If [rescuers]…used my photo in websites, smiling, showing me sewing clothes I couldn’t even afford, I would want someone to at least say, “Yeah, that is bullshit.” – Sarah Miller
The police chief in Miami Gardens has been fired after he was arrested on suspicion of soliciting prostitution…Stephen Johnson was [caught in a sting after buying the absurd claim that]…the price for…two women would be $100 for 30 minutes…
More than 70% of UK sex workers have previously worked in healthcare, education or charities, while more than a third hold university degrees, according to one of the largest surveys of the industry ever undertaken…The second most common former area of employment was retail, with…33.7%…38% [had an undergraduate degree]…while…17%…had a postgraduate degree…The Leeds University study [was] carried out by Dr Teela Sanders in partnership with National Ugly Mugs…
A man who became obsessed with a prostitute and launched a rash of lawsuits against her…has had his case shot down in the Supreme Court [of New Zealand]. The client and the sex worker were in an “arrangement” that turned sour some three years ago…when the Auckland woman [realized] her client was stalking her…
A popular “sugar daddy” dating website that links young women with wealthy older men…may break sex work laws, [Austalian] police have [bloviated]…In Victoria escorts must be registered, and in South Australia it is illegal to pay…for sex…South Australia Police [pretend to be concerned about “dangerous situations”, and]…Victoria Police [threatened to “look] at [the sites] closely”…
The rescue industry is getting so absurd, even Jezebel can see it:
…Punjammies is just one of many companies selling goods made by former sex slaves. There’s also the Nomi Network—their tagline is “Buy Her Bag Not Her Body,” a deployment of rhetoric implying she’s going to have to sell one or the other, and she is dependent on your choice to seal her fate. There’s Purpose Jewelry, “handcrafted by survivors of modern day slavery… each jewelry tag is hand-signed by the girl who created it.” There’s JC Denim, “handcrafted by girls who have been rescued out of sex slavery.” One more—just for the pun—a soap brand, Trades of Hope made by women who “have made a clean break from their previous lifestyle in the sex trade…” Punjammie fans…are proud of the work they’re doing by buying and wearing Punjammies. You see a lot of words and phrases like empower, good deed, and making a difference…
The Ski World Cup in Sweden has been a worldwide party…But behind the scenes police have been battling a rise in prostitution…“The phenomenon is bigger than we think, there are large hidden numbers” [said a trained police parrot]…”We have received information…that this…is…a…bigger problem during the World Cup than…normal…”
…the California Supreme Court unanimously ruled that the residence restrictions automatically imposed on sex offenders by state law are unconstitutional…the law prohibits registered sex offenders from living within 2,000 feet of a school or park, without regard to the nature of the crimes they committed or the threat they currently pose…the 2,000-foot rule excludes 97 percent of the land zoned for multifamily housing in San Diego County…residence restrictions…often apply even if an offender’s crime had nothing to do with children, [and] can be so extensive that entire cities are effectively off limits…
You may not be able to spot it for all the cop-worship and badge-licking, so I’ll help you: “The CEASE Network” is just another front for Swanee Hunt’s “Demand Abolition” pogrom-funding program: “CEASE, an acronym for Cities Empowered Against Sexual Exploitation, got its official start in Boston, Denver and Seattle earlier this year, with seven more cities — including Portland, Chicago and Phoenix — set to launch their own initiatives later this month…” This article is several months old, but I think it’s important to track the growth of this private war conducted to please the bloodlust of a morally-warped multi-billionaire.
A Bangkok Post article from the director of EMPOWER:
Every year without fail for over a decade, Thailand has been scolded by the United States for not doing enough to comply with US anti-trafficking and border control policies in its annual Trafficking in Persons report…To show that Thailand is doing its job to tackle human trafficking in the sex industry, every year a few hundred migrants, mostly young women, are rounded up, detained and deported as victims…It will never be possible to use harsh laws and punishment to stop people moving across borders for better lives…
I honestly have to wonder if Emily Nagoski hasn’t been reading me:
…Flibanserin…is a drug intended to treat low sexual desire in women. The F.D.A. has rejected it twice already, and will most likely reject it a third time…the drug…is…attempting to treat something that isn’t a disease…The previous model, originating in the late ’70s…placed sexual desire first, as if it were a hunger, motivating an individual to pursue satisfaction. Desire was conceptualized as emerging more or less “spontaneously.” And some people do feel they experience desire that way. Desire first, then arousal. But…many people (perhaps especially women)…experience desire as…emerging in response to, rather than in anticipation of, erotic stimulation. Arousal first, then desire…What these women need is not medical treatment, but a thoughtful exploration of what creates desire between them and their partners…Feeling judged or broken for their sexuality is exactly what they don’t need — and what will make their desire for sex genuinely shut down…
Worse Than I Thought (Traffic Updates)
The fetish for posting silly “sex trafficking” signs in stigmatized businesses has been growing for a while now, but this the first time I’ve seen magic powers attributed to the placards:
Lawmakers are introducing a new bill…[which “creates signs to free sex slaves”] across Florida. The bill would require new signs that tell victims how to get…rescued [from] truck stops, massage parlors, and other places where human trafficking victims are forced into sex slavery…
Yet another edition of “OMG WHORES KNOW HOW TO USE THE INTERNET!!!!”
