Donna Hughes and the anti rights activists victory in Rhode Island

Recently URI Professor Donna Hughes lead a successful campaign to criminalize indoor sex workers in Rhode Island. She and her allies championed this in the legislature as their great David Vs. Goliath battle and a resounding victory for women and trafficking victims.

However, this “victory” in actuality means that both consenting legal adult sex workers and trafficking victims are now subject to arrest where they weren’t before. Leading to a few thoughts.

1. The fear of arrest places the police and legal system out of reach for sex workers that were victimized by a crime.
2. How is the sex worker that was doing sex work to earn a living better off with an arrest and criminal record? How does this enhance her ability to get a job outside the sex industry? The anti rights activists so staunchly proclaim to be working toward giving options to sex workers wanting to leave the industry. Yet when does an arrest/criminal record enhance a job search? Never.

3. The non consenting trafficking victim now has to worry about being arrested and somehow being able to convince the police and justice system that she is a victim of trafficking in order to escape her trafficker. How often, realistically, are the police going to be open to that explanation? How often are the police going to ignore the trafficking victim’s arguments that they are a trafficking victim because they get an easy collar and the D.A gets an easy conviction?

Finally, Donna and her anti rights activist allies in Rhode Island portrayed their struggle as David vs. Goliath. With their cause and it’s activists being David. In reality, Donna Hughes and her anti rights activist allies had the support of the police in their efforts, the backing of the US Government via the abysmal Trafficking Victim’s Protection Act, and a mislead public pumped up on the fear mongering of Hughes, CAT and their allies. Meanwhile the alleged “Goliath” is an indoor based prostitute trying to earn a living in a society that virtually no one argues stigmatizes prostitutes.

Donna Hughes, CAT and their victory protect no one. They instead have done a great deal of harm. The only victory here is for the activist profiles of Donna Hughes and her allies as they can place a “victory” on their CV’s. Apparently their victory at the expense of many ruined lives is some morally superior fast track to them? To me it’s just corrupt opportunistic activist/academic career advancement for Ms. Hughes and her allies at a horrible price for many that are allegedly being protected, but instead pay a high price for the theatrics of Donna Hughes and her allies.

Las Vegas Attorney Seeks to Aid Brothel Workers

By way of the Sex Workers’ Virtual Community, attorney Leon Greenberg is offering to represent brothel workers on a contingency basis for unfair labor practices.  He appears to be teh real deal and here’s what he says about himself:

I am an attorney who represents employees who are not paid proper overtime wages, minimum wages, or other compensation owed by their employers. It has come to my attention that Nevada brothel sex workers are considered “independent contractors” by the brothel operators. As a matter of law I believe that to be incorrect and they clearly should be treated as employees of the brothels employed in a legal business. That would mean they would have the right to minimum wages, overtime wages, social security contributions from employers, workers compensation benefits, the right to form employee unions, and so forth. I believe numerous Nevada brothel workers may be owed substantial amounts of money because of the brothel owners’ violations of the law. I am interested in advising brothel workers of my services. I work on a collection only basis and would not charge any up front fee.  I can be reached at 702-383-6085.

“Working Sex: Power, Practice, and Politics”: Desiree Alliance Conference July 25-30, 2009

Mark your calenders for the 2010 Desiree Alliance conference in Las Vegas! 

Check out this link for more info.: http://www.desireealliance.org/conference.htm

A ‘course’ on trafficking with only one hurdle

Following up on the issue of misuse of academic status and questionable credentials, last year she included a piece of my writing in the syllabus of a course at the University of Rhode Island called Human Trafficking and Contemporary Slavery. Mine appears to be the only reading not taking an avidly ‘anti-trafficking’ stance. The goals for learning about the week’s topic, Analyses of Sex Trafficking & Prostitution, were:  ’Read different analyses and perspectives on sex trafficking and prostitution from different philosophical and analytical perspectives: Christian, feminist, psychological, and economic migrant workers rights.’ This sounds good, but here is the list of readings:

Enslaved in America, Tina Frundt
A Christian Perspective on Sexual Trafficking, Lisa Thompson
Prostitution and Male Supremacy: A Feminist Analysis, Andrea Dworkin
Working in the European Sex Industry: Migrant Possibilities, Laura Agustín
The Swedish Law that Prohibits the Purchase of Sexual Services, Gunilla Ekberg
Survivors of Trafficking and Prostitution Manifesto
Not Sex Work

I believe all the other pieces are fundamentally against prostitution per se and against the idea of sex work as work ever. In that case, students are not getting a rounded view of the varying ways to think about the issues. My piece is anthropological, an exposition of what I’d learned through spending years hanging out/doing research with migrants who sell sex. I wrote it at the request of the editor of a Madrid migration journal who asked for an article about migrants who sell sex that would be free of moralising. I agreed without for a moment imagining the enormous conflict that would arise when I turned in what to me seemed to be a harmless, purely descriptive piece. You can read more about that drama in this piece today on Harlot’s Parlour.

The following section is, I’m told, what totally winds up certain people – theory and background information apart. It’s from ‘Working in the European Sex Industry: Migrant Possibilities,’ Laura Agustín, translated from the original ‘Trabajar en la industria del sexo’, OFRIM/Suplementos, June 2000. This piece wins me endless emails from kids in Latin America looking for employment, by the way.

