I got up this morning intending to catch up on all of the posts and comments that I didn’t get to last night. To my surprise I came across Melissa Farley’s letter to us in my mailbox. I received it in a strange sort of round about way, I’m not sure why it wasn’t just sent directly to me or to the blog administrators. Anyway, I was bummed that I didn’t receive it last night so that it could be posted for our live bloggers to see, so I posted it this morning in hopes that maybe there would be some folks awake early enough on the East Coast to post some responses.
To my delight, we had some heavy-hitters from the West Coast all over it practically the moment that it was live. You’ve got to love it when you see RF, MD and SH finding common cause!
September 17th-18th our blog had more traffic than it’s ever had. It’s thrilling to see that sex worker’s voices are being heard by a growing audience. We owe so much of this growth to our contributing authors and all the bloggers who linked to us and encouraged their readers to “listen to sex workers.” Thanks to everybody who contributed their time and energy!
The debate around legal prostitution and trafficking in Nevada was still getting coverage in Las Vegas as late as Monday, September 17th.
We sent out a press release about the live blog event, but we eren’t that surprised that we didn’t get any mainstream media coverage, considering that the release went out pretty last minute.
Meanwhile, another politician announces resignation after being caught in a prostitution scandal.
Barb Brents reviewed Melissa Farley’s new book and Iamcuriousblue provided some discussion about her methodology.
We got some great comments from sex workers in different places.
I believe that Melissa Farley is motivated by compassion towards sex workers, but that doesn’t change the fact that she’s played a pivotal role in hurting many of us around the globe. I even wrote her a somewhat lengthy e-mail several years ago (before I realized that she was irrational and too blinded by anger to truly care about our well being). I started the letter by praising her for her efforts in helping women who want out, to escape their bad situations. I have always believed it was a noble cause to assist women needing help to improve their lives. It is unfortunate that she got so caught up in her anger towards all sex work that she lost sight of what she started out doing- helping women.
We were joined by two of Farley’s supporters, Jody Williams and Josie. They kept the debate interesting and we thank them for their participation. I hope that these conversations will evolve into cooperative problem-solving. I strongly encourage readers to check out all of the comments sections.
We also inspired the creation of a new blog! (Or is it just coincidence that the blog was created yesterday?) I came across it while checking out SkyBabe’s blog.
This morning we were mentioned over at Reno and Its Discontents as well as at the $pread Magazine Blog
And finally, Renegade Evolution breaks it down feminist expat style.
Thanks again to everybody who participated! More live blogging to come!
In solidarity,
Stacey
Filed under: Allies, Farley, Featured Bloggers, Feminism, Liveblog, Politics | 25 Comments »