To think that grooming students into casual jobs as 'Sex Workers' is wrong

[theOtherPamAyres]

Freshers' Fair for new students at Brighton University featured a 'Sex Workers' stall.

If your son or daughter, fresh out of school, fancied a well paid but highly dangerous casual job then there were tips and leaflets on how to stay safe, and goody bags of lubricants and condoms.

In such a way, the prostitution trade is normalised.

It is sold as an 'empowering', edgy thing and lucrative self-employment. It is marketed with faux concern for young people's safety. (I bet they don't actually reveal the extent of beatings, robberies and rapes of prostituted men and women, though!)

Any young person who might think that sex work isn't all it's cracked up to be will keep their views to themselves, in the face of such enthusiasm and endorsement from the University. No-one wants to be labelled a SW erf (Sex worker exclusionary radical feminist).

Is that what we want for our adult children?

www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2018/09/30/brighton-university-accused-encouraging-prostitution-sex-workers/

Sorry that should say 1/3 of female students.

Elephant but are they including cam work in the umbrella term of "Sex work"?

Very likely.

Do you realise how common it is for young people to engage in cam work these days?

www.telegraph.co.uk/women/sex/11499381/Student-sex-work-the-secret-industry-in-Britains-universities.html

See this article from 2015

According to a new study, released by the University of Swansea, one in 20 students has turned to sex work in order to secure extra income.

Researchers surveyed 6,750 students, of whom 5 per cent said they'd worked in the sex industry. Almost a quarter admitted they had considered it.

There's a need for support and education.

Well for starters 1 in 20 is not the same as 1/3. And I still dont think that normalising prostitution with a stall at a Freshers Fair is appropriate either.

Elephant I said the article was from three years ago. I'm not saying the figures are right but I'm saying it IS an issue and to pretend it isn;'t happening is foolish.

Normalising it is one way of putting it. Providing visible and accessible support is another.

No wonder young women are considering it if they are going to their Freshers Fair as 18 year olds just out of school, having achieved well academically at school and made it to uni, and seeing prostitution there on a stall amongst the Ultimate Frisbee Society and the Book Club.

Would you say a charity that helps addicts being there was normalising and encouraging drug taking?

If said charity was pushing the line that heroin is a hobby just like any other hobby, inviting people to come and play on a wheel of drug wellbeing, and not giving any more than lip service to supporting people to quit or recognising that there are any inherent dangers to addiction, yes I would.

This. Nobody is saying that women (or indeed men) working in prostitution shouldn't be offered advice and help and a support network. Many of us have supported that for years. But there's advice, and there's normalisation.

Elephant and the shite they're bombarded with online has nothing to do with that has it?

They're exposed to a hell of a lot of pretty dark content via social media you know. They're able to go on forums like Reddit and talk normally to girls who've already crossed that line.

Freshers won't be their first introduction you know.

I can't really see any valid objection to a charity who support female sex workers (i.e. prostitutes, cam girls, lap dancers etc.) going somewhere where young women are known to frequently turn to sex work (i.e. a university) and promote the support they offer.

I can't for the life of me how anyone who supports supporting women can consider that "normalisation". To me that is so counter to the good work of these charities; do the Samaritans normalise suicide? Do self-harm charities normalise self-harm? Should they stop reaching out to communities where people disproportionately self-harm or kill themselves in case acknowledging how common it is "normalises" it?

Also, if a DV charity continues to offer support to someone who isn't going to leave their abusive partner, are they supporting the abuse? Or are they just saying that if you stay you still deserve support, just like the prostitute who refuses to stop selling sex still deserves to be as safe from harm as she can be?

Personally I would rather the women who sell sex be as safe as they can be, rather than in any way frustrating their access to support in the hope that the sense of stigma acts as a deterrent to others. That's not the way to end the ills of the sex trade, in my view. And it would see a good many women living increasingly more difficult lives.

They're exposed to a hell of a lot of pretty dark content via social media you know. They're able to go on forums like Reddit and talk normally to girls who've already crossed that line.

If it is commonplace for 15/16/17 year old girls to be going online prior to uni and chatting with prostitutes about the best way to get into the industry then I think that is a separate issue that needs serious attention. I don't see how a stall at a Freshers Fair with a jaunty 'wheel of sexual wellbeing' is going to help with that.

I wonder, if an 18 year old fresher went up to this stall and said 'hiya, I'm thinking of getting into sex work because I have heard the money is great and I don't want to end up with loads of debt, but I am totally against the objectification and commodifocation of women and I believe its dehumanising to sell your body for money, and then obviously there is the fact that its also extremely dangerous, what advice can you give me?' what the response would be?

Elephant you probably need to stop saying prostitutes...I can almost hear you spitting.

Sex worker is more appropriate because it covers the gamut of what these young people are potentially involved in.