…Pornography…spurred the adoption of…VHS tapes, interactive CDs and DVDs, and pretty much the entire Internet. Now it’s coming to your smartphone in a whole new way, thanks to…Snapchat…the service unveiled a feature called Snapcash, which allows people to send money using Square…Strippers and porn stars have started to use Snapchat to send videos and photos of themselves naked for a small fee…Snapchat doesn’t leave anything in your search history. There’s no trace of it to be found by a snooping significant other or an overprotective parent…
In the Sweden story, the police said: “…which indicate that this [sex trade] is going on and is in fact a SLIGHTLY bigger problem during the World Cup than what it normally is,”
Now THAT’S alarming! Well of course it’s going on and it’s not surprising that any business does a bit more trade when there’s a big influx of tourist. What is more telling is the fact that it’s a ”big problem” at all when they have this wonderful magic law.
That’s funny: low sexual desire in women isn’t a disease. Little girls experience spontaneous clitoral erections just like boys do, but after puberty girls no longer experience clitoral erections even when mentally aroused or physically stimulated, let alone spontaneously as boys still do. It’s just that women are different, namely more interested in things other than sexual pleasure, like true romance. Where have we heard that story before?
What most women need is good, old-fashioned talk-therapy at $50/hour. Just disregard any lack of evidence that such “treatment” is safe or effective by medical standards. Whatever we do, let’s not invent a physical disease and call it clitoral erectile dysfunction, which is incurable but easily prevented by attacking the mass hysteria over child sex abuse and the implicit support for the traditional mental castration of girls in early childhood.
“but after puberty girls no longer experience clitoral erections even when mentally aroused or physically stimulated”
This kind of blanket statement is almost never true. Women most certainly do experience clitoral erections – or at least, they used to when I went down on ’em. There’s a lot of individual variation, of course.
Put it this way: if you want to know about what average penises are like, you are better off talking to a woman who has experience several, than a man who has only experienced his own.
You’re right: I should have said: In my personal experience,etc. But inidividuals who have seen or felt clitoral erections in women are conspicuous by their absence. Despite years of my saying this, you are the first person to dispute my “numbers.”
The most interesting part of your comment is “used to.” Look around you: the last 35 years of child sex abuse hysteria has evidently created a generation of sexually dysfunctional women, a tragedy indicated by two separate surveys.
Now how about commenting on the well-known physiological mechanisms underlying mental castration in childhood: activity-dependent synapse formation, and neural pruning/atrophy when an organ (e.g. the clitoris) is not stimulated during development? (descibed in more detail on my blog)
By “used to”, I did not mean that women have ceased to experience clitoral erections, I meant that since I turned 45 or so I have pretty much lost interest in going down on ’em.
As to their reality: clitorises vary quite a bit from person to person. I have several times experienced the transition from “Well, I’m in the right spot” to “Hello! There she is!” – the tongue is quite sensitive.
I cannot, however, give you any data on how clitoral erectivity (to coin a phrase) varies from person to person with respect to childhood activity-dependent synapse formation. I would be speculating.
Exactly: why are most people, especially most women, refusing to speculate? The silence is deafening.
I agree that low sexual desire is not a disease, but I see no harm in giving women who do see it as a problem for themselves, access to a quick fix. If the “fix” turns out not to really work, the market will drive it out on its own.
Indeed, if the new drug is not made available at pharmacies, I’ll bet it is soon available from dope dealers.
“A popular “sugar daddy” dating website that links young women with wealthy older men…may break sex work laws, [Austalian] police have [bloviated]”
You know what? They are absolutely right. These people *are* engaged in prostitution and it *does* break the (stupid, misguided) law. As for the “dangerous situations”, we all know that the danger is exacerbated by the criminalisation of the activity.
Nevertheless, the cops are right.
From a sex worker’s point of view, sugar daddy websites are an attempt to make prostitution legal for certain kinds of people, but not others. They are classist. As an underclass, out and proud sex workers have an interest in calling out this particular strain of hypocrisy.
[…] (Hat tip: Maggie McNeill.) […]
“”Snapchat doesn’t leave anything in your search history. There’s no trace of it to be found by a snooping significant other or an overprotective parent…””
Oh, the horror! People might actually have a touch of privacy, so let’s all lose our minds!!
Well, actually I know we agree on this one. Seems somebody figured out how to hide the secret from the squirrel, or something like that.