The Naked Anthropologist

Tag Archives: campaigns

Ambassador CdeBaca’s incoherent ideas on trafficking and slavery

Luis CdeBaca is a US government employee with the misleading title Ambassador-at-Large for Trafficking. I am told this means he reports directly to the President, so he is largely free to do what he likes. At an event I attended in Washington DC last year, he said people ask why he doesn’t address the root causes of trafficking in his work and gave his answer: My budget is only $25 million, so obviously I can’t address root causes. Only $25 million, well that explains it. He went on to say he therefore would continue to concentrate on raids and rescues.

He spoke stirringly of the UK-US alliance to end this scourge and leaned heavily on a supposed connection to William Wilberforce, an evangelical Christian Englishman who neocolonialists claim to be responsible for the end of slavery. In this account no mention is made of the original conquests that set up new and reinforced existing slave economies or of native resistance movements and revolutions: No, one White Man did it practically singlehandedly, and by the way he was also an enthusiast of the Society for Suppression of Vice (father of the Obscene Publications Act, by the way, amongst other repressive delights).

I was surprised CdeBaca was at the Washington event, because all the other speakers were critical of his sort of approach and rhetoric, which is why I accepted the invitation. Thus unprepared, I became very wound up when he cited the US Constitution as justification for interference around the globe, so much so that I scrapped what I had intended to say to the large audience of government and ngo employees and instead, when it was my turn, lambasted the ambassador’s speech. I slipped once and said fucking as an adjective because, I can’t help it, imperialism is the subject that most boils my blood. There were a couple of blanched faces amongst the organisers but also some cheers from the audience, and CdeBaca had left already, anyway. I didn’t know before I went that the Woodrow Wilson Center is supposed to be a hallowed hall, but I can’t guarantee I wouldn’t have said it even if I had known. They describe my talk like this:

While Laura Agustín also critiqued U.S. policy toward human trafficking, her primary focus was on combating the assumption “that the U.S. and other sacred nations must take action” against human trafficking. Rather than assuming that trafficked persons need to be rescued, Agustín believes that we must interrogate the structure of ‘rescue’ efforts that can at times feel more like arrest, abuse and deportation. She also emphasized that migrants are not always passive victims, but rather are courageous, active agents, willing to risk the hazards of the informal economy in order to find work and pay in developed countries. She concluded that the current international discourse on protecting the rights of trafficked workers is misplaced and recommended that developed countries begin to legally recognize more jobs in the informal economy.

CdeBaca was in the audience at the BBC World Debate in Luxor, too, where he heard one of the panellists, Siddharth Kara, inflate so-called estimates of slavery into the 20-millions. That’s one of the places in that programme where I cut in and expressed disbelief, asking how exactly such a figure was reached and why the topic had shifted suddenly from trafficking to slavery. No problem for Kara, however, since the figure is reached by simply including vast categories of people, from child labourers in general to any woman selling sex and potentially to any worker in the informal economy. These are slaves, now, remember, not just trafficked people.

At a recent event at the Vatican, of all places, CdeBaca estimated between 12.5 and 27 million people are trapped in slavery around the world, ranging from children forced to work as domestic servants or in sweatshops to women coerced into prostitution. And here are statements all ascribed to him in Up to 27 million trapped in slavery worldwide (the incoherency might come from the reporter, there’s no way to tell.)

Countries where migrants arrive should try to identify potential victims and protect them, rather than opting for immediate repatriation which often sends them back into the hands of human traffickers. LA: Here he says people shouldn’t be deported (ghastly euphemism, repatriated) because they will run into traffickers again.

Tens of thousands of migrants are fleeing turmoil in North Africa, with many trying to reach Europe by boat, but the problem of slavery exists all over the world. . . Now he switches to saying slavery is everywhere, so presumably it’s on all the borders, too.

The European Union has urged African border authorities to bolster controls to prevent human smugglers taking advantage of the situation. But . . . it is more effective to fight slavery in the countries where the victims are exploited. Here he says it’s no good closing borders and implies they should be open, but I am not clear how this is connected to his claim that fighting slavery should happen in European countries. He seems to be saying it’s no use trying to do anything in the countries of origin, let all these folk get into Europe and then save them.

You don’t fight trafficking on the borders, because people don’t yet know they are trafficking victims, it’s only when they get to where they are going that they are enslaved. People should be keeping an eye on where these refugees end up, what kind of jobs they are being put into and how they are being treated. Again he’s against hardened border controls, but his statement that victims don’t know they are victims till they get inside is a silly and demeaning generalisation, since, if something has gone wrong lots of migrants know so at an early stage. He also calls enslaved migrants refugees, showing ignorance of what the term means in migration policy.

These statements do not add up to a plan. CdeBaca clearly wants to criticise European border policy, but his solutions are incoherent. Maybe he did hear what I said in Luxor, however, about one solution lying in revising antiquated and arbitrary distinctions between informal and formal sectors of the economy, so that people being called slaves could have some labour rights and people being called trafficked might get work permits to do jobs in other countries.

People are always telling me that these moral entrepreneurs went to Harvard and such places, as though that means they must be right. Maybe they are intelligent and got nice degrees, but their understanding of migration, social processes and precarious labour is practically non-existent. Being in campaign mode seriously distorts analytic ability.

By the way, note that images of white imperialism work two ways; in the Tintin picture blacks are carrying a white, while in the other picture a white is carrying a black. In both pictures, the white is in charge.

–Laura Agustín, the Naked Anthropologist

Pickups, loose women, good-time girls, prostitutes: enemies who carried disease

In every one of these posters about the dangers of venereal diseases (now known as sexually transmitted diseases or infections), men are being warned about women. Women are the carriers of syphilis and gonorrhea- particular women, that is: available women, pickups, good-looking stylish women who are alone or women in groups. Not mothers, homebodies, wives, daughters. And since these come from a war era, dangerous women are likened to the enemy and to weapons capable of ruining the lives of innocent, clean young men. This gender stereotyping (or misogyny) is only 70 years away.

These images come from 100yearsofsex.org.

