Even though I’ve been talking about the subject on my blog for nine years, and have discussed it in countless interviews, lectures, articles and Twitter threads, some people still don’t seem to grasp why sex workers oppose criminalization of “pimps”, and why puffed-up oinking about “going after pimps” is so destructive. So once again I’m going to spell it out succinctly. Most sex workers are independents who have no management, but because the “degraded whore” narrative claims we’re all dominated by “pimps”, cops and prosecutors who want to look like big heroes go sniffing around for anyone they can pin the “pimp” label onto, so as to slam them into a cell. Genuine management (“pimps” if you must, though I must point out we don’t make up special pejorative terms for managers in most businesses) charge a fee for finding clients, just as any entertainers’ agent does; some provide a premises (which the law is pleased to call a “brothel” or more absurdly, a “bawdy house” or “house of ill fame”) from which to work. So when cops and prosecutors want to destroy someone by calling them a “pimp” and prosecuting them for “trafficking”, what do they look for? People who receive money from sex workers and/or provide an apartment that they work from. Who falls into the first category? Drivers, maids, receptionists, secretaries, roommates, other sex workers who share an incall, partners, adult offspring, and even elderly or disabled dependent parents. Who falls into both categories? Landlords. If you were a landlord and you discovered you were renting to a sex worker, and recognized you might be charged with “pimping” because of it, what would you do? Evict her, of course. Norway has the Swedish model, which is what the awful Kamala Harris supports despite her recent lie that she favors decriminalization. Well, a few years ago Norwegian cops had a scheme called “Operation Homeless“, in which they sent letters to sex workers’ landlords threatening them with pimping charges if they didn’t evict the sex worker. This is what Harris and other lying monsters like her mean when they say they want to “go after the pimps”: they want to persecute sex workers’ friends, family members, associates, employees and landlords so as to drive us into the streets and thereby make us vulnerable not only to rape and murder, but also to disguised criminalization charges such as “loitering”, “trespassing”, etc. Swedish model proponents call this persecution “decriminalizing the seller”, despite the fact that sex workers are still subject to cop surveillance, expulsion from university, being forced into “re-education” systems, and even having their children abducted by the state on the grounds that they are “unfit parents”…and all this on top of the proven harms of the model itself. So next time someone tells you how “johns and pimps” are the “real problem”, and cops merely want to “help” sex workers by persecuting them, you’ll understand a bit better what that actually means.
Posts Tagged ‘pimps’
Going After the Pimps
Posted in Perception, Tyranny, tagged agency denial, avails laws, brothels, cops, drivers, end demand, Going After the Pimps, Norway, pimps, politicians, propaganda, Swedish model on March 8, 2019| 1 Comment »
In the News (#917)
Posted in Current Events, Miscellaneous, News, Tyranny, tagged A Broker in Pillage, agency denial, Amsterdam, asset seizure, Backpage, bad customers, BDSM, cell phones, censorship, consensual crime, cops, Dangerous Speech, dehumanization, drivers, Droit du Seigneur, drugs, Dutch Threat, ethics, False Target, fantasy, fascism, Florida, Google, harm reduction, He Said-She Said, hysteria, Indiana, Ireland, law, lawheads, LGBT rights, Malaysia, Massachusetts, Montana, Netherlands, Ohio, Pennsylvania, pimps, politicians, propaganda, Pyrrhic Victory, racism, rape, rescue industry, surveillance, The Crumbling Dam, The Widening Gyre, To Molest and Rape, Traffic in Nonsense, United Kingdom, Washington (state), What Were You Thinking? on March 2, 2019| 2 Comments »
The government has…tried to financially strangle these defendants at every turn. – Ariel Neuman
Hey, King County; maybe you should consult Matthew 7:3 for your “sex trafficking” policy:
Mark L. Norton, the superintendent of transit security…for King County Metro, was arrested…for allegedly “coercing a female to engage in commercial sex acts in King and Snohomish Counties.” Norton…allegedly “groomed” the victim for five years while [she] was a babysitter for Norton’s children, using “emotional and psychological coercion [to] convince [her] to participate in prostitution for his benefit…the suspect operated as a pimp and pressured the victim to engage in prostitution on numerous occasions…and kept [her fees]”…ironically, King County Metro’s buses were recently covered with anti-trafficking signs as part of a [propaganda] campaign…by the…County…
What the Hell Were You Thinking? (#335)
Destroying sex workers’ safety net, one internet “improvement” at a time:
…Google could be putting [Irish sex workers] at risk by blocking key functions on an app used to warn of dangerous clients. The tech giant decided…to include limits on call logs and SMS permission access on apps in the Google Play store…[this could cripple] an Android app called Ugly Mugs, which…has been using advanced access features since 2013…[to] screen…incoming calls and text messages to sex workers and alert…them if [the initiating] number…is in the app’s database…
…psychiatrist…Keith Ablow…[is facing malpractice lawsuits from three female patients who say he] abused his position while treating them for acute depression…the…therapist…encouraged women to trust and rely on him, then coaxed them into [BDSM] sexual activities, often during treatment sessions for which they were charged…three women who worked for Ablow [also] agreed to file affidavits, included in the lawsuits…that Ablow sexually harassed them, too. One former staffer, Amy Dixon, said she had sex with Ablow during which he would regularly hit her and that he told her he wanted a “master/slave relationship”…In all three cases, the women…relocated from other states, at Ablow’s request, to be closer to his Newburyport [Massachusetts] office where he…treat[ed them] for depression…[with] Ketamine…in conjunction with talk therapy…
Ablow, who was a consultant for Fox News for years, has been mentioned in this blog before.
When a cop rapes kids, there’s usually at least some chance of a conviction: “…[cops from] the Cascade County [Montana] Sheriff’s Office and agents from Homeland Security [quietly] arrested [rapist pig] Virgil Wolfe on 80 counts of sexual abuse of children…”
Using “gayness tests” to deport refugees spreads to the UK:
A [67-year-old] man faces deportation to Malaysia, where homosexuality is illegal, after the Home Office [claimed] it did not believe he was gay – suggesting it was suspicious that [a 67-year-old migrant] did not have a boyfriend. Yew Fook Sam…will be persecuted and imprisoned for his sexuality if he is deported to Malaysia, where homosexual acts are punishable under federal and sometimes sharia law. He fears he will be forced to undergo gay conversion therapy should he be returned to the country, where the opposition leader last year blamed gay people for causing earthquakes and a lesbian couple were caned publicly for having sex in a car…
The government keeps making up new rules in its war on thought:
…federal prosecutors are arguing that they’re entitled to all money made by Backpage, even proceeds derived from unquestionably legal ads, and that decades worth of earnings made by former Backpage leaders before the website even existed are also tainted…their lawyers [state in a recent filng that] “Virtually all of the Defendants’ assets have been seized, virtually all of the money in their attorneys’ trust accounts designated to fund the defense has been been seized or is effectively frozen,” and defense lawyers “may expose themselves to criminal liability if they use those funds to pay fees” from the case…the Cato Institute, DKT Liberty Project, and the Reason Foundation…filed a brief in support of the defendants on this matter…”The government has shut down a major internet site and confiscated millions of dollars of assets and proceeds not only from that site, but also from defendants’ numerous other publishing venues—ventures completely unrelated to the alleged criminality of the site and indisputably protected by the First Amendment…The history of government efforts to suppress and censor disfavored speakers, particularly speakers who offer sexually explicit materials, is long [and has]…involved tactics…designed to bankrupt speakers by forcing them to litigate on multiple fronts to prove that their speech is protected by the First Amendment”…
…the De Wallen neighborhood…could soon face [forcible gentific]ation as local government officials strive to implement a new policy, set to increase the number of sex-work permits beyond De Wallen in an attempt to p[ush] sex workers…elsewhere…the Netherlands has been increasingly [aggressive] in [selling its Disnification efforts as] combating human trafficking…the…government…shut down many coffee shops and 112 sex-worker windows…pushing many sex workers towards illegal work or abroad to Brussels…[due to increased harassment] it’s often no longer in the interest of many independent workers to be registered under Amsterdam’s Municipal Ordinance…because sex workers [are rightly concerned] that their…work might be [criminalized or they might be branded “victims” against their will]…sex workers are increasingly demanding…the ability to book clients online and work [legally] from home…
