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That Was the Week That Was (#430)

Posted in Current Events, Miscellaneous, News, Tyranny, tagged , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , on July 26, 2014| 22 Comments »

Sex work is part of the human story.  Accepting and embracing sex work…should be our humane, as well as our pragmatic, approach to the reality of our human lives.  –  Richard Horton and Pamela Das

Rough Trade

Two [Frankfurt] men were sentenced…to long prison terms for raping and abusing two prostitutes…A 34-year-old has…ten years and three months…[while] his 33-year-old accomplice was sentenced to eight years and three months…

License to Rape

Two American paratroopers stationed at a US military base in Italy have been arrested for allegedly beating, raping and robbing a pregnant Romanian prostitute…The suspects…agreed to pay…But after the three reached a secluded area, they allegedly decided to get what they wanted for free.  The two…beat up and raped the prostitute…for…three hours…then…left [her]…in the…field…and made off with her purse…

Lying Down With Dogs

From Vietnam:

…the People’s Committee has asked the National Assembly to…[increase] the…penalties on sex buyers and publicly naming them in the local community and…[to replace] the words “sexual intercourse” with “sexual satisfaction” [in the law] in order to cover behavior causing sexual arousal and the sex trade of homosexuals…

Saving Them From Themselves

The UK continues its drive to become a colony of the US:

Police have warned teenagers of the risks that…”sexting”, can pose to their safety, with the possibility they could wind up on the sex offenders’ register.  Several teenagers have already been cautioned over the practice…and police have stressed the risk that sexting poses to teens’ future welfare, as well as their criminal record…

Schadenfreude 

I don’t think I’ll ever tire of seeing rescue industry figures exposed as frauds:

…Lady Katerine Nastopka…was surprised to see [reporters] at her fundraiser for the Rescue Children From Human Trafficking Foundation…In 2011, she made national headlines when she called herself a “Countess”…[and] claimed she had a connection to the famous Guggenheim family of New York.  Police arrested her and two others on charges of fraud for lying about the connection.  As part of a plea deal, she promised the court she would never use the Guggenheim name again…Nastopka…agreed to [speak to reporters but]…the interview never happened because [she] ran away…none of [the politicians she claimed as members of her board of directors]…know anything about [it]…

The Sky is Falling!

A reporter breathlessly asks if dating sites have a “prostitution problem“, in other words if sex workers use them to advertise.  You know, like sex workers have been using personal ads to advertise for as long as such things have existed.  But poor little Caitlin seems to imagine that the practice only started with “the advent of Craigslist”, and furthermore that large numbers of professional escorts will waste their time going on dates without first ascertaining whether money is forthcoming.  Her ignorance is so pronounced that it merely comes across as cute rather than deeply insulting when she suggests that it’s sex workers who need (presumably compulsory) “safe-sex education” rather than her fellow amateurs.

A Broker in Pillage

…the US Embassy in Pretoria…announced that the Department of Justice was conducting a workshop to teach South African law enforcement the practice of civil forfeiture…civil forfeiture is anti-democratic, and allows law enforcement agencies in the executive branch to attain some degree of independence from civilian or democratic oversight…foreign partnerships in law enforcement investigations allow the DOJ the ability to use worldwide NSA dragnet surveillance to find and acquire targets for asset forfeiture, particularly under the Foreign Corrupt Practices Act (FCPA)…

An Example To the West

…retired sex workers in Zimbabwe have opened a prostitution consultancy…to help young women protect themselves from being taken advantage of.  Lima Mankarankara (65) said they teach the new sex workers about the industry and how it works.  They also teach them how to handle clients…pizza girl

The Widening Gyre

I have a mental bet with myself about how silly these “slavery” claims will get before the end of the panic.  Bonus meme: pizza!

…Newspaper Expressen reported earlier this week that human traffickers had gone from “just” selling sex to selling women as lifelong slaves.  The newspaper’s sources said the cost for a slave…is €2,000 ($2680).  For 700 kronor ($100) one can rent a couple of girls for a day, for cooking, cleaning, or anything else…”It’s like ordering a pizza,” Per Hjort, a Stockholm detective, [said]…

King of the Hill

Most of this is the typical masturbatory filth (including the vile claim that most men who pay for sex are pedophiles), but it does include a link to the DoJ fantasy “report” which produced the infamous “top 13 child sex trafficking hubs” list: Los Angeles, Minneapolis, Dallas, Detroit, Tampa, Chicago, San Francisco, San Diego, Miami, New York, Washington, Las Vegas and St. Louis.  I do not believe these are intended to be in order of magnitude, so I’ll just count them as “top 13” claims. Lancet sex work infographic

Shift in the Wind (TW3 #44)

The biggest news story of the week was the release of a World Health Organization report calling for total decriminalization of both drugs and sex work; it was accompanied by this reiteration of The Lancet‘s support for our position:

Sex work must be decriminalised if the world is to stand a chance of controlling the AIDS pandemic, say scientists contributing to a series of research papers in the Lancet medical journal.  Sex workers…are subject to repression, violence and abuse…at the hands of those who are supposed to uphold the law, according to the series of seven research papers presented at the International AIDS Conference…decriminalisation of sex work…across all settings…would reduce HIV infections by 33% to 46% over the next decade…

Original Sin (TW3 #321)

Neofeminist rhetoric and pop “addiction” charlatanry has now been completely incorporated into evangelical Christian beliefs about sexual “sin” to form a fully-developed “sex trafficking” religion:

Opposition to sex trafficking is almost universal…But many also…believe pornography production and distribution is a “victimless crime.”  They don’t connect the dots that lead from pornography directly to sex trafficking.  Pornography is a powerful stimulant that can actually alter brain patterns, creating addiction…Our sexualized culture, with its constant sexual portrayal of women, affects not only boys and men but girls and women, too.  Mass-marketing advertising campaigns directed at young girls seem to dictate that they must dress and act like prostitutes to be valued…girls increasingly view themselves as objects in a process called “sexual self-objectification.”  One result is today’s epidemic of “sexting”…Catherine Mackinon says that consuming pornography is an “experience of bought sex and thus it creates a hunger to continue to purchase and objectify, and act out what is seen.”  Pornography, she says, is “advertising for trafficking”…

Pimping the Pimp

Nevada “authorities” continue to use ridiculous “pimp” myths to enrich themselves and increase their power:

…A bill which would provide more resources for victims of human trafficking passed in the House of Representatives…Metro Police’s Vice Section rescued 91 women from the slave trade last year and 148 the year before.  The legislation could have an impact on men who trap these women. The prosecution of pimps wouldn’t be possible without the rehabilitation of survivors…The bill accesses millions of dollars for non-profits, who apply for money to serve homeless, runaway victims of severe trafficking…

Presumably, “rescued from the slave trade” actually means “arrested and caged for consensual sex”, because all the police departments in the entire country don’t discover anything like 91 coerced prostitutes per year.  And “serving victims” seems to mean “locking up whores indefinitely until they agree to participate in kangaroo courts.”

