“Getting Away” With Hating It: Consent in the Context of Sex Work

I’ve been selling sex in one form or another for nine years, which is a long time. Most people in the sex trade pop in and out as their financial situation warrants, and few think of it as their career. For me, however, among the straight work I’ve pursued concurrently, prostitution is my profession and… Continue reading “Getting Away” With Hating It: Consent in the Context of Sex Work

Activist Spotlight: Audacia Ray, on Telling Stories and the Tricky Politics of Inclusion

Audacia Ray is perhaps most renowned in the sex workers’ rights movement for her longtime editing of the now sadly defunct $pread magazine. But as a sex workers’ rights movement activist, Audacia has really been everywhere and done everything: blogging for years about her sex working experience as Waking Vixen; publishing her book, Naked on… Continue reading Activist Spotlight: Audacia Ray, on Telling Stories and the Tricky Politics of Inclusion

What Antis Can Do To Help, Part One: Aiding Those Still in the Industry

I am a sex worker who hates the sex industry. As an anti-capitalist, I hate all industries. It’s not quite as if I’d prefer another system in place of capitalism. If I had to describe my ideology in positive terms, I’d call it fatalistic socialism, which I define as the belief that socialism would be… Continue reading What Antis Can Do To Help, Part One: Aiding Those Still in the Industry

An Intimate Life: Sex, Love, and My Journey As A Surrogate Partner (2013)

An Intimate Life might not exist if not for The Sessions, last year’s Oscar-nominated film fictionalizing the experience of sex surrogate Cheryl Cohen Greene and her client Mark O’Brien. From the blurbs by actors Helen Hunt and John Hawkes to the book’s pictures of Cohen Greene posing next to the stars, it’s obvious the publishers were… Continue reading An Intimate Life: Sex, Love, and My Journey As A Surrogate Partner (2013)

The Week in Links–March 15th

This week, the NYPD’s ridiculous and oppressive practice of using condoms continued to be written up in various venues. RH Reality Check weighed in, as did the Daily Mail, and Jezebel, while the Red Umbrella Project stepped up their campaign against the cops by creating postcards illustrated with victims’ stories that NYers can send to… Continue reading The Week in Links–March 15th