Denmark’s Grosse Freiheit: Red-light name for anti-prostitution Rescue Industry event

On the subject of sex, Denmark has traditionally positioned itself as less like its Nordic neighbours and more like Germany. Hamburg is not far away, which perhaps explains why the organisers of an abolitionist, anti-prostitution event in Copenhagen would name it Grosse Freiheit, a street off the Reeperbahn in St Pauli, Hamburg’s red-light district. After an embarrassingly late jump onto the Rescue Industry bandwagon, CNN recently accused Denmark of being the Brothel of Scandinavia (reported here in puppet-fashion with the usual dumb photo).

Grosse Freiheit, Hamburg

Or do the event organisers want to imply the event is about the great freedom prostituted women will enjoy once they are saved from slavery? Whatever they mean, Grosse Freiheit?, scheduled for the weekend of 7/8 May in Copenhagen, promises to club attendees into submission with back-to-back speakers who agree that prostitution should be abolished and clients of sex workers should be jailed. I don’t use the word conference for this sort of thing because no actual analysis, not to mention differences of opinion, occur: Revival meeting, campaign event, movement marketing are more descriptive (readers of Sex at the Margins may recall that I attended a 3-day version of such an event in Madrid a decade ago – sleep-inducing but very illuminating).

Two non-Nordic prostitution-haters, Janice Raymond and Julie Bindel, are on the agenda. Raymond hates transsexuals and transgender people, too – I imagine a lot of this event will be about hating, now apparently a central facet of Extremist Feminism (which I briefly discussed in Something Dark). Hate is how local Danish protesters refer to the appearance of Raymond and Bindel (more from modkraft here.) Swedish state feminists will also speak, but note that Danes would be very annoyed by the implication that they are being over-influenced by Sweden.

The event is part of a wider campaign which saw Danish feminists marching on International Women’s Day through an area of Copenhagen associated with street prostitution and drug markets, where they made a loud protest against even the idea of sex work. The egregious Anne-Grethe Bajrup Riis, who recently screeched at a sex worker on national television (and was deliciously satirised afterwards) led the march. A so-called Danish Model is promoted by the organisers. Only real insiders will detect any difference here with other Nordic regimes – who wants to try?

Danish men opposed to sex-buying are part of the campaign. At the SIO event I spoke at in Copenhagen on 31 March, a couple of young male politicians intervened, making uninformed, purely ideological allegations and completely ignoring anything said back to them. Nothing quite so boobyish as Ashton Kutcher’s video mishaps about Real Men Not Buying Sex have been undertaken so far, but who knows what the future holds? I am told that the proposition to criminalise the buying of sex will probably be made – again, by certain leftists – but is unlikely to pass, given political coalitions in parliament. But the campaign to bring in such a law perhaps explains why just another anti-trafficking and anti-prostitution event has such a big profile.

Note how some leftist politicians wish to distance themselves from transphobia whilst simultaneously associating themselves with the abolition of prostitution . I have no sympathy for them. The Danish sex worker rights organisation SIO is of course opposed to the whole event. And no, although I sometimes live only a half hour from this event, I won’t be attending.

–Laura Agustín, the Naked Anthropologist

Truckers, truck stops, lot lizards and sex trafficking victims: what confusion

The incredible double-messaging of US prostitution law finds perfect expression in two recent stories from the state of Oklahoma. In one, everyone agrees that prostitutes are a nuisance and a judge forces the owners of a rest stop to post signs, fix a fence, provide cctv and hire guards to arrest sex workers. (The name lot lizards presumably refers to how baking-hot people get hanging around on black asphalt in the sun.) In the second, truckers are admonished to understand that sex workers are victims of trafficking who are passively transported and need rescuing, the focus being, of course, on adolescents (who, we learned the other day, are mostly running away from home.)

One would almost think these stories are describing two separate groups, one that’s bad and one that’s good, but that’s not true, of course. All the people involved are selling sex in truckers’ rest stops. Some truckers are buying sex. Some owners of truck stops are willing for this trade to go on. For people who don’t want it to go on, however, there are two choices: blame the sex workers or rescue the victims. Very confusing.

Truck stop ordered to clean up prostitute problems

Jesse Wells, 8 April 2011, KFOR

Oklahoma City — An Oklahoma County judge forces a metro truck stop to clean up it’s act. . . “The Five Star was symbolic of the worst problem of prostitution in the city,” video vigilante Brian Bates said. For a long time, Oklahoma City police negotiated with the truck stop owners to curtail the illegal activity but got no results. That’s when they took the issue to court. “Prostitution had been running rampant at that business and the owner wasn’t doing anything to stop it,” explains Oklahoma City Police MSgt. Gary Knight.

The court order will now force the business to post additional “no trespassing” and “no soliciting” signs, repair and enhance the fencing, provide continuous video surveillance and hire security guards who can arrest prostitutes day or night. . .

Oklahoma truckers learn how to stop human trafficking

By Kristi Eaton, 25 March 2011, Associated Press/TheTrucker.com

Oklahoma City — It’s been nearly 30 years, but Mark Brown still remembers the face of the teenage girl who approached him at a truck stop in California. He’d just finished a long day of driving across the country when the girl, who wasn’t more than 15 or 16 years old, knocked on his window and asked if he wanted a date. He said he ignored her and let her proceed down the row of trucks, knocking on windows trying to sell her body for money. “I still regret that decision to this day,” he said. “I should have helped her.”

Brown now uses his position as assistant director of Driving Instruction at Central Tech in Drumright to teach new drivers about what they can do combat the industry’s hidden secret. He passes out wallet cards with tips and information to students and is going to distribute a training video to other schools across the country about human trafficking. And it’s all because of a partnership with Truckers Against Trafficking, an initiative that hopes to educate and raise awareness about domestic sex trafficking along the nation’s highways. The program by the anti-human trafficking organization Chapter 61 Ministries specifically targets young girls and boys who it says are transported across the country to prostitute at truck stops and plazas.

Lyn Thompson, who started Chapter 61 Ministries in 2007 with her four daughters and a family friend, said she developed the idea for Truckers Against Trafficking after learning the important role gas station attendants play in identifying victims of human trafficking. Taking it one step further, she began focusing on truck drivers. “Traffickers have to transport their victims, whether by plane, train, ship, bus, car or truck,” said Thompson, a Tulsa resident who acts as a national coordinator for the initiative. “So, all the transportation industries are first-line defenders against this crime.”