‘If we look at the description of what constitutes the industry, we find possible jobs as a telephone worker, in which the client is not even seen. Or as a striptease artist, which in many places involves dancing nude and nothing more. Even if we talk about ‘full sex’, it isn’t the same doing it for a pornographic film as in a brothel (or, for example, with clients of sexologists. Obviously, they are different jobs, some carried out in bars, others in houses, offices or examination rooms. In some the worker controls the situation and the hours more; in others he lacks control. Some are well paid, others not. Some services seem easy to perform to some people, while to others they seem difficult. The boss or owner of the place may be the most important element in some jobs. In short, everything depends on the specific situation. It’s the same if we look at the many forms of physical/sexual contact, of serving the client. [5] Obviously, performing oral sex on a client in a car or in an alley in the rain is not the same as spending a shift inside a club with heating, where you talk and have drinks as well as sex with clients. We can however point out some necessary abilities for carrying out these jobs well, that is, in the most efficient and less problematic manner. In general terms:

• The essence of the work is giving pleasure to others. The worker who doesn’t want to or can’t do this, no matter how good-looking, will fail. The client wants to feel some kind of pleasure.

• As in other service work, the ability to relate to others is very important. To know how to listen ‘actively’, negotiate, encourage, read the body language of the other, sense what is not said and the psychology of the other. To judge when the other is not all right (and not to confuse this with physical appearance). Capacity to smooth situations and calm violent people, confronting or manipulating them. Also necessary for those who work over the telephone.

• Ability to relate to and come to appreciate people from other cultures or ethnic groups or with values different from one’s own. Diplomacy. Clients may be rejected, but income is lost. Being able to imagine the situation of the other, as much through what he wants to hide as through what he reveals. Understanding more than one language.

• Knowing oneself well is extremely important in sex work. Knowing how to use the body sexually and how to take care of oneself, minimising infections, strains and exhaustion, whether physical, emotional or spiritual. It’s necessary to know when one is tired or with little desire to work, because states of neglect often lead to danger. Self-esteem is essential.

• The worker needs a lack of shame about bodies. To be able to talk about sex and show sexual things. A good sense of humour helps.

• As with the jobs of nurses and stewardesses, it is essential to give the client the sensation that he really is desired, that giving him pleasure or taking care of him matters. This is also necessary for cultivating a loyal clientele, one that comes back.

• Often the client wants to talk about his life: problems in his marriage, with his children or at his job. He may have lost his wife or need counseling. The ability to satisfy this type of desire or to want to help to resolve the problems of others is part of sex work. Sometimes this kind of attention matters even more than sex to the client.

• Knowing how to put limits, control what happens and protect oneself from excessive demands. Being able to maintain boundaries with client, who may have many emotional needs.

• Knowing how to sell is key, including over the telephone and in written messages (electronic mail, chat, mobile phones). Seduction is an art that few command, which helps explain the high status of courtesans and geishas in the past. Nowadays transsexuals are often most famous for knowing how to seduce.

• For people who work on their own or have a business it is fundamental to know how to manage funds: accounting, taxes and investments. Knowing how to negotiate, decide on prices.

• The ability to manage, organise and oversee a business is necessary in whatever level the worker works. Working freelance can be done successfully only by someone with the self-discipline to evaluate his efforts and manage his time.

• When employed in someone else’s business, workers need the talent of being able to please the boss or owner as well as the client, who often demand contrary things (for example, to the boss it matters that the work is done rapidly, while the client wants more personal attention).

• If one dances or performs, it’s essential to stay in good shape and act with confidence. Knowing how to take advantage of one’s own good points. Knowing how to dress and make up according to the situation.

• Much of sex work is performance: it’s necessary to know how to present oneself, project oneself and play roles. An example: the stereotype exists of ‘passive’ Asian women, so, for an Asian woman, knowing how to play the passive role may be a key talent. If one works in domination or submission, one needs to know how to create scenes, act, involve and convince the client. Knowing how to flirt.

• The client is not necessarily of the same gender or ‘sexual orientation’ that the worker wants for his or her own partner. Thought of another way, the worker’s personal taste does not have to match what he does at work: a lesbian can work with men, a heterosexual with gays, a transsexual with heterosexuals, a homosexual man with women and so on. In the world of the sex industry, flexibility and ambiguity in tastes and desires are the norm; binary visions (like masculinity/feminity or passivity/activity cease to be very useful.

• Since it’s a market, one needs the ability to compete, create new services and change with the times. Inventing new ways to make money, using new technologies and trying to match services to desires.

• Sexual knowledge is fundamental to carrying out the work. Knowing how to stimulate bodies to produce pleasure, delay or precipitate orgasms and judge the sexual capacity of the other. Moreover there are many tricks that make the job easier for the person who knows them: putting condoms on without clients’ knowing, feigning penetration and many others. Often it’s necessary to teach principles of sexual health to improve the client’s experience: masturbatory techniques, self-control or permitting oneself ‘forbidden’ acts. It’s important to point out that not every client is the confident man of the machista stereotype; many feel shy, ashamed or incapable. There are prostitutes who specialise in therapeutic srvices with disabled people. As for education to avoid sexual illnesses, being able to convince clients that they can enjoy sex with condoms is an important talent.

• One can choose the services one wants to offer, whether oral or manual sex or vaginal or anal penetration. Moreover, in times of ‘safer sex’, less ‘classical’ forms are being accepted, such as mutual masturbation.

• Being able to offer massage, reflexology and other therapies offer more possibilities to make money.

