To every thing there is a season, and a time to every purpose under the heaven…A time to weep, and a time to laugh; a time to mourn, and a time to dance. – Ecclesiastes 3:1-4
Most sex worker gatherings are either celebratory (such as our conventions and June 2nd events) or vehement (such as our protests and March 3rd events); many partake of both. But on this one day a year they are more solemn, for it is the day we honor our dead. Whether we would like to or not it is something we must do, because in places which would prefer to pretend we don’t exist, or places (like the US) where our very existence is criminalized, there is no one else to do it; were whores to fail to remember our dead, they would be forgotten entirely…and we refuse to let that happen. Some prohibitionists say we bring violence upon ourselves by our choice to live outside of the sexual restrictions that repressive cultural norms have imposed on women for the past several millennia; others try to rob us of our agency, claiming that the violence comes from imaginary “pimps” and demonized clients. But the truth these would-be social engineers don’t want you to know is that the majority of violence against whores is inflicted by the police, either with the blessings of the state (in the name of “fighting prostitution” or “rescuing victims”) or in the shadow created by the state’s definition of harlots as creatures outside the bounds of humane treatment. The state, Western religions, and carceral “feminists” teach that a woman who has sex for practical reasons rather than emotional ones is robbed of her “purity”, and that an “impure” woman would be better off dead. Furthermore, since they only value women for our sexual characteristics, they teach that a woman who sells sex “sells her body” or even “sells herself”; a person without a body is a ghost, and a person without a self is nothing at all. Given these beliefs, is it any wonder those who adhere to them think dead hookers are of no great import? As far as they’re concerned we were dead already, or worse than dead. And if we are, is it any surprise that violent, weak-minded thugs in or out of uniform believe they can rape, rob, brutalize or even kill us with impunity?
Exactly one month ago tonight, I sat in a room with three of my sisters; we ate together, talked about our lives, swapped war stories, laughed and hugged and shared a kind of intimacy I’ve never felt with any group of amateur women. That intimacy was itself one of the topics of conversation, and we understood that one of the reasons for its existence is that, in the eyes of the state, we are all outlaws – career criminals – fallen women whom the state has to use violence to cage lest we infect others with our dangerous notions about freedom, independence and self-ownership. That was a night of celebration and joy, but I wish that tonight I could be with that same group again to mourn others who were not as fortunate in escaping doom as we have been. Just as nobody else can understand our bonds of camaraderie in life, so too can they not understand how we can care so deeply for departed sisters we never met while they were still alive. The answer to both is the same: we must love and care for each other so, because none of the “good”, “righteous”, “upstanding” members of “law-abiding” society will.
Well it may be true in the USA that most violence agianst sexworkers comes from the police (but somehow I doubt that) but here in the UK(and jurisdictions where I know the research literature, Austraiia New Zealand Denmark and N.Ireland as well as the UK most of the violence and certainly the murders come from clients.
There are obviously those of a violent bent that seek out sexworkers, possibly because they are particularly vunerable as they often work alone and there are many examples of prostitutes being murdered by clients.
As for other non-lethal violence it is moatly perpetrated by clients-especially against those working on the streets-it is disingenuous to pretend otherwise. However the extent of violence is exagerated by prohibitionists, most encounters pass off without incident.
>”Well it may be true in the USA that most violence agianst sexworkers comes from the police (but somehow I doubt that)”
Your statement is much like saying that you doubt most rain falls from the sky. Clients have the same reason not to be violent as any one else, it’s illegal, and they might get caught and punished. cops do not fear that.
Even so, there’s way too much harm coming from clients or cops.
Be safe, sisters.
Clients also have an additional reason: If you by a service from somebody and the quality is fine, you may likely want to buy that service from the same supplier again. Many people understand the concept of a fair exchange and how it relates to the continued availability of that service or ware.
Too many cops these days are just people that take by force because they feel entitled to it and because hiring criteria for cops have reverted to their original nature: The goons that keep ordinary folk in line for those in power. Some self-enrichment opportunities and opportunities for sadism come as a perk. This, incidentally, is also the origin of “the law”, although there is this nice fairy-tale cover-story of it being about “protection” and “fairness” for ordinary citizens. It is not and it never really was.
In every country where sex work is even somewhat criminalized, the bulk of violence is perpetrated by the police. Or don’t you consider assault, rape, abduction, robbery and caging to be forms of violence? Because I certainly do.
UPDATE: In my inbox today from Zi Teng, the Hong Kong sex worker rights organization:
Really from “clients”? Seems strange that they would pay. There are many examples of pizza delivery workers being murdered, though it’s not due to pizza buyers
Violence is not all-or-nothing. Some men (a small minority, thank Aphrodite) believe that paying a woman gives them leave to do as they like with her. In those (again, rare) cases, it’s the payment which they believe justifies the rape, hitting, abuse, infliction of visible bruises or whatever.
Violent opportunists are not clients any more than bank robbers are customers.
AMEN
Maggie is not trying to say that cops beat up whores and that’s the number one cause of death (though it does contribute); what she’s saying is that by criminalizing prostitution an unsafe environment is created that invites violence. If it weren’t criminal, it wouldn’t be so dangerous.
