Suppress prostitution, and capricious lusts will overthrow society. – St. Augustine
I really wanted to comment on the “Craigslist Killer” story while it was still topical, but since I didn’t have enough to say about it to make a full column I decided to piggyback a few other articles about legal issues affecting sex workers which also aren’t long enough to be columns by themselves.
Good Riddance To Bad Rubbish
Paraphrased from an AP article:
Philip Markoff, 24, a former medical student who was accused of killing a masseuse he met through Craigslist committed suicide in the Boston jail where he was awaiting trial, authorities said Sunday. “Markoff was alone in his cell, and all evidence collected thus far indicates that he took his own life,” a spokesman said. The facts and circumstances surrounding his death will be investigated, the district attorney said. Saturday would have been Markoff’s first wedding anniversary, but his nuptials were canceled after his arrest. Markoff pleaded not guilty in the fatal shooting of Julissa Brisman, of New York City, and the armed robbery of a Las Vegas woman; both crimes happened at Boston hotels within the span of four days in April 2009, and Rhode Island prosecutors also accused him of attacking a stripper that week. Markoff had met all three women through advertisements for erotic services posted on Craigslist.
Pardon me if I’m not to broken up about this. The sleazebag didn’t even have the excuse of being psychotic; he was only interested in robbing them to support his compulsive gambling and was smart enough to realize that even when sex workers dare to report crimes against us, the cops are never terribly interested in investigating said crimes. I honestly believe the only reason they even bother investigating murdered sex workers is because the crime tends to result in public outcry even if the victim is “only” a whore. Those who followed this case may recall that the Boston District Attorney’s office tried to use it as an excuse to pressure Craigslist to discontinue adult services ads, rather than admitting that it is the suppression of our trade rather than our method of advertising which makes us targets. Hurrah to Craigslist for refusing, though I must include the caveat that the popular website agreed two years ago to cooperate with cops in 40 states by providing them on demand with information on girls who advertise therein, so cops can use that information to deceive, molest and persecute them.
As for Markoff, I’m just glad he decided to face his karma like a man rather than submitting to a show trial which would undoubtedly have resulted in another round of persecution against both sex workers and our advertising venues under the guise of “protecting” us. Ever notice how governments are always trying to “protect” us from everyone but themselves?
And here’s a good example:
New Orleans’ Nasty Little “Sex Offender” Game
In my column of August 5th I mentioned that women arrested for prostitution in Louisiana are routinely charged with “Crime Against Nature”, but in the case of escorts this is generally just a scare tactic to get them to plead guilty to misdemeanor prostitution. Those whores who have neither the means nor the organizational skills necessary to arrange a lawyer, however (i.e. streetwalkers) usually get stuck with the charge, resulting in their being classified as “sex offenders” for at least a decade and thus unable to get out of whoring even if they wanted to. I wish I could tell you that this strategy was something unique to New Orleans, but it isn’t; the idea of officially branding women as prostitutes and then prohibiting them from holding other jobs (or in some societies, even getting married), thus ensuring that they can never leave prostitution, goes back many centuries. It was, in fact, San Francisco’s practice of this strategy which inspired Margo St. James to found COYOTE, the first prostitutes’ rights organization in the US, after she found herself a victim of it.
Women With A Vision Inc. is a New Orleans organization which is now taking on an important anti-criminalization campaign and needs support and volunteers; the “No Justice Project” will combat the sentencing of sex workers under the two-century-old “crimes against nature” felony law. Modern penalties for this law (which were strengthened several years ago in response to public hysteria over pedophilia) requires women to register as sex offenders for the next 10 years and places the label “sex offender” on their driver’s licenses (among other prescribed penalties); the vast majority of those so convicted are black women and transsexuals (click here for a more in-depth article). WWAV needs volunteers and support immediately; if you are in New Orleans, please consider volunteering with WWAV, and if you aren’t please consider supporting WWAV’s urgent work with a contribution. For information on how to support or volunteer with WWAV telephone (504) 301-0428 or email wwavinc@wwav.nocoxmail.com.