• Working in the production of pornography, it’s possible to learn techniques of photography, video, etc.

• If one works via the Internet, one needs knowledge of computers, email, chat, databases and the construction of webpages.

• If one becomes a supervisor or even owner of a sex club or escort agency, one learns to deal with the necessities of the personnel, encouraging them to work well.’

The whole piece can be read here.

Comments by “Citizens against Trafficking” about Photo of Cambodian Sex Workers Protesting Law Enforcement Brutality

“Citizens against Trafficking” (CAT)  wrote the following about a photo of Cambodian sex workers protesting law enforcement brutality under U.S. imposed anti-prostitution legislation: 

“Look at this photo from a ’sex workers’ rally’ in Cambodia. The writing on their t-shirts says ‘Sex Work is Work: Defend the Right to Livelihood.’ Look at the faces of these women. Do they look like happy, empowered women and girls rallying to demand their right to be prostitutes? Or do they look like victims of trafficking told to put on t-shirts and sit while someone takes their picture?

A Rhode Island police officer who has been in the brothel-spas looked at this photo and said, ‘The women I saw in the spa looked just like that.”

Well, of course these sex workers look unhappy considering that they were protesting the rapes, beatings, and theft that Cambodian sex workers have been subject to by police and prison guards under U.S. imposed anti-prostitutuion legislation.  Yet, CAT mentions nothing about this oppressive legislation.  CAT mentions nothing about how sex workers have been incarerated and subject to police brutality under anti-prostitution policies this organization  promotes, in which the issue of human trafficking is exploited to promote policies against sex workers.  Well, this is a tragic example of what happens when people  exploit the seriousness of human trafficking to promote oppressive laws against sex workers.   The quote above was on page 3 of an article “Sex Radicals Vision for Rhode Island.”   Here’s a link:  http://www.citizensagainsttrafficking.org/attachments/File/sex_radical_vision_for_ri_92309.pdf .

Also, here’s an online documentary about the human rights abuses Cambodian sex workers are being subject to by law enforcement under U.S. imposed anti-prostitution legislation: http://www.blip.tv/file/970833/ .

Here’s an article which uses the same photo of Cambodian sex workers protesting that CAT used, but the difference is that this article used the photo in context: http://www.ibtimes.com/articles/20080604/cambodian-prostitutes-protest-police-crackdown_all.htm .

Store this number as “creepy diaper guy”

From Alex Leo of the Huffington Post:

Senator David Vitter, a man who endured a public scandal after being outed for visiting prostitutes, has devoted himself to taking on ACORN (Association of Community Organizations for Reform Now) after the group advised an under-cover couple posing as a prostitute and pimp to lie about her profession and launder her earnings in order to receive housing aid.

Andy Cobb is not amused. The satirist made a video asking Americans to call Vitter’s office to discuss his prostitution scandal and lack of punishment. Cobb wrote this on his YouTube page:

“If Senator Vitter is so outraged by the ACORN prostitution scandal, surely he doesn’t mind talking about his own. The group that Vitter and others so easily condemn provides vital services to some of the poorest people in America. ACORN is clearly imperfect, but it takes a bold man to attack their sex worker interactions when his own have gone unpunished. So as long as the self-proclaimed ‘most outspoken critic of ACORN’ is sitting in judgment of prostitute consultations, let’s benefit from his real world experience. Call up Senator Vitter’s office [(202) 224-4623], ask him all your questions vis-a-vis hooker management services. If the topic is important enough to deny services to the most under-served communities in America, it’s important enough for him to address directly.”

Read more at: http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2009/09/30/david-vitter-americas-pro_n_304069.html

Corrections Employees Fired Over Sex Worker Death in Perryville Prison, AZ

NY Daily News

PHOENIX — Sixteen Arizona corrections employees have been fired, suspended or otherwise disciplined for their roles in the death of an inmate left in an outdoor holding cell for four hours in triple-digit heat and for a “wait-them-out” practice at the prison where she died.

Full Article

End Demand Being Introduced in Chicago

Reform advocates push for overhaul of prostitution law

Advocates target customers, seek help for women

• • X
    Missing Persons
    Employment
    Abusive Behavior
    Chicago Police Department
    Prostitution
    Police Arrests

By Erika Slife Tribune reporter

September 17, 2009

They can be lawyers, doctors, CEOs and even police officers. They’re often somebody’s husband, boyfriend or father.

But the public may know them better as johns. And far too often, former prostitutes and their advocates say, they’re getting away with their crimes.

“I went to jail, and he didn’t,” said former prostitute LaTaunya Frazier, 39, who was caught with a john. “I never really understood that because we’re both committing the crime. If he wasn’t buying, I wouldn’t be selling. I never thought that was fair. … They get to go home to their families, their wives, and no one knows what they did.”

Johns and pimps are severely underrepresented on arrest logs, but starting Thursday, reform advocates will push for an overhaul of state law to give police departments the resources to go after leaders and customers of prostitution rings. They also want prostitutes to be eligible for protections and benefits afforded to victims of sex trafficking because many of the women suffer from the same elements of recruitment, harboring and force.

The belief is that by holding the men accountable who are fueling the demand for the sex trade — and by helping the women escape it — prostitution would plummet.

“What we’re doing right now does not work. And we don’t need a Rhodes scholar or a rocket scientist to tell us it does not work,” said Cook County Sheriff Tom Dart, whose office presides over a special prostitution intervention team. “The general public opinion on this is not in step with everything we know about this issue, and that really needs to be challenged and changed.”

