Data matters, research matters, and it all shows that the con[flation of sex work and “trafficking”] is just based on ideology. – Melissa Broudo
A Woman’s Point of View (#1228)
In Rhode Island’s case, this would be re-decriminalization:
A new report by a Rhode Island study commission recommends the full decriminalization of consensual adult sex work in the state. The commission of thirteen individuals, including [politicians], sex workers, medical professionals, and [spokespigs], spent two years reviewing research and evidence, and listening to lived-experience testimonials, before releasing the report, which highlights multiple reforms intended to…promote the health and safety of sex workers…
The more vague the law, the more authoritarians like it:
Iowa…[has pass]ed a law…that…requires schools to remove books that depict a “sex act”…unleash[ing] a frenzy of book-banning across the state, one that illustrates a core truth about these types of censorship directives. Their vagueness is the point…Uncertain whether books…might run afoul of their state’s law, [bureaucrats nearly always]…decide nixing them would be the “safer” option…This week…Iowa…School[s]…released a list of 68 books…removed from schools to comply with the law. Among the titles: Ulysses by James Joyce, Nineteen Minutes by Jodi Picoult, The Handmaid’s Tale by Margaret Atwood…The Bluest Eye by Toni Morrison…1984 by George Orwell, Brave New World by Aldous Huxley, Slaughterhouse-Five by Kurt Vonnegut and Forrest Gump by Winston Groom…
Airports are among cops’ favorite places to lurk in order to rob people:
[Pigs and spooks lu]rking at…Atlanta International Airport rarely find drugs on passengers at departing gates. More often, they find money. Records show [thugs] have s[tolen] millions of dollars from passengers at boarding gates. The [robbery] is administratively [justified by belching out the magic words “]proceeds of drug trafficking[“] even [though] no drugs are [ever] found…[they] do not arrest the passenger. They [simply rob them]…Most cases never go before a judge….passengers are forced to [somehow] prove their money “innocent’ on the spot at the airport gate or it’s s[tolen]…passengers are forced to pull up bank statements on their phones or otherwise provide proof the money isn’t from drug trafficking. Merely flying from Atlanta to Los Angeles is suspicious, according to [porcine fantasies], because it’s a “known drug trafficking route”…
Cops are sexual predators who often specifically target traumatized women:
A Greenville [South Carolina cop has] resigned after[being caught lying] about whether he had sex in his patrol car with another [cop. But just a few months ago]…Timothy Matthews…was the subject of an anonymous complaint by a woman in the charitable organization Jasmine Road, a residential program for…wom[en who had bad experiences in]…prostitution…[because] he [repeatedly pressured her for]…her phone number [and bombarded her with texts after she gave it to him]…
Bureaucrats who committed illegal surveillance refer to their victim as a “public nuisance”:
…the Michigan Supreme Court…has the chance to decide whether a municipal government…can circumvent constitutional protections by farming out the task to a private company…warrantless drone surveillance is [explicitly un]constitutional…[but] the appeals court…said that excluding any evidence gathered would be inappropriate, so the state Supreme Court can functionally determine whether local governments can do this and get away with it. Multiple civil liberty advocacy organizations have submitted amicus briefs…argu[ing] that “if the Township gets its way, it will not only profit from its privacy violations, but open the door to other local governments deploying cheap, pervasive, flying surveillance devices to surveil private property for the smallest of civil infractions…Without consequences for arbitrary invasions into [Fourth Amendment] rights, no one can be secure in their person, house, papers, or effects”…
How many women died as a result of inaction by the murderer’s cop buddies?
Rex Heuermann, the New York architect accused of being the Gilgo Beach serial killer, has been linked to…the deaths of Shannan Gilbert and Karen Vergata…four witnesses [have come] forward with information about Heuermann…The first…went to Heuermann’s house for a sex party in February 1996 with her boyfriend, who was a cop, and Vergata…During that time, she spoke with [Heuermann’s wife, Asa] Ellerup, who…told the witness that she was “afraid of Rex”…the second witness…[i]s a taxi driver…[who] saw Gilbert and Heuerman together when she picked her up in the fall of 2009…[Gilbert was] “crying and shaking”…[because Heuermann had tried to cheat] her [with] an envelope of paper scraps instead of money…
While Mastercard chooses to discriminate vs sex workers via an elaborate concern kabuki derived from “sex trafficking” propaganda, Visa prefers to burble reasonable-sounding rhetoric about “risk” in order to justify charging sex workers more money to access their services than other businesses. Back in the old agency days, I simply lied to my card processor and called my company a consulting firm in order to avoid high fees, excessive scrutiny, or arbitrarily being dropped by the processor. But things have changed a great deal in the past two decades, and there’s no way for an online provider to cloak herself as I did. This article in XBiz is too dense for me to understand, but if you’re an online sex worker you probably already understand many of these terms, and may find it helpful.
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