over the post from my predecessor I noticed the numbers were quite low and resolved to correct the situation.  So I increased the number of raids, and instituted harsh discipline against any man caught taking bribes from the madams.  Yet still, the numbers kept shrinking, for no discernible reason.”

“What do you mean, ‘no discernible reason’?  Surely all the prostitutes didn’t mysteriously vanish?”

“But that’s just it, sir; it was as though they had.  Whenever I sent a squad out to raid a brothel, they found it locked and shuttered.  When officers were dispatched to a bar, they found only men drinking.  When they went to bring in street women, they found all the usual areas deserted.  Even when informants told us of activity taking place, it was not so by the time we arrived.  It was as though someone was warning them that we were on the way.”

“Obviously, the pimps and madams have a confederate inside your office.”

“That was what I thought at first, sir, so I tried not announcing the raids; I would just suddenly come in, order a group of men to follow me, and take them to the red light district myself.  I found the same thing that had been reported to me: locked doors and deserted streets.  I assumed that it was a trick, and that there was some secret way of gaining admittance; so we started breaking down doors, only to find the buildings empty.  Yet my informants told me they were doing a thriving trade again the next day, all doors and windows open.”

The Commissioner no longer appeared angry; now he was the professor again, considering the complexities of an abstruse problem.  “What did you do next?”

“I reshuffled the entire department, bringing new staff into my office and reassigning the entire vice squad.  Then I took officers from other divisions on the raids, to no avail; the numbers continued to drop.  Every arrest we have had in the past year was obtained by officers bringing in known prostitutes who were buying groceries, eating in restaurants or riding in public conveyances, or else beggars we charged with prostitution to hide our disgrace.”

“Do you have any theory at all to explain this strange phenomenon?”

“Yes, sir, but I was afraid to tell you lest you think me mad.”

Now the Commissioner was intrigued.  “Do go on.”

“Well, sir, I asked the same question of all my senior officers; I even promised a promotion to the one who could explain it.  Finally a group of them came to me one afternoon, and told me that they knew exactly what was responsible.”

He hesitated for so long the Commissioner finally spurred him on with, “Yes…?”

“It’s because of, um, a spirit.”

“A spirit?!?”

“Yes, sir.”

“Do you actually expect me to believe that the ghost of some dead prostitute is going around warning her colleagues about our raids in time for them to flee?”

“Well, not exactly, sir.  I mean, yes and no.  We don’t think she’s that kind of spirit.”  This time the Commissioner did not prod him, so he swallowed and went on.  “You see, sir, I was so desperate by this point that I was willing to try anything, so I brought in a priest to perform an exorcism.”

“A novel solution to a novel problem, but clearly it failed.”

“I’m afraid so, sir.  The priest went to the red-light district, and talked to the prostitutes, and performed some sort of spiritual investigation, including research in many books.  And then he came to me and said, ‘I cannot help you; this is not a restless spirit reluctant to be reborn, but rather the guardian spirit of the area.  As such, it would be wrong for me to attempt to drive it out even if I could.’  I know this priest, sir; he is a wise and holy man, and I trust his judgment on this matter.”

The Commissioner thought for a moment.  “This district has been associated with the flesh trade for centuries, yet nobody has ever seen this spirit before.”

“Well, sir, that’s not exactly true.  Part of the priest’s research was historical, and he showed me records telling that though the spirit has never appeared during a time when prostitution was tolerated, it has often been seen during periods of intolerance.  In fact, the priest warned me that the manifestations would become more powerful, and more dangerous to my men, should we persist in harassing the women and their business.”

The Commissioner grew quiet.  He turned in his chair to look out at the rain; then he rose and paced back and forth for a few minutes.  Several times he looked as though he were about to ask a question, then thought better of it.  After a while he sat down and worked on his computer, intently examining the data displayed on the screen.  Then he turned sideways in the chair again, fixing his eyes on one of the awards on his wall, and sat quietly for a time.  The Chief Inspector did nothing to disturb him; he merely prayed silently, grateful he had not been fired on the spot.

Finally, the Commissioner spoke.  “We will turn this to our advantage.  First, you will announce that the human traffickers have grown so dangerous, you can no longer allow representatives of NGOs to go into the red-light district unless accompanied by a police officer; if this spirit warns the prostitutes of our approach, that will allow us to later demonstrate to the Americans that we have ‘cleaned up’ the district, since there will never be any prostitutes about when they go to look.”

“A brilliant idea, sir!  But, won’t they want to see the women we’ve ‘rescued’?”

“I was coming to that.  I will announce – completely unrelated to your announcement, of course – that we are expanding opportunities for women in the police force, and will begin actively recruiting them immediately.  This will also please the Americans, who will no doubt provide some grant to help us train them.  We will then disguise the new policewomen as prostitutes, send them out to the district, pretend to arrest them, and send them to a new ‘rehabilitation center’; we will keep NGO members away from the center due to ‘concern for the women’s privacy’ so they can’t discover that it is a false front.  Then we send the same women out again to be ‘arrested’ again, until we can credibly claim to have ‘rescued’ a large fraction of them.  The Americans will be happy; our government will collect more money; you will be lauded as a champion against trafficking; the prostitutes will be free to work in peace; the men will be able to hire them without fear of exposure; and the spirit will be placated.”

“Magnificent!  What a plan!” the Inspector cried, rising spontaneously to his feet.  “I am a fool for not having brought this problem to you sooner.”

“Nonsense.  You are a practical man, trained to deal with mortal criminals; it would be unreasonable of me to blame you for fearing my reaction.”

The Chief Inspector, now smiling like a child with a new toy, bowed excitedly, thanked the Commissioner again, gathered up his documents and set forth to implement the new plan, relieved of the burden under which he had struggled for so long.  And once he had gone, the Commissioner silently thanked the Buddha for a most interesting mental exercise and asked his secretary to bring him a pot of tea.

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International Sex Worker Rights Day

Sex worker rights are human rights, and there can never be too many voices speaking up for them, nor too many occasions on which to speak.
-  Maggie McNeill

Three times a year, there are days set aside by the sex worker community to make a concerted effort to call public attention to governments’ systematic denial of our rights, implemented by often-brutal police and supported by prohibitionists who want to see our trade eradicated no matter how many of us are hurt or even killed by the process.  Though many of them deny this and insist they really want to “help” us, their chosen tactics (which include stalking, infantilization, pathologization, impoverishment, abduction, confinement, deportation and brainwashing, to name just a few) reveal the truth to anyone whose thinking is not clouded by dogma.  So even though activists like myself call attention to this marginalization and maltreatment every day, it’s good to have several annual occasions on which our unified voices can ring out together to pierce the haze of ignorance, disinformation and disinterest.  Those occasions are:  the Day To End Violence Against Sex Workers (December 17^th, the anniversary of the 2003 sentencing of the Green River Killer); Whores’ Day (June 2^nd, the anniversary of the 1975 protest in which over 100 French prostitutes occupied the Church of St. Nizier in Lyon); and today, Sex Worker Rights Day (the anniversary of a 2001 festival in Kolkata attended by over 25,000 Indian sex workers despite efforts from prohibitionist groups who tried to prevent it by pressuring the government to revoke their permit).  The symbol of sex worker rights used for all these days (and sex worker protests in general), the red umbrella, originated in yet another 2001 protest event, this one in Venice, Italy; it was adopted as the official emblem of the sex worker rights movement by the International Committee on the Rights of Sex Workers in Europe (ICRSE) in 2005.

