I received a link to this blog post just hours ago via a feminist listserv; a listserv that has, just like much of the feminist community elsewhere has, experienced A LOT of heated debate around prostitution, sex work, abolition, and decriminalization.
The author claims to desire a ‘genuine’ answer to some specific questions she puts to abolitionists and, implies, by the title of the post: Choosing Our Battles: Why the feminist movement needs to stop arguing and support the decriminalisation of sex work, that what she truly desires is to end the infighting and to do what’s best for women, which of course, is really what we all want….That said, the post, and even the title of the post hints at something different than a desire for genuine discourse. Not only does it suggest that decriminalization is the only possible avenue for the feminist movement to take in terms of finding a solution to prostitution and male exploitation of women, but the questions she asks seem to, once again (I say once again because this is, unfortunately, such a common thing coming from arguments against abolition and for decriminalization), display a complete lack of research, an unwillingness to listen to and understand what abolitionists argue and fight for, and the imposition of a word, ‘prohibitionist,’ that shows, again, a complete lack of understanding in terms of the arguments that are being made. When we begin a conversation which pretends to desire authenticity and immediately misrepresent and misunderstand the other side of the argument, is it difficult to take seriously that intent.
This means that two out of three of the questions the author claims to pose genuinely, are actually unanswerable by abolitionists:
2) How, in practical terms, does prohibition work towards the goal of abolition
3) Where has prohibition been an effective tool for changing social conditions or altering social practices?
Prohibition is the practice of prohibiting the manufacture, transportation, import, export, sale, and consumption of alcohol and alcoholic beverages. Women are not alcoholic beverages. They are not products to be bought, sold, manufactured, or traded, though I suppose this perspective is telling in terms of those who might like to use this term; perhaps they do indeed believe women to be consumable ‘products’ that should be bought and sold freely?
Abolition refers to a desire to put a stop to something, a practice. It first was used in terms of the movement to end slavery and the slave trade. It is now used by feminists to refer to a movement to end prostitution and the trafficking of women. Feminists who fight for abolition believe that prostitution is a form of exploitation and is an example of male privilege and power. Can you see the similarities here? I feel like if we were asking ‘genuine’ questions we would get the terminology right.
The author goes on to ask: Who should be criminalised? Sex workers, johns, madames, members of the kink community, bachelor parties, bar/club owners? Again, to me, this question shows something sincere, that is a sincere lack of research, a genuine intention to not hear what women are saying. Abolitionists do not argue for the criminalization of sex workers. They argue for the complete decriminalization of prostituted women and the criminalization of the pimps and johns. Simple as that. For those who are sincerely interested in hearing the actual arguments from actual feminists and abolitionists, I’ve linked to some references here, here, here, here, here, here, and here. There is a lot more information out there, including here on our website and on EVE’s website, as well as many, many more resources I haven’t included here
The abolitionist argument has never been about ‘cracking down’ on women who work in the sex work industry but rather has been about ending male privilege, male violence, and the exploitation and abuse of women and women’s bodies. It is about pointing out that, in a truly egalitarian society there is no ‘deal’ in which men are allowed access to women’s bodies simply because they have the cash and women need the cash. In a truly egalitarian society we would not believe that men have this right or that men somehow need to use women’s bodies lest they become violent or rape (which is an argument commonly used to support prostitution).
For decades, feminists have repeated over and over that criminalising abortion will not stop abortions.’ How can the continuing criminalization by sexist, right wing men of access to abortion for women – whose lives are on the line, either in botched procedures or birthing – be compared to attempts by feminist women to impede sexist men’s entitlement to the bodies of women whose lives are also on the line? Reproductive rights provide women with control over their lives and bodies. As the author points out, ‘Women die when abortion is not accessible.’ Women should get to choose whether or not they have to give birth. Whether or not they want to raise children. They ought to get to make those decisions; not men. But women also die at the hands of pimps, johns, brothel owners and traffickers. Abolitionists have no desire to criminalize the prostituted: they desire a world where sexist men can no longer buy sexual violence against women, where male privilege doesn’t mean that women are put in the position of having to sell their bodies to men. The only valid comparison is that the criminalization of abortions by men hurts women and the tolerance of men’s demand for prostitution hurts women. Abolition and abortion rights both demand freedom for women from a patriarchal society which locks women into the roles of tools for sexual use of men.
In response to this post, and this author’s supposedly genuine desire for a sincere conversation, I suggest we begin with a) research, b) the correct use of terms with which we describe the abolitionist movement, and c) actually listening to people when they talk. When right off the bat your argument begins with an assumption that abolitionists argue for the criminalization of prostitutes and continuously calls the movement ‘prohibitionist’, all it shows is a lack of interest in conversation, in sincerity, in women’s voices, and in the truth.
Try again.
Tags: abolition, decriminalization, johns, Misogyny, pimps, prostitution, Rape, Sex Work, Violence Against Women
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Excellent post, thank you very much Meghan.
One telltale signal of the lobby’s disinformation, for me at least, is the allegdly shorthand use of “decriminalization” (or “decrim”, in attempt to feign street talk) to argue what one should be advocating. If they are not telling you what or whom is to be decriminalized against abolitionist objections, it is obvious that they mean pimps, brothel proprietors and johns and their privilge to buy and sell women and youths… mais il ne faut pas le dire!
Yes! We are also for a certain level of decriminalization, no? Just not pro-pimp and John.
Thanks for this excellent piece of writing, Meghan. What’s interesting is that on the pro-sex-work side there are plenty of women ready to out themselves as being, or having been, in the industry. The abolitionist side has many, many women–more than half, by my estimate, but at any rate, a significant number–who have been in the sex industry, yet are not going to out themselves publicly. Thus, radical feminists get labelled as privileged and not knowing what the sex trade is like. Yet, I have personally had survivors tell me they wanted me to speak out against prostitution in all its forms.
The author of the blog you mentions to states that the first targets of police repression are those in minority and vulnerable communities. This is true, yet I do not hear the author putting up so much a fuss about murder laws.
Also, I wonder if there are blogs where men argue with other men about whether they have the right to sexually abuse women if they throw money at them? If they exist, I haven’t seen them; on the whole, men don’t care about the well-being of the prostituted. After all, there are plenty of poor, destitute men out there, but you don’t see them lining up, fighting for their right to participate in the sex industry in anywhere near the numbers women are out there.I haven’t even seen any men’s rights blogs fighting for the right for men to prostitute themselves.
Radical feminists are currently proposing the Swedish model. It doesn’t solve the problem, but it is the best we have right now. Are there problems with its’ implementation? I’m sure there are, as with everything else. Is it going to make women in prostitution happy? No, not at first. Almost every exited prostituted woman I’ve spoken with was convinced she loved being fucked by strange men, but years afterwards, she realized she had survived the most awful thing.
Where prostitution is legalized, men are likely to see all women as potential prostitutes. Is this what you want for your sisters? For your mother or daughter? With the economy/ecological crisis going the way it is, we may see more and more women heading for this route. Be careful what you wish for, my sex-work position sisters. You just might get it.
“The author of the blog you mentions to states that the first targets of police repression are those in minority and vulnerable communities. This is true, yet I do not hear the author putting up so much a fuss about murder laws.”
I state that I am a prison abolitionist. I do not believe in the prison system. For more of my ideas on laws and the criminal legal system, see the second post on my blog: goitalonetogether.ca/blog
“Where prostitution is legalized, men are likely to see all women as potential prostitutes. Is this what you want for your sisters? For your mother or daughter? With the economy/ecological crisis going the way it is, we may see more and more women heading for this route. Be careful what you wish for, my sex-work position sisters. You just might get it.”
I don’t want this, but I don’t see how the law will stop this. Have laws ended domestic abuse? What about rape? The drug trade? No. I am challenging the idea that laws can protect us. Maybe instead, we need to get rid of these laws and protect ourselves – fight for a better world together.
Hey Kaley,
In your case you are consistent in being anti-prison in all cases, but my point is that in general progressive lef left circles when arguments are brought up regarding legalizing/decriminalizing prostitution, folks say that cops are unjust anyway, so laws don’t work. Yet I hear nowhere near the same outcry on this same progressive/left blogs regarding laws that apply to violence faced by men.
No, laws have not ended domestic abuse or rape, and I don’t believe they will. However, I do believe survivors of battery are at least glad such laws are on the books, as they show support in word for equality for women. They have also allowed women *some* protections.
As I say below, I feel when feminists are told, “don’t use the law,” it’s really more of an excuse to get us not to do anything. This is not because I think the law is the answer–I don’t–but it is one tool.
The happy hooker (or faux happy hooker) shit is bogus in a lot of exited women’s cases and it pisses me off to no end whenever I hear it repeated. Just like it riles me to hear other radfems repeat the idea that some women *love* being beaten by their partners … until they can be convinced otherwise! No. Women know shitty situations are shitty, but often stay in them because there seems to be no escape.
I never thought I loved it. A number of exited women I know didn’t love it either. We just did it because we had to make money. In some of our cases, make a lot of money fast (ie, we had just lost our jobs and needed to pay rent, we had a sick mother or child, we had a Nigel that blew through all our cash but would try to kill us if we kicked him out or broke up with him).
I was often a ‘date’ for hire (some dude would hire me to pretend he had a girlfriend for the night, basically so he could show off to the other dudes before getting his blow job etc), and I can recall sitting through every occasion laughing and playing along while all the while thinking, “I wish I could put this cigarette out in your eye, you stupid wanker.”
The exited strippers I know thought something along the lines of “I wish I wouldn’t get in trouble if I just took my shoe off, bludgeoned these dickholes with the heel, and stole their wallets. It would be easier and less degrading for me.”
I wonder what the johns would think about the whole experience if they knew that (but were unable to commit violence against the women in retribution).
((((Joy))))
Thanks for sharing.
“I wonder what the johns would think about the whole experience if they knew that (but were unable to commit violence against the women in retribution).”
Ha! That’s a really good point! My guess is they’d probably think women were lying when they said they had the thoughts you and many others have had. But who knows.
Probably that we were lying, yes, or that we were deluded as to our “true purpose”, right-wing or “repressed”, or else (as rmott has repeatedly said) “too mentally damaged to know the ‘truth.’”
I’ve heard many pro-prostitution women telling angry exited women, “I’m so sorry you had a traumatic experience with selling yourself (or being sold).” As if there could be any OTHER kind of experience with selling yourself or being sold!
Why? Because you say can’t imagine any other experience? So you’ve decided there is no other kind of experience? So, different people couldn’t have different experiences? That’s absolutely impossible…
Because we always all experience everything the same way? Right.
Tell me, how many current sex workers support abolitionists’ approach? Any?
How can you claim it benefits sex workers.. Wouldn’t they all be supporting you if that were really true?
