Heidi Fliess Takes on Reality TV

Ok, this is several weeks old, but I just saw it.

Heidi Fleiss to Appear on ‘Celebrity Rehab With Dr. Drew’

I am more than a little dismayed by the fact that, for many, this will simply confirm the ‘hooker as addict’ stereotype.

Adult film star, and former candidate for Governor of California, Mary Carey, was on the show’s first season.

Podcast Training for and by sex workers in San Francisco

Hey all, apologies for posting something San Francisco-centric, but in the interest of getting the word out, I couldn’t not share this with Bound, not Gagged. Please pass on freely!

(Text version of this flier after the jump; reblog and share over email and boards!)

Bad Girls Dictionary

New dictionary hopes to help redefine the world’s oldest profession

While most of us never challenge or even consider the role of linguistics in our daily lives, Empower, a charity offering support for sex industry workers, has braved the norm and created the Bad Girls Dictionary, in which typical meanings of words are reworked in a new light. For the creators of the new book, the real definition of a word involves “not just its meaning, but also the context in which it is used”. Written in the first person, the text works to present old ideas in a new prejudice-free light.

To paint a clearer picture of the radical dictionary, let’s take a look at a couple words.

Prostitute n Prefer sex worker. The name others call our profession. Politicians blaming each other for corruption and vote selling also use it, enhancing its negative association. In Thailand, the abbreviation “P” is commonly used to refer to women who have regular STD checks, and researchers use it in statistical analysis. When we hear prostitute or “P” it has the negative connotation of something underground and subversive.

Journalist n Our regular customers; our good friends and supporters; people who like making money from Empower stories; however, sometimes after a story runs, the police crack down, and the women blame Empower.

Fat adj Fat old men, etc. Many fat old men are very respectful, kind, entertaining, generous and polite customers. We’re not prejudiced.

Bush Policy exp During 2003, after Bush’s policy failed to make any impact on the global problems of drugs, arms and terrorism George W. Bush had a new idea. He mistakenly deduced that migrant sex workers were moved by the same channels that drugs, guns and Osama were. Therefore he used us as a scapegoat in unrelated issues.

Along with its colourful entries, the book also includes a sassy 20-FAQ section which is highly recommended for anyone interested in the sex industry. It includes questions such as, “If a customer offers to pay more money, will women agree not to use condom?”

And the given answer, “If you ask this, we understand you believe we are stupid and greedy women who will do anything for money even risk our lives. Would a paratrooper not use a parachute if offered more money?”

The ‘Bad Girls Dictionary’is available for 200 baht at http://www.empowerfoundation.org/. Call 02-526-8311 for more information.

Documentary on Deborah Jeane Palfrey

Straight from the New York Post’s Page Six: Movie Madam

May 13, 2008 — WE haven’t heard the last of Deborah Jeane Palfrey, the DC madam who committed suicide last week rather than go to jail. Literary agents Marianne Strong and Jason Allen Ashlock are discussing doing a documentary on Palfrey with producer Beverly Camhe, and they have also commissioned legendary biographer C. David Heymann and Gerry Visco to “pen a book looking inside the sex industry, with Palfrey as the touchstone. Perhaps her life won’t have been taken in vain,” Strong told us.

Plea Expected for Primary Booker in “Prostitution Ring” Linked to Spitzer

http://www.nytimes.com/2008/05/13/nyregion/13plea.html

Several former prosecutors and defense lawyers said the movement toward resolving the charges against Ms. Lewis and her codefendants suggested that prosecutors were nearing a decision on whether to prosecute Mr. Spitzer. The pleas do not indicate clearly what decision the government might reach, they said.

“It’s an indication — it’s not definitive” that a decision is near on Mr. Spitzer, said Patricia A. Pileggi, a criminal defense lawyer who served for 25 years as a federal prosecutor, five of them as the chief of the public corruption unit in the United States attorney’s office in Brooklyn.

Brandy Bergman, a spokeswoman for Mr. Spitzer, declined to comment, as did Rebekah Carmichael, a spokeswoman for the office of Michael J. Garcia, United States attorney in Manhattan, which is prosecuting the prostitution case.

Will Spitzer ever be forced to endure a day in court?