In addition to all of these days I’ve added my own; every Friday the 13^th I ask all of my readers who are not themselves sex workers to speak up for us, to show the prohibitionists and scoffers that we have many allies outside of our own movement.  Now, I’m well aware that this is often difficult; many who truly feel that sex work should be decriminalized, and sex workers freed from persecution, nonetheless fear speaking out because they are afraid of being stigmatized as prostitutes (if female) or clients (if male).  Several readers who have bought or sold sex asked me to suggest pro-decriminalization arguments that do not betray personal interest, and last Friday the 13^th I provided some suggestions; since I’ve been asked the question again lately, I’d like to take this opportunity to repeat those suggestions.

If you’re generally…civil rights-oriented in your politics it’s easy; all you have to do is argue for decriminalization from a perspective of “people have the right to do what they like with their own bodies”.  As I’ve pointed out in the past, every court decision…which upholds abortion rights also upholds the right to sex on one’s own terms, even if money is involved (abortion isn’t free, after all); ditto court decisions overturning sodomy laws…And obviously, the arguments for drug decriminalization  also apply to prostitution.  If you’re an atheist or skeptic, that’s easy too; in addition to the arguments above you can make statements like “prostitution laws are based on religion and xenophobia, not facts” and “the sex trafficking hysteria is a moral panic like the Satanic Panic and the Red Scare”.

The harm reduction perspective is another good one, and is the approach generally favored by advocates who have a human rights background or strong religious affiliation (including some members of the Catholic clergy):  Prostitution has always been with us and we can’t make it go away with laws any more than the “Drug War” has made drugs go away.  All the Drug War has done is to subject innocent people to invasion of their privacy and make drug users vulnerable to impure drugs, not to mention all those caught in drug-related violence; similarly, anti-prostitution laws help nobody and force prostitutes into the shadows where they can be harmed and exploited.  Furthermore, many governments (including those of New Zealand, New South Wales  and Brazil) have recognized that illegal prostitution invariably leads to police corruption, just as alcohol Prohibition did and drug prohibition still does.

Finally, there’s the feminist approach:  why does society have the right to tell women they can’t make a living with their natural sex-based attributes when it allows men to do so with boxing, bodyguard work, etc?  Furthermore, laws against prostitution invariably subject women’s dress and mannerisms to police scrutiny; women are accused of prostitution for dressing sexily, acting sexily, carrying condoms in their purses, being in certain areas, not wearing underwear, etc.  This is “slut shaming” with criminal consequences.

Though women have traditionally taken the brunt of civil rights abuses resulting from prostitution law, this has changed in the last few years; “end demand” rhetoric has resulted in men being persecuted just as intensely as women (though not more intensely, despite the claims of those who support such campaigns).  Furthermore, anti-prostitution laws (especially when re-branded as “anti-sex trafficking efforts”) are used as excuses for mass arrests of both men and women, confiscation of their property, collection and retention of their DNA and intrusive surveillance.  This is why you should care about the rights of sex workers even if you aren’t one, don’t know any and have no intention of ever hiring one:  laws which oppress marginalized minority groups are only the thin end of a wedge which is invariably driven deeper, blow by blow, until it is forcibly stopped.

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Off Track

The circulation of confidence is better than the circulation of money.  -  James Madison

Claire writes:

I’m an experienced GFE escort and generally have very nice clients, but recently I’ve had trouble retaining regulars and I’m trying to figure out what I’m doing wrong.  If I click with someone or have a bit of chemistry that I can work with, I can deliver a really good session; however, I’m 34 now and I suppose I might make assumptions a bit early.  I have never really networked, so I don’t have many people I can ask questions; do you have some sort of list or tips for girls to use in the room?  I haven’t had many good sessions lately and my confidence is a bit blown; I’d appreciate any advice you can give to help me spice things back up again.

It would be nearly impossible for me to guess what’s causing your trouble; there are any number of possibilities, ranging from the esoteric (an unnoticed health problem that’s subtly changed your biochemistry) to the psychiatric (burnout) to the chaotic (a plain run of bad luck).  But once one’s confidence begins to slip, her mystique can quickly go downhill and then it becomes a snowball effect.  So it’s very important that you get control of this, build up your presence and before too long you’ll be building up your regulars list again.  One thing that I think is very important is that you get a complete medical checkup, just in case there is some subtle gynecological or hormonal issue; if you can afford it, a short holiday might also help.  You might even consider overhauling your website because after all, the root cause may be external (i.e. in your customer base rather than in you), and an infusion of new blood may put things to rights.

I don’t have any kind of list, because most of what I did was based in pure instinct; in other words I’ve never really analyzed what I do, as much as just following my gut with a particular man.  Though I do have a few practical tricks I could teach, they’re more “show” than “tell” and I suspect you already know them anyway.  One of the things that I think is very important for GFE is to be as real as possible without letting negativity into it; in other words DO tell clients how excited you were to get tickets to that sold-out show, but DON’T talk about how bummed you are that your daughter’s having trouble in school (I wrote about this sort of thing at length in “Playing the Part”).

Because everyone is different, though, and because I want to get you back on track right away, I think we need to “crowdsource” this one.  I’m going to bump tomorrow’s column and put this in its place, and invite all of my readers who are either current or former pros to offer suggestions for you in the comment thread.  Make sure you read all of them, and keep up with it for several days; some readers may take a few days to see the column, but might have really good answers for you.  It may even be that some male readers might offer their input as to what has caused them to stop seeing a regular escort, and perhaps you might recognize something one of them says as something you’re also doing and didn’t see as problematic until it was pointed out.

Readers, have you any suggestions for Claire?

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Pearls Firmly Clutched

You don’t know this world.  You’re making judgments [based] on what you see on television.  -  Suzy Favor Hamilton

Sometimes my highly-organized format makes it difficult to write about breaking news stories; if the story is too involved for a short item in “That Was the Week That Was”, but the schedule is too tight to bump anything for a full-fledged column, I either have to postpone my coverage (possibly past the limit of freshness) or just ignore it.  This was the case with the outing of Suzy Hamilton; appearing as it did on Yule Eve, there was simply no way to work it in before King Day and what I wanted to say wouldn’t fit into a TW3 blurb.  This turned out to be a good thing, however; my thoughts about Hamilton, her choices and the judgmentalism and evil-mindedness of the public reaction would barely fill a paragraph, but my opinions of the yellow press coverage are a different matter.  And because I’m going to say these things without raising my voice, perhaps they’ll get more attention now that the media noise has died down.

Regular readers of this blog understand that there is nothing “shocking”, weird or even terribly unusual about an educated, accomplished woman doing sex work; the extremely high income and self-esteem boost alone (Hamilton is known to have a history of depression) are more than enough reason, no matter what filthy-minded reporters and pundits have claimed.  Furthermore, how she conducts her private life is no more anyone else’s business than how gay celebrities conduct theirs, and if anyone disagrees I suggest he insert his opinions (and the computer on which he types them) into the least comfortable orifice available.  While I might question Hamilton’s wisdom in outing herself to some clients, and her morality in continuing to escort (supposedly) against the wishes of her husband, I do that as her sister harlot who knows what our world is actually like, and not as some holier-than-thou, hypocritical ignoramus who has appointed herself moral arbiter over another’s life.  Had she asked me for advice I would have told her exactly what I just wrote, but out of concern for the damage her poor choices might inflict upon her, not for some imagined injury to “society” or “decency”.