Does it make you feel especially good to make such comments about other people whose lives you have no clue about because they happen to say something you don’t agree with.
The kind of pleasure some of you seem to derive from making absolutely ignorant and malicious about people you then claim to be only wanting to help makes is quite revealing. You cannot even manage to conceal your contempt and cannot resist for long before revealing the truth and your real motives.
It’s truly disgusting behavior and shocking you can all pretend to have the best of intentions.
Don’t talk to me about selling “myself” (which is the most absurd way to refer to it but I know how fond of you all are of being as dramatic as possible), when you’ve sold out and pimped out your integrity.
But your comments are truly enlightening. Keep it up, this is great and makes your true nature and motives crystal clear to anyone who might be wondering.
Yes, I am one of those truly disgusting, hateful people whose True Nature holds that all of us, as human beings, are more than just objects to be bought and sold.
I should be ashamed of myself.
the mis-naming of abolitionists as prohibitionists could say more about the “pro-sex-work” people’s perception of women than about our arguments. By calling us prohibitionists, they imply that women are merely a substance that can be controlled. We do not imply any such thing by using the term Abolition. Rather we are drawing a parallel between slavery and prostitution. The same arguments that were used by reformers during the fights to abolish slavery a mere 150 years ago in the United States. Reformers argued that some enslaved people *liked* slavery, they were protected and employed at meaningful work and they had good relationships with their owners. What would they do without them? Sound familiar?
Exactly. Thank you, Erin.
I never say in my blog post that sex workers like sex work. That is not the conversation I am interested in.
I also use the word “prohibition” in the sense of something being outlawed. Drugs are prohibited, so is loitering in some areas, so is murder, rape, assault – these are things that are prohibited by law. This is the sense that I use the word. “Prohibitionist” in that people want to prohibit by law the sex trade.
As a prison abolitionist, the idea that we can confront misogyny and patriarchy using patriarchal and oppressive system (the current criminal legal system), whether directed at sex workers or johns, is difficult for me to understand. This is the explaination I am looking for.
Do you also call people who want murder to be illegal ‘prohibitionists’? Do you call yourself a ‘prison prohibitionist’? The reason the decrim side calls abolitionists prohibitionist is because it hints at puritanism and moralism (for example, Christian women’s groups in the 1800s) which is how they are constantly trying to spin our argument. As we all know, abolition is not about morals. The term prohibition is not used in good faith when used by decrim adovocates to describe abolitionists, as of course you know, otherwise you would not have used it. It is used to show spite towards. Again, this does not display a ‘genuine’ interest in conversation or in understanding and respecting one another.
Like the term “prostituted women” is used in good faith…despite sex workers being clear about not wanting to be referred to that way and not using the term when speaking of themselves?
Right.
Spite? And you are surprised by this? What exactly do you expect when continually victimizing sex workers without giving any consideration to what they are telling you?
I’m really curious, what exactly do you expect the reaction to be when you insult, belittle and dismiss sex workers in every way you can and disrespect every aspect of their efforts to be included in decisions about their own lives. How is someone supposed to react, in your opinion, to others trying to silence what they have to say about their own experiences?
How do you reconcile this with your claims of wanting to help those same people? How exactly does that work when you then treat them with absolutely no regard and categorically ignore what they have to say?
What’s the mechanism that allows you to justify that kind of behavior and contradictions? I’m at a loss, maybe someone can explain how they manage to do this – I would be very interested. Don’t be too surprised when I actually listen to what you have to say.
You are forgetting that there are many exited women who are abolitionists who use the term ‘prostituted women’. But of course, decrim advocates love to ‘forget’ that there are many women are came from the industry who don’t argue that it is ‘just a job like any other’. And no, I’m not surprised at all. I have been on the internet once or twice before and am never surprised by comments like yours from people who think they are bringing something new to the table as opposed to just rehashing the same old tired rhetoric. I want women to be free from rape and abuse and murder and exploitation and I want to end patriarchy. You can’t convince me (or any other feminist with an ounce of intelligence) that, because I don’t want to pretend that sexism is actually empowering (but wouldn’t it be SO AWESOME if it were???) and that living in a world where the vast majority of people believe that women actually exist to be used and abused and thrown away is totally fine as long as they are paid for it, I am condescending.
And here in lies my major problem with you Meghan. You make some strong points but are often very disrespectful, and yes condescending and not always righteously.
I agreed with some of elephantine’s points but you’re right Meghan, many women who have been in prostitution are also describing their own lives and fighting for abolition (and legal prohibition). However, just chastised elephantine for ‘forgetting’ about these women I cannot count the number of times you choose (because I know you’re aware – I wouldn’t try to belittle your intelligence as you so often do to others) to ‘forget’ that many sex workers voices are actually left out by many abolitionists and their concerns and requests are overruled and dismissed. Both sides are to blame for this.
I’m disrespectful to those who treat others with disrespect. I’m sorry but I just don’t have the patience to be kind and polite to those who insist on twisting, manipulating, and intentionally distorting arguments to their own end. It happens far too often in this debate. I am sick of correcting and clarifying massive lies that could easily be avoided if people were actually sincere in their intents to understand the arguments they pretend to pick apart.
I feel that you are ascribing motives and actions to us (us being the people to whom you don’t have the patience to be polite) that I do not have.
It took most of a week here for me to go from wondering why you supported criminal enforcement against johns to realizing that you didn’t have the position I thought you did.
For my part, I was poisoned when the argument over definitions wasn’t resolved by using a thesaurus or dictionary. I can’t tell if the energy put by both sides into quibbling over the use of specific words is because the specific words are important, or simply that everyone is convinced that their reasons for their position are The Truth.
Everyone has privileged information about their own feelings; both you and I claim to have been rude because we experienced rudeness. I apologize, for my intentional rudeness, my negligent rudeness, and for not checking my perceptions when I first felt treated rudely.
None of this is about “feelings.” It’s about FACTS regarding the sexual exploitation industries. Just because some people may say being in the Amerikan military was a valuable experience doesn’t mean i it’s right to promote this view, with all the harm the U.S. killing machine does worldwide. Similarly, there were a few African slaves who stated they preferred being slaves, that their Owners cared for them, and that even stayed on after abolition. As white people in Amerika, are these the black folks we should rally around?
There were plenty of people, thought of as “good slave holders,” who wanted to make slavery into a nicer, gentler thing. This was a deeply considered view during the hell of African slavery in the U.s.
There are belief systems that can be shown to be false, harmful, and unjust, no matter how cool they are to promote.
I’m not sure what the military has to do with sex work, or what being a member of the military has to do with determining the objectives assigned to the military.
Why is John Brown better company than Elliot Ness? And what does it mean for a ‘belief system’ to be ‘false’?
Try this on for size: Support the troops. Bring them home.
I completely understood your use of the word “prohibition” Kaley. Abolitionists want a complete end to prostitution and trafficking but the majority of the time a significant expression of this work is around laws. In that sense, abolitionists want abolition in large part through legal prohibition of sex work/prostitution. I can’t get over the feeling that those that fight this kind of understanding so much are doing so in part because they don’t want to agree that a large part of their fight is in our legal system, you know, the currently oppressive one.
“Abolitionists do not argue for the criminalization of sex workers. They argue for the complete decriminalization of prostituted women and the criminalization of the pimps and johns.”
So, the people who describe themselves as wanting to ‘abolish’ prostitution want to eliminate the current structure around prostitution, and not restrict the right of a person to choose to prostitute themself? I understand the basis for criminalizing the pimps; why criminalize the purchase of sex while permitting the sale? Also, do you intend to deny the existence of male prostitutes and female buyers, or are you excluding them from the discussion? Finally, how would the discussion be different if there was effective protection against abusive traffickers, pimps, and johns?
Decius,
The idea behind criminalizing the buying but not the selling is to prevent those selling to be further harmed by the legal system for trying to survive while placing the onus where it belongs, on the buyer. To prevent/reduce the number of buyers while protecting sellers from prosecution allows the sellers to ease their way out of prostitution.
The concept applies equally to male and female sellers, so, yes, male and female buyers of male sex would be subject to the same laws.
Your question about “effective protection” while a worthwhile one academically is so huge and difficult to address given the mechanisms that would have to be in place WORLDWIDE as to render it impractical. It would require someone, usually the seller, to report that abuse and for law enforcement to take it seriously; two things that do not happen and would be difficult to enforce.
Simply criminalizing the buying of sex would provide “effective protection” when enforced.
Am I reasonably close here, Meghan et al?
Andrew Pari
Chasing the Why
I don’t see how criminalizing buyers, or even permitting sellers, helps sellers transition out. Increasing the cost to buyers (by adding legal risk) without increasing the price paid to sellers seems to me like it would have the effect of making it harder for sellers to afford the clothes/address/education/time needed to secure a different source of income. Most people who exited would be those who already had the means to exit, and left because they weren’t making enough money.
I think a better approach would be to criminalize and enforce a prohibition on pimps, while at the same time pursuing aggressive outreach and and training/education programs allowing prostituted victims to gain traditional means of support and learn how to recognize, avoid, and leave abusive relationships.
Suppose we lowered the bar for reform; would the problems centered around prostitution remain if prostitutes had the same level of effective protection against abuse that retail and service industry workers do? I think that can be done locally with only local mechanisms providing for the licensing, regulation and/or inspection of brothels and purveyors. One of the obstacles to effective regulation is of this type that it requires that the concept of ‘selling sexual services’ be legitimized, while condemning the current black market in prostitution.
Yes. Thanks Andrew. The Nordic Model, which many abolitionists advocate for, would also include a support system for those who wish to exit. The point is to support and provide other options for the prostituted and to work towardsa world in which we don’t believe that men are entitled to access women’s bodies and where women need not put themselves in these kinds of positions in order to survive.
You keep using the concept “prostituted”. Are you referring only to to people who have been coerced (other than the general economic need of having an income) into entering/remaining in sex work, do you mean to include people who are in sex work voluntarily but for financial reasons, or do you mean to include all people in sex work regardless of motivation?
No one is denying the existence of prostituted males and/or female buyers; however, men are simply not the majority of prostituted people. Female buyers are also criminalized under the Nordic model. When feminists use the word “women,” we usually mean people treated socially as women, and prostituted males would certainly count.
In countries that have legalized the sex trade, there is still not effective protection against abusive johns, pimps, and traffickers. Legal brothel rooms will have four “saftey” buttons in them for the woman to press. Do you go to a job with four safety buttons in your office lest someone try to kill you? Rooms also are essentially bare, because they pillows and sheets have been used to kill women. I personally know women who have been suffocated by pillows in prostitution, though they are (fortunately) still alive.
How would the conversation be different if women were valued as human beings instead of sex toys to abuse for pay?
Thanks so much for writing.
