Leeds managed zone 'glowing review'

That's a very good point, sex worker potentially becomes something of an umbrella term doesn't it.

Yes I think it's a very unhelpful term when talking about prostitution because not only does it potentially include pimps it also includes e.g. a middle class woman at university doing some phone sex for a bit of spare cash. This is a world away from the women in Holbeck so it seems bizarre to even put them in the same category. I also often find that it's the middle class graduates who are speaking on behalf of "sex workers" - you rarely ever see those in survival prostitution get a platform. The main reason for this, of course, is that the women in survival sex work don't actually want to be identified.

I think so, thats why I'm very supicious when some sex workers say that it is a free choice.

As people on here with experience have said its often a choice based on limited options and given the opportunity would make different choices. There are people who stand to benefit from keeping the status quo and its not necessarily the sex workers, women and children who risk abuse in that area.

I really dislike the term 'sex worker', I realise it's a broader term to refer to other forms of sex 'work', other than prostitution, but the words only remind me that their bodies is the vehicle and the sex is the 'service'. It's another greying of language. I never really think of it as including a pimp. but I suppose it is really.

They are really good posts @seonaseona and @WombOfOnesOwn and some very important points raised. I think a lack of funding is hurting people in many areas and it just shows how out of touch our current goventment is.

40% of that sample were sex workers I'm always a bit suspicious of the term sex worker, I know its supposed to refer to the people providing the service, but to often it seems to mean pimps, madams and traffickers who don't care about the welfare of the people they profit from and that is a huge problem for me.

IME online surveying excludes older people, people with MH and disability reasons not to be online, and sometimes people living in poverty and people with ESL (but not always).

Nice dismantling of the report claims by Nordic Model Now. What I can't get over is how much the authors are having to misrepresent what is happening to get to their conclusions. It smacks of having decided what they wanted to find and forcing the research to fit.

Wasn't this supposed to be an independent review? Aren't academics supposed to be held to standards which includes truthful reporting?

Its so dishonest I find myself wondering if they intentionally chose an online survey to minimise resident responses.

FannyCann none of this surprised me. Zones/areas of toleration (if I can call it that) reminds me of Brian Paddick's time in Brixton and the approach to drugs, which led to drugs tourism. Though the impact of the Holbeck approach is far worse.

And response to the review from Nordic Model Now

nordicmodelnow.org/2020/07/11/nmn-response-to-the-independent-review-of-the-holbeck-red-light-zone-in-leeds/

Press release from Nordic Model Now

nordicmodelnow.org/2020/07/12/press-release-campaign-group-finds-independent-review-into-controversial-holbeck-red-light-zone-in-leeds-failed-to-consider-equality-implications-made-claims-not-backed-up-by-data/

@FoxBaseBeta good to know there are still some decent, principled councillors up there (as a former Leeds resident).

The managed area is a destination zone for the dregs of men from all over the UK and beyond.

This frankly embarrassing piece of academic review should be thrown in the bin where it belongs. With needles and condoms and the detritus of male violence.

As Womb says, her word as a woman and a prostituted women at that are worthless, but the crime exists nevertheless. And can be prosecuted by the system.

I used to have to read the Bad Date file at work (shelters) because the women kept a list of descriptions of men who had raped, assaulted, robbed, kidnapped them. It wasn't one or two men described again and again. It was many many men. We need a way to prosecute these utter scumbags and the Nordic model provides that.

Oh yes, for many years. My own prostitution experience happened as a 17-18 year old runaway, jumping from the frying pan to the fire as abuse went.

Took about 10 years to claw my way all the way into polite company after lots of menial roles and emotional tolls, but after years of career advancement in the straight world I'm now living my "best life" with financial security, a beautiful home, and lovely children with another on the way. Things couldn't be nicer!

But I know how very lucky I am, and how many of the young women I knew back then didn't fare so well. It gives a unique sense of survivor's guilt.

Hope you are safe now and ok @wombofonesown

I'm a former prostitute who would like to say that I'm in favor of the Nordic model and that it would have been a true blessing in my life if it had been implemented when I was engaging in prostitution in order to survive.

If I could have turned my pimp in, I could have been free of his abuse and coercion. I might have still had to turn tricks for a while. But when one of those tricks raped me, I could have had him sent to jail, and had good proof he'd committed a crime. With decriminalized prostitution, women have a "he said/she said" situation when "dates" go wrong. A "he said/she said" where her input will be put down as "just a whore's."

"The service which helped me quit?? Gone now due to funding cuts!!

You cannot have Nordic until you have proper welfare and exiting services in place"

What was available to you was enough to help you, it can be enough to help other women. It isn't perfect, but it's enough to help women now.

I support the Nordic model.

@seonaseona that's a really, really useful post, thank you for taking the time to write it.

I absolutely agree that there should be not only adequate services and funding in place but good services and benefits. Having worked with girls who entered and were abused at a very early age , i know that they were recruited even by guys in prison already. They were abused within houses which the police never raided. How was this any safer. There is no excuse that will make any of this safer for women and girls

Your outcome can only be offered for all women if you push for the Nordic model. Particularly in the UK context, supporting decrim makes the Nordic model approach less likely. You legitimise it as a profit driven industry (we aren’t going to get the co-op, non-profit making model In the U.K.). Trafficking goes up and prices go down - Germany has shown this. There’s no incentive at all to improve your welfare system or to support women to exit. In fact, it’s great as you can validate women in poverty to find another source of income and reduce your welfare net.