Have you actually read any of the rubbish these pompous busybodies wrote about a woman who never did them any harm?  The pearl-clutching in the original Smoking Gun article is practically audible; it reads like something written by a 70-year-old spinster Victorian schoolmarm rather than by an early-21^st century journalist who evidently considers herself urbane:

…she inexplicably shared her true identity with several male clients, believing that her secret was somehow safe with strangers who paid for her company by leaving envelopes stuffed with cash…Hamilton expressed concern that her story would be “sensationalized” by a reporter.  It is hard, though, to imagine how that could occur.  The actual events of the ex-Olympian’s past year already seem like the fever dreams of a Lifetime producer who decided to adapt Luis Bunuel’s Belle de Jour for basic cable…it was…a credulous notion that client and escort were morally bound by some implicit pledge of omerta.  Why would her secret be safe with guys about whom she knew nothing (except that many were paying for sex while their spouse was back home)?  These johns slept with an attractive former Olympian, an All-American girl with a Wikipedia page and a Nike commercial on YouTube.  How could they not boast about their costly Las Vegas escapades?…

The author also brandishes the word “illegal” as though it actually carried moral weight, which I submit makes her far more naïve than Hamilton could ever be.  The Daily Beast was even more astonishingly ignorant, attempting to harass Las Vegas escort services by phone for information on competitor Haley Heston (the agency Hamilton worked for) and publishing Melissa Farley’s paranoid drivel as though it constituted something other than the diseased masturbatory fantasies of a dried-up, deeply frustrated misandrist:

Melissa Farley…says that…whoever is behind Haley Heston is most likely a pimp or group of pimps.  “They are receiving money from prostitution and they have a great deal of control – both physical and mental – over the women that are in their employ”…

Obviously, Hamilton must have been suffering from “false consciousness” when she said, “I take full responsibility for my mistakes. I’m not the victim and I’m not going that route.”

The only exception to this parade of condemnation came from, interestingly enough, Fox News.  Though their consultant, Dr. Keith Ablow, felt it necessary to include truly moronic statements such as “[prostitution] is extremely dangerous psychologically and medically,” to make some highly questionable associations and to add two rather creepy caveats to his conclusion, these do not ring true with the rest of his article and I suspect they were either demanded by editors or voluntarily inserted by Ablow to soften the blow of an article in which he subtly denies three prohibitionist myths and calls for legalization:

…there are likely women whose interest in being hired for sex is so strong that, for all intents and purposes, it is their “sexual orientation”…these women are not different…from other women (and men) who want to be hurt during sex…A woman wanting to sell herself because she thinks it is exciting is not much more dramatic than a man who wants to dress as a ballerina in order to feel excited…there are [also]…women (and men) in the business of prostitution for whom it carries no stigma and is lucrative.  If we assume that Ms. Hamilton had ten clients a week…then she could have been making $300,000 a year in cash…If she had 20 clients a week (and some of the prostitutes I have treated as a psychiatrist have had 20 clients a week), then she would have made $600,000 a year – in cash…high-priced prostitution is…available in every city.  Millions of American men with families and professions are customers.  And not every prostitute is devastated psychologically by the experience.  As one lawyer and prostitute put it to me…“I suppose that…[it’s] more complicated to have a boyfriend…but I don’t know if it’s more complicated than getting back home from working as a police officer or pediatric neurosurgeon or gynecologist.  Lots of professions are incredibly complicated, emotionally”…I take no moral position on the matter…it is time to legalize prostitution, put in place safeguards to help protect those who participate in it, and, of course, tax it.

In case you’re counting, he denies the myths that sex work is inherently devastating, that hookers see dozens of clients per day and that only a small fraction of the male population are clients.  And though he does seem to buy into the “damaged goods” myth and clearly has a skewed perception of the fraction of whores motivated by psychological drives rather than pragmatic concerns, it’s heartening that he nonetheless sees criminalization as an unproductive evil; furthermore, it’s very telling that a so-called “conservative” news source is actually promoting a more enlightened view of the subject than two other sources which do not share that political bent.

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Still More Mentoring

There are some questions that shouldn’t be asked until a person is mature enough to appreciate the answers.  -  Anne Bishop

I generally answer questions via email, then edit the question to make it more concise (and to remove identifying details), correct any clumsy phrasing in my answer, and transplant the whole into a column.  In this case the inquirer responded to my answer with a second, more general question that I think might prove useful to inexperienced hookers and enlightening to clients.  If you have a question of your own, please email me at maggiemcneill@earthlink.net.

I was wondering if you could give some advice to women working as dommes or doing fetish work.  I am new to this and don’t know exactly what it “illegal”.  I don’t have sex with clients, but I think the cops have other ways of busting you.  Do you have any advice/tips?  I do not want a prostitution record to haunt me for the rest of my life.

Unfortunately, both the laws and police practices vary from state to state, so even in states where paid BDSM or fetish work is legal one cannot always count on the police to honor that.  Many people are arrested every year and charged with things which are not crimes (for example, taking pictures of cops), and even if the charges are later dismissed it’s still traumatic, potentially expensive and (if your local police enjoy shaming people and the local media panders to their sick urges) reputation-destroying once the news is released.  You can’t unring a bell, so even if charges are dropped and your record is expunged the story is already out.  I’m not telling you all this to frighten you off, but rather to convince you of the necessity of proper precautions.  First, consult a lawyer about the legality in your state and the police practices; though you or I could easily look up the law itself that will not tell you if the police in your state have a habit of making spurious charges against dominatrices or fetish workers.  Next, screen your clients as thoroughly as if you were a vanilla escort; even if the police are unlikely to come after you, this is still important for the protection of your person and reputation.  The fact that your type of work does not involve intercourse matters to nobody but lawyers; it is still surrounded by stigma and an unstable man who is sexually aroused can still be dangerous, so you’ll want to be sure potential clients don’t have a history of violent or stalking behavior (asking for and checking references is the easiest way for a beginner to do this).  Finally, don’t cut yourself off from other sex workers; join your local escort board even though you are not a full-service escort, because it will keep you in touch with the latest talk on bad clients, stings and the like.  It may even get you some crossover clients; just make it very clear in your ads that you only do fetish and domination work.

I have heard about “screening clients” but it wasn’t really clear. Any advice on how to do that?

The best and simplest means of screening is by referrals; what this means is that you ask the client for the names of two established escorts he’s seen before.  It’s best if they provide the same type of service as you do, but even if that’s not possible just the fact that you know he’s the real McCoy, shows up on time and has no history of creepiness can be a great comfort.  When you get their contact information, make sure they’re really established girls (not just “Jade at the Bangkok Spa”) and then contact them, telling them Mr. So-and-so used them as references, and ask if they remember him.  The more information a girl gives you, and the more honest and friendly she sounds, the better; if she just shoots back a two-word text saying “he’s ok” from her smartphone, consider that just the same as if she failed to respond at all because she may just be blowing you off and doesn’t actually remember him.

You can also join a “whitelisting” service such as P411; “hobbyists” pay the company to verify them, and then give their P411 ID to escorts they wish to visit.  It doesn’t cost anything for providers to join, and you can see not only a self-generated profile of the client, but how many “OKs” he has received from other girls.  Provider Buzz is the opposite, a blacklist; an escort who has had a bad experiences with a client can enter his identifying information, and others will be able to see whatever she writes in the report (ranging from “no show” to serious violence).  Honeysuckle has a nice little escort screening tool which allows you to enter a potential client’s name, phone number and email address, and searches him via Google, phone listings, Amazon wishlists and Linkedin, all on one convenient screen (you may also be interested in her escorting tips and starter kit).  Pipl allows you to search names and even accesses some public records, and even just Googling a person’s name can turn up interesting stuff (especially if he owns his own company).

