sex work

Abiola Abrams

photo by JC, Stark-Arts

Friday, November 6, 2009 6:30 TO 9:30 PM

VISIONS OF SEXUAL FREEDOM

NEW YORK CITY
SEXBLOGGERS
2010 CALENDAR

BURLESQUE…..SWAG…..SEXY BLOGGERS….RAFFLE

Celebrate the release of our Limited Edition 2010 Calendar

Meet your favorite sex bloggers and the hot photographers who shot them, get a free gift bag and maybe win an amazing raffle prize donated by on of our many sponsors and supporters.

Support Sex Work Awareness with a $20 calendar purchase.

FREE ADMISSION
Friday, November 6, 2009
6:30 – 9:30 PM

Fontana’s
105 Eldridge Street
New York, NY

By Michael Fattorosi

Who Stole the Tarts?
Sex work and Human Rights
By Sandhya Rao & Cath Sluggett

From CASAM: The Centre for Advocacy on Stigma and Marginalisation (SANGRAM)
 

Question:  What happens when advocacy and legislation in defense of human rights assimilates and perpetuates human rights abuses in the form of societal negative judgments of sex workers? 

The answer:  Sex workers often end up no better off than they were before and now they can add human rights advocates and human rights laws to the list of people and institutions working against them.

Synopsis

The title of this monograph and all the chapter headings are drawn from Lewis Carroll’s Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland.  Besides the allusion to tarts, the pejorative term for sex workers, the farcical fantasy of Alice’s adventures in the mythical Wonderland seems an apt reference to the unfamiliarity of the terrain, and Alice’s experiences echo much of our experiences in writing this paper.  Coming as we do from decades of work using the human rights framework, it is indeed difficult for us to critique it.  But we see the need to revisit this framework and do a reality check as to where it has succeeded and where it has failed.  The successes are well documented and therefore we choose to dwell on areas where it has not delivered as promised.  We claim that the human rights framework is a necessary but not a sufficient condition to address the problems faced by some populations, in particular the sex workers. We do not claim that it has failed entirely here either. However, there is a need to take into account the issues highlighted in this monograph.

In addition the title reflects some of the absurd ways human rights are constructed and applied to sex workers.  The attitudes of morality that surround sex work are mirrored in much of the tale.  From ground experience, the human rights framework, in the context of sex work seems to be as farcical as the trial in Alice in Wonderland. Human rights, their violations, and lack of access to the universal justice that it purports to offer, and indeed the framework itself, is the focus of this paper.  How does it work with sex workers?  Through a literature survey and by talking to sex workers in unstructured interviews, this paper critically engages with the dilemma that human rights presents to those in sex work.  The paper attempts to inspire a lively discussion on this topic rather than provide answers.

(Introduction from "Who Stole The Tarts?")

Please download and read the full document here: Who Stole The Tarts (.pdf)

If you want more information or have some resources to offer in assistance, you can contact SANGRAM by email at sangram.vamp@gmail.com

Why Japanese and Western people are infected with HIV in Thailand

By Yas(Kyo) Taniguchi

1. Thailand is the country in which most foreign people become infected with HIV.

Considering HIV infection through sexual contact, condom usage must almost perfectly prevent the infection. This fact should be well known to all people living in developed countries. It is well known to those who visit Thailand that HIV is widely spread among Thai people.

Nonetheless, quite a lot of foreign people have been infected with HIV in Thailand.

According to a paper titled “Sex, Sun, Sea, and STIs” reported in British Medical Journal dated March of 2004, 69% of UK heterosexual men who have been infected with HIV from 2000 to 2002 were infected in foreign countries. And 22% of them were infected in Thailand. As for women, 24% of them have been infected with HIV in foreign countries.

Why UK people, who have knowledge that condom usage can prevent HIV infection, have been infected with HIV in Thailand?

Condom usage rate among Western people (data of Germany heterosexual men) who visit Thailand for the purpose of sexual contact with Thai ladies is reported in this paper. It says that condom usage rate is only 30 – 40%!! According to this paper, visiting Thailand for the purpose of sexual contact (sex tourism) is very common among Western people. Be that as it may, 30 – 40% of condom usage rate is too low. It is obvious that having sexual contact with Thai sex workers is very dangerous.

Then, why do they have sexual contact with Thai sex workers without a condom in spite of having the right knowledge?

The answer is also reported in this paper. It states that many foreign people who visit Thailand for the purpose of sexual contact with Thai sex workers do NOT regard sex workers as prostitutes but intimate friends.

