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May 28th, 2009
cacophonicpulse
 | 04:43 am - Carol Queen & Nina Hartley
Is anyone here going north of I-81 to D.C. for The State of Sex: Sex and Freedom in the Obama Era with Carol Queen & Nina Hartley?
I really want to go, but I don't have a ride. I can pitch in for gas. I live in Blacksburg, Virginia.
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April 15th, 2009
bialogue
 | 06:52 pm - [USA} PLEASE NOTE: Fwd: [SWIRL]: Sex Worker Murdered in Boston
Yesterday a sex worker from NYC was brutally murdered here in Boston. Police are saying they think its the second attack by the same guy (first was not killed).
He makes appointments with people on Craig's List to come to Boston and meet him in nice hotels. There are surveillance photos of the guy being posted now, at this link:
http://www1.whdh.com/news/articles/local/BO110496/
PLEASE spread the word to anyone you think needs to know about this.
Feel free to post on list servers. I'm thinking that people outside of Boston may not know this is happening -- and those are the people he's preying on.
Judy
SWIRL
PLEASE READ AND REPOST - HELP SAVE A LIFE -- THANK YOU
Current Location: USA
Current Mood: ![[mood icon]](http://l-stat.livejournal.com/img/mood/classic/sad.gif) worried
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March 10th, 2009
ohh_anxiety
 | 05:57 pm - bbws, fatties, and pretty faces: size and the sex industry
If you've seen this call out in another fat and/or sex work community, I'm sorry.
I'm currently writing a non academic article on fat (or plus size, or bbw, but I currently use fat) women* in the sex industry. I'm interested in exploring both the positive effects of fat women in porn and the industry in general (feelings of acceptance, making bank, you know the deal ) and the negative (are fat fetish sites representing us fairly? does this "other" us even more? etc). Because it's non academic, and I don't do strict reportage, I have the opportunity to talk about my own experience, but it's important to me to talk to other women about their work and experiences.
If you fit the categories, please PLEASE consider getting in touch to answer a few questions. you can email me at rina.anxiety at gmail.com
*this definition includes bio, cis, and identified, obviously.
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princessebee
 | 08:06 am - Obama, Please Ignore Kristof For Now
by Melissa Gira Grant - blogger from http://deepthroated .wordpress. com/ the fabulous Desiree Alliance blog in the US
http://www.huffingt onpost.com/ melissa-gira- grant/obama- please-ignore- krist_b_164775. html
Nicholas Kristof has been issuing ad-hoc Presidential guidance on the sex trade for years now. The archive of his editorial column in the New York Times serves as a record of his proposals. In 2004, he "bought the freedom" of two women working in brothels in Poipet, Cambodia with the intention of returning them to their villages. Kristof wasn't prosecuted under US law for the purchase of sex slaves -- he wrote of this sale as an "emancipation," and in 2005, he was back in Poipet to check up on the women. One had returned to prostitution, prompting Kristof to offer another round of recommendations to President Bush, pleading with him to commit the United States to a New Abolitionism.
Now he's back with his 2009 agenda, delivered like the others, as a kicker to his column. In it, he asks that the Obama administration pressure the Cambodian government to bust more brothels, on the premise that the risk of going to jail for selling sex will hurt brothel owners' profits and will protect more women from abuse and violence. Yet such stings and raids are already the centerpiece of a disastrous crackdown on Cambodian prostitution. The Bush administration has supported the raids of Cambodian brothels for at least as long as Kristof has been demanding they step up a fight they are already in -- and losing.
It was under threat of sanctions from the United States that prostitution was outlawed in Cambodia. The resulting government-sponsore d raids on brothels did not lead to a great improvement in the lives of women and girls. Instead, the same police tasked with "liberating" women from Cambodia's brothels have been accused by human rights groups of abusing these same women.
In a video made by members of the Asia Pacific Network of Sex Workers (APNSW), one survivor of what was called a "rehabilitation center" relates the story of being gang raped by six members of the police force: "They raped me from one after the other... the last one didn't use condom because I got only five condoms. I told him that I have HIV but he was not believe me. He said if I had HIV, would have scar on body, not so smooth." Another woman survivor describes her time in the Koh Kor rehabilitation center. It sits on the same island that was once home to a Khmer Rouge prison and execution camp. She explains that when she asked questions about why she had been taken in against her will, and what was wrong with what she was doing, she was repeatedly beaten by her captors -- the police. These are the people -- the police, and the government officials who have operated brothels in a network of corruption -- that Kristof would like us to trust to combat violence.
