Newsday: Vigil to end violence against sex workers

Fox News:

Violence Against Sex Workers : MyFoxNY.com

December 17^th is the International Day to End Violence against Sex Workers. It is a day of mourning, but it’s also a moment for allies and friends to show their support for individuals in the sex trade. If you’ve never been involved with December 17^th before, or are considering how you might be an ally to sex workers year round, here’s a list of three ways to be an ally on this very somber, but important day.

1. Listen to the stories of people in the sex trade.

Transactional sex is a complicated and complex world of experiences. There are sex workers who feel incredibly empowered and excited by their work. There are queer youth living on the streets, trading sex for food and shelter. There are single mothers with children, trying to survive, engaging in work they would rather not be doing. There are individuals who have been coerced by another into trading sex for the profit of others. There is no one story about how transactional sex happens and no one story is more valid than another. Different people have different choices that they can make and circumstance plays a large party in any profession someone chooses.

One the greatest ways you can be an ally is to listen to people’s stories as their own. Respect that everyone is an expert of their own experience and that nothing you have heard before about sex work, survival sex or sex trafficking will tell you what that particular person thinks and feels about their own life. Consider the possibility that the statistics you may have heard on the news, the stories you may have read online or the anecdotal messages you’ve been given about transactional sex may not be the whole story and, at the very least, are not the story of the person in front of you.

If you have never met someone who identifies as a sex worker, attend a sex worker event. If you live in New York City, you can attend the Red Umbrella Diaries (which is also available as a podcast). Consider your own concerns, hang-ups and potential prejudices when listening to folks speak about their experiences in the sex trade. What is difficult to hear, and why? Be thoughtful about what is hard to hear or doesn’t sit right with you. Consider how your own upbringing and background may be a factor in how you perceive the sex industry or people involved in the sex trade. Take what you hear and think about your experience and share it with your friends, partners and coworkers. Engage them in more conversations about what’s interesting, troubling or somewhere in between.

2. Advocate where advocacy is needed.

While most sex work is illegal in the United States, the ways that individuals in the sex trade are affected by stigma and discrimination go beyond their illegal work status. Like any stigma or prejudice, discrimination that is supported by laws leads to further criminalization, more individuals working in unsafe conditions or being unable to report a crime against them if they experience violence from a client. Being silenced out of shame or fear can have very real consequences for one’s safety and wellbeing.

Beyond being made invisible or insignificant by laws that criminalize their work and a society that supports their invisibility and insignificance, sex workers face day to day realities of having limited access to services and healthcare. Many individuals in the sex trade are unable to disclose to medical providers, for fear of shaming or misunderstanding of their work. Many social services providers are unacquainted with sex worker experiences, or treat sex workers as victims of their own poor choices. Some people expect sex workers to be trauma victims, believing that all people engaging in transactional sex are sexual trauma survivors or come from backgrounds of violence and abuse.

If you work with medical providers, social workers, psychiatrists, teachers, case managers, or anyone in an educational or clinical setting, ask them how much they know about the sex trade. Consider what kind of answer they give you. Do they view the sex trade through a singular lens? Do they see the multifaceted nature of sex trade experiences? Do they know how they might talk to a sex worker competently, if they were to have one as a client or patient? Take the time to educate yourself and those around you on the issues those in the sex trade face. Being educated and aware is the first step you can take to being an affirming and empowering ally.

If you are interested in having a training for your office or organization about how to speak to sex workers with sensitivity and care, contact your local Sex Workers Outreach Project for more information. If you are a student, start a conversation about the sex trade in a feminist group or LGBT organization. Consider conducting a panel discussion or organizing a workshop.

3. Attend a December 17^th event, in any way you can.

If you can attend a December 17^th event in person, it is a wonderful opportunity to support those in the sex trade as an ally. However, not everyone lives near an event or has the means to get to one. Change your Facebook or Twitter photo to a December 17^th logo. Read and repost articles about sex workers and violence, such as this one from Annie Sprinkle on how to help stop violence against sex workers, and start conversations with your friends, partners, families, coworkers and neighbors. Get involved in the conversation online. Think about ways you can support every day of the year, not just December 17^th. Hopefully, the ways listed above will get your started. Above all, remember that December 17^th is a day of remembrance, so take a few quiet moments to experience the memories of sex workers who have been lost this year and what that means to you on this day.

