There are people who believe that migrant women who sell sex need to be saved; that they must want to go home; that they must want another job and they have 200-year-old ideas about what those jobs should be. –
Laura Agustín
My favorite comic book artist of all time has passed away at the age of 87. It’s impossible to overstate his influence on the industry, nor how iconic his style was for those of us who grew up with Silver Age comics. If you’re unfamiliar with his work, take a moment to look at this portrait of one of my favorite heroines and this 8-page story (written by Gardner Fox).
Cops do this all the time, but Pittsburgh-area cops are especially shameless:
Homestead Officer Ronald DePellegrin, 48, admits that he allowed Diana Gross, 26, to give him oral sex before he informed her that he was actually a cop…attorney…Michael Waltman…says DePellegrin’s conduct is unacceptable…”The police…are engaging in the exact type of…activity that they’re…[allegedly] trying to protect the community from”…
You know how I keep pointing out that prostitution laws harm all women?
What do you do when you’re detained by powerful officials, everything you say is presumed deceptive, arbitrary “evidence” is held against you, and you’re treated like a moral deviant?…It happened three times in two weeks — being detained by U.S. border officials…my…“sexy underwear” were mentioned…[and my] condoms…were looked upon scathingly…[one official told me] that adultery was a crime in America — a crime that he could deny me entry for…I was detained, yelled at, patted down, fingerprinted, interrogated, searched, moved from room to room…without food, water or being told what was going on…
Furry Girl explains how laws supposedly intended to “protect children” were really intended to harass the porn industry:
…”2257″ is shorthand for the…irritatingly-named Child Protection and Obscenity Enforcement Act…when you appear in adult productions in the US, you as the performer/model must give the production company/photographer two forms of identification and sign…paperwork promising that you are over 18…fake IDs [exist]…and any contract a minor signs is void anyway [so this]…doesn’t do a thing to guarantee age…Any random person can search for companies reselling and licensing adult content, and with a purchase, buy performer’s legal names, social security numbers, and addresses…a determined stalker can comb through enough adult content resellers and have a good shot at finding their target…Independent pornographers…have to choose between a fear of federal prosecutions and prison time…and a fear of…stalkers coming to our homes to rape or assault us…
A man convicted of crimes related to promoting prostitution was sentenced…to…eight years in prison. Kevin J. Barker…had about 35 women working for him…Barker would get $80 and women would get $80 per call and…anything after that was negotiable…
Trafficking, Trafficking Everywhere!
One of the few concessions New Zealand has made to “sex trafficking” hysteria (and one of the few things that keep it from absolute decriminalization) is its ban on international students in sex work. Of course this creates a bottleneck which leads, predictably, to the very type of exploitation the law is supposedly intended to prevent. The New Zealand Prostitutes’ Collective of course understands this and is calling on the government to end the restriction; Catherine Healy explains:
Just recently I was dealing with a case of a young woman who…had gone into this agreement with a brothel operator who said…I’ll look after your money until you need it to pay for your student fees, and of course when that time arrived, the money wasn’t handed over…She couldn’t stomp off to the police, she couldn’t talk to…the university, so really…the law…contributed to her exploitation…back in 2003…the then minister of immigration had hatched this dopey clause in the 11th hour, and we said look, this will have the opposite effect of what you’re intending…
Funny how religious fanatics are always ready to make convenient exceptions:
A Kuwaiti woman who once ran for parliament has called for sex slavery to be legalized – and suggested that non-Muslim prisoners from war-torn countries would make suitable concubines. Salwa al Mutairi argued buying a sex-slave would protect decent, devout and “virile” Kuwaiti men from adultery because buying an imported sex partner would be tantamount to marriage…[she] even suggested that it would be…better…for women in warring countries as they might die of starvation…offices could be opened to run the sex trade in the same way that recruitment agencies provide housemaids…
To sum up: prostitution under individual control = sin. Compulsory prostitution under government control = good.