The campaign, called End Demand, is being watched by reform groups across the country. It has the backing of the Chicago Police Department, the Cook County sheriff’s office and the women’s-rights group NoVo Foundation, which invested $550,000 in the effort. NoVo is led by Warren Buffet’s son Peter and his daughter-in-law, Jennifer.

“We thought, ‘Wow, if Illinois can do this, what a model for the country, and even the rest of the world,’” said Jennifer Buffett, who will speak at a panel presentation about the campaign Thursday.

Advocates want to increase penalties for pimps and johns, create a statewide database that would track the arrests of prostitution-related offenders and encourage law-enforcement agencies to work together in prosecuting prostitution-related crimes. They also want to reflect in state law that a prostituted individual is a victim, said Samir Goswami, policy director for the Chicago Alliance Against Sexual Exploitation.

“If you treat her as a victim and offer her services and support, it’s less likely she will [return to prostitution],” he said. “And that’s the shift in our law that we are advocating for.”

According to Goswami, johns account for 25 percent of the 4,000 to 5,000 annual prostitution-related arrests in the city. Pimps represent less than 1 percent of those arrested, advocates say.

In the Chicago area alone, studies have shown that between 16,000 and 25,000 women and girls are involved in the sex trade, many of whom travel across city and county lines. Some of the women start out as runaways, while others are introduced or coerced into the lifestyle by family members or boyfriends.

One former prostitute, who called herself Ashley while working the streets on the West Side, said her 24-year-old boyfriend asked her to turn her first trick when she was 15. As a runaway, she felt she had no choice.

“I said I could do it this one time,” said the woman, now 19. “I got really sad. I started crying. That’s how it all started. I didn’t have any help, so I did it out of survival.”

Advocates say that once girls and women enter prostitution, it’s even more difficult to get out. Felony prostitution convictions on their records make it difficult to find jobs; abusive pimps scare them from leaving.

“Many of these women see the [pimps] as their intimate partners. They’re coerced, raped, and they’re sold,” said Leslie Landis, director of the Mayor’s Office on Domestic Violence, which oversaw a 2006 prostitution study. “Violence is sometimes used against them. Taken as a whole, it’s just an advanced stage of domestic violence.”

A little look at some numbers in San Francisco

I haven’t seen any figures about the actual cost of the First Offender’s Prostitution Program, but from the Examiner Article I think we can infer that the expense is approximately:

100 (Street sting operations)
+ 4 (Internet based operations)
=104 x 6.6 (# of arrests per operation)
= 686.4 (participants annually)

686 x $1,908 (actual cost per participant)
=1,309,651.20 Total annual cost of program (approx)

According to the SF State website, a semester of tuition is $4,740. So to earn a degree at SF State (8 semesters, full time) it costs about $37,920

So for what the City of San Francisco spends in a single year on the FOPP, which has had no benefits to the City whatsoever, we could put 34 people through four years of full-time college, they could earn a degree and get stable work, stable housing and actually pay into the City’s tax system rather than live off of it.

When people go to jail they get sick, or their existing illnesses are exacerbated. They’re more likely to have unstable housing and employment. These problems put a strain on the City’s budget while residents are not getting relief from problems wrongly associated with prostitution such as theft and drug dealing. It’s clear that projects such as the FOPP are cash cows for the District Attoney’s Office and Police Departments while the tax payers get no return on their investment.

The sad thing is that SAGE actually provides some important resources and programs for people who are specifically in need of the services offered. Their resources are getting sucked up by this program because the PD and DA want to ensure that they get their cut of the money paid in by tax payers. Eliminating the criminal enforcement of prostitution laws and focusing on this as a social issue with community-based solutions will produce better results, even if it won’t satisfy the moralists who seem more interested in making sure that prostitutes are punished for their sins than in actually decreasing violence and corruption within this system.

Let’s hope this audit will open the eyes of San Francisco voters.

Audit faults S.F. D.A.’s prostitution program

Audit faults S.F. D.A.’s prostitution program

John Coté, Chronicle Staff Writer

Sunday, September 20, 2009

The program operated by the San Francisco district attorney’s office targeting customers of prostitutes has ill-defined goals and no way to determine its effectiveness, according to a new audit by the city’s budget analyst.

Despite being touted as a national model that comes at no cost to taxpayers, the audit said the program didn’t cover its expenses in each of the last five years, leading to a $270,000 shortfall.

The program has first-time offenders arrested for soliciting a prostitute pay as much as $1,000 for a one-day class taught by sex-trafficking experts, former prostitutes and others in exchange for having the misdemeanor charge dropped. The program was $49,000 in the red last year, the audit said.

District Attorney Kamala Harris’ office disputes that the program is ineffective and says the 14-year-old First Offender Prostitution Program, begun eight years before she was elected district attorney, paid for itself during its first nine years and will do so again.

“There have been a few years in which the revenue generated has not exceeded expenditures,” said Erica Derryck, a spokeswoman for Harris. “We’re actively implementing cost controls to prevent this from being an ongoing pattern.”

Those steps include using on-duty police officers rather than paying overtime for the eight undercover prostitution stings a month that the program covers, authorities said.

The audit was requested last year by then-Supervisor Jake McGoldrick before an ultimately unsuccessful ballot measure to decriminalize prostitution in the city.