This morning I spoke to Lorie Seruntine at the “No Justice Project” and explained that I wanted to mention the project on my blog; she told me that due to a recent grant from the National AIDS Fund they are finally able to get the program, which was formerly hampered by a dearth of funds, rolling in earnest. She provided me with PDF files of their brand-new brochure (No justice brochure August 2010) and flyer (No Justice Interview Flyer), and we spoke about the vital need for their work and about the necessity of all sex workers and those who support our rights unifying to stop the kind of abuses which inevitably result from the prohibition of prostitution. She told me that their website is currently being rebuilt and will be fully up to date probably next week, and said she would keep me posted on any other developments. Furthermore, she asked me to post this emergency request, which I am happy to do:
Dear Friends, Supporters, Allies, and Sisters of Women With a Vision, Inc,
We are writing to ask for your help for a woman we recently met at a No Justice Project event, we will call her DC to keep her anonymity intact. The same year that Women With A Vision opened our doors in 1991, nearly 20 years ago, DC was convicted with a La 14:89 Solicitation of a Crime Against Nature. Ever since that day, DC has been haunted with this conviction. Fast forward to yesterday at our No Justice event, DC has been clean for several months, and recently gotten the opportunity to move into Catholic Charities Voyage House, a housing program for women. This is a great opportunity for DC, one that she could not pass up and one that her sobriety depends upon, but this required her to move from Jefferson Parish back into Orleans. Due to her prior conviction and sex offender registration requirements, she is forced to pay for sex offender notification cards and mailing fees, which totals $1,208.67. The court is forcing her to pay this fine by the end of next week, August 16-20, or face the original sentence of 40 months of hard labor in the Department of Corrections.
We are asking you to make a gift of an emergency monetary donation to help keep DC out of jail and the hands of the Department of Corrections, and to help support her decision to remain sober even if it meant moving into Orleans Parish and facing these fees. She is committed to her sobriety and has pledged her commitment to the No Justice Project and the fight we have ahead.
You can make a tax-deductable donation several ways: you can mail us a check or money order to 215 N. Jeff Davis Pkwy New Orleans, La 70119 and label the check with “Funds for a free DC,” or go to our website at wwav-no.org and click on our pay pal donate button an follow the steps to donate online.
We will be in the courtroom with DC next week to help support her through this ordeal.
On behalf of the women of No Justice and Women with a Vision, we want thank you for you generous support and let you know that we appreciate you. If you have and questions or want to know more about the No Justice Project, please don’t hesitate to contact us.
You are appreciated,
Women With A Vision, Inc.
My prayers are with DC and with WWAV for their continuing efforts.
Here’s another case in which relative wealth results in different standards of “justice”:
Third Party
Did you ever wonder why porn is legal but prostitution isn’t, even in Hollywood? The excuse given is that in porn the actress is paid by a third party rather than the one she has sex with, and that makes it legal. Oh, really? In that case I’ve been on quite a few calls which were not prostitution, such as the many times I’ve been paid by a best man to give the bachelor a last fling at his bachelor party or the several times I’ve been hired by parents (of either sex) to take their son’s virginity on his 18th birthday. A few times I’ve even been hired as a bribe (such as the time a snack food distributor bought me for a Wal-Mart executive). Even if one attempts the spurious argument that to qualify for the “porn exemption” both people having sex must be paid participants, that still allows the very common “two-girl show”, where a client pays two whores to have lesbian sex so he can watch and masturbate without touching either of them. Yet in a case in Arizona where sleazy cops arranged such a show and then busted the girls, their conviction was upheld on appeal.