Setting a human rights agenda for the United States will be an enormous challenge for Barack Obama and his incoming administration, with a host of failed Bush campaigns to contend with. His handling of so-called "sex slavery" will be but one. When considering how he ought to proceed, to undo damage done, and to improve human rights around the globe, Obama should look not to Kristof and his urgent cries, but to those women who are currently imprisoned and violated by the people who were supposed to "save" them. To endorse brutal, violent raids and "rehabilitation" as a solution to the brutality and violence of coerced prostitution ignores the evidence that raids do nothing to discourage abusive conditions -- they perpetuate them.
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princessebee
 | 08:04 am - Uni team studies sex worker impact - aka disaster waiting to happen!
March 07, 2009
Article from: Australian Associated Press
A TEAM of researchers from a Sydney university intends to speak to residents living near sex workers so it can pass its findings on to state and local government authorities.
According to the University of Sydney's professor of built environment, Spike Boydell, legislation related to the sex industry "is largely based on anecdotal information' '.
"There is a dearth of research into the relationship between the choices made in regulating the sex industry, as well as the real and perceived impacts on the community,'' Prof Boydell said in a statement today.
He said the research will "inform urban planning and environmental control by highlighting what matters in terms of neighbour relations generally''.
Prof Boydell and his team will gather information from residents living near brothels, street-based sex workers, erotic massage parlours and home-based sex workers in the greater Sydney region.
The team intends to publish its findings next year.
Thoughts? I'm so freaking tired of academics "studying" us and our work. It rarely ends well.
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March 2nd, 2009
princessebee
 | 09:54 am - Consensual Underage Sex Work: Discussion
Hi all,
I'd like to open up a discussion, for anyone who's interested. It's a tricky issue and I expect there to be a very wide variety of equally valid feelings on it.
The topic is consensual under age sex work.
Last week, this story hit the media:
15 year old schoolgirl makes small fortune working as a prostitute
A 15-YEAR-old schoolgirl in northeast England earned about £14,000 ($A30,641) over two months by working as a prostitute.
Her unusual weekend job was exposed when a teacher at her school in South Shields, near Newcastle, found condoms, lubricant and details of the agency she worked for in her school bag.
Police officers who searched her home found more than £8000 stashed in the attic in November last year. The girl, who cannot be named because she is a minor, is thought to have netted around £1700 pounds every weekend.
Details of the case emerged during a hearing at South Tyneside Magistrates Court on February 13 to decide what should happen to the cash.
Asa Anderson, representing Northumbria Police, told the hearing: "The money was seized after police received a phone call from a school where a teacher found a pupil's bag. The bag was found containing certain items."
The court decided the cash should be forfeited to the authorities.
Police said a man aged 44 and a woman aged 46 were arrested on suspicion of inciting child prostitution, but later released facing no further action. The schoolgirl herself is not thought to be facing any charges.
The details on this are very scant and I am in favour of that remaining so in order to protect the girl at the heart of the issue.
But what I can glean from this report is this: The girl knowingly made a choice to work in the sex industry and deceived the people around her in order to do so. The fact that the older man and woman were released and not due to face further action indicates that if, as it seems to suggest, they are the owners of the premises she worked within, they did not know her true age.
What occurs to me is this girl is highly intelligent and proactive. I am angry that the authorities have confiscated her money, that she earned. To my mind they have done this in order to punish her for getting one over on them and I think it is utterly wrong. It infuriates me, because she earned that money fair and square and the confiscating of it strikes me as far more abusive and exploitive than an activity she consensually took part in...
... Which brings me to the discussion points:
I would posit this girl is particularly precocious, but the fact remains she is underage. The issues around sex with older people and those who are underage revolve around power disparity.
What do you feel a 15 year old's capacity is to truly consent to sex work?
Can we really apply a blanket standard across all those of a certain age, disregarding personal development and individual circumstance?
Is a 15 year old really able to make an informed choice?
The fact that she deceived everyone, including the possible brothel owners, indicate she was not coerced by anyone into it. How do you feel about this? Does she have the right to work if she has the ability to deceive the system?
I think the line becomes more blurry when others become involved - for example, if the brothel owners had been aware of her underage status, that points to a power disparity but I'd still argue it's not going to be exploitation every time.
And I won't ever argue there are situations in which the underaged are coerced or manipulated into the sex industry and that is extremely, indisputably wrong - but is it always the case?
And when it isn't, what is the appropriate response? Is there one?
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February 27th, 2009
blackgrass
 | 05:36 pm - 15yr old high class sexworker in UK.
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-1155502/Suspicious-teacher-exposes-double-life-girl-15-earning-100-000-year-upmarket-prostitute.html
A 15yr old girl was found out to be a prostitute..not only that, a high class one, & earning £100,000 pa.