A national group is trying to get people not to…[listen to] sex workers, but to [instead label] them as…victims of human trafficking [no matter what they say about their own lives]. The group Truckers Against Trafficking [indoctrinates] truck drivers–and others–[in] how to [project their fantasies about] modern day slavery [on other people without their consent]…Ohio has been [trying to convince people that it’s] a hotbed of human trafficking in recent years…
SCOTUS demolishes a major pillar of government extortion schemes:
States are bound by the Eighth Amendment’s prohibition against excessive fines and fees when they seek to [steal]…assets from individuals charged or convicted of a crime, the U.S. Supreme Court ruled unanimously…It’s a decision that hands a major victory to critics of civil asset forfeiture, and it opens another avenue to legal challenges against that widely…abused…practice by which states and local governments can seize cars, cash, homes, and pretty much anything else…[under the pretense that it was] used to commit a crime…Timbs v. Indiana, involved the seizure of a $42,000 Land Rover…from Tyson Timbs…During oral arguments in November, Indiana’s solicitor general got boxed into a corner by Justice Stephen Breyer, who managed to twist the government’s lawyer into arguing that Indiana should be allowed to seize vehicles for as small an offense as driving 5 mph over the speed limit, which literally elicited laughter in the courtroom…
“The law is the law and if more people die, tough shit“:
…The U.S. Department of Justice took aim…at the movement to open a supervised consumption site in Philadelphia…[with] a civil lawsuit…against Philadelphia-based nonprofit Safehouse, asking the the U.S. District Court to rule that safe injection sites violate federal law…Ronda B. Goldfein, vice president of Safehouse…said the federal government is using the “crack house” statute in the Anti-Drug Abuse Act of 1986…[which] was [supposedly] intended to prevent businesses from profiting off drug consumption…
I’m really happy to see Uber hoist on its own “sex trafficking” petard:
On February 19 2019, a woman shared a [fantasy of the type common in moral panics]…that a phony Uber driver in Tampa had nearly successfully abducted her for the purposes of sex trafficking…Within 48 hours, the post had been shared more than half a million times…[because of] its similarities to long-circulating urban legends involving nearly identical scenarios at locations [such] as Target, Hobby Lobby, and Walmart…police were able to verify that she did indeed get in the wrong car, but [pretended] they were perplexed as to how Hurley concluded that the mix-up was due to “sex trafficking” [despite the fact that they have themselves been spreading scare stories about “sex trafficking” for a decade now]…the car entered by Hurley was in fact a legitimate Uber driver, not an Uber impersonator. The [hysteric] called for an Uber at the airport and appeared to have entered one of the several other Ubers not there for her…[her claim that] she “later found out” that the Uber driver was “a sex traffic worker”…[even though] police said [no]thing like that at all [is typical of the way “sex trafficking” propaganda tales are boosted by false claims of official verification]…
The fascists don’t want their surveillance powers limited by mere civil rights:
Microsoft is pushing back on a bill sponsored by a…group of Washington state [politicians] that would ban local and state governments from using facial recognition until certain conditions are met…Microsoft has endorsed a [much weaker]…bill…[with largely cosmetic] facial-recognition rules…Shankar Narayan, director of the technology and liberty project of the ACLU’s Washington chapter, says requiring public notice of face recognition won’t check its use, and he warns that authorities [will] use the “emergency” exception as a loophole. “Microsoft’s bill has us heading to a world where face surveillance is ubiquitous and the norm,” Narayan says…
In the News (#885)
Posted in Current Events, History, Miscellaneous, News, Perception, Tyranny, tagged activism, agency denial, Amsterdam, brothels, California, Canada, censorship, cops, Disaster, disease, Droit du Seigneur, Dutch Threat, Florida, Hollywood, hotels, hysteria, law, masturbation, New York, O Canada!, Only Rights Can Stop the Wrongs, pimps, politicians, porn, Pyrrhic Victory, rape, Red Lamp, red-light districts, scams, stripping, surveillance, Thailand, The Notorious Badge, The Puritan Recrudescence, The Red Umbrella, To Molest and Rape, To Protect and Serve, video, violence vs. sex workers, Watershed on November 7, 2018| 4 Comments »
The goal of sexual suppression is that of producing an individual who is adjusted to the authoritarian order and who will submit to it in spite of all misery and degradation. – Wilhelm Reich
As long as sex work is marginalized, sex workers will be targeted for violence:
…four masked men…knocked on the hotel door of a dominatrix in Queens, pushed their way in and tied her up at gunpoint before running off with an iPhone, cash and a debit card…The woman got a call from an unknown number she figured was a client; when she opened the hotel door, she expected her client to be on the other side…The four men, all wearing black hooded sweatshirts or jackets, forced their way in…when she opened the door around 5:45 p.m. They menaced her at gunpoint and bound her with duct tape before stealing the phone, cash, card and her state driver’s license…
For those who think I’m wrong about sex worker rights having passed the watershed:
The Federation des Femmes du Quebec (FFQ)…a well-recognised women’s rights organisation…took [the obvious]…stance…that women can make a free-will choice on their own to enter into the sex trade…The executive-director of Stella, a Montreal sex workers advocacy group praises the decision…[saying] said it recognises sex workers choices and their human rights…
Sometimes, studying commercial sex of the past opens people’s eyes to the present:
They worked in brothels frequented by troops serving on the front line in northern France, but their role has been virtually erased from the history books. Thanks to a new Roundhouse art project, Cause and Effect, to mark the centenary of the end of the conflict, the wartime sex workers have been immortalised in a film with poet Hollie McNish …[who] worked with historian Clare Makepeace…to create War’s Whores, which details the “significant minority” of men paying for sex on the front line…McNish [said]…that one of the things that she found most poignant was the fact that so many men wanted to visit a sex worker if they thought they would die the next day…“It’s a much deeper thing than we give it credit for. The men thought they were likely to die the next day, the thought you’re never going to have someone touch you nicely again before you die, it must be horrendous”…she hopes that reigniting the memory of wartime sex workers will provoke conversations about the industry today…“It’s ridiculous…that we’re allowed to talk about violence and not about sex…That job has been shamed out of history, rather than just forgotten”…
Only Rights Can Stop the Wrongs (#726)
Sex work has been illegal in Thailand since 1960 but government officials and law enforcement officers have long turned a blind eye…a series of high profile police raids has put considerable strain on that relationship and some sex workers fear the whole industry is in jeopardy…the country’s Tourism Minister, Kobkarn Wattanavrangkul [has] said “We want Thailand to be [Disnified]…we want the sex industry gone.” Her [statements parrot] those of the military junta that seized power in 2014…said Somai Jantawong, a…sex worker living in Chiang Mai…“If we are arrested or lose our jobs then it affects the whole family and the whole community. We are the drivers of development in this country, if you lock us up then you will have more people in poverty and more people without homes”…Havocscope, who chart black market crime statistics and data, estimate that the sex industry pumps $6.4 billion into the Thai economy. In fact, Friedrich Schneider, an economist at Johannes Kepler University in Austria, found that Thailand has one of the largest shadow economies in the world, accounting for 40.9% of real GDP in 2014…
From October 15 to 21, police arrested 20 [sex workers and associates] through the seventh edition of Operation Northern Spotlight…a Canadian law enforcement [sting] operation…to [harass] and [intimidate]…sex [workers]…This year’s operation [included]…the RCMP…and…62 [other cop shops] from Alberta, Saskatchewan, Manitoba, Nunavut, Ontario, Quebec, New Brunswick, Nova Scotia and Prince Edward Island…
Last spring, Emily Meade was getting ready to give a [fake] blow job [to a dildo] in front of a crew of people on the…set of HBO’s The Deuce…As Meade knelt down, a woman named Alicia Rodis, the network’s first-ever “intimacy coordinator,” was within eyeshot, watching the monitor. She had given Meade a pad for her knees, knowing that the hard floor would bruise them otherwise. Between takes, she offered mouth spray and flavored lubricant. And she had spoken with Meade before the scene about her concerns and relayed them to the director…Network executives found Rodis through Intimacy Directors International, a nonprofit she cofounded in 2016 that aims to normalize a set of standards and practices surrounding the execution of sex scenes on stage and on film…HBO has now adopted a policy whereby all of its shows and movies with intimate scenes will be staffed with an intimacy coordinator — either Rodis or someone like her…
Because hiring actual sex workers as consultants for this sort of thing would be crazy, and fucking amateurs can’t think of things like knee pads.
