Prostitution & Sex Trafficking – The Conflation of Force & Freedom

 

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Below is the Diwataman video that I mention, the part with the definition starts around 3:45

 

Well, This Happened

There was this video uploaded on the ZJemptv youtube channel.

The most disturbing thing about it is the comment thread where there are actually some people saying “thank you for the balanced overview of the two sides”. Of course it is NOT a balanced overview, it’s a textbook  ”radical feminist critique of sex positive feminism” – which should be assumed unbiased about as much as you’d assume that The Joker would offer an unbiased “critique” of Batman.:

I sent a tweet – which is rather out of character for me – which said “Thank you ZJ for giving someone who is not a sex worker yet another chance to speak for sex workers”. You can see the rest of our exchange, and some of the other twitter exchanges involved in the video below. I was pissed and things got ugly:

And just in case you are wondering, as one of the comments on my video says, if “zj had a chance to process everything” you should know that as far as the Love146 charity drive is concerned, it’s unfathomable that zinnia hadn’t heard about it months ago, considering how many people were sending pms and leaving comments about it, including links to the following video:

And also just-in-case, if you’re maybe thinking I was too angry in that video up there with all the yelling, take a listen to my initial reaction to the charity fiasco, where I’m sure a few people were disappointed that I wasn’t angry enough:

Sorry if this has ruined your day, it has certainly ruined a few of mine.

My Latest Disturbing Video

Not For Sale is one of the orgs that Google announced it is donating money to, so I took a look at the Board of Directors:

If you watch it on youtube you can expand the vid, if’n you wanna read the screen

“Rapey Songs”

I was reading this post from feministing’s community site which mentioned this buzzfeed post listing songs the poster considered ‘too rapey’. It made me think of the Liam Lynch song embedded below, which I like to think is parodying or spoofing the rape-happy narrative that has been found in some popular music.

At least, I like to think it’s a parody because then I don’t feel guilty when I laugh at it.

Happy Things

Whee!

—Click the red box to make the annoying annotations go away  ↑

Sad Things

I saw this earlier.

Do not think of suicide as the ultimate Fuck you

Do not think of suicide as the ultimate Fuck you
or that your moral plane is so much higher.
Nothing in the world has a thing to do with you—

little ever does, when everything is through,
your majesty, your royal highness, bastard, sire.
Do not think of suicide as the ultimate Fuck you,

or even a selfish act; she did what she had to do.
The storm-blown hawk knows when to release the wire.
Nothing in the world has a thing to do with you.

Her life was night and nothing more for all she knew,
angels of the minor keys sang among her choir.
Do not think of suicide as the ultimate Fuck you.

There’s nothing you could have done and nothing to undo.
Fill your life with everything you love, what you desire.
Nothing in the world has a thing to do with you.

She had regrets and grief, was more than passing blue,
but no one blames the hand for withdrawing from the fire.
Do not think of suicide as the ultimate Fuck you,
nothing in the world has a thing to do with you.

—————————————————————————————————–

A person I only-sort-of-knew killed himself a few days ago. Like I say, I only sort of knew him and I don’t want to make it like I’m personally devastated by it – I’m certain those who were close with him are feeling devastated and I don’t want to appropriate that or disrespect that grief. I dunno, it’s a sad thing, and when sad things happen we react but it bugs me when people do that thing where they act like they lost their best friend when the person was actually someone they only-sort-of-knew. Is that cold?

But here’s something I don’t talk about much, which recent events have brought to mind. Just over two years ago my stepfather killed himself. We hadn’t spoken in years. After my mother died –  I want to say that ‘he didn’t handle it well’ when my mother died, but the point is, and has always been, that he handled it the best he could. I handled it the best I could. I had hoped we would have handled it together, but I think that I reminded him of my mother too much. We have the same laugh, cough, mannerisms etc, and a couple of times he told me things like he’d heard me clear my throat in another room and for a moment he’d think I was her. I know what that is like, that instantaneous feeling of closeness, followed just as quickly by renewed devastation as you realize the person isn’t close, they are still as far away as can be. I think that was the biggest part of it for him. He was the sort of person who would make sure to avoid that sort of pain, and to avoid it he had to avoid me. I pressed, I didn’t want to let go. He had all the memories. The memories and more. But I had to let go, and when I say I didn’t want to, I mean I didn’t want to – but it had gotten to the point where he’d told me flat-out not to come around anymore and I knew that if I kept pushing, things were going to get very ugly. I remember thinking to myself that if I didn’t back off he was either going to call the cops on me or shoot me. He’d been drinking a lot, did I mention that? Yeah, there was that.