What it comes down to, of course, is money; the movie industry (of which the porn industry is a subset) is extremely powerful in California, so no governmental entity is going to rule against it for fear of interrupting the flow of both tax revenue and campaign contributions. I might also point out that most porn producers are male, and therefore constitute no threat to the egos of legislators and judges the way whores do. If we had the backing of a major lobby group I’m sure we could buy politicians just as easily, but until the mainstream women’s organizations purge themselves of puritanical, anti-sex elements and recognize the obvious truth that prostitution rights are as much a feminist issue as abortion rights, there seems little hope that we will be able to afford to hire any of these political whores any time soon.
Another Reason Not To Do Cowgirl
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Penile_fracture
http://www.scientificamerican.com/article.cfm?id=can-you-really-break-your
Those guys who are brave enough to read these articles will notice the most common cause; for those who aren’t brave enough to read them, look at the heading of this subsection. A guy in Boston actually sued his girlfriend for injuring him in this way (yes, she was on top), and though he lost his case I’m not sure he would have had she been a professional. When I first heard of this story back in 2003 I advised my girls of the possible danger. Since I already avoided the position it didn’t affect me, but it certainly gave me a new and powerful excuse: “I’m sorry, but I can’t risk that kind of liability.”
Seems the risk is less than that of getting a disease, and besides, “I don’t like that” should be reason enough.
You’d be amazed how much more convincing “my lawyer won’t let me do that” is for most men than “I don’t want to.” When a woman objects to a particular sex act the average man has the urge to try to convince her, but businessmen understand and respect the concept of unacceptable risk.
I am like … like a business man … umm … almost … I`m more like … you know … never mind
When you are on, you are on !!!
Now start bitchslapping me with that `red herring` woman !!!
A fractured penis? Ugh…Not a subject I’d be comfortable discussing. I’ve actually had requests from guys calling into my service asking if they could hire two girls to put on a show for them to film. My partner and I have a strict no-cameras policy, so she and I always refuse such requests. I guess if we rebranded ourselves as porn moguls though, the government would be less likely to try to shut us down.
I’m sure most guys feel that way, which is why I left it just offstage (as it were), in deference to my male readers.
Sad, isn’t it? 🙁
I always had this fantasy involving me and Samantha from “Sex and the City”
I would be tied to the kitchen sink, she would wear my grandmothers curtain and then she would slap me with a giant `red herring`:P
ok
now the real question:
I would never have the problem of paying someone for a service.
Then why do most of the man, including me, have their hearts pumping with fear, at the thought of combining themselves with a call girl?
I think the reason is twofold; first, there’s the very real fear that official busybodies might be currently engaged in one of their recurrent campaigns to waste public funds by stopping people from engaging in {{{gasp}}} SEX!!! In other words, they’re worried the woman who claims to be an honest whore might actually be a dirty, lying cop. In the days when escort agencies advertised with expensive yellow page ads police departments couldn’t afford to set up a fake agency and therefore concentrated on creating fake streetwalkers, but a website is cheap and easy so the risk to the high-end client is greater than it once was.
The second reason derives from the “all whores are degraded, drug-addicted criminals” propaganda the government loves so much; many a client has told me how relieved he was to see that I was a normal well-dressed woman, because he was worried that some strung-out trollop might appear at his door. Some clients have also said they fear that a girl might call in her big, gun-toting “pimp” to rob him.
The best way to get around both of these fears is to talk to the girl you intend to see several times before the meeting; don’t ask her prying questions because she may think you are a cop. Just talk normally to her and make an assessment based on what you hear. Obviously, both girls and agencies tend to prefer a customer who make appointments without a lot of hassle, but experienced girls will understand your trepidation and do their best to allay your fears. Once you find a girl you like, stick with her; if you prefer variety find an agency you like instead. If you prefer to see independents, I suggest limiting yourself to girls who maintain their ads for several months before you see them, thus ensuring both legitimacy and at least some degree of quality.
Good luck! 🙂
If those are your eyes, I would like you to know … oooh … this one`s hard for me … I … I would, like to … order a pizza.