I very proud as an exited woman to be named as an abolitionist – for I do connect the sex trade and the making of women and girls into sexual goods with a mass abuse of human rights, and for a great many inside the sex trade conditions of slavery.
I am not a prohibitionist – for I will have that the continuing use of language that makes the prostituted class into goods – nothing more than alcohol. Existing and surviving the sex trade, is to made sub-human, and only purpose to an object for men to masturbate into. Using the language of prohibition, keeps the prostituted in the position of being goods – it keeps the status quo of the sex trade and its vast profits.
The language of abolition is a language of giving back the prostituted dignity, self-respect and that they are fully humans not goods. It is the language that gives the prostituted real hope – for it not the language of harm reduction and keeping the sex trade running as usual with the veneer of being clean and safe. Abolition is the language that states what most of the prostituted know in every cell of their body – that prostitution cannot be allowed to continue – for it is founded on violence and degradation of the prostituted class.
I, and other abolitionists, have never back criminalising the prostituted – we have always seen as people who had their rights stolen from them, so must be decriminalise and given long-term and holistic ways to exits.
It is not about the prostituted being “punished” – it is about confronting the male entitlement to buy and sell the prostituted class – it is vital to challenge the male demand to have a class of people that are made sub-human for their selfish sexual wants.
I am not surprise that many women in the abolitionist movement are survivors of the sex trade – and do feel safe enough to be open about their past. I am constantly in shock at how the pro-sex trade lobby will use that being a survivor of prostitution and then becoming an abolitionist – is considered treachery. They will attack survivors who are abolitionists on a terrible personal level – using that to ignore or override our words especially it is clear is being heard. They attack us by making we are too mentally damaged to know reality, they make out we are weak or were clearly in an “illegal” aspects of the sex trade, that we must now religious freaks or right-wingers, even encourage to self-harm or commit suicide. I am proud of what I have become – but it is bloody hard.
I would never accuse a survivor of being treacherous for their political views, although I may not agree.
I am challenging the notion that criminalising the sex trade (buying or selling), will move towards confronting patriarchy, or “the male entitlement to buy and sell the prostituted class – it is vital to challenge the male demand to have a class of people that are made sub-human for their selfish sexual wants.”
Using the police and prison system to do that work has not worked with any other struggles. Prisons and the police are, themselves, patriarchal, oppressive, and violent institutions. How do we expect them to challenge the systems that create them?
When women are told not to use the law, I feel we are being told “do nothing (that will result in will change).” That said, holding city ordinances, such as the one in NYC around street harassment, did get people talking about how to make real change and also let women and others affected by street harassment tell their stories.It is unlikely this will result in any actual laws being changed. Something similar could be done with prostitution/pornography.
As a final FYI, last time a group in the U.S. attempted to pass an ordinance allowing for civil suits against pornography, the insurance companies told anti-pornography feminists they had never seen a lobbying effort like it!
Yes, and as someone who has been involved in direct antipolice actions (the G20 riots in Pittsburgh, the RNC protests in 2008, etc, as well as a number of others both larger- and smaller-scale), I can say that it often backfires. To say the least.
I’m an advocate for antipolice action, actually, but if (say) prostituted women DID start taking matters into their own hands — bludgeoning johns with their heels, shooting men who tried to purchase them, etc. — it would not work either. PR would spin them into monsters and the men into innocents. Look at Aileen Wuornos, who shot men who were *raping her.* She got the needle.
We can’t even take action against things the general liberal public can *agree* are bad (ie, the Republican party, imperialism, lack of health care, and so on). I want an actual, rioting-in-the-streets feminist revolution possibly worse than almost anyone I know, but taking feminist action without a really big backup contingent would be a complete nightmare.
“I want an actual, rioting-in-the-streets feminist revolution possibly worse than almost anyone I know, but taking feminist action without a really big backup contingent would be a complete nightmare.”
Oh goddess, I want that too, so badly it hurts. Seriously, I get chest pains sometimes thinking about it.
There is so much infighting in the radfem “movement” we don’t end up putting aside our differences to get shit done. Secondly, as you point out, Joy, we really *don’t* have a big enough contingent of women to actually get the revolution going .I just watched the complete video on YouTube about rev feminists in the ’70s and one of the woman says she has gone on to other work, not because her politics have changed, but because she doesn’t think now is the time, politically, for a Women’s Lib Movement. That breaks my heart, because that is saying until the time is “right”, women will continue to be treated like (or worse than) trash. The time may not be “right,” but somehow we have to make it be.
There is an interview about radicals using cops here: http://vancouver. mediacoop.ca/audio/deep-green-resistance-death- threats-and- police/8014
I have had bad experiences with the cops myself, though even before than I was (and am) a prison abolitionist ; the question, in my mind anyway, is how to get there. All these structures we did not set up have to be dismantled….somehow.
Rebecca,
Woman such as yourself, who are survivors of prostitution should be the ones leading the movement. In fact, I do consider you a leader.
I love when you say, “The language of abolition is a language of giving back the prostituted dignity, self-respect and that they are fully humans not goods. It is the language that gives the prostituted real hope – for it not the language of harm reduction and keeping the sex trade running as usual with the veneer of being clean and safe. Abolition is the language that states what most of the prostituted know in every cell of their body – that prostitution cannot be allowed to continue – for it is founded on violence and degradation of the prostituted class.”
As usual, you have such a beautiful way with words.
Hi Meghan and others,
I wrote the blog post that this is a response to. I struggle, though, with if and how I should respond to the above attacks.
Attacking my commitment to feminism, or my authenticity as a feminist because I support decriminalising sex work is petty and fails to address my core issue: how does criminalising sex work (either from the selling or buying side) move us towards social change that eliminates sex work?
Your definition of “prohibition” is wrong. I use the word on it’s general definition: 1. The action of forbidding something, esp. by law; 2. A law or regulation forbidding something. Forbidding the sale or purchase of sex by law is what I mean by prohibiting sex work.
Based on those ideas, my two questions are valid. If abolitionists believe in abolishing sex work, not simply outlawing or prohibiting it, how does this struggle (for the criminalisation of johns) fit within that struggle.
Your attempt to insult and belittle me is problematic, and the exact reason why i have, until now, been relatively silent on this issue. I will not respond publicly to any further attacks, but can be contacted personally if you would like to speak.
Best,
Kaley
I don’t see anyone attacking your commitment to feminism or your authenticity as a feminist here, Kaley. You specifically ask for a response in your post and go on to say: ‘I am prepared to have those discussions, debates, arguments. I am willing to be open and to challenge myself and to listen during what would be challenging times.’ Yet as soon as someone does respond critically you call it an attack and refuse to engage? I don’t really care whether you choose to engage here or not, but you did specifically ask for a response to your post. You make it (whether intentionally or unintentionally) difficult, if not impossible for abolitionists to engage in dialogue with you because, right from the get go, you label them in inappropriate ways and misrepresent their arguments. Before we even begin a conversation we need to start with these corrections and clarifications. This is why I don’t believe your intention to dialogue is in good faith. If you actually do, ‘genuinely’ want dialogue I suggest you ‘try again’. Sincerely.
Hi Meghan,
I would just like to draw your attention to these sentances:
“For those who are sincerely interested in hearing the actual arguments from actual feminists and abolitionists” – this phrase implies that I am not an “actual feminist,” does it not?
Or
“Again, to me, this question shows something sincere, that is a sincere lack of research, a genuine intention to not hear what women are saying.”
This type of hurtful and mean language seems completely unnecessay.
Best,
Kaley
I don’t think it’s unnecessary at all. The first sentence you point to implies that you have not familiarized yourself with arguments made by feminist abolitionists. It has nothing to do with your feminism. I think you misread the sentence. And the second sentence you point out, well, it is, again, the precise point I am trying to make. Unfortunately abolitionist arguments are constantly misrepresented by decrim advocates and it is extremely frustrating. It seems that, after all that has been said, all the information out there, all the work done by feminists, for, once again, these arguments to be misconstrued and/or simply missing, there would have to be some kind of intention in order to not hear those arguments.
I agree with Kaley and I hope you can hear this Meghan. You have shown an ongoing pattern of referring to people you are aware identity with feminism as not “actual feminists” or “faux-feminists” or more plainly “not feminists”. This is dismissive and puts you in a position of power to define who gets to be heard in feminism and who doesn’t. It’s also insulting and not the value of respecting identities I know many feminists hold on to.
In the above quote you did not say “feminist abolitionists”. You said “feminists AND abolitionists” demonstrating these two can be related but they are also separate identifiers.
I may agree with some of your well-articulated arguments but when I disagree with you and even find some of your arguments problematic and not representative of MY feminist values I do not express this by discrediting your identity as a feminist. Please, please stop doing this to other women and other feminists.
I don’t think I’ve ever said that someone who identifies as feminist is not an “actual feminist” – please do correct me if I’m wrong, though. In terms of the ‘faux-feminist’ term, well, I think this points to arguments which are presented as empowering for women when, in fact, they do the opposite. I say ‘feminists AND abolitionists’ because not all feminists describe themselves as abolitionist. Those people are still free to call themselves feminist, of course.
Part of the problem is that today, things that are often very sexist and very harmful to women are presented as ‘empowering’ or ‘feminist’. Simply because one claims that, for example, stripping, or pornography is ‘empowering’ or ‘feminist’ does not make it so. And so I do think it is important to challenge this kind of discourse.
Hi Meghan,
I just wanted to say thank you for writing this article and for all your work on informing the public about the detriments of prostitution.
I have a lot of friends who are so progressive about so many other issues, and we agree on almost every topic… every topic except this one. My friends really buy into the ill-informed, lame arguments of the so-called “decrim” camp. Thus, I often go online to find more evidence, better arguments,etc. to debate them. I always find a lot of good stuff here on your website, so please, please, please continue to do your excellent work!
How painfully naive–very quick to lob accusations (“lack of research…misrepresent…misunderstand”) at others (is the true mark of a radfem an inability to get along with anyone less radical?), but don’t want to spend even a moment actually *answering* the questions posed by GoItAlone(Together). No, instead there’s nitpicking over choice of terminology (the internet definitely needs another pedant!) that leads you to completely invalidate the very reasonable questions posed on that blog.
There’s no attempt to even answer the one question that might have been deigned acceptable by ideological puritans: “What would abolishing sex work actually look like?”
Take a stab–seriously. I’ll go first.
Abolition in the absence of revolutionary changes to the socio-economic structure (which you never explicitly lay out) is a mirage; a vision divorced from reality, and abolition would look no different than what we have now. Research shows mixed results for the Nordic model, and it has not even come close to wiping out sex work or the international trafficking of women to those countries. So criminalizing the purchase of sex while decriminalizing sales will make almost no difference, except make abolitionists feel better (but continuing to force sex workers into risky labour practices if they actually want to make money).