So I didn’t talk to him anymore after that. To say that this was a difficult time in my life is an understatement. First my boyfriend slept with my best friend on the day my mom died, and neither of them were coming around, and then the break with my stepdad came 2 months later. Mostly I remember feeling desperate to distract myself from the reality of life. And mostly I succeeded.  That’s pretty much when sex work saved me. It probably sounds weird but I would always tell people the truth – like when a client would ask “so how’d you get into this biz” – I would just tell them “Eh, my mom died and my job sucks and I’d rather sit home grief-stricken than be in that stupid office” and they would get it. They would tell me about when their parent/s died, and I’d start quite a few sessions that way; me and the client laying open our grief to each other. I’d been to grief counseling, and to a couple grief-group things before but the talks I had with clients were infinitely better, more connected, more comforting on an emotional level. Plus there was sex and money, too, and I know a lot of you think that makes it weird or wrong, but you can only take my word when I tell you it actually made it so, so right.

And then a few years went by and I got a call from my brother. He never calls, and he was calling to tell me that my stepdad had shot himself. I don’t really know how to describe my reaction. He wasn’t in my life, and his death would make no physical day-to-day difference to my life, so it was sort of like I was grieving for the loss of hope more than I was grieving for the loss of him. The hope had been that we would speak again. I had this silly picture in my head, and I’d carried it all those years, the image of when we would reconnect, and we would forgive, and we would understand, and we would remember. Mostly we would remember. But when he died all that hope was gone and it hit me hard to realize how closely I’d been holding that hope for so long. That hope that someday he would call. There is more I could tell you, about the heartache of ‘could I have done more? should I have done more’ – that heartache crops up for me now and then but, well, that’s why I like that poem.

What A Cliche

I just read this comment on a thread on Jezebel, and it’s just such a perfect example of the sort of thing that a Tool of The Patriarchy would say:

I know that you choose your choice, but you didn’t make those choices in a vacuum. I don’t think it’s the world’s greatest coincidence that those who like to dress in short skirts and belly shirts and the like almost always identify as women. We do happen to live in a society where women are rewarded for dressing ‘sexily’, and acting in other ways that appease hetero men. The fact that women are willing to risk frostbite to dress a certain way merits discussion, and we’re not doing anyone any favors by saying that personal choices are above critique. 

Now this isn’t to say that you deserve to be shamed for what you wear, because you don’t. I too like to wear short skirts, but I’d be stupid to say that it has nothing to do with societal expectations. 

If Only…

“A female does not generally benefit from establishing simultaneous pair-bonds with multiple males because (1) she can only have one pregnancy at a time (so lots of sex with different males does not increase her reproductive success)“

-via 

Ah, if only there was some way to receive tangible benefit from each of those males, then multiple partners would very much improve the likelyhood of reproductive success and survival of offspring.  Yes, if only…

Cult of Charity

Well, apparently there are some people besides me who think the charity aspect is important:

“One of the alleged victims in the Penn State University child sex abuse scandal on Wednesday sought an injunction to stop the Second Mile charity from dissipating its assets.

In a filing in Pennsylvania state court, the alleged victim said he and others intended to sue The Second Mile for negligence and failing to report known sexual abuse of children, and wanted to stop the charity’s assets from disappearing.

…

According to the grand jury report that laid out the charges against Sandusky, The Second Mile learned almost a decade ago that he had showered with a young boy but did not alert the police.

…

“The assets of The Second Mile should not be dissipated, encumbered or in way obligated or disturbed in any form and should be available to victims of sexual abuse,” according to the court filing.

