The San Francisco Bay Guardian profiles this year’s Sex Worker Film and Arts Festival, focusing on contributions by festival co-founder Carol Leigh/Scarlot Harlot, Mariko Passion, James Darling, Siouxsie Q, Juba Kalamka, Courtney Trouble, Amber Dawn, and Rhiannon Argo. Toro Hashimoto, mayor of Osaka, outraged pretty much everyone this Monday when he stated publicly that the sexual services… Continue reading The Week In Links–May 17th
Tag: criminalization
What’s Trafficking Got To Do With It: The Media and the Cleveland Kidnappings
Last week in Cleveland, Gina DeJesus, Michelle Knight, and Amanda Berry escaped from Ariel Castro’s “house of horrors” where he imprisoned the women in a nightmare of rape and torture for almost a decade. Castro has been arraigned on four charges of kidnapping and three charges of rape. The courageous women escaped with the help… Continue reading What’s Trafficking Got To Do With It: The Media and the Cleveland Kidnappings
The Week In Links – April 5th
A Florida escort was arrested on charges of attempted murder for nearly biting her client’s penis off. It’s possible that this woman was just fulfilling a treasured universal sex worker fantasy, but I think it’s more likely there was an assault on the client’s part that we’re not hearing about. Two teenage girls drowned in an attempt… Continue reading The Week In Links – April 5th
The Week In Links–March 29th
Louis Vutton has been accused of promoting prostitution in a promo video for its 2013 fall collection, in which models do a poor imitation of street workers on a Parisian set. Sex work abolitionist feminist Joan Smith concludes in the Independent that the Swedish model of criminalizing clients works, based on her experience jumping in a squad car to… Continue reading The Week In Links–March 29th
Les Mis Isn’t An Anti-Trafficking Bible
Les Miserables translates roughly as “The Downtrodden.” Fantine is one of these downtrodden, a young working-class grisette who hides her out-of-wedlock child to obtain respectable employment. When her secret is discovered, she is thrown out of the factory. In desperation, she sells her hair and her teeth, and finally, reluctantly, she sells sex. (Incidentally, she may not be… Continue reading Les Mis Isn’t An Anti-Trafficking Bible