AmnestyInternational Prostitution

[JuliaScurr]

Please tweet #Amnesty agm in support of Nordic Model
Pimps out in force

[OldLadyKnowsSomething]

Ah, Sabrina, you're talking about Migsy? (I think that was her name). Yes, she was being horribly exploited, a victim of sexual abuse as a young child, gangrape at 14, and pimped by a "friend", (who may have been the father of her dc) doing "parties" because she felt safer. A truly horrible situation, and I'm glad she found a lot of support here.

But how would criminalising her punters have helped? She'd be driven further underground, further away from whatever exiting services are available in her area.

[aformersexworker]

SabrinaMulhollandJjones

Other people's sex work is other people's sex work and they are the best judge of how that works with their personal vulnerability.

ALL sex workers (no exceptions) are vulnerable if only because of the stigma that the radfems and the rescue industry shamelessly exacerbate and exploit for their own ends.

I am vulnerable to the point of helplessness but that doesn't mean I am vulnerable to exploitation (who wants to try it BRING IT ON) or unable to make the best choices for myself.

Fact:
Being "exploited" is f*cking awful but pays much better and offers much more personal freedom and autonomy when it involves sex than when it involves the rescue industry.

[SabrinaMulhollandJjones]

No, because exiting services exist under the Swedish model.

I wasn't going to be so disrespectful as to put her username up here But she is underground now. She is being pimped. That's illegal - that's underground.

The answer for her would have been to never meet her pimp - then she would never have got into prostitution in the first place. It wasn't her choice, she doesn't want the sex. She's been groomed into it.

[SabrinaMulhollandJjones]

aformersexworker - you're talking such nonsense on this thread, I can't even converse with you.

Stigma from radfems my arse.

[aformersexworker]

SabrinaMulhollandJjones

"I'm not talking about being trafficked here - I'm talking women who have got into debt, and some 'friend' suggests moving in with them, or gives them a room, suggests prostitution as a way out? And end up paying a substantial % to that 'friend'? "

I have to say I have never come across that one though I have come across women who work themselves into an early grave at all kinds of minimum wage jobs too keep constantly compounding loans sharks off their backs.

Then there was Sharon (working name, if you recognise you GET IN TOUCH :) ) who rescued me in MacDonalds in Marble Arch when I had no money and nowhere to go due to an "administrative error" and was traumatised beyod all normal function, brought me to her B&B and explained to me how to work smart and safely on Park Lane rather than getting a criminal record in the first 30 minutes. I admit she was a total cow for borrowing fivers and probably still owes me £10 but she also had similar shaming trauma in her life to me and made it possible for me to come to terms with it and see myself as a human being with a right to life again...

Or long before all that there were the ladies of Powis Square in the heart of Rachman country who made every excuse under the sun to use a horrible spare bedroom instead of their much nicer rooms to see clients as an excuse to give a pregnant 15 year old with malnutrition sores on her arms because her boyfriend would drink all his invalidity benefit in the first three days of a fortnight a bit of money so she could eat.

Are those the kind of things you mean? Because they are reality.

[SabrinaMulhollandJjones]

What about the punter who came on here and told of the 18 yr old who had suffered abuse, and cried before he paid to fuck her? Of course, he thought it was fine - because he asked her if it was ok first.

He was also some poor student's first punt (how exciting for him) and said she was shaking with fear - she had got into debt. But that was ok by him too, because he paid her, so he was helping her get out of debt.

What about his choices to buy sex from women who don't want to do it?

[aformersexworker]

SabrinaMulhollandJjones

The very limited "exiting" services that exist at all in Sweden (just enough for PR purposes) are abusive, invasive and virtually useless so that is a non-starter.

Did you know Sweden has swung to the right of late and all welfare provision is being drastically cut back?

If not you do not really know enough about Sweden to hold an opinion.

As if radfems ever stopped stigmatising sex workers did anyone ever tell you that you have a brilliant sense of gallows humour?

[aformersexworker]

SabrinaMulhollandJjones
I can actually just make apocryphal stories up too...but I would only get confused so I thought I'd better stick to things that really happened instead?

[SabrinaMulhollandJjones]

I don't identify as a radfem, I am a feminist. I believe in sexual equality and that nobody has the right to buy another's body for sexual services. What prostitution boils down to is women being bought by men in power. It is not an equal transaction - it is desperate women (you've admitted it) needing money, and being fucked by entitled men with money.

[aformersexworker]

OldLadyKnowsSomething

"Aformer, I hugely admire your persistance in your argument for hours, maybe your ASD helps? grin"

Probably.

[SabrinaMulhollandJjones]

Yeah - you can. You want me to link to threads where these stories have been shared? You doubt the stories of the punter who came on here? Really? He shared his stories thinking he would win us over. The fool.

[OldLadyKnowsSomething]

Exiting systems are supposed to exist under the Nordic Method, but realistically if you can earn £150 an hour (not an uncommon rate for independent sexworkers, £100 is certainly achievable by most) with total flexibilty as to the hours worked, why would you want to take on a NMW, possibly zero hours contract in a "respectable" (and, of course, totally non-exploitative) job?

Migsy isn't underground, her pimp advertises her services on her behalf. In, y'know, public places, possibly including Adultwork. It's not the '60's any more, it's not business cards in phoneboxes, and "word of mouth" wouldn't get her 5-10 punters a day of any age these days.

And yes, stigma from radfems, who refuse to recognise the agency of adult women, who call women who are brave enough to stand up and speak out "non representative", who refuse to read Dr Magnanti's book on sexwork because she was, erm, a sexworker...

[SabrinaMulhollandJjones]

Oh, and already we're at BM. Cos her experience was just so similar to the prostitute we are talking about, isn't it? Did Brooke get £35 a punt, and give 40% of that to her friend?

[OldLadyKnowsSomething]

And still nothing about why there is no feminist campaign to abolish relationships, where many, many thousands of women are beaten and abused every day, with over 100 killed every year?

[aformersexworker]

SabrinaMulhollandJjones

You don't know much about sex work really do you?

I did not say all sex workers are desperate and even those that are are usually on a higher income than most of their clients after the first few days...

Just making "a little bit of money" from sex work is one of those "peeing area in a swimming pool" things...either you are a sex worker and have a VERY good income OR you are not and, when applicable, you remain utterly desperate...

There is really no half way. Though, of course, dual carer and special needs Mums trade of a lit of income for the shorter working hours.

That is not to say that going from desperate to "very good income" pretty much overnight never goes to anybody's head or that they never get a bit silly with the money...

But why not? They have earned it. :)

[aformersexworker]

SabrinaMulhollandJjones

Of course I want you to link those threads if they exist...why wouldn't I?

And I am sorry for thinking you made them up. :(

[SabrinaMulhollandJjones]

So, back to my former question to you:

You feel a punt is the same as a relationship?

You feel that being a punter is the same as being a student in school/patient in a hospital? You didn't answer the first time.

[aformersexworker]

I am not friends with Brooke any more for personal (not sex work related, how could they ne, we are bother "formers") reasons. But I don't think we should be discussing her income unless she wants to come here and discuss it...

My mother would be HORRIFIED by the rudeness.

[aformersexworker]

SabrinaMulhollandJjones
I feel buying sex is not dissimilar to elective surgery (though, of course there are less risks and a shorter recovery time! For MOST guys, anyway ;)).

I have also felt selling sex was far more affirming and less degrading than being conned into a one night stand (something that always left me feeling totally humiliated next day.

But I don't really see how you could connect buying sex with being a medical student?

[OldLadyKnowsSomething]

I'm talking about BM's book on sexwork, Sex Myths, not the BdJ books. A proper, annotated, bibliographised, footnoted, referenced piece of work which I have seen people here refuse to even borrow from a library.

Because, y'know, she might actually have an informed point of view.

Read it, it's enlightening.

Another I'd recommend, for a more global view of sexwork, is The Wisdom of Whores, by Elizabeth Pisani. The most fascinating insight into the work of NGOs, by a woman who had never been a sexworker, but is/was an epidemiologist working on HIV issues, so actually talked to yer actual prossies, male, female, and trans. An eyeopener for next time some charity solicits you for funds.

[OldLadyKnowsSomething]

Sabrina, I'm assuming your odd q is addressed to me; do I think a punt is the same as a relationship? No, of course I don't, but it's not dissimilar to a ONS. And if punting should be illegal because of violence against women, surely relationships should be illegal too, given the amount of violence that occurs/can occur within them?

If punting should be illegal because punters are sometimes violent towards sexworkers, and we know that patients are sometimes violent towards nurses (to the point some A&E units have resident police officers), logically "being a patient in A&E" should be criminalised.

Obv that's total bollox, so where does that leave the radfem argument re punters?

[FloraFox]

aformer your experience sounds very erm... singular to say the least. What you've posted is bizarre. OLKN has a very poor track record for buddying up with the soon-to-be banned, that doesn't bode well for you.

Your statements about the income of women in prostitution is not borne out by other women in prostitution who have posted here but hey, you are the most intelligent person who ever lived so that's their problem. So long as you're alright, Jack?

[SabrinaMulhollandJjones]

Yes, the question was directed at you, Old Lady, because you were the one comparing punting with actual relationships.

We try, as a society, I hope, to build a foundation for people to have an education, healthcare, equal opportunities in employment, and fulfilling, equal relationships. So, please explain to me why the men do pretty much all the buying of sex, and women do most of the selling of sex in prostitution? Does that not mean a pretty unequal society -with women as the sex class, as things to be bought by men? We have the argument upthread that to deny women the right to sell sex is akin to letting them starve and the word homicide was used at one point.

I would ask why this is - why are women prostituting themselves to feed their children, but men are the ones buying sex from women who don't want sex with them??

Here's the thread, former The punter-poster was zeffa101.

[OldLadyKnowsSomething]

Flora, I am . Do I really?

Or are you attempting to discredit and silence me, and indeed aformer, as per radfem usual tactics? What has either of us said that would get us banned?

[aformersexworker]

FloraFox

Why thank you :)

In turn it seems to me that pretty much every word you have said here is total cr*p.

Thank you also for the warning (or was it a threat? I do mix those things up a lot) about being banned. I hope I will not be too afraid to sleep.