Even if, miraculously, such a legal regime were able to wholly wipe out prostitution in one jurisdiction, it would only drive customers to sex tourism in other jurisdictions, so if you’re serious when you say the word “abolition,” you have to mean globally, and it has to be globally enforceable or one jurisdiction will just play host to the world’s sex tourists.
Really, what sex workers need is legitimacy and the safety to organize as a group. But that’s not the type of small-steps, detailed plan you’re focused on developing, is it?
No, Meghan, instead you use your soap-box to accuse anyone who doesn’t agree with you of “a genuine intention to not hear what women are saying.” As though you hold the only valid opinion on this issue. I hate to sink to your ad hominem tactics, but I’ve been reading your blog long enough to see your online persona in action, and it scares me.
If the self-righteousness weren’t enough (what person, desiring “sincere” discourse, starts off with statements like yours, above?), the manner in which you bully and throw snark at other women has me questioning your bona fides.
My husband, a union and community organizer, just laughs when I describe to him the state of feminism today (at least as represented by your blog). He and I both realize that the strength of organizing only comes through unity. So how the hell will we (as women) ever accomplish any change if we can’t even be civil with one another and debate the issues instead of holding pissing contests over our ideological and theoretical purity (as if that isn’t privileged and EXACTLY the way a man would do it).
I doubt you’ll have the courage to publish this comment, but if you do, you’ll be addressing your sarcastic rejoinders and snarky rheotoric to a ghost: this is the last time I’ll be visiting your site. You’re obviously a smart young woman, so I wish the best to you in your future endeavours, and I sincerely hope your approach to feminist activism matures as you age.
Hi Marisa,
1) I didn’t ask for ‘sincere’ or ‘genuine’ discourse, the author of the post I respond to does.
2) I do NOT hold the only valid opinion on this issue. My argument is based on the work and activism of many other women, some of whom I’ve linked to in this post.
3) You’re right. Expecting people to listen or do research before writing on a highly sensitive topic is ridiculous. I am SOOOO naive.
4) Did you seriously just try to belittle feminists by saying that YOUR HUSBAND laughs at the movement?? Good lord you really don’t have a clue, do you?
5) I only delete comments that are off-topic, derails, trolling, or extremely offensive. And as you must know, since you frequent this blog so often (right? right?), I even post most of those comments! Your comment is both amusing and on topic and even though you used a fake email address (because you are just. so. courageous! See: #7), I am more than happy to post your very important and thoughtful comment. I mean, the fact that you even bothered to visit this website and stroke our egos by *squeeeee* posting a comment (!) makes my egotistical heart swell. You are very clearly a busy and important lady who doesn’t have time to frequent silly blogs like this one or involve yourself in petty conversations like these. After all, isn’t this whole movement just one big hilarious joke to you (and your husband – gosh he sounds important)?
6) Like I give a fuck if you visit ‘my site’ (this is actually a collective site) again. Most people who make those threats have never actually listened to our show or read any of the posts here.
7) Courage you say? You didn’t even have the ‘courage’ to leave a real email address. Generally I don’t post comments from people who leave fake email addresses but you are just so special I couldn’t help myself.
8 ) Sigh. I hope I grow up someday too. I imagine that, with age, I will come to realize that words and research and listening don’t matter. But alas! You won’t be here to witness that change in me! Oh well. We’ll have to go on without you and YOUR HUSBAND (oh self-righteous one).
I am writing you from our drop in centre, where we work with 115 former and current sex workers on average per months. We are a user directed organization, meaning that our policies and philosophies stem from those we support. We know from sex workers that when you criminalize ‘Johns and pimps’ that it is criminalization by association. When you criminalize ‘Johns and pimps’ police will continue to place pressure on sex workers for information. When you criminalize ‘Johns and pimps’ bad dates increase, as dates take the women to the outskirts of the city to flee police. We also know that arresting ‘pimps and Johns’ will do nothing to improve reporting to police or to curb violence. It essentially pushes the trade further underground. I am not “pro sex-work” I am pro-people. I want to see an end to the violence that has become common place. I recognize that we all want this. To end this violence, we strongly believe that a model of decriminalization, which will have the input of sex workers, is key. Sex workers want to be listened to, in our experience, and not be rescued. At the end of the day I do hope that there can be at least some common areas of agreement. The in-fighting is not getting us anywhere and I personally have no interest in attacking others or making them feel unsafe. My best to everyone and while we see this matter from different perspectives I thank Megan for her response. Best, – Rene
Hi Rene,
Here are some arguments supporting why decriminalization does not address the problems you are concerned about:
http://www.prostitutionresearch.com/Decrim_fact_sheet.htm
Or read what the Aboriginal Women’s Action Network has to say about legalization and decriminalization:
http://www.awanbc.ca/aboutus.html
I like the Swedish definition of prostitution as being yet another form of “violence against women”. Therefore, I think decriminalizing prostitution is like trying to decriminalize slavery or child abuse under the guise that we should try to “make them safer”. You cannot make an act that is itself violent”safe”. Prostitution will always involve violence because it IS violence.
That’s a pretty narrow definition of the word ‘prohibition’. If the arguments of those in favour of decriminalization suffer from word games, so does yours.
Regardless of alternative definitions, the one I use is the most common one and is the one that, as I am absolutely sure you realize, the general public will immediately associate with the word. Also, as I mentioned earlier, the word is not used by decrim advocates in good faith. We all know this. You are being insincere if you claim otherwise.
It is hard to imagine two groups of people further apart than the protagonists in this debate, which has been dragging on for many years. Now it seems to be getting further obscured by a sea of words.
It might be more helpful if we tried to define common ground and isolate the differences. The latter tend to be ‘what to do about it’ rather than an acknowledgement of what the issues are.
For instance we all want what is best for women – all women, we are all concerned by male privilege, power, entitlement and violence. We all abhor “the exploitation and abuse of women and women’s bodies”.
The difference lies in how people perceive the fact that some people exchange intimacy and sex, and these perceptions lie poles apart, and the ‘facts’ tend to be cherry picked. In terms of what society should do about this, we can start by looking at the current situation which nearly everyone considers ineffectual, and harmful. Therefore the removal of such exchange from penal codes would seem to be a desirable end, whatever name you place on it.
The argument here seems to be the use of criminal sanctions against those who exploit women, which prima facie seems admirable. Unfortunately the understanding of ‘exploit’ is far from clear whether in ethics or law (see Vanessa Munro: Exploring exploitation : Trafficking in sex, work and sex work, in Munro and della Giusta (eds.) Ashgate 2008).
One could argue, as did Justice Himel in the Ontario Superior Court, that abuse, exploitation and slavery are already prohibited under Canada’s Criminal Code and that therefore further laws are unnecessary and appear to do far more harm than good.
Great work. I tried to hold in my chuckles at the term “Prohibitionist” and your point about women not being alcoholic beverages. Uh yaaa! Haha! That was a strange word choice for the other author, that’s for sure. Thank you for posting this, you make a lot of fantastic and solid points.
Hi Megan, Kaley asks a couple of questions: 2) How, in practical terms, does prohibition work towards the goal of abolition 3) Where has prohibition been an effective tool for changing social conditions or altering social practices?
You first argue that the questions are unanswerable because they don’t represent your understanding of the abolitionist perspective. In other words, a person contesting your views doesn’t deserve an answer unless she agrees with your perspectives and definitions? Is that what you are saying here?
Then you “answer” Kaley’s questions anyway, except that rather than actually answering them, you misrepresent them. As you must be aware, prohibition, like many words, has a number of meanings and first means: “a law, order or decree that forbids something.” Kaley is asking a relevant question and your only response is to rely on a secondary definition of prohibition that bears no relevance to the question. Added to that is your specious and offensive suggestion that Keley considers women to be the equivalent of alcoholic beverages. You are going to have to do a lot better if you expect to be treated with respect in these discussions.
Here’s a definition of rhetoric you might find to useful to test the validity of your arguments in the future: 2. Language designed to have a persuasive or impressive effect on its audience, but often regarded as lacking in sincerity or meaningful content.
Esther
Esther – Kaley’s questions don’t represent any abolitionist’s understanding of abolition. Not just mine. What I am saying here, which is very clear, is that the language of abolition makes sense, in terms of our goals, and the language of prohibition does not make sense to anyone except for those who don’t want to listen to the arguments. There is no way her questions are answerable because there is no such thing as ‘prohibition work,’ at least not in the way you and Kaley mean it. I believe you ‘get’ this.
I’ve already addressed the use of the word ‘prohibition’ in replies above and am not going to repeat myself.
I don’t answer Kaley’s questions. Not once. And I don’t care how you decide to treat me in this discussion. Go ahead and be disrespectful if you’re into that! Kaley is the one who is refusing to engage because she doesn’t like the critiques. I didn’t ask for engagement. Though I am open to it. Obviously. Hence the whole blogging thing.
I will not address the repeated attempt to burden abolitionists with the label “prohibitionist”: it is callous enough to discredit its authors on its own merits.
As to how effective legal intervention against pimps, brothel-owners, johns and traffickers can help the women, youths and men driven to prostitution, one must first look at countries, such as Sweden, where existing laws or a change of legislatio have effectively reduced these exploitative practices. (I am assuming that we agree that not being sexually exploited is better than being sexually exploited. Perhaps I am wrong.)
Another factor is that buying sex is really a crime of opportunity; it generally does not answer a need that cannot be addressed by equalitarian relationships, but takes place when social conditions facilitate this exercise of privilege, e.g. on business trips, visits to impoverished countries, male outings, war brothels, etc. As such, the comparison with murder is inappropriate.
So taking away men’s opportunity to exercise this privilege unchecked has the effect of reducing their political entitlement to push into the sexual sphere their financial advantage and practice of further disposession of women, children and disposessed males, just as laws against domestic battery limit the cruelty and privilege of males in marriage, even if they do not solve all problems therein.
Not rocket science but, unfortunately, a rich field for denial from some quarters.
“Another factor is that buying sex is really a crime of opportunity”
Excellent point.