…If Governor Bryant [of Mississippi] signs “Lenora’s Law,” sex offenders who violate the state’s registry system will wear a GPS tracking device…[the law] also [extends] the residence buffer for sex offenders to 3,000 feet from a school…”These are people who have proven they won’t obey the law,” said [bill sponsor Will] Longwitz. “Now…we will know where sex offenders are at all times, and can prevent them from striking again”…
No, these are usually people who can’t obey the law because its requirements have become increasingly-difficult to comply with:
Michael Byars’ effort to modify [Iowa] sex offender laws was a case study for effective citizen activism…until…he was arrested and fired from his job…[because] he didn’t update the state sex offender registry to reflect his voluntary, unpaid and, so far, largely successful attempt to persuade lawmakers to change the law…Byars…was convicted in 2008 of lascivious acts with a child…[for] a short, consensual relationship with a 13-year-old high school freshman while he was an 18-year-old high school senior. The conviction…saddled him with a lifetime…sentence that requires him to check in regularly with a parole officer and stringently limits his interaction with children, including his own son…
24-year-old Byars was such an amazingly successful lobbyist that an opponent called the cops, claiming that his advocacy is a “job” and demanding he be arrested for failing to register it (despite the fact that when he tried to do so he was told it was unnecessary). The cops were of course happy to comply, because we can’t have those dirty girlfriend-daters demanding their rights.
Via Reason TV, Tracy Quan speaks with Shereen El Feki in “Sex and the Citadel: Does the Arab Spring need a Summer of Love?”
Observable fact: 16-year-old leaves home. Conclusion: sex trafficking!
…Vancouver police are investigating the disappearance of 16-year-old Isabella Castillo, and her family…thinks she’s caught up in sex trafficking because one of her friends told them they’d seen her around with another girl who is known in the local sex-trafficking world. That girl is used by sex traffickers to recruit other girls by befriending them. She then lures them in, grooms them and gets them to run away. The girls are never heard from again…
“The local sex trafficking world?” Was it really necessary for cops and fanatics to fill the family’s head full of this kind of nonsense? Young women don’t leave home because they’re induced to run away by “traffickers”; they leave because home has become intolerable for some reason, often sexual abuse. And if they enter the sex trade it’s because the laws have made that their only means of support, not because they’re “trafficked”.
I wish I had all the magical powers Zimbabwean harlots do:
A prostitute in Bulowayo, Zimbabwe…[apparently] died during an encounter with a customer…[but] came back to life just as officials placed her in a metal coffin…she suddenly woke up in a panic screaming, “You want to kill me!” at the officers…Seeing a woman presumed to be dead spring back to life shocked onlookers, many of whom ran away in fear…
Apparently the word “legal” is not part of this reporter’s vocabulary: “Vicksburg [Mississippi] mayoral candidate Linda Fondren and her husband once owned a [brothel] in Nevada…it’s not clear…if the Fondrens are still involved…[and] Linda…denies she ever was…” After the actual evidence, the fact that Mr. Fondren once publicly defended adults’ right to have consensual sex with other people is presented (presumably on the “only a witch…” principle).
…chimpanzees…have the ability to “think about thinking”…according to new research…researchers…required them to…name what food was hidden in a location…chimpanzees named items immediately and directly when they knew what was there, but…
sought out more information before naming when they did not already know…
Dr. Laura Agustín is currently in Ireland (speaking at the Dublin Anarchist Bookfair today), and gave this short interview about “trafficking” hysteria and related prohibitionist schemes.
Alexis Wright…has reached a plea deal with prosecutors in the Kennebunk prostitution case…[agreeing] to plead guilty to theft, tax evasion and prostitution…clients…who have been charged so far include a former mayor, a…hockey coach, a minister, a lawyer and a firefighter…
Another interview (this one in Reveal) with Becky Adams about her plans for a brothel for the disabled: “More than 700 people have already agreed to work for a reduced price…’We’re expecting the local council to object, but we are prepared to take the argument all the way to the European Court of Human Rights‘”…
A similar prohibitionist deception from a decade ago:
[In November 2000]…a Swedish radical feminist named Alexa Wolf…showed her “documentary”…Shocking Truth…[which]…shows what seems to be a rape scene…Wolf…[slowed] down the film making it appear as the woman was helpless and drugged…[thus creating] a moral panic…The pay per view-channels promised that there would be no “violent porn”…Video stores removed porn from the shelves. 57% of the Swedish population wanted to ban ALL porn…in conservative Norway we had more or less the same reaction…The woman seen “drugged and raped” in the film…is…award winning porn actress…Mila Shegol [who stated in an interview that] she was not on drugs, she was not raped, it was all acting, she actually took part in directing the scenes…she was not a suffering, oppressed or exploited woman, and she had no idea there had been made a documentary about her alleged rape…
A Broker in Pillage (TW3 #312)
Here’s that weird “pay back” euphemism again: “A…brothel owner who made thousands exploiting vulnerable women was…ordered to pay back…£75,000 of his sordid gains within six months [or] he [will] be locked up for…two years…” Because money gained via business is “sordid”, but that gained via extortion is “just”.
