Any law which violates the indefeasible rights of man is essentially unjust and tyrannical; it is not a law at all. – Maximilien Robespierre
Some of you may have noticed that my columns are posting earlier as of this week; I realized that if I posted them at 10:01 UTC every day, all my readers would be able to see (or at least be notified) of them on the proper date (even though it ranges from late evening in New Zealand to one minute past midnight in Hawaii). That probably won’t matter to most of you, but it corrects a deficiency that’s been annoying me for some time.
I’m Sure You Feel Safer Now
The brave police of Manatee, Florida have announced their heroic capture of a dangerous criminal …a street woman so desperate she offered sex in exchange for two McDonald’s dollar-menu cheeseburgers. I’m sure my Floridian readers will sleep more soundly tonight knowing this menace was removed from the streets.
Updates
Crime Against Society (February 26th, 2011)
Though Louisiana’s oppressive “Crime Against Nature By Solicitation” law was reduced to a misdemeanor last year (thus removing the requirement for sex offender registration), Doe vs. Jindal continued because the state refused to release those previously condemned. On March 29th the judge decided in favor of the sex workers:
…U.S. District Judge Martin Feldman said state lawmakers had no “rational basis” for requiring people to register as sex offenders if they were convicted of a “crime against nature by solicitation”… “The defendants fail to credibly serve up even one unique legitimating governmental interest that can rationally explain the registration requirement imposed on those convicted of Crime Against Nature by Solicitation,” Feldman wrote. “The Court is left with no other conclusion but that the relationship between the classification is so shallow as to render the distinction wholly arbitrary”…
This is a victory not only for the approximately 400 people released from the tyrannical regime of “sex offender” registration, but for all those fighting to get armed busybodies out of people’s personal lives.
The Soft Weapon (March 24th, 2011)
I exposed the Schapiro Group’s lies twice before the Village Voice did last March, but their voice is much louder than mine, and apparently quite a few heard it because a new petition on Change.org has called for criminal investigation of both the Schapiro Group and the “Women’s Funding Network” (one of billionaire prohibitionist Swanee Hunt’s fronts):
Recently the Village Voice exposed the Schapiro Group…and the Women’s Funding Network…for knowingly deceiving both congress and the public using false data manufactured through fraudulent research…[when] legitimate organizations that serve exploited…minors…are not able to report that they have reached numbers of youth comparable to the inflated numbers of victims…it jeopardizes their credibility and funding…[also] increased funding for law enforcement efforts to combat a vastly inflated threat…is channeled instead into police actions directed not at traffickers, but rather against consenting adult sex workers…We reject the concept that criminalizing members of any population is an effective way to rescue them…Therefore, we, the undersigned, call on the United States Dept. of Justice to investigate the Schapiro Group and the Women’s Funding Network for conspiracy to commit fraud against their donors, the public and the US government…
Needless to say, I urge you all to sign!
Sales Pitch (May 22nd, 2011)
Here’s another study which proves that the “Swedish Model” doesn’t work; this one is from human trafficking expert Ann Jordan, who called the law “a failed experiment in social engineering” and pointed out that “the Swedish government has been unable to prove that the law has reduced the number of sex buyers or sellers or stopped trafficking.”
The Leading Players in the Field, Not (June 15th, 2011)
This was forwarded to me by an academic correspondent; I think it speaks for itself.
Umpteen Thousand People Can’t Be Wrong (November 12th, 2011)
The New York Times continues its crusade against sex workers, this time via a slanted article which refers to a 17-year-old as a “child” and blames Backpage (rather than the unexamined conditions at home which caused her to run away twice) for her becoming an underage prostitute. Apparently the Times is hoping that Village Voice loses its nerve and backs down on the Backpage adult ads, because it would be forced to reverse course and oppose the fanatics (rather than getting in bed with them) if they succeed in enacting laws that make websites (like that run by the Times) responsible for user-generated content.
Held Together With Lies (April 2nd, 2012)
The UN has released its latest “estimate” of “human trafficking victims”, and though it’s less than 9% of the popular figure popularized by fanatics, it’s still both unsubstantiated and inflated by at least two orders of magnitude:
The U.N. crime-fighting office said Tuesday that 2.4 million people across the globe are victims of human trafficking at any one time, and 80 percent of them are being exploited as sexual slaves. Yuri Fedotov, the head of the U.N. Office on Drugs and Crime…said $32 billion is being earned every year by unscrupulous criminals running human trafficking networks, and two out of every three victims are women…According to Fedotov’s Vienna-based office, only one out of 100 victims of trafficking is ever rescued…
In other words, Fedotov can only support 1% of his claim, or 24,000 people in the entire world. That’s a lot more believable, but it wouldn’t generate the necessary panic so fanatics multiply it by over 1000x, then refuse to produce even the most tenuous evidence in support of the exaggerated claim.