The girls and boys who work the trucks stops and plazas are called “lot lizards,” said Kendis Paris, a national coordinator for TAT based in Denver. She said the group is focusing on kids under the age of 18 because by law, they are victims of human trafficking if forced into the sex trade. “I honestly don’t think anybody wakes up and says, ‘I want to sell my body,’ but the kids really have no choice,” she said, adding that many are runaways who have been coerced into prostitution. By attending trucking industry events and meetings, Paris hopes to get the wallet cards in to the hands of every trucker in America. Trucker drivers can call a hotline number listed to report a crime or ask questions if they are unsure something illegal is taking place.

“The issue is difficult to police or get control of, so that’s why TAT’s effort is so important, because we feel like if we can educate the professional truck driver, nine out of 10 of them are going to want to get these people arrested who are doing this stuff,” said truck stop plaza owner Sam Smith, who has hung up TAT posters and distributed wallet cards to drivers at his Nashville, Tenn., store.

Sex slavery scare called a waste of time in Kansas

How very interesting to read an anti-panicky editorial in the midwestern US state of Kansas. The common-sense argument here says no cases of sex slavery have been found in strip clubs, police should pursue such cases where they do hear about them and the morality of a few should not be legislated for all. The editor asks what lawmakers should be spending their time on, especially given that a similar effort was made by anti-prostitution campaigners last year. Dizzying reasonableness.

Editorial: Strip club bill wastes time

19 March 2011, The Topeka Capital-Journal

Republican leaders in the Kansas Senate see no reason to spend time working on a bill that probably would regulate adult entertainment clubs and stores out of business. Neither do we. A similar bill was introduced and subsequently rejected last year. There’s no reason to waste more time on the issue this year, especially given other important issues — including budget deficits — facing legislators.

Supporters of the bill — known as the “community defense act” — contend adult entertainment businesses, strip clubs if you will, are host sites for illegal activities ranging from drug sales and prostitution to sex slavery. We don’t know how much, if any, marijuana or cocaine is being sold at strip clubs across Kansas, but we’re pretty sure that putting the clubs out of business entirely wouldn’t eliminate one dealer or inconvenience one user. Anyone who wants to buy illegal drugs doesn’t have to go anywhere near an adult club to find them.

As far as the adult clubs in Kansas being hot beds of prostitution and sex slavery, we know of no one who has ever produced specific cases or statistics to back up such claims. Sex slavery is a heinous crime and any law enforcement officer who really suspects it’s going on anywhere should be conducting investigations and making arrests. No, the real issue here is that the adult clubs offend the morals of some among us. We understand that, and know their moral outrage is sincere. However, legislation that would force all to adhere to the morals of some is bad legislation. Granted, no one wants a strip club next to their home, their church or their children’s school. But those are zoning issues that can be handled by local governments without state interference.

The “community defense act” would prohibit full nudity at adult entertainment clubs, force them to close between midnight and 6 a.m., require performers to stay at least 6 feet from the customers and forbid contact between performers and customers. It also would require new clubs, adult bookstores, video stores, theaters, modeling studios and sexual device shops to be more than 1,000 feet from any church, library, park, school or day care center.

Proponents say the bill, which originated in the House and was passed along to the Senate, is not an attempt to legislate morality or regulate sexually oriented businesses out of existence. It is exactly that, and no more time should be spent on it. The clubs, book stores and shops will close their doors when they aren’t generating enough traffic to make a profit. But as long as communities are supporting them financially, the Legislature should stay out of their business and find other things to do. . .

Social movement mainstreaming: Anti-trafficking by DJs, by country musicians and at film festival

It’s official: I can’t keep up with all the anti-trafficking actions going on or make all the commentary that could be made. I hope someone else is doing a serious study (would be a great phd subject) of how a social movement develops; I would need a salary to do it. Anyone want to pay it?

Anyway, in case it was thought that only bigger celebrities, like Kutcher, Sorvino and Emma Thompson were campaigning against trafficking and sex work, note how local initiatives are playing out. Here are djs in Michigan, a country musician in Ottawa and a film-festival entrepreneur in Florida. Note Brandt’s comment:

It’s a slow process, it’s not for the faint of heart or the people who want a quick fix. Every little victory is a huge thing on the way to stopping this. It’s like the abolition of slavery -it takes very brave people to jump in and take a stand.

Ty Beat leads the back for concert to help prevent human trafficking

Get down for a cause with the high-energy music of DJs from around Michigan: Ty Beat, K@Dog, DuKtap, Drchandt, and DJ Muchos Gracias, each creating different sub-genres of electronic music—live drumming, synths, and vinyl DJs. All the proceeds go to the Michigan Human Trafficking Task Force. “I want to raise awareness of trafficking in our community,” Beat said. “I hope that when people realize this is happening here, we can organize to find solutions to reduce the incidents, hold criminals responsible, and help rehabilitate victims.”

Country singer calls for action on human trafficking

After country star Paul Brandt met a six-year-old victim of human trafficking and sexual exploitation, he felt compelled to do something. “There are times I wish I hadn’t seen these things because life is a lot easier when you don’t,” said Brandt, a keynote speaker at a human trafficking conference in Ottawa Tuesday. “With knowledge comes responsibility and once you’re confronted with these things, you have to choose. Are you going to do something about it or not?” Brandt travelled to Cambodia in 2004 with Samaritan’s Purse, an international relief organization, to help distribute Christmas presents to children.

Women’s International Film Festival tackles human trafficking at annual event

When Yvonne McCormack-Lyons began screening films to accept into the annual film fest she founded, she noticed a recurring theme in the works submitted: human trafficking. The films, by and about women, dealt with the lives of trafficking victims and the difficult path to freedom. But McCormack-Lyons decided that viewing the films during the Women’s International Film Festival this week wasn’t enough. She wanted the art to lead to social change.

–Laura Agustín, the Naked Anthropologist

Hating sex workers, and parodies thereof, and a Copenhagen event

I wrote about hate and hating last year in a somewhat jocular tone, noting that I maintain a sort of parallel cv in which Important Enemies appear as a category (note that readers’ comments were highly entertaining). I also noted that some anti-prostitution activists question the right of people even to disagree with them. Then not long ago ex-movie star Sorvino attempted to stop me from talking on a BBC World Debate where I was a panelist – without succeeding, but her sense of entitlement is amazing (BBC editors softened the effect of her attack considerably in the published version).