Number Puzzle (TW3 #324)

Cathy Reisenwitz spoke to some German sex workers:

…Germany’s decision to legalize prostitution not only helped sex workers, but actually decreased the number of human trafficking victims…According to the data, violence against sex workers is down, while sex workers’ quality of life is up…From 2001…to 2011, cases of sex-based human trafficking shrank by 10 percent…The mean age of a sex worker in Germany is 31.  Besides not being supported by data, the claim that legalizing prostitution increased human trafficking also defies common-sense economics…sex slang

Nasty Words (Extra Edition) 

The guy who did the massive Timeglider charts of slang terms for genitalia has unveiled three new ones: slang for sexual intercourse, for oral and anal sex, and for orgasm, bodily fluids and contraception.  Because he could.

Whimsical Notions

A group of former prostitutes has filed a lawsuit against the South Korean government seeking more than $1.2 million in compensation, alleging that it exercised significant control over their activities…The women worked in special government-designated areas near U.S. military bases beginning in the late 1950s…[the regime included] mandatory testing for sexually transmitted diseases, and women who were infected were sent to government-run camps…[where] their human rights were violated…It is thought to be the first such legal action taken by women — now elderly, but known as “western princesses” during their youth — who once worked in brothels that catered primarily to U.S. troops…in the decades after the Korean War…

Catastrophic Consequences

SCOT-PEP…exposed proposals from Police Scotland to impose unannounced “welfare visits” on sex workers who work from home…”Operation Lingle”…includes a programme of increased online surveillance of suspected sex workers, a clear violation of the civil liberties both of sex workers and the general public.  Members of the public will also be asked to speculate about which of their neighbours might be a sex worker and report them to the police, despite the fact that selling sex remains legal in Scotland…

As you may recall, we’ve seen this tactic before in Canada.

King of the Hill (All Traffick, All the Time)

Having his ridiculous numerical claims debunked multiple times in the national media hasn’t stopped Texas politician John Cornyn from making more of them:

Child sex trafficking has historically had a huge effect on the current immigration crisis in the U.S., and according to two Texas congressmen…hundreds of thousands of victims [have been] identified…”At least 700,000 people were reported as victims of international trafficking each year, 14,500-17,500 of which are women and children who are trafficked specifically into the United States”…

To Protect and Serve (TW3 #413)

Since their local case was dismissed, they took it to the feds:

…30 strippers are suing the San Diego police department after cops…forced…[them] to pose “nearly nude” for photos taken by members of the police department’s vice squad…approximately 10 officers detained the women for nearly an hour without a warrant or probable cause, and…cops made “arrogant and demeaning comments” while “ordering the women to pose in various positions and expose body parts so that the police could ostensibly photograph their tattoos”…Police department spokesperson Lt. Kevin Mayer described the raids and photos as a “routine” part of the city’s permit to regulate establishments with nudity…and…is meant to deter the women from engaging in “illegal acts”…

The Public Eye (TW3 #423) Land of Smiles poster

This is a refreshing change:

The phrase “human trafficking” conjures thoughts of sex slaves.  Most people mentally picture oppressed and exploited women…chained to a life of prostitution from which they must be freed…Erin Kamler…[traveled] to Thailand…and…found that things are not that simple…she discovered a world where politics and morality trumped human rights…feeling the need to educate the masses, Kamler…wrote a musical about Thailand’s anti-trafficking movement.  The Los Angeles premiere of Land of Smiles will run Wednesday-Saturday, July 23-26, at the Los Angeles Theatre Center, before heading to Scotland for the Edinburgh Fringe Festival in August…[in] the story…Emma…arrives in Thailand an abolitionist wanting to “rescue” all the sex workers.  After speaking with Lipoh, who is being held at a detention center following a raid of the brothel where she worked, Emma begins to question what “rescued” really means…

Nice While It Lasted

Like hell it doesn’t:

New Zealand’s second-largest political party wants to reverse the burden of proof in rape cases if it gets into power, making defendants prove their innocence…Andrew Little, the Labour Party’s justice spokesman, has outlined plans for a monumental shift in the justice system…he said…”This approach does not contradict the fundamental principle that a defendant is innocent until proven guilty”…

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Like a Courtesan

Posted in Miscellaneous, Q & A, tagged , , on July 23, 2014| 11 Comments »

I have naturally good looks and skin, but I strongly think I need to refine them for my husband.  In my country we don’t have as much variety of expensive beauty products as you do in the United States, so I was wondering if you could drop some tips on how to take care of oneself finely, like a courtesan did.  It would help a lot.

Like you, most of my beauty is natural; my good skin, healthy color, and other features are all mine without having to do anything other than stay healthy and clean.  I get plenty of sleep, avoid chaotic schedules whenever possible, eat a varied diet in small enough portions that I don’t put on weight, and wash my face and body with gentle products that don’t dry out my skin.  I have never smoked, used drugs or drank more than a minimal amount of alcohol (and that only on rare occasions), and I’ve never subjected my hair to harsh chemicals in order to change its color or texture.  And in fact, now that I’m aging I find myself at a bit of a loss, because I never really learned many beauty tips; for the first time I’m seeing grey hairs and dark circles, and though I don’t have any crows’ feet or smile lines yet I suppose it’s inevitable that they will eventually appear.  So, I’m only now beginning to think about some aspects of self-care that others have been dealing with since their teens, and that means I’m not really a very good source of beauty advice.  However, two months ago I asked my readers for new makeup suggestions and the response was excellent; I’m therefore going to “crowdsource” this question as well.  Readers, what beauty secrets are you willing to share?  Try to keep brand names out if you can, so the tips will apply in every part of the world.