See link.
Though the issues that this girl is under-age is not under dispute.
They have confiscated £8,000 they found..but why? Who gets that? It makes you wonder doesn`t it? Maybe though they are using it in evidence in some way, if thats the case they should say so. minor or not, she obviously worked for the money & deserves it back.
The stance because she is legally a minor, is that she is a victim...but what if she wasn`t? She probably is now, because she will see it as a way of getting away from the blame & social stigma created when such things like this happen.
So back to what I was saying, what if she wasn`t a victim? What if she wanted to make money & make it fast? What if she was using the youthful advange within the sex industry to harvest while the goings good!
There can be few jobs in this world where the possibility to make more money as a young, fresh person than your older counterparts.
As you get older in the sex industry you tend to re-define yourself in a futile catch-up process that you lose as the years pass by.
I am quite angry at the response to this girl, because as usual, huge assumptions are made.
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February 25th, 2009
princessebee
 | 07:54 am - Stand up for your work rights
<a href="http://cherrie.e-p.net.au/features/stand-up-for-your-work-rights.html" _fcksavedurl="http://cherrie.e-p.net.au/features/stand-up-for-your-work-rights.html" target='_blank">Original article here
Elena Jeffrey’s dispels the myths about sex trafficking.
Pornpit Puckmai is an articulate and proud sex worker from Empower Foundation, Chiang Mai, in Thailand. She spoke to CHERRIE about mainstream feminists from Australia who would like to ‘rescue’ her from sex work.
“Why has it been so easy to convince Australian people that all Thai women sex workers are victims of trafficking? Perhaps because it supports the stereotype of the weak, helpless Asian woman? Maybe because we’re not white? That English is not our mother tongue? Because our country is not as rich as yours? Maybe because we are smaller, and look younger than you?”
“The problem is not that there are Thai women doing sex work in Australia,” Pornpit says, “but that Thai women doing sex work in Australia are not equally protected under the law.”
Criminalising sex work does not result in the abolition of sex work. Instead it creates an underground sex industry that makes sex workers more vulnerable to corruption and exploitation and less able to access mainstream health and protective services. Efforts to abolish sex work have been attempted many times and have failed in every case. Anti-trafficking laws have criminalised sex worker migration and sex workers are angry!
Sex workers have a huge community in Thailand, “representing a workforce of about 200,000,” Apha Norta, also of Empower Foundation, explained to CHERRIE, “about the same size as the Thai police force or the Thai monks.” Thai sex workers travel to Australia for work, but are often not eligible for a visa. Some migrant sex workers in Australia, around 300 a year, find themselves in a debt contract of thousands of dollars after having their travel and visa organised for them.
Anti-trafficking policies stand between sex workers and unimpeded travel around our region. Apha Norta told CHERRIE: “Prostitution law, immigration law, migrant labour law, entertainment place law, zoning policy and now anti-trafficking laws are the new mountains and rivers my neighbours must overcome in search of a good life.” Worse still, sex workers have been criminalised in South Korea, Cambodia and China as a result of feminist attacks on their work, all in the name of anti-trafficking.
Feminists are ensconced in whorephobic campaigns in South Korea, with support of big business. Minseongnoryeon, the Seoul Sex Worker Organisation, explained in a media release last year, “Sex workers in prostitution areas (jipchangcheon) all over the country are experiencing the double suffering of first the attack from ‘mainstream feminists’ who turn the Special Laws Against Prostitution into a political weapon and demand the abolition of prostitution areas, and then of "construction capitalists" who aim at profiting from redevelopment.
“Although the former claim to ‘rescue’ us and the latter want ‘city aesthetics’, they are no different in the way they erase our right of survival and right of abode.”
Police brutality has been another unintended outcome of feminist anti-trafficking campaigns. In Hong Kong this included public shaming of migrant sex workers on Kowloon. “In June 2005 they arrested a group of people suspicious of illegally working as sex workers, and treated them with torture,” Zi Teng, Hong Kong Sex Workers organisation, reported, “they retained over 80 people in a tiny iron cage of 200 square metres.
“There was plenty of rubbish and leftovers inside the cage. The people there had to suffer from the heat emitted from air-conditioners nearby and the severe sunshine for thirteen hours, allowing other people to watch them and take pictures.”
Migrant sex workers caught up in anti-trafficking raids are forced into detention centres, sometimes described as ‘retraining camps’ by religious anti-sex work projects in the Asia-Pacific region, projects that were funded by the Bush administration. “Rape by security guards at the detention centre is routine,” Pik Sokchea of the Womens Network for Unity, Cambodian Sex Workers Union, told CHERRIE.
