MORNING WORKSHOP SESSION OPTIONS
In this session we are offering two workshops looking at the practical impacts of the availability and normalisation of porn and the sex trade on our lives. These have different impacts and meanings for men vs. women and so we are offering separate workshops for men and women. The aim is that everyone feels free to discuss the issues honestly and not be inhibited by potential reactions from those of the opposite sex. We ask that everyone respects this. None of the other morning workshops or panel discussions have this restriction. For more about this, see the Eventbrite page.
Workshop room 1. Women, Sex and Desire: Navigating our pornified world in relationships and beyond. For women only. This is aimed primarily at younger women struggling to date, form relationships and develop careers in a world in which many (if not most) of their male contemporaries are now heavy porn users and OnlyFans and prostitution are sold as empowering. We will discuss the impact of porn, and practical strategies for addressing this in sex and relationships, as well as misogyny in the workplace. Facilitator: Eileen.
Workshop room 2. Pornification deprogramming. For men only. This workshop will be run by men for men who want to explore the impact of porn and the wider sex industry on their lives and attitudes and how to de-programme from that and become part of a movement for more meaningful and egalitarian relationships between men and women. Facilitators: Michael Conroy and Björn Suttka.
Workshop room 3: A Small Collection of Innocuous Objects. This workshop will be facilitated by Jimini Hignett, an artist and writer whose work has, for many years, focused on prostitution. Hignett’s book of the same name will form the impetus for the workshop in which a slide show of supposedly ‘innocuous’ tourist souvenirs – including fridge magnets, snow globes, salt and pepper shakers – from the red-light district of Amsterdam (a city Hignett has lived in for almost 40 years), will be juxtaposed with a short film of a male actor narrating the text of a young Dutch prostitution survivor challenging the idea that involvement in the prostitution industry is a free and positive choice. Unveiling the subliminal message conveyed by the imagery, the incongruities between the survivors’ testimonies and the world portrayed by the souvenirs, sheds light on the larger links which are often ignored in the debate concerning prostitution, and opens up a space for participants to reflect on what these objects mean, and to discuss their implications for society and the adults and children in whose kitchens and living rooms they end up. Facilitator: Jimini Hignett
Workshop room 4: Interviewing Survivors. An interactive workshop designed for bloggers, citizen journalists and writers covering interviewing techniques, formats and legal issues. Journalism students also welcome. Facilitator: Julia Robinson.
Main hall: What’s wrong with surrogacy?
- Anna Fisher: Surrogacy in the UK. A brief look at the current law on surrogacy in the UK and the Law Commission’s proposals for change.
- Olivia Maurel: A surrogacy born child fighting against surrogacy today. Olivia will talk about her personal story being born through surrogacy, the harms it has caused her, and why surrogacy should be banned to protect children
- Gary Powell: Surrogacy as reckless commercialism: the degradation of the human on the altar of bogus LGBT+ rights. Surrogacy has been given a power-boost in recent years by the LGBT+ lobby and the claims that gay men have a human right to be biological parents. The consequence of this is that opposing surrogacy gets condemned as “bigoted” and a violation of gay rights. Gary, himself a gay man, will explain the flaws in this argument and the risks that the multibillion-dollar surrogacy industry poses.
- Marie-Anne Isabelle: This is what is wrong with surrogacy. Marie-Anne, who was an altruistic surrogate for a family member, will explain why she believes the official HFEA advice that surrogacy for a family member is a good option is misguided; how things went terribly wrong for her; and how she came to realise that this is far from unusual.
- Q&A/discussion.
AFTERNOON WORKSHOP SESSION OPTIONS
Workshop room 1: Raising kids in a pornified world – This workshop is suitable for anyone who cares for, or works with, children and young people. It will outline an up-to-date context of pornography and the sex trade and suggest practical strategies for: having age-appropriate conversations about pornography and the sex trade; encouraging children and young people to speak up if they feel unsafe; and supporting children and young people to recognise the harms of pornography and the sex trade. Facilitator: Helen McDonald.
Workshop room 2: A woman’s experiential journey: Supporting women with experience of the sex industry – This workshop is primarily aimed at professionals working in healthcare, the VAWG sector, the criminal justice system, the police, housing or addiction services, and similar and will be focused on how to effectively support women who are or have been in the sex industry. Facilitators: Sally Jackson and Hannah Shead.
Workshop room 3: Campaigning against surrogacy in the UK and beyond. A workshop looking at the issues caused by surrogacy and reform in the UK and abroad, focusing on recent legal change in Ireland. This workshop will examine how different feminist groups are campaigning against surrogacy and look at practical actions to make change. Facilitators: Lexi and Marie Josèphe Devillers.
Workshop room 4: Groomed (women only). An intimate space for a small group of women to explore first memories of being sexualised with the (longer term) aim of reclaiming female sexuality on our own terms. Facilitator: Heli St Luce.
Main hall. The sex industry: A conducive context for male violence? This will start with a short film that juxtaposes prostitution adverts, sex buyer (punter) reviews, and survivor testimony and will be followed by:
- Valérie Tender: Punter Reviews – Adding insult to injury. How does it feel when a woman involved in prostitution reads the reviews that punters have left about her?
- Linda Thompson: Money and Power – A brief overview of the global sex industry, its power dynamics and links with mainstream culture.
- Merly Åsbogård: Sexual exploitation as VAWG. Speaking from her own experience of prostitution along with her academic research, Merly will explain why we need to understand sexual exploitation as violence against women and girls (VAWG) and how that violence runs through the whole of society – it does not end with the individual prostitution encounter.
- Julia Long: Pornification: the sex industry as a model for male / female relations. This talk will provide a radical feminist analysis of the pornification of culture, looking at how the sex industry informs wider social relations between women and men, including the construction of femininity and heterosexuality.
- Q&A/discussion.
https://nordicmodelnow.org/2024/09/27/women-for-sale-private-matter-or-public-crisis/