(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.)

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Guest Columnist: Anonyma

Posted in Guest Columns, Q & A, The Dark Side, tagged , , , , , , , , on July 14, 2014| 29 Comments »

Since the very beginning of this blog, I’ve endeavored to be brutally honest on the subject of sex work; I have neither exaggerated the good aspects of the work nor hidden the bad ones.  This is not only because of my sincere belief that honesty is the best policy, but also because ugly truths that are hidden become weapons for enemies when discovered; sex worker activists must hide nothing, so the public will understand that we’re being just as honest about the things we deny as those we confess.  This month’s guest column is about one of those unpleasant aspects of sex work; sex workers’ ad copy often presents us as insatiable sex goddesses getting paid for having a ball, but in truth we really aren’t all that different from other women and work sex is generally much more about work than sex to us.  The essay is also quite unusual in that it asks for advice, much like a Q & A column; however, since the question came from a celebrity I thought it needed a different treatment.  Furthermore, though I was able to give the lady some advice from my own experience, in my opinion she needs very specialized input pertaining to an area of sex work I have no personal experience with:  commercial porn.  Because the nature of the question would tend to undermine her public persona, she asked to be published anonymously and of course I have agreed;masked woman I used the name “Anonyma” both in reference to Catherine Walters, and because the title “Guest Columnist:  Anonymous” has already been used.  Please respect her wish for anonymity by not speculating on her identity in the comments.  I hope that readers with porn industry experience (I have at least two of you in mind) will weigh in, and if you feel your advice is better given privately please email me with “Anonyma” in the subject line and I’ll forward it to her.   

I am an award winning porn performer. My image is that of a hypersexual young woman who is insatiable—a sex symbol for my fans. But off camera, that image could be farther from reality.  At first, my porn life didn’t interfere too much with my  real life; I was still able to have sexual relationships on camera, and my libido was as high as ever.  But after I was in the industry for a while, my sex drive dropped to non-existent and the thought of a man’s penis penetrating me now makes me cringe.  Why?  A lot of reasons.

On set, I’m expected to have sex for hours.  After a while, the sex isn’t pleasurable; it’s actually quite painful.  Long days on set paired with exhaustion cause tears and cuts in my vagina- oftentimes it happens on set and I am told to power through to complete the scene.  Having sex with a tear is excruciatingly painful.  My many sexual partners and exploits have also led to another painful problem:  pelvic inflammatory disease, an infection that causes inflammation of the uterus and ovaries. In other words, every time a penis gets deep inside me the pain is unreal.  Normally, pelvic inflammatory disease is treated with antibiotics and abstinence from sex, but being that my job is to have sex, it comes and goes for me.

Sexual trauma from my past has also given me a mental block that arises whenever I have a sexual encounter.  I, like many other survivors, suffer from PTSD because of the assaults I have experienced.  Also, the thought of having sex and not being paid for it now bothers me; it’s as though I only view men as dollar signs, as games to be won.  Before, I always loved men AND women!  But now I’m encumbered by this aversion to men, and the thought of having sex with a man does not appeal to me in the slightest.  I still find men attractive, but I don’t have the urge to jump on him and fuck him like I used to.

Obviously, this is causing issues in my relationship with my boyfriend.  He is amazing and understanding, but I feel guilty for not being able to please him; we have only had sex 2 times this summer (I know, it’s horrible).  I have seen a therapist and he advised me to quit sex work, and maybe he’s right; maybe it is causing permanent damage to my psyche.  But it’s my livelihood and I still love it in most ways.  Does anyone have any advice?  What do I do to get over this mental blockage?  How do I begin to have a normal sex life again?  Help! 

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My Turn

Posted in Miscellaneous, Q & A, tagged , on May 21, 2014| 19 Comments »

Every day you’ve got to wake up
And disappear behind your makeup.  –  Blondie, “Living In the Real World”

Maggie portrait OK, female readers (especially but not limited to sex workers), it’s my turn to ask you a question, and you can answer in the comments below (or email me if you prefer a private conversation for some reason.)  Except for occasional pre-hysterectomy episodes where my complexion went to hell for a few weeks or months, I’ve always been fortunate in that I don’t really need makeup.  My skin tends to be clear and I have excellent natural coloration; in fact, I literally never wore makeup when I was working unless the client was taking me out somewhere.  This was really convenient because I had no makeup for sex to ruin; a quick brush of the hair and I looked the same going out as I did going in.  The most I might have to do was wash my face if something got on it.  Nowadays, when I do wear makeup I just use this skin bronzer stuff which is like a powder that goes on without foundation, then do my eye makeup, blush and lipstick.  My skin isn’t oily, but neither is it dry, and I find that the oilier the foundation the more quickly it looks old and crappy on my face.  This powdery bronzer looks good for a lot longer than any foundation/powder combination I ever used, even the expensive stuff, and I can do my whole face in six minutes flat.  However, it still doesn’t last as long as I would like, and I’ve noticed it tends to make my face look tanned or flushed in photos (which is not a good look for me).  So now that I’m about to go on this tour, I’m really thinking about trying something new and I’d like suggestions.  What I’m looking for is makeup that doesn’t take 20 minutes to put on, yet looks good and lasts a long time.  It would also be nice if it doesn’t cost a fortune, and if it’s available from regular stores so I don’t have to locate a department store in a strange city that happens to carry that exclusive line.  The most important thing is the base, because I’m actually pretty happy with my other makeup; however, if you have a suggestion for a whole line I would still like to hear it.  Yes, I realize I’m asking a lot; that’s why I’m “crowdsourcing” this rather than just asking one or two friends.  I figure that somewhere out there is the perfect makeup for me, and I’d rather not try another 50 things before I find it.

(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.)

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Guest Columnist:  Molli Desi (Part Two)

Posted in Biography, Guest Columns, Perception, Tyranny, tagged , , , , , , , , , , , on May 13, 2014| 38 Comments »

This is the second part of the story of Molli Desi, a young Indian woman abducted into a “rescue center” under the excuse that her sex worker friends might “traffick” her.  If you missed the first part yesterday, I urge you to go back and read it first before continuing.