Kaley (and other liberal feminists), In response to your note addressed to Meghan (and all), even your language therein is misleading, in that you deliberately say “attacks” which, as we all know, is the age old way to try to make someone else look like the baddie (an attacker!) rather than describe what this piece and these comments actually ARE, which are critiques. Do you not think anyone should criticize or deconstruct what you have to say … even if it’s wrong? Are you more interested in being “right” and unquestioned than realizing you may have been wrong, thus becoming wiser, and consequently going on to change your previously held wrong opinion? Everything I have read here is intelligent, thoughtful, clear and respectful. So where are the attacks? I am sick of the propagandic language used by liberal feminists: “sex positive” (as if any of us are sex negative?!? And as if prostitution is “just sex” – RIGHT), “prohibitionist,” “sex worker” — all these terms are just meant to smear radical feminists and to make liberal/libertarian “feminists” look good, with a nod toward patriarchy’s approval/disapproval. Can we please stop this childish, clowning nonsense? Can we please start using words, terms and concepts that actually MEAN what they mean (and seriously, if we don’t know or aren’t sure, then we look them up and find out before applying them to people and things) rather than just to try to manipulate public opinion or be stridently, popularly “right” (even when we’re wrong)? No progress can be made when one part of our contingency refuses to speak in language that actually means anything, and so refuses to even allow for something as simple and basic as communication. Maybe that’s the whole point to begin with, just to waste a whole lot of time and energy on bullshit. I don’t know. Meanwhile women are being abused, raped and murdered.
I have to agree with Kaley and Marisa here. Meagan, with all due respect to the work you do, your response to Kaley’s invitation for discourse carried a needlessly condescending tone. I am also on said listserv and I personally admired Kaley – a self-described “young feminist” – for her courage to circulate her thoughts on a widely-read academic forum. Kaley is right to feel attacked by many of these comments. They are no different from the silencing tactics that the patriarchal system uses to discredit feminist arguments. Did you respond to correct Kaley or did you respond to mock and patronise Kaley? If you had “genuinely” wanted to correct Kaley you might have simply answered her question and shown her where you see the holes in her logic. But instead you belittled her understanding and invited her to “Try again”. Marisa’s husband is right. If we can’t convincingly show each other where our errors are we will never progress. What is the point in responding to another’s opinion if you’re not even going to try to educate them? Honestly.
Laura. I am ‘genuinely’ sick of having to correct, over and over again, this kind of misinformation that is spread, en masse, by decrim advocates and pro-sex work folks. I’m sure for many of them it is accidental (i.e. a lack of research, a lack of interest in listening to the ‘other side’), but for many I believe it is intentional and an attempt to discredit abolitionists and radical feminists. Kaley had ‘the courage’ to circulate her thoughts, yes, but does this mean that we may not respond when, ONCE AGAIN, these same lies are repeated? It is frustrating and in no way does it encourage discourse. It is disrespectful. Kaley’s arguments are far from being silenced, rather decrimanalization is very much favoured by both the popular and alternative press, in part, I believe, BECAUSE of this misinformation and in part because we believe (and are told) we have no other option, that prostitution is here to stay – ‘the oldest profession in the world’, is the (untrue) statement made over and over again to back up this cynical claim. It is offensive and indeed, if what she does want is discourse then she needs to ‘try again’. There is no conversation happening when one half of the parties involved are spreading lies. I believe I did try very hard to ‘educate’ Kaley. Perhaps it was not as polite as you would have liked but, as you may have gathered, her post was completely disrespectful towards abolitionists.
I would also like to add, once again, that I am not at all sure that there is any point in dialoguing with those who continue to support industries which support patriarchy and violence towards women (such as prostitution and pornography), but rather Kaley has asked for dialogue. If we want dialogue we need to listen to the other side and, based on her post, it didn’t seem as though she had been listening. Personally I think that Michael might be right – it is very possible that no dialogue is possible BUT ‘that continuing dialogue is useful to those whose world view is not yet committed.’ and so we will need to continue to make these corrections and continue these conversations if only so that those reading can make up their minds based on truths rather than slander.
Not sure I was explicit enough at one point there: *meant to smear radical feminists in that it erases their arguments that point to the abuse inherent in these practices, and thus attempts to erase those abuses.
Unfortunately this discourse is going nowhere and merely repeating well trodden paths. Everybody attacking everyone does not advance the cause of the people at the centre of this – sex workers.
Let’s just respect each others’ differences and try and listen a little harder to the men, women and others who work in this profession.
Again, who is “attacking” whom? And how do you define “attack”?
And which women are we supposed to listen to? Only the ones who say they love “sex” “work”? Because I’m a woman who “worked” in this “profession” and I’m an abolitionist. In fact, I think johns should be shot in the fucking face and their money distributed to women who “work” in the “trade.” It’s not neat and pretty and it doesn’t fit with your agenda, but there it is.
As Meghan has written elsewhere, and I agree, if we’re going to have everyone in the tent we might as well not have a tent at all.
Thanks Joy. I would also argue, Michael, that the ‘people’ who are at the centre of ‘this’ are women. All women. Prostituted women, especially, but male privilege, male power, male violence against women – those things affect all women. This is about the status of women around the world, not just about a few individual people who think it might be fun to dabble in sex work and who can get out whenever they feel like it. Men don’t get to buy women. Period. I am a woman, I have a say. You are ignoring the fact that, as Joy and Rebecca (and others) have made clear, there are many women who have exited the trade and are abolitionists. Don’t you think that people who are working in the profession *might* be invested in trying not to feel completely victimized and abused? As I’m sure you know, women often see things very differently after they have been out of this ‘profession’, as you call it, than they do while they are dependent and engaged in that lifestyle.
Hi Meghan,
I am not opposed to engaging. I will even drop the word prohibition. I am actually interested in an answer to how criinalising prostitution (either from the seller or buyer side), will work towards abolishing prostitution? What role does the tactic of advocating for the criminalisation of johns in your overall political strategy to end prostitution?
Thank you,
Kaley
I’m not Meghan, but I do want the abolition of prostitution. I wrote about this on my blog:
“I’ve been thinking recently about how I can be an ally to sex workers while simultaneously advocating the dismantling of the prostitution industry. Chiefly, is that even possible? So far, I have not received an answer to either of these questions. It disturbs me to think that I’d be at odds with the women in the industry, women who are vulnerable enough as it is. While I haven’t seen this topic elaborated on, I assume this alliance would still entail advocating for legalization of prostitution. Unfortunately, that is something I absolutely cannot and will not do, for one very obvious reason. Legalization will inevitably lead to growth of the prostitution industry, and along with it, human trafficking.”
It’s not so much that we’re for *criminalizing* the johns as we are against *legalizing* them. Legalization is an act of support to the industry, whether or not we intend it to be. Criminalization is just the system that is in place. We neither support it nor fight it. Criminalization is not an adequate strategy for combating prostitution, but legalizing it will help it expand. Thus, stalemate.
It is one step, among many, in terms of creating an egalitarian society. We must say, as a society, that women’s bodies are not things which can be bought and sold and tossed away. Legalizing prostitution, essentially, further normalizes and entrenches male privilege and power. I think it is an extremely cynical thing to do as it really just says: ‘ we have no other choice’. We do have another choice. The choice is to dismantle patriarchal structures that marginalize and exploit women. We need the law, but we also need education and support systems.
When the time comes that people’s bodies “are not things which can be bought and sold and tossed away” in the comm on perception, will it still be possible to buy and sell sex and commercially harvest fruit?
For the record, Decius thinks women’s bodies are exactly like fruit. Objects to be bought and sold.
Note, asshole: it’s not “sex” that’s being bought and sold. It’s WOMEN. “Women” is not synonymous with “sex”, much as you think it is.
Also for the record, I fully support a worldwide workers’ revolution in all trades. Let people grow and pick their own fruit, and jerk themselves off too.
Joy great reply to Decius! And thanks for this post Megan.
I am so tired of how those who support the status quo of the sex trade, are so dismissive and patronising to women to have survive the sex trade who are now abortionists. It is no surprise that the many exited women who now do fabulous work to bring about real change and justice for the prostituted class, are usually silent about their past. It takes great courage to be open, (kudos to Joy and so many others).
As Omnia Vanitas has said language is vital, and is a powerful weapon use to silence abolitionists.
The use over and over and again of sex work or sex worker – is used override that abolitionist reject that term. Sex work is the language of the profiteers of the sex trade, and is use to cover up the violence and degradation that is the norm. It is also a clever ploy for the sex trade to have the veneer of being left-wing and women friendly.
Prostitution is not sex – it is being owned and controlled as living porn toys. There is no communication – it can never be equal when there is a buyer and seller, and the prostitute is just viewed as goods.
It is not work – it is an abuse of basis human rights, it is violence. Calling it work, is deeply insulting to vast majority of the prostituted who live with sexual, mental and physical abuse/torture as their norm.
Calling it sex work, is to give the sex trade free rein – with the veneer of harm reduction.
Harm reduction is the language of viewing the prostituted as goods – that should fix up and then sent back into the violence of the sex trade. It is like giving soldiers enough mental relief in a hospital – in order to get them fit enough to go back to the war.
Most harm reduction is more about making punters feel that they will not get diseases off the prostitute. Harm reduction is about having the veneer of being a “caring employer” – but only in the brief period of any inspection or when wanting to recruit more women or girls. Harm reduction does not encourage serious and holistic methods for the prostituted to exit. Harm reduction is a band-aid on a cut throat.
There is constant dismissive that abolitionists are forming holistic and often exited women-led ways to make holistic and long-term ways to help women exit the sex trade permanently. This must include specialise and focused work with the trauma that is usually extreme. It this trauma, that makes it hard to leave the sex trade – for inside the sex trade emotions and being fully human is deaden – feeling the terror, pain and grief is horrific.
I find the concept that coz women inside the sex trade say they are happy or have the appearance of being happy – not just naive, but on occasions a wilful choice to cover up the violence that is their norm.
Many women in domestic violence – will say they love their abuser, that they can change their abuser behaviour, they are fine.
Many girls abuse by those who should be their carers – will say they love their abuser, that it must their nature to be treated like this, that it is private so back off.
Women who have be on the receiving end of acquaintance rape often try to understand what they did to provoke their rapist, they will try to change their behaviour to be safe.
We would usually say in those scenarios, that those women and girls are only blaming themselves, for to see they could not control male violence is unbearable.
But we change the rules for the prostituted class.
If she said she is happy, then that becomes a full stop, Then we refuse to see how she has adapted to a life where most of her choices have been stolen from her, by constant mental, physical and sexual violence.
I like nearly all prostitutes who doing it long-term and with little or no access to exiting – said loudly and in a defiance voice that I choose my life, that how dare anyone criticise my lifestyle. I would be the “happy hooker”. That was a vital survival technique – for to know I was just disposable goods, that I had no power or control over what violence was done to me – that would of been impossible to live with.
It only if you are lucky enough to exit, and get completely away from the life – that the reality of what it is to be prostituted smashing down into the survivors – that is PTSD.
To end, when I say that those who support the sex trade considered exited women who are now abolitionists as traitors – I was speaking of an organised and focused attack on our voices – not that it should lessen to just an individual attack. That is very patronising.
There are many street based survival sex workers who hate being in the trade and wish they could leave. Yes, this is true. It it also true that the majority of the women I know in this position support full decriminalization as it will create a safer environment for them.