On December 17, International Day to End Violence Against Sex Workers Marks One Year Since Bodies Discovered on Gilgo Beach

WHEN: Saturday, December 17, 2011 from 2 to 4 pm

WHERE: Trinity Lutheran Church of Manhattan, 164 West 100^th Street near Amsterdam Avenue. 1, 2, or 3 train to 96^th Street.

WHO: Organized by sex worker support and advocacy groups the Red Umbrella Project and the Sex Workers Outreach Project New York. Attendees will be people currently or formerly involved in the sex trades and our friends, family, allies, and those concerned for our health and safety.

In December 2010, the bodies of four women, later identified as Amber Lynn Costello, Megan Waterman, Melissa Barthelemy, and Maureen Brainard-Barnes were discovered on Gilgo Beach in Long Island, after the family of missing woman Shannan Gilbert insisted on a police investigation of her disappearance. The cases remain unsolved, and since December the remains of another six people have been discovered in the area. The Suffolk County Police Department, which is responsible for the investigation, believes that it is likely that there are multiple local killers who are preying on people who sell sexual services.

On December 17, 2011 people in the sex trade and the people who love and support us will gather at Trinity Lutheran Church of Manhattan from 2 to 4 pm to hold a vigil for the victims of the Long Island killers and the many other people killed every year because they trade sex and are vulnerable to violence. The event will feature community activist speakers, a candle lighting, and a reading of the names of people in the sex trade who have been murdered this year.

The International Day to End Violence Against Sex Workers was first organized nearly a decade ago by sex workers in San Francisco to memorialize the people murdered by serial killer Gary Ridgway. Ridgway captured the attitude that cultivates violence towards sex workers: “I picked prostitutes because I thought I could kill as many of them as I wanted without getting caught.” At the event, we create a space that challenges this assumption by demonstrating that we have a caring community.

CO-SPONSORS
If you would like to become a co-sponsor, please email swank(at)riseup(dot)net.

• The Center for Constitutional Rights
• HOOK
• Latino Commission on AIDS
• NYC Anti-Violence Project
• Queering OWS (Occupy Wall Street)
• Paradigm Shift
• Police Reform Organizing Project (PROP)
• PONY (Prostitutes of New York)
• Positive Health Project (PHP)
• Sex Workers Project
• Trans Women’s Anti Violence Project
• Washington Heights CORNER Project
• VOCAL-NY

Of all the differences between SWOP chapters across the country, the one thing we all have in common is celebrating four important days each year. Today, November 20, SWOP-NYC will participate with other SWOP chapters in honoring and commemorating the thirteenth annual Transgender Day of Remembrance. This international event seeks to remember and memorialize the persons of trans experience who lost their lives due to transphobia.

This day is an important one for the sex worker community to take pause and remember. As a community and a movement, there is much we share with the trans community. Trans women are routinely profiled as sex workers, and face harassment on a regular basis from police and the community alike for simply being present. LGBTQ populations routinely face institutionalized marginalization and a lack of access to services which often can lead to participation in alternative and informal economies, including the sex trade. Both the sex worker and trans community are targets of violence, prejudice, and discrimination, and those lives tragically lost must be celebrated, and their memories kept. But both these movements share the same core principle: that every person is imbued with the right of bodily integrity, and that self-determination is central to our lives and identities. While on November 20 we remember those lost, we must also celebrate that central principle – that we alone own our bodies, our decisions, and our lives.

Lean more about TDOR
TDOR Events (International List)
Why We Remember by Jillian Page (Montreal Gazette)

TODAY!
CATW COUNTER-PROTEST
*Please distribute only to your trusted contacts.*

When: Wednesday, November 16 from 4:00 PM to 7:00 PM
Where: The Village Voice Offices, 36 Cooper Square, New York, NY

A response to CATW’s (Coalition Against Trafficking in Women) protest against the Village Voice and backpage.com. SWOP-NYC will be handing out flyers in the area highlighting why shutting down backpage is harmful towards sex workers and poses greater challenges to idenitifying trafficked persons.