At the “rescue” centre (which we only thought of as a “detention” centre) we were told that the NGO had custody papers for us from a court, and that we could not leave.  I think it is important to understand why we are held in custody rather than given our freedom after we are “rescued”.  Most anti-trafficking programmes must have what are called the “Three Ps”: Prevention, Protection, and Prosecution; without cases the NGOs cannot meet their prosecution quotas, and without women and girls in their centres they cannot meet their “protection” quotas.  Many of these NGOs are not rights-based at all, but rather prioritise prosecution of traffickers; they must therefore detain sex workers under “safe custody orders” so as to force them to testify in court.  This detention can last many years because the court process is so slow, so the trafficker can get bail and live free while the “victim” is held in centre or even prison.  If women or girls run away, the NGO claims they were kidnapped by traffickers.  In reality, though, it is the NGOs who are the real traffickers; sex workers and other women they capture are a commodity that they buy and sell.rescue center show  To get money from USAID they must promise to be anti-prostitution, and to get money from other donors they use women they have captured to put on shows.  The women are even given false ages to make it look like they are very young; they told the court and donors that I was 12 years old though I was actually 17, and one woman of 23 was said to be 16.

The detention house was not like the orphanage; the women and girls were scared and cried a lot.  Several of them were not even sex workers, but rather migrants without papers; the NGO said they were “at risk” for trafficking.  Most of the girls there with me were not sex workers; some had been raped while in domestic service.  Everyone wanted to leave but many had nowhere to go, because the NGO had told their family and home village that they had been trafficked and raped.  They do this to stop you from being able to go home, because they know your family will reject you for being a sex worker; it’s a way to discourage running away from the centre.  This is why it is so important to give a false name and say you are from a faraway place when they catch you (which we did); it also helps to prevent anyone from filing a First Instance Report (FIR).

After a couple of days, the NGO demanded we undergo gynecological examinations and take HIV tests, but I refused to undress or to let them take blood.  They would not respect my wishes, so I had to physically fight them; the NGO director hit me in the face with her hand, and I now have a scar on my forehead from her heavy ring.  Each day we had to do activities in the centre, and we were not allowed to go outside.  One day two white donor women came to visit the centre, and we were forced to sing and dance for them and let them take photos of us; when the staff realised I could speak English they took me upstairs and locked me in a room until the women had left.  After we had been in the centre for a week, we started planning our escape, but our hidden phone needed credit and charge; though we had the money I had hidden, we did not have any contact with outside.  We learned from other women who had been there a while that night security would exchange food and candy for sex, so we propositioned one night guard and in exchange for oral sex and money he eventually brought us a phone charger and phone credit.  We were then able to contact our sisters in the orphanage, who had been very worried about us; the orphanage had filed an FIR on us because they thought we had been kidnapped and trafficked.

Microsoft Word - Document1After another few more days of oral sex with the night guard and some of his friends (whom he was charging money for access to us), we arranged for two of our sisters to come to the centre in an auto-rickshaw, late at night (this was during a festival time).  We then used a metal bar we got from the guard to prise open the metal cage on our window, lowered ourselves onto the annex roof, and got down to the garden.  Unfortunately, the main gate was still locked and we could not get to the street, so we rang our sisters outside and they convinced the auto-rickshaw driver to break the lock and let us out, whereupon we all ran to the auto-rickshaw and fled away into the night.  We did not go straight home, but stopped for iftar food; it tasted so good, and we were all so happy to be free we laughed and cried all the way home.  When we got home everyone was so pleased to see us, and we immediately washed our clothes and had showers; I then slept for almost a whole day.  We told our director that we had been lured away by miscreants and eventually escaped from their hideout, so she wrote a report and the FIR was cancelled.  We eventually heard from a woman who escaped the detention centre later that the staff had claimed traffickers had kidnapped us from the centre, and that we had probably been sent to Mumbai.

My main accusation against the “rescuers” is that everyone presumes that they take proper care of those they “rescue”; in truth, however, the NGOs have complete power over their victims. There is no proper protection for women and girls they detain, so it is very common for centre staff to rape them.  Though the Government is supposed to supervise orphanages and centres, the reality is that it lacks the capacity to do so; all NGOs know there is inadequate supervision, and many of them resist external accountability and will pay the few inspectors who do come to give them clean reports.  This power and impunity from consequences invites abuses of all kinds, such as the way the night guard charged his friends for sex with us; personally, though, I did not find the sex trading for telephone credit and food nearly as bad as the way the women senior staff acted toward us.  They want sex workers to be forced into domestic work or garment factory work, or to be married to low caste men; they know they are trapped inside patriarchy and resent our determination to live free.  You can find many “rescue” stories on the internet, but most of them are usually mediated by the “rescuers”; if you read my account here and the various links I have included, you will hear another truth.

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Guest Columnist:  Molli Desi (Part One)

Posted in Biography, Guest Columns, Perception, Tyranny, tagged , , , , , , , , , , , , on May 12, 2014| 20 Comments »

Molli Desi is one of the small number of Devadasi (sacred prostitutes of India) still remaining; she and Rani Desi, a Nagarvadhu (high priestess) now live in London and are active on Twitter, which is how I got to know them.  A few years ago Molli was trapped in one of the rescue industry’s many “rescue centers”, but eventually escaped; I asked if she would share the story on my blog and she graciously consented to do so.

Molli DesiI wish to give special thanks to the Nagarvadhu for helping me with this article, which is a translation from an account written in my mother language.  In this short a space I cannot tell the whole truth about all rescue projects, but I think I can expose how structurally and institutionally dangerous most rescue centres are in much of South Asia.  Furthermore, I will suggest that many donors from the West deliberately ignore these risks to detained women and girls so as to pursue their self-serving agendas.  I do not use the terms women and girls lightly; women and girls are often conflated by the NGOs, so that women of 23+ or married women of 16 will be referred to as girls; female identity in India is far more complex than any simple consideration of age.

It seems so strange to me that organisations that condemn the excesses of closed brothels will in turn exercise the same powers over those they claim to rescue; of course most girls are not rescued from closed brothels, but rather are taken from domestic labour or other sex work environments such as bars, clubs or rooms.  After “rescue” they are detained in facilities (sometimes called orphanages, shelter homes or rehab centres) where sexual and other abuse is commonplace; these detention centres are supposed to be inspected by the Government, but there is very little accountability so they foster and encourage a culture of impunity among the organisations that run them.  I wish to share my story because I think it very important that people understand the motivations and practices of these organizations; my experience is not unusual, and was a direct consequence the power that “rescuers” exercise over detained women and girls.  I have changed names and some details so as to protect myself and others.