An Example To the West (April 3rd, 2012)
This article by researcher Matthias Lehmann on the harm criminalization does to Korean sex workers largely covers familiar ground, but also mentions that the prohibitionist Korean laws enacted in 2004 were strongly influenced by the “Swedish Model” and linked this strong criticism of the laws by two Swedish legislators. Lehmann points out that “sex workers…remain criminalised unless they claim to be victims”, dividing women into “’good women who are worthy of help’ and ‘bad ones who need to be punished’, thus continuing the stigmatisation of women who sell sex.” Unsurprisingly, this is the version of Swedish legislation now infiltrating the US as well. The article quotes many of the same sources and developments I’ve reported previously, but I found this announcement very intriguing:
Sex workers often rightly criticise researchers, politicians or the media for distorting the reality of the sex industry. I am therefore working together with Woo Yun Jin, a Korean visual artist, to develop a graphic novel entirely based on experiences shared with us by sex workers in Korea…[it] will be made available [later this year] in both English and Korean…we [hope this helps] people to better understand that sex workers are part of their communities and deserve the same rights just as everyone else.
Lehmann also provides links to “Research Project Korea” and a number of news articles and resources.
The Rape Question (April 4th, 2012)
More information is better than less, but I’m concerned this could make rape trials even more of a “he said/she said” affair than they already are:
…An in-depth study comparing rape victims with nursing students at the University of Southern Denmark reveals that vaginal injuries are just as likely to result from consensual sex as rape. [Researcher] Birgitte Schmidt Astrup [said] ‘…The nursing students experience just as frequent vaginal injuries as rape victims, and so these injuries cannot be used for much more than to establish that intercourse has taken place.’ She added that in cases of convictions based on evidence of vaginal injuries, there could now be discussions as to whether there have been miscarriages of justice…all [of the subjects] were examined less than 28 hours after sexual intercourse…vaginal injuries were found in 36 per cent of rape victims and in 34 per cent of the nursing students. The…students’ results were not affected by whether they had engaged in rough or gentle sex, or whether they had used condoms or sex toys…
Feet of Clay (April 5th, 2012)
The outcry against Nicholas Kristof and his anti-whore crusade continues to grow and generalize; this week I discovered a well-written article from a member of the Occupy movement denouncing Kristof’s transparent attempt to call attention away from his own lies and exaggerations by branding the much-hated Goldman-Sachs “financiers of sex trafficking”:
…It was with some horror…that…I observed several Occupy-affiliated Twitter accounts sharing a link to an op-ed by Nicholas Kristof of the New York Times, entitled “Financiers and Sex Trafficking”…It’s easy to see how this could appear to fit in the widespread populist anger against the financial sector that powers Occupy Wall Street…[but] Backpage is mostly used by consenting adults, and Nicholas D. Kristof is a man with a history of trying to use the specters of trafficking and child prostitution as leverage for a campaign that seeks ultimately to further criminalize sex workers…his “rescue” work in developing countries has basically involved riding along with law enforcement and live-tweeting brothel raids, writing himself into the story as the white savior (consequences be damned). In other words, he is a buffoon, a prime member of the Liberal Class that preserves the status quo by defining the acceptable limits of dissent…Meg…[of] SWOP Chicago…[explained that] “The anti-trafficking crusade is a top-down movement, led by (among others) two right-wing religious conservatives from the Bush Administration (Laura Lederer, Swanee Hunt)…if Occupy Wall Street jumps on the anti-trafficking bandwagon, they’re really just swallowing rhetoric designed by one of the nation’s best consulting firms to further the particular agenda of a few members of the top .0001%”…Trafficking and child prostitution have been invoked to justify criminalizing…sex work since at least the end of the last century…Demand Abolition’s own material [confirms] this…[its] Nation Strategy emphasizes that “Framing the Campaign’s key target as sexual slavery might garner more support and less resistance, while framing the Campaign as combating prostitution may be less likely to mobilize similar levels of support and to stimulate stronger opposition.”
…If Occupy wants to add justice for sex workers to its cause (and it should), then it can carry on doing what the movement has generally done very well: Don’t pay much attention at all to the self-appointed pundit class at the likes of the New York Times. Listen to actual workers, the people for whom these issues are an everyday reality, not a hot topic…
Metaupdates
Good News, Bad News in That Was the Week That Was (#10) (March 10th, 2012)
It turn out that the push to impose the Swedish Model on Western Australia is largely a one-woman campaign enabled by a sleazy political deal:
…The government’s prostitution bill proposes to make sex work in residential areas illegal and requires brothel owners, managers and sex workers…to register…Labor is opposed to the legislation…[along with two prominent] Liberal MPs…[so] the government will need [the support of] independent MPs Janet Woollard and Adele Carles…[who] wants…three amendments…[which] would [shift] the criminal focus…to clients…Carles said she had visited Sweden…”They determined that prostitution is not a job. Prostitution is violence against women”…
But while Carles is the typical neofeminist Swedish dupe , Woollard refuses to back the law unless it bans brothels entirely in five years. Since that won’t happen, the law probably won’t pass, but I’ll report as the situation develops.