So please don`t send me any picture of you, because I`m a lunatic, a weirdo and a creep. I could not resist the temptation. I would print it out, then frame it, then force it watch me having my sick pleasures with myself while wearing a wookie costume. 😛
…
In my country prostitution is illegal. Every one of them is a “street girl”. They are ugly, smell funny, behave like cattle, possible with STD, junkies and of course not to mention getting yourself mugged.
We have these `massage saloons`but it`s very primitive. Then of course night clubs, those one`s with the pole.
I went a couple of times with some friends of mine and all I got was a comedy. My lame friends were afraid “OOH GOD … I like you sooo much … I don`t want to hurt you when I touch your breast”
Then some girl who could be my sister in age, started to bend over with her mini skirt, while wearing no thongs, giving me a nice sight and a headache at the same time.
Come on. Under half an hour? What is this? A porno movie or a comedy?
I remember as a kid watching people beating the shit out of each other on the streets for a piece of bread, and I aint` joking about this one. Hail to the glorious leader of the party, hail to you Big Brother.
I had my first mobile phone in 1998, so we got a little bit civilized, since then. 😛
So I am thinking.
I should get an intelligent girl, then have someone teach her this courtesan stuff 😛
Yes, they’re my eyes. And though I can’t send anyone pictures, you have my permission to do anything to yourself you like while thinking about me, in or out of a Wookie costume. 😉
Sadly, it’s illegal in the US as well even though we pretend to be an “advanced” country. I’ll bet there are high-class girls where you live as well; you just don’t know how to contact them and they don’t make it obvious for fear of being raped, assaulted and imprisoned by the police.
Don’t you hate it when you spend good money on a Wookie costume, and then you have to cut a slit in the crotch so you can reach in and {ahem!}, and then the whole costume starts to unravel? You want to have it altered professionally, but you can’t stand the looks they give you at the taylor’s. And then some of them even laugh.
Good Lord, it’s the 21st Century. You’d think these people were living a long time ago, in…
Not that I’d know about that, of course.
<__>
Just pick up a little Fray-Check at your local fabric store. Might make for a little chafing, but at least the costume remains intact. 😉
I hooked up with my ex-girlfriend this weekend, we met in town, then back to my place.
I asked her to `role play` the “bad girl” and surprisingly she agreed. She started to come up, with these weird stuff for me, but I had to stop her, because I realised, this wasn`t my hearts desire at all.
It`s more like the idea of the forbidden fruit. If you can`t get it, it`s going to be in your mind.
So if you can`t get these “bad girls”, then you are going to fantasies about them. But reality hits you. Every woman can be anything for you, you are just to afraid of your own little shadow.
It`s funny that men lie to themselves so much. We pretend to be strong and mature, but we are children longing for mommy. She actually reminds me of her, maybe that`s what has wierded me out so much.
We kissed, then watched a movie, then I called a cab.
I was thinking for hours, until I could go to sleep.
I think it`s time, to shove up my own pride, then find myself somebody to settle down.
I couldn’t ask for a better example of the damage the Madonna/whore duality can do. As you say, any woman can play any role as needed; we are ALL Madonnas, and ALL whores, and ALL a number of other things that don’t even fit into that duality.
In fact, my personal problem with the Madonna-whore dichotomy (looking back at the past, from my vantage point as an adult now entering middle age) is that I never felt a woman could be a Madonna without being also a whore. How on earth could she get the angel wings, the beatific smile, the halo and the golden aura without being a whore?
This, exactly. I’ve never understood how people, male or female, can believe that women are either innocent, motherly virgins, or pruient lustful whores. These are two aspects to human nature; very few people are lacking in either one. And really, do they think that all these mothers just lubed up the turkey baster when it was time to make kids? Just because I don’t want to picture my parents having sex doesn’t mean I’m in any denial that they did, and passionately.
Random, but there’s this whole segment of conservative Christian fundamentalists that, while believing you should never look at porn or have sex before marriage, also believe that God intended you to have wild, orgasmic sex with your once-and-forever spouse. While I disagree with their politics, I did find the sex advice in Intended For Pleasure extemely useful. /random