When you have sex with someone, you give them a part of your soul. – quoted un-ironically by Time
After the events of the last several weeks, a recent article in Time seems bizarrely anachronistic. Now, long-form articles like this one aren’t written in days, but in weeks; it’s pretty obvious that this one was started on the other side of the watershed, and the passages about Amnesty may have been grafted on as an afterthought. Because while many reporters these days are beginning to be skeptical of “sex trafficking” lies, this one swallows them like a local-paper stenographer. While in the wake of the Rentboy raid, most large media outlets are beginning to view the shockingly sexist rhetoric of “sex trafficking” fetishists with more skepticism, Time instead parrots neofeminist gobbledygook about “prostituted women” and evil men who “exploit” them by offering them pay for services rendered. And while many stories now quote experts who have actually studied the violence inflicted by cops upon sex workers, this one instead quotes cops as though they weren’t pathological liars and licks badges with a fellatory gusto that is quite nauseating. The article is much too long and derivative to bother quoting at length, but I would like to focus on a few of the more horrific passages.
The first subsection sets the tone by mindlessly repeating prohibitionist claims without an investigation whatsoever. Even the slightest bit of research, for example, would have revealed the egregious lie behind Tom Dart’s “end demand” pogroms: while the claim is that Tom Dart’s Chicago police operations now concentrate on clients and “help” sex workers, in fact felony convictions for sex workers have increased 68% since the start of the program, and now make up 97% of all prostitution-related felony convictions in Cook County. Furthermore, while it pays lip service to the recognition that transwomen are disproportionately represented among sex workers, it doesn’t mention Dart’s vile practice of charging trans sex workers as clients to boost the appearance of “ending demand”. It relies heavily on stigmatizing language like “some men…grasp at the sexual cornucopia they think they are owed” to generate anti-client feelings, despite the obvious illogic in the idea that people who seek to buy a thing actually think they are “owed” that thing. And it revels in the degradation of men who are treated as criminals for seeking consensual sex, an approach that would be vilified if it were discussing busts of gay men in bathhouses.
The next section is propaganda for the Swedish model on which “end demand” is based, but like all pro-Swedish articles does not mention that violence vs sex workers increases under that model; furthermore, it pretends that Dart’s “CEASE network” is an independent association of cities, when in fact it is merely a front for a private organization, “Demand Abolition”, run and funded by morally-warped multi-billionaire Swanee Hunt. It also fails to mention that those who have attacked Amnesty’s support for decriminalization are not sex workers or objective researchers, but moralistic ideologues committed to suppressing the truth about the harm caused by the Swedish model, ideologues who repeatedly mischaracterize the model as “decriminalization” in order to fool the uninformed into thinking sex workers, Amnesty and other human rights organizations support it. And as usual, it conflates legalization with decriminalization, then touts the problems of the former (which virtually no sex workers support) as though they occurred under the latter.
No article lionizing the revolting Tom Dart could be complete without praising his campaign against Backpage, which of course ignores the terrifying constitutional and practical implications of allowing a local politician to make decisions affecting not only the whole US, but the entire world...including countries in which prostitution is perfectly legal. And though it quotes Amnesty about the violence of some clients vs. sex workers, it totally ignores the far greater problem of police violence – including rape – against sex workers in criminalized and legalized regimes. But of course, this makes perfect sense; if one is going to publish propaganda, one can’t be distracted by facts. And if one’s going to publish a hagiography of a monster, one’s going to have to ignore or misrepresent the various evils and tyrannies for which he is responsible.
I’d feel pretty nervous about a sex worker with a fee structure like that.
I don’t believe in the soul in the christian sense, but I think it’s true we put a bit of ourselves in anything we do. These people think you have a finite amount of ”soul”. The way I see it, it’s a renewable ressource, like spem.The more often you give, the faster it replenishes itself.
Moreover it goes both ways. If each partner gives a bit of soul to the other, then their spiritual balance remains the same (but richer in diversity).
Our “fearless” sheriff fancies himself a modern-day Eliot Ness. But he should probably remember how Ness spent the last few years of his life as a destitute drunk (oh, the irony!) in addition to the tales of his career.
“ ‘The pimps and the traffickers are not going to say “oh it’s legalized now, we’re out of the business,” he says. ‘ ” (Quoted from that Time article).
Does he mean like, oh, how the vast majority of liquor bootleggers & company said that and continued doing business-as-usual when Prohibition was repealed in the US?