Here is an example of another actress, Anne Grethe Bjarup Riis, making a nasty attack on a mainstream Danish television show (Go’ Morgen Danmark, TV2). Here no editing has softened the full effect; even without subtitles, even with the sound turned off completely, you get the gist. Bjarup Riis feels entitled to scream at and interrupt the other guest, hog screen time and use insulting language (fissehul = cunthole). The object of her attack is Susanne Møller, spokesperson for SIO, sex worker rights organisation in Denmark. Sus reacts to the attack by smiling and remaining calm.

Anne Grethe Bjarup Riis’ pinlige optræden på Go’ Morgen Danmark, TV2

Link in case embedded video fails

The attack backfired, since SIO got lots of positive attention from viewers who did not appreciate Bjarup Riis’s behaviour and, especially, from those who repudiated her claim that she speaks for all women. This is a perverted version of feminism, to put it mildly. A parody was soon made of the encounter which is quite funny, and this time the presenter has a way to turn the screeching off.

Live fra Bremen 4 – Diskussion om sexarbejderne – Nyhederne sådan cirka!, DKWebTV

Link in case embedded video fails

For those in or near Copenhagen, there is a sex worker festival on three days next week; I will be there on Sunday.

Sexarbejderfestival 2011

27 februar 1300 – 1800 Festival begins at Jemtelandsgade 3, Kvarterhuset, near Amagerbro Metro station (the metro to and from Vanløse to the airport). Map.

12:30 – 13:00 – Ankomst – Kom gerne i god tid

13:00 – 13:15 – Velkommen – Eini Carina Grønvold fra De røde paraplyer byder velkommen og fortæller om dagens forløb

13:15 -14:00 – Antropologen Laura Agustín taler om migrante sexarbejdere
14:00 -14:30 – spørgsmål og debat

14:30 – 15:15 Sexarbejderaktivisten Pye Jakobsson taler om forholdene for de Svenske sexarbejdere
15:15 – 15:45 spørgsmål og debat

15:45 – 16:00 Pause

16:00 – 16:30 Historikeren Nina Søndergaard vil kort skitsere op hvordan prostitution er blevet opfattet og reguleret i Vesteuropa gennem de sidste 150 år.
16:30 -16:45 spørgsmål

16:45 – 17:15 Talskvinde for SIO, Susanne Møller, vil fortælle om SIOs kamp for sexarbejderrettigheder
17:15 -17.45 spørgsmål og debat

17:45 – 18:00 – afrunding og og tak for i dag

1 marts kl 18:30 – 20:30
Filmaften i Virus Bio på Valhalsgade 4, 2200
Der vil blive vist film, der tematiserer sexarbejde fra forskellige vinkler. Efterfølgende debat. Entré 20 kr.

3 marts kl 17:00 – 19:00
Festivalen slutter d. 3 marts hvor vi vil markere Sexarbejdernes Internationale Rettighedsdag med en demonstration FOR sexarbejderrettigheder og IMOD sexkøbsforbud fra Rådhuspladsen til Halmtorvet. Alle er velkomne!

Sex on Sunday Special: What do we have in common? What would a counter-campaign look like?

I am asked – nay, challenged – to say what the issues I comment on here have in common. Not the obvious answer incapsulated in the blog’s title: migration, trafficking and sex, but what lies underneath those – or what the framing issue is above them all. What are you and I concerned about? What brings us together? What’s behind the immediate issues?

Leaving out regional tags the cloud to the right lists:

borders campaigns children clients colonialism culture dance demand development feminism gender equality helping hiv home informal economy laws media migration mobility money police porn power rescue research services sex tourism sexuality sexwork smuggling statistics sundaysex sweden trafficking transnationalism travel urban space violence

Which is not what I need, even if I add more such topics, like

rights, censorship, prison, law and order, fake economics, voodoo evidence, taboo, stigma, regulation, moralism, government repression, government intervention, sexism, misogyny, disrespect for women, disrespect for poorer women, neocolonialism, imperialism, sexual regulation and the list could obviously go on and on

None of these get to the nucleus of what we are worried, annoyed and protesting about. Recently several people – here on the blog, in emails and at live events – have said what we all know by now: that none of the debunking and deconstructing of the anti-trafficking movement’s messages has had much effect. Whatever has been mobilised with sex-slavery reductionism is impervious to reason and evidence. Therefore the question is, What would a counter-campaign look like? A positive message, not a negative one. One that doesn’t refer to organised political parties or broad schools of thought such as liberalism, humanism, libertarianism. Or to unfortunately over-used words like equality. And this is a non-academic question: no abstruse or long-winded replies allowed. Answers do not have to come in the form of a pithy Madison-Avenue message, either – not yet.

Sexual autonomy? My Body, My Self? Sexual Respect? Do those exclude anything really important?

Send ideas as a comment and let’s have a conversation, or talk to me via the contact form to the right.

— Laura Agustin, the Naked Anthropologist

Change the world by getting men to stop buying sex: Spain

Because YOU pay, prostitution exists. This campaign, financed by Madrid’s Equal Opportunity programme some years back, takes a bottom-line, you-are-guilty approach.

Are you worth so little you have to pay?

These two come from Sevilla’s anti-demand campaign, also from a few years ago. The men’s clothes apparently show that different types of men buy sex, and the idea is to dissuade them by saying buying sex is the sign of a worthless person.

Do professional psychologists advise how to word these messages? There is no way to know whether anyone is discouraged by them, but as with so many anti-prostitution and anti-trafficking campaigns, one goal is to demonstrate the correct gender-equal values. Taking away the source of income from women depending on these clients, and further consequences, are completely ignored. Before setting up such projects to end demand, abolitionists should be forced to come up with more, wonderful, available, good-paying jobs for women.

Business strategies brought to campaign to ‘End Demand’ for commercial sex

Pornography is characterised as a training manual for men to buy sex in the campaign described here. Sound odd? Developments confirm that industry was a good term to describe the burgeoning phenomenon I used in the title of my book (Sex at the Margins: Migration, Labour Markets and the Rescue Industry), and I now see it as logical that business strategies should be brought to the cause. This campaign aims to eliminate demand for commercial sex (elsewhere in the report called the demand for trafficking, which they should scrap as it makes no sense). Organisations subscribing include ngos, public services like police, FBI and hospitals, business corporations, foundations, journalists, nuns et cetera. Are government employees permitted to use their titles in such privately-funded campaigns?