Birth of a Movement (TW3 #312)
Muslim women have launched a campaign to send a message to “sextremist” collective Femen. “Muslimah Pride Day” was organised in response to Femen’s self-declared “Topless Jihad Day”, a day of topless protests around the world to support Tunisian Femen activist Amina Tyler…
Montana lawmakers are looking at ways to prevent and punish human trafficking in response to reports of increased prostitution [among]…people who have come to find work in the Bakken oil boom…there is no actual proof that trafficking is a problem in Montana, said…Rep. Sarah Laszloffy…But without the language on the books…authorities [lack] the tools needed to track it…
And more importantly, the way to clean up on “trafficking” grants! Already, selfless volunteers are working to make sure “authorities” have sufficient disinformation to block out real facts:
…Melissa Woodward…helps train law enforcement about how to spot a child that may have been sold into prostitution…”Does she have physical markings on her? Tattoos that are often visible…things like wearing very provocative clothes…”
You heard it here first, kids! Tattoos, sexy clothes and looking for work are all signs of “sex trafficking”! If you see a woman with any of those telltale signs, call the cops immediately so she can be “rescued” into the nearest jail!
“That girl is used by sex traffickers to recruit other girls by befriending them. She then lures them in, grooms them and gets them to run away. ”
My god, are we talking a girl or a succubus here? What a ludicrous story. Fortunately, I have just the right response:
Trafficking, Trafficking Everywhere!
I’m really impressed a local sex worker union(?) is advocating for the rights of foreign student-workers; normally they would take the free opportunity to quash the source of competition.
None So Blind
Well, that’s horrific.
Tis ain’t your grandpappy’s Old West anymore. That means you’ll need to stop being a free thinker, free spirit and a free man. Don’t even think about whoring, gambling or walking around with your gun unless you qualify for a carrier’s permit for each and every firearm we the government decide to let you own and carry, boy!!!
“Lenora’s Law” – proof positive that Conservatives are every bit as good at playing on emotions to ramrod unconstitutional laws down our throats as Liberals are.
In other news … NOPD is apparently trying to squelch a rumor that a missing local school teacher was abducted by Russian human slavers.
http://wgno.com/2013/03/06/missing-teacher-and-the-russian-mob-rumor/
I’m surprised that NOPD isn’t riding that rumor for all it’s worth to romance more of our tax dollars from the federal human trafficking task force(s). I think maybe the reason they are not playing along is … Russian Mafia in Lakeview? Uhm – that’s hilariously unbelievable! 😛
I’m really pleased that “sex trafficking” hysteria never really caught on in Louisiana, despite the best efforts of cops and the rescue industry to push it. I’m also overjoyed to see really bizarre, crazy “trafficking” stories spreading now; sure sign the panic is close to collapsing.
Yeah that’s funny isn’t it … you’re familiar with New Orleans so you get the hilarity of it. Let’s see here – you’re a Russian King Pin Sex Slaver … where in NOLA do you set up shop??
Why of course, the FIRST choice of every Russian mafioso is LAKEVIEW!! LMAO!!
Regarding Mr. Infantine; I always admired his work, though I liked Gil Kane and Jack Kirby’s better. He certainly gave the Silver Age Flash comics a distinctive look that I don’t think has been bettered.
I’ve had issue with the 2257 law myself, my own information has been stolen, and posted.
As for US border officials, they are an awful lot. Rude, arrogant, and totally drunk on power. Try traveling when you’ve a foreign accent. I have a US passport, (Now) totally valid. But because of my accent, which despite all these years in the US I haven’t managed to lose, I’m always questioned. I’ve never had a spot of bother with Canadian, Jamaican, Mexican, UK, or other European border officials.
Reading that article, “Sexism at the border: A personal account,” really infuriated me. I feel like I need to take some time and cool down after reading it.
One of the very cool things I found about the U.S. Military is the way they beat it into you that, while wearing that military uniform, you are a representative of both the American people and the United States Government. Your actions, directly influence how others (especially foreigners) view America. Responsibility for American image is placed on the shoulders of every individual.
Now – some scum bags never live up to the tasking – but in the military I can tell you that those scum bags are very few and far between. When they popped their little heads up on my ship’s I just had them crucified as an example to all but … unfortunately this doesn’t happen at every command.