Please distribute widely to your trusted contacts. If you can spare some time this Wednesday afternoon, join us!

Here are a few points we’re hoping to share with people today:

• Sex work does NOT EQUAL Trafficking:  The conflation of these issues perpetuates policies and practices that do not reflect the needs of those engaged in sex work: the willing, those doing it out of economic necessity, or those trafficked.
• Increased policing of prostitution forces everyone in the sex trade further underground (including those trying to leave): When sex workers have to operate in more secrecy, the results are clear: an increase in violence, STI/HIV transmission, and a loss of access to basic human rights.
• Further marginalizing the already marginalized: Further marginalization and isolation of this population will only increase stigma and discrimination, hinder access to basic services, and promote a loss of autonomy over the conditions in which people engage in the industry. This not only worsens the conditions for current sex workers, but also makes it more challenging to leave the sex trade.
• The electronic trails captured by Backpage.com mean safety: The more traceable connection that two people have means safer working environments and an increased likelihood of identifying trafficked persons. Having a point of connection gives the opportunity for sex workers to screen potential clients – one of the most important steps in reducing violence against sex workers.
• Pushing sex work underground makes it harder to identify trafficking situations: There are countless advertising sites, and closing the most public ones will only increase traffic to sites that are less willing to work with law enforcement. Without Backpage.com it is conceivable that the 50 cases of sex trafficking identified through the website may not have been discovered at all.

by Kate D’Adamo, Community Organizer, SWOP-NYC/SWANK

This week, Change.org sent out a blast which continued the assault on advertisers working with sex workers in a blast entitled, “Child Prostitutes Earn Cash for the Village Voice.” If this sounds to you like the kind of over-blown, fabricated language which has about as much substance as high school rumors, you’re right, it is. We know that Change.org wants to fight trafficking in the sex industry, but taking a socially irresponsible tactic such as this one only creates harm, and makes things more dangerous for sex workers of all stripes – those there by coercion, circumstance, or choice- and does absolutely nothing to address actual trafficking in persons. Closing advertising outlets like Craigslist and Backpages is a mistake for a number of reasons.

Critically, it forces everyone in the sex trade further underground (including those who are trying to leave). Prosecuting people who work with sex workers is not a new tactic, and it’s one with dire consequences – for the sex worker, that is. Further marginalizing already-marginalized populations means you’re forcing people into more discreet locations with less protections, and less ability to protect themselves. This leads to increased violence, STI and HIV transmission, less negotiation time for both safety and money (which means lower rates and more clients), and less autonomy. That means you’re putting the same people considered “victims” at greater risk.

Electronic trails mean safety. As much as people like to bring up the Craigslist killer as a reason of why these sites are dangerous, people also casually forget that the electronic email chain was one of the pieces of evidence which connected Philip Markoff to his crimes. Sex work existed long before Craigslist, and even before the internet, and controlling how it’s used online ignores that simple fact. The more traceable connection that two people have mean safer working environments. Connecting over email means the ability to do background checks, search bad date lists, and verify new clients – it essentially means the ability to engage in best practices to protect one’s own safety.

Shutting down the most visible sites leaves a bevy of sites which can be harder to hold to best practices. Part of the criticism of Craigslist was that they were doing nothing to curb trafficking in persons on their site. Unsurprisingly, this was false. In 2008, when Craigslist was the focal point of this conversation, the site was utilizing industry best practices for addressing this issue responsibly. In a statement released from their counsel on online safety, security, and abuse, Elizabeth McDougall noted that they were taking a “practical approach… getting input from interested parties, including NGO’s, advocacy groups, law enforcement, politicians, and victims.” Time and time again, “solutions” come from outside parties with little more than an agenda. We should trumpet outlets who give credence to relevant community stakeholders, instead of those who simply listen to who is yelling the loudest (and this even includes you, Change.org). There are countless websites who will pick up the traffic from Craigslist, and trying to negotiate with a multiplying number of increasingly discreet sites is just going to make this more challenging.

This isn’t going to solve anything. Even if there weren’t countless other websites, and even if we weren’t completely illogically thinking that shutting down every advertising website means that there would be no more trafficking, there is absolutely no evidence to support this tactic. In the two and a half years since Craigslist closed their “adult services” section, there has not been a shred of evidence that this has had any impact at deterring, slowing, or stopping trafficking in persons in the sex industry. Nothing. Closing Backpages will do nothing to hamper trafficking in persons. It won’t even make a dent. But it will make the problem less visible – and harder to tackle. It will push everyone, including victims of trafficking, into more dangerous situations with less regulation and less paper trail.

Sex worker advocates want to stop trafficking. We’re not categorically saying that there has never been a minor advertising for sex work on Backpages. We’re simply advocating for reasonable solutions which actually address the causes of sex work – poverty, marginalization, and lack of access to resources, and help support the exit of people who want to leave. Shutting down the companies who work with the sex industry only make people in the sex industry harder to reach. But there’s one other problem with this kind of rhetoric: Why are we only focusing on the moment after someone has been trafficked when we could be talking about the moment before? In New York City, there are roughly 4,000 unaccompanied homeless youth every night, and the city funds approximately 200 youth-shelter beds. Five percent of the need is met on a nightly basis. Let’s change this conversation to stop talking about the moment they might engage in sex work, and instead focus on the moment when they realize they have to. Let’s stop guessing as to what will make those engaging in the sex trade – whether through choice or coercion - safer and start listening to what those of us who have worked in this industry already know to be life-saving.

By: Melissa Sontag Broudo and Penelope Saunders
October 27, 2011

In the last four weeks, many have been wondering what has driven people to Occupy Wall Street (OWS) and bring attention to the economic situation that has developed in our country. Critics have argued that so many issues are being discussed and that so many disparate groups have joined forces, that the occupation has no cohesive message, purpose, or goals. As our group of sex workers and allies stood in solidarity with our fellow revolutionaries Wednesday, October 5th at the rally at Foley Square in New York, it was apparent that we were included in that critique or question. What were we doing there? What was our purpose? What was our message? And how do sex workers’ rights connect to the larger OWS movement? Those of us who were there, or who are active in the sex workers’ rights movement generally, have no doubt about how we fit within OWS and how OWS fits within our movement. United, in solidarity, with everyone coming together in Zuccotti Park and in all the plazas nationwide, we can bring about greater change. After the rally, we decided to highlight the points that bring together our intersecting movements and realities. We, as sex workers and allies, have joined OWS because:

1. Sex workers, people in the sex trade and people affected by anti-prostitution policies (such as trans communities, youth) are deeply oppressed by the economic inequities that exist within our society. As the OWS slogan goes, we are the 99%, with 1% of the country’s wealthiest owning 40% percent of the country’s wealth [see these and other facts about economic disparities here]. These disparities are highlighted and magnified across racial, gender, ethnic, geographic, and other lines. Many sex workers and people in the sex trade are from economically marginalized and oppressed groups and seek to address their economic needs through a wide range of sexual commerce. The criminalization and stigmatization of many forms of this work only compounds the economic and social disempowerment that many already have faced and is a deep form of injustice (that is punishing people for their desire to provide for themselves, their communities and families).
2. Sex work is work, and thus we as the sex workers’rights movement are joining forces in solidarity with other labor rights’ movements. The idea that sex work is work has been a critical rallying cry for sex workers all over the  country and world. The United States lags in recognizing sex workers as a labor force and creating an environment in which sex workers may fight for and establish their rights [in India and Brazil, for example, there are strong and powerful voices for the sex worker labor  movement: e.g. Durbar Mahila Samanoy Samity in India and Davida in Brazil]. Participating in OWS allows us to be seen – and heard – as a workers’ rights movement and to gain ideas and momentum by linking visions and strength with fellow workers.
3. The NYPD must be held accountable for the abusive practices they utilize against those they perceive to be politically powerless, including sex workers, street vendors, people who are living at or below the poverty level, people of color, transgender people, and others. Sex workers and their allies have long known what some are just finding out at OWS: the NYPD often utilizes harsh, ineffective, inhuman, and downright degrading tactics to subdue and control those without power. Sex workers have been and continue to be targets of police abuse. Police demand sexual favors, perpetrate physical violence and refuse to take rape and assaults against the sex work community seriously. The ability of our community to come out and join forces with others to fight against this is critical and will hopefully create positive and empowering change.
4. Because sex workers have critical roles to play in making this movement more accountable in regards to racism, sexism,transphobia, homophobia, xenophobia, and the stigmatization of various activities. M, an organizer and former sex worker, notes that, “many sex workers exist at the intersections of marginalized identities and are contributing to the dialogues among protestors as our movement takes this opportunity to confront oppressions within our ranks.” We hope to be able to provide this awareness about how various identities interrelate and intersect with multiple systems of oppression relating to race, gender, heteronormativity, the prison industrial complex, and other issues to other activists and to the general public by our presence and voice.