The Crumbling Dam in That Was the Week That Was (#13) (March 31st, 2012)
Ron Weitzer’s article on the recent Canadian decision clarifies a detail I had missed: “The court gave the government 12 months to appeal the decision allowing bawdy houses, 30 days to rewrite the ‘living off the avails’ law to restrict it to exploitation, and allowed the parties 60 days to appeal the decision to uphold the solicitation/communication law.” Obviously the government will appeal to keep its brothel ban and these workers will appeal the upholding of the “communicating” law, but as I understand it the avails law is a dead duck in its present form, which is certainly good news.
One Year Ago Today
“Neither Cold Nor Hot” looks at Jezebel’s weird ambivalence about sex work.
WTF, I’m pretty sure that I have never injured a woman “down there”. I know I’m not huge but I’m no tiny-mite either. A few complained of “soreness” the next day (while smiling as they said it) but I knew that was female BS to boost my ego or something. I think there is a secret jedi-school for girls on manipulating the male ego. 😛
1 in 3 have a vaginal injury even from consensual sex? That doesn’t make sense unless they’re counting some pretty insignificant “injuries”. Then again – maybe people just aren’t using lube but I don’t understand that – sex needs to be at least “comfortable” for it to be good.
Maggie you just posted the first thing I’ve heard from the “Occupy” movement that I’ve found to be positive. Beating the hell out of Nick Kristoff (figuratively, that is) – I think I may join the occupy movement! LOL
Also – the news in Louisiana on SCAT keeps getting better and better. I’m glad to see this abomination eliminated and … I’m still confused, but does this mean no more “scarlett letters” on the driving licenses of SCAT convicts?
Anyway – I know Women With A Vision (WWAV) has done a lot of cool work on the SCAT issue – but I wonder what their next mission will be now that SCAT is pretty much a done issue? I checked their calendar – and they don’t have anything on it really.
Shit … I meant to say SCAN – not SCAT!! LOL … why do I have SCAT on my mind? It’s not a Freudian slip I assure you!! Dumazzz.
See! Sex IS violence! 🙂
Actually, it probably makes sense. Mucous membranes are quite fragile. Your lips tear and crack all the time, blowing your nose can cause bleeding, coughing hard damages the lining of the throat, and rough toilet paper ….
The thing is, those membranes heal very quickly too, and no one notices – unless someone is looking for proof of rape.
What gets me is whenever people say that (unrepentant) prostitutes need to be punished, no one asks “Why?”. What exactly have they done that requires legal punishment?
Even if prostitution is violence against women, as long as it is consensual and does not result in permanent physical injury or death, so what?? Boxers endure deliberate violence. So do American football players. Stunt women and sparring partners are paid to get beaten up or worse. Surrogate mothers endure terrific pain and discomfort for money, and don’t tell me getting impregnated and giving birth is not sexual. But nobody claims that these people should be punished.
The same goes for brothel keeping and pimping. If no one gets hurt, and the prostitutes are not forced to use their services, why are they punished? A brothel owner is basically an innkeeper, and a (good) pimp is a personal business manager and agent. Why isn’t the agent of an actress who gets her a part in a cheesy sexploitation film equally guilty?
Nothing. Because laws are not about wrong-doing, they are about power. Even with laws that on the surface are about wrong-doing.
Take murder. No ruler would likely ever get elected on a platform to make murder legal, but they can get elected on a platform for the state to go murder (they wont call it that) foreigners or a hated local minority. Which means, for rulers, laws against murder are not motivated by principle (murder is evil), but by pragmatism (opposing murder laws will make me unelectable).
Or kidnapping someone and locking them in your basement. No ruler would likely ever get elected on a platform to make these legal, but they can get elected on a platform for the state to kidnap and imprison people for say, selling or buying sex, or drugs, to name but a few. Which means, for rulers, laws against kidnapping and imprisonment are not motivated by principle (kidnapping and imprisoning someone is evil), but by pragmatism (opposing such laws will make me unelectable).
And sure, I imagine rulers don’t want to be murdered or imprisoned in someone’s basement either, and would like those laws too, but that only accentuates the hypocrisy. Note this works for totalitarian style states too, elections are just a smokescreen to make people think they have power, and to accept the imposition of power by the rulers.
In short, you are looking for moral principles in a system that only pays lip service to them when it’s convenient, and tosses them to the four winds when it’s not.
I was shocked at the whole vaginal injury thing too. I’ve had a lot of sex, sometimes with large men, multiple men, double penetrations, fisting, and I’ve not been injured. Maybe I’m just made of stronger stuff.