Did some of us forget to reread this first:
The Myths of Bedford v. Canada: Why decriminalizing prostitution won’t help
http://www.feminisms.org/3265/the-myths-of-bedford-v-canada-why-decriminalizing-prostitution-won%E2%80%99t-help/
Prostitution: if you think it should NOT be abolished… show me studies etc. that it benefits most or all women, show me that it has a positive effect on society’s and men’s attitude toward women. etc. etc. Can’t do it? Then Abolition is the Gold Standard. The conversation should soon be about how best to dismantle it and minimize the difficulties of the women currently working as prostitutes.
There is too much hate and anger on this page and not not enough love and generosity and willingness to try and understand each other’s viewpoints.
While this has been depicted as a women’s issue, we need to remember all genders are involved in these exchanges, and that many women, including those who self-identify as feminists do not support the dominant discourse on this page.
With regard to validating the experiences of those who exited and support this position, this has to be balanced by the voices of those who have the opposite opinion, including those actively working. All these voices equally deserve respect and validation.
So, women shouldn’t be entitled to hate and anger (I would add rage), at their oppressors? And at a white, male supremacist capitalist system which lives women prey to sexual predators?
What’s your stake in this, Michael? That you care about women soooo much and want to fight for justice for us? As the saying goes, with allies like you, who needs enemies.
“With regard to validating the experiences of those who exited and support this position, this has to be balanced by the voices of those who have the opposite opinion, including those actively working. All these voices equally deserve respect and validation.”
Michael, after reviewing your academic pursuits (as provided by your linked-to CV) it doesn’t look as if you promote any position regarding “sex work” (some abolitionists reject such a term) besides that which supports full decriminalization. Does this mean you aren’t balancing your work with the voices of the opposite opinion? Or maybe you have but have since concluded you aren’t convinced? But does that then mean you aren’t respecting or validating abolitionists?
A similar sentiment is expressed in these discussions all the time by the full decrim. side (but you were mighty vague so hard to accuse you directly) which amounts to: you don’t agree with me thus I am concluding you’re simply not respecting my opinion or *not listening at all*.
With regards to those who see this as a war of words, I think we can work something out. I see no reason why those who want to be called abolitionists should not do so, provided it is clear what they mean. The term has changed meanings a number of times over the centuries originally supporting the abolition of the nineteenth century system of regulation. Abolitionists want to abolish sexual exchange, that seems clear, and they are entitled to that viewpoint. Where the two sides vary is the reasons for advancing that position, and how to achieve it.
On the other hand those who favour the term prohibition are looking on this from a very different perspective. They see laws that attach criminal sanctions to actions associated with sexual exchange as part of a generic societal attempt to suppress ‘vice’ and are correct that lawmakers and moral reformers frequently bundle prostitution, crime, alcohol and drugs into a package of human activities that must be suppressed by the law and agents of social control. Those opposed to this see the problems with the suppression of any of these activities as having common roots. (Eg Meadowcroft J. Prohibitions. IEA, London 2008)
Both terms have validity and are not mutually exclusive, provided everyone is clear what they mean.
Thank you very much Michael for trying to bring both objectivity and common sense to this discussion.
Esther
A man of whom may be a consumer of prostitution is hardly objective.
Michael talks about “vice.”
No, we are talking about the trading in human beings as if they are possessions.
It is not the possessions’ fault. It is not OUR “vice” (which is such a born-again-sounding word, which I’m sure is meant to draw false parallels between radical feminists and fundamentalist preachers, when I assure you I don’t know of a single radical feminist who actually talks about “vice”).
It is men’s insatiable desire to buy and sell women that is the problem, the “vice.” As I’ve said before, women are doing what they have to do. It’s men who are BUYING OTHER HUMAN BEINGS.
Also, by Esther’s standards, anyone who does not see human beings as possessions is lacking in common sense and objectivity. Very edgy and hip. I bet all the faux-rational, human-buying men just love that and dole out a truckload of pats on the head for it.
How do you reconcile the concept of “doing what they have to do” with the desire to abolish prostitution?
Will the women who currently “have to” cease to exist, or will it turn out that there really is another possibility? The vast majority of women sex workers have decided that prostitution is less undesirable than the alternative; to reduce prostitution, provide better alternatives instead of making sex work absolutely worse.
You are speaking as if we don’t seek to provide other opportunities for women. We are FEMINISTS. Abolishing prostitution is ONE part of disassembling patriarchy. Providing educational opportunities, dismantling rape culture, these are things we all work for AT THE SAME TIME. The abolition of prostitution coincides with society ceasing to see women as sex objects, making it much easier to find work and much less unpleasant.
P.S. sex-pozzies, add victim blaming to the list of qualities you find acceptable in allies. It’s painfully obvious what Decius is trying to imply in “or will it turn out that there really is another possibility?”.
The sexual perpetrators who buy access to women’s bodies could just GIVE women their money instead! How’s that for “another possibility?” Or do you care less about women’s well-being than male access to women’s bodies?
Okaayy… I think you just suggested a welfare/security net/socialist system, where anybody who can’t meet their basic needs is subsidized in a manner inversely related to their means. There’s nothing wrong with that type of system, in theory. In practice, it feels unequal to the people doing the subsidizing (which I can live with).
It might even work to reduce the number of people who enter prostitution because of severe economic hardship. It will also reduce the number of people who enter the workforce because of severe economic hardship. I don’t think welfare can eliminate prostitution, but it probably helps with some demographics.
It really doesn’t sound at the moment as if the positions outlined here have much chance of coming closer together. This is perhaps not surprising given the deep and persistent schisms which the issue has caused within feminisms.
Nevertheless dialogue is important if we are ever going to understand each other. It was suggested above that my academic work suggests the necessity of decriminalisation as a necessary but not sufficient condition to improving the conditions of sex workers. Again this should hardly be surprising since the vast majority of academics have come to the same conclusion. Furthermore I have always believed that abolitionists also favour such an approach – that is they do not support victimisation of those involved in sex work. Hopefully we can agree on this?
We might therefore ask why this is so. Basically the two sides represent two very different approaches to conceptualising the issue. Those who identify as abolitionists rely on essentialism. That is the starting point of discussion is that sexual transaction is, in its essence, violence and exploitation. The alternative viewpoint favoured by the academic community is based on empiricism. That is to seek for evidence that confirms or refutes a particular viewpoint. In this case the issue is whether violence and exploitation are inherent in sexual transaction or are instead the products of structural factors that shape the nature of sexual exchange. The key structural factors appear to be stigma and criminalisation.
It was suggested to me by one of the writers here that the traditional viewpoints being expressed here are so deeply embedded that no dialogue is possible. Even if that were true I think that continuing dialogue is useful to those whose world view is not yet committed.
Dr Michael Goodyear,
Department of Medicine, Dalhousie University
Global Coordinator, Centre for Sex Work Research and Policy
Michael, do you always *talk around* the women with whom you so deeply wish to develop this “dialogue”??
Several times now you have entered this thread to announce all that is going wrong with The Debate, but never once address the women who take issue with you, specifically. Then, after ignoring us for the umpteenth time, you give yourself a damn title signature (which all but tells us you are a white male in a white male supremacy–daring!) in a freaking !comment thread!.
How Man of you.
So we’re clear, you’re not the only one (HINT) coming at this from Public Health Academia.
And, since you’re an “empiricist,” I’m going to need some evidence that supports the following claim:
“The alternative viewpoint [full decrim] favoured by the academic community…”
I’m also going to need to see some evidence that abolitionists don’t use “evidence.” ????
The crux of this debate, as I see it, could be summed up in one question (for full decrim supporters): Why do you trust men? Why, during this ongoing, sexual violence pandemic, do you trust men with legal, sexual access to female bodies?
Men have proven they will rape and sexually torment ANY FEMALE, from birth to death. In public spaces or in the tiniest of home closets. As a means to get dinner or as a full-blown war tactic. There is no *speck* on the spectrum of Time, Place or Circumstance left untouched by male pillage and colonization of the female body. That’s backed by empirical evidence stacked to depressing heights. You know this.
Why do you trust men?
pisaquari
RadFem Extraordinaire
Department of Women’s Liberation
Yes, pisaquari. Yes!
Thank you for this comment. Well-said.
“Those who identify as abolitionists rely on essentialism. That is the starting point of discussion is that sexual transaction is, in its essence, violence and exploitation.”
No, one does not have to rely on essentialism to wave the abolitionist flag. Sexual transaction does not have “an essense” independent of the social setting where it happens. Our social setting (see feminist studies department on “patriarchy”) is such that sexual transactions cannot be but exploitative.
Change the setting and perhaps sexual transaction can be all fair and non-exploitative. Only, it might well be that there are no “sexual transactions” in non-patriarchal society..
I think the idea that doing something for money that you wouldn’t do for free means you don’t consent doesn’t work. If I work at McDonald’s, I don’t want to work there, but I do it because I want the money. This is not considered slavery. McDonald’s doesn’t own me, I am merely exercising freedom of contract, giving McDonald’s a service they want in exchange for something I want (money). Similarly, a prostitute who has sex with a man for money is exchanging a service, sex, for something the man wants (also money). To call prostitution rape because the woman wouldn’t consent if money weren’t involved only works if you want to take a wage slavery view of the service sector in general. I don’t see why sex worker is an inaccurate term.
Although they are a small percentage of prostitutes, especially worldwide, at least some high-end prostitutes seem happy with their jobs. They are paid hundreds of dollars an hour, and have some control over when they work. Going forward the internet seems like a great medium for women to advertise services, as they can contract and contact directly with the johns, avoiding potentially abusive and confiscatory pimps.
A better solution than banning prostitution would be to address the problems that lead to women having so few options that despite extreme opposition to prostitution, they do it anyway. A basic income guarantee would go a long way towards preventing the poverty that often leads to exploitative prostitution. I don’t know what you have in Canada, but the U.S. poverty assistance is tied to showing that you have or have had a job, which of course in a cash only illegal business you cannot prove. The only way around that is if you have children, which has its own set of issues if you can’t support yourself.
I don’t mean to make this entirely an economic issue. Your podcast talked about a lot of social issues, such as the rampant misogyny in mainstream pornography and the effects that has on relationships. Not sure what can be done about that, other than raising awareness. But I think exploitative prostitution is a result of desperate, powerless women, and at least in developed countries ineffective social programs to prevent poverty are the major cause.
No, MEN BUYING WOMEN
let me repeat that
MEN
BUYING
WOMEN
is the cause.
Thanking you kindly if you’d get your head out of your ass.
Do you think that misogyny is spontaneously created in men, in some manner not related to genetics or learned behavior? Are the priorities of women formed independently of their social situation?
Or are there complex causes to the problem of men buying women, such that addressing the root cause can reduce or eliminate the problem?
Could/should sex work survive like this?
