NUS and prostitution - confused...

[Ubik1]

They seem to haves passed a motion which holds anyone who thinks the Nordic model of managing prostitution is the preserve of right wing radical feminists.

I'm confused. I don't know much about sex work but I do know it is linked to trafficking of women and children and organised crime. I would be delighted if men were criminalised - but maybe I'm wrong?

Here's the motion but you might not be able to view it...

I'm not surprised this has gone through.

The SU at my university recently voted against the Nordic model, making it very clear that those awful Radfems were evil, 'whorephobic' arseholes... University is a very hard place to be a radical feminist. I'm surprised I've got time to study given all the time I spend being a SWERF 'n' TERF.

I feel a bit odd in that I don't think my ideas have changed much over the years.

Not sure why that is but I seem to be much more intractable than other people I know. Mind you, my children both got in their parent's evenings when they were in reception (different years different teachers) they have very strong ideas about right and wrong so maybe it's a family trait!

What about people who support the nordic model who have worked as prostitutes? Are they "whore phobic"?

I find the whole thing baffling. Just, really really odd. Have some views sure but all the ranty shouty labelling is just strange. Some of it is literally nonsensical.

When she was a teenager my sister totally bought in to all the crap about the sex industry being life affirming and empowering for women. She went on and on for years about how she wanted to become a lap dancer (not a prostitute because even she failed to romanticise prostitution) so that she could exercise her power over men and get paid plenty for it. As soon as she turned 18 she was off like a shot to get this job (PT, while studying).

Turns out that it wasn't empowering or life affirming. It was (as you'd imagine) seedy and demeaning and she felt vulnerable and unsafe. Plus the dodgy pimps characters that ran the place we constantly badgering her to offer 'extras' to the unpleasant clientele.

The men that want to pay for access to women's bodies are not nice men. And I think NUS feminism has, like far too much popular feminism these days, actually become a tool of the patriarchy. What better way than to get the so-called feminist movement to start campaigning in behalf of pimps and punters (as well as getting those pesky women to police each other by shouting down and insulting anyone who wants to talk about the issues that affect the bodies and experiences people previously known as women).

I imagine they're self-hating 'whorephobes' Pilchard

I feel like I'm living in the twilight zone. I have nothing but concern for those involved in sex work. I see the Nordic model as the way of protecting women while criminalising punters and pimps - as it should be. To say it's a job like any other and people should be free to do what they want with their bodies is baffling. Are they going to be campaigning for peoples rights to sell their own organs?

I do find it odd that anyone expressing any anti-punter (or anti-pimp) sentiment gets called 'whorephobic'.

I wonder how many people these people have known, met? I always talked to and knew lots of people who did all sorts of weird and not always great stuff. Maybe they haven't met any vulnerable people who have prostituted themselves because they were off their heads or young and reckless or whatever? I mean I've not either but a couple, it's all a bit there for the grace of god really. I've been offered money for sex more than once and if I was just a bit more wasted / depressed / whatever then I could imagine thinking OK why not. Like I say my friend did it once, she was a mess emotionally so really, you know. Not good. That's the sort of angle I come at it from, anyway.

I also think the NUS types might be better served if they stopped playing at (identity politics) and maybe learned how to debate and critique. Shouting ever more specific insults at people (SWERF, TERF, whorephobic) isn't all that useful and does nothing to promote any position.

Lol that opening line makes no sense.

I wonder how many people these NUS people have known or met who have prostituted themselves. There is a great range isn't there, from people who are grown-up and choose their clients and it fits in with their lives etc, to the people who are, well, not in that position. They seem to have only spoken to the former group. Or is it that the latter group are victims of crime and so fall into a different conversation in their opinion.

Of course, that's probably why they're so keen on no-platforming. Because they can pretend they're protecting someone else (ooh, how valiant) while making sure that they never have to actually defend their position or make a convincing argument.

I mean I haven't met many if I hadn't met any then my posts wouldn't be making sense at all!

I have only met the latter group though and not too many. The former group well probably might well have done but didn't know.

I would imagine that a great many of them are much like my sister was in that she'd never met anyone with any actual experience of the sex industry but she'd heard lots from those in powerful enough positions to get media coverage for their rose-tinted happy hooker and empowered strippers version of the world. Except that they don't necessarily want to do it themselves; they want to feel like some sort of virtuous saviours campaigning on behalf of others.