Sex Work for Free-An Indecent Proposal

I cannot be the whore you need. I know you wanted a muse, a non pro sugar baby who would not talk of needing money, who would not demand a donation or an hourly, who would just adhere to future promises of being your high paid mistress for free..but, no. It won’t be me. I can’t. I couldn’t make it past the first date. I’m sorry. I’m too lazy to dress up and pretend I care when there isn’t cold hard cash involved. Even if you are the one of the bigwigs in a certain huge AIDS foundation and promised to get my sex worker organization it’s dream start up budget from all his associates and more. Some women both within and outside of this movement are naturals at this type of sex work. Some can marry and date rich. Some girls date the big daddies and succeed, but I fear a worse ending, being strung along with promises and dropped off with nothing but cab fare home. And it was such an indecent proposal because I saw you string up my love and passion for sex workers rights as the carrot as you tried to manipulate yourself into my weekly calendar. The thing that got me was that he wouldn’t offer dinner with these late night meetings at the hotel bar that we were supposed to “work on my grant application.” The thing that gets me now is that he said he “didn’t want to even sleep with me until he got my organization funding.” Of course, in his eyes, waiting to sleep with me would justify not paying me for my time, because of course, all prostitutes should be paid for are the sex acts, right? Maybe I screwed up the opportunity for my chapter of SWOP to get funded in major ways in the next year, but let’s hope not. I don’t think that grant decisions, even in Hollywood are decided by the sway of one guy’s sex drive. Especially not the only straight guy in a gay office. I’m sure the gay/bi sleep your way to the dream game is similar. It’s how James Dean made it, I hear. A lot of things in business get done by who you know and who you sleep with, unfortunately, and not just in Hollywood, but in the Foundation/non profit world too. I am too much of a power freak to be a whore for free. Once you’ve been paid extraordinarily for your sexuality-which could take form in listening, smiling, giving advice, engaging in conversation, sucking dick, taking it in the ass or watching someone without judgment or attachment throw their lives away in a dirty motel room smoking crack. Once you’ve been paid, it is really hard to go back to ever going through similar motions for free. You feel somewhat degraded everytime you do. Unless it’s with someone you love, of course. But we don’t love our tricks. We love our jobs. We like and respect our clients at best. Oh, except the sugar babies..they actually do end up marrying their clients, and that is the ultimate win in their eyes, so maybe they do end up loving. Like Ivanna Trump did. Like my mom did… I’ve tried to control the daddy types, but they just won’t play along with my power game. They are the ones who ultimately control. And I just won’t be that girl, so they end up hating me soon enough.

As far as Mr.AIDS Foundation Mack Daddy, I bid silent farewell. He was asking me to mix the day job with the night job, but essentially work overtime doing both for free. I have worked endless hours for this movement without compensation, no doubt, but on my own watch and my own direction. I also don’t know if I want anyone to have access to all of my personas at once. That is priceless. I felt very conflicted for many days about it, but the last time I flaked on him, it felt like the right thing to do.

TODAY! Meditation remembrance for the DC Madame…and keeping it together.

Hey lovers,

Deborah Jeane Palfrey.  I can’t stop thinking about her. Her death cut me deeper than I ever could have imagined.

Her death has been heavy on the hearts of many a sex worker, indicative as it is of this juggernaut of a system that could grind us into nothing if we get caught up.  For me, I think her death translates into real fear.  A fear that is about fighting the good fight, and still going down.  If we manage to survive and thrive in a crazy industry; if we live ethically as sex workers and use all our faculties to operate our businesses and maintain what we believe is right, we still might end up dead.  Ms. Palfrey was a resourceful woman.  A woman connected, perhaps dangerously, to big players in the government.  And she got royally fucked. Someone, somewhere said, we’re going to bring her down.  We’re going to make an example of this one.  And they didn’t stop until she was swinging from a rope.

“Upon news of her death there was no shortage of those who suggested Jeane Palfrey had been killed by cloaked enemies in the government. They miss the point.

Jeane Palfrey of course had been killed by her government. She’d been unfairly ground down and hounded to death by shameless prosecutors and disinterested robed judges in our judicial branch.”

(Bill Keisling, Yardbirds.com )

I regret deeply now that I, we, did not do something more concrete to support her in her struggle.  It is a bare and unpleasant truth that the moment a sex worker comes under legal fire, s/he becomes untouchable.  Abandoned by clients, friends, etc…how did Palfrey end up in her mother’s home?  Why wasn’t she staying with me?  Where were her friends?  Where was her support network?

This blog was begun as a response to her original arrest.  She has, inadvertently, been an enormous catalyst in the sex workers rights movement.  And now she’s dead.

What the fuck.

There will be no procession, fanfare, or jazz funeral for the DC Madame.  Ain’t no crying in the streets for her, except by us, invisibly.  But I want to hold her up in this moment.