I do not know my date of birth; I do know I was taken from the arms of a dying woman who told the people around her my name just before she died.  One man claimed to be my uncle and wanted to take me away, but one Devadasi lady knew he was really a miscreant and refused to let him take me.  Eventually I was taken to a nice orphanage, and while I was growing up there I was told that my mother and father were migrant workers who had been killed in a bus crash, so no one could trace my real extended family.  In India this made me a social outcast, but my time in the orphanage was a happy one.  I had many “sisters”, was successful at school and had a talent for classical dance and singing; however, I was also aware that was socially suspect and that I would not be considered suitable for marriage by most “respectable” families because I was an orphan.

In India, marriage is the institution in which patriarchal power is reproduced, and its implementation and policing is delegated to older women; married women in particular support marriage, as it is the means by which they exercise male-delegated power over their son’s wives.  It was common practice for the sons of respectable families to target orphan teen girls when they went to college and to have affairs with these girls with promises of marriage.  Once the boy graduated, his family would arrange a marriage to a respectable girl and the orphan girl would be disowned.  Such young women would then only be able to make a marriage to a low-caste man, and then only with a promise of dowry; if the dowry was considered insufficient the husband and his family might even torture the wife, and sometimes kill her.  Orphan girls fully understand that we need to find alternatives to marriage if we want to escape such subjugation.  Some girls focus on getting skills or higher education; others develop dancing or even gymnastics.  Others do sex work rather than marry or take dangerous work in a garment factory or domestic service.  However, in India an unmarried woman is not considered fully human, so anyone who refuses to marry is considered a dangerous rebel.

As I got older, I began to spend time with a small group of girls and young women who sold sex in various residential hotels; I was attracted to them because they worked as a group and lived a freer life, coming and going as they pleased.  Two of my good friends from the orphanage worked with these women, and when we were not at school and they were not working we would arrange outings and gatherings.  Because they worked as a group they could negotiate with the owners of the residential hotels for better rooms to meet their clients and for less cost.  If any residential hotel owner caused a serious problem or assaulted any member of the group, they would set fire to his rubbish bins or his car and send a note to say next time they would burn the hotel.  They had money that could use for clothes and telephones but mostly they saved their money in the bank for when they would rent their own apartment.  If men eve teased them in the street they would shout back and even throw stones at them, whereas most girls would run away.    I admired their self-assurance, but I did not do sex work myself at this time because I did not feel confident enough.

sex workers detained in raidOne evening before Ramadan I was visiting my two girl-friends at a residential hotel where they working when suddenly there was a commotion from the lobby.  One friend looked out of the door and then closed and quickly locked the door; she told us the police were in the hotel. We were all terrified because the police will often rape women and take their money.  The police went from door to door shouting for everyone to come out; we could hear the screams of the women and girls.  I hid one of our phones and most of the money in a condom inside my vagina; it was very painful but I knew we would lose it all if I didn’t.  We then went outside into the hall, where two policemen shouted at us to come into the reception area; eventually there were about twelve women and girls surrounded by more than twenty police and NGO workers (only two of them were women).  A police sergeant made us line up and he took everyone’s phone and money, except for what I had hidden; if he asked a question and didn’t like the answer he got, he would hit the woman in the face.  After a few minutes the police inspector left, and the NGO workers said all young women and girls would have to go with them for safe custody; only women who could prove they were over 20 or had a magistrate permission certificate to be a prostitute could stay.  Eventually the NGO workers took me, my two friends and another young woman; we were chosen because we were the smallest and the police said they knew the other women were well known prostitutes who were definitely over 18.  The police then took the women who were allowed to stay, and in exchange for sex they could have their telephones back.

We told the NGO workers that I was not a prostitute, but was only visiting my friends; also, a police officer said that I did not look like a prostitute because I was wearing blue jeans and not Salwaar Kameez like the others.  However, the NGO workers said I was at risk of being trafficked by my friends, so I must go to “safe custody”.  There were five NGO workers; they took photographs of us (it’s not unknown for TV journalists to be invited to watch these “rescues”) and then took us outside to their minibus.  I tried to run away in the street, but one NGO woman grabbed my long hair and slammed me into the side of the minibus.  A crowd gathered as I was fighting back and during the chaos the other young woman managed to run away, but the NGO woman was much bigger than me so eventually my friends and I were pushed into the minibus.  All the way to detention the woman hit me and called me very bad names.

In tomorrow’s conclusion, Molli describes the rescue center and tells how she eventually escaped.

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Played Out

Posted in Perception, Tyranny, tagged , , , , , , , , , , , , , , on March 11, 2014| 64 Comments »

Come children, let us shut up the box and the puppets, for our play is played out.  –  William Makepeace Thackeray, Vanity Fair

As regular readers know, the chief organization crusading for imposition of the Swedish model on Ireland is Ruhama, the new mask worn by the orders of nuns who for centuries enslaved many thousands of women in the horrible Magdalene laundries.  Just barely over a year ago I published “Puppet Show”, in which I shared information from Irish and British activists exposing Ruhama’s chief puppet, Justine Reilly, as a convicted “pimp” with a long history of “reframing her experiences” to transform herself from ruthless businesswoman to naïve hooker to pathetic victim of “pimps” herself (whichever was most profitable at the time).Rachel Moran  But soon after that column appeared, Ruhama unveiled a new star, Rachel Moran, whom they paid to present herself as the author of a fabricated memoir entitled Paid For.  I say fabricated because over a year before it appeared a correspondent wrote to me saying that during a bad time she had shared her own unfinished memoir with people from Ruhama and had reason to believe they had photocopied much of it and would in the near future build some tragedy porn around it; when this book appeared she confirmed that much of it was plagiarized from her manuscript.  But while Moran’s pantomime performance as victim-turned-author seems credible to True Believers and ignoramuses, it is utterly unbelievable to those involved in the tiny and close-knit world of sex work in Dublin.  For months now, activist Gaye Dalton has been “tweeting” about the holes in Moran’s story, and on February 26th she actually filed an affidavit swearing to that testimony.  When I expressed an interest in publicizing the affidavit Gaye kindly provided me with both scans and a transcription; I have combined the scans into a PDF for your perusal (her address and phone number have been pixilated to preserve her privacy), but here’s the heart of the document:

I sold sexual services on Waterloo and Burlington Roads in Dublin…between approximately June/July 1987 and March/April 1993…I worked there 5 or 6 nights a week…usually [arriving] at about 9:30pm and [working] until at least 2:30am.  I spent most of my time on the streets either walking or in two places:

  • At the top of Waterloo Road by the corner of Wellington Lane
  • Near the corner of Burlington Road outside Dublin Institute of Advanced technology

In cold or wet weather I might also sit in my car either at the top of Waterloo Road, or on Burlington Road looking out on to Waterloo Road.  The sex workers and regular clients were a small community that could be compared to the regular clientele of a pub, we all knew each other, at least by sight and were very much aware of new people, unusual occurrences, or any form of crime or abuse.  Every woman I knew at that time worked independently, for herself, apart from two women who were in personal relationships that would have been abusive and coercive in any environment…Anyone who seemed underage was prevented from working, sent home if possible and reported to Gardai.  Many of the women had teenage children of their own and were not easy to fool in this respect…Drug abuse was extremely rare and many women were actively involved in the “concerned parents” movement in their local communities.

At no time did I ever see, or hear of “Rachel Moran” author of Paid For and founder of “Space International” nor anyone resembling her, working in that area.  In her book she claims to have worked near the corner of Wellington Lane from early evening until “the small hours”, which would have placed her within 15 yards of me for several hours most nights.  I have asked several people…from that time and nobody else can remember her, or anyone like her, not only there but in any form of sex work indoor or outdoor, at any of the times she claims to have worked, between 1991 and 1998.  Beyond this, in her book Paid For and…blog The Prostitution Experience she has described several people, but not one of them even resembles anyone I ever met or heard of.  Like any small community of people there was gossip…we knew plenty about each other’s lives and were familiar with the known details of any abusive, awkward, or even interesting clients.  She does not allude to anyone recognisable  to me at all.  At no time does she show any awareness of the terminology we used, nor even the material realities of our work.  She has also, at times, claimed to have been arrested for soliciting before 1993.  Not only was this impossible, but also, one of the first things you would be told as a sex worker at that time is that you could not be arrested for soliciting. She did not even know that.

Rachel Moran is making money from her book and speaking engagements as well as…making significant input into Justice Committees both sides of the border through totally misrepresenting herself and that entire community and time.  Meanwhile real sex workers are denied all…self representation to refute [her claims]…I understand that it is unlawful for a person to obtain financial advantage from deceit, but I am personally more concerned with the damage to vulnerable, voiceless people that Rachel Moran will do with her lies.  The idea of anyone so unscrupulous having any degree of control over sex workers’ lives in future…absolutely horrifies me.  Justine Reilly, her partner in “Space International” (all reference suddenly removed from website in past few weeks) was discovered to be a convicted pimp in February 2013, after…putting herself forward in the media as a helpless victim.  RuhamasharonaI have never observed her to show any remorse towards the women she exploited, while at least one of these same women has been openly chastised by Ruhama for “disrespect” for alluding to her convictions.  During consultations in both North and South of Ireland genuine sex workers have been treated as animals who cannot think and speak for ourselves while dishonest persons such as these have been put forward as speaking for us. Genuine sex workers have been abused, intimidated and excluded while blatant lies are treated with the greatest courtesy and respect…

I wish that I could believe that this affidavit will help to undermine Moran’s credibility with the Irish government, but I have little hope for that considering the obsequious deference it has rendered and continues to render to the Magdalene orders, both on the issue of compensation to their past victims and the issue of their current attempts to bring sex workers under their control once more.  But I can and do hope that it has some deleterious effect on her credibility with the Irish people; each revelation like this one adds to the growing heap of evidence that Ruhama, like all prohibitionists, is a pack of sociopathic liars who will stop at nothing to subject all human sexual behavior to police and institutional violence.

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Drawing Lines

Posted in History, Perception, tagged , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , on February 21, 2014| 16 Comments »

This essay first appeared in Cliterati on January 19th; I have modified it slightly for time references and to fit the format of this blog.

Idealized Portrait of a Courtesan as Flora by Bartolomeo Veneto (1520)For most of human history, nobody thought of taking money for sex as a defining activity.  This is not to say that there were no whores, because of course there were; it isn’t called “the world’s oldest profession” for nothing.  But it wasn’t the fact that a woman took money for sex which defined her as a whore, but rather the fact that she made a living from it.  As I wrote in my Cato Unbound essay, “Treating Sex Work as Work”,

…It was almost universally understood that many working-class women and a not-inconsiderable number of those in higher classes would accept money for sex, at least on occasion, and it was impossible to draw a bright, clear line between behaviors that constituted “prostitution” and those (such as concubinage, mistresshood, and political marriage) which did not despite their often-mercenary basis.  The manifold laws regulating sex work were not intended to preclude pragmatic motivations for sexual behavior, but rather to keep up appearances, guard the purity of bloodlines, and maintain public order.  But as the Victorian Era dawned, a new idea began to take hold of European minds: if science could perfect Man’s tools and techniques, why couldn’t the same process be applied to Mankind itself?  The immediate result of turning (pseudo-)scientific inquiry upon sex was that taking money for it was no longer considered merely something that “unladylike” or “sinful” women did for a living or extra income; instead, the “prostitute” was defined into existence as a specific type of woman, separate and distinct from other women.

Prior to the 19th century, any sexual behavior outside of marriage was considered “sinful”, regardless of its motive, but there were also class considerations; sexual “immorality” was both expected and assumed of working-class women, and whether a girl occasionally asked for money or not could make little difference in the way she was perceived by her so-called “betters”.  This is why it was not unusual in pre-industrial cultures for a disgraced upper-class woman to turn to sex work; once she had fallen from her elevated station, taking money for sex did no more harm.  But once the idea of “prostitution” as some uniquely disgraceful activity was invented, and the “prostitute” was defined as the lowest of the low, it was inevitable that women who would previously have been considered more or less the same as whores would attempt to draw lines between themselves and the new pariah class.  And once governments began to criminalize prostitution or activities around it as a result of the new ideas, distinguishing oneself from a “common prostitute” became a matter not only of dignity, but practical necessity.

