advocacy

This film by the Asia Pacific Network of Sex Worker$ (APNSW) gives an inside look at issues facing sex workers in Myanmar, and tells some of the fascinating story of how sex workers have organised and responded to HIV and to claim their rights.

I can say "Fuck you!" in public, but I cannot (with your permission) actually fuck you in public.

Have you ever wondered why is it that a statement of sex as an insult between people who don't like each other is a protected right, when the actual performance of sex as an act between two people who like each other is prohibited? 

Why is sex profane?  This is not something that comes from nature.  Sex is one of the basic needs of all mammals, along with air, water, space, warmth and food.  So, it doesn't come from our DNA, which means that we made this shit up.  Sex is free.  Sex feels good.  Societies across the globe discourage us from having sex, talking about sex, thinking good things about sex, being proud of sex.

The opposition to sex is so widespread across human cultures, that it seems universal, but is it?

How many people live inside a culture that vilifies sex, while personally holding different and more accepting views?  I'd venture to say that it's a majority.  At some point we all feel moments of sexual desire.  In sexually repressive social settings, we hide our true views on sex in order to avoid retribution.  This could be public shaming, beating, ridicule, disapproval and even killing.  Here's a hint: gay porn and MTF trans porn are the two biggest revenue generators online.  Cis-gendered heterosexual men are the people with the money and they are the people getting off in private to sexual images that society won't let them have while retaining the privilege of being cis-het men.

NAIROBI, 11 August 2010 (PlusNews) - By night, Viviane Muasi, 25, is a sex worker in Kenya's capital, Nairobi, but when not canvassing for clients, she spends much of her time convincing other sex workers to test for HIV and use condoms.

Muasi, a sex worker for nine years, is a peer educator with the Sex Workers Outreach Programme (SWOP) - a project run by the University of Nairobi and Canada's University of Manitoba.

"Initially when I came to Nairobi, I was employed as a house-maid," she told IRIN/PlusNews. "I was being paid little, so another woman introduced me to sex work and told me I could make more money."

For us, by us

Through the SWOP programme, Muasi and her fellow educators have enabled more than 3,000 of their Nairobi peers to get tested for HIV and other sexually transmitted infections.

"We know each other and where they [the sex workers] live, so you just visit them at home and ask them to create time and go to the clinic," Muasi said. "They now have skills to negotiate condom use with their clients... we don't want to be infected and we also don't want to infect anybody.

"At first, the police would just round us up and force us to go for [HIV] tests; many commercial sex workers used to hide," she added. "But today, because the call to test comes from one of their own, they have embraced it."

Here is Nina giving the Keynote Address at the 2010 Annual Conference of the Desiree Alliance, Las Vegas, NV.

The Lies of Liberty (2010) is a new documentary, produced by the LGBT Centre of Mongolia.  It is a powerful series of interview with LGBTQ folks in Mongolia, telling in their own words, how they are treated. 

Part One:

This new short film / PSA is from RedLightDistrictChicago, directed by Serpent Libertine.  Flying in the face of stereotypes and slander, the film is a collection of sex workers stating in their own words about why they like their jobs.

(h/t SWEAT)

A story supported by the Sex Worker Education and Advocacy Task Force (SWEAT) and facilitated by Women'sNet in South Africa.  I found this to be moving, simple and very much at the core of what it means to be human.

Wed, 7/14

PARADIGM SHIFT: NYC’S FEMINIST COMMUNITY Proudly Presents

“GUYLAND: THE PERILOUS WORLD WHERE BOYS BECOME MEN”

Lecture and Discussion featuring
DR. MICHAEL KIMMEL, PhD, Author & Sociologist, is among the leading researchers and writers on men and masculinity in the world today

Moderated by SHELBY KNOX, nationally known feminist organizer & subject of the Sundance award-winning film, The Education of Shelby Knox

“Michael Kimmel’s Guyland could save the humanity of many young men-and the sanity of their friends and parents- by explaining the forces behind a newly extended adolescence. With accuracy and empathy, he
names the problem and offers compassionate bridges to adulthood.”
— Gloria Steinem

“If you’ve ever had a conversation with a teenage boy and wondered what on earth was going on behind the blank stare and slightly open mouth, this book will serve you well.”
- Chicago Tribune

Obsessed with never wanting to grow up, this demographic, which is 22 million strong, craves video games, sports and depersonalized sexual relationships.  Kimmel offers a highly practical guide to male youth.

GUYLAND is the best-selling investigation of young people’s lives today.

By Pavol Stracansky

WARSAW, Jun 1, 2010 (IPS) - Pressure from the Catholic Church to effectively stop sex education in schools is threatening the health of tens of thousands of teenagers who fall pregnant every year because they have little or no knowledge of safe sex, education groups in Poland have warned.

They say many youngsters go into their first sexual relationships with little or no idea of contraception and the health consequences of unprotected sex, as conservative clergy covertly stifle any school sex education that does not conform to the Church’s strict Catholic teachings.

Anka Grzywacz, educator with the Polish Ponton Group of Sex Educators, told IPS: "The Catholic Church has a huge influence in Poland and in schools. The Catholic Church does not want sex education to be taught and, therefore, schools simply do what the Church wants and just do not teach it."

More than 20,000 Polish girls below the legal age of consent give birth each year, according to official figures. But it is believed that many more teenagers fall pregnant, and because of Poland’s strict abortion laws and the unwillingness of doctors to perform even legal abortions, they undergo dangerous illegal abortions or head abroad to have the procedure carried out.

(Posted at NEWW-Polska)

Every year 1.2 million Russian women deliberately terminate pregnancy and 30,000 of them become sterile, many from the estimated 180,000 illegal abortions.

Russian law permits abortions up to the 12th week of pregnancy. If the future mother is suffering from tuberculosis or mental illness she is permitted to terminate a pregnancy later than 12 weeks.

There is also a variety of social factors, which permit women to commit an abortion up to the 22nd week of pregnancy, including rape, imprisonment and poverty, and death or severe disability of the husband.

Nonetheless, Illegal abortion is widespread in Russia - unofficial estimates say 10-15% of the total, or up to 180,000 terminations.