Last but definitely not least, trust your gut.  Even if everything checks out, if your intuition says he’s not right, he probably isn’t; at least half the girls I know who were arrested told me later that they felt something was wrong, but dismissed it and went anyway.  Vice cops practice deceit as a way of life and a few of them are very good at it, so if alarm bells go off you need to listen.

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That Was the Week That Was (#39)

It’s not about promiscuity, which makes you sound square; it’s not about prostitution, which makes you sound dirty; it’s about sex-trafficking, which makes you sound like you’re on the side of the angels, know-nothing though they might be.  -  Michael Wolff

Amazingly Stupid Statements

“Just Don’t Call It Slut-Shaming: A Feminist Guide to Silencing Sex Workers” is a funny and dead-on-target lampoon of neofeminist anti-whore rhetoric in the form of a mock primer.  Definitely a must-read.

Cracks in the Dam

Canadian courts slap down another government attempt to stop sex workers from claiming human rights:

The Supreme Court of Canada has upheld the right of a non-profit group representing women…in downtown Vancouver’s sex trade to challenge the country’s anti-prostitution laws on constitutional grounds.  The ruling means the Downtown Eastside Sex Workers United Against Violence Society can go back to B.C. Supreme Court to pursue a case it launched five years ago…

The government’s argument against the suit relied on the sophistry that one of the parties in the suit (Sheryl Kiselbach) was no longer affected by the laws due to being retired, and that the other party (the DESWUAVS) could not be affected because it was an organization, therefore neither had the right to sue.  But the judge realized that the government’s claim that streetwalkers had to bring such suits individually was absurd, and ruled in favor of the group.  It’s not only good news for sex workers, but for other marginalized Canadians as well:

…[attorney] Katrina Pacey…explained [that] “This would provide a real opportunity for marginalized people, people with mental health issues, people with HIV, prisoners, refugees, children to form a collective organization whereby they then have the support and capacity to bring these cases forward, as a community”…

Japanese Prostitution

The bad economy and political tensions between their countries have combined to make things increasingly difficult for Chinese whores in Japan, creating a dangerously unbalanced buyer’s market:

…“Rumors have been spreading that Chinese girls have been beaten up by Japanese Johns, and some of them are even begging off on transactions with customers they don’t know out of fears for their safety,” says “pink” journalist Yasuhiro Ebina.  “Many Chinese women tend to be blunt and unsociable, but of late they are forcing themselves to smile, and have been primping themselves to improve their appearance.  Before a deri heru (out-call sex) service might have charged an additional 8,000 yen for honban (the “real thing,” i.e., intercourse), but now they’ve knocked as much as 5,000 yen off the total price”…women from Shanghai tend to be proud and many refuse to dispense oral sex, but over the past week they are now even providing lip service bareback.  And some ladies from Dalian or Harbin are even allowing customers condom-free rides…

Forward and Backward

The stupidity, it burns!  ”…[Washington, D.C.] police lieutenant Jeffery Carroll told residents at a neighborhood meeting…that [a perceived] jump in [street] prostitution may be related to the surge in construction activity and increase in construction workers in the neighborhood.  Carroll told residents that prostitution activity typically takes place between midnight and…6:00 a.m. The recent surge has come between 3:30 and 7:30 a.m. or else at around 3:30 p.m….which police say could correlate to changes in construction shifts…“

Not To Be Taken Internally

Yet another poor fool has died from allowing a non-doctor to inject filth into her arse in a non-medical setting:

…52-year-old Morris Garner…who has had gender changing procedures and goes by the name Tracey Lynn Garner, is charged with depraved-heart murder in the March death of 37-year-old Karima Gordon, of Atlanta…Gordon became ill within 30 minutes of leaving Garner’s house in Jackson after…injection [of a silicone-like substance into her buttocks] but decided to try to make it home to Georgia before seeking medical treatment…[investigator Lee McDivitt]…said her chance of surviving the injections was small, anyway…”The [medical examiner] told me…[that when he] cut the victim open…this material ran all over the floor, all over their shoes, all over the place”…

What I can’t understand is why so many of these self-proclaimed cosmetic surgeons are transgendered.

Above the Law

Once again:  As long as government actors have excessive power over individuals, this will keep happening:  “…Pittsburgh Public Schools police officer…Robert Lellock…was arrested…[on] 23 counts of crimes including corruption of minors, child endangerment and sex crimes…”  Lellock allegedly raped several 13-14 year old boys, ensuring their silence by a combination of threats to kill their families and rewards of marijuana and class-skipping privileges.

An Example To the West

You may remember that DMSC had formed its own football (soccer) team for the children of Calcutta sex workers; well, two of the boys were picked for a world championship team:  “Two sons of sex workers from India’s eastern state of West Bengal will play soccer…in the Indian…team for the Homeless World Soccer Cup 2012 in Mexico…’This is a big achievement in integrating children of sex workers with the mainstream sports community,’ said Dr Samarjit Jana of DMSC.”

The Birth of a Movement

This Guardian article is mostly about sex workers’ reaction  to the socialist scheme to inflict the Swedish model on France, but it also contains interesting information on French hookers’ efforts to circumvent busybody laws and the sleazy tricks cops use to harass them.

…The “white van women”…embody the French state’s difficult attitudes to prostitution.  As in the UK, prostitution itself…is not a crime.  But…[a] 2003…law [forbids being]…in a public place known for prostitution dressed in revealing clothes.  To get round this, women started working in private vans.  Selling sex inside a vehicle was not breaking the law.  But police are now using any means to crack down on the growing number of sex-work vans, namely parking tickets and tow-trucks…some…owe thousands of euros in parking tickets and pound-release fines accrued each month…

Shift in the Wind

An excellent op-ed against “end demand” rhetoric appeared last Sunday in, of all the unexpected places, The New York Times; I’ll bet Nick Kristof isn’t happy:

…policy makers have started to push to eradicate all prostitution, not just the trafficking of children into the sex trade.  Under the catchphrase “no demand, no supply,” they advocate increasing criminal penalties against men who buy sex — a move they believe will upend the market that fuels prostitution and sex trafficking…[but] the “end demand” campaign will harm trafficking victims and sex workers more than it helps them…End-demand advocates’ prototypical victim — an abused teenage girl…forced into the sex trade…does exist.  But they disregard the fact that individuals, including boys, men and transgender people, enter the sex trade for a variety of reasons.  The pimped girl who has inflamed the public’s imagination needs government services and protection, not to be made into a symbolic figure in an ideological battle to eradicate the entire sex industry, which, like many other sectors, includes adults laboring in conditions ranging from upscale to exploitative, from freely chosen to forced…despite their righteous anger, the end-demand crowd is quick to dismiss what many sex workers actually have to say.  Some activists have gone so far as to brand those who criticize their campaign as “house slaves” unable to recognize their own oppression…

The writer is being polite; Melissa Farley’s actual term was “house nigger”.  The article goes on to strongly criticize the Swedish model, flatly stating that it has failed to reduce prostitution and explaining how it harms women; it reports that most abuse of sex workers is by police rather than clients or “pimps” as claimed by the prohibitionists; and it discusses real solutions very much like those advocated in this blog.  The article is not long, and well worth your time.