“SUBVERTING THE STATUS QUO”
An abbreviated excerpt from:
Should Feminists Oppose Prostitution?
Laurie Shrage
“What can a person who works in the sex industry do to subvert widely held attitudes toward her work? To subvert the beliefs which currently structure commercial sex in our society, the female prostitute would need to assume the role not of a sexual subordinate but of a sexual equal or superior. For instance, if she were to have the authority to determine what services the customer could get, under what conditions the customer could get them, and what they would cost, she would gain the status of a sexual professional. Should she further want to establish herself as a sexual therapist, she would need to represent herself as having some type of special technical knowledge for solving problems having to do with human sexuality. In other words, experience is not enough to establish one’s credentials as a therapist or professional. How ever, if the industry were reformed so that all these conditions were met, what would distinguish the prostitute’s work from that of a bona fide “sexual therapist”? … [I]f prostitution were sufficiently transformed to make it completely nonoppressive to women, though commercial transactions involving sex might still exist, prostitution as we now know it would not.”
A way to ensure that prostitutes had control over available services and prices would be to ban pimping but not patronizing, and only allow prostitution in the form of co-ops, where the prostitutes own the brothel, and can establish whatever working conditions they see fit. I don’t know that there would be much political demand for Marxist brothels, and the financing would be problematic. Also if they set prices too high street prostitution would probably not go away.
The widely held attitudes toward a person who works in the sex industry are mainly moral, right? As far as credentials go, I don’t think that convincing people that you are a very talented and knowledgable sex worker is the road to respect for the profession. While on this blog there is a strong feminist opposition to prostitution, at least in the U.S. an overwhelming majority of the opposition to prostitution is conservative and religious. The question “What can a person who works in the sex industry do to subvert widely held attitudes toward her work?” is an interesting one, and I don’t know what the answer is.
“if she were to have the authority to determine what services the customer could get, under what conditions the customer could get them, and what they would cost”
How widely held (among the people contributing here) that sex workers, in general, do not currently determine what services are available under what conditions and at what payment? Every other provider of every other service has to make those decisions.
There is no pressure to provide condomless sex, other orifices, or other acts that may injure the person, in order to keep up with the competition and growing sexual entitlement from men. They don’t offer condomless sex because they WANT TO HAVE CONDOMLESS SEX. Plumbers do not have to constantly up the ante.
The quote above from Laurie Shrage’s paper “Should Feminists Oppose Prostitution?” shows an approach toward a possible future for prostitution but not the whole picture.
The Laurie Shrage paper goes far beyond the simplified approach I put in the previous post and it contains for me convincing arguments for abolition of prostitution. I recommend it to those who are still interested in exploring the issues.
Googled up and available on Michael Goodyear’s site. Thanks Michael.
http://myweb.dal.ca/mgoodyea/Documents/Philosophy%20and%20morality/Should%20feminists%20oppose%20prostitution%20Shrage%20Ethics%2099(2)347%201989.pdf
For the record, I was so harsh to John because (apart from his name — is he named John, or is he a john?):
Yes, a restaurant worker doesn’t have a fun job. You can get splashed with hot grease or hot water or chemicals, which is painful; you can possibly get injured if you handle knives or cutting/slicing equipment, or if you slip on the floor, or if you handle heavy boxes or massive trays of dishes, etc.; your coworkers and bosses could be mean, vindictive assholes; it’s hot and hectic and not intellectually stimulating and not very fun.
But you’re not having your mucous membranes abraded, dozens and dozens of times a day. You’re not sustaining injuries to your mouth, vulva, perineum, and probably anus. You’re not risking a host of sexually transmitted infections, diseases, and crabs. You’re not being spat upon, beaten, raped, and called horrible names that mock your humanity and wholeness as a human being who’s good only for the ways a man can use you for sex. You won’t risk pregnancy and its myriad complications, which even in a developed nation can include death. You won’t have to have a call button in case someone tries to murder you. You won’t have to wonder if your next customer is going to be the one who murders you. If you are murdered on the job, the cops will probably treat your case seriously and try to apprehend your murderer. If you are raped, the cops might not laugh at and mock you because “they paid their check and tipped you, that means you can’t be raped.” And so on and so forth.
The service industries all suck and are undignified, pretty much by nature. So in that sense, “prostitution really is like any other service-industry job.” But arguing that prostitution is exactly like any other service industry job in every sense is completely disingenuous.
Also, if you heard that customers were wantonly beating, raping, infecting, disfiguring, and murdering staff at a local restaurant, you would at the very least stop patronizing that restaurant — right? You would probably even try to get it shut down, and not for any moral reason other than “people don’t deserve to be beaten, raped, infected, disfigured, and murdered.” Right? You’d probably think the people doing the beating, raping, etc. were terrible people who should cease and desist this behavior, correct?
You wouldn’t argue that the patrons should be protected because they can’t help themselves. You wouldn’t fight for the restaurant to remain open because everyone knows what they’re signing up for when they go to work there. You wouldn’t … go to that restaurant yourself. Would you?
Of course you would, if you’re a fucking john.
DING DING DING! Joy hit the nail on the head. “You wouldn’t argue that the patrons should be protected because they can’t help themselves. You wouldn’t fight for the restaurant to remain open because everyone knows what they’re signing up for when they go to work there. You wouldn’t … go to that restaurant yourself. Would you?”
Joy,
That was an absolutely brilliant reply.
McDonald’s doesn’t have multiple call buttons in a small space for its employees, because they’re very rarely threatend with death or severe physical assault on the job. And while we both are anti service work and the capitalist economy, I can’t say I’ve ever experienced PTSD from any of the myriad of horrible retail jobs I’ve worked.
“John,” if prostitution is such great work, why aren’t men advocating that more men should be able to “work” in the industry? Instead, all the time is spent vying for women to be “kept” in the industry.
Again, if the men really buying access to women’s bodies wanted to help them in this grossly unfair wage system, they could start by just paying them and not demand women sexually service them.
And how do you know that the women you refer to as happy really are? Acting happy is part of the “job.” Look what Joy has written about her and many other women absolutely despising–and that’s being nice–the men who bought them.
I probably should have made this clearer, but John is my name; I do not pay people to have sex with me.
I’m not sure where the quote came from for “prostitution really is like any other service industry job,” but it wasn’t me. I wasn’t saying that the working conditions are similar for street prostitutes and McDonald’s employees. I don’t mean to imply that any of my friends who work in the fast food industry would trade their job for a job where they are spat upon, beaten, raped, and called horrible names. My comparison of prostitution to working at McDonald’s was on a consent level, not a respect from customers/clients level.
My point was that when someone willingly does something because they want the money that they will get if they do it, they consent. I would rather flip burgers than have sex with strangers. But I’d rather not do either of those things. To say that prostitution is inherently rape (which, admittedly, is not said in the original post, but was one of Meghan’s responses to Hugo Schwyzer regarding Slutwalk, and is agreed with by at least some prominent anti-prostitution feminists on Wikipedia, namely Catharine MacKinnon) because the women doing it would rather not do it doesn’t seem to follow for me. People do things they would rather not do all the time for money.
I’m not saying that prostitutes are never raped. When they are raped, it’s rape. But the act of having sex for money is not inherently rape any more than flipping burgers for money is slavery.
I understand the argument that flipping burgers for money is slavery. If you can’t survive not doing it, which financially may be the case, then you don’t have much of a choice but to work for others, in the same way that if you can’t support yourself without being a prostitute then you don’t have much of a choice. But unless you’re willing to take this radical stance on economic exploitation, calling prostitution that women choose to do because their options are limited rape is a strange view of consent.
Just so we’re all clear, this is what I said (I think this is the post you are referring to, John?): ‘Just to be clear, I don’t believe that prostitution is work, I believe it is exploitative and abusive and I believe it is a legitimized form of rape. It’s not the same as providing a service like physiotherapy, nor is it the same as cleaning a toilet, as certain decriminalization advocates have implied. What other ‘job’ is so gendered? What other ‘work’ involves being called abusive words, rape or depictions of rape, the giving over of your body to another for them to do with it what they wish? This ‘work’ is very much dependant on race, class, and gender and reinforces a perception of women (not just some women, all women) as objects, not humans.’
Money doesn’t necessarily = consent. If a person is desperate and then you pay them to do something degrading, that is coercive and manipulative. Not ethical. Paying a woman to let you do things to her that she would not otherwise consent to because she needs to pay her rent and you know that she can’t really say no because otherwise she won’t be able to pay her rent does not equal a fair exchange between adults. Just because McDonalds pays their employees does not mean they can also degrade, humiliate, and abuse them.
John would totally still go to that restaurant.
Because hey, the employees know what they’re getting into. And besides, he pays them. Even tips them. That means they’re fair game and must be totally cool with whatever comes next.
Because John has no empathy or, I daresay, humanity.
I am sorry but being prostituted is not part of the service industry, unless you class the prostituted as goods, and therefore sub-human.
It is nothing like being a cleaner or working with fast food – of course both of these can and do have terrible conditions, and can be treated very badly by their employers. But it is not the same having to live with the constant threat of rape, of being beaten up, of being move into more sadistic aspects of the sex trade as “punishhment, or knowing at any time you could be murdered. Also, most cleaners and fast food employees when they leave do have extreme PTSD, do not internal injuries, do not have long-term STDs. This is common with survivors of the sex trade.
The thing is prostitution is not sex trade – and it is sex without full consent, for money or goods does not make consent but coercion.
“John”,
It lacks basic human compassion that you would come on a feminist blog defending the sale of women’s bodies and use the name “John” as your screen name, even if it is your birth name.
The people saying they were raped every time they were bought for sexual abuse are women who have worked in the industry. Choosing the support the most violated women is certainly a feminist position.
No, not all of prostituted women say this, but there are plenty that do, and many aren’t willing to discuss their experiences on the Internet because they know people such as yourself will read about them.
Good point, womononajourney. I’m always afraid some asshole will have a good wank over my suffering, even though I never share details anyway out of sensitivity to other women’s triggers.
A few jackasses have actually responded to my posts elsewhere saying, essentially, “Thanks, I just busted a nut over the fact that you were in pain.” These are the kinds of men who purchase women.
Thank you so much Joy.
If working in MacDonald’s is so like being prostituted – then as I say at meeting, when you do something wrong with the burgers, is the “punishment” that your head is shoved in a toilet whist you are anally raped.
Thanks, Rebecca. Just so you know, you’re one of my internet heroes, so this means a lot to me.
It’s really important to have survivors’ voices heard, and in order for that we need to speak. We unhappy hookers who haven’t been “born again”.
You already know this, but, for others’ benefit:
That’s a really icky myth, that only exited women who were religious to begin with or who have “found god” or “are repressed” can possibly object to the use of women. That we’re all just hanky-clutching in vapors over “sin!” This is simply not true, which I will explain in a moment.