The first group to successfully shed the whore stigma was actresses, who had since classical times been considered interchangeable with harlots; after the dawn of cinema they actually moved into a de facto higher social class, especially in the United States.  Dancers whose style could be credibly represented as asexual or highbrow (preferably both) followed them, then masseuses and women who had extramarital sex for non-financial reasons.  In the past several decades, the number of such groups has exploded and now includes many whose claim to being different from sex workers is threadbare indeed; burlesque dancers, competition pole dancers, glamour and lingerie models, professional “cuddlers”, nude maids, waitresses catering to sexual fantasies  and even sugar babies insist that they are different from strippers, hookers and fetish workers in some real (and legally defensible) way.  Even people who are directly paid for a hands-on sexual service claim that being “certified” or “spiritual” or whatever makes them not sex workers, and some who cannot possibly deny that they are still pretend to be “better” than other sex workers because they are “legal”, or because they don’t have direct intercourse and parrot “trafficking” propaganda to kiss up to cops.  But this example from the January 15th Guardian takes the biscuit:  “As a professional dominatrix, I…[know] sex is a human need, and kink can be a meaningful part of the sexual spectrum.  We sex workers turn the erotic into a humane and powerful art.  [But] too many of us, particularly escorts, are miserable slaves, and we must fight tirelessly for their freedom…”Mudflap Girl Tesselation  Way to go there, Margaret Corvid; boost yourself up on the backs of all us pathetic, dirty escorts…oh, excuse me, “miserable slaves”.  Because only wonderful, superior dominatrices can choose freely, while those of us who prefer to sell more mundane sexual services are clearly dysfunctional.  In my essay “Whorearchy” I wrote,

…a whore is a whore is a whore, and legal, moral or procedural lines serve only to break people into smaller groups which are more easily dominated by the power-hungry.  If you accept money from someone that he gives due to sexual interest in you, then you are a whore and everything else is just semantics.  When politicians, pundits or rulers use some arbitrary determinant like penetration, duration, location or motivation to bless some harlots while damning others, what they’re actually doing is reducing the size of the group who might oppose them and winning supporters from among those granted legitimacy.  This is why I’m harshly unsympathetic to those who vehemently maintain that their species of sex work or sensual therapy is absolutely not prostitution:  all they’re doing is throwing other women under the bus, and if we had all stuck together from the beginning of second-wave feminism…prostitution would’ve been decriminalized long ago and many women who are now dead or damaged might still be alive and healthy…

As I’ve pointed out before, gay people only won their civil rights by forming a coalition, and until sex workers stop drawing arbitrary lines between each other and accepting the lies and false divisions promoted by those in power, we will never have the same kind of success.

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Priorities

Posted in Miscellaneous, Philosophy, tagged , , , on February 3, 2014| 19 Comments »

Small communities grow great through harmony, great ones fall to pieces through discord.  –  Gaius Sallustius Crispus

herding catsOrganizing sex workers is like trying to herd cats, yet somehow they manage quite well in Asia (and to a slightly lesser extent in Africa and South America).  I think it’s largely due to the fact that whores in those places recognize the seriousness of the situation, and are willing to put their petty squabbles aside to pull together against the real enemy.  In Europe (especially the UK) that’s not so true, and in the US not at all (though Canada seems to do better); white Westerners seem to be either oblivious to the danger we’re in, or else unable to understand the concept of prioritization, or else unwilling to admit that their personal hurt feelings are less important by several orders of magnitude than the cause to which they claim to be committed.  I say “claim” because every movement has its dilettantes, those who join for much the same reasons as others might join a social club; others clearly have other agendas (such as Marxism or feminism) which command their primary loyalty.  Indeed, someone recently said it seemed to her that a good fraction of sex worker rights activists might even be prohibitionists had circumstances not led to their taking up sex work before politics; I can’t say I disagree with that assessment.

Because of this, the movement in the West is regularly troubled by personal animosities which interfere with the important work we’re trying to do.  The mildest cases, which are also the most common, are those in which one activist dislikes another for reasons that have more to do with a personality clash or a difference of opinion than anything else: Activist A decides she doesn’t like B for what B has said or written rather than anything B actually did to her, and so A blocks B on Twitter, says nasty things about her to others in private, and refuses to acknowledge her work, no matter how good it is for the movement.  It’s grade-school stuff, really; there are certainly some activists I don’t get along with, but when they do noteworthy work I call attention to it just as I would if we were friends.  The cause we both support is more important than my (or anyone else’s) personal feelings.

And then there are those who take direct offense at something else has said; C says something ill-considered or stupid, D is upset by it and rather than settling the matter privately she mouths off about it on social media for all to see.  In the most extreme cases this can turn into a large and ugly brouhaha complete with the taking of sides and staggering amounts of energy completely wasted on unproductive infighting rather than responding to the plentiful attacks on sex workers in the mainstream media.  Sometimes the person on the receiving end doesn’t actually do anything to draw such wrath; it’s just that E is bigoted against some group to which F belongs, and will therefore bad-mouth him every time he speaks up.  Or, G insists on ideological purity, and will attack anyone who wanders from the party line; neither E nor G has any regard whatsoever for the damage this causes the movement, and if confronted will pontificate about her feelings rather than have a substantive discussion about her actions.

Eris by TelthonaOf course, there are cases in which the breach between the two parties is neither petty nor remediable; this is especially true when their relationship was personal rather than professional.  And though some divorces are amicable, others are anything but; if the parties to an acrimonious dispute care to take their private war public, all Hell breaks loose.  People take sides, “he said/she said” exchanges are hurled back and forth, and precious time and energy drains away while Eris laughs.  When such a thing happens, it is absolutely paramount that dedicated, mature activists refuse to take sides no matter how much pressure one or both of the parties exerts; though their struggle is certainly important to the combatants, it cannot be to anyone else who is not directly involved.  As I once wrote, “an advocate…is working not for herself but for generations yet unborn”; it is therefore both foolish and irresponsible to allow oneself to be distracted from a vital mission by personal and transitory strife, no matter how important those directly involved believe it to be.