All the friends in Barcelona right now, doing the good work at the International harm reduction assoc. conference are making me remember that we are making progress.  Lateral steps toward a more just system.  And I want to thank Deborah Jeane Palfrey for her part in that.  As a contentious figure, a frustrating spin doctor, or a hero.   Whichever.

So today, beginning at midnight GMT (6pm Central, 4pm Pacific) for 24 hours we’re holding a conscious meditation, vigil, or remembrance of Ms. Deborah Jeane.  Light a candle, say some words, or sit in silent meditation with us.  We’ll be sitting for 1 hour at midnight pacific time (8am GMT) and consciously holding her, and what her death means for all of us,  in our thoughts all day.

Please join us!

thinking of you, with love and respect.

Surgeon and Faffs the Jackal

Update from International Sex Worker Harm Reduction Caucus

Some of our friends are currently in Barcelona, representing the International Sex Worker Harm Reduction Caucus at the International Harm Reduction Association’s 19th International Conference.

Over the weekend, Stacey sent us the official statement adopted by the International Sex Worker Harm Reduction Caucus for the event, and in multiple languages too. The introductory paragraph is included below, followed by attachments of the full statement, in English, Spanish, and Russian!

The International Sex Worker Harm Reduction Caucus is a working group of sex workers and sex worker rights advocates who are committed to increasing the participation of sex workers and their organizations in discussions of harm reduction at the international level. We are pleased to present the following key messages about sex workers rights and harm reduction issues to delegates and participants in Barcelona:

Sex Worker Statement IHRA 2008 - English

Sex Worker Statement IHRA 2008 - Espanol

Sex Worker Statement IHRA 2008 - Russian

Sex Workers Tribute Video…

 

 

Martha Stewart’s Dreamers Contest

While browsing BBQ recipes on former convicted felon Martha Stewart’s website the other day, I came across her “Dreamer’s Contest.“   I was asked if I was LIVING MY DREAM and if so, if I was a woman who had turned my hobby into a business and my passion into a successful career?   At stake was $10,000 and a “lifetime” of vacations, which upon reading the fine print is actually only 10 years at a Wyndam Resort timeshare in Orlando, and I’d have to pay my own travel expenses.   Regardless, ten large is ten large, so I submitted my 250 word essay.

I am an attractive, college-educated woman who has been lucky enough to turn a lifelong passion for  anonymous sex with strangers into a wonderful career!   I am a top-rated call girl in my region and offer my clients a relaxing “girlfriend experience” for $300 per hour.   Talk about community service!

I hope they pick me!

Study on Sex Trafficking of Women and Girls in Chicago

DePaul’s Family Law Center to Release Results of Study on Sex Trafficking of Women and Girls in Chicago

The study, titled “Domestic Sex Trafficking of Chicago Women and Girls,” was conducted in conjunction with the Illinois Criminal Justice Information Authority and funded by a grant from the Chicago Foundation for Women. It examined the strategies used to recruit young women; the levels of coercion involved in their recruitment; and the control and violence used to keep women in the trade. The research also examined the geographical areas in which women are forced to work, including the distances they are transported and whether state lines are crossed in the process. One of the goals of the investigation was to explore parallels between young women in the local sex trade and those internationally trafficked to Chicago.

Press release linked above, additional articles about the study listed below.

Alternet: Satisfied Sex Worker or Domestic Trafficking Victim

cbs2chicago: New Study Reveals Danger of Local Sex Trafficking

First International Sex Worker Harm Reduction Mini-Fest 2008

Celebrate our culture! View our mini-fest featuring movies about providing services for sex workers, needle exchange, life in the street sex work economy and fighting for sex workers’ rights.

All films in this selection have been produced by sex workers and their organizations.

Produced by the International Sex Worker Harm Reduction Caucus and volunteer curators from SWOP-LA, SWANK, SWOP-NYC, BPPP, Desiree Alliance and the Scarlet Alliance (the Australian Sex Worker Organisation), and curated in conjunction with the San Francisco Sex Worker Film and Arts Festival.

Deborah Jeane and 9/11 Conspiracy Connection?