From the Executive Summary of the National Planning Meeting to Eliminate Demand for Commercial Sex, Cambridge, Massachusetts, May 8–May 10, 2010, Sponsored by the Embrey Family Foundation and Hunt Alternatives Fund:

Most public and private resources dedicated to human trafficking in the past decade have been crisis oriented, understandably geared toward rescuing and rehabilitating victims and, to some extent, prosecuting the perpetrators. However, policymakers, academics, and activists increasingly recognize that the endless supply of victims won’t abate unless we combat the demand for trafficking. A growing number of countries and cities worldwide have designed policies and programs to end this demand. We are not starting from scratch.

Inspired by the work of others worldwide, and in collaboration with a team of top-level advisers, Hunt Alternatives Fund is launching a multi-year, multi-stakeholder campaign to eradicate demand for commercial sexual exploitation in the United States.

As a first step, Abt Associates Inc., a consultancy in Cambridge, MA, was contracted to review practice, policy, law, and research related to demand reduction. The Abt consultants were asked to suggest three to four frameworks for developing a national strategy.

The planning meeting was a chance to develop a common understanding of demand and create a national campaign focused on effectiveness and devoid of partisanship and ideology. Recommendations included the following (also called Landscape Assessment for the National Campaign).

1. Conduct ongoing research, especially as a tool to unlock public (thus, official) support.
2. Leverage survivors’ knowledge and experiences to put the research in a human context and to cultivate political will by making an undeniable case for addressing demand.
3. Lobby Congress to pass, strengthen, and fund laws.
4. Build coalitions to unify the movement’s work. Dr. Shively cited mental health as an example of how a movement can use procedures.

A selection of suggestions from the meeting:

We need to attack prostitution as “a business like any other corporation,” and we must convert profit-making practices into liabilities, as was done to the tobacco industry.

We should seize large marketing opportunities, such as the upcoming World Cup matches in South Africa, to “create controversy on a world level” and use it to draw attention to prostitution.

Hotels that are sites of exploitation should train employees to recognize the signs of sex trafficking and require that they sign a Code of Conduct sponsored by ECPAT, but many refuse to do so.

We need to harness the power of technology, specifically e-advertising, to raise awareness and increase public engagement.

We should tap “celebrity power” to use major stars’ influence to encourage public engagement.

Read the report’s Executive Summary or the whole long thing. Here’s the list of participants in the planning meeting:

• David Abramowitz, Director of Policy and Government Relations, Humanity United
• Christopher Adams, Polaris Project, Director Of Operations
• Annjanette Alejano-Steele, Laboratory to Combat Human Trafficking, Research and Training Director
• Kayrita Anderson, Harold & Kayrita Anderson Family Foundation, CEO
• Hilary Axam, DOJ Civil Rights, Acting Director Human Trafficking Prosecution Unit
• Luis cdeBaca, Ambassador at Large, Office to Monitor and Combat Trafficking in Persons, U.S. Department of State
• Christina Bain, Program Administrator for the Initiative to Stop Human Trafficking, Carr Center for Human Rights Policy, Kennedy School, Harvard University
• Kevin Bales, Free the Slaves, President
• Julie Bindel, Journalist, Researcher and Feminist Campaigner
• Katherine Blakeslee, U.S. Agency for International Development Director, Office of Women in Development
• Rachel Boisselle, Federal Bureau of Investigation, Special Agent
• Theodore Bunch, A CALL TO MEN, Co-Director
• Cathy Boisvert, YWCA of Central Massachusetts Daybreak Coordinator of Special Projects
• Francine Braae, SAGE Project, Co-Executive Director
• John Chris Bray, Phoenix Police Department, Vice Enforcement Unit Sergeant
• Jimmie Briggs Jr., Man Up, Founder/Executive Director
• Elizabeth, Cafferty. Massachusetts General Hospital, Associate Director, Division of Global Health and Human Rights
• Brigitte Cazalis-Collins, Friends of Maiti Nepal, Executive Director
• Kristy Childs, Veronica’s Voice, Executive Director
• Katherine Chon, Polaris Project, President and Co-Founder
• Adam Cohen, NoPornNorthampton, Co-Founder
• Joseph Collins, Friends of Maiti Nepal
• Dawn Conway, LexisNexis, Sr. Vice President of Corporate Responsibility
• Janice Shaw Crouse, Ph.D., Concerned Women for America, Director and Senior Fellow at the Beverly LaHaye Institute
• Linda Daniels, Department of Defense, Program Manager, Trafficking in Persons Program
• Stephanie Davis, Georgia Women for a Change, Executive Director
• Gail Dines, Professor of Sociology and Women’s Studies, Wheelock College in Boston
• Rachel Durchslag, Chicago Alliance Against Sexual Exploitation, Executive Director
• Jesse Eaves, Children in Crisis
• Carol Edgar, Carol Edgar Communications, Media Consultant
• Gayle Embrey, Embrey Family Foundation, Executive Vice President
• Heather Faris, Air Change, Co-Executive Director
• Melissa Farley, Prostitution Research & Education, Director
• Amanda Finger, Laboratory to Combat Human Trafficking, Executive Director
• Ken Franzblau, Equality Now
• Eleanor Gaetan, Coalition Against Trafficking in Women, Senior Policy Advisor
• Donna Gavin, Boston Police Department, Family Justice Center, Human Trafficking Unit, Sergeant Detective
• Susan Goldfarb, Children’s Advocacy Center of Suffolk County, Executive Director
• Samir Goswami, Chicago Community Trust, 2010 Fellow
• Deena Graves, Traffick911, Executive Director
• Florence Graves, Brandeis University, Founding Director, Schuster Institute for Investigative Journalism
• Ruchira Gupta, Apne Aap Women Worldwide, Founder/President
• Marian Hatcher, Cook County Sheriff’s Office, Administrative Assistant to the Executive Director
• Kaethe Morris Hoffer, Chicago Alliance Against Sexual Exploitation, Legal Director
• Wiveca Holst, Swedish Women’s Lobby
• Michael Horowitz, Hudson Institute
• Donna Hughes, University of Rhode Island, Professor and Eleanor M. and Oscar M. Carlson Endowed Chair; Co-Founder of Citizens Against Trafficking
• Kathryn Infanger, Marion County Prosecutor’s Office, Deputy Prosecutor
• Guy Jacobson, RedLight Children, Executive Director
• Cherie Jimenez, Kim’s Project, Coordinator
• Celiné Justice, Peace is Loud, Program Director
• Jackson Katz, Anti-sexist male activist and Co-founder of the Mentors In Violence Prevention
• Nan Kennelly, Office to Monitor and Combat Trafficking in Persons, U.S. State Department, Deputy Director
• Amanda Kimball, Children at Risk, Director of Public Policy and Government Affairs
• Beth Klein, Esq., Klein-Frank P.C., Founder & Managing Shareholder; Fellow of the Colorado Bar Foundation
• Mark Lagon, Consultant on Corporate Social Responsibility and Human Trafficking (an independent consultancy); former Ambassador at Large to Combat Trafficking in Persons at U.S. State Department
• Carole Lombard, Sisters of St. Joseph Boston, Director of Justice and Peace
• Victor Malarek, Investigative Journalist
• Mohamed Mattar, Johns Hopkins University, Director of the Protection Project
• Katherine McCullough, A Future. Not A Past./Juvenile Justice Fund, Campaign Director
• Terrie McDermott, Cook County Sheriff’s Office, Executive Director of the Department of Women’s Justice Services
• Karen McLaughlin, International Organization for Victim Assistance, Director of Public Policy
• John Miller, former Ambassador at Large to Combat Trafficking in Persons, U.S. State Department
• Martin Monto, Professor of Sociology, Portland State University,
• Bradley Myles, Polaris Project, Executive Director and CEO
• Maria-Isabel Nieto, BAVARIA S.A., Director of Government Affairs
• Audrey Porter, My Life My Choice, Assistant Director
• Norma Ramos, Coalition Against Trafficking in Women, Executive Director
• Jendi Reiter, NoPornNorthampton, Co-Founder
• Deborah Richardson, Women’s Funding Network, Chief Program Officer
• Mary Robertson, Laboratory to Combat Human Trafficking, Research Assistant; University of Colorado at Boulder, graduate student of sociology
• Beth Schapiro, Beth Schapiro and Associates, Executive Director
• Jeff Sedgwick, Keswick Associates, President; former Assistant Attorney General, U.S. Department of Justice
• Jane Nady Sigmon, Ph.D., Senior Coordinator for International Programs in the U.S. State Department’s Office to Monitor and Combat Trafficking in Persons, Global Affairs
• Carol Smolenski, ECPAT-USA, Executive Director
• Melysa Sperber, Vital Voices Global Partnership, Senior Program Officer for Human Rights
• Dorothy Stafford, Middle Georgia Alliance to End Regional Trafficking, Board of Directors
• Guðrún Jónsdóttir Stígamot, Counseling and Information Center on Sexual Violence, Spokesperson
• Karen Strauss, Polaris Project
• Lisa Thompson, The Salvation Army National Headquarters, Liaison for the Abolition of Sexual Trafficking
• Samantha Vardaman, Shared Hope International, Senior Director
• Steve Vienneau, FBI Boston, Agent
• Mary Rita Weschler, The Women’s Table, Sisters of St. Joseph of Boston, Director
• Alan White, SAGE Project, Co-Executive Director
• Linda Williams, University of Massachusetts Lowell, Professor
• Brian Willis, Global Health Promise, Director
• Alicia Foley Winn, The Boston Initiative to Advance Human Rights, Executive Director
• Thirteen police officers and sheriff’s deputies whose identities are withheld
• An additional 10 people who were interviewed but requested anonymity
• Relevant discussions were held with an additional 15 people during conferences and events convened by the U.S. Department of Justice and U.S. Department of State

Soldiers in a War: Anti-trafficking as Abolitionism

It’s language to thrill to: like Onward, Christian Soldiers, many people’s favourite hymn, calls to join the anti-trafficking movement propose to rouse people from their stupor of unknowing and uncaring. Quite early in my own study of this phenomenon I understood that campaigners wanted to manifest indignation, show people what ‘caring’ should look like. Some contemporary folk call this The Abolitionist Movement to end Modern Day Slavery.

We are those who will not sit by while others are denied the basic right of freedom. Join the abolitionist movement. Speak for those who cannot. Fight for those who cannot.

But just as with the hymn, the language is combative, the movement is a military crusade.

Become a soldier in the War on Internet Trafficking.

The Battle against Craigslist’s Adult Services Section has been won!!!!!

However, we may have won that battle but the war has just begun!!!!

How is it suggested you join the war?

Skip your Starbucks for two days and use that money to free a slave.

I wonder how many people fall for such a line and send money in – and if they ever know where it went, I couldn’t easily find any explanation. The website where all this appears, which I don’t link to because it is hideous, noisy and full of spelling errors, is called With More Than Purpose.

-Laura Agustín, the Naked Anthropologist

US anti-traffickers think they have a ‘global responsibility’: just more imperialism

Do all Internet websites have a global responsibility just because they are accessible from everywhere? Most people would find that far-fetched, but I’ve received a letter signed by people calling themselves the anti-trafficking community who think so in one case – that of Craigslist. The letter asks the company to close its erotic and adult services sections all over the world, not only in the US, talking about ‘global responsibility’.

The letter demands a meaningful solution of how you intend to guarantee that no children are being sexually exploited on your site. Not only is this a bizarre request but is the same sort of thinking that justifies imperialist actions like invasions of other countries. It reminds me of a speech I heard that explained anti-trafficking campaigns around the world based on principles in the US Constitution.

The signers complain that Craigslist defended themselves at one point by saying that ‘experts’ in the ‘field’ of anti-trafficking approved of what they were doing (this is before they shut down the section in the US). On the contrary, say the signers of this letter, we are the real and only experts. Given the lack of evidence for most claims about trafficking it’s pretty silly to describe it as a field of knowledge, but that is the basis of this letter.