Which reminds me – Maggie, have you heard? The Conservative government here in Canada has quietly legislated in the Swedish model. Already its constitutionality has been challenged.
On this day, thinking back on the interesting, kind and wonderful sws I have met over the last ten years and wishing all good things, most especially continued health and safety. In respect to all who have suffered harm, no matter from whom, I pledge to continue to support the fight for harm reduction, and elimination of criminalization and stigmatization.
There’s a demo in Belfast, N Ireland tonight abut this. I doubt it will get much attention. But it’s a start. Alas, opening brains and getting them to think is a very uphill task here.
In other, but similar news, a protester who harassed the boss of the local abortion clinic has been ordered to do community service:
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-northern-ireland-30513682
and I expect to go past the site of the harassment tomorrow; I wonder what I’ll see.
Shared to FB, as status update, to “public.”
Well said.
[…] 17 is commemorated internationally in the sex worker community as a "Day to End Violence Against Sex Workers"—violence which activists say is rooted in prostitution's […]
[…] 17 is commemorated internationally in the sex worker community as a “Day to End Violence Against Sex Workers”—violence which activists say is rooted in prostitution’s […]
Why December 17? Did some terrible event happen on that day?
Here’s the story of how the day started.
[…] 17 is commemorated internationally in the sex worker community as a “Day to End Violence Against Sex Workers”—violence which activists say is rooted in prostitution’s […]
[…] 17 is commemorated internationally in the sex worker community as a “Day to End Violence Against Sex Workers”—violence which activists say is rooted in prostitution’s […]
[…] 17 is commemorated internationally in the sex worker community as a “Day to End Violence Against Sex Workers”—violence which activists say is rooted in prostitution’s […]
[…] 17 is commemorated internationally in the sex worker community as a “Day to End Violence Against Sex Workers”—violence which activists say is rooted in prostitution’s […]
It is quite clear that working girls can be subjects of violence-both from punters and others. It is also clear that whether a WG has experienced violence depends on where she is working (on the street or indoors-indoors being far safer).
Ronald Weitzer in his recent book” Legalizing Prostitution: From Illicit Vice to Lawful Business” (http://www.amazon.co.uk/Legalizing-Prostitution-Illicit-Business-ebook/dp/B006L2BXXY/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1335269104&sr=8-1#_) provides a useful table (Table 2.1) (unfortunately not available on the Amazon “Look inside” ) where he summarizes academic work from a number of countries on the comparative levels of violence suffered by those working indoors and on the street. A point made by Weitzer is that the precise numbers in different surveys differ.
The most cited work in the UK comparing rates of violence in street and off street locations is that of Church et al (2001) (Church S et al “Violence by clients towards female prostitutes in different work settings: questionnaire survey” BMJ 322 , 524-525 NB by Clients http://www.bmj.com/content/322/7285/524 ) who questioned street workers in Leeds and Glasgow and indoor workers (saunas , and flats) in Leeds and Edinburgh (N=240 in total). The results showed that prostitutes working on the street experienced significantly more (about twice as much) violence from their clients than those working indoors) and the violence was more extreme, and whereas 25% of street workers had been raped the figure was 2% for those working indoors.(and incidentally also showed that the age of entry of street prostitutes was 19.6 that of indoor workers 22.7-so not as children as is sometimes claimed).
Similar data showing the street/indoor split were produced by Kinnel (2002) cited in Brooks-Gordon B (2006) The price of sex Willan p170 table 5.1, and the relative safety of indoor work demonstrated in surveys of brothel and flat workers (N=135) in Birmingham and Merseyside showed that three quarters had never experienced violence at work (Sanders T & Campbell R (2007) Designing out vulnerability, building in respect: violence, safety and sex work policy The British Journal of Sociology, 58: 1–19. doi: 10.1111/j.1468-4446.2007.00136.x(p7) ). Similarly in Leeds (N=105) 60% of Sauna and 50% of flat workers had never been assaulted but the figure fell to 25% for street workers, the same study showed that over 80% of sauna or flat workers had never been raped, the figure for street workers was 70% (Church SL 2003 The social organization of sexwork: The implications for female prostitutes health and safety pHD thesis University of Glasgow table 29 p 240)
In a large survey of indoor sexworkers who contact clients via the internet 81% had never experienced violence form a client (Jenkins 2009 Beyond gender: an examination of exploitation in sex work pHD thesis University of Keele http://ebookbrowse.com/gdoc.php?id=3350047&url=76cc3b73d5076830c65a9f88b4d5810f p289 answer to survey question 28 (It should be pointed out that some surveys ask sexworkers whether they had ever been assaulted or raped by a client-others ask whether such an event had occurred in the last six months or a year-this is to control for length of time in the industry-obviously those who had been sex workers for longer would have a higher risk of ever having such an event
Other countries experience
Similar results have been obtained in other jurisdictions-so for instance in Denmark a survey (N=290) of prostitutes (113 escorts, 140 brothel 37 street prostitutes) showed that violence is very rare in brothels-and even on the streets many have not experienced violence in the year before the survey ( Kofeld et at 2011 Postitution I Danmark http://www.sfi.dk/publications-4844.aspx?Action=1&NewsId=3032&PID=10056) p 232 fig.10.2).