What you don't know about sex work could harm a sexworker...and does. 

A video interview with a Swedish sex worker and activist Pye Jacobsson about the legislation around prostitution and its impact on sex workers’ lives in Sweden.

Credits:
SWAN
www.swannet.org
Hungarian Civil Liberties Union
2009
Interviewer: Peter Sarosi
Filmed and edited by: Istvan Gabor Takacs
Music: Antony Raijekov - When Waves Trying to Catch a Marvel
Filmed in Stockholm, at the Swedish Drug Users Union in January 2009

From Caroline:

I am in the midst of setting up a group blog for sex workers and allies about, as the title of this post suggests, sex work and sexuality.

I'd like for it to be concerned mainly with the UK and Europe, though I do want to include US bloggers and issues.

I think this has a hell of a lot of potential. Blogging is a fantastic way of getting the message out to people and so often the US dominates discourse, so having a blog to really push the UK and Europe forward will be a very big thing. And I want this to work.

What I need - some folks from the UK and Europe. So, if you are a sex worker or ally from the UK / Europe and you'd like to participate in this, whether you'd like to be a regular contributer, post sporadically or just want to be in on the ride, give me a shout:

 

shepherd[dot]cc[at]gmail[dot]com.

 

I've already got one or two very groovy people, so you'll be in awesome company :)

By Tod Hunter

Thursday, Aug 13, 2009  

LOS ANGELES — Satellite radio channel Playboy Radio will be doing eight hours of live remote broadcasting from the Mustang Ranch brothel near Reno, Nev., on Friday, Sept. 4.

"It's a perfect fit," Mustang Ranch madam Susan Austin told XBIZ. "They are the quality and the caliber of what I would like to associate with. I've done spots on their shows and people calling in asked them to do a remote. They can see my world. It's going to be fun."

Tiffany Granath will host her “Afternoon Advice” show from 11 a.m.-3 p.m. followed by Christy Canyon and Nicki Hunter on “Night Calls” from 4-7 p.m. "Afternoon Advice" offers four hours of uncensored talk. Granath, joined by celebrities and a rotating panel of sex and relationship experts, takes listener calls and sometimes guides callers toward unexpected and unfamiliar sexual directions. “Night Calls,” hosted by Canyon and Hunter, is also a talk show with celebrity guests and callers.

Playboy Radio broadcasts on channel 99 on both Sirius and XM Satellite Radio, and also can be heard online.

For fans wishing to attend the live broadcasts, the Mustang Ranch is 14 miles east of Reno, off I-80, via exit 28. There is no charge to attend the broadcasts, but guests must be at least 18 years old and have a valid ID.

Written by Tamara A Huggins, Antigua Directorate of Gender Affairs

“Si un hombre dece que no se va a poner un condon, yo digo fuera de aqui!”

“If a man tells me he’s not gonna use a condom, I tell him get out of here!”

“Hablamos de sexo seguro cada dia.”

“We talk about safer sex everyday.”

“Empowerment.”  It’s a word used a lot in discourses on feminism, and a word you probably expect to see in the Gender Journal.  But you, like a lot of other women, and feminists, might rarely connect the word “empowerment” to a prostitute, a sex worker.

In fact, feminists globally rarely engage in a deep, non-stereotyping way with street walkers or ladies of the night.  Instead they mostly feel sorry for prostitutes who they feel need to be saved from a patriarchal society that exploits them.  They say that prostitution is a form of violence against women, and these women are “victims” either of male dominance, or of a class or economic system that oppresses them and leaves them far from “empowered”.  Other feminists – the type that flinches at shaving her legs and isn’t sure she should express any type of conventional female sexuality – feels personally affronted by women who paint their lips and wear thigh high boots saying this continues the objectification and subordination of all women.  God(dess)-forbid that they exploit their sexuality!  Even if they are savvy to the wider gender inequalities that drive their trade and exploit this unequal system to feed two kids or send money home to build a house.

APNSW (Asia-Pacific Network of Sex Workers) has posted a new video describing themselves and their own desires for how people can relate to them.  

There are both voluntary and involuntary sex workers and the rights of both groups are to be respected.  There are a lot of differences between the organizations that discuss, support and target sex workers.  There are a lot of strong opinions about the meaning, value and impact of sex work on the lives of sex workers.  Every single person involved in sex work has a personal perspective, their own story, their own values and their own voice.  I encourage everyone with an opinion about sex work and sex workers to look beyond what you already feel/think/know and allow the voices of sex workers to inform your own words and deeds. 

-arvan