9/11 Conspiracy Connection To DC Madam Murder

Palfrey told former NSA official that call girls had picked up information concerning foreknowledge of attacks

Paul Joseph Watson
Prison Planet
Monday, May 5, 2008

Former NSA analyst and Navy intelligence officer Wayne Madsen tells the The Alex Jones Show that one of the key motives behind the DC Madams murder may have been the information her call girls picked up from Washingtons top brass concerning foreknowledge and government complicity in the 9/11 attacks.’;

Former NSA analyst and Navy intelligence officer Wayne Madsen tells the The Alex Jones Show that one of the key motives behind the DC Madam’s murder may have been the information her call girls picked up from Washington’s top brass concerning foreknowledge and government complicity in the 9/11 attacks. Madsen also connected another suspicious death - that of former CIA agent Roland Carnaby who was gunned down by Houston police last week - to another individual who was involved in both the 9/11 cover-up and the D.C. Madam scandal, disgraced lobbyist Jack Abramoff. Noting that Palfrey and her defense team had tried to invoke the Classified Information Procedures Act in the U.S. District Court in Washington, which is only used when classified information or the names of people who are intelligence officers needs to be discussed, Madsen said Palfrey, “Had information which could have a bearing on the 9/11 attacks that some of her employees may have picked up information beforehand that would have been very useful to the 9/11 investigation.”

Madsen added that most of Palfrey’s call girls had been active around the area of McLean Virginia, which is where the CIA and other intelligence agencies are based and where Dick Cheney lived at the time. Host Alex Jones recalled that during interviews Palfrey had told him that her escort service was in fact being used as an intelligence operation to gather intelligence on individuals who used the service, particularly those connected to the military. Madsen, who spoke personally to Palfrey on numerous occasions, recalls one conversation at dinner about a month a go with Palfrey and her asset forfeiture lawyer where Palfrey told him, ‘I have information that would have been of great interest to the 9/11 Commission - there’s information that they have (her call girls) that would have been very important for the 9/11 Commission to know having to do with intelligence they picked up about 9/11 before it happened’. The former NSA official noted that some of Palfrey’s call girls were being chauffeured by Sherlington Limousines to poker parties attended by former CIA director and co-chair of the Joint 9/11 Intelligence Inquiry Porter Goss. One of the reasons cited for Goss’ abrupt resignation in May 2006 was his alleged involvement in a prostitution scandal where lobbyists were holding parties for GOP lawmakers that featured hookers and gambling at the Watergate Hotel in D.C. On the morning of 9/11, Goss was having breakfast with the head of Pakistan’s Inter Services Intelligence (ISI) General Mahmoud Ahmad, the man who ordered a wire transfer of $100,000 to alleged lead hijacker Mohammed Atta.
Deborah Jeane Palfrey.

In addition, Madsen pointed out that Jack Abramoff, who was also connected to the DC Madam scandal, allowed at least two of the 9/11 hijackers to use one of his casino boats in the days before 9/11, and this is what Palfrey was probably referring to when she spoke about her call girls picking up information about 9/11 before it happened. “There’s the link, when you’ve got Abramoff and you had two of those hijackers on his casino boat a few days before 9/11 - I just wonder if that’s what Jeane was talking about,” said Madsen, “Because now I’m looking at this crazy incident in Houston with Roland Carnaby, a retired CIA guy who was still contracted to the CIA, being gunned down in broad daylight by the Houston police department - now I’ve been told by Agency sources in Houston that one of the people he was looking at was Abramhoff and the casino boats - so here you’ve got two people in the same week, looks like they were both assassinated in broad daylight,” he concluded. Many readers will recall that Newsweek reported that military brass in Washington received a warning the night before the 9/11 attacks which led to a September 11 flight being cancelled. “NEWSWEEK has learned that while U.S. intelligence received no specific warning, the state of alert had been high during the past two weeks, and a particularly urgent warning may have been received the night before the attacks, causing some top Pentagon brass to cancel a trip. Why that same information was not available to the 266 people who died aboard the four hijacked commercial aircraft may become a hot topic on the Hill,” according to the September 13 2001 issue. The connection to 9/11 is tantalizing and provides a key motive for why numerous power brokers would have wanted Palfrey to be shut up for good before she had the opportunity to release information in court that her call girls picked up about 9/11 pointing to foreknowledge and government complicity
in the attacks.

——————————

Farewell, Deborah Jeane Palfrey

A touching article by Bill Keisling at Yardbird Books.

Thanks to Yardbird Books for letting us know!

More Scarlet Letters

The Delaware State police earlier this year decided to start stamping people arrested as prostitutes(regardless of conviction). What happened to innocent until proven guilty? Seriously, don’t take my word for it:

In Early January ‘08, the Delaware State Police announced that pictures of those arrested for prostitution related offenses would be made public. This program is a direct effort to curb prostitution and its associated criminal offenses plaguing our community.

Starting February 1st, and moving forward, any person who is arrested (not necessarily convicted) for any such prostitution related offense will be pictured- here- on the TRIC-TICS web site. Those previously arrested, prior to February 1st, will not be included.

–Delaware State Police Website.