I do not understand – how an agency of government like Homeland Security can escape this philosophy. It’s not just border guys – it’s TSA agents too. They just don’t seem to give a fuck about their image as professionals.
I must agree. My experience with soldiers has been very difference than my experience with border officials, and cops. My thinking is that soldiers are the real thing, they don’t need to puff themselves up like the pretenders.
Note:
Whenever the sex ratio in any given population favors men, prostitutes are sure to come in. That is a fact of life in the same way that water is wet and and rocks are hard.
Such is the situation in the Bakken oil fields, so get used to it. If you bring in that “human trafficking” nonsense into a situation like this, the potential for disaster increases in proportion to to the imbalanced sex ratio.
Typo: “to”
So, today I got an image on my Facebook feed of a stoic looking bearded man in a T-shirt holding up a sign saying “Real Men Don’t Buy Girls.” (I’d post the link, but I don’t want the image to show up in my comments.)
Now, that’s not the interesting part.
The interesting part is that it was a burlesque dancer friend of my cousin’s who posted the image.
Now, I had already know from some other posts where she got into it with some other burlesque dancers that she looked down on ordinary strip clubs (the other burlesque dancers were defending ordinary strip clubs for their part).
But she’s also posted positive things about porn she watches on her Twitter feed. More importantly, she often runs afoul of Facebook’s morality police herself, finding her account locked for periods of time because she posted some risque pictures of herself.
So here we see how feminism gets involved in teaching women how to cut their own throats. If we ever got such a repressive regime in this country where prostitution was totally suppressed, how long does she think stripping would survive after that (even fancy artistic stripteases like she does)? Either that or porn would be next on the chopping block, and would be violently suppressed.
I just don’t get it. I’d get into it with her, but as “Mr. White Heterosexual Man” I figure I’d get back, “Thanks for mansplaining that for me, pervert, now go to Hell!” or something along those lines.
I have never bought a girl in my life.
That “phrase” is right out of the “How to Argue Like a True Idiot” book. A close relation to it … is saying that a hooker “sells herself”.
I think we need to stop those cats from using those kinds of terms. Next time they bring it up … you just say … “Hey, why are you using terms that do not apply? Because a hooker actually “sells herself” about as much as a Doctor or Lawyer does – and no where near as much as a politician does.”
I don’t let people get away with that when they argue with me. There are certain terms and ways of putting things that are completely WRONG but some people still feel perfectly comfortable using them. Fine – defend them then. Let’s talk about what it means to “sell oneself” – it’s an argument I can win every single time and they’ll think twice about using their pet slogans next time around.
So I would be like “Real Men Don’t Buy Girls”? Oh – well we’re not going to talk about human trafficking my friend – we’re going to talk about your use of the word “buy” in that phrase and I’m going to show you what a linguistic infant you are. The funny thing is – most people who use these kinds of sayings don’t even think twice about their legitimacy – until it explodes in their faces.
Yes, if it had been someone who I actually conversed with I would have probably argued with them, but it’s not someone I ever talk to.
My main reason for being on Facebook is that it turns out to be a good way to talk to my many friends overseas. (These are my actual friends, and they are mostly completely baffled by American politics. One of their many good qualities. )
However, if you ever get on Facebook, pretty soon every person you vaguely know starts to “friend” you. Then you get to find out all their well thought out political opinions on everything.
Still, any site that let’s me subscribe to “Hot Italian Girls” can’t be all bad. Eventually I will have blocked every American friend I have on that site, and it will be nothing but foreigners and “hot Italian girls.” (Who I suppose are actually also foreigners…. come to think of it.)
“I tremble for my country when I contemplate the fact that God is a just God.”
Thomas Jefferson
“she couldn’t talk to…the university, so really…the law…contributed to her exploitation”
Yup, she was exploited by the law. The poor dear was forced, simply forced to work illegally. It’s not like anyone could possibly support themselves through uni without doing sex work like – for instance – every male student has to do.
On the subject of comic books, have you heard of Arthur Pinajian and his comic book characters Madame Fatal (the first cross dressing superhero) and Hooded Justice?
Apparently, he stopped working on comic books after returning from WWII and went into high art. His work was lost and discovered some 10 years after his death by a couple of guys trying to flip a house.