Worse Than I Thought

Proposition 35 is so awful (Chorus:  How awful is it?) that even trafficking victim advocates oppose it:

…The opponents, who range from a South Bay nonprofit to a co-author of California’s current law against trafficking, say that, instead of helping, Proposition 35 will set back their work by years.  Chief among their concerns is the measure’s focus on hefty penalties rather than a collaborative attack on the problem…That approach, they say, ignores the victims…[they] also condemn the discrepancy between penalties for labor and sex trafficking…Most victims don’t end up in the sex trade…yet Proposition 35 provides for lower penalties for labor victims…

The Phoenix Pharisees

The Maricopa County sheriff’s office only “treats prostitutes as trafficking victims” when they find it convenient:  “…Over the course of a month, detectives made 37 arrests on suspicion of prostitution-related crimes…in an unincorporated area of the county tucked between Tempe and Guadalupe…suspects made contact with an undercover deputy, who secured an offer of sex for money and then used a code word as a signal for other deputies to storm the hotel room…”  “Code word?”  “Stormed” the room?  Their pomposity would be hilarious if they weren’t ruining the lives of real women.

Thoughts On My First Conference

I’m the third interviewee in this video.  It’s not very long, but I still figured y’all would want to see it.

Parting of the Ways

This Guardian op-ed presents Michael Wolff’s opinion of the Backpage-Village Voice split; though he has no love for Lacey and Larkin he has even less for Kristof and company, and the article provides the interesting tidbit that some of the anti-Backpage campaign was funded by the Church of Scientology in revenge for the Voice’s relentless attacks on it.

Metaupdates

Bad Fantasy, Good Reality in TW3 (#7)

Cambodian cops are learning to parrot their American masters quite well:

Chan Sreynuch, the owner of Mikasa Coiffure and Beauty…was arrested…on suspicion of human trafficking, according to the national military police spokesman Kheng Tito…According to him, Sreynuch would lead young women — often aspiring singers and students — to her salon, then connect them with wealthy businessmen…Three of her manicured and coiffed callgirls were also detained…[and] sent to Phnom Penh Municipal Hall’s rehabilitation centre for “re-education”…

Coming and Going in TW3 (#12)

“Anna Gristina…has pleaded guilty to promoting prostitution…[she] will be sentenced…to time served and probation as part of a plea deal.  The judge warned the Scotland-born woman she could also be deported…”

An Example To the West in TW3 (#14)

“Workers in the [Korean] sex industry called…for the scrapping or revision of anti-sex trafficking laws…[which limit their] rights to sexual autonomy and their freedom to enjoy a free sex life as adults…another sex worker surnamed Kim submitted a petition…for…judgment on whether the laws are constitutionally acceptable…“

Real People in TW3 (#21)

British prohibitionist Julie Bindel interviewed the Fokkens sisters, the elderly Dutch whores about whom a documentary was recently made; unsurprisingly, she only reports the negative parts and dismisses the “rosy picture the twins paint of prostitution” as just a kind of weird twin-thing.  Of course she is pleased to report that the Fokkens say legalization has been bad for Dutch hookers (largely because of the exaggerated tax assessments European officials commonly use to persecute sex workers), but cannot or will not comprehend that no sex worker rights organization in the world supports Dutch-style legalization.

Neither Addiction Nor Epidemic in TW3 (#29)

If you’re impressed by those brain studies that “prove” porn, sugar, the internet or whatever is “as addictive as cocaine”, you need to consider the study which won this year’s Ig Nobel Prize in neuroscience “for demonstrating that brain researchers, by using complicated instruments and simple statistics, can see meaningful brain activity anywhere — even in a dead salmon.”

This Week in 2011

My columns on Mabon and Banned Books Week were followed by others on misuse of the word “vagina”,  the fallacy of “empowerment”, dehumanization of whores,  dominatrices in the news and women’s views of male sex workers.

This Week in 2010

My first Mabon column, the problems caused by unsatisfied male sex drives, my sex-related pet peeves, one of my earliest columns on “sex trafficking” hysteria  and an angry reply to it, the growth of opposition toward prohibition and my announcement of the Himel decision.

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That Was the Week That Was (#38)

Beware of billionaires who want to save your life.  -  Mark Leno

Modern Marriage

Brooke Magnanti on Catherine Hakim’s new book:

…people are still marrying, still making that leap into the conceptual and statistical improbability of ’til death do us part.  And where does that leave affairs, clients of sex workers, enjoyers of porn and the rest of us?…When many couples choose to remain childless, or have no familial wealth to pass on, why are we still doing this, anyway?  Those questions and a lot more are what drives the narrative of…The New Rules: Internet Dating, Playfairs, and Erotic Power.  In it, [Catherine Hakim]…calmly dissects the differences between the cultures where it’s okay to throw a strop at the first sign of relationships going off piste, and those where adultery is not only usual but expected…

Aversions

In a way, this is one of those “dog bites man” things, unless I’m the only one who’s ever noticed that most women are more sexually open when they’re very turned on:

…A small Dutch study…indicate[s] that arousal overrides feelings of disgust and facilitates a woman’s desire to do something that a woman who is not aroused might find flat-out repulsive…Daniel R. Kelly, an associate professor of philosophy at Purdue…explained that disgust is an “extension of our immune system” that helps prevent people from getting infected by making them wary of things, like bodily fluids, that…make people vulnerable…David Buss, a professor of psychology at the University of Texas…[said] “Women show far more disgust and especially sexual disgust, than men…It helps to protect women from having sex with the wrong men, such as men who might communicate diseases…show signs of a high ‘parasite load’…have poor hygiene and so on,” he said.  What is interesting about the new Dutch paper, the two experts agreed, is that it suggests the mission to avoid the potentially “dangerous” parts of sex takes a backseat when women are aroused…

Who Did Your Tits?

Color me unsurprised:  “Letting women ‘test drive’ larger breasts before a boob job…[by] wearing a heavily padded bra for two weeks while doing ordinary tasks…[has led to them picking] 30 per cent larger [implants] than they first planned – at least one additional cup size.”  Despite claims from insecure women that they hate having big tits, the fact is that many women wish they had gone bigger, and most do so if the implants need to be replaced.

My Readers Write

This could be considered an update to “Welcome To Our World”, “Neither Cold nor Hot” or the “All in the Family” update in last week’s TW3, but the fact that it was written by regular reader Aspasia (in her own blog) trumps all that:

Jezebel ran two articles…that…highlight the hypocrisy of much of their readership…The first…“How to Tell Your Parents You’re A Prostitute”…[is followed by a] comment thread…rife with the moralizing pearl-clutching of feminists who claim to be supportive of women’s choices…Three days later, came [another] article…[which] criticizes certain choices made by women…and…[was] roundly condemned in the…comment thread…but…[the second author]…merely [did] what the average Jezebel reader does whenever sex workers…are discussed:  stripped a whole group of women of their autonomy, projected her own standards onto them, and criticized their choices…

Uncommon Sense

Prostitutes in…Geneva have formed [Switzerland’s] first sex workers’ union, citing foreign competition and the high cost of rent…[it will be] called…the Sex Workers’ Syndicate [and]…aims to operate alongside the organisation Aspasie, which has advocated for prostitutes in Geneva since 1982.  Aspasie primarily concerns itself with the health and well-being of sex workers, while STTS was mainly founded to address prostitutes’ financial concerns and working conditions…

I reckon that’s good news, though I’m a bit wary of the protectionism implied in that first line; if foreign women are excluded, it could potentially create a  bottleneck.  Of course, the government is working on one of its own:

Switzerland has long been criticised by the international community for allowing prostitution by teens as young as 16.  The government has proposed changes to the criminal code which would make it a crime to hire or sell the services of a prostitute who is younger than 18…[due to] a Council of Europe convention it signed in 2010…young sex workers would not be prosecuted for their actions – only those who seek or sell their services would be held responsible…

The age of consent in Switzerland is 16, but once again we see the magical thinking that money somehow taints sex and the complete lack of consideration about what will happen to those girls once their agency is denied and their once-legal trade is semi-criminalized.