The Puritan Recrudescence (#820)
In recent years, we’ve seen the return of a strange, antiquated belief system that claims that masturbation results in weakness, loss of manhood, and psychological damage…Your Brain on Porn and Reboot Nation are…online groups who argue that masturbation to porn…results in neurological changes which desensitize a person’s brain to real sex, cause erectile dysfunction, and instill an addiction to…pornography…Brigham Young University…spent what appears to be a great deal of money to produce a public service advertisement against the dangers and “darkness” of masturbation…The Proud Boys…a group of young, nationalist males…claim…that masturbating makes men less likely to get dates…all of these concerns, both historical and modern, about masturbation are primarily focused on male masturbation…Wilhelm Reich…who wrote The Mass Psychology of Fascism…suggested that sexual suppression was a tool of fascism, a way to train young people to submit to authority, even in something relating to their own body…and…conservative religions…have a long history of condemnation of masturbation…
A rare victory for sex workers over pigs:
The San Diego City Council today gave the green light for $1.5 million in payouts to 17 dancers who…were violated [by cops] during raids at two strip clubs…The first settlement awarded $110,000 to one dancer. The second settlement awarded about $1.4 million to 16 dancers…[who] were held against their will and [molested]…by 10 [pervert cops]…Attorney Dan Gilleon, who represented 16 of the dancers, [said]…”The…settlement is a drop in the bucket compared to what the City of San Diego spent conducting the raids in the first place and then misleading the public for four years with painfully dumb legal denials and defenses…the City Attorney’s Office…arrogantly bullied the dancers and filed bogus defense after bogus defense until they realized they would not sell their legal charade to a set of jurors with common sense”…
We did warn you dilettantes that this wouldn’t stop with actual sex workers:
…HotMilitaryGirls.com, a site that for years offered nude photos and videos of female servicemembers, has been shut down by its operators as the site’s legal counsel reviews its content…after [pearl-clutching prohibitionist politician] Claire McCaskill, [one of] the [chief sponsors of the censorship law FOSTA/SESTA]…called for the Defense Department’s inspector general to investigate the site…McCaskill’s office said in a statement that she lauded the news the site had [self-censored] but still sought [revenge on peaceful people for daring to be sexual]…
The three parties which run Amsterdam city council have drawn up a string of proposals for dealing with the city’s red light district and moving prostitution to a new location is one of the options…The area has been home to prostitution for centuries, because of its proximity to the docks, but the surge in tourism is causing both locals and prostitutes considerable problems, [politicians claim]…Many clients are now visiting prostitutes they find via internet or at a hotel rather than in the Wallen district. This means that many red light windows are now empty during the day and [prohibitionists have schemed for years to]…clos[e] them altogether…[politicians] now suggest giving licences for prostitution outside the red light district, so the women who work in window brothels can move to a new area, without the problems caused by tourists…Prostitution is a major tourist draw, but is this really the reason you want to attract people to visit?, said [prudish busybody] Socialist councillor Nicole Temmink…
If these pimps weren’t cops, they’d be facing “sex trafficking” charges right now:
Six of the NYPD cops accused of running a prostitution and gambling ring are in plea talks with prosecutors…the men were offered plea deals ranging from probation to 2-to 6-year prison sentences, but their lawyers didn’t want to accept so early in the case…
More on police abuse of Amazon’s face recognition software:
…[in downtown] Orlando…lightbulb-sized camera[s] affixed to…traffic signal poles…instantly send a live video feed over to Amazon’s facial “Rekognition” system, cross-referencing…face[s] against [a surveillance database]…In the US, there are no laws governing the use of facial recognition, and there is no regulatory framework limiting its law enforcement applications. There is no case law or constitutional precedent upholding police use of the tech without a warrant; courts haven’t even decided whether facial recognition constitutes a search under the Fourth Amendment…[so of course cops are eager to] pilot…these systems [before their power is limited by laws or precedents…Amazon marketed its facial recognition tools to Orlando’s police department, providing tens of thousands of dollars of technology to the city at no cost, and shielding the Rekognition pilot with a mutual nondisclosure agreement that kept its details [secret from]…the public…In May, Orlando police reportedly finalized a deal to crowdsource neighborhood footage from residents of the city using [another Amazon] service called Ring, which uses…a doorbell camera…to[feed images] to Orlando Police…There is no automatic sharing of data between Ring and Rekognition right now. But Amazon would not…commit…to keep the data generated by each of these companies…separate…
[A cop] is caught in an act of sexual misconduct every five days, and that the majority of cases involve “motorists, crime victims, informants, students and young people in job-shadowing programs”…black women, girls, trans and gender nonconforming people, along with Indigenous, immigrant, and other people of color, make up the majority of people targeted for sexual violence by law enforcement agents…police sexual violence is consistently ignored by mainstream media and movements focused on police violence and sexual assault…[because cops] intentionally target people they don’t think will be believed…people who use drugs, trade sex, people who are precariously housed, disabled, LGBTQ—people who aren’t seen as ideal poster children for mainstream movements. Secondly, acknowledging sexual violence by [cops] as a systemic problem profoundly destabilizes the notion of police as protectors, an uncomfortable reality for movements deeply invested in law enforcement as the answer to sexual violence…
You see that blink-and-you’ll-miss-it reference to “people who trade sex”? That’s the only reference in a 1200+ word article about the one group which is targeted for sexual violence by cops more than any other, by a wide margin. In an article about how activists ignore rape victims who aren’t ideal poster children. The reek of hypocrisy is overwhelming.
R.I.P. Dennis Hof
Posted in Current Events, Obituary, Perception, tagged brothels, Hall of Shame, hysteria, Nevada, pimps, politicians, prohibitionist myths on October 18, 2018| 3 Comments »
Dennis Hof, owner of half of the brothels in Nevada, died early Tuesday morning, apparently of natural causes; he was 72. I have never hidden my deep dislike for the man, who is still the only male member of my Hall of Shame; that dislike is inextricably bound up with my deep dislike for the exploitative fascist system which made him both wealthy and infamous (and it’s impossible to say which of those he relished more). The state of Nevada, as I’ve written before,
…is [no] more whore-friendly than any other American state…unless one considers a poultry factory-farmer to be a “friend” of chickens…[it] allow[s] a small number of politically-connected cronies to run brothel ranches (switching from one kind of livestock to another) out in the desert far from human habitation (so the “sex rays” from diseased harlots don’t contaminate real people)…like a collection of mummified monsters and pickled curiosities in a roadside tourist trap, and to harshly persecute any who dare show themselves in town.
Now, it’s absolutely true that there would be nothing immoral about the Nevada system as long as whores had a free choice whether to work there or not; furthermore, the restrictions of the Nevada system are largely state-imposed and not the fault of Hof or other brothel owners. I’ve never worked in one of the Nevada brothels myself because I refuse to submit to being treated like a criminal, so I have no firsthand experience in what Hof was like as a boss (and the varying opinions I’ve heard from women who have basically average out to “he was no worse than the others”). So my revulsion has nothing to do with the brothel system itself or what he was like as an employer, but rather with his opportunistic promotion of “sex trafficking” hysteria (which he privately admitted to me that he knew to be bullshit), the “dirty whore” myth, and the notion that women are too stupid, weak and incompetent to be trusted to manage our own sexual behavior. I was also disgusted by his deep hypocrisy (claiming to be a libertarian while participating in a crony system, supporting Donald Trump, cuddling up to the vile Joe Arpaio, and revering the word “legal” as though it were a cultic totem) and his relentless and distasteful self-promotion.
That having been said, it’s also true that Hof’s participation in the reality series Cathouse probably served to demystify at least one kind of sex work to hundreds of thousands of people; that his businesses provided jobs to hundreds of sex workers and support staff; and that regardless of my personal opinion of him, he was liked and even loved by many of his employees, business contacts and others, including several people (such as my friend Christina Parreira and 1st amendment powerhouse Marc Randazza) I like and respect very much. Furthermore, though some of the recent attacks on Nevada brothels were obviously retribution for his political activity, others had nothing to do with him personally and his notoriety and local popularity may have helped fend them off; now that he’s dead the whore-haters may redouble their efforts, and there’s no telling what effect Nevada’s deeply weird licensing laws may have on the fate of many, many people’s livelihoods.