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Something in the Milk

Posted in Current Events, Guest Columns, Perception, The Dark Side, Tyranny, tagged , , , , , , , , , , , on January 28, 2014| 88 Comments »

Readers, I recently got this letter from a sex worker I’ve known for years.  Obviously I’m not in a position to know all the ins and outs of the situation, but this lady is very sharp and I talked to her about some of the earlier incidents she refers to as they happened, including the one from three years ago.  I have edited this a bit for conciseness, to remove a few unnecessary personal details and to embed links, but the rest is hers.  The “Gina” she refers to is the owner of Preferred 411 (“P411”), a client verification service to which I’ve referred on multiple occasions.

Dear Maggie,

P411 lilyI am writing this in hopes that you may help me to share this information regarding P411.  I was reluctant to come forward at first, but after the evidence that presented itself today, I can no longer deny the responsibility that I have to my sisters to report that I strongly believe that the security of the site can no longer be trusted.  I was the biggest proponent of P411 for years, but now sadly, I must say that Gina and I exchanged emails today that can leave me with no other impression than that she is working with cops, maybe even the FBI.

Three years ago a man claiming to be “Danny H___”* attempted to schedule appointments with me in Orlando, Florida, using a very memorable email address.  I was provided with screening information that led to a Florida real estate license, so I made the appointment; however, my intuition kept telling me that something was wrong so I ran some checks on the contact form he filled out on my website.  A back door tracker showed it originated at “Orange County Telecommunications”, and following that back took me to the police department website.  I quickly cancelled the appointment, yet had already told him the hotel; he begged me to see him, and when I looked out the window I saw two blacked out undercover Dodge Chargers in the parking lot, parked driver to driver in the style of the police.  So I told him that I found him attractive and would see him for free, and suddenly he lost interest.  Hmm.

Early last week, I was surprised to be contacted by that same memorable email address again!  I had just posted a new ad on Eros for the Tampa area (which includes Orlando).  Because I knew he was a cop from last time, I decided to look at the MBI website and found a message from the Director breaking down their efforts to eliminate escort advertising from Orlando for tourism reasons.  I spent hours reading it, and began tracking all of my communications.  Imagine my further surprise when each of four different client contacts that day all tracked back to the same Orlando IP address as the cop’s email; in fact, each of the four clients forwarded all of my emails to the same four contacts in various locations of the country, all showing “human trafficking” task forces located in those cities.

I went into high alert mode, using P411 as my preferred source of screening, and that day I was contacted by two P411 members.  I agreed to meet one of them, but had to redirect his conversation many times because he kept saying graphic things that would not occur in a tantric session.  I never want to blow a client out of the water by shouting “There is no sex in my sessions”; I let them figure it out on their own and they are usually OK with it.  But this guy wouldn’t let go of the sex talk prior to meeting.  In fact, he got a little upset and said, “This is too much work.  It sounds like you are just an escort, not Tantra with Sex.”  I explained that I had to be careful due to Florida’s efforts to impose moral agendas by persecuting erotic education.  And boy, did that email get a lot of attention; it was forwarded or opened 68 times on 5 different devices in 5 different cities.  In fact, all of the contacts that week circulated my emails to the same network, including some in which the supposed client wanted me to cross a state line to see him (which is fishing for a Mann Act charge).  I have detailed tracking reports on all of these emails, though none got quite as much attention as the one in which I mentioned that I was aware of current police operations.

Once I had verified that all of these suspect mails were coming from the same IP address as the P411 account, I contacted P411 immediately by phone; the operator (with zero sense of urgency) told me to email Gina.  I had to do that twice before she replied, and her replies left me with no doubt that she is working with the cops.  She claims that a P411 client forwarding our emails to known police IP addresses is not an issue because IP addresses are “garbage information”.  I agree that without other information, they mean very little, but when the addresses are clearly part of a network and the same IP comes up again and again, it is undeniable that something in the milk ain’t clean.  When I explained how I knew these addresses were associated with known cops, she categorically stated that the original client from three years ago was “with no doubt, NOT LE”.  Following this oddly-certain declaration I decided to Google that memorable email address, and found multiple blacklist reports which also identified him as LE (in direct contradiction of Gina’s statement).  When I confronted her with this evidence, her reply was, “Some people just live for drama and paranoia.”

This is not the first time I’ve suspected problems with P411.  Prior to the Denver busts using fake P411 accounts last June I had emailed Gina about suspicious activity from a Denver account with zero OKs who forwarded my emails to Colorado State Government computers; this supposed newbie was trying to get me to travel from Florida to Colorado and to “bring a friend to Colorado because I like to watch”.  Pretty odd for a newbie to reach out to Florida for something as easy to find as a duo, unless you’re trying to invent a “human trafficking” scenario.  But this week, when I reminded Gina of that incident, she claimed the username I reported was not the one involved in the busts.  There was one other incident last year:  I checked my P411 account after a long absence and found that my phone number had been changed to someone else’s; searching the new number revealed a duplicate of my ad, complete with my photo and an apparently false review.  Gina’s reaction to that issue was to say that I must have changed the phone number myself.

"I've just made a deal that will keep the Empire out of here forever."

“I’ve just made a deal that will keep the Empire out of here forever.”

I didn’t speak out then because I could not believe that Gina, as well respected as she is, could really be in on this.  I’m also aware that Gina and P411 reside in Canada, but with the current “sex trafficking” hysteria who knows what agreements may have been made between the two countries’ police agencies?  And it’s not like there is no such thing as extradition for “crimes” that are now being represented as something very serious.  Furthermore, I’m not the first provider to accuse Gina of being “dirty”, and several clients I know are concerned that she is preparing to “cash out” due to the fact that she was recently offering lifetime P411 memberships for the cost of two years (citing “bad business decisions” as her reason).  Today I deleted my account.  But I have a responsibility to stand up as an activist and say that these things are undeniable, and I have the evidence to prove it.

 Months before the Denver incident, P411 was also compromised in Wisconsin and Little Rock, Arkansas; there was also evidence of a much more serious problem which I included in TW3 #43, but removed mere hours before publication time because Gina came up with a seemingly-credible explanation for it.  But now, the circumstantial evidence appears to be stacking up; even if this can all be explained, it has not been as yet.  Services like P411 run on trust, and Gina does not appear to be investing enough effort in maintaining that trust; until and unless she does, I would advise all escorts using the service to be wary and to run your own extensive screening on anyone who approaches you via P411.  

*Mr. H____ has emailed me and insists that he had nothing to do with this sting operation; given that the police don’t care whom they hurt  in their crusade against whores, it’s entirely possible they could simply be using his name without his permission.

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