I don’t know why feminists who supported Femen without making any attempt to find out who they were or what they stood for are surprised by the Muslim feminist backlash. Femen whose member include neo-nazis, strip off at everyone of their protests for attention but are actually anti-prostitution, anti pornography, anti stripping. They attacked sex workers and their clients, and have threatened to castrate men found NOT guilty of rape. It’s hardly surprising that their slogans and imagery was going to be overtly racist and now they are insults Muslim women who wear the hijab.
Behind then tit-flashing, violence, vandalism, racism and faith-baiting, they have no ideological aims or objectives, and the Ukrainian leader of Femmen France, lInna Shevchenko, is a complete moron. When you look at the facts behind their topless jihad: Amina Tyler, a half-Tunisian student, has not been arrested for posting topless pictures on facebook, hasn’t been committed to a mental asylum, and doesn’t face persecution from the Tunisian authorities. She’s also free to wear the same clothes in public that I am in Italy.
There is so much to read in your posts. Thank you for making such efforts. I appreciate it.
Infantino got a mention in Prof. James Kakalios’ book The Physics of Super Heroes.
Way to save those victims, DePellegrin.
I’ve said it before: when prostitutes have to pretend, for legal reasons, that they are not hookers, the inevitable result is that women who are in fact not hookers will be mistaken for hookers pretending, for legal reasons, that they are not hookers. Leave the hookers alone and you solve the problem for hookers and non-hookers alike.
Actually, it’s pretty easy to find almost anybody these days. But yeah, no reason it should be even easier to find porn performers.
When I read that he was convicted for “promoting prostitution,” and I I saw the comic, at first I thought he was convicted for the comic! And BTW, thanks for the comic.
It’s just a smaller-scale version of what we see in the US: when a hooker can’t go to the police, people do things to her which would get the police called on them if they did it to anybody else. Also, the New Zealand Prostitutes’ Collective? I just saw several Star Trek fans’ heads explode (to say nothing of Ayn Rand fans).
This sex slave thing is just like how so many of us wink and nod at prison rape: it’s OK if it’s happening to BAD people.
It shouldn’t be shocking that when we make it difficult or impossible for someone to live a legal life, that someone chooses living an illegal life over just laying down and quietly dying.
I’ll get back to NAKED TRUTH because it’s just over an hour long. I do want to see it, though.
The other girl is “known in the local sex-trafficking world?” So, why is she running around? Or maybe this other girl just has a reputation for… running around?
Even Vertilya to Thorma doesn’t have that kind of power!
If they don’t want to vote for a woman who owned a legal brothel, fine. But the voters should know if it was in fact legal, and if Fondren did in fact own it.
You know, with all we’re learning about apes these days, I could almost believe that a child raised by them would be able to integrate into human society. Que the Weissmuller yell.
God for Agustin. The land of my ancestors needs this.
”More than 700 people have already agreed to work for a reduced price…”
So much for the “whores are all greedy bitches” stereotype.
A similar thing happened in the US in regards to “snuff films.” A movie actually called Snuff got the panic rolling when it supposedly contained an actual murder as the final scene. The actress supposedly murdered on camera appeared in other films after her supposed demise.
That the money must be “payed back” to government shows you who the real pimp is.
OK, I’ll get to the rest later. I’ve been staying at Laura’s for the past few days because my AC isn’t on, but it’s supposed to get cooler tomorrow, and I’ll be back home. Not sure why I do a worse job of catching up here than there, but I do.
Well now I see that “the rest” was just three more, lol. So here I go:
Not only are these French police harassing prostitutes (and no doubt women they mistake for prostitutes), but it looks like racial profiling is not an American oddity.
There’s no reason Femen telling women what they’re allowed to wear is any better than a cleric telling women what they are allowed to wear.
I have wondered why, in this day and age when so many of us believe that a child molester hides behind every tree, so many of us insist on dressing our little girls like the Hollywood stereotype of streetwalkers. And now, all the little girls in strangely trampish clothes can be taken away from their parents and… what? Sent to do laundry? You know that’s an idea which appeals to some in the States.
OK, I’ll move on, keep catching up, and I WILL watch that video.
I DID watch that video. Very good. However, I suspect that freedom will probably have to wait until, to put it bluntly, a lot of people just don’t CARE about religion anymore. I don’t mean Egypt will have to become a nation of atheists, just that religion will have to become only an influence in culture and law, not something it can safely be assumed (because it’s true) that everybody except a marginalized few will riot, vote, or spend money because of.
[…] via Maggie, here’s another example of ICE depravity, as described by Clay Nikiforuk, a young woman […]