We Told You So

More of this, please:

[A Philippine “anti-trafficking” NGO named] the Visayan Forum Foundation (VF) [has been] accused of fraud by…USAID…At least…$5 million…meant to fund the group’s projects…[is] missing…the warrant that led to the search…said…the foundation…may be in possession or control of “falsified private documents which were used and are being used to defraud…donors”…

Scapegoats

“…Carlos Romero…was arrested…and charged with misdemeanor sexual activity with an animal, by officials in Ocala, Fla., but believes the real outrage is that the Sunshine State is ‘backwards’ towards zoophilia…The victimized animal is a 21-month-old miniature donkey named Doodle he purchased two months ago…”  Whatever you may think of Romero’s preferences, ascribing human sexual hang-ups to a donkey in heat is beyond absurd.

The Last Shall Be First

It’s good to see bigots like this criticized by peers and spotlighted by the media:

An Oklahoma County judge is refusing to let men planning sex-change operations switch to feminine names.  District Judge Bill Graves has denied name changes in two such cases so far…[ruling] both times the requests were made for a fraudulent purpose…His position…has generated criticism of him at the courthouse.  Five other Oklahoma County judges who handle name change requests…routinely grant them in transgender cases.

His reason for this prejudice?  Science!

Graves…has concluded a person cannot really change…sex because the person’s DNA stays the same…“A so-called sex-change surgery can make one appear to be the opposite sex, but in fact they are nothing more than an imitation…petitioner has not even had the surgery…To grant a name change in this case would be to assist that which is fraudulent…Genesis 1:27-28 states: ‘So God created man in his own image, in the image of God created he him; male and female created he them.  And God blessed them, and God said unto them, be fruitful, and multiply, and replenish the earth …’  The DNA code shows God meant for them to stay male and female.”

You can always tell a legitimate scientific argument by its quotation of Genesis.

Above the Law

As long as bureaucrats have excessive power over individuals, this will keep happening:

[An]…investigator with Florida’s Department of Children and Families has been arrested for “bribery by a public servant, official misconduct, and falsifying records” after he told a woman under his supervision that he would hide the results of her drug-positive urine test if she would have sex with him.  When [she] refused…Andrew Thomas threatened to report her to her probation officer…[he] is the third Florida DCF employee to be charged this year with a sex-related crime.  In August…Peter Crane…was charged with…molesting two five-year-old girls.  In June…Jean Lacroix…was charged with having sex with a teen who was part of a prostitution ring composed exclusively of foster children…

Naked Truth

Fortunately, most of the journalists who contact me are looking for informed commentary on issues rather than a sex-work story they can twist to fit their own agenda, but Charlotte Shane does an excellent job of skewering the twits who pester non-activist sex workers to “get their real stories”.  If you’re not a journalist or academic you’ll enjoy reading this, but if you are either of those you need to read it.

Worse Than I Thought

California’s “Proposition 35” defines virtually all normal sex as “prostitution” and a lot of normal behavior as “coercion”, lists anyone who has anything at all to do with “coerced prostitution” as a “sex trafficker”, and condemns individuals so labeled to decades of prison, lifetime “sex offender” registration and theft of all their property by the state.  It’s so awful, in fact, that even bona fide coerced prostitutes are against it:  “Anabelle sees herself as a victim of sex trafficking. Stories like hers are driving Proposition 35…But Anabelle isn’t supporting [it]…and her arguments — and those of sex workers and their supporters — paint a very different picture of a law that could hurt the people it’s supposed to protect.”  And if that article’s not enough to convince you, how about this slide show?

Metaupdates

Follow Your Bliss
in TW3 (#16)

Another pervert claims to “help” teenage runaways so he can help himself to their sexual favors:

The founder of [a charity for homeless youth named “Stand Up For Kids”] has been charged with repeatedly sexually assaulting a child over a three year period.  Richard Koca, Sr., 69…faces seven felony charges of sexual assault on a child by a person in a position of trust…The charges…were…sealed…by court order…after KMGH’s report…investigators are preparing for the possibility that more potential victims could come forwarding the case…the organization’s website was no longer accessible online today, and calls to the headquarters went unreturned…

The Pro-Rape Coalition in TW3 (#30)

Sex work-positive journalist Susannah Breslin interviews two porn producers (one of them Ira Isaacs), two actresses and a lawyer about the potential effects of the ramped-up porn prosecutions promised by Mitt Romney should he be the winner of the quadrennial popularity contest.

Feminine Pragmatism in TW3 (#32)

No matter how carefully and thoroughly I scan for items of interest, a few things always slip through the cracks.  While reading about Nadya Suleman using the money from her porn flick to lease a new house, I encountered the sentence “She spent the summer begging for money from fans and offering dates for cash.”  Wait, what?  Sure enough; the linked article is from August 6^th:

…Nadya Suleman…has opened a profile on the dating website  WhatsYourPrice.com, TMZ reports…Although some would consider Suleman’s latest venture a dip into the prostitution pool, Gawker’s Louis Peitzman outlines, “yes, there’s something a little sketchy about selling yourself online, but it’s not prostitution unless they’re paying for sex…”

You’ve got to laugh at the moronic mental gymnastics with which some people justify their childish attempts to draw sharp, static lines between complex, fluid behaviors.  Octomom’s done stripping, porn and sugar baby work, but she’s not a whore, noooooo.  And neither is she a pathetic victim like the rest of us “prostituted women”; according to the house-leasing article,

“It has been the most empowering, liberating thing I have ever done,” Suleman told…Dr. Drew about doing porn.  “There is nothing I won’t do to take care of my family…I had full control and power over my choice.  I take full accountability and I’m proud of it.”

So there you are, ladies; in order for your equally-pragmatic choices to be considered valid, you first have to have 14 fatherless kids you can’t support.

This Week in 2011

A two-part guest column from veteran sex worker rights activist Norma Jean Almodovar was followed by criticisms of people who ask questions but refuse to accept the answers and sex workers who waste energy in internecine squabbles.  “Uncommon Sense” (linked above) was then followed by a look at clueless neofeminist whining and a tale of the Ouled Nail.

This Week in 2010

The week began with my three-part column on the intersection of BDSM and whoring, which was followed by columns on why many escorts shun black clients and the physiological differences between genetic women and post-op transsexuals.  I also told the sad story of an escort I called “April” and published my very first (two-part) Q & A column.

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Robyn Few

Until prostitutes have equal protection under the law and equal rights as human beings, there is no justice.  -  Robyn Few

Last Thursday, sex workers all over the world were saddened to hear of the death (after a long battle with cancer) of the charismatic and tireless Robyn Few, founder of the Sex Workers Outreach Project USA.  When the day finally arrives on which sex work is recognized in the majority of the world as work like any other, hers will be one of the names remembered as instrumental in achieving it.

Robyn L. Spears was born in Paducah, Kentucky, on October 7^th, 1958, to Virginia Owen Spears; she had an older brother and a younger sister and lived in the small community of Lone Oak, Kentucky.  She attended Lone Oak Elementary and Lone Oak Middle School, but dropped out and ran away from home either during or after her 8^th grade year, when she was 13 years old.  The causes of her leaving are not clear, but whatever they were she later reconciled with her mother and in fact died while visiting at her home.  Like so many runaways she soon turned to survival sex work, and though she later received vocational training to be a materials tester for concrete and tried a few “straight” jobs such as drafting, she was never satisfied with these and became a stripper soon after turning 18.  As she says in the video below (recorded in Chicago in July of 2008), “I loved it so much; it was so empowering to be able to get up on the stage…I came alive, and for me being paid to dance and to show my body [that] I was so proud of anyway…it was just an amazing experience.”