Choosing the right name and good keywords for social campaigns is crucial to success, and claiming to be the anti-trafficking community is not a bad effort. There are several implications to the claim:

that there is only one community that cares about victims of trafficking
that everyone in it saw this letter
that everyone who saw the letter signed it

But, of course, there are many other groups, ngos and individuals who do anti-trafficking work of one kind or another and who were undoubtedly not sent this letter to sign. I object to having the entire project of righting wrongs in this ‘field’ hijacked by a group with a particular ideology everyone does not share.

September 14, 2010
Sent via facsimile to
Jim Buckmaster, CEO
Craig Newmark, Founder
Craigslist, Inc.
1381 9th Avenue
San Francisco, CA 94122

Dear Craig Newmark & Jim Buckmaster,

The experts in the anti-trafficking field who have signed this letter stand together asking you to shut down all the Adult and Erotic Services sections of your website around the world.

We all know that plenty of activity has preceded this letter. There have been meetings, news articles, research studies, protests, letters from survivors, blogs, boycotts, earnings estimates, lawsuits, subpoenas, and plenty of other actions. The voices of survivors, advocates, service providers, local law enforcement, members of Congress, and State Attorneys General have all implored you to do more to fight the sex trafficking of women and girls that occurs on your site.

We thank you for voluntarily closing the Adult Services section of Craigslist in the United States. While this is a positive step, Craigslist is a global company, and it has a global responsibility. More than 250 Craigslist sites exist around the world that still feature “Erotic” sections where trafficked children and women are being sold for sex through your website.

Of particular concern is your repeated statement that anti-trafficking “experts” are supportive of your approach. For example, in one of Jim Buckmaster’s online responses on the Huffington Post, he states, “To the contrary, we are convinced Craigslist is a vital part of the solution to this age-old scourge. We’ve been told as much by experts on the front lines of this fight…”1

There are some who may want you to keep the Erotic Services sections going outside the United States for various reasons. Sex traffickers surely want you to keep the sections going because it helps them make high profits by advertising women and children to large audiences of paying customers. “Johns” who pay for commercial sex want you to keep the section because your site makes it easy and less risky for them to buy women and girls simply by surfing the Internet and perusing the photos on various ads. There may even be some law enforcement officials who see some value in placing decoy ads on your site, or using Craigslist ads as evidence in an investigation. However, we highly doubt that on balance, law enforcement would condone a venue that is a platform for the sex trafficking of women and children. The recent letter signed by 17 State Attorneys General strongly suggests that many law enforcement officials believe the best solution is to close the section, as you have done in the United States.

The signers of this letter are the experts on the issue of human trafficking. Many of us work on the front lines, directly with victims on a daily basis. Some of us are survivors of human trafficking.

p 2
With this letter, we are telling you that on the whole, Craigslist’s Adult and Erotic Services sections continue to be more part of the problem than part of the solution. On the day that Craigslist shut down its Adult Services section in the United States, were the pimps and johns who depend on the site to advance the sex trade happy or upset? The answer to this question should help guide your path forward as you address the remaining “Erotic” sections around the world.

We acknowledge that there are some things that Craigslist has done that are part of the solution. Offering to meet with law enforcement and non-profits is a good thing. The decision to start screening the Adults Services ads was a step forward. Eliminating the blatant nudity that persisted in past years in the United States’ Erotic section was also a step forward. Posting national hotlines, and cooperating with law enforcement when cases are found is useful and laudable. As stated above, voluntarily shutting down the Adult Services section in the United States is also a step in the right direction. Despite such steps forward, these efforts are not enough.

We are deeply concerned that you have not yet taken down the Erotic Services sections across the globe. We are also concerned that it seems that you are not applying the screening techniques that were used in the United States to all the other Erotic Services sections worldwide.

In changing the name of the Adult Services section from “Erotic” to “Adult” in the United States, why did you not implement this change globally across your entire site? Furthermore, for the “Adult Services” pages in the United States, there was a “Warning & Disclaimer” page that discusses human trafficking an sexual exploitation. This disclaimer page is also present for the “Erotic” sections in Canada. Yet, as of the date of this letter, there is no “Warning & Disclaimer” page for the other international “Erotic” pages. Nudity is also still present in the photos associated with some “Erotic” ads in the international pages. The reality that you have not made the same improvements globally across your site reveals a disingenuous and inconsistent response on your part. Moreover, the few helpful actions you have taken do not measure up to the amount of daily harm being facilitated by Craigslist through the thousands of Erotic Services ads around the world each day.

In a recent letter, Jim Buckmaster stated that human trafficking ads are “quite rare” on Craigslist.2 Based on our experience and collective knowledge, we know that the presence of human traffickers on your site is more frequent than you realize. Traffickers have figured out ways to post pictures of clothed women and children that can get past your screeners. The anti-trafficking field has yet to be presented with a meaningful solution of how you intend to guarantee that no children are being sexually exploited on your site. As a result, we ask that you take down the Adult or Erotic sections, wherever they appear on Craigslist.

Another important reality for you to realize is that law enforcement does not currently have the resources to review and conduct an investigation of every single Adult or Erotic Services ad on your site. The sheer volume of ads outpaces law enforcement’s ability to respond to each one. Consequently, maintaining the Erotic Services sections in other countries enables the majority of Erotic ads to thrive without a law enforcement deterrent. Cooperating with law enforcement when a rare case is brought is a short-term solution, not reflective of an overall systemic analysis of the crime problem that you are enabling.

p 3
You have asserted that removing the Adult or Erotic Services sections will not entirely eliminate the presence of sex ads on your site. This may be true, but eliminating the centralized thoroughfares of each designated “Erotic Services” section seriously disrupts pimps and johns who buy and sell women and children on Craigslist. Closing this section of Craigslist across the globe will send a clear signal to sexual predators that you will not stand for them using the site to sexually exploit children and women.

You argue that there are other online sites that advertise sex ads. Yes, the signers of this letter are aware of other sites with adult ads, and we are working to address those sites as well. But frankly, the user volume and name recognition of those sites pales in comparison to yours. They are not a household name like Craigslist.

We collectively feel that if you are seriously committed to ending the site’s use as a platform for sex trafficking of women and children, you will apply the same approach you recently took in the United States and immediately close the remaining Erotic sections around the world.