There are currently 14 people, and to help keep those 14 people anonymous, I will not be linking the site here. I do however want to give you contact information to calmly and rationally tell these police people they are being entirely stupid. This is not the first time, and doubtful will be the last.

Contact Information:

Corporal/1 Jeffrey C. Whitmarsh, II

Cell 302.598.5188

or call the dept of Internal Affairs 302-739-5901 between the hours of 9am-4pm EST

Tonight: $pread It, Spin It: Dance Party! Launch of $pread Magazine’s Issue 4.1

$pread It, Spin It: Dance Party! Launch of $pread Magazine’s Issue 4.1
*Sexy Raffle, Lapdances, Punk, Rock ‘n Roll, Disco, Soul, & Go-Go*

DJ As If! www.myspace.com/misterzan
DJ Fritz & Plushus www.myspace.com/plushus
DJ Nutritious www.djnutritious.com
Art by Michelle Talich http://www.michelletalich.com &
Cricket Alexander http://www.cricketalexander.com

brought to you by:

SpinSpinNYC

[http://www.spinspinnyc.com]
SWANK
[http://www.myspace.com/weareswank]
$pread
[http://www.spreadmagazine.org]

Date: Thursday, May 8th, 2008
Time: 10pm-4am
Location: The Leopard Lounge
85 2nd Ave @ 5th Street
East Village — New York, NY 10003
Subway: F/V to 2nd Ave, 6 to Astor place, Q R W to 8th St. NYU
Cost: $5 (suggested)

Death of the D.C. Madam hits home

Violet Blue shows the side of sex work you won’t see anywhere but in new media

Looking for the silver lining, I asked Kirchner if she thought there could be a positive outcome in anything surrounding Palfrey’s death. She replied, “This is another issue being discussed among (sex work) providers. Some of us are hopeful that people will be outraged by this to such a degree that it will inspire new action and new voices working to improve the lives of sex workers. But most of us are skeptical, putting our heads down and focusing on our personal needs right now. I’m hopeful that if we can all be supportive of each other while we’re recovering from the shock and create accessible support systems for sex workers who are moved to action, then it is likely that we’ll see more providers becoming vocal about the injustice of prohibition.”

Symposium: “The Sexualization of Childhood”, Featuring Our Favorite Researcher

Point Park University Presents:
The Eighth Annual Childhood and Society Symposium

The Sexualization of Childhood, June 13 – 14, Pittsburgh 

Co-Sponsored by A Home Within 
Up to 8 Continuing Education Units for Psychologists 

Featuring Nationally Renowned Childhood Experts:                

Sharon Cooper               
Gail Dines               
Matt Ezzell               
Melissa Farley               
Diane Levin               
Susan Linn               
Sharna Olfman               
Sandra Steingraber               
Carolyn West

This symposium will address: 

• How boys’ & girls’ gender & sexual development is impacted by our sexualized culture
• Sexual exploitation of children through internet crimes and prostitution
• The dramatic rise in the production and consumption of child pornography
• The exploitation of black adolescent girls through rap music and hip hop culture
• The falling age of puberty in girls as a result of toxic chemical exposures
• What professionals, policy makers and parents can do to make a difference

The Other Professionals: Men & Transwomen in Sex Work

I wanted to link to this over here…and ask, if possible, in comments if anyone with information on Sex Worker Outreach, as it pertains to transwomen and men, could please post it in the comments?  I’m trying to gather some serious information on this, as well, I think it’s an important and sometimes way too over looked subject.

Thanks-Ren

(saving up for Chicago!!!)

 

Sex Work and Trafficking Are Different

Last night, Melissa Ditmore published an article that provided a dose of sanity on RH Reality Check. Yet again, the difference between sex work and trafficking needed to be explained. While the site in question has featured some good writing on the topic, in the past few weeks, two articles appeared that begged clarification. Dr. Ditmore answered that call.

The tendency to treat trafficking and prostitution as if they were the same thing has a long and problematic history. Legislation and social discussion have often blurred or denied any difference, but that has always made things worse rather than better for those involved.

The trafficking of women and children into sexual slavery is undeniably a gross abuse of human rights. Like all trafficking, it involves coercion or trickery or both. Sex trafficking is an odious forms of trafficking, but it is far from the only one. Men, women and children are also — and more commonly — trafficked routinely for purposes of household and farm labor as well as sweatshop manufacturing. Their lives may be less media-genic than those of sex trafficking victims, but they are no less brutal, dangerous and degraded.

Sex Work, Trafficking: Understanding the Difference

Sanity, via comments following the story, is greatly appreciated!