After stripping for a while she started working in a massage parlor, then later escort services and a clandestine brothel; in her late 20s she married one of her clients and had a daughter, but after her divorce in 1993 (after which she retained her married name, Few) she moved to California and began to take college classes with the intent of earning a degree in theater.  She became interested in marijuana and AIDS activism, but the bills had to be paid so she returned to escorting in 1996 and soon became a madam.  Like so many of us, she never told anybody about her sex work; her activism was directed toward other causes until fate decreed otherwise.

The events of September 11^th, 2001 engendered a heightened climate of paranoia, and the enactment of the PATRIOT Act soon made an unprecedented level of funding available to any government agency which could make even a remote claim to “fighting terrorism”.  And though then-Attorney General Ashcroft had been strongly rebuked by Congress for devoting more FBI agents to the “Canal Street Brothel” case in New Orleans than to counterterrorist operations, he had learned his lesson and justified later whore persecutions with flimsy “anti-terrorism” excuses.  Robyn’s agency was accused of having “terrorist suspects” as clients and she was arrested in June of 2002,  then convicted of “conspiracy to promote prostitution” and sentenced to six months house arrest (during which the trial judge allowed her to continue her activism).  After her arrest, she was angry to discover that both neighbors and supposedly “enlightened” activists treated her differently once they knew she had been a prostitute; she threw herself even harder into medical marijuana activism, but began to think about how people’s ignorant attitudes and the oppressive anti-sex work laws could be changed.

Her inspiration came a year after her arrest, in the form of the US Supreme Court decision Lawrence vs. Texas:  Justice Antonin Scalia pointed out in his dissenting opinion that “state laws against bigamy, same-sex marriage, adult  incest, prostitution, masturbation, adultery,  fornication, bestiality, and obscenity  are likewise sustainable only in light of [the overturned Bowers vs. Hardwick decision’s] validation of laws based on moral choices,” and though the other justices tried to pretend otherwise Robyn knew that Scalia was correct, and that the court had opened a door for sex workers’ rights.  So after a Berkeley, California high-school teacher named Shannon Williams was arrested for prostitution in August, Robyn gathered a group of sex workers to protest outside the courthouse at Williams’ arraignment in September.  Unfortunately (but understandably), Williams wanted the whole mess to go away as soon as possible and so had no desire to become the “poster child” for prostitutes’ rights.  Robyn of course backed down, but the fire had been lit; with the help of her partner Michael Foley and sex worker Stacy Swimme (whom she had met earlier that year at a medical marijuana protest), she founded SWOP-USA the following month.

The organization was modeled on SWOP Australia, and Rachel Wotton (who now specializes in sex work with the disabled) was instrumental in securing permission for the American group to use the name and helping to set things up.  Within a few weeks the new organization was contacted by Dr. Annie Sprinkle for assistance in arranging the very first Day To End Violence Against Sex Workers, and for the next year Robyn worked furiously to contact politicians and get the attention of the media so as to let them know that sex workers were not going to quietly accept persecution any more, and were mobilizing like those in many other parts of the world to demand our rights.  But after the failure of “Proposition Q”, a ballot measure she wrote which would have established de facto decriminalization in Berkeley, Robyn and SWOP settled in for the long haul and committed themselves to the slow, arduous task of reversing centuries of stigma and decades of oppressive legislation.

Shortly after the two shorter videos were recorded at the International Conference on the Reduction of Drug Related Harms in Warsaw, Poland (May of 2007), Robyn was diagnosed with cancer; she continued to work tirelessly for the cause all through her chemotherapy, and though the disease appeared to have gone into remission in January of 2010 it returned by July of 2011, and this time proved terminal.  She died on September 13^th, 2012 while visiting her mother, and there will be a memorial service on what would have been her 54^th birthday (October 7^th, 2012) at the Milner and Orr Funeral Home in Lone Oak .  I never had the pleasure of meeting Robyn, but as you can see from the personal accounts on her website and the many expressions of grief all over the internet, those who did speak without exception of her warmth, her strength, her good humor, her courage and her plain human decency.  And though it’s an oft-used phrase, there is no other which sums up the way everyone in the sex worker rights community feels about her passing:  she will be sorely missed.

(I am indebted to the Sin City Alternative Professionals’ Association (formerly SWOP-LV) for information and links, and also to a group of Robyn’s school friends from Lone Oak, who contacted me Sunday morning and filled in a number of vital details I could not find anywhere else.  If anyone reading this can correct an error or omission, please email me with the info.)

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That Was the Week That Was (#33)

The truth is always easy to write.  -  Chi Mgbako

Damned If You Don’t

Because “prostitution” is defined purely by a motive, charges depend solely on the statements of cops and are often directed against any convenient victim:

…Guillermo Cuadra says…an apparent prostitute asked him, “Do you want a fuck?” as he was stopped at a traffic light [in Miami.  He said “no” but she signaled another cop anyway]…and…Cuadra…was…ordered into a motel parking lot where…cops pulled him out of the car, pushed his face into gravel, stepped on him and handcuffed him, then…[broke his] left upper arm, [tore] his shoulder ligament and [caused] nerve damage to his elbow and hand…[when] Cuadra [complained about his arm one of them]…responded, “Fuck you…”  Though he had just $3 in cash on him…the city falsely charged him with “solicitation of prostitution, allegedly offering the undercover police officer $60″…

The charges were later dropped, and Cuadra is suing.  If you’re wondering why the cops were so stupid as to claim he offered $60 when he only had $3, it’s because “police reports” are just boilerplate, with the details written long before the actual “sting”.  See also “Zimbabwe” below.

Updates

An Enormous Big Nothing

Reader Casey Nelson shared this story of his own experience as the target of “sex trafficking” hysteria:

…I’m 50+ years old, white, a businessman and have lived in Cambodia for more than 18 years.  I’m married to an Asian woman…and have two beautiful children – a 9 year old girl and 7 year old boy…though they are not distinctly Asian, they are darker than me and not 100% European in appearance…[one Sunday while on an outing] I noticed a woman…taking photos…She held up her camera, pointed at it and said…“Photo you, internet, you pedo…for police,” in a distinctly Italian accent.  I said something like “These are my children.”  She just shook her head and started to raise her camera again.  I said, “You want police?…I’ll call police”…her mind [was] probably…twisted by the constant stream of sensational, repetitive and often wildly-overstated stories of western pedophiles and abused children in Cambodia.  And not only by the western press but by NGOs that profit from it and feed the beast with exaggerated stats and a constant stream of rehashed horrors stories that keep the funds flowing…I figure that when my photo turns up on some Italian website as another pedophile operating…in Cambodia, it will also include a story of my powerful police connections that were on their way to protect me and how she had to flee for her life…

There’s a lot more; I urge you to read it in its entirety as yet another example of the fallout from moral panics.

Convenient and Inconvenient Victims

An excellent essay on victimhood from law professor Chi Mgbako:

When many people think of typical victims of human rights abuse, they often conjure up stereotypical images of passive and powerless people…waiting to be saved.  The biases underlying these notions can lead some human rights advocates to favor  “perfect victims” in advocacy and publicity campaigns, and…to disregard injustices faced by other marginalized individuals who may inspire more ambivalent and complicated responses from the public.  The privileging of “perfect victimhood” is misguided because all people have human rights regardless of subjective determinations of “worthiness”…the danger of the…construct is illustrated by two examples:  Anti-prostitution advocates who privilege abuses experienced by victims of trafficking over violence faced by those voluntarily involved in adult sex work; and society’s failure to view economically disenfranchised black men as victims of the devastating ‘war on drugs’…

For another excellent essay on human rights being independent of “worthiness”, consult Ken White’s “Deserve’s Got Nothing To Do With It”.