If you continue to keep the Erotic sections outside of the United States, we ask that you at least be honest and more specific about the reasons why you are keeping them. After receiving this letter, please do not claim that it is because anti-trafficking “experts” agree with you and wholly support your approach. In closing, we note that in one of Jim Buckmaster’s recent letters, he asked the question: “Would it not be a step backward to confine adult ads to venues that don’t cooperate with law enforcement, that don’t care what advocacy groups and nonprofits have to say?”3

This statement seems to indicate that Craigslist does care what advocacy groups and nonprofits have to say, more than other venues. If this is true, then you must care about this letter. Please hear what we have to say, read the signers of this letter, and recognize that the anti-trafficking field is standing with solidarity and unity, and collectively asking you to take down all the Adult and Erotic sections worldwide, completely and permanently.

1 Buckmaster, Jim. “An Open Invitation to Rachel Lloyd.” Craigslist Blog. 11 May 2010. Available at http://blog.craigslist.org/2010/05/ (visited September 13, 2010).
2 Ibid.
3 Ibid.

To see who signed this letter Continue reading →

Can advertising be trafficking? Is Craigslist like Wal-Mart? Is freedom involved?

Running a website with erotic advertisements as sex trafficking: the mind boggles at how anything connected to the sex industry can now be given the scary label trafficking.

In the USA, where Craigslist is headquartered, the website’s advertisements for paid sex are causing a furore amongst moral entrepreneurs who want the ads stopped on the grounds that ‘child sex trafficking’ is going on. C raigslist and the sex trade shows a cnn reporter attempting to make the owner of Craigslist himself personally responsible, pointing at ads, challenging him to explain. Some of this resembles scapegoating, the desire to find a single responsible villain for a Great Social Evil, implying that stopping this advertising would be a significant battle against it.

The fear fueling this campaign is captured in one NGO’s statement that An estimated 100,000-300,000 American children are at risk for becoming victims of commercial sexual exploitation. This figure is not even an irresponsibly extrapolated number of victims, which we are now used to, but an estimate of how many might be vulnerable. The cnn reporter describes the torso-photo in one ad as young-looking. Such imaginings are not the basis for policy! And note that where there would have been a distinction in terms not long ago (commercial sexual exploitation v trafficking), now there is not. Everything becomes trafficking.

The argument against stopping all commercial sex ads centres on freedom of expression/information, a key principle in human rights law. This principle takes in written, oral and print media, including the Internet, and covers not only the content but the means of expression. Of course there are situations meant to override this freedom, nowadays usually called Hate Speech, the Harm Principle and the Offence Principle. One could certainly make a strong argument that sex ads are harmful if one could prove that all those running them were criminals forcing other people to perform sex acts against their will. To do that would require real evidence, not panicky guesses about young victims. Not scare tactics.

Another aspect of this crusade is about something else: the ‘accusation’ that Craigslist is like Wal-Mart. This appears to be hostility both to big profits and a comparison with Wal-Mart’s unadorned, high-volume, warehouse-like style. Or perhaps it refers more to Wal-Mart’s legendary lack of social consciousness, poor community relations, environmental disinterest, use of badly paid foreign labour and so on. The problem is: Wal-Mart is also enormously popular. Would a personalised boutique style make Craigslist more acceptable?

Some of the ads on Craigslist might be the work of bad people. The ways they might be bad range from taking too much of the money a worker earns right through to kidnapping and slavery. But should the possibility that bad things could happen be allowed to justify shutting down all the ads, including those placed by competent adults? See Amanda Brooks on that.

Classified adverts are the subject of a similar crusade in Spain at the moment. In that case, mainstream newspapers are the accused businesses, but the issue is just the same.

It’s never too early to begin panicking about sex trafficking: London Olympics 2012

Media writers are to blame for spreading at least half the misconceptions about trafficking and the sex industry. The London Olympics are two years away but they loom. Prostitutes will flood Essex. Where does the reported ‘information’ come from? Not from any official or researcher but from a social-work campaigner. It’s irresponsible journalism. (I also find the term rape charity unpleasant.)

The other half of the blame goes to people like the campaigner quoted, head of a local rape crisis centre, who appears to want funding to take trips to foreign lands to do ‘research’ where none is necessary. We’ve just had ample and repeated research-based debunkings from South Africa about the threat of trafficking during the World Cup, and nothing happened in Vancouver, either – which this spokesperson admits, but then she cunningly claims the credit goes to people like herself who planned correctly. What nonsense.

Sex trafficking fear as the Games loom

Sarah Calkin, 30 July 2010, The Echo

Prostitutes are expected to flood south Essex during the 2012 Olympics, a rape charity has warned. With the opening ceremony of the Games now less than two years away, experts at the South Essex Rape and Crisis Centre have already begun investigating what can be done to discourage an influx of prostitutes and protect women from being trafficked into the area. Hundreds of athletes and spectators are expected to descend on the county to train and stay for the duration of the Games.

Sheila Coates, director of the centre, based in Thurrock, said: “Research has shown that during large sporting events, sex crime actually increases because of the large number of participants and a lot of people travelling from country to country. Sadly, pimps see that as a way of increasing their income and we will see women trafficked to the area. . . The centre is preparing to research the possible impact and take the necessary steps to mitigate the impact of any increase in sex trafficking and prostitution in the area. We are going to start looking at research available from the winter Olympics in Canada and the World Cup in South Africa to see what the impact may or may not be. In Vancouver it looks like it wasn’t as big a problem as anticipated because they planned for it and planned it out.”

A spokeswoman for Essex Police said the force had not been made aware of any expected problems.

And speaking of panicking-planning early, campaigners in Glasgow have already begun in regard to 2014’s Commonwealth Games.

Anti-trafficking poster objectifies victims: Sheepshead Bay, New York

As in the strange exhibition with Emma Thompson we saw the other day, anti-trafficking campaign material is often incoherent. This one comes from a bus shelter on Emmons Avenue and East 26th Street, Sheepshead Bay, New York

Notice how the victim is treated here like an object even though the words appear to come from her. Is she meant to be able to read this poster? Probably not, or even to see it. Rather, the message is meant for the eyes of English-reading citizens, presumably to alert them that she might be around somewhere nearby. I do see the point but the poster belongs to a now long tradition that reproduce thoroughly objectifying images in order to complain about objectification. I have met victims of trafficