A brief history of the ‘Sex work is work’ movement - Nordic Model Now

[stumbledin]

In 1977 a Swedish project was launched to discover the everyday reality of prostituted women’s lives. Researchers interviewed hundreds of women, johns and pimps. What they found exploded the old Victorian myths that prostitution resulted from a biological urge in men and a mental defect in the women. Instead, they found it was something that men do to women with tragic consequences.

Around the same time feminists in the United States and elsewhere, such as Kathleen Barry and Andrea Dworkin, were making a powerful analysis of pornography and prostitution as key elements in the systematic subordination of women. As a result, the sex industry had a serious image problem on its hands.

This article provides an insight into the ways in which the sex industry fought back, including by using euphemism to obscure the reality of prostitution and the idea of prostitutes’ trade unions to give itself legitimacy.

nordicmodelnow.org/2021/06/05/a-brief-history-of-the-sex-work-is-work-movement/

[Fallingirl]

This is good, thanks for sharing. I think this bit is particularly important

“ Calling someone a victim of anything other than something random and unpredictable has become associated with an insult to that person’s humanity, strength, “agency”, and so on. It is no accident that this change in popular culture has come about in the decades that neoliberalism has controlled the media and infiltrated academia. It is yet another ideological trick to block analysis of systems of oppression and to keep us all firmly in our place.

We should not be surprised therefore that those who want to normalise the sex industry accuse anyone who critiques it of promoting a victim/saviour narrative that impugns the “sex worker’s agency”.”

That little word “agency” is so often used to justify harm. Anyone who is not in a coma has agency, this does not mean they are freely choosing all the harm and abuse they suffer.

[ArabellaScott]

Great, bookmarkig to read later. THank you.

[Thisbee]

@Fallingirl

That little word “agency” is so often used to justify harm. Anyone who is not in a coma has agency, this does not mean they are freely choosing all the harm and abuse they suffer.

Most prostitutes in Britain don't suffer harm and abuse. When they do it's often because of the restrictive laws that we have. Women aren't allowed to work together for safety.

What you're saying to a woman is "We're not going to allow you to do it because we have decided that you are going to be harmed. Even if you don't know it you will be harmed. That's not for you to decide."

And who are you exactly? You're not one of the experts in this field. You're not Dr Belinda Brooks-Gordon, Dr Nicola Mai or Dr Brooke Magnanti. They don't agree with you. I know you think you are promoting the feminist position but not all feminists are Radical Feminists.

Andrea Dworkin and Kathleen Barry had an ideological belief that women shouldn't be having sex with men. They were happy to team up with Christian Evangelicals like William H Hudnut mayor of Indianapolis to campaign against pornography. A total failure. They didn't need to campaign against prostitution because men were already criminalised for paying for sex in America. So I don't think that because of Andrea Dworkin, Catharine MacKinnon and Kathleen Barry the sex industry 'had a serious problem on it's hands'.

[InspiralCoalescenceRingdown]

@Thisbee that's a lot of words just to say "You're wrong, nyah, nyah".

[cakedays]

Most prostitutes in Britain don't suffer harm and abuse.

...aaaaand your specious and disingenuous argument falls down right like that. Because we all know that prostituted women in the UK are not having a fine old time living it up.

Why are so many people always rushing to claim, against all the evidence, that prostitution is really very jolly and a fantastic career choice that only mean old feminist bags could possibly be against? Do you think we are idiots?

[Thisbee]

@cakedays

What evidence are you talking about? I take my evidence about conditions for sex workers in Britain from Dr Petra Boynton, Dr Belinda Brooks-Gordon and Dr Nicola Mai. They are all researchers. They all recognise that we shouldn't generalise about sex workers or their clients because they are very different groups.

Just about the only 'researcher' who believes the same as you is the American Melissa Farley who has done poor research almost entirely on drug-addicted street prostitutes and then pretends that it applies to all sex workers.

Emily Kenway is an expert on trafficking and in her recent book she said this
"The 'radical feminists' and religious interests that promote models which harm women want us to think we have to take a side; against sex work entirely and therefore exploitation, or for it entirely and therefore comfortable with exploitation. This in totally untrue. In fact, we can be against exploitation and support those in sex work, recognising sex work as work and recognising trafficking for sexual exploitation as abhorrent and wrong."

[cakedays]

Okay, I'll bite: Thisbee, I'm an academic myself with 20 years' experience in a related field, so throwing in a few "Drs" isn't going to convince me.

Please do show me a piece of research that backs up your claim that:

Most prostitutes in Britain don't suffer harm and abuse

I'm going to assume you're pretty young, or not in the UK, or quite sheltered in life, because you really have to be very young, gullible or have very little life experience genuinely to believe that "most prostitutes in Britain don't suffer harm and abuse".

Have you ever lived or worked in an area in the UK where prostituted women or men work? Had any experience of social or healthcare work with prostituted women? Or is it all just reading Dr Brooke "I was a happy escort girl" Magnanti online?

It would be more interesting to know why exactly you are so keen on disseminating this fantasy that prostituted women don't suffer harm or abuse. Is it because you want to believe so much that women in prostitution don't suffer harm?

(Not just women, either: my mother was a social worker working with underage street prostitutes, including very young teenage rent boys with drug addiction in inner-city Manchester: I guess they don't come into your category of "most prostitutes"?)

Or is it that you just hate the idea of radical feminism so much that you feel you have to try to disprove it?

Are you really, really, genuinely convinced that prostitution is largely harm-free?

[cakedays]

Just about the only 'researcher' who believes the same as you is the American Melissa Farley who has done poor research almost entirely on drug-addicted street prostitutes and then pretends that it applies to all sex workers

And you've got to be very young, gullible, or not in the UK to believe this one.

[HecatesCatsInFancyHats]

Thanks for sharing stumbledin. For those interested in reading more there are several articles on this thread too: Nordic model demand in Daily Mail www.mumsnet.com/Talk/womens_rights/4222357-Nordic-model-demand-in-Daily-Mail

[Thisbee]

@cakedays

If you are a social worker then you only get to see people who have problems. You will probably think that all prostitutes are drug addicts. That's why you need to look at the work of researchers who look not just at drug-addicted street prostitutes but the much larger number of women and some men who work in other aspects of sex work.

You wrote "I'll bite" as if your opinion is the majority opinion and I'm just trying to be controversial. It is people like Emily Kenway who have more credibility than those who take an ideological approach like Andrea Dworkin.

Dr Brooke Magnanti has used her expertise in statistics to analyse all the relevant research and has published the results. You can read her books "The Sex Myth: Why Everything We're Told is Wrong" or "Sex, Lies & Statistics".

[cakedays]

If you read my post properly, I didn’t say I was a social worker.

Brooke Magnanti’s actual PhD was in forensics - not in this field. I’m assuming you’re too young to know the background, but she wrote a titillating (not sociological) anonymous sex column in the early 2000s, claiming to be based in her (short, around 18-month) experience of being a “high class call girl”. She always acknowledged from the start that this was heavily fictionalised and mainly designed to attract a column and a book deal (and it was then turned into a titillating television show). The idea that she is a renowned expert on the demographics of sex work is pretty laughable.

[Thelnebriati]

Most prostitutes in Britain don't suffer harm and abuse.

Some of us know women who are prostituted. You'll be standing chatting to them on the street and then they'll suddenly disappear mid sentence because they've been summoned.
When I say 'suddenly disappear' I mean literally they turn, run, and tumble into the car at top speed.

You don't think thats evidence of harm, I disagree.

[cakedays]

Thisbee why exactly are you so invested in the idea that prostitution - and you did say prostitution specifically, not "sex work" in the sense of phone sex or webcamming - is actually mostly like the kind of fantasy world Brooke Magnanti was selling in her column/book?

Do you genuinely believe this kind of fantasy represents the reality of most prostituted women in the UK, and if so, why do you want to believe this? Is it because you think selling sex is a good thing in general?

[sharksarecool]

I don't have any background in this field, my background is in education. In all our safeguarding training we are taught that exploited people often don't actuallycrecognise that they are being exploited. On that basis, the accounts of current or recent sex workers don't really convince me.

What might convince me would be to hear the testimony of retired sex workers in their 60s, who loved their job so much that they stayed in the sex trade for their whole working life, made enough money to live reasonably comfortably, maybe a foreign holiday once in a while. Who were able to save enough of their earnings to live off in their retirement, and now look back on their years in the sex trade with fondness, without any regrets.

If sex work is a job like any other, where are all the happily retired sex workers?

[InspiralCoalescenceRingdown]

If sex work is a job like any other, where are all the happily retired sex workers?

Great question. I'm sure we can think of other good questions, too.

If sex work is a job like any other, how does The Health and Safety at Work Act 1974 apply?

[MargaritaPie]

"Why are so many people always rushing to claim, against all the evidence, that prostitution is really very jolly and a fantastic career choice that only mean old feminist bags could possibly be against?"

People do acknowledge that radical Christian groups support the Nordic model too. And what evidence? A website called NordicModelNow and some Daily Mail articles?

Anything to say about actual evidence that shows in the first 13 years of the Nordic Model in Sweden only 2 clients were convicted? Sex Workers aren't willing to testify against their clients.

UN HIV and the Law Commission report:
www.hivlawandpolicy.org/sites/default/files/FinalReport-Risks%2CRights%26Health-EN.pdf p38

[cakedays]

MargaritaPie there have been very few prosecutions for FGM. Should we say that it's then great to decriminalise it?

Radical Christian groups are neither here nor there when deciding if women selling their bodies to men for money is something we feel is morally right and acceptable. There are some very bad faith pro-sex work arguments.

Who benefits from prostitution? Is it really the women? Is it someone else? The punters? Men in general? And just why are you advocating for them, exactly?