However, the US Government is also about to turn around on this issue, noted by Minseongnoryeon: “The 2008 Trafficking in Persons Report, published by the US Department of State, documented that ‘because of the large scale crackdown…. this law has blatantly failed.” The Obama Government will hopefully reverse many of the anti-sex work policies of the Bush regime and begin to listen to sex workers, not just in America but across the globe.
The Howard Government followed in Bush’s footsteps and chose to listen to an anti-sex work message on trafficking, mostly driven by feminists whose agenda is to criminalise sex work. They assume incorrectly that all sex work has a trafficking component. The Howard Government treated “sex” trafficking and “labour” trafficking differently, and did not recognise sex work as work. This led to raids and deportation of migrant sex workers in Australia, under the guise of ‘protecting’ sex workers from trafficking.
Pornpit Puckmai is furious about these policies. “We are seen as empty pages that the anti-prostitution lobby, George Bush and anyone with an agenda can write upon. They do not respect us as adult women with full histories, lives, skills, plans and dreams of our own. They think we are stupid, ignorant and pity us and judge us as powerless. We are not recognised as working women and head of the family who support five to eight other adults.”
The Rudd Government does recognise the rights of these working women. Minister Bob Debus is supporting sex worker organisations to develop closer links with Empower Foundation in Thailand and improve peer education for migrant sex workers in Australia.
“Some people say sex work is dangerous or damaging,” Pornpit Puckmai of Empower concluded, “but many jobs are much more dangerous than sex work - police work, snake catcher, crocodile farmer, security guard, boxer, truck driver, miner, and we don’t ban those jobs! Other jobs also use intimate labour – nursing, medicine, surgeon, nanny, massage, carer, and we don’t ban those jobs. We try to make these jobs as safe and as healthy as we can. We apply safe and fair standards. We change the conditions, not the work.”
Links of interest:
Scarlet Alliance (Australia)
Zi Teng (Hong Kong)
Empower Foundation (Thailand
Anti-trafficking: Cambodia, The Reality
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January 25th, 2009
January 13th, 2009
blackgrass
| 01:10 pm - Questions to a sexworker!?
Don`t you think its gone really quiet on journals the past few months compared to what it was like?
Anyway...I thought some time back about a possible questionaire that the public or non-sexworkers might respond to in a constructive way.
These are not the questions from clients..but the possible questions from the public, if they had the chance to talk to a sexworker/s, & at the same time putting aside their prejudices. In other words saying not what they think..but what they would like to know!
Any idea of what those questions may be?
& what would sexworkers like to see in action or put into place about the sex industry as a whole, within reason?
Current Mood: ![[mood icon]](http://l-stat.livejournal.com/img/mood/classic/confused.gif) curious
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January 3rd, 2009
fromdistantstar
 | 10:04 pm - Stepping Up to the Pole
I am new to the sex work world and am planning on starting dancing within the next month in San Francisco.
A close friend of mine was a dancer for a while, and I have learned a bit from her about the good and the bad and a few tricks of the trade. But I prefer to have a really solid idea of what I'm getting myself into before I leap, and I'm looking for women & resources in the bay area that I can utilize. I'll be moving to SF from the northeast and have no experience with the dancing scene out there whatsoever, outside of reading about it.
If I can't hook up with some supportive ladies in SF, I'd love to at least get talking to people and have some brains to pick when a new question comes up, and for a few different perspectives on problems I might encounter. My friend who was a dancer is available to me completely as emotional support, but she's pretty done with dancing and is not interested in helping me break into it.
As a last resort & side note: I'm reading everything I can get my hands on, from back issues of $pread to blogs to dissertations and any website containing relevant advice. If you have anything to suggest, please do!
(I decided dancing would be the simplest form of sex work for me to get into, since I'm just starting out. If you think there are better options, I'm interested.)
If you're interested in helping me out, let's trade email addresses.
(I considered posting mine here, but I'm not sure what the likelihood of harassment is...)
Thanks!
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December 3rd, 2008
bigsockgrrl
 | 12:02 pm - Sex work on grad school apps?
I'm working on grad school applications right now, and I'd like to find a way to talk about my work as a pro-domme rather than just omitting the experience entirely. I've got to submit resumes and explain long work gaps, so it would be quite useful if I could find a good way to talk about it that doesn't bring up the negative bullshit most people think about sex work and sex workers. Plus, my work at the house has taught me more about working with people, holding good boundaries, and therapeutic mind fuck than any other work experience I've had, so it's relevant to applying to programs where I'll be learning to become a therapist.
Have you mentioned your sex work in application(s) for mainstream work or school? If you did, how did you describe it? Even if you haven't, any ideas you've got would be helpful.