The Second Mile said through a spokesman that it would review the filing. “As always, our thoughts and prayers are with the victims and their families,” the charity said.”

Prayers. Yay.

If we really want to prevent these things from happening we have to stop thinking this is all about the cult of power and prestige in sports and acknowledge that it’s also about predatory behavior enabled by the Cult of Charity.

The Vertical Pole

Damn awesome!

Ashton Kutcher, Idiot Do-Gooder

Oh this is rich. Apparently Ashton Kutcher, idiot do-gooder, tweeted some ingorant bullshit about Joe Paterno of Penn State abuse scandal infamy before he actually heard about all the abuse stuff. I read here that he had assumed Paterno was canned due to poor performance. But here’s the kicker, Sandusky (the actual alleged child rapist) got access to his victims through the charity he founded, “The Second Mile”, which ‘helps’ at-risk youth. Kutcher as celebrity mouthpiece for the rescue industry gets all sorts of insulted and indignant whenever somebody suggests that those charities he stumps for and is aligned with do more harm than good. He believes that anyone who says “I’m here to help these poor unfortunates” actually means it. The suggestion that the rescuers might actually be exploiting and abusing those they rescue is something Kutcher refuses to believe, refuses to even consider it. When people tell him this, that the helpers are actually harming, he turns it around and calls us rape supporters and child abusers. Fucking idiot.

Filthy Banned Ad

I’ve read that only 4 people complained.

“We considered that the length of her dress, her leg and position of the perfume bottle drew attention to her sexuality,” the ASA said.

“Because of that, along with her appearance, we considered the ad could be seen to sexualise a child. We therefore concluded that the ad was irresponsible and was likely to cause serious offence.”

“The revolution has taken us, and will not let us go until the last breath”

This was originally published on Thierry Schaffauser’s blog, I thought it was awesome. Many, many thanks to Thierry for the translation.

This is an extract from the post-face of Le Noir est une couleur from Grisélidis Réal. Réal was an anarchist whore, an artist and a poet. She was a pioneer of the sex worker movement in the 1970′s and was part of the occupation of French churches in 1975. I translated this passage because she deserves to be known outside francophone countries. (- Thierry Schaffauser)

I no longer hide. Times have changed, we revolted. In the face of the world, thousands of women coming out of the night and speaking, writing, gathering, sometimes in masks, but also openly, and shouting their truth, their lives. They were listened to, muzzled, contested. They wanted to silence them, but their voice was stronger. We had to see them, to know they exist; so they are no longer crushed like roaches in the dark.

In Paris, fourteen years ago, in a chapel in Montparnasse, I entered into revolution, with my damned sisters. Since then I’ve never left them. The revolution has taken us, and will not let us go until the last breath. It inflames the world.

Never again, will our children be stolen from us. We will not be despised, hunted, trapped, killed. Our lovers will no longer be thrown in prison. Respect will lie down in front of us as a velvet carpet on which we walk barefoot without being hurt, happy, triumphant.

Even if we still have to fight, to the death, still have to pay, always pay with our blood, our lives. This money they are taking from us is very hard to earn, and even more to sacrifice.

Freedom is priceless. We know it, which is our strength and hope.

Prowling like she-wolves, like tigress, like birds we will walk on the moon if necessary, we will gain our rightful space, we who are the balm on the wounds, offered and injured, soft, violent, women and witches, princesses of our senses and of men’s desire.

In Paris, at the Chapel of St. Bernard, in Montparnasse, at the beginning of June 1975, five hundred women were present, pale, resolute, some had no more voice after too much talking, and shouting. The priests who had received them covered with a cloth the statues of the Virgin and the saints. The fourth night, the police drove them out with batons.

We will not give in. The struggle continues, it crosses the seas; it burns paper, screens, walls. Never again, will we walk the streets like hunted animals, we will no longer be raped in cars nor anywhere.

To my too many missing friends, who died of loneliness, of too much love given, never received: In their memory, I will have to say how the everyday life has killed them, and the contempt from people. And how beautiful they were, generous, full of talent and mystery, surrounded by all those who had such need of them, who were hungry for their caresses, their tenderness, their infinite patience, their knowledge, their power.