A very large survey of 770 sexworkers in New Zealand (working on the streets, in brothels or as private workers) showed that in the past year over 90% had not experienced violence or rape (again violence and rape were more common in streetworkers)( Abel G et al 2007 The impact of the Prostitution Reform act on the health and safety Practices of Sex workers :Report to the Prostitution law review committee table 6.4 page 120)
In a relatively large study in Queensland Australia of 247 sex workers (102 in legal brothels, 103 independent escorts and 42 illegal street workers) it was found that found that 85% of sexworkers overall had never been raped by a client, of those that had been raped most were street workers where 50% had been raped (Seib C 2007 Health, well-being and sexual violence among Female sexworkers: a comparative study PHd thesis Queensland University of Technologyhttp://eprints.qut.edu.au/16398/1/Charlotte_Seib_Thesis.pdf )(p102 table 4.4) Appendix 4 of this thesis (p 216 ) present a summary table of eight other studies that examined prevalence of rape in sexworkers, again showing most indoor workers had never experienced rape while the frequency of rape in street workers was higher. Similarly for assault (“bashing”), again 85% overall had never been bashed by a client (p105 table 4.6) street workers had the highest prevalence of bashing where 50% reported ever having been bashed by a client (p106 table 4.7)
So while most prostitute client interactions pass of without violence, such violence as there is is mostly perpetrated by CLIENTS. It does not help your case Maggie to pretend otherwise.
I’m not “pretending” anything; WHO THE FUCK DO YOU THINK YOU ARE? Don’t ever try to tell me that you know better than sex workers about who fucking inflicts the most violence against us; many of those studies you cited are only of client violence and specifically exclude institutional violence, just like the FBI doesn’t track police murders of citizens as murders because they’re “justified”. If I were you, I’d drop this line of attack right fucking now; accusing me of dishonesty is an instant, one-way ticket to my permanent shit list.
Leaving aside the methodological problems with many of these studies, Robert, you are utterly missing the obvious reality here, which is that in criminalized regimes, such as the US, institutionalized violence against sex workers is a HUGE part of the risk that sexworkers face. Unless you don’t consider arrest, imprisonment and confiscation of property to be violence. Or the extortions and rape committed by members of law enforcement. And if Maggie seems a little sensitive on this last point, consider that she experienced it first hand.
Maybe we are talking at cross purposes here. Of course in countries where prostitution is illegal like the USA there is institutionalized violence in the way that anyfool describes. What I (and I think most people would understand by violence) is violence perpetrated by individuals against individual prostitutes, and most of that comes from clients (or those masquerading as clients) and not the police as Maggie seems to imply.
Was the serial killer Steve Wright who murdered six prostitutes in Ipswich UK a cop? (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ipswich_serial_murders )? No. Was Peter Sutcliffe (aka the Yorkshire ripper http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Peter_Sutcliffe) who killed 13 women some of who were prostitutes a cop? No. Was Garry Ridgeway the Green river killer a cop? No. Was Robert Pickton who murdered prostitutes in Vancouver a cop? No.
Murders (especially serial murders) are no doubt extreme events but here in the UK where prostitution is legal (although hemmed in by restrictions) between 1990 and 2003, 87 street workers in the UK were murdered You might argue that the stigmatization of prostitutes (in which the police might play a role) contributed to the hate these men felt towards their victims or to them working in unsafe conditions but the point is that most of these murders were committed by men who were clients.
What about other violence experienced occasionally by some prostitutes- the rapes and assaults, bashings, robberies verbal abuse and the rest? That too comes overwhelmingly from clients as I indicated above (see also table 58 of Prof. John Lowman’s report Violence Against Persons Who Prostitute: The Experience in British Columbia (where 96.5% of assailants were clients and 3.5% pimps) .
(http://184.70.147.70/lowman_prostitution/HTML/violence/Violence_Against_Persons_Who_Prostitute.pdf
Also in Australia (see Donovan, B., et al , (2012). The Sex Industry in New South Wales: a Report to the NSW Ministry of Health. Sydney: Kirby Institute, University of New South Wales.( p13 of https://maggiemcneill.files.wordpress.com/2012/04/nsw-sex-industry-report-2012.pdf
“Client violence(note-not cop violence) is another issue that sex workers face. While 5% to 10% of brothel and private workers have reported some form of violence in their work (e.g., robbery with violence, rape, bashing, stabbing) for street workers violence is a more pervasive issue. Upwards of 50% of Sydney street workers report violence at work. The illegal, visible, and stigmatised status of street sex work attracts extreme violence. …….. It has been argued that the state contributes to these murders by promoting stigmatisation and exploitation of sex workers while alienating them from the security that should be provided by the police”.
It is precisely because of violence against prostitutes that Bedford v Canada was initiated so that prostitutes would be allowed to work together and more safely and was also a major reason why prostitution was decriminalized in New Zealand and various states in Australia
You do get that murder is only one of many kinds of violence, right? And that the officials who tabulate such things don’t count arrest, police brutality and destruction of business as violence, right? And that they pretend that cops don’t extort, rob and rape sex workers, right? And you do know that the primary reason New South Wales decriminalized was because of rampant police violence & corruption against sex workers, right?
And you do know what an ass you look like arguing about this subject with an unusually well-informed member of the impacted population, right?