The original female prohibition lobby was tarred with the same brush. Many of them were indeed Christian, but the main objection to alcohol wasn’t “ooh, those bad people will drink of the sin liquor!” The women’s temperance movement (Christian or not) just wanted men to stop drinking up their earnings, leaving their wives and children with no income, and then beating and raping said women and children while drunk. Then, as is now, alcohol was a serious social problem.
But unlike with buying a human being, having a drink doesn’t automatically make someone a bad person. If you have a drink, and then don’t do anything stupid, you’ve just had a drink. If you have *purchased another human being*, then you are automatically a fucking horrible person: because you think you can *purchase another human being.* Essentially, you have just gone to a slave auction and come away with a purchase, even though it’s one you can’t keep. Is anyone arguing that enslaving people was a good, great, natural, and unavoidable idea?
Likewise, abolitionist women aren’t in need of smelling salts over an idea of our own (and others’) “lost” “virtue.” We just want men to stop treating women like property. And beating and raping us, etc.
Because there is NO human being who deserves to be bought and sold, and especially no human being who deserves to have their head shoved in a toilet during anal rape.
It seems it impossible for the pro-sex work lobbyists to imagine that women who have exited the sex trade have become abolitionists because they do not want any other woman or girl to be sexually, mentally and mentally abused by the punters and profiteers of the sex trade. We oppose the sex trade because it is structured on violence, and on making women and girls into sexual goods – that is it is designed to make the prostituted class sub-humans. We protest and fight or abolition because it a human rights issue – not out of narrow morals, not from a position of shame about our pasts.
This is continually dismissed or patronised by the sex work lobbyists – who paint us as unintelligent, like the violence of the sex trade has knocks our brains – though of course they are in deep denial that there can any real violence in indoors prostitution or most porn. Of course, they pretend we are religious fanatics – usually a sign they have have few or no rationale views left, so personal insults may work. There is the old, old classic of saying exited women who are now abolitionists – must of been in the criminal aspects of the sex trade (like any of it is not highly capable of terrible criminal acts against the prostituted) – or were just very “unlucky” to be on the receiving end of extreme and calculated hate and violence.
It all designed to shut us up – for we were not meant to have survived the sex trade, especially not to do more that just survived, but to remember clearly and with amazing courage the true conditions of the sex trade. We have no choice but to be abolitionists – for the sex trade cannot continue the mass rapes, the mass sexual torturing, the constant disappearances of so many prostituted women and girls, and having a whole class of the prostituted made sub-humans.
For us, abolition is about saving lives and giving the prostituted full dignity and the basis right to be a full human.
I read the comments of the blog you are responding to. I have a few things I’d like to say about the way the pro-decriminalization of ALL aspects of the sex industry frame their simplistic arguments.
1) Women aren’t paid to have abortions. This means its a matter of COMMERCE not human rights. You don’t have the right to do anything you want for a living. SORRY.
2) Iamcuriousblue who is a renowned anti-feminist who has released private information about a young radical feminist online in his past, apart from being an abusive moron claims that by calling ourselves “abolitionists” we seek to allign ourselves with Sojourner Truth, etc.
What he fails to understand is that she was adamantly against prostitution which is not surprising seeing as she was a slave in her life and saw many black women sexually exploited by slavemasters and the white populace generally. There’s a reason why the majority of prostituted women today are not white. Its completely tied into colonialism, imperialism, and slavery. You cannot erase that history. When people argue for decriminalization they argue that whats been happening to non-white women since white people invaded these lands is ACCEPTABLE, NORMAL, PERMISSABLE.
We owe young women a better world than one where its acceptable to rent their bodies for sex. We need to abolish prostitution itself.
Excellent response. Thank you Terri.
I’ve heard about this iamcuriousblue guy harassing feminists several times now. Is there anywhere I can read in detail about his history?
No, there isn’t. But its not a bad idea if we all get together and share our experiences about this fuck. He just makes shit up and lies mostly but he’s actually tried to come after me IRL several times now.
Pathetic.
Shoot me an email, I would love to talk some more – about other things too, I mean.
There isn’t really a debate going on here at all. There is a group of people who hold certain convictions on the nature of transactional intimacy and sex with a fervour. While everyone is entitled to an opinion there also seems an unwillingness to consider any other viewpoint. This is a problem with certain feminist positions, they leave no room for what Elizabeh Iglesias refers to as a ‘redemptory trajectory’ (Elizabeth M. Iglesias: Rape, Race, and Represemtation: The power of discourse, discourses of power, and the reconstruction of heterosexuality. 49 Vanderbilt Law Review 869-992 (1996)).
My remarks are directed rather to those who are not committed. While the wrongs of patriarchal hegemony are undeniable, there appears to be a belief that sexual transaction is an icon of that power imbalance, rather than an intrinsic part of human nature and society – we trade what we have for what we desire. By focusing purely on the context of women selling to men, the nature of that transaction is obscured.
Don’t you think it’s a bit essentialist to posit that prostitution is “an intrinsic part of human nature and society”? Indeed, there actually is no way one can prove or disprove such a theory.
“we trade what we have for what we desire.” So why is it overwhelmingly men who are trading FOR sex? I’m pretty sure nobody here believes women have a lower sex drive than men.
‘Transactional intimacy’? Seriously? What exactly do you mean by this? From the sounds of it, you are the one who is ‘essentializing’, hence the whole ‘sexual transaction is an intrinsic part of human nature and society’ argument. Patriarchy is not ‘natural’ and therefore men buying women as though they are things is not ‘natural’ or an innate part of society. Do you really believe that a context of male power and privilege has nothing to do with the existence of prostitution?
NICE TRY NS and Meghan, but the Good Doctor does not talk to the wimmins. He simply marches in with his comment-thread-stethoscope and diagnoses all the problems.
It would appear that neither side accepts the status quo (as was found in the 2006 Parliamentary subcommittee report on solicitation laws) and therefore seek social change. To achieve this requires defining objectives and identifying strategies and resources to reach those. Rage is unlikely to be a useful vehicle to this end.
Abolitionists wish to see sexual exchange disappear, as part of a drive towards more equality and the dismantling of patriarchy. However changing human behaviour is complex and difficult. Over thousands of years many cultures have sought this with interventions varying from the death sentence to mandatory imprisonment and rehabilitation in totalitarian regimes through to sanctions directed solely towards purchasers, currently favoured by this group, and as practised for instance in Sweden. Despite this there is scant evidence that any of these processes have made any appreciable difference, and have caused much suffering.
Views regarding sexual transaction, to return to the original theme, like other moral issues including the death penalty and abortion, cause deep divisions in society that are not easily resolved. It has been said that laws cannot make men moral, so the achievement of this goal may be best pursued by social rather than legislative ends. Furthermore since all things occur in context and have reasons, efforts directed to causes are likely to be more successful. For instance in a a society in which women continue to experience inequality in economic opportunities, exchanging sex continues to be a relatively attractive economic proposition compared to menial minimal wage service industry employment. Therefore addressing the abolition of sexual exchange cannot succeed unless we address the whole context of power and economic inequality in our society.
“Therefore addressing the abolition of sexual exchange cannot succeed unless we address the whole context of power and economic inequality in our society.”
“the achievement of this goal may be best pursued by social rather than legislative ends” We obviously do this. You are on a feminist blog. We don’t intend to abolish prostitution through the use of legislation. It’s just that we don’t want to *support* prostitution through legislation either.
Michael, I have just read this whole thread – thank you to most of you for your awesome insights – and I want to call you on your extremely abusive behaviour of labeling this debate in the first sentence every f*cking time, as if you were some god-ordained arbiter berating unruly children or Natives and expressing your dissatisfaction, instead of what we know you are, an advocate fully engaged on one side of this struggle.
Since you are an academic, I urge you to take a look at your behaviour using an anti-colonialist lens (since I don’t trust you to do so through a profeminist one).
It is unacceptable (and indeed quite laughable).
Please stop it.
All of these statements like “sex workers should have a right toorganize” and “sex workers deserve to be treated properly” are alarming to me as no femminist I know ever wanted to deny any of these things. I think all feminists can agree that want women to not be treated like shit. Unfortunately an outstanding number of women around the world are being treated like shit – not because they did anything to deserve the shit, but because men, as a class, around the world, feel entitled to women’s bodies. This is because our human society has been deeply embedded in white supremacist and male supremacist values. These values are status quo. These values are patriarchal. These values created prostitution and other forms of exploitation. These values are the cause of many, if not nearly all, problems in the world. One looks to these institutions and sees hunger, poverty, rape, murder, and war. The male-dominated capitalist machine has made it so that selling and subordinating human beings, the outstanding majority of them being female, has become normalized. To me, this argument is not as much about everyone’s personal feelings and positions as much as it is the actual institution of prostitution that has been with us for a terribly long time. Many other systems and institutions have been abolished but this institution remains intact. I believe it is because women, as a class, are viewed as less-than-human. This notion of women as an inferior class has lead to systems and institutions, one of which is prostitution. This notion needs to abolished. This, as well as other institutions that perpetuate extreme violence, racism, classism, sexism and homophobia, need to be abolished. By abolish I mean that they should not be. In an egalitarian world they would not be. In fact, to keep my sanity and my passion, I must picture this world where patriarchy is obsolete. When patriarchy is obsolete, the many horrors of the world, I truly believe, will begin to lose their appeal. It may not happen soon, but eventually the humanity will shine through in the world again.
Nevertheless, I try my best not to tell women who are not abolitionists or who support decriminalization that they are wrong or less-than-intelligent because of the way they pay their bills, feed themselves or their children – and I think most identified radical women can say the same and I believe we have been clear. My intent, and further, my philosophy about all of this lies in the sheer desire for a better world. To me, this entire argument goes deeper than all of our possible discussions – it goes right down to the core of how power is concentrated in our society and what that means for everyone, but particularly women and well, anyone who isn’t a white heterosexual middle class man. Right now, it means that every facet of daily life is existing within an oppressive and patriarchal framework. Some people face more oppression than others and this shouldn’t be denied, however; we must not forget that our lives – our choices or lack thereof, do not exist in some kind of vacuum. They grow and change with the dominant culture and take on new forms within the oppressive paradigm. This is the concern. The root is the concern for me and probably for many other radical left folks.
Anyway, that’s my two cents in the middle of this clearly heated comment section…
BK
Also, to everyone, please visit the Aboriginal Women’s Action Network at http://www.awanbc.ca This organization is based in Canada and is doing a lot of great work. Also, please check out Exploited Voices Educate here http://www.educatingvoices.ca and Asian Women Coalition to End Prostitution here http://awcep.org
These will give everyone a fresh perspective from this side of the fence, I think.
Goodnight!
BK