Even in the middle of see-sawing between nausea and anger over how the myths of “sex trafficking” and “pimps” are perpetuated by the dogmatizings, misrepresentations, and misinformation in the Time article, I actually guffawed at that one.
I just wonder how Maggie continues to make herself read this kind of nonsense. After you’ve read a few of them and making yourself a bit ill they wear out rather fast.
You say “……it totally ignores the far greater problem of police violence – including rape – against sex workers in criminalized and legalized regimes” It’s a point you frequently make but I can find no evidence (or facts) to support it. We have corresponded about this previously (see our exchanges on your article of 17th December 2014) but you have yet to produce much evidence (apart from assertion as “a member of the impacted community”) that this is actually the case.
You point to your post of 22nd August 2014 as containing evidence where you say “After generations of ignoring the violence against sex workers which is directly or indirectly caused by either full (as in the US) or partial (as in the UK) criminalization, the public is slowly beginning to wake up to the reality: most of it is perpetrated by the police.”
Taking the US first-it is undoubtedly true that violence is perpetrated on sex workers by the police-but it is also true that clients can also be violent. It also depends on what is considered “violence”. I would be grateful for any studies you can point me to that show most of it is commited by the cops. What I did find was this small scale study 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.
You then point to one study from India where you say “police are the largest victimizers and clients and pimps the least, with domestic partners and people empowered or emboldened by the marginalization of sex workers in the middle.” The infographic needs proper reading on p1 of the graphic it does indeed imply 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-that evidence that most violence comes from the police is not present in this piece of evidence. 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.
In the UK the police can be heavy handed (as you mention in the Soho raids) but most violence against prostitutes is in fact perpetrated by clients as I pointed out in many citations in response to your article of 17th December last. But as you say “if one is going to publish propaganda, one can’t be distracted by facts.”
I support decriminalization as you do but I think you play into the hands of the prohibitionists by playing down the violence that can be perpetrated by clients.
First like you say it depends what we consider to be violence. It also depends what we consider to be a ”client”. There’s a difference between a genuine client and someone who is just pretending to be one to rob or rape them.
It is moot to discuss the violence of clients in a situation where the trade is criminalized. The Supreme court in Canada threw out the old prostitution laws precisely because they prevented sex workers from protecting themselves against dangerous clients. Decrim in NZ improved safety of workers.
All in all, studies at least in Canada find that most encounters with clients are peaceful.
http://www.parl.gc.ca/Content/SEN/Committee/412/lcjc/Briefs/C-36/SM_C-36_brief_Chris_Atchison_E.pdf
When it comes to violence by police, simply being threatened with arrest and imprisonment for a consensual behavior is violence enough. Just because the violence is condoned by the law doesn’t make it less violent.
And you actively align yourself with prohibitionists by pretending state-sanctioned violence such as arrest is not violence. I do not allow prohibitionists to comment here; consider that carefully before replying in this vein again.
Good grief, I thought we were done with this. Indeed, I thought Maggie had banned you after your first exchange with her. I attempted to defend you, giving you the benefit of the doubt because you claim to support decriminalization.
No more. Mr. Shields, sir, if you consider yourself in any way intelligent, surely you realize this is a fight you are not going to win here. Beyond what appears to be a massive blind spot in what you think constitutes violence towards sex workers, you act as if Maggie is alone in her conclusions. She most assuredly is not. Further, when has she ever “played down” client-perpetrated violence? It seems twice weekly now she’s posting stories about how such violence is DISMISSED because the victim was a sex worker!
I’m asking you as a fellow gentleman and decriminalization supporter, please, don’t take this any further.
Robert – A typical prostitute is obviously going to have direct encounters with many more clients than she or he will with police officers.
Yet according to your description of the Sex Workers Project at the Urban Justice Center 2005 study you cite, the number of sex worker experiencing violence was only about three times greater than the number experiencing violence at the hands of police.
This strongly points to the conclusion that any given police officer who interacts with a prostitute is significantly more likely to perpetrate violence against her than any given client, statistically speaking.
Also, as Francois said, “There’s a difference between a genuine client and someone who is just pretending to be one to rob or rape them,” and “simply being threatened with arrest and imprisonment for a consensual behavior is violence enough… Just because the violence is condoned by the law doesn’t make it less violent.”
Maggie I am not a prohibitionist and in fact in public have supported decriminalization (for instance in my public lengthy and signed response to Rhoda Grant the MSP who tried to introduce the Swedish model into Scotland.)