Right?
Maggie-perhaps if you read what I wrote more carefully you will see in my post Dec 19th the para starting “What about other violence experienced….” Where I do acknowledge that there are other types of violence besides murder and if you look at the whole of my post on Dec 18th it is about non- lethal violence showing that most of it comes from clients. So I do acknowledge” that murder is only one of many kinds of violence” Right?
Do you acknowledge as “unusually well-informed member of the impacted population” that prostitutes can be murdered, raped robbed and attacked by clients. So the discussion is about the relative proportion of client vs cop violence. Right?
You may well be right that in the USA where prostitution is illegal that the majority of violence is produced by the police-but you have produced nothing but assertion “ as a member of the impacted community” to back that up. Right?
Perhaps in countries like the UK Austalia New Zealand and Canada which have the same legal tradition and where prostitution has never been illegal (although hemmed around with so many restrictions that it is hard to operate legally ) things are different. Certainly the police are sometimes mistrusted by prostitutes but the reasons they cite for the mistrust is not police violence but ”that the quality of the police depends on the individual officer, they don’t trust the police, that their complaints are not taken seriously by the police , that the police are disrespectful, they have been harassed by the police” but violence by the police is not mentioned.
Certainly in the UK police know where the brothels are and that Saunas are a front for brothels but provided there is no evidence of coercion and trafficking or complaints from neighbors they tend to leave them alone
And I do know that part of the impetus for the legalization of prostitution in Australia in Queensland and NSW and CT was to prevent police corruption (the police in Queensland and NSW had been taking kickbacks form owners of brothels which were illegal at the time) but police violence was not an issue-indeed the issue was harm reduction. This can be seen either in the preambles to the legislation or in the parliamentary debates, in all the states the reasons for legislation all include the safety of sex workers, prevention of corruption and of organized crime and the protection of children. But you know all that. Right?
Look, Robert. You don’t seem like a person who is just here to troll (I don’t think trolls tend to use what look like their real names), but why are you pushing so hard on this? You’re giving the government and police far too much leeway on this with phrases “may well be right” and such. You don’t think the legislation and parlimentary debates are full of bromides and even outright lies about what their true intentions are?
I was wiling to give you the benefit of the doubt before, even though to this observer you seemed passive-aggressive, condescending, and ignorant (hopefully not willingly so) about what Maggie has spent literally decades learning and writing about here. It seems now though, that you’re doubling down and are as good as banned. Have you done any research yourself? Again, you use what looks to be your real name, so tell us about yourself. Who are you and what has been your experience that has led you to these conclusions?
Thank you, Quiet Man; I’m going to leave off banning him outright (for trolling) for long enough for him to answer you.
You’re welcome Maggie.
First, I think I should clarify one of the questions I asked Robert. By research I meant work you have undertaken yourself, as opposed to citing studies performed by others.
Perhaps I ought not to say this, but I could almost feel the heat of your first response to this gentleman radiating through my computer screen. It was on my mind for most of the past two days (perhaps that’s a sign I’ve been reading this blog too much, but that’s another story). I wanted to respond before this last pair of Robert’s comments, because I thought at first perhaps this fellow had made other responses, that were indeed outright trolls and were even ruder, which the rest of us weren’t privy to, because I just wasn’t seeing why, after only two comments, the reaction to him suddenly went from 0 to 100 mph. It would appear now that was not the case.
However I still wanted to respond because I keep thinking about Ms. Vonk and her ‘golden bridge’ concept. While this individual doesn’t seem to have thought things out to their fullest extent, I’m loathe to call him a troll because he doesn’t sound like he’s arguing against decriminalization or is otherwise against sex workers. If we think he is ignorant on some points, let’s educate him. Perhaps he could become a true ally instead of a potential one. If he chooses not to listen, then that’s his loss. He wouldn’t be the first and I’m sure he won’t be the last.
I’d be interested to know what some of your other regular readers think of this gentleman.
I can tell you the exact moment I went from merely annoyed to yellow-hot (he still didn’t get me to white or blue, and I doubt he could): The culprit was, “It does not help your case Maggie to pretend otherwise.” There is nothing that will make me angrier, quicker than accusations of intellectual dishonesty; I go to great pains to make my intellectual processes on this subject as transparent as is possible, and for some TOTAL JACKASS to dismiss years of work and effort, and to smear my reputation for brutal honesty with a flip equivalent of “LOL your lyin”, is enraging.
Well, that’s why I wanted to see if this fellow could be felt out a bit more. It raises another question I think is worth asking:
Robert, when did you discover Maggie’s blog and how much of her story have you read?
If someone is just going to jump in to this discussion after reading only one or two posts, knowing little to nothing about you, then of course he’s going to end up putting his foot in his mouth. That’s why I think he’s in need of education.
As for the anger you feel toward him, I’m not begrudging you that. Please believe me when I say this. This is your blog and no one can tell you what to feel. However, before Robert made his last two responses, I thought perhaps your initial blistering reply had scared him away (it was at least 24 hours since his first reply to these current ones, wasn’t it?) and we’d never know why he’s saying what he’s saying. In that respect, I thank you for not banning him just yet so we can learn more about him, hopefully to our mutual benefit.
Semantic, pedantic me wonders what Robert Shields means by “violence”, and whether his understanding differs from Maggie’s. I looked “violence” up in Chambers and while it didn’t specifically include “physical”, that this was meant was clear. (I didn’t know that “violence” is a synonym for “rape”.)
Physical violence is obvious, there are marks, bruises, or at worst a body. Mental and emotional violence is much harder, much more subtle—there may be no physical evidence. So often this boils down to “he says, she says”; even in rape, it’s not always so clear, if there isn’t any physical evidence. (And, for so many men, rape seems to mean non-consensual sexual intercourse which must be accompanied by physical violence.) Non-physical violence is like bullying of any sort: it’s what the victim feels, not what the aggressor did or didn’t do. or what the aggressor thinks. If the victim thinks they have been bullied, then the default position should/must be that they have been. As so often, sex workers are felt by society to be “not-persons”, then it’s obvious that anything they say is worthless.
I’d go with what I feel is Maggie’s concept of violence; anything that damages, whether physical or emotional, whether direct, or indirect (as in confiscation of assets) as a consequent of a life-style not (morally) approved of by society at large.
I’ve never been to the US, so I’m totally unable to comment on what happens there. But, I’m aware of the situation in Ireland; where, for example, a sex worker can have her assets seized and distributed, and where she (or indeed, he) must pay a fine to those organisations like Ruhama whose expressed purpose is to rescue sex workers, but whose espoused position is to enrich themselves through the State, while providing a zero to minimal service. I’d say that the payment of a fine to Ruhama (and similar organisations) is indeed a form of violence, one in which the scars are internal and, to a casual observer, not apparent.
Well lots of questions quietman. I first got interested in the whole area some years ago when I saw the patently ridiculous figures of trafficking being bandied about in the UK, which to anyone who is the slightest bit numerate could not possibly be true. So as a scientist with a passion for evidence I started to dig into the background finding work by Teela Sanders and Belinda Brookes Gordon in the UK and Ronald Weitzer in the USA which made much more sense to me-and through Weitzer became familiar with the ridiculous prohibitionist literature as well.
Then I saw that Newsweek article based on the “work” of Melissa Farley-I wrote to the author of the article saying Farley had “form~” and was not to be trusted and that was the time I discovered Maggie’s Column, which must be July 2011 and said pretty much what I had said to the author of the Newsweek article-and I have been a reader and admirer ever since.
My own view is that prostitution should be decriminalized as it is in New Zealand. I am very familiar with the rather copious academic literature, Government reports parliamentary debates in the UK, Australia and New Zealand. Australia is particularly interesting as different states have different legislation and so is a natural laboratory for the different types of legislation on prostitution ranging from decriminalization in NSW through legalization in Victoria and Queensland to being the UK or Canadian type model in South and Western Australia.
I have written long ripostes to consultations proposing the Swedish model in Scotland , N. Ireland Ireland and to proposals to push the Swedish model in Europe and also I have been thrown off the Mumsnet forum in the UK for taking prohibitionists to task for their assertions-all the time countering their arguments with evidence from the literature.
Then Maggie makes an assertion that most of the violence against sexworkers if from the Police-so naturally I would want evidence for that statement espeically as I am very familiar with the literature on violence agianst sexworkers..
Maggie has written a number of times saying things like “But since I refuse to take anything on faith or to accept arguments from authority, and they never have any actual facts,” (columns of June 4, 2014, 5th July 2012)…” While unsupported arguments from authority are a powerful persuader for a certain fraction of the population..”(April29th 2014)
So when I ask for her evidence-and cite evidence that most of the violence comes from clients -what does she do she says “WHO THE FUCK DO YOU THINK YOU ARE?”-is that not arguing from authority? Where is the evidence Maggie-apart from your say-so?
It’s a shame-because usually her columns are well evidenced-but this one is not.
Because obviously the experience of every sex worker who’s ever written on the subject isn’t as authoritative or credible as government-issued studies that specifically omit cops from the data. Got it.
Okay. First of all, thank you Robert, for taking the time to write this. It raises more questions, but (and please forgive me for this Maggie) I don’t think there’s as much daylight between you and Maggie as we might think.
A key takeaway for me is that you’re in favor of decriminalization. You rightly dismiss “traficking” stats and the prohibitionist platform as dangerous nonsense, and have even put your money where your mouth is by speaking out. That’s to be commended in my view. My goodness, you even say you’ve been reading and admiring Maggie since 2011! About as long as I have. While it boggles my mind that you couldn’t have anticipated Maggie’s response to you, and I still don’t agree with how you’ve phrased some of your arguments, I don’t consider you to be a troll now. I would just hope you cast as skeptical an eye on any government-sponsored study on violence against sex workers as you do on the ‘traficking’ studies you’ve concluded, again rightly, are grossly inaccurate.
On the subject at hand, I wonder if the disconnect here might be on the definition of authority rather than that of violence. Don’t look now, but Maggie is indeed arguing from evidence. As she says in the reply above mine, the evidence is her own personal experience (she suffered more violence at the hands of LE than she ever did from clients) and that of all the sex workers who seek her counsel and advice. There is no ‘pretending’ there. That is indeed authoritative, but it’s a different kind of authority than that of a nationwide survey conducted by statisticians, who are prone to their own biases, conflicts of interest, and other shortcomings. Perhaps there is indeed a large group sex workers who, through pragmatism, intelligence, or just plain luck have managed to avoid police violence, but I doubt it.
Which brings me to my final point. You describe yourself as a scientist, Robert. What area of science are we talking about? Could you undertake the in-depth study that would back up your conclusion that clients are the source of the majority of violence against sex workers? You’ll either be vindicated or Maggie will be, and when you’re done there will be still more data to show indecisive people that decriminalization is the only solution to reducing violence against sex workers. Such a study could not, by necessity, have any connection to the government because of the conflict of interest, which would also rule out universities and colleges because almost all of them are tied to government money in some shape or form. So I’m afraid I personally do not know how it could be carried out.
I think it’s been good to have this conversation. If I don’t reply to any further comments here, it is because I’ll be spending time with family and not out of any disregard for further thoughts you might have on the matter.
Quietman-while the evidence of personal experience can be informative it is not enough. My personal experience is that almost everyone I know cycles to work. Does that mean that everyone cycles to work? No that claim must be hedged around with qualifications. Maggie’s personal experience is that most of the violence against prostitutes is perpetrated by cops-she then generalizes this to all prostitutes. That’s like saying all prostitutes are drug addicted based on the experience of street prostitutes. Perhaps Maggie’s experience is largely US based, perhaps it is largely of indoor workers working for agencies who prescreen clients we don’t know how representative it is of the totality of prostitutes.
What many studies by reputable academics have shown (at least in the cases of Australia (several states), New Zealand, the UK N. Ireland Canada Denmark and Switzerland (in many of these surveys purposive sampling was used so the samples are as representative as possible interviewing escorts, brothel, massage parlor and street workers ) the surveys found that the major source of violence was from clients. And Maggie it is simply not true to say that institutional violence was specifically excluded as there were open ended survey questions as well. And interestingly the surveys from different countries concur remarkably on which type of prostitutes (thousands were interviewed in total-in fact in the NZ sample one third of the estimated total in the country) suffer the most violence and also on the levels and types of violence which adds to their veracity. And the violence mostly comes from clients not the police.
Now one caveat is that in all those countries prostitution is legal-it is possible that where prostitution is illegal that the major source of violence is the police-but client violence obviously occurs as well.. Maggie it is simply not enough to argue from authority as an impacted person-as you yourself have pointed out arguments from authority need to be backed by evidence. You should hold yourself to that same standard. I am interested in Maggie’s citation (Dec17) from Zi Teng about Hong Kong about the relative number of complaints about Police and clients-perhaps this would need to be expanded into a rigorous survey to know what the relative proportions as to sources of violence were that would or would not support Maggie’s contention-but would only be true for Hong Kong
Both Maggie and quietman mistrust any research that comes from government or is government funded because of conflict of interest or trying to cover things up. There is some research directly sponsored by government when they want to know about a particular area so as to inform policy or to assess the impact of policies. So for instance the report on the effects of decriminalization of prostitution in New Zealand was requested by the NZ parliament on the passing of the prostitution reform act and carried out five years later to assess the impact. To ensure that it was not influenced in anyway by the government an oversight committee (including amongst others a nun, an ex-police chief and a representative of the NZ prostitutes collective was set up) and they commissioned academics to carry out the research. The recent report from the ministry of justice in N.Ireland (http://www.dojni.gov.uk/independent-research-into-prostitution-in-northern-ireland-published) was commissioned in a similar way (and certainly came to conclusions that the DUP-the major political party in government hated as did those who support the Swedish model-a good sign of its independence). So government sponsored research can well be independent.
The other type of “sponsored” work is via research grants and these are awarded on competition by a committee independent of government and carried out by academics who are the last people who can be corralled into supporting the official line and this is perhaps the source of most of the research on prostitution which is published in the peer reviewed literature. Of course academics have their own prejudices and views but that is perhaps inevitable but the system is designed to minimize their effect.
I am very suspicious of research carried out by interest groups and NGOs-so Melissa Farley is an example and there are various anti sexwork advocacy groups who also produce “research” (Ronald Weitzer does a good job on this type of research in “The mythology of prostitution: advocacy research and public policy” http://esplerp.org/wp-content/uploads/2012/12/Mythology-of-prostit.pdf) –I much prefer the official reports (provided they are carried out independently of government and the peer reviewed literature. But those with a specific line to peddle will still object-I recall pointing Radfems (or neofeminists) to the report on prostitution in NSW Australia, a report commissioned by the Minsitry of health in NSW (https://maggiemcneill.files.wordpress.com/2012/04/nsw-sex-industry-report-2012.pdf) –they refused to look at it condemning it as biased as it had pictures of red umbrellas on the front! One must be very careful not to dismiss stuff out of had simply because the conclusions to dot agree with ones own prejudices.
But back to the main theme Maggie’s claim that most violence is perpetrated by the police may possible be true in the US and it may be true in some other countries but it is certainly not true in all. So such abroad claim needs to be qualified
You are 100% totally wrong, and I’m tired of telling you that. You ignore studies from Asia (such as this one from India), all of which have shown what I’m telling you. You have not read the freaking methodology of the studies you do cite, which specifically exclude “official” police violence as violence. You are simply too invested in the idea of cops as protectors to see what every inhabitant of the demimonde knows: they are a menace to human society, and always have been.
Good day to you, sir; I will not engage you again.
Maggie, now that you’ve finished interacting with Robert (and I hope he isn’t banned just yet, otherwise my response to him below was something of a waste), I have a question for you. Perhaps a foolish one, but one I think is important.
If you were to go on Bill O’Reilly or Sean Hannity or some other mainstream program and they took the same tack Robert is taking (in a nutshell, “I support sex workers, but I also support the police and there’s no evidence police do the greatest harm to sex workers”) would you react in the same manner you did at the very beginning of this exchange?
The stakes are much higher on a TV show than they are here in my own comment section, and my own responses would be tailored accordingly. That having been said, don’t forget that I already turned down an offer to appear on The O’Reilly Factor two years ago, and though I may not turn down my next such offer I won’t do so without first rethinking my stance on pharmaceutically-assisted mood management.
I do recall you informing us you had turned down O’Reilly. I was thinking of a time in the future (if ever) when you decide go on such a program. The stakes are higher on TV, but I wouldn’t discount the stakes here in the comments. You may not like this hypothetical, but during this whole business with Robert I was thinking of some newbie who discovers this blog, having never read it before and knowing little to nothing about you or your history. If one of the first things they saw was a commenter getting cursed out (even if he is in the wrong), it might lead them to draw the wrong conclusions about you and tune out what you have to say.
I’m going to close this by repeating what I said a few days ago; I’m not trying to tell you what to feel or anything like that. I mean this to be as constructive as possible.
And Maggie –as an editor of very high level scientific journals for over 18 years I do read the “the freaking methodology of the studies I cite” it’s one of the first things I turn to.
And they don’t as you claim “specifically exclude “official” police violence as violence.” In fact they specifically include it-just to give you two examples, one large Australian study-which I know you have seen since the pdf on your website made it easy to re-find is “The sex industry in NSW” (https://maggiemcneill.files.wordpress.com/2012/04/nsw-sex-industry-report-2012.pdf) written after decriminalization has a section “Encounters with the police at work” (p26) and says
“ Less than 10% of LASH respondents reported any work related experiences with the police in the past year. Of these, 68% said the police had been supportive and friendly. Two women reported threats of arrest, one reported being threatened with violence, two reported physical assault by police, one reported police had demanded money, and three reported pressure to provide sexual services to police (Table 15)”.
Another study I cited –Stepahie Church’s PhD thesis “The Social organisation of sex work:Implications for female prostitutes’ health and Safety (http://theses.gla.ac.uk/1179/) on p270 has a section on “Violence from police managers and local people” says
“In Chapeltown, only one woman made a complaint of harassment from the police feeling that they arrested her more often than other women in the area and they constantly asked her for information about local drug dealers. This however, was never related to threats or violence from the police.” and goes on to contrast how in another area of the same city the police behave differently and the section concludes “The examples of abuses by the police, and the differences in experiences between the two units, demonstrates how vulnerable women in prostitution are to exploitation and threats from the very people they may otherwise turn to for protection”
I could go on through the other studies showing that far from specifically excluding the actions by the police as you claim they specifically include it.-but it just make this post longer and more boring.
However I find the poster you cite from Bengal interesting which says on p1 of the graphic that most violence comes from the police. If you actually turn to the fuller article you see that violence and victimization are conflated-so if you look at actual acts of violence the police are responsible for 19% (rather less than comes from regular clients (the “Babus”) and much less than comes from local hooligans which pretty much supports my original point. In addition the cited work comes from a sex worker right advocacy group-not that the data is necessarily wrong although it important to note that fact.
Anyway this discussion is becoming sterile-its Christmas-lets drink to decriminalization and maybe then the police might help sex workers as in these stories from New Zealand
Sex worker gets $25,000 over harassment
http://www.stuff.co.nz/business/industries/9777879/Sex-worker-gets-25-000-over-harassment
Police help short-changed sex worker
http://www.nzherald.co.nz/nz/news/article.cfm?c_id=1&objectid=11292537
Good grief! You just cited an example of the lack of police violence in a decriminalized system (The Kirby report) as evidence there is no police violence in criminalized systems! Somebody’s being intellectually dishonest, but it ain’t me.
Goodbye.
I’m guessing that “Goodbye” means Robert is banned now, but I feel I ought to point out that so far Robert has not claimed there is NO police violence, only that it is not the largest source of violence. Unless I’ve overlooked something, did I?
Robert, I hope Maggie’s decision to not engage with you further does not preclude me from doing so, at least one final time because I feel with this last response we’ve gone as far as we can go.
First, I don’t know if you’re trying to blind us with walls of text or something, but I don’t think you mentioned what type of scientist you are. If I missed that, would you mind reiterating it?
Second, all that citing of studies and such doesn’t go to what I think is the heart of the matter. If you answer no other question I ask, please answer this one. As Maggie alluded to in her final response, what are your feelings regarding police? Is Maggie correct when she says that you are invested in seeing them as ‘protectors’? Think hard about this one. It seems clear you disagree with her that all the studies you’ve cited are fatally flawed because they exclude police violence (which, to be clear, comes in forms that do not necessarily leave physical marks or evidence, and therefore are apt to be ignored by the people creating these reports). What about the India study she cites in her final response?