There are people I know who are celebrating his death, and others who are mourning it; personally, I’m glad we won’t have to endure his signal-boosting of prohibitionist lies, but I’m also worried about the future of the women who work in brothels in general and his brothels in particular. In short, Hof was a complex, often maddening man in life, and his death has left a situation that’s equally complex and maddening.
In the News (#872)
Posted in Current Events, Miscellaneous, News, Tyranny, tagged Bait and Switch, California, cops, dirty, Droit du Seigneur, Elephant in the Parlor, end demand, End Demand (updates), fascism, Florida, hysteria, Minnesota, New Jersey, New York, Ohio, Perquisites, pimps, prisons, propaganda, rape, stripping, Swedish model, Switzerland, Thailand, The Punitive Mindset, The Widening Gyre, To Molest and Rape, Twitter, Uncommon Sense on September 19, 2018| 3 Comments »
There’s real people being hurt. But [cops are too] busy playing these goddamn games. – Kristen DiAngelo
Though pimps are not common, a disproportionate number of the ones who do exist are cops:
Seven members of the NYPD were arrested [last] Wednesday in connection with a prostitution and gambling case as part of an investigation dating back to 2015…retired NYPD detective Ludwig Paz…and his wife, a former prostitute, ran brothels located in Queens, Brooklyn and Hempstead, Long Island, along with numerous gambling rooms set up in beauty salons and other businesses. [Cops] who knew the retired detective then became involved…providing security or information…the suspects have been identified as…Carlos Cruz…Louis Failla…Cliff Nieves…Steven Nieves…Giancarlo Raspanti…Gionanny Rojas-Acosta…[and] Rene Samaniego…
But they’re “going after the johns”!
A coalition with the stated mission of disrupting human trafficking in the Sacramento region touted the results of a crackdown on the men who pay for sexual favors. But the press release…omitted one crucial detail: Considerably more women are arrested for prostitution-related offenses—contradicting the message that authorities are zeroing in on the men who purportedly fund sexual exploitation…
Cops will keep pulling these shenanigans as long as courts let them:
A…man received a stay of imposition Sept. 7…Paul R. Lund was…charged last August with felony prostitution…[after cops] rented a Springfield residence and [fantasy role-played] as 16-year-old females willing to trade sex…for money or narcotics. Lund’s defense attorney, Jacob Birkholz of Mankato, accused the State of trying to burden shift, using photos of someone age 18 or older, originally claiming the female was 18, then 16…
A rare example of an appropriate sentence for a rapist cop:
A [typical and representative Ohio] cop convicted of raping four women…was sentenced to 43 years in prison. The first 33 years of Justin Sanderson’s sentencing are mandatory…and he will not be eligible for early release until the last 10 years. Sanderson will have to register as a sex offender if he is ever released from prison…
…the Russian spy who shagged NRA members is yet another sexual fiction created by the feds. Russian national Maria Butina still stands accused of having failing to file proper paperwork while working as a foreign agent and conspiracy. But U.S. prosecutors have now admitted that they have no evidence she traded sex for secrets or otherwise acted as a “honeypot“. The Butina text messages used to make that claim were just jokes, prosecutors now [admit]…Butina’s lawyers “are arguing that the prosecutors’ error is emblematic of a flawed federal case that has wrongly landed their client in pretrial custody”…The alleged error is…incredibly typical for the feds…[who often] tell sordid or scandalous sexual tall tales about suspects, especially when any appearance of transactional sex is concerned. Butina is lucky that prosecutors have at least acknowledged their mistake publicly…All too often, those who the feds falsely accuse of sexual intrigue and crime do not get that chance…
For the last seven years, inmates have stocked the libraries of their personal MP3 players with $2 downloads. Come January, they’ll be forced to hand it all over because the Florida Department of Corrections signed a new deal with a competing company…the Florida Department of Corrections struck a deal with JPay…to sell profit-driven multimedia tablets to incarcerated people…inmates will have to return the players [they purchased from another company], and they can’t transfer the music they already purchased onto their new devices…The Department of Corrections, meanwhile, has collected $1.4 million in commissions on each song downloaded and other related sales since July 2011…JPay already operates banking accounts and facilitates phone calls at the state-run prisons, charging inmates and their loved ones steep fees for the services…
Are amateurs really so sheltered that this sort of thing shocks them?
A tour bus company was slammed after footage emerged of young lads being entertained – by COYOTE dancers. The young men hired the coach…for a trip from Bangkok, Thailand, into neighbouring provinces. But video taken during the journey onboard the…Bus…with blacked out windows shows passengers cavorting with young women in hot pants and skimpy tops…Video…sparked outrage from [busybodies] who said [other people’s private behavior] was [somehow] inappropriate…
How countries with healthy ideas about sex react to the Swedish disease:
…the Zurich Women’s Centre…launched its campaign for a ban on prostitution based on the Swedish model…Other NGOs started a counter-campaign called “Sex Work Is Work”, in which they take a stand against a ban and for the rights of sex workers. Even state-run gender-equality agencies and advisory offices have spoken out against the demands of the Zurich Women’s Centre…A majority of the Swiss media is also sceptical about the Zurich Women’s Centre’s proposal. A ban on prostitution would be expensive, the Tages-Anzeiger commented: If the sex trade is made illegal, then it would be necessary to help the women concerned to find new work, or to fund their retraining. “Anything else would be hypocritical and unfair”…
Another entry in the “sex trafficking” scare story invasion of Twitter:
A [New Jersey] teen took to Twitter to formally apologize for initiating a widespread panic with her tweet that [fantasized a shopping mall]…in Toms River was a hot-spot for human trafficking. The original tweet, posted by Sarah Gascho, stated: “the parking lot on route 37 where ShopRite, staples, Panera, etc. are located is apparently becoming a spot for human traffickers to kidnap victims!!!!!” The tweet has since been deleted; however, it garnered hundreds of shares and comments on social media prior to being removed…“We have not received any official reports alerting us to any criminal activity of this nature,” stated Toms River Police. “Please be aware that posting un[approv]ed rumors can rise to causing false public alarm which is a chargeable offense. If you have been witness to something or feel in danger, call the police, do not post about it”…
Empty Set
Posted in Perception, Tyranny, tagged Australia, brothels, cops, law, Nevada, New Zealand, pimps, politicians, sex work is work, statistics on September 13, 2018| 4 Comments »
Why don’t the people who support decriminalization work together with those who support legalization to fight criminalization?
The answer to that is simpler than you might think: it’s because nobody supports legalization. You may think that’s a bit glib, but it’s basically the truth. Every sex worker rights organization, human rights organization (including Amnesty International), health organization and academic who has actually made a proper study of sex work agrees that decriminalization (in which sex work is treated as a form of work rather than a type of criminal behavior to be “controlled”, and sex workers are treated as adults with agency rather than broken children to be managed by the state) is the best framework for everyone involved. Studies from New Zealand and New South Wales demonstrate that the decriminalized sex industry in those places is far healthier than in any place with heavy-handed government “regulation” of women’s sexuality by police. The number of sex workers who want themselves declared moral imbeciles in need of management by the state is vanishingly small; nearly everyone who supports “legalization” is a politician, cop, moralist or crony who stands to profit from the “legalized” system (such as Nevada brothel owners or the owners of STI testing services). In other words, the only people who support women being paternalistically treated like imbecilic disease vectors who need others to make decisions about their bodies for them, are those who stand to gain power (including the power to rape women who color outside the lines) or money from such a system. And many such people, such as Dutch “authorities” and pimps like Dennis Hof, are perfectly happy to spread “sex trafficking” propaganda and other lies in order to ensure that women are denied control over our own sexual and economic behavior.
Does that answer your question about why we can’t work together?
(Have a question of your own? Please consult this page to see if I’ve answered it in a previous column, and if not just click here to ask me via email.)