Just like others who are coming to OWS, we each have our own stories and reasons for joining in solidarity. We hope to bring a distinct perspective to the OWS movement – and to solidify the sex workers’ rights movement as a critical labor force standing in solidarity with the 99 percent.

Quotes from Sex Workers

As a sex worker, I joined Occupy Wall Street because the issues that impact both myself and my community are issues that are affecting other workers: lack of affordable housing, healthcare, education, and childcare. I come to stand in solidarity with communities of color, immigrants, Indigenous folks, and LGBTQ folks who have remain disproportionately impacted by a system that has failed to provide justice, decriminalization, destigmatization, and the practice of fundamental rights.
- Hannah, a sex worker for over a decade

We’re participating at OWS because sex work is real work,and all workers deserve living wages, affordable housing, and healthy communities. Sex workers are a part of OWS’s cross movement dialogues at working groups, marches and teach-ins, inorder to build mutual understanding and work for broadbased social change.
-M, an organizer and former sex worker

I hope that my presence at OWS and the sign that I carry  revealing myself as a sex  worker and a person affected by  the crimes committed on Wall  Street, open up people’s minds  to the possibility of including sex  workers in the process of the  people’s liberation.
- Andy, a male prostitute and organizer for sex worker rights

Occupations are at the heart of sexworkers’ rights movements. Think back to the Lyon occupation in France in the1970′s. Taking Times Square last Saturday was a full circle moment, given the history of sex work in Times Square, and the joined forces of corporate and political interests that have displaced sex workers from not just Times Square but any public space. For sex workers, occupying public space is about economics as much as it is free speech.
-Melissa Gira Grant, writer and former sex worker

Penelope Saunders and Melissa Sontag Broudo are both representatives of SWOP-NYC and the Best Practices Policy Project. We are also involved in many other organizations working for the rights of sex workers. We would also like to thank SWOP-NYC and SWANK members for sharing their thoughts about OWS with us.

On October 10 we saw something that is rare on television: We saw a sex worker who was not a victim of a violent crime or being arrested as a victim of trafficking. A sex worker voluntarily went on the daily Judge Judy-style show which features the civil adjudications of Texas cop-turned-Judge Alex Ferrar. This week Judge Alex was presented with the civil dispute between two women, one of whom was a sex worker, and predictably he could not help but try and humiliate the defendant because of her profession. But he also went one giant leap further: in response to the dangers that the defendant faces in sex work, Judge Alex informed her that “…if you get killed, it comes with the territory.” Hearing a public figure whom is charged with protecting people from, at the most basic level, bodily harm devalue the lives of sex workers is a painful reminder of the uphill battle faced by those of us who work in the sex industry

Sex workers know better than anyone else that violence is a terrifying reality of the job. Every year we add more and more names to the list of sex workers who have passed away in the last year and we are now embarking on that same task this year. Sex workers are the number one target group of serial killers, a statistic which we remember painfully as the one-year anniversary of the discovery of bodies at Gilgo Beach approaches, and we are still nowhere closer to catching the killer. In a pair of studies from the Sex Workers Project, 46% of indoor workers and 80% of street-based workers had faced violence, with many reporting that it was difficult to get police to take their complaints seriously.