Budget Analyst Harvey Rose’s audit said the program is not “sufficiently comprehensive” to be “effective in reducing recidivism or assisting women to leave prostitution.”

Harris’ staff disputes that, noting that the program has been replicated in
37 other locations nationwide.

Prosecutors also point to a 2008 report commissioned by the National Institute of Justice that found men who attended San Francisco’s so-called “john school” were about 30 percent less likely to reoffend.

But even researchers in that two-year study said the reports’ findings were unexpected.

“While the program has a sensible curriculum and was generally well executed … (its) low-intensity and brief intervention, which lacks aftercare, led us not to expect a statistically significant impact,” the report said.

The budget analyst says the program has no clearly defined goal. Various documents say the program reduces the demand for prostitution through education, reduces recidivism and assists women in leaving prostitution, according to the audit.

But the district attorney’s office doesn’t have the resources to measure recidivism, including if the person reoffends in another county, and the nonprofit group that provides social services to prostitutes does not track the number of women who left the profession, the audit says.

Paul Henderson, chief of administration for the district attorney, said even if auditors were unsure, the program’s goal was clear: cut reoffending among solicitors of street prostitution in the city.

“The two-year NIJ study shows that the program has been effective,” he said.

E-mail John Coté at jcote@sfchronicle.com.

Read more:
http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/c/a/2009/09/19/BAT519OMJL.DTL#i
xzz0RfSwGCLn

Polk County busts Craigslist prostitution ring

By JOSÉ PATIÑO GIRONA | The Tampa Tribune
and NATALIE SHEPHERD | News Channel 8
Published: September 14, 2009
Updated: 09/14/2009 10:21 pm

They came from Central and South Florida; authorities say they were trying to earn money in the world’s oldest profession.

One woman was dropped off by her 19-year-old daughter and her husband of 20 years. At least two were pregnant.

One prostitute came from a previous prostitution job, took a shower and was setting an appointment for her next job in Lake County, according to the Polk County Sheriff’s Office.

One “high-dollar” prostitute flew in from California and another from Wisconsin, investigators say. Read More…

Press Release: Malicious tactics used by Fox News reporter

The Desiree Alliance, Sex Workers Outreach Project (SWOP-USA) and allied organizations such as BAYSWAN and the Best Practices Policy Project are saddened to observe the malicious tactics used by Glen Beck of Fox news in a recent “expose” of ACORN. All of our organizations stand firmly against the exploitation of minors in prostitution and we also oppose trafficking in persons, but we are concerned about the way the provision of services to adult sex workers was portrayed in the recent report.

In Glen Beck’s effort to critique ACORN via a highly edited series of videos, he in fact belittles the efforts of sex workers who seek services to find stable living circumstances and financial help.

“The Fox news report tears down the efforts of grassroots service providers all over the country to reach out to hard to reach communities of sex workers to help them,” said Tara Sawyer of SWOP-USA.

“Sex workers are already very fearful about accessing services that could help them, and these low-brow media attacks on service providers increase barriers and harm” she added.

All of our organizations are concerned that the “expose” will cause service providers and non-profit organizations to shy away from providing harm reduction services and helping sex workers “where they are at.”

“Providing sex workers with information about how to live safely, even though what they do is criminalized, is essential,” said Susan Lopez of Desiree Alliance. “And we commend all organizations that provide these services to prevent HIV, help sex workers find housing, seek financial support and to take care of their health needs. Don’t turn sex workers away because of unconscionable undercover reports like those carried out by Fox.”

About the Organizations:

The Desiree Alliance is a diverse, volunteer-based, sex worker-led network of organizations, communities and individuals across the US working in harm reduction, direct services, political advocacy and health services for sex workers. We provide leadership and create space for sex workers and supporters to come together to advocate for human, labor and civil rights for all workers in the sex industry.

Sex Workers Outreach Project-USA is a national social justice network dedicated to the fundamental human rights of sex workers and their communities, focusing on ending violence and stigma through education and advocacy.

Shout out of support for Victoria Thorne in UK!

Latest adult woman persecuted by zealous prohibitionist police. She’s going to jail for 15 months!

Some choice quotes:

“It is plain that those who thought they knew you, and knew you well, are at a loss as to how you came to be involved in such a seedy world.” ~the judge who sentenced her

“In this case Vicky Thorne showed complete disregard for both the law and our own high standards and paid the price through the loss of her career and freedom.” ~ Det. Insp. Andy Jones

Policewoman turned escort jailed in UK

A shout of support for Tiffany Shepherd

Talk about whore shaming! This poor woman merely posed for some sexy photos and was fired.

Bikini-clad teacher Tiffany Shepherd, aka Leah Lust, turns to porn after being fired from school
BY Eitan Gavish
DAILY NEWS WRITER

Updated Tuesday, September 1st 2009, 12:05 AM

Tiffany Sheppard lost her job after racy photos of her in a bikini surfaced.
A Florida biology teacher fired after posing for racy pictures has landed a new career – in pornography.

Tiffany Shepherd, 31, made headlines in April after bikini-clad pictures of her on a fishing charter got her canned from Port St. Lucie High School. She turned to doing porn, she told a Florida news outlet, after losing custody of two of her three kids to her ex-husband and sending out 2,500 resumes – some even to prisons – without landing a new teaching job.

“I’m not particularly proud of it. To be honest, I hate it,” Shepherd told Page2live.com. “I’m an educated woman, but I never thought it would come to this. No one gets brought up thinking they’ll be a floozy.”

On screen, Shepherd goes by the name Leah Lust and has filmed five feature films, including one titled ‘My first sex teacher,’ where Shepherd portrays the very job she’s been trying to get back.

“It’s very professional,” says Shepherd on the Web site. “Everyone’s tested — for venereal diseases and AIDS — and I’m carrying around my little piece of paper that says I’m fine. They love me because I take care of myself and I don’t run out to party with my money.”

Shepherd got into the business after the captain of the fishing charter that got her into trouble in the first place recommended it as a way to make good money. Captain Gil Coombes, of the boat ‘Smokin ‘Em,’ owns a porn Web cam studio with his wife, Kat, called KLC productions.

“We sat down with her and told her she’d never get a teaching job again,” Coombes told Page2live.com

Read more: http://www.nydailynews.com/news/national/2009/08/31/2009-08-31_bikiniclad_teacher_tiffany_shepherd__aka_turns_to_porn_after_being_fired_.html?print=1&page=all#ixzz0Q09KVsNj

New Garrido search: Prostitute serial killings

http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/c/a/2009/08/28/BAE119FAJL.DTL&t
sp=1

New Garrido search: Prostitute serial killings

Posted on behalf of Maxine Doogan

Jaxon Van Derbeken, Chronicle Staff Writer

Friday, August 28, 2009

(08-28) 14:27 PDT ANTIOCH –

Police investigating the serial killings of 10 prostitutes in the 1990s near where Phillip Garrido lived and worked conducted a new search today of the home outside Antioch where police say he held Jaycee Lee Dugard captive for
18 years.

Pittsburg police executed a search warrant at home on Walnut Avenue where Garrido, 58, lives with his wife, Nancy Garrido, Contra Costa County sheriff’s Capt. Dan Terry said.

The couple are charged with kidnapping Dugard in 1991, when the girl was 11, in South Lake Tahoe. Dugard had two daughters by Garrido, and she and the girls were forced to live in his backyard encampment, authorities said.

“Pittsburg police, for whatever reason, decided he was a person of interest,” in the prostitute slayings, Terry said.

He said some of the women’s bodies were found in 1998 and 1999 in an industrial area near where Garrido worked at the time.

Terry said Garrido has been interviewed by authorities about the killings, but said nothing to indicate he was involved.

Read more:
http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/c/a/2009/08/28/BAE119FAJL.DTL&t
sp=1#ixzz0PWPyQ7Nm

Marriot Hotels Sexist?

It’s bad enough they cooperate with traumatic prostitution busts; but they also seemed to blame a kidnapped, raped woman (and her kidnapped children) for her rape/kidnapping. Marriot then blames their insurance company for the unfortunate wording in their defense.

Don’t stay at Marriots if you’re female.

Important Petition Regarding Human Trafficking Policies

This petition was started by the Global Alliance aganist Traffic in Women (GAATW), an awesome anti-trafficking organization that is very supportive of sex workers’ and migrant workers” justice.   Please sign and circulate the petition, and post it anywhere you can:

 

http://www.gopetition.com/petitions/stop-look-listen.html
GAATW Web site: http://www.gaatw.org
Background

Over the last ten years, human trafficking is gaining increasing global attention; many governments around the world are developing policies and laws to combat it, and hundreds of millions of dollars are being spent worldwide. The logical next step would be to examine these efforts to combat trafficking to assess how anti-trafficking measures are being implemented (including the way money is being spent) and what consequences they are causing.

We urgently need a rigorous review of the situation. Increasingly, human rights defenders and activists world-wide are concerned that these anti-trafficking measures are even leading to further violations. We need to ask what is actually being done by governments to prevent trafficking and to protect the rights of those that have been trafficked. Is it working? Who is benefiting? Are the rights of people migrating, or returning to their home countries, better protected by anti-trafficking policies?

CASE: The Indian Government considered women migrant workers a “particularly vulnerable lot” and “issued an order prohibiting any female household worker below the age of 30 from being employed in the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia under any circumstance.” The concern was that women may be sexually/physically abused or trafficked into exploitative conditions. To avoid this ban, women have to take riskier migration options than their male counterparts, making them more vulnerable to abuse at the destination point.” (Collateral Damage, India chapter, GAATW p.129).

As part of our work to fight against trafficking in persons, we need to hold governments accountable to their international human rights obligations by reviewing their efforts and make appropriate changes to ensure that all anti-trafficking measures are effective and human-rights based.

This petition is part of the GAATW Stop, Look, Listen! urgent action calling for the implementation of a review mechanism and will be presented to governments during the fourth conference of states parties to the UN Convention Against Transnational Organised Crime and its Protocols (including the Protocol to Prevent, Suppress, and Punish Trafficking in Persons) – October 2010.

SIGN THE PETITION BELOW, AND SUPPORT THE URGENT ACTION TO CALL FOR A REVIEW MECHANISM OF THE INTERNATIONAL UN PROTOCOL ON HUMAN TRAFFICKING.

http://www.gopetition.com/petitions/stop-look-listen.html

You may also want to join the facebook cause.

SWOP-NYC: Thoughts On “Being a Good Ally”

I was asked by SWOP-NYC to pass this on to Bound, Not Gagged. Enjoy.

Thoughts on “Being a Good Ally,” for People in the Sex Trade and Supporters:
Thank you for your interest in working with us.  Here are some points to keep in mind.

Basic Guidelines:

1)  Remember that we are all allies to each others experiences.  No one has had exactly the same experience in the sex industry, and we must all be mindful to listen to each other and respect our differences as well as our common ground.

2)  People involved in the sex industry are diverse, and many belong to multiple marginalized communities.  Part of respecting people with sex trade/industry experience is respecting people of all races, classes, immigration statuses, gender identities, gender expressions, life experiences, histories (including histories in the sex industry and experiences of coercion), ages, educational levels, abilities, orientations, HIV statuses, trans statuses, etc.  It is important to note that people with addictions and/or substance use histories, criminal records, and health issues (mental and physical) are also just as worthy of respect as anyone else.

3)  Think of being an ally as work that you do and not as your identity.  Don’t get so bogged down in critiquing yourself or in memorizing and adopting dominant ways of thinking and ideologies around sex work that you lose sight of the reason you are an ally in the first place.  Hopefully, fundamentally, you are an ally because you wish to cultivate basic respect for all people, as well as contribute to the important work that allies can do in supporting people in the sex industry in organizing for their rights, health, and safety.  Being an ally is less about how you carry yourself (though, again, respect is important) and more about what you contribute to the struggle.

4)  To expand briefly on (3), ideas and concepts and points of unity are important, but they should serve human rights and the issues that sex workers face, not the other way around.

5)  Understand that experience as a client does not necessarily give you special insight into the lives and realities of people in the sex trade.  Friends, significant others, researchers, reporters, and service providers also filter others experiences through their own lens.  No one is as well-equipped to speak on their thoughts, feelings, motivations, experiences, etc. as the person directly involved.

6)  It is not appropriate to “out” someone without their consent.  Doing so can have real-world impacts for a person beyond embarrassment/reputation.  Please also remember that disclosure is a personal choice.  Be considerate in what you ask and remember that no one is obligated to disclose anything to you.  Asking someone about their sex industry experience at all may often be considered too personal.  Allowing people to come to you with information is usually the best policy (with limited exceptions specific to organizing).

7)  Respect people’s self-identification.  Many people who have what you might consider “sex work” experience do not identify as “sex workers.”  Some other words that might be problematic for certain people include prostitute, hooker, whore, escort, etc.  Please follow the lead of the person in question as far as how they would like to label themselves.

8)  Allies must remember that all people have a stake in advancing the rights of sex workers, as sex workers’ struggles address issues we all care about.  Whether these issues are police harassment, immigrants’ rights, economic rights, health and safety rights, or rights of equal access to public spaces, these issues affect everyone.  Being an ally means engaging in the spirit of solidarity and shared struggle.

Additional Guidelines for Activists/Organizers:

1)  Understand that allies should support and listen to sex industry workers rather than impose their own ideas about sex work on the community, and that leadership and decision-making will privilege voices of experience.

2)  If you are a client, understand that sex industry organizing is not a forum for finding dates.  Also, opposition to client/police/management violence on the part of sex workers rights activists is not a slight against you personally.  Please be respectful, humble, and avoid ogling or flirting with the other activists.

3)  Allies should offer consistent, uncompromising support for the human rights (including the right not to get arrested for engaging in consensual activities between adults), health, and safety (especially freedom from violence) of all people in the sex industry regardless of their own attitudes or thoughts about the industry.

4)  As we are all allies to each other, just as voices of sex industry/trade experience should be prioritized over ally voices, voices and leadership of more marginalized members of the sex work community should be prioritized on the issues that affect them the most.

5)  As a diverse community, it is inevitable that already-marginalized voices within the community will at various points be erased, ignored, colonized, or tokenized.  Awareness of this fact should inform our activism and our leadership structure (formal and informal).

6)  Some self-identified allies may have sex industry experience that they do not wish to disclose for any number of reasons.  This is one reason that ally space is important in organizing.

SWOP-NYC http://swop-nyc.org/wpress/

SWOP National Network http://swopusa.org/

Marketing stories from Germany

The other day I posted a story about German brothels advertising special prices for green and unemployed clients. Now here’s another in which ‘free’ prostitutes are thought to be ‘exploited’ by a politician who doesn’t believe they can be consenting to a marketing strategy. The impulse to save sex workers from themselves goes on.

German prostitutes defend ‘flat rate’ brothels

Reuters | 07/27/2009

BERLIN – Prostitutes in Germany are fighting back against attempts by conservative politicians and some irate residents to stop popular “flat-rate” brothels. Officials in the state of Baden-Wuerttemberg launched moves to stop one brothel with a “flat-rate” fee system because they viewed it as inhumane for women to provide unlimited sexual services all day for a one-off 70 euros ($100) fee.

But a group of 77 prostitutes bought advertising space in two national dailies to argue that this was simply a ruse to get brothels banned altogether. “Get off our backs — no ban on brothels with or without ‘flat rates’,” read the headline in the quarter-page adverts. Under the guise of ‘humane working conditions’, they are in reality plotting to ban brothels and threaten our livelihood.”

For a 70 euros charge customers are entitled to all the sex, food and drink they want between 10 a.m. and 4 p.m. The evening flat rate rises to 100 euros. Pussy club operator Patricia Floreiu has said most customers leave after at most two sessions. There are at least four such “flat rate” brothels across Germany, a country where prostitution is legal.

Heribert Rech, Baden-Wuerttemberg’s Christian Democrat interior minister, has led a campaign against the “Pussy Club” establishment in the town of Fellbach, saying the “favorable price suggests women there are being exploited“.