In the News (#870)
Posted in Current Events, Miscellaneous, News, Tyranny, tagged activism, adolescence, Allied for Change, Argentina, asset seizure, Banishment, bisexuality, bogus studies, brothels, California, Chauvinism, cops, Creepy Coppers, Droit du Seigneur, Facebook, fantasy, Finding What Isn’t There, Florida, Follow Your Bliss, hysteria, internet, Louisiana, New Jersey, Ohio, Oregon, pimps, porn, prisons, psychology, rape, red-light districts, scams, sex offender registry, Soap Opera, sporting events, streetwalkers, stripping, The Clueless Leading the Hysterical, The Widening Gyre, To Protect and Serve, transgender, TSA, United Kingdom, Washington (state) on September 12, 2018| Leave a Comment »
We didn’t think it was good idea to have [rapey cop] conduct aired publicly in a prosecution. – Scott Perrilloux
Strip club raids exist only for pigs to get their jollies:
Prosecutors have scuttled a multi-agency investigation into a…strip club in St. Helena Parish [because a disguised pig]…committed a crime – by digitally penetrating a woman during two private dances. The month-long sting operation included another [cop] asking a dancer at The Mansion to lactate on him “because he was curious”…The [sexual assault] of the dancer was described in a lengthy affidavit…by Scott Jarreau, a Tangipahoa Parish Sheriff’s…deputy who recounted the…actions in graphic detail [because he idiotically thought it would]…support…a civil asset forfeiture case against the club’s owner that was ultimately dismissed. The [pigs’ disgusting] conduct was among the reasons prosecutors decided not to pursue charges against 13 people arrested in the raid, including the club’s proprietor…It’s not clear why Shreveport, which is more than four hours away, lent officers to the effort…
It’s “not clear” to people whose heads are so far up their own arseholes they don’t know what pervert cops look like.
Though pimps are not common, a disproportionate number of the ones who do exist are cops:
A…Newark [cop] was charged…with…soliciting and accepting cash payments from brothel owners in exchange for protecting the brothels from police action and…failing to report those cash payments on his…income tax returns…Julio Rivera…[extort]ed more than $100,000 in cash payments from three brothel owners [?] in Newark…
I’m guessing that by “brothels” these prosecutors actually mean massage parlors.
The Clueless Leading the Hysterical 
Hysteria over “dangerous teen fads” is much funnier when cops are its primary vectors:
…“Momo”…is the face of a viral Internet game, [fantasized] to be spreading via…WhatsApp and sparking worldwide warnings…by [authoritarians] about its potential to harm young people who may be lured into playing…references to “Momo” also have circulated on Facebook, Twitter and YouTube. The…“Momo Challenge”…requires players to complete escalating tasks that are [supposedly] dangerous…But…it’s simply another one of the many hoaxes that breed on the Internet. Officials in multiple countries [fantasize] Momo’s final challenge is suicide and the game is rumored to be linked to at least three recent cases of minors who killed themselves in Argentina, Colombia and India…None of these circumstantial reports tying the game to suicides have been proved…[people who aren’t cops or hysterics] are calling it an Internet hoax designed to generate paranoia among adults…
…David Cohen…of Stanford’s…Center for Human Rights…has created a set of resources to help NGOs and government agencies working in the anti-trafficking field gather data [for] policymakers…about the nature and scope of the problem they face. “Sectors in the anti-trafficking field [do] not always cooperat[e] in a way that…allow[s] us to understand that data”…said senior program manager Jessie Brunner…“After decades of work…there is still no [politically popular] answer to “what is the problem and why is it happening”…That scares me, that after all these efforts and money spent we still aren’t able to figure that out. And we need a solid answer to that question so that we can actually stop the problem”…Brunner…that the data that exist are often limited…of low quality or outdated…
When an article about the lack of good data about a phenomenon refers to that phenomenon as a “problem” and a “scourge” while admitting that the hysterics don’t even know that there is a problem, it’s a safe bet that any forthcoming data from the announced project will be worthless.
Instead of purging sex workers with police violence, Argentina negotiated with them as citizens:
…For two months, transgender sex workers will move from the red light zone in Plaza Florencio Sánchez…in…Palermo…to another space, a few blocks away…The move [was agreed upon in meetings between]…the Argentina LGBT Federation and the Association of Women of Argentina (AMMAR)…sex workers in the area, the Undersecretary of Human Rights and Cultural Pluralism of the Buenos Aires Government and the Ombudsman of the City…The reason is that Florencio Sanchez square is being converted to volleyball courts, while the neighboring Lago de Regatas is being conditioned for the Olympic Triathlon swimming competition…[for] the Youth Olympic Games, which will run from October 6 to 18…until October 31, the trans girls will leave their usual area…to…offer their services in…a temporary red light zone…the City Government also agreed to make improvements in working conditions that they had committed to when the red light zone…was created in 2008…
This announcement is definitely flawed, but I applaud any client who comes out:
Lily Allen has revealed that she slept with female escorts because she felt “lost and lonely” during the tour for her third album Sheezus in 2014…explaining her decision was made after learning that some details of her upcoming book My Thoughts Exactly had been leaked to the Daily Mail. “I slept with female escorts when I was on tour, cause I was lost and lonely and looking for something. I’m not proud, but I’m not ashamed…I don’t do it anymore”…
Yet the government still won’t admit that the TSA attracts pedophiles:
A…Transportation Security Administration supervisor has been sentenced for having child pornography at his home. Devin David Jutilla…resigned from his job at Seattle-Tacoma International Airport after his arrest April 25 [and]…pleaded guilty last month to second-degree child pornography possession as part of [a plea bargain] with Pierce County prosecutors…Judge Bryan Chushcoff sentenced Jutilla to six months in jail…
Cops are trying to regain control of a runaway moral panic by using their favored tool, violence:
An Ohio mom’s Facebook video about the attempted abduction of her child in a Walmart parking lot was [like] all [sex trafficking scare tales] made up…Chelsie Hendel was arrested…after…Marion County Sheriff Tim Bailey…[reviewed] security footage [that]…showed no such incident happened. Bailey also said Hendel never reported a crime to police. When police questioned Hendel…she admitted to making the story up and was arrested on a misdemeanor charge of inducing panic. Her video…has been taken down from Facebook…
…civil commitment allows a prosecutor to subject those convicted of sexual offenses (and sometimes, those with no conviction at all) to an indefinite period of civil punishment at the end of their criminal sentence. Civil commitment can mean years of additional detention under the guise of psychiatric treatment meant to reduce a person’s risk of committing another crime, with an often-illusory promise of freedom. Statutes that [supposedly] constrain the power of authorities to civilly commit people…are broad and ambiguous…and…rates of reoffending are far lower than would be believed—potentially imperiling the justification for civil commitment itself…In California, there [are] 345 people trapped in…“pretrial” detention for more than three years. More than a quarter of those have been held without trial since 2006 or earlier. In Florida…89 of the 489 detainees at their civil commitment center are pretrial. Fourteen have been held for more than a decade; five for nearly 20 years. In Washington State, Jesse McReynolds spent nine years civilly detained on McNeil Island without trial before a judge ordered his release…McReynolds’s case was…not an anomaly, and…multiple [Washingtonians] have been civilly detained pending trial, sometimes for decades…
They’re “certified” in making up absurd stories and spreading moral panic:
…in Deschutes County, a local response team comprised of 16 experts in their various fields follows up on all human trafficking leads. The Deschutes County Commercially Sexually Exploited Children (CSEC) Response Team then coordinates a continuum of care, helping victims become survivors…
In Bend, Oregon, home of this “team”, this “continuum of care” includes posting magic “sex trafficker” detecting stickers (subtitle link), turning people in to the pigs for being injured, and claiming that eclipses cause “sex trafficking” by magic passes involving poker chips.
In the News (#869)
Posted in Current Events, Miscellaneous, News, Perception, Tyranny, tagged activism, Africa, agency denial, bogus studies, California, censorship, cops, dating, dehumanization, dirty, Disaster, end demand, evidence, hysteria, Israel, Kentucky, language, law, Lower Education, Maryland, Mexico, pimps, politicians, pragmatism, racism, rape, Rescued To Death, Shame Shame, Signs, Spain, statistics, streetwalkers, stripping, The Course of a Disease, The Face of Trafficking, The Monsters Are Due, The Sky is Falling!, The Widening Gyre, To Molest and Rape, Twitter, Uncommon Sense, United Kingdom, violence vs. sex workers, Worse Than I Thought on September 8, 2018| 1 Comment »
My body is my business – and it is a money maker. – Vera Sidika
“Human trafficking” has become nothing more than a dysphemism for sex work:
A trio of bills before the [Frederick] County [Maryland] Council [cl]aim to address human trafficking…[one] would require hotels and motels to conduct human trafficking training for new employees, [the second would] hold landlords and tenants liable for criminal charges for [not evicting sex workers on a cop’s say-so] and [the third would] regulate “bodyworks” establishments, which [prohibitionists pretend] are relatively common locations for human trafficking…The landlord and tenant bill would would make it unlawful for any tenant or landlord or property owner to [lease to anyone a cop decides to call]…a potential problem…Prince George’s County has…implemented this bill and has seen success in [evicting] some [sex workers]…the goal of the bill isn’t to punish the landlords,
but to get them to [become fascist tools] by evicting the tenants or reporting [them] to police…
Instant karma’s gonna get you…
On [May 16th], Sahar Sarid, Thomas Keesee and Kishore Vidya Bhavnanie—three out of four alleged owners of Mugshots.com—were arrested and charged with extortion, money laundering and identity theft…[for] harvest[ing] people’s mug shots and charg[ing] them exorbitant fees
to have the photos removed…$399 and up…many people have filed lawsuits against the site…California Attorney General Xavier Becerra said…“Those who can’t afford to pay into this scheme to have their information removed pay the price when they look for a job, housing, or try to build relationships with others. This is exploitation, plain and simple”..
