Related to an earlier Tits and Sass post this week, “Actually, My Hand Feeds Me,” here’s more on the Annie Sprinkle kerfuffle. For anyone who’s a little behind, Fornicatrix goes in depth over the context of the whole weekend before getting to Sprinkle and Peechington Marie added her beautiful two cents in “Be Careful With Your Hand, You Don’t Want it Bitten Off—Annie Sprinkle, Fantasies That Matter, Sex Work, and Erasure of People of Color.”
The Rose Alliance has begun a Change.org petition calling for the Swedish and Norwegian governments to care about the health and safety of sex workers, and to admit the dangers to sex workers that they gesture at but attempt to gloss over in the August report on the success of the Swedish model.
Porn performer Christy Mack was beaten horribly by her ex-boyfriend, Jonathon Koppenhaver (AKA: War Machine), last Friday, who then fled the scene, declaring via Twitter, “It wasn’t me.” Mack’s injuries, while not life-threatening, are severe. Unrepentant and high on the entitlement of an abuser, Koppenhaver tweeted, “She’s my property and always will be.”
The UK’s highest-paid sex worker has announced he’s A) paid more than the Prime Minister and B) out to end stigma against sex workers.Flaunting one’s income in an austerity economy sounds like a sure-fire way to do it, yeah.
The Barton Street East Neighborhood has an innovative way of dealing with the sex worker population amongst them: acceptance and support.
“The women are not a blight on the community, they’re an asset,” Braithwaite said, adding that the committee is not working to get rid of the women, but rather to work with them and make them feel safe…
“This community is not about gentrification, not about stopping (the women),” she said, adding that they are all “fibres of our community.
Part of making them feel safe is looking for support services, food, and health outreach spaces that the workers can access, as well as shelters where needed, and continuing with community education, so that residents are aware of issues facing the women. The police force is also involved, having changed its focus from one of persecution to one of support and safety planning.
Police in Battle Creek, MI are also looking for ways to help sex workers.
… several people who attended said a first step for the group is to include and talk with sex workers.
“It is presumptuous of us to speak for them,” said Joyce Siegel, program manager for Sexual Assault Services. “It is very easy to judge them and it is very easy to put them in jail and then let them out but clearly it is not effective.”
Jessica Lee protests the Canadian government’s overemphasis on prohibitionists and former sex workers who have had bad experiences, as well as the prohibitionists’ focus on Lee’s use of the term “happy hooker” to the exclusion of what the phrase actually means:
Bill C-36 may make these forums, which I rely heavily on to stay safe and happy, illegal. My safety is a huge part of my current and continued success and happiness, and I’m sorry that message wasn’t clearly understood. [emphasis added]
Another sex worker in New Zealand has been able, by the grace of decrim, to report a client assault to the police. The man got 10 months in jail.
Prostitution in China is a major industry, and it is thriving, as the resumption of sexual services in Dongguan last week makes clear.
However, The Economist did a deep data dive into falling prices for full service sex work, citing the financial crisis, migration, and the increase in online-based work as reasons for an increase in supply and “broader social changes” for a decrease in demand. What about the closure of advertising sites? What effect does that have?
The Economist also does a predictably trite interview with a very self-possessed sex worker, “Lily,” who remains unruffled and on point, hitting key talking points in a fantastic and winsome manner.
Germany is contemplating raising the minimum age to enter full service sex work to 21 to prevent trafficking. What effect this would have on trafficking is unclear, but that’s never stopped legislators before.
RH Reality Check declares that “The Evidence Is In: Decriminalizing Sex Work is Critical to Public Health.” No argument here, or from the WHO or the International AIDS Conference for that matter.
Forbes comes out against the Swedish Model.
A sketchy loan company called “Sexy Business Funding” advertises its services to marijuana dispensaries and strip clubs. Seems legit.
I wonder how sex workers who get mainstream media profile pieces done on them still manage, in twenty goddamn fourteen, to say, “well, it may surprise you to hear this, but SOME of my clients don’t actually have sex with me!” with a straight face. Surely, some sort of internal alarm bell goes off, screaming “warning: you are about to utter the biggest cliche of sex workers talking to civilians in this history of sex workers talking to civilians. would you like to reconsider, y/n?”
(in reference to the UK’s “highest paid sex worker”)