[JoodyBlue]

Slightly on a tangent, but relevant. Watching "Line of Duty" with my family. Heard a prostituted woman referred to as "livestock". I paused the tv, I was flabbergasted that no-one else batted an eyelid. That is the reality @Thisbee prostituted women are "livestock", this is referenced on maintream TV as entertainment. Defend that if you can. Tell me how empowering it is.

[drwitch]

I am actually prepared to believe that the nordic model may be counter-productive (it could be that it pushes out those clients who are just creepy and leaves the really dangerous ones, it could be that because it reduces demand it reduces price and so makes people need to do mor tricks to make ends meet. But a) i would need to see some proper evidence and b) i would like to see people suggest other things to reduce the need to people to go into sex work. This of course is the real problem, many women's lives are so shit that sex work does not seem to be that bad.

[InspiralCoalescenceRingdown]

I am actually prepared to believe that the nordic model may be counter-productive

I'm all for more and better evidence, as well. The Swedes' own inquiry into the Nordic model suggested that demand had reduced under their model - ec.europa.eu/anti-trafficking/sites/antitrafficking/files/the_ban_against_the_purchase_of_sexual_services._an_evaluation_1999-2008_1.pdf

I note that particular data appears to be missing from the report quoted above.

Maybe the best approach is decriminalisation combined with some kind of social work programme. Or maybe something off the wall like the Swiss approach to heroin. But the simple fact is, major organisations like Amnesty International and UNAIDS are supporting total decriminalisation on the basis of lobbying by organised pimps.

www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2015/oct/22/pimp-amnesty-prostitution-policy-sex-trade-decriminalise-brothel-keepers

Of course, under "sex work is work", the pimps and the ponces are just another kind of sex worker.

[CousinKrispy]

If sex work is just another job, let's see the risk assessments. I've been up to my eyeballs in RAs all this year because I work a job and they are required to ensure we are operating safely. Who is writing and enforcing these?

[sharksarecool]

If sex work is work:

• Are sex workers entitled to statutory maternity pay?
• Were sex workers able to claim furlough if they could prove their earnings?
• What's the process for performance management? Is there a payscale?
• Is income generated through sex work taxable?
• What's the law concerning unfair dismissal?

[MargaritaPie]

I don't think FGM is comparable, and I certainly don't see letters with 200+ signatures advocating for the decriminalisation of FGM.

decrimnow.org.uk/open-letter-on-the-nordic-model/

[MargaritaPie]

"Amnesty International and UNAIDS are supporting total decriminalisation on the basis of lobbying by organised pimps."

The rumour that Douglas Fox had input on Amnesty's sex work policy is false: www.amnesty.org.uk/douglas-fox

Not sure why you are claiming UNAIDS is being "lobbied by organised pimps". The link I posted gives clear facts with sources clearly demonstrating the criminalisation of clients part of the Nordic Model in Sweden is practically impossible to enforce, wastes a lot of resources that could have been used elsewhere, and has not been shown to reduce demand or trafficking. That isn't "pimp lobbying" that's just laying the facts out on the table clear as crystal.

[Thisbee]

@Thelnebriati

Street-based sex workers are a minority among sex workers. I have quoted below from Revolting Prostitutes: The Fight For Sex Workers' Rights by Juno Mac and Molly Smith.

"Everywhere in the world, regardless of the legal model, street-based sex workers use a familiar range of safety strategies. For example, they might work together with a couple of friends, they might take time to assess a client before getting into his car, and they might have a friend to write down his car's number plate to signal to him that someone will know who she's with. How does the criminalisation of clients change or shape these safety strategies? Working with a group of friends on the street makes you more visible to the police, which isn't something you can risk if you're hoping to make money. If you're too obviously visible as sex workers, even if you're not worried that you yourself may be arrested, clients won't want to risk approaching you for fear that they will be arrested. Again, to get the clients money, you have to cater for his need for safety from arrest - by working alone rather than in a group.

As for having a conversation before getting into his car, that is the time when he is most visible to the police as a client, and therefore he will be keen to speed the process up. Instead of having a conversation about services, prices, and condom use while still on the street, he'll ask you to hop into his car and have that conversation while you're already speeding away. Because you need to keep his custom in order to get the money you need, you say yes. But that means you have no chance to reach a verbal agreement about prices and condoms before getting into the car, let alone assess his demeanour or even establish whether he has a friend hiding in the back seat."

Kerb crawling is illegal in Britain and in some places the law is enforced. I have been to Red Light Districts in Britain, in the 1980s to Argyle Square near King's Cross for example (I'm older than you think), and I have never seen women 'suddenly disappear'. If that is happening in parts of Britain today then it is people like you who have created that situation. Women don't want to do that, don't have to do that, except when people have insisted on police crackdowns. It is not the prostitution that has harmed them, it is the misguided people who think they can get rid of it by giving more power to the police.