And yet I don’t see Becerra pushing for a law to make mugshots not public records. Is that the stench of hypocrisy I smell?
Beware of male “feminists” who try to stop women from organizing:
Spain’s fiercely anti-prostitution Prime Minister Pedro Sanchez was left red in the face…after it emerged a sex workers union was approved by his own administration. Sex work is…neither illegal nor regulated [in Spain] but Sanchez came to power in June with a strongly feminist agenda promising to fight…women. “Prostitution in Spain isn’t legal and this government won’t support any organisation that includes this illicit activity,” he tweeted…
“Abatement”. A term used for things, especially nuisances, here applied to people. But NHI, right?
…[spokespig] Gaetano Caltagirone…announced the initiation of a “Sex Worker Abatement Unit”…Some 20 [cops] applied [for obvious reasons], but only four were selected…the unit has arrested “Johns” — men soliciting prostitutes — as well as pimps. Any ensnared sex workers, he said, have been offered [brainwashing sessions or else]…This [paternalistic scheme] was modeled after a pilot program in Seattle…This news was, by and large, well-received by the meeting attendees…[but] Tessa Brown, a Mission resident, pinned the rise of street prostitution on the closures of popular personal websites like Backpage…“I just wanted to push back at the idea that all neighbors agree that we should be arresting all sex workers and more clients of sex workers,” Brown said…Another attendee, Aaron Sunshine, chimed in and suggested the police ease up. “Let’s just leave the sex workers alone,” Sunshine said…
Slowly but surely, we’re getting through to people who aren’t predisposed to bigotry & bootlicking.
What an actual attempt to abduct a woman into forced prostitution looks like:
…her former pimp crept up from behind and dropped her with a roundhouse punch. Two men heaved her into a car trunk and they were off, forcing the woman to claw for her life in the dark as the vehicle careened along crowded city streets…Soon police were in pursuit across the Bay Bridge. Minutes later the car would slam into a pole in a fiery, fatal wreck. But before the deadly crash, the woman in the trunk remembered an episode of The Oprah Winfrey Show that informed viewers about emergency trunk latches. In her panic, she found her lifeline and escaped from the vehicle as it headed to the bridge…
…the exchange of youth and beauty for long-term financial gain, motivated not by hunger but by aspiration, glamorised by social media stars, and often wrapped in the trappings of a relationship. Older men have always used gifts, status, and influence to buy access to young women. The sugar daddy has probably been around, in every society, for as long as the prostitute. So you might ask: “Why even have a conversation about transactional sex in Africa?” The answer is that in Kenya, and in some other African countries, “sugar” relationships seem to have become both more common and more visible: what once was hidden is now out in the open – on campuses, in bars, and all over Instagram…
Ashe Schow debunks the absurd numbers behind the “campus rape crisis” propaganda:
A potential draft of new federal campus sexual assault policies was leaked this week, so expect a new round of false and misleading statistics to be shared by those who claim due process “protects rapists” and “hurts victims”. Rape and sexual assault are serious offenses, and shouldn’t be watered down to create a narrative that America is somehow the rape capital of the world, nor should we pretend that non-offenses are offenses…I’ve taken down every one of these statistics before — sometimes many, many times — but it’s time to debunk them all in one place…
Schow debunks the “1 in 4” lie (“numbers thousands of times higher than war-torn Congo”), the “serial predator” bogeyman, the “all rape accusations are true” poison, the “universities which report no rapes are lying” libel, and the “1 in 3 men intend to rape” bullshit. It’s worth reading in its entirety.
[Cops] in the Louisville Metro Police Department’s youth Explorer program…interrogated…a girl who [was the victim]…of sexual abuse [by one of their cronies], took her cell phone and refused to let her parents be present when she was questioned during an out-of-town trip…the head of the program tried to keep the allegations quiet through what amounted to a bribe — offering to pay the cost of the trip to Atlanta…Louisville Metro P[ig] Brad Schuhmann…sexually abus[ed] the girl from 2008 to 2009…and sought sexual pictures and acts from her. The abuse [was perpetrated] in [pigmobiles], at Explorer events and through text messages. The lawsuit was initially filed under seal in Jefferson Circuit Court in October but was moved to federal court earlier this year. It is among five other similar suits unsealed [on August 30th]…the teen told her parents, who confronted Schuhmann and met with the program’s leader at the time, Lt. Curtis Flaherty. Schuhmann is under criminal investigation and [was rewarded for the rapes with a] paid [vacation]…
In which “sex trafficking” hysteria is employed to mask the stench of xenophobia:
Britain is ramping up efforts to [charge people with] sex trafficking of girls…amid [fantasies] that cases uncovered by police are just “the tip of the iceberg” with modern slavery ever-evolving…Britain this week announced a 2 million pound ($2.6 million) scheme to [divert funds to cronies under the excuse of] help[ing] stop at risk children falling into the grip of traffickers and gangs who rape them and force them to move drugs…from cities to rural areas…Britain has been rocked by a series of child sex trafficking and abuse [s]ca[r]es over the past few years, with hundreds of girls [claimed to be] exploited by large gangs..of mainly Asian men…
The Course of a Disease (#850)
We were warned that Israeli whore-censorship was only “part of a wider plan”:
The State Attorney’s office, along with Israeli police, decided…to take severe measures against the practice of lap dances in strip clubs. The new enforcement intends to eradicate “the activity that in certain circumstances constitutes prostitution”…The police issued a written notice to owners of strip clubs clarifying the new policies…[Prohibitionist] Nitzan Kahana of the Task Force [for Pearl-Clutching smugly bloviated]…“The treatment to root out prostitution in Israel has begun…Strip clubs are a major part of this industry…lap dances, posing for years as ‘an innocent dance’ when it is apparent to all that they are essentially a sexual act of physical contact intending to please customers”…
OH MY GOD WE CAN’T HAVE CUSTOMERS EXPERIENCING PLEASURE!!! THE HORROR!!!
I’ve never seen anything galvanize public support for sex workers like FOSTA has:
…Coyote…RI…conducted a survey of 262 sex workers between April 14 and May 25, 2018. Seventy percent…reported that sex work had been their primary source of income before FOSTA and 77 percent…were the sole providers for their families. Within a week of the laws’ passage, 70 percent noticed a drop in their income, rendering them unable to pay for rent, food, utilities or phone…Sixty percent…now take on less safe clients in order to make ends meet. Sixty-five percent…reported that someone had tried to threaten, exploit or [rape] them…censorship of sex workers’ content…means that many are turning to street-based sex work…including people who have little to no experience working on the streets…street-based sex work…increases vulnerability to predators, including police…
The ugliest part of a peak moral panic: lynch mobs:
Some residents of [the] small town [of Acatlan] in central Mexico [abducted] two men accused of trying to kidnap children from police custody and burned them to death…A crowd of about 150 people gathered and stormed the jail…then doused the…[men] with an accelerant and burned them [alive]…
In the comments, a witness wrote, “The two men were innocent. They were drinking in the street and they got arrested. A small group of people [then] began gossip[ing] that they were kidnapping children…Everything was broadcasted on Facebook Live and the mother of the younger man was watching the stream of her son getting killed. There are posts of her begging them to stop…”
Here’s another entry in the “sex trafficking” scare story invasion of Twitter. Notice we’re back to Ikea again; apparently “sex traffickers” just can’t resist picking up cheap furniture and enjoying Swedish meatballs while shopping for their “sex slaves”. I wonder how many abductions it takes to make a furniture store a “hot spot”, and how many women have been abducted from the Covina Ikea in comparison with, say, the Cost Plus in San Dimas or the Ethan Allen in Pasadena?