When I read the article about the woman offering sex for two cheese burgers I was outraged. As a true whore, I was bothered by the fact that she was selling sex, but that she was selling it so cheaply. This just ruins the business.
Bloody amateurs. I’ve gone off about this before. I’ve seen it so often. Some woman decides sex work is a good way to make quick money, she goes into it not knowing what she’s doing, she doesn’t know how to protect herself, she ends up having a bad experience and we’ve got a new anti-porn or anti-prostitution crusader. Amateurs also aren’t as scrupulous about using condoms, which can lead to problems.
If you’re going to buy sexual services, go to an established professional.
I’m thinking now that maybe they were counting some insignificant “anamolies” that they were able to find during a vag exam – but the women didn’t even know they had. So maybe they have a point here and some minor, insignificant abrasions are just part of the process of sex. The human body is like that. Last physical I had the doc told me I had lots of blood in my urine – I felt fine (great actually) – and we determined that it was a result of “deadlifting” in the gym the day before. The blood is just a normal part of the recuperative process, obviously some form of minor internal injury has occurred but – you don’t notice it unless you have some lab tech looking at it under a micro.
I suspect those lesions are just the same thing as unexplained bruises. Lots of women (myself included) constantly have bruises of unknown origin; I always get them on my thighs after energetic sex, but can’t feel them and don’t know when they appeared. And let’s face it, most rape isn’t any rougher than consensual sex; rapists generally use some means other than pure physical force (such as trickery, threat or just dead weight) to secure compliance, and the actual intercourse itself is pretty much standard. I think the problem here is that most people equate “rape” with “forcible rape”; I suspect in the latter the lesions might be more common or severe.
“If you’re going to buy sexual services, go to an established professional.”
That brings up an interesting question. All established professionals retire some day, So how does one go from ‘amateur’ to ‘professional’ without having that bad experience that turns her into a diehard prohibitionist?
By learning from a pro, such as in an agency or by networking with other pros on the internet.
“When I read the article about the woman offering sex for two cheese burgers I was outraged.”
She could have at least asked for a “quarter pounder”, or even a “whopper” if left feeling unfulfilled…
The Soft Weapon – I signed the petition. When liars are caught, it is essential to bring attention to their perfidy. The more they are exposed, the sooner the current wave of trafficking hysteria will end.
The Rape Question – I don’t think this should make much of a difference. I was involved in a rape case during December 2010, and the judge said that the lack of internal injury was irrelevant to whether a rape had taken place. There was only one holdout juror, and she soon relented, resulting in a unanimous guilty verdict.
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2126157/Three-male-German-business-students-offer-sex-service-stressed-female-students-s-proven-improve-grades-claim.html
I live near Mannheim. Maybe I should go to the uni and put up my cell number and offer my “stress relief services” , eh? LOL!!!
“independent MPs Janet Woollard and Adele Carles”
it is mostly ugly women who want prostitution banned. Can’t handle the competition.
“I’m Sure You Feel Safer Now”
Oh totally. When I lock my doors at night, it’s because of all the prostitutes out there. I’m glad police are chasing them down instead of minor irritants like murderers and kidnappers.
Plus, she’s reducing the supply of cheeseburgers on the child menu. Children Will Starve! I thank God the police have removed this threat To The Children For The Children!
She is jyst trying to reduce childhood obesity…
Maggie,
There is a grim irony in using a quote from Robiespierre railing against injustice and tyranny, dontcha think?
One of my strong points is, if I may be permitted to say so, a healthy appreciation of irony. 🙂
What’s the emoticon for “Ironic Grin?”
Can’t you see the danger in allowing a woman to trade sex for $2 worth of food-like substances? It will seriously undercut the dating market!
Patty the Hooker on My Name Is Earl occasionally worked for hamburgers. And all this time I thought that was just a silly piece of comedy.
Had I not ever been in sex work, had I married, been a typical wife and mother, I think I’d be less worried about prostitutes, who would have sex with my husband only if he sought them out and paid them, than all the amateur women, who would have sex with him for free.
Here’s a new “man bites dog” story you might be interested in.
http://www.spiegel.de/international/zeitgeist/0,1518,825714,00.html
All jokes and concerns about undercutting the market aside, the twin tragedies of the “Hamburger Hooker” are that
a) the woman was hungry, and apparently there weren’t enough people who were willing to just give her a hamburger, and
b) the cops had to be such stick-up-the-ass jerks that they gave the woman a trip to jail instead of a hamburger. At least in jail they have to feed her.
[…] are criminalized. And in Illinois and a few other states (Arizona, Florida, Idaho, Indiana, Louisiana, Michigan, Oklahoma, South Carolina, Texas and Vermont) prosecutors are actually able to charge […]