I have frequently agued with prohibitionists in the UK and been barred from websites such as Mumsnet here in the UK for pushing the cause of decriminalization. I take great care to ensure that my arguments are evidence based and I can back up what I say. or one plays into the hands of the prohibitionists. Indeed I have seen criticism of the statement that most violence comes from the police used on at least one prohibitionist site. So I would like to believe that most violence comes from the police but as yet I have not found evidence that this is the case.
You said (blog of 22nd August 2014 ) “After generations of ignoring the violence against sex workers which is directly or indirectly caused by either full (as in the US) or partial (as in the UK) criminalization, the public is slowly beginning to wake up to the reality: most of it is perpetrated by the police…….in every study of violence against sex workers ever done (such as this one from India), police are the largest victimizers and clients and pimps the least, with domestic partners and people empowered or emboldened by the marginalization of sex workers in the middle”
I would be most grateful if you could point me to those studies (the one from India is problematical as I indicated above). I am very familiar with the literature on violence against sex workers in a number of jurisdictions (UK, N.Ireland, Ireland Australia (several states-some decriminalized, some legalized some still criminalized), Canada, New Zealand Denmark Switzerland) and in those jurisdictions at least more violence comes from clients than the police.
Now of course it depends what you mean by violence-and several types of violence are well laid out in the WHO document (http://www.who.int/hiv/pub/sti/sex_worker_implementation/swit_chpt2.pdf) -what I understand by violence (and I believe most people would accept and understand by violence and comes under the WHO categories of Physical and Sexual Violence (see Box 2.1 of the document ) is Murder, Rape, bashings beatings threats of physical violence , attempted rape, strangulation, stabbing slashing being held against their will robbery (and refusal to pay), verbal abuse (and abusive texts)(these types of violence have been experienced by prostitutes surveyed in the UK, New Zealand and Australia .
These types of violence are rare, most client prostitute interactions pass off without violence but when violence does occur it is overwhelmingly perpetrated by clients and not the police. And the police are not specifically excluded from such surveys as Maggie has claimed before. ( so see for instance Seib 2007 Health, well being and sexual violence amongst female sex workers a comparative study)
It is precisely because clients can on occasion turn nasty that the Bedford vCanada action was brought to allow prostitutes to work together to improve their safety.
So to make the claim that most violence comes from the police some sort of equivalence is made (as Franciose says) between” simply being threatened with arrest and imprisonment for a consensual behavior is violence enough. Just because the violence is condoned by the law doesn’t make it less violent.” and the type of physical and sexual violence mentioned above.
Well sorry I don’t buy that as being equivalent-and I think most people hearing that “most violence is committed by the police” will understand that as equivalent either
So perhaps in future when making the claim of the relative proportion of police/client violence you should qualify it to say you are using violence in a very broad sense and not the sense that most people would understand it.
Goodbye, pig-lover; I hope you enjoyed your last word.
Maggie, clearly it’s fruitless to respond to Mr. Shields further, hence I’m responding to your response. Since it’s several days later I don’t expect a response to this, but if I don’t express my thoughts now, I shall feel like I’ve missed an opportunity.
Would it be wrong of me to suggest that this exchange (and the one from last December) would make for an interesting discussion in a further column (as opposed to comments threads), perhaps in a time down the road when Krulac is back? I’d be interested to hear what he (and some of the other regular commenters here) think.
I only suggest it because while I have no idea why Mr. Shields chose to be so stubborn about posting his ideas after being told quite clearly they were unwelcome here, I can’t help but feel he’s representative of a larger group, a group that might, *might* be made into allies. Blind spot or not, he did seem sincere (to me) in his declaration that he supports decriminalization, and unless I missed something I didn’t see anything in his writings here or back in December that expressed support for the powers that police currently hold. I can easily picture someone like Bill O’Reilly or Sean Hannity holding similar views. I suppose it’s a “with friends like these…” sort of thing, but again I’m reminded of the “golden bridge” that Ms. Vonk described many months ago.
Unless it’s gotten to the point where sex workers won’t be safe from violence from police, even with full decriminalization, unless police are gotten rid of altogether?
To be absolutely clear, I’m not telling you how to feel or think or what to do on your blog. I just wanted to say that while I don’t fully agree with Mr. Shields words and don’t approve of his actions here (and never did), I’m sorry, but this is a rare time when I don’t fully agree with you either, if only in terms of the response to him.