A Moral Cancer

The adult obsession with adolescent oral sex isn’t at all creepy or perverse:  “The popular notion that teenagers …are experimenting with oral sex en masse is being challenged by new data…[which shows they’re] about as likely to engage in oral sex before intercourse as they are to have intercourse first…”

May Q & A

Another view of the issues that can arise when a whore falls in love and tries to give up harlotry in order to be faithful to her man, courtesy of Cathryn Berarovich writing in The Gloss.

Against Their Will

As many as 45 sex workers…[escaped from a social institution in Jakarta and]…are currently being pursued by the police…30 [visitors] …were turned away at the entrance gate by 3 guards because it was not visiting hours yet…[then broke in and] urged the inhabitants to escape with them…one of the [intruders]…who was suspected [of being] the sex workers’ pimp was arrested…those social institution inhabitants would undergo guidance in terms of social, mental, physical, and other skills…

Obviously, they were forced to escape by the “pimp”; clearly they couldn’t have wanted to flee a brainwashing attempt be trafficked away from their rescuers of their own free will.

Blackball

I’ve explained how escort services blackball bad customers, and now the UK is introducing a nationwide plan to do the same. But Douglas Fox of Harlot’s Parlour has some reservations:

…Although in this “article” it is claimed that local sex work projects have operated ugly mug schemes for twenty years, real sex workers…have operated them for as long as there have been sex workers…in theory [the plan] should work nationally…however…[it] relies on local [outreach] projects…who…work only with…street workers…[and] have little or no contact with the vast majority of sex workers…The scheme also relies heavily upon the co operation of the police.  Sex workers do not trust the police, with very good reason…Although the new…scheme promises that sex workers can report crimes anonymously through their local project, the real advancement would be if sex workers were able to report crimes against them…directly, with out fear of arrest or harassment.  One is tempted to suggest that the first ugly mug listed…should be the police themselves…

Presents, Presents, Presents!

Thanks so very much to Chester Brown for sending me a copy of his graphic memoir Paying For It.  And as if the gift itself were not cool enough, he autographed it AND drew a cartoon just for me on the title page!  I’ll tell you about the book in an upcoming column, probably around mid-September.

They Still Don’t Get It

Another stenographer who fancies herself a journalist presents yet another collection of prohibitionist myths vomited out by cops.  This one’s especially fascinating in a train-wreck sort of way:

…21 suspected prostitutes [were] arrested during a two-day sting by the regional Street Enforcement Team…Federal grant money was used [because]…the focus was finding underage prostitutes and their pimps.  None were found…prostitution activity in the community …is a mix of local women desperate for money…and an emerging trend of younger Northern California women who work for pimps and target Reno, especially during special events…“Before, it would be older, local women just trying to get a motel room and a rock to smoke,” said [Sgt. Ron] Chalmers…“Now they are younger, from Sacramento being run by their pimps.  We are trying to help these women, and provide victim services,” he said…

This one has it all:  the “gypsy whores” myth, conflation of escorting and streetwalking, internet demonization, “trafficking” mythology, agency denial, a demonstration of the flaws of legalization (the stings were in Reno, Nevada, not far from legal brothels), illegal diversion of federal funds, whore as addict, victim and nuisance all at once, “rescue” as an excuse for criminalization and even Maslow’s Hammer!

Zimbabwe

Here’s a hint, ladies:  if you want this to stop, you need to campaign for decriminalization because whores look just like other women:

Hundreds of Zimbabwean women are protesting in Harare against a spree of arbitrary arrests by local police…[who] are detaining any women they see out after dark for soliciting…police said they have only been arresting commercial sex workers.  Human rights groups, however, claimed hundreds of women have been arrested every week…Inspector Sabau said the crackdown…would continue as long the constitution prohibits prostitution…

Childish Things

Dr. Paul Maginn of the University of Western Australia says it’s time for people to get over their childish attitudes toward sex work:

…the stereotypical image of a sex worker…is a woman forced to work on darkened streets…to feed her drug habit and pay her pimp…[but] the world of sex work is much more complex…Some work…out of economic necessity.  But don’t we all work to pay the bills?  Some people are coerced or part of forced trafficking.  However…research suggests the proportion of these…is very low…Yet we tend to let our minds be overtaken by…those who seek to initiate moral panics about sex work…and other forms of so-called ‘abnormal’ sexual practices, such as homosexuality …Effective policy is based on hard evidence, not media stereotypes or moralistic posturing by politicians or religious groups…

Metaupdates

A Tale That Grew in the Telling in October Updates (Part Three)

This article on a Brooklyn “john school” is like many others CNN has published since it turned completely yellow, but it’s interesting in three respects:  first, that the title calls it a “trafficking class”; second, that it states ordinary men cannot tell adult women from prepubescent children; and third, that they’ve once again lowered the “average age of entry”:

…Rhonnie Jaus, the chief of the Sex Crimes Bureau, said the class attempts to sensitize and educate the men on the dangers of prostitution to both the John and the prostitute.  “You think you’re having sex with an adult, and it…could be…a trafficked child brought from China…”  [Assistant DA Grace] Brainard emphasized that most girls enter prostitution between the ages of 11 and 14…

If the average prostitute starts at 12.5, that means there are two girls out there who started at age two to balance my entry at 33.  Clearly, basic arithmetic is not a requirement for a government position in Brooklyn.

Shifting the Blame in TW3 (#12)

Has anyone else noticed how the search for the Long Island Killer ground to a halt as soon as they recognized he was probably a cop?

…There are arguably lots of reasons why Suffolk County investigators have had a difficult time tracking down the so-called Long Island Serial Killer (or killers, there is much debate) including the condition and age of the bodies…and the difficulty of getting sex workers and their johns to work with active investigations.  But the Post today argues that at least part of the blame can be placed on the local PD not wanting to give up any PR glory to the Feds:  ”Despite repeated signals by the agency that it was ready and eager to deploy units, Suffolk brass have ignored the FBI in an effort to retain control of the high-profile case”…

Chimeric phrase of the week: “sex workers and their johns.”  Kind of like “African-Americans and honkies.”

For Those Who Think Legalization is a Good Idea in TW3 (#29)

Indian sex workers again demonstrate their awesomeness:

The Board of All India Network of Sex Workers has taken exception to an affidavit filed by Ministry of Women and Child Development… “Sex workers expressed strong reaction about the affidavit filed by the Ministry of WCD before the Supreme Court that sex workers are devoid of dignity and that all sex workers should be rehabilitated by all means,” AINSW said in a statement…”Human dignity cannot be robbed by the state based on occupation, caste, creed or economics”…

This Week in 2011

“Blackball” (noted above) was followed by an example of prohibitionist cockroaches fleeing from light, a survey of my “Top Ten” columns at that time, a two-part examination of whores who think they aren’t and short articles on anti-streetwalker laws, diseased amateurs, selective partisan blindness, and a small sex worker victory against Google, plus cops harassing strippers while ignoring serial killers, the absence of “trafficking” in New Zealand and ignorant sexologists.

This Week in 2010

My first Friday the 13^th, film review and miscellanea columns, escort service callers and client behaviors that drove me up the wall, “The Clipboard Effect” and “The Empress Theodora”.

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