I do wonder if the position of the NUS is because of of the number of students involved in Sex Work that came out in a recent report? Even with the anonymity of the survey I wonder if stigma caused under reporting of the number of students in sex work? BBC report here

Also considering that Leeds University found a third of strippers were Higher Education students you see a trend and it actually makes sense that the NUS would take this position.

And I hate agreeing with the NUS after the stupidity of the Al Jolson Jazz Hands, crossing dressing and the appropriation of female PoC language by the gay community. So 3 things I have issues with and one which makes sense.

Yes but the motion they passed doesn't refer specifically to students in high education working as strippers.
And it's not about reducing stigma nor supporting these young women.

They want to close down debate about Nordic style method of managing prostitution. If you support it you are defined on a certain way and your opinion devalued. No debate allowed.

I also saw something about white gay men and how they have 'white, male privilege' and was astounded. I have male gay friends who struggled so much with their sexuality 25 years ago and suffered threats of violence and were rejected by their families. In the real world I don't think it helps to be gay in traditional male roles. I don't think there is 'privilege.'

Meh, it makes me sad.

I think white gay men do have white, male privilege, surely?

They don't have straight privilege.

I don't think it is fair to talk about 'in the real world' as if students are somehow not in the real world.

I think it's tough to be a gay man in the armed forces, in the building trade and other areas traditionally male. Look at football.

TBH the naivety of some of these motions does make me question whether they do live on the real world.

There was a man tied to a lamppost and burned alive for being gay in scotland a few years ago. Look at Russia.

It does make me question what world they live in.

Is there a scale of privilege? Is it written down somewhere?

I agree with you. Who doesn't?

It's still the case that white, gay men have white, male privilege and not straight privilege.

I do agree with you there's a disturbing tendency to 'rank' privilege and, obviously, it is shifting and complicated.

I can't read it- it's blurry. Have they actually passed this? It doesn't surprise me considering how anti feminist the NUS are.

Calling radical feminists 'right wing'. Not very well informed are they?

If prostitution is so bloody wonderful why are they bothering with uni? Why don't they go out and work the streets/lap dance/do webcamming etc? because they are shit, dangerous jobs that are 'beneath' them. It's ok for poor, black, disabled, vulnerable women to do these 'jobs' though.

NUS 'feminists' are silly little girls who use the 'feminist' tag to make rich white men think they aren't gold digger wannabes.

They're discussing legalising prostitution on Jeremy Vine right now

That woman campaigning to sell sex as a basic human right is on.

Students are coming out in favour of all the crap on transgender rights too aren't they?

Some people confusedly said something about students being stereotypically left wing. They were yes, back in the 90s. They're clearly not now. They're busy trying to paint all feminist views as evil and cut down the voices of any women who say otherwise.

We seem to be in some confusion about what constitutes left wing nowadays < thank you bastard Blair and gits New Labour>.

What I find disturbing is that any critical thinking around transgender is immediately dismissed as bigotry.

Yes, we're not supposed to think. Thinking was always the major enemy of existing powers. Along with education and free (as in speech) provision of information. Oddly all those things have been attacked and semi-privatized out of existence at this time.

One of the reasons I did not go to university (way back in the 60s) but decided to get a job after A levels and do my degree later as an external student while working was I wanted to get some experience of work and everyday life first.

It was a time when students did a lot of sitting around in protests smoking cannabis and thinking they had the answers to the world, the universe and everything, when in fact they were utterly naive and many existed in a la la land.

I am depressed to think that nothing has changed - they have merely swapped naivety about war, drugs and the Bomb for naivety about prostitution and sex work.

There is a project called the Student Sex Work Project which is led by Swansea University, in partnership with the Terrence Higgins Trust, Cardiff and Vale University Health Board – Integrated Sexual Health Service, the National Union of Students Wales and Newport Film School. It aims to "promote learning and understanding about student sex worker needs".

Its latest study, published today I think, into students and sex work can be read at www.thestudentsexworkproject.co.uk/wp-content/uploads/2015/03/TSSWP-Research-Summary-English.pdf.

I found the report very depressing.