Edit to clarify: It's quite likely that I won't spell out that what I was doing was sex work. I'm looking for a way to re-frame it. For example: I taught classes for an educational/social group for trannies, genderqueers, and allies interested in BDSM. I'm including it on my resume as safer-sex educator. It's a true description, and it avoids the hot button aspects of what I was doing.
Thanks!
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October 27th, 2008
bialogue
 | 02:51 pm - [Cali USA]: 10,000 Volunteers needed to help WIN EQUALITY in CA! *REPOST*
( Read more... )
REPOST REPOST REPOST PLEASE
Current Location: California USA
Current Mood: determined
Current Music: We Are the Champions
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October 21st, 2008
hexyhex
 | 07:39 pm
http://nocleanfeed.com/
There are so many reasons why the "clean feed" idea is a really, really shit one. Many people have pointed them out in better words than I can muster. But to throw another spin on the issue that I haven't seen many people addressing: This has extremely serious potential ramifications for sex workers across Australia.
The internet has revolutionised the way sex workers (independent OR brothel based) advertise and reach out to clients, and how clients find and contact us. Even the less-tech-savvy workers and establishments are usually listed in a few directories that are heavily perused by clients.
To put it simple and selfishly: If this shit comes in, and the vast majority of Australians are prevented from accessing adult services sites, I'm going to suddenly find it very difficult to make a living.
Contact deets for the Minister for Broadbands and Intertubes are here. Please take the time to voice your objection.
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October 10th, 2008
blackgrass
| 08:54 pm - Spread magazine in desperate need of staff!
Spread magazine are in desperate need of staff, can anybody help them out here?
DESPERATE CALL FOR NEW STAFF Calling $pread fans:
If you want to see us keep publishing, now is the time to step up and help! Most of our core staff have left in the past year, including three out of four editors (the last one is leaving in a few months), our art director, financial director, ad director, and new media director. A few very dedicated staffers are holding the magazine together but they desperately need help. People are always telling us that $pread is important but now we need you to put your time where your mouth is and get on board so we can keep it going. We currently don’t have the resources to coordinate with long distance volunteers so we’re looking for people in the NYC area who can attend weekly Sunday meetings and dedicate at least ten hours a week to $pread (although you don’t need to be able to work during regular office hours). Volunteers MUST be reliable, self-motivated, and willing to jump in at the deep end and pitch in with whatever needs to be done. We are specifically looking for people with design skills, but we need general volunteers too. We also ask that you make a commitment to $pread for at least a year. We know this is a lot to ask of unpaid staff but $pread has always relied on such dedicated volunteers. The original team who have kept $pread going over the past few years are thoroughly burned out and can’t do it anymore so we need an enthusiastic new team to take over. So, if you live in New York and care about $pread, please put your life on hold and step up to help us get through the next year.
Email info@spreadmagazine.org if you can help.
Current Mood: ![[mood icon]](http://l-stat.livejournal.com/img/mood/classic/shock.gif) anxious
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October 5th, 2008
September 25th, 2008
September 22nd, 2008
beat_ho_
 | 10:52 pm - Critical Resistance in Oakland: This Weekend. Good Sex Worker Panels
mmm, it's been hurting to walk down stairs again, & the silver lining to the aging body is that when one gets busy & forgets self care, the vulnerabilities of the mortal flesh will holler for stage. My knees have been hurting again & that has become, in the last couple of years, my body's hints that I'm overbooked & under-nursed.
I've slept alot of the day & picked up some supplements & am sitting down after this to chart out my week in effort to take care while I have an anatomy exam on Thursday & CR10 sessions this weekend.
SEX WORKERS & anyone really: please tell BayArea folx about the Critical Resistance Conference happening in Oakland, at Laney College, Sep. 25-28. This prison abolition conference marks the 10th yr. anniversary for this organization, founded by Angela Davis, that will prove to be instigating & inspiring! I don't know how often I hear people talk about the end times, & I witness people sinking deeper into their mattresses, while there are considerable actions, perspectives & ideologies that can lift the apathy from our follicles, & damn-if that doesn't feel better than bitterness, believe.
there will be more than 200 workshops, as well as incredible performances from across the nation & I believe world. & there's an amazing medical/healing space with free body work! It is free, no excuses to not come out & learn how the p.i.c. impacts all people in the u.s. & abroad. How we can remove its joints.
criticalresistance.org/article.php
I have organized & will facilitate a session called:
"Sex Workers Buck & Behead the Criminalization of their Trade," that will take place Saturday, September 27, 4-530pm.
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September 21st, 2008
September 18th, 2008
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