In the News (#864)
Posted in Current Events, Miscellaneous, News, Tyranny, tagged Afghanistan, Austria, brothels, California, censorship, China, False Target, fascism, FBI, Florida, Google, homosexuality, hysteria, I Spy, If Men Were Angels, Illinois, Imaginary Victims, Ireland, Laura Lee & Sex Work Stigma, Legal Is as Legal Does, Lower Education, Monsters, neofeminism, New York, Ohio, pimps, psychology, Pyrrhic Victory, racism, rape, surveillance, tabula rasa, teachers, The Dogs Do Bark, The Widening Gyre, Twitter, violence vs. sex workers, yin and yang on August 22, 2018| 1 Comment »
Justice is what…feminists want from others, not what they do to others. – Scott Greenfield
Concern for “child sex trafficking victims” vanishes when there are no adult whores to oppress:
The Ohio Supreme Court…upheld the murder conviction of a [young] woman whose forced prostitution as a teenager was cited as a factor leading to her involvement in the fatal shooting of her pimp during a robbery…that prosecutors [claim] Alexis Martin helped plan…she…was 15 at the time of the slaying…[of] Angelo Kerney…and his brother. The girls were having sex with the victims to distract them when the robbers entered a house and the victims were shot…Martin is not accused of firing a gun. The juvenile court judge should have determined that Martin was covered by a 2012 Ohio law that protects children whose crimes are related to their status as trafficking victims…Had the judge determined that the so-called Safe Harbor law applied, a court-appointed guardian for the teen could have been named…
As I’ve pointed out many times, “safe harbor” laws only protect “perfect victims”, not real ones.
Did anyone not know this already?
Men have better sex with women who are emotionally unstable…and women prefer men who are less agreeable but pay attention to detail, according to the German survey of a thousand people…Julia Velten and her colleagues interviewed each volunteer about their sex lives, personality and sexual function…
Though most of this is just typical racist anti-migrant bullshit, one part reveals a deeper sickness:
An 18-year-old Afghan native seeking asylum in Austria may have had his application denied because he didn’t act gay enough…Homosexuality is against the law in Afghanistan and many other Muslim-majority countries…But…an Austrian official…[wrote] “The way you walk, act or dress does not show even in the slightest that you could be homosexual…You appear to be capable of a level of aggression which would not be expected among homosexuals”…He had said he became aware of his sexuality when he was 12 years old, but the official found that was “rather early” and so not likely, particularly in a society such as Afghanistan “where there is no public sexual stimulation through fashion and advertisement”…
The idea that all queer people “act gay” (even if they come from a place where doing so might be fatal) is bad enough, but the notion that young people are asexual tabulae rasae until they are “sexualized” by society is much worse; this dehumanizing dogma is the foundation for “conversion therapy” and “john schools”, because if sexuality is learned one who fails to conform to enforced norms can be “re-educated”.
Gay porn star and comedian Wesley Woods has opened up about a brutal…assault he and his best friend endured on 8 August when out walking in West Hollywood….in a video posted on his Twitter account….where scars on his face are visible…
This is what feminists call “equality”:
When…feminist superstar Judith Butler’s disgraceful and flagrantly hypocritical letter defending her sister superstar, NYU prof Avital Ronell…was sent around for signatures, threatening NYU with the wrath of scholars if Ronell wasn’t exonerated, the university had already found Ronell responsible…one of the university’s brightest academic lights had sexually harassed a gay male student under her care. This wasn’t one of the faux Title IX cases of post-hoc regret, but the real deal. Ronell was grad student Nimrod Reitman’s doctoral adviser…And…she turned him into her boy toy upon the implicit threat of destroying his career. And it continued throughout his graduate studies, as proven by Ronell’s emails…Yet, these scholars sought to coerce a university into silence…to conceal Ronell’s conduct…”Diane Davis, chair of the department of rhetoric at the University of Texas-Austin…said she and her colleagues were particularly disturbed that…Reitman was using Title IX, a feminist tool, to take down a feminist“…Forget the jargonized rhetoric about power dynamics and oppression. To these feminist scholars, Title IX is just a bludgeon to beat men into submission, and they fought to protect one of their own from facing the consequences of her sexual abuse. And largely succeeded…
Willow Creek Community Church [in Illinois] agreed to pay more than $3 million to settle lawsuits over the sexual abuse of two developmentally disabled boys by a church volunteer…The second and largest of the settlements, for $1.75 million, was made in February, before the Chicago Tribune revealed [supposedly] unrelated claims that the evangelical megachurch’s founder, the Rev. Bill Hybels, engaged in inappropriate conduct with women, eventually leading to his early retirement and, this month, the resignation of the church’s two leading pastors and its entire board of elders. The influential…church also agreed last year to pay $1.5 million to another victim of former volunteer Robert Sobczak Jr…[who] is serving a 7-year prison sentence after pleading guilty in 2014 to sexually abusing an 8-year-old boy with special needs at the church and an older boy who was not connected to Willow Creek. In 2013, Sobczak pleaded guilty to sexually abusing another disabled boy, around age 9, at the church…
These silly stories have been common on Facebook for some time, but now I’m starting to see them on Twitter; this one popped up in my timeline last week, and naturally my mockery of it attracted a number of “You can’t prove it isn’t true!” idiots. They’re beautiful examples of The Law of the Instrument: “It is tempting, if the only tool you have is a hammer, to treat everything as if it were a nail.” And if you’re a not-very-bright young woman who’s been told that “sex traffickers” are lurking behind every bush waiting to abduct you, naturally you start to see everything in your environment, up to and including litter, as a “sign of sex trafficking”. I’m not sure how much more ridiculous this hysteria will get before it implodes, but I don’t think we’ll have to wait very long to find out.
Hong Kong police arrested scores of suspected sex workers after launching new anti-vice raids in a residential building where nearly 100 prostitutes…were [arrested] in a [raid] earlier this year…the 80 [new] arrests…at the 15-storey King Hing Building…were…on suspicion of breaching their conditions of stay…Inspector Timothy Cheung Chun-long said…“Investigations showed criminals arranged sex workers to work in subdivided flats in the building”…
When it comes to mass surveillance, fascism beats communism hands down:
Back in March, as it investigated a spate of armed robberies across Portland, Maine, the FBI made an astonishing, unprecedented request of Google…to find all users of its services who’d been within the vicinity of at least two of nine of those robberies…the request covered a total space of 45 hectares and could’ve included anyone with an Android or iPhone using Google’s tools…The FBI then demanded a lot of personal information on affected users, including their full names and addresses…Google account activity…[and] all affected users’ historical locations…Google didn’t provide the information…[but] the FBI’s remarkable attempt…[should] worry all who…[realize that] Google continue[s] to track people even when they turned location features off…the FBI believe they have a right to that location data too…
Laura Lee, Sex Work Stigma, and the Limits of #MeToo (#863)
Brooke Magnanti on the re-opening of Laura Lee’s case:
…you probably know the outlines of Laura Lee’s story by now. How the vivacious and outspoken campaigner for rights was (in her words) abused by a man who interviewed her, then she reported him, then she died. How he has gone to great lengths to cover up his misdeeds since. Including demanding apologies out of Senators and journalists, simply for sharing what I wrote. How he leans on Twitter to disappear my tweets…How he does anything but face justice. This week, a mote of light shone through a chink in the brick wall of denial. Gardaí have reopened their investigation into Laura’s accusations. This includes interviewing witnesses who saw Laura and Olaf on the night in question, who offered information to the police before but whose evidence was never followed up…We see a pattern in all of this: that an assent, or an apology, or public acceptance wrung out under the threat of legal proceedings says very much about the man who tries to bend women to his will, and very little about the women — for it is only women — he has tried to silence. How he systematically uses their fear of humiliation and harassment to get a superficial approximation of what he wants…
In the News (#857)
Posted in Current Events, Miscellaneous, News, Perception, Tyranny, tagged All-Purpose Excuse, Australia, Canada, censorship, dehumanization, Disaster, Elephant in the Parlor, Good News-Bad News, halfway whores, hysteria, illegal aliens, law, Neither Addiction nor Epidemic, neofeminism, New Zealand, pimps, politicians, prohibitionist myths, propaganda, psychology, Pyrrhic Victory, rape, shame, slavery, Spain, surveillance, Swedish model, The Face of Trafficking, The Real World, The Sky is Falling!, Theatrics, underage, Washington (state), Watershed on July 25, 2018| Leave a Comment »
It is not possible to support individuals and also call for the abolition of their profession. – WAVAW Board
Even by prohibitionist standards, this is hilariously hysterical:
“Sugar daddy” dating sites such as Seeking Arrangement…are aggressively targeting college students — with free premium memberships for signing up under an .edu email plus plenty of assurances that being a “sugar baby” is safe, empowering and profitable. But sugar babies typically do not, in fact, have control over these relationships, which often turn dangerous and exploitative, [pearl-clutchers whined]…at a “World Without Exploitation Youth Summit” held in Downtown Brooklyn for high school and college students…“Sugaring” almost always involves a coercive exchange of money for sex, the [pearl-clutchers moaned]…even if the coercion is subtle and regardless of the dating website’s promises of “pampering,” “mentoring” and “networking”…“There’s an expectation that the buyer or the sugar daddy can do whatever he wants, so very often we hear there’s extraordinary violence when the door gets shut,” adds Lauren Hersh, national director of World Without Exploitation, a [prohibitionist] group…
This is your regular reminder that Lauren Hersh is a former prosecutor who was forced to resign in disgrace after she was caught trying to railroad two innocent black men for rape.