I can’t predict what your answer to the above will be of course, but I think what’s going on here is you are a pro-sex worker individual clashing with the “police must be abolished” stance that has been articulated here (with good reason) since this blog’s inception. It’s a shame in my view, because it’s an irreconcilable difference that means leaders like Maggie will keep folks like you at arm’s length, at best. (As an aside, decriminalization probably wouldn’t truly work anyway unless the police in their current form were abolished. We aren’t holding them accountable for the violence they inflict on innocents now. Why should we expect them to stop abusing sex workers just because it’s decriminalized? But I digress.)
For what it’s worth Robert, I’m glad we managed to have this conversation, and I hope it hasn’t altered your stance that sex work must be decriminalized. Happy Holidays.
The quietman
Well sort of scientist-trained in mathematics and theoretical physics switched to Biology especially molecular biology and genetics and have written extensively for the non-expert on scientific subjects and for about 18 years have been editor of very high profile scientific journals in molecular and cell biology and genetics. Now retired but with hobbies such as baiting radfems on issues around sexwork. (My go at a student of Sheila Jeffreys is a masterpiece if I say so myself)
It was during this baiting I became very familiar with their arguments –one of which is that sexwork is intrinsically violent. Now I don’t think it is-and could be made safer by decriminalization, allowing prostitutes to work tougher and so forth. But the fact that clients can be violent (pointed out constantly by radfems-along with the guff about “rape culture” “male entitlement”) bothered me-and while it would be nice to follows Maggie’s line to say well this is nothing compared to violence by the Police- looking at the data (at least in the areas I have studied most) it did not seem to be true. Hence the debate in this column.
As I pointed out in my last reply to Maggie she is simply wrong that the studies specifically exclude the police-I show that by contrast the police are specifically included-so the studies are not as you put it “fatally flawed”. I think it is also a bit dishonest to conflate physical violence and things such as threats and verbal abuse-they need to be catergorized separately and not lumped together. I gave my reply on the Bengal study-more power to their elbow-but as far as physical violence goes-more comes from clients and hooligans than the Police. But I cam imagine there may well be places where there is more violence from the Police-but this always has to be qualified by which country etc-you cannot generalize.
What are my feelings about the police? Well certainly not Maggie’s where every other link is anti-police-but then although I have lived in the USA I never experienced those sorts of events directly although I know they occur. Maggie’s political views seem interesting-she seems to be a small state libertarian-almost an anarchist-but I ignore most of her politics (with which I mostly disagree) but we have a different perspective here in Europe.
But I almost always agree with her writings on sexwork-and we could probably agree on violence if she was more strict with definitions, and did not conflate abuse with physical violence-and did not seem to generalize from one example to all sex work-because that makes it too easy for her enemies (and I am not one) to pick holes in and dismiss her arguments.
“but we have a different perspective here in Europe.”
Aha, there’s the source of the disconnect. I think then, you would be well-advised to make a study of the perspectives here in the USA (believe me, there’s no shortage of information out there). Even if the studies you’ve been citing are sound (which again, is doubtful), they have absolutely no bearing on the American situation.
However, even if you did learn more about the circumstances sex workers in the USA face (which are rapidly extending to the rest of the population) and were willing to come back and share what you’ve found out, I think it’s too late. With that last paragraph, you’re probably as good as gone from this place. But for what it’s worth, it was enlightening having this discussion. Thank you for your time.
No you are right quietman-but Maggie has really failed to show that the major source of violence is the police as she claimed-I have shown that this is not the case in several pieces of evidence I cite. She then claims that those reports specifically exclude police violence-I again show she is wrong on that too. Still its her blog she can say what she likes-even if it is untrue
I’m right about what? That the studies you’ve been citing have zero to do with the urgent and deadly circumstances sex workers face in the US? Or that you’ve been banned and are now trying to sneak in the last word? I’m glad that you think I’m right about something, but seriously? Calling out Maggie (!), several times (!!), in public (!!!) on a subject she is a subject matter expert in (!!!!) is one thing, but trying to get in here after being banned?? I fail to see what you are gaining from this. You’re too smart to be a common troll, but my word. Brass tacks here, why didn’t you just write Maggie an e-mail if you have this much of an issue with her claims? It might have saved us all a lot of time and energy.
I just hope I’m not antagonizing Maggie by continuing to interact with you.
Quietman-right about this
“Robert has not claimed there is NO police violence, only that it is not the largest source of violence. Unless I’ve overlooked something, did I?”
Sorry I did not make it clearer
BEHIND. CLOSED. DOORS. An Analysis of Indoor Sex. Work in New York City. Sex Workers Project at the Urban Justice Center 2005 ..( http://sexworkersproject.org/downloads/BehindClosedDoors.pdf) (fig 25 p51) shows that while 7 workers had experienced violence from the police more than three times as many had experienced violence from clients –small scale survey, only indoor workers (so probably less vulnerable to police harassment ) but it does go to show that in some constituencies more violence comes from clients than the police.