But Judge Alex was not making a statement on the plight of sex workers in America, rather, he was pulling a notorious but often-utilized tactic: blaming the victim of an assault or murder because the individual is not a “perfect victim.” With those comments, the Judge was devaluing the life of not just the woman who was brave enough to out herself on national television, but of any sex worker who faces violence in the course of their work. Violence against sex workers is an issue we should never stop talking about or take lightly. We should shout about it. But we should never accept the status quo, and we should rail against those who reinforce it, especially when such harmful reinforcement comes from the places and people who are charged with protecting us from violence.

We ask Judge Alex to issue an apology. We ask Judge Alex to recognize that his flippant comments reinforce the same marginalization and stigmatization that make sex workers a target population for crime of all forms. We ask the Judge to recognize that as a representative of the legal system, he has been charged with protecting everyone, including (and especially) the most vulnerable. The Honorable Susan Himel of Ontario, Canada, took this responsibility seriously last summer when she found that the laws relating to prostitution in Canada’s Criminal Code were unconstitutional because they harmed sex workers. In her landmark decision, she found prohibitions against keeping a common bawdy house, living on the avails of prostitution and communicating for the purposes of the trade violated the women’s Charter rights to freedom of expression and security of the person, writing: “The law presents them with a perverse choice,” she said. “The applicants can safeguard their security, but only at the expense of another’s liberty.” We can only expect and hope that all of those charged with upholding and protecting the law recognize the impact of the legal system on those who are most at risk of harm.

We, as sex workers and allies, have rallied together to fight violence against our community in all forms. The International Day of Violence Against Sex Workers is on December 17^th. We will gather, in groups all over the world, and recite the names of the ones we have lost to violence. It is a somber day of remembering and grieving, but it is also a day of hope, in that we are working together to change the misconceptions and beliefs that people have about those in the sex industry. We hope this letter can also work towards bringing forth this awareness and eventual change.

– Kate D’Adamo, Community Organizer, SWOP-NYC/SWANK

Next month will conclude a series of conferences for the adult film industry which have cris-crossed the country in the last few months. In its fifth year, Exxxotica now boasts an average of 20,000 attendees at each exhibition, bringing together adult film stars, devotees and exhibitors of every stripe. This year, SWOP-NYC has been invited to join in the event, and we are excited for the opportunity to attend, and reach a whole new group of people with our work and our advocacy.

But this event is bigger than just new membership. The adult film industry is an important area in the field of sex work, and one which is often overlooked in sex industry advocacy. One major difference between the adult film industry and many other sectors of sex worker are that it operates within legally established bounds, meaning many of the challenges around legalization are faced in a very different arena. But this also means that adult film performers are one of the most organized areas of the sex industry. The industry has a strong voice in expanding what is legally permissible, and has the capital and voice to engage directly in the political system to advocate for expanding its borders.

What is still lacking, though, is a stronger voice to advocate for the rights of performers, both at work and in their day-to-day lives. Adult performers still face issues such as stigmatization, mandatory health testing, privacy and copyright concerns, and exploitation. Just this year filmmaker and sex educator Tristan Taormino was uninvited from speaking at Oregon State University’s conference on “Modern Sex” for her body of work in progressive, often education-focused pornography. Three months later a site calling itself “Porn Wikileaks” revealed the legal names, stages names, home addresses, and HIV statuses of 15,000 current and former performers. According to a Gawker article on the subject, the site (which has since been closed) not only reveled in revealing legal names of performers, “but their addresses, family members’ information, copies of state identification—even Google Maps pictures of their homes.”

These very real hurdles are human and labor rights violations which are the exact reasons why advocacy exists, and what is needed is a voice not for the industry but for the worker. SWOP-NYC is ready and primed to be that voice. By attending the Exxxotica Conference, SWOP-NYC will be the only group bringing this much-needed message to a community primed and ready for change.

For the event, SWOP-NYC is trying to raise $1,000, both for attendance and the printing of new materials (including a swanky new t-shirt!). Please help SWOP and SWANK bring this message to an industry which is ready for action by donating today. We’re offering some great donor rewards for those who are kind enough to show their support.