But Juanita Henning, the leader of Dona Carmen in Frankfurt, told Reuters that critics want to reverse a 2002 law that gives prostitutes extensive legal rights and protection. “This is nothing more than a moral campaign,” Henning said. “If they looked more closely at the offer they’d see a man can get all the sexual services he wants but not from one woman. It’s pure ignorance and prejudice against the industry.”

Laura Agustín

Border Thinking on Migration, Trafficking and Commercial Sex

Sex Worker Literati Reading Series Launching August 6th in NYC

Photo by Sinead McCarthy, design by Sinclair Sexsmith

Best-selling author David Henry Sterry and sexuality rights activist Audacia Ray, both former workers in the sex industry, are proud to announce Sex Worker Literati, a new free monthly reading series that features sex workers, former sex workers, and people with stories about the sex industry who will read, monologue, perform, and shimmy their ways into your hearts, minds, and naughty bits. The series kicks off at 8 pm on Thursday, August 6 at the Lower East Side staple Happy Ending (302 Broome Street), which fittingly enough was once an erotic massage parlor. On the first Thursday of every month, Sterry and Ray will showcase a diverse set of performers who have stories to tell about the business of sex.

The reading series is inspired by a new anthology edited by David Henry Sterry and RJ Martin, Hos, Hookers, Call Girls, and Rent Boys: Professionals Writing on Life, Love, Work & Money published in July 2009 by Soft Skull. After Sterry asked Ray to contribute a piece to the anthology, they began to discuss collaboration possibilities. The results are the Sex Worker Literati reading series and the website hoshookercallgirlsrentboys.com, which features writings by sex workers, sneak peeks at the book, and videos featuring anthology contributors.

The Sex Worker Literati inaugural reading on August 6 features six performers from all corners of the sex business. Blues diva and pinup girl Candye Kane, Times Square wild girl Jodi Sh. Doff, Scandinavian/African rent boy Damien Decker, and ex-teenage ho/ award-winning filmmaker Juliana Piccillo are all contributors to the anthology. They will be joined by renowned artist and former nude model Molly Crabapple, who is the illustrator and co-author of the graphic novel Scarlett Takes Manhattan and former go-go dancer and porn producer Sam Benjamin, author of Confessions of an Ivy League Pornographer.

Those in far-away lands who are unable to attend the reading series in New York will be able to enjoy some of the performances online: videos, photos, and stories will be published on hoshookerscallgirlsrentboys.com. We are also planning events for the anthology around the country, so check the website or become a fan on Facebook to find out more.

August 6th Inaugural Reading Line Up

Molly Crabapple is an artist, author, and the founder of Dr. Sketchy’s Anti-Art School, a 90 city chain of alt. drawing clubs. Called a “Downtown phenomenon” by the New York Times and “THE artist of our time” by Margaret Cho, Molly has drawn for the New York Times, Wall Street Journal, and Marvel Comics. During college, she was a professional naked girl. Her first graphic novel, Scarlett Takes Manhattan, is out now from Fugu Press.

Candye Kane may still be a well-kept mainstream secret but in most underground circles, her diva status is legendary. She has been making music professionally for over two decades and toured worldwide since 1992, performing for amazingly diverse audiences. She played at the French Embassy in Rome for the President of Italy, headlined the Rhythm Riot, a rockabilly and R&B festival in the UK, and belted it out alongside Ray Charles at the Cognac Blues Festival. She slayed em’ at the Cannes Film Festival, kept them enthralled at New York Gay Pride and most recently, helped organize a thirteen city tour of the Netherlands for special needs kids. Learn more and hear her sing on her website.

Jodi Sh. Doff, writing as Scarlett Fever. Scarlett Fever was born with the first issue of BUST and has gone on to publish in Penthouse, Playgirl , Bust, Tear (Italy), Olive Tree Literary Review, Cosmopolitan, Stim.com and CommonTies.com; been anthologized in Best American Erotica ‘95, Bearing Life (Feminist Press – as Jodi Sh. Doff), Between the Sheets (Penthouse Anthology), and The Bust Guide to a New Girl Order . She has been active in prostitutes rights, harm reduction and outreach. Scarlett has been working on a memoirs of her ten years in the pre-Disney Times Square topless business for what seems like forever. She is proud to have been a chapter of “historical reference” in Lily Burana’s Strip City. There is also a serial killer love story, with some rather disturbing parallels to her own life, in the works. That said, Ms. Doff grew up in the suburbs as someone else entirely.

Sam Benjamin is a graduate of Brown University (1999), a former go-go dancer, and the director of over one thousand Los Angeles-based interracial gangbangs, gay and straight. His book, “Confessions of An Ivy League Pornographer,” is a memoir of a youth well spent.

Damien Decker’s writing has appeared in $pread magazine and the anthology Unhoused Voices. He has been featured on The Daily Beast and is currently working on a memoir. Damien was born in Zambia but moved as a young child to Scandinavia to become one of the first black people in northern Europe. He recived his degree in USA and is a former college, semi-pro, and national team athlete. Damien is a multilingual jack-of-all-trades who speaks fluent Swedish, Norwegian, English, plus enough French to not starve when in Paris and enough Swahili to know when mother was angry. He currently resides in New York.

Juliana Piccillo is a soccer mom, filmmaker, writer and sex worker’s rights activist. She has an MFA in Creative Writing.