For those who think I’m wrong about sex worker rights having passed the watershed:
As a [rape crisis centre] we always say that systems and perpetrators of violence need to be held accountable. This is no different when we have enacted harm ourselves…We have taken actions that have caused harm to sex workers, and it is important that we take responsibility for those actions. In 2008, we produced a position paper on sex work titled “Stepping out of the Binary”. The paper framed the sex work industry as inherently violent and oppressive…and…conflated sex work with trafficking and exploitation…Our [excuse] was that we critiqued and challenged the sex work industry as a whole, but would not turn away individual sex workers who wanted to access our services. This position is inherently flawed. It is not possible to support individuals and also call for the abolition of their profession…We support sex work. We support the rights of sex workers. We believe sex workers should have access to the services they need, when they need them…
Though this subtitle is now used for prohibitionist publicity stunts, the original covered this:
…dozens of female workers in Spain’s Huelva region, most of them Moroccan…reported having been harassed, raped, blackmailed, physically assaulted or insulted by their superiors…
Australian prohibitionists are just as vile as those in the US & UK:
Prostitution legislation is currently being discussed in the Northern Territory…Prostitution affects everyone because…[the private acts of individual women magically inflict] violence against [other] women…Australia’s acceptance of [civil liberties] is becoming embarrassing internationally, as progressive countries move towards [authoritarian regulation]…of [the bodies and lives of] all women. When it is acceptable for women to [make their own choices]…every woman is devalued [to the state]. The availability of women’s [sexual services for free] creates a sense of entitlement in too many men which inevitably plays out in their day to day interactions with women…
Only in the warped prohibitionist mind could reducing women to mere parts of a collective entity and demanding government control over people’s private lives be characterized as “human dignity”.
The Face of Trafficking (#646) 
One of New Zealand’s most sickening criminal cases, just the third conviction for slave trading in the country’s legal history, can now be revealed. A mother of a teenage daughter has been jailed for six years and 11 months [for pimp]ing her daughter…some 1000 times over a two-year period…as many as five times a day. The teen…escaped…in November 2016 and fled to police. Kasmeer Lata, the teen’s mother, was sentenced…for dealing in slaves and receiving earnings from commercial sexual services from an underage person…
While I usually edit items to point out the truth in authoritarian propaganda, in this case I did so to eliminate the lurid language the reporter used to exploit this young woman’s ordeal for clickbait. Because yellow journalists are just as awful in New Zealand as anywhere else.
Just in case you forgot about the other sex workers Trump paid off:
…investigators discovered recordings made by Michael Cohen which include a then-candid Donald Trump talking about a payment to…former Playboy model…Karen McDougal [who] previously claimed that she had an affair with Mr. Trump…
Neither Addiction Nor Epidemic (#833)
All the disclaimers won’t stop charlatans from pretending this is their imaginary “sex addiction”:
The World Health Organization’s International Classification of Diseases (ICD) list…filed “compulsive sexual behavior disorder” — often [incorrectly] referred to as sex addiction — as an impulse-control disorder…WHO’s new list will not take effect until Jan. 1, 2022, as revisions still need to be made…clinicians…fear that recognizing compulsive sexual behavior disorder would pathologize normal sexual behavior, [said] Dr. Stefanie Carnes…“One of the things WHO did…is say specifically, ‘You can’t make the diagnosis of the compulsive disorder just due to shame or moralistic thoughts and feelings’”…In other words, a diagnosis cannot be made for someone with conservative religious views who frequents pornography sites a few times a month and thus believes that is a problem…the…proposed inclusion characterizes the disorder as “a persistent pattern of failure to control intense, repetitive sexual impulses or urges, resulting in repetitive sexual behavior over an extended period (e.g., six months or more) that causes marked distress or impairment in personal, family, social, educational, occupational or other important areas of functioning.” Carnes…[said] “I have patients who…spend $300,000 on a prostitute”…
Say, Dr. Carnes, would you introduce me to these guys? I’ll take good care of them, I promise.
I hope this finger-pointing keeps up until the hysteria implodes:
…the Trafficking in Persons Report directly references the vulnerability of migrants and children to trafficking without mention of recent U.S. policies that increased family separation and detention. This dissonance is not new [to this administration], although recent events have been particularly egregious. Since his inauguration, President Trump has espoused strikingly different — and dramatically inconsistent — approaches to immigration and human trafficking…Despite the administration’s [typical] rhetoric about protecting survivors of trafficking, the brutal fact is that indiscriminate targeting of undocumented immigrants…has sown chaos and fear in immigrant communities. This makes survivors much less likely to cooperate with [pigs], and more likely to be targeted as victims…on June 28, 2018, USCIS issued a new policy memorandum specifying that any survivor who applies for T visas — and is denied — will be placed in deportation proceedings…
Trumpists: “YOU’RE helping ‘human traffickers’!”
Anti-Trumpists: “No, YOU’RE helping ‘human traffickers’!”
Me: “LOL, please continue.”
Sex workers already operate at the social and economic margins. SESTA-FOSTA makes it increasingly difficult for them to advertise and screen clients safely, deeply cutting into their incomes and threatening their livelihoods…The conflation of consensual sex work with trafficking, abuse, moral decrepitude, and shame is as pervasive as is it is lacking nuance…Mental health providers must wade through social discourse thick with misinformation to be effective allies to sex workers in their practice. Scholars and practitioners alike propose harmful and stigmatizing models of understanding sex work…Although sensationalist media outlets frequently use sex trafficking as a boogeyman to encourage tougher policing of sex work, research from New Zealand, Australia, and Spain shows that decriminalizing sex work has made the industry safer…In the wake of SESTA-FOSTA, sex workers are scared that they won’t be able to provide for themselves and their families…
RealNetworks, the Seattle company best known for pioneering streaming media…will offer a new facial recognition technology, called SAFR, for free to K-12 schools to help upgrade their on-site [surveillance] systems. SAFR can be used with the same cameras that traditional surveillance systems to recognize students, staff, and people visiting schools…in addition to security, the tool can also help with [normalization of constant surveillance] and [the school-to-prison pipeline]…
Woodhull, et al’s request for a preliminary injunction vs FOSTA is a thing of beauty, and even if you don’t really understand legalese you should read it, because most of it is in plain English and its arguments are solid. Reading it for yourself is the only way you can fully grasp what a crock of shit the judge’s inaction was:
A federal judge on Thursday tabled a motion brought by the Woodhull Freedom Foundation and four other plaintiffs, who are suing to stop the government from enforcing…FOSTA…Judge Richard Leon…made no ruling on Woodhull’s request for a preliminary injunction that would stop the law from remaining in effect until the group’s lawsuit…is decided. Nor did he announce a date when he would issue a ruling. According to one account from inside the courtroon, Leon “sounded skeptical” that the law had actually caused harm to the plaintiffs in the case…
Basically, the judge wants time to try to think of the proper legal wording for “Yes, I know this law is blatantly unconstitutional, but I’m not gonna be the one to issue an injunction on it because whores”.
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