And this is from me:

Tomorrow Waits With Joy

Holly at The Pervocracy posted an entry titled “Sex-Pozzie“, which was then mentioned on Feministe, and both threads have generated many comments of the wow/ugh inducing variety.

All I can muster is to republish parts of two earlier posts. When I wrote them the suicide of Hope Witsell was in the news.

First there was:

This is about the slut-shaming suicide of a 13 yr old girl who killed herself. Hope Witsell sent some naked photos, they got passed around like naked photos always do, her school, students and teachers alike, slut-shamed her mercilessly.

This is what sex-positive feminism is all about. It’s not about liking sex, it’s about teaching that sex isn’t shameful. Teaching that sex, and that nudity, is “positive” is the opposite of teaching that it’s shameful. We can’t teach “not shameful” without teaching “positive”. It’d be really great if we can, if you know how, please let us know.

This girl got the same shaming in the hallways of her school, from boys and girls both, that so many bloggers heap on playboy centerfolds. I know, we don’t call them sluts anymore so much, we know something doesn’t feel right about that, so we say they promote “rape-culture” and women’s oppression, if the centerfold happens to have said that she feels “empowered” by it, we tell her she is confused, possibly brainwashed. Delusional, stupid, childlike, “doesn’t get structure”, weird. That is shaming.

The idea that sex is not the most important thing is what, I think, all feminists want to teach girls. I understand the perception a lot of people have of what “pro-sex” feminism is; that it’s about liking sex, and thinking that sex is great, but “pro-sex” feminism is just a different way to teach girls that sex isn’t the most important thing.

Then there was:

Among the various things that decorate my walls, is a small unassuming frame with just one dash of color and a handful of words:

Hope. Tomorrow waits with joy.

That’s what I’d like to say to every girl who has to walk down the hall while taunts, spoken or imagined, of SLUT! and WHORE! echo behind them. Tomorrow waits with joy. I won’t tell you it gets better. I can’t make that promise. I can’t promise that it gets easier either, it does for a while, but then it gets worse again. Life is like that.

But someday, beyond the better or worse and easy or hard, comes understanding, and understanding brings joy.

Those people with their taunts, and their justifications for saying them, will never go away. That’s another lie I won’t tell you. No one grows out of it. They use new words, and they construct vast theories of why it is ok to call you a slut. They will twist it and twist it until they have painted you as the one who taunts, and they are the ones who suffer. They may even get you to start believing it, that it’s your fault. It’s not your fault.

It’s not your fault that you took a naked picture of yourself.

Were you proud of your body? Were you trying to prove something? Were you trying to get attention? Did you do it for pride, ego, or loneliness? It’s not your fault.

It’s not your fault that you sent the picture to a boy, or a girl.

Did you want them to like you? Did you want to feel pretty? Did you want to feel wanted? Did you want to? It’s not your fault for wanting to. It’s not your fault.

It’s not your fault that the boy, or the girl, disregarded your wishes and didn’t guard the photo the way you expected it to be guarded.

Were they charming? Did they promise they wouldn’t share it? Did they say you were special? It’s not your fault that you fell for it. It’s not your fault.

But more important than it not being your “fault” – is that the things you did, are no one’s fault. It is all right and good and normal and natural. To be proud, to feel lonely sometimes, to want attention, to be too trusting – all of that is right and good and normal and natural. It’s nobody’s fault that you are a normal person. What blame could there ever be for “normal?”

Only a slut – would be so prideful, so eager for attention, or so easily fooled. If that’s what makes a slut, we are all sluts.

Probate

Been a rough couple of months, dealing with shit I don’t want to deal with. Old death, old worries. Things that couldn’t be dealt with at the time.

Funny how that works. I wanted to get this shit squared away years ago. Could’ve used the money back then. But now? Someone else is ready, so the things I wrote off, the things I had to let go of emotionally, now I have to deal with it all.

It’s too hard to explain, and there’s too much sad in it all.

Feministe’s “Don’t Do This” Thread Actually Teaches That What You Should Do Is Denigrate Choice and Mock Other Women

It’s about labiaplasty, and states:

Surgically altering your labia: DO NOT DO, unless there is some actual medical reason. Also ohmygod forget anyone who tells you your labia are too large or that virginal vulvas look one way and whore’s vulvas look another. They all look really different, I think! But also kind of the same! Also if someone is face-to-face with your labia, everyone involved should be having fun, so focus on that. If someone says something bad about your labia, not only are they terrible, but they really need a new hobby because what? You’re evaluating and insulting labia now? I’m kind of mad, actually, that this is now making all of us think about the relative sizes of our labia, which is not something I had ever seriously considered before, but which I’ve just wasted five minutes of my life considering. (Conclusion: This is a fucking stupid thing to be thinking about).

Hopefully you weren’t expecting any sort of discussion about those medical reasons mentioned in the first sentence. That’d be such a stupid discussion! Stupid to even think about! Poor Jill, so sorry you had to waste 5 minutes pondering something stupid.

Conclusion: I can’t even.

ps: the comment section is a train wreck, bring popcorn.

pps: shoutout to somebody Jill should probably listen to.

On That Dead Island Thing

QFT

From the comments under this interview on The Good Men Project with anti-porn lapdog Robert Jensen .

Well, that’s a nice way of claiming to be in some way put upon in this conversation, but I think it’s a serious reversal of what’s actually going on here. It is extremely hard to have an honest conversation when both yourself and Terre have been disingenuous in the extreme. Both in terms of trying to reframe what is essentially a political argument between the sex positive movement and the antipornography movement, as represented by Robert Jensen, as simply a case of the former group being a bunch of heartless neo-puritans (huh?) trying to force others into unwanted sexual openness. Never mind that it has in fact been the antiporn movement that has been extremely aggressive in pursuing its ideological and political goals, and that the sex-positive side has simply been trying to *defend* individual rights in the area of sexuality from the moral panic and political onslaught coming from the other side.

You continue to act as though it is somehow beyond the pale to bring up Robert Jensen’s antiporn politics, when in fact this is central to his position. I repeat, this is like claiming you want to have a “non-political” critique of the pro-choice movement while featuring an interview with Randall Terry’s objections to the pro-choice movement.

And there’s the fact you and Terre have been very quick to toss out several harsh, poorly sourced, and inflammatory accusations, namely, that the sex positive movement is the expression of “big money” from shadowy sources and that sexual slavery is the norm for porn performers. If you’re going to drop bombshells like that, Lili, you really should expect an equally strong response, not to mention that you really ought to be prepared to *thoroughly* document such accusations. Instead, you play this disingenuous game that you’re being shamed and that your free speech is under attack. (Because somehow it violates your free speech to be criticized.)

The way I see it, you’ve brought absolutely nothing new to the conversation around the subject of porn and its place in society. Instead, we get the same kind of groundless accusations and guilt-tripping that the antiporn ‘feminists’ have been throwing around now for over 30 years. Talking points that many of us have heard, understand (even if we don’t agree with), have long since responded to, and are pretty sick of, actually.

I would suggest, Lili, that if you really want a conversation rather than a shouting match that you and Terre start engaging with a bit more honesty than you’ve been doing so far. If you’re going to engage in a political antiporn critique, do so openly and in the spirit of debate. It is dishonest to toss out such issues and then hide behind a claim that you are in some way being attacked for being sexually modest. (Which, BTW, nobody is doing.) Oh, and if you or Terre are going to start using Shared Hope International and the *American Family Association* as sources, you have absolutely no place to claim your position is being “co-opted” by the Religious Right.

- Iamcuriousblue

So Precious!

“After keeping an open mind about this issue, I studied many different articles and books about prostitution. After my research, I have come to the conclusion that prostitution should not be legalized.”

Yup, sounds legit!

 

Dogs of the Deployed – SqueeWeep!

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I cried the whole time I was making this; seriously, my eyelids and eyelashes are killing me. And my cats just sat glaring at me while I was putting it together as if to say, “Really? This is what you’re doing instead of cleaning out our box?? Really?”

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