Whether you like it or not, it's real.

There is a growing number of young people involved in sex work in one way or another.

It's not about recruiting them. It's about offering advice and support where needed.

And what's more, hiding from these facts is dangerous. And damaging. And wrong. So open your eyes, stop imagining that these people...the ones offering support, are some sort of shady Victorian Madams bent on turning the heads of middle class kids from the Home Counties and selling their bodies for them.

That's not what this is.

To me that is so counter to the good work of these charities; do the Samaritans normalise suicide?

Interesting example because I believe the Samaritans advice around the way in which suicide is discussed and the way it is reported in the media is extremely strict, precisely because they do not want suicide to be normalised.

I can almost hear you spitting.

Interesting example because I believe the Samaritans advice around the way in which suicide is discussed and the way it is reported in the media is extremely strict, precisely because they do not want suicide to be normalised.

Yes, I'm well aware of that. I don't think they said anything about not publicly reaching out themselves to at risk communities though, did they? Because that's a very different thing from controlling the public narrative.

This was a women's charity targetting an at risk population for support. That is not weaving a public narrative of approval.

Rat, there are a lot of charities supporting women working in the sex trade. They aren’t in general massively high-profile but they’re out there and have been for years. Many of us who are objecting to this particular charity doing this particular thing have supported these charities in the past, or have worked with them or have assisted in setting them up. (I notice Janice Turner getting flack on Twitter for condemning this - she is/was a trustee of a charity supporting women in street prostitution.)

It is really, evidently not the case that anyone objecting to this charity doing this thing must therefore be naive prudes who oppose charities supporting women in prostitution.

Ajax, with a 'wheel of sexual wellbeing'?! Come off it. I'd be all for a stall that offered support, awareness-raising of the dangers, and routes out of the industry for those already in it. But that isn't a freshers fair thing, because what freshers are really likely to already be involved in the sex industry?! Very few. That tells you all you need to know about this stall and its aims.

Yes Elephant spitting...the way you keep saying "prostitute" when the issue is wider. You use the word in a way designed to provoke a reaction. It's emotive for you for some reason...but we're not just talking about prostitutes.

It is really, evidently not the case that anyone objecting to this charity doing this thing must therefore be naive prudes who oppose charities supporting women in prostitution.

I didn't suggest for a second that they were

I also don't doubt that people on this thread objecting to the stall don't care about the well-being of sex workers, and that they even support charities working in the field.

What I do think is that people objecting to this stall, whilst obviously aiming to help women, are going about it in such a way that does women more harm than good. The benefit of students in the sex trade being able to find and access support far outweighs the benefits of retaining a healthy stigma around the sex industry.

Keeping access to this support behind closed doors within the very community identified as "at risk" does not help, in my view. And that's the key - the fact this is an at risk community. If it was just a question of how prostitution etc. was presented publicly I might be more inclined to agree, but this was support targeted exactly where it would be most effective. That's what's important. That has to be allowed to happen.

Errant "don't" in my second phrase their; you know what I mean. I know the objectors care about women's well-being, of course they do.

The benefit of students in the sex trade being able to find and access support far outweighs the benefits of retaining a healthy stigma around the sex industry.

This.

Roly has put it perfectly.

But Rat, you’re describing the objections to this as if they're objections to the idea of a charity supporting sex workers in general. You seem to think that people’s problem woth this charity doing this thing is a general objection to charities supporting sex workers, or at least to doing so openly or around students.

That is not the case. People aren’t accusing this charity doing this thing of normalising prostitution because they don’t think charities should provide support.

As I said upthread: I would have no problem with a charity supporting addicts having a presence at the fresher’s fair. I would start having a big problem with it if said charity was pushing the line that heroin is a hobby just like any other hobby, inviting people to come and play on a wheel of drug wellbeing, and not giving any more than lip service to supporting people to quit or recognising that there are any inherent dangers to addiction.

(and while it’s not quite the issue at hand, I’ve worked in the third sector and really dislike the narrative that charities are all inherently good and inherently doing what they say they are. Plenty are great; some are mismanaged to some extent or another; some are shit and ineffective. Some are far too easily influenced by specific industry pressures, interests or funding.

I wouldn’t object to someone like DrinkAware having a presence on campus, eg, but I’d be raising some serious eyebrow at their work given their historical links with the alcohol industry, and I’d be absolutely calling foul if they were inviting freshers to come and play on a wheel of booze well-being.)

It's a charity to support women or men who sex work. It's a support service. It'd to offer advice and support on perhaps leaving that. People must be off their head of they think the presence of a support service is encouraging it. They're a support service! They're a charity who help vulnerable people. They have done nothing at all.wtomg. sex work happens and the workers need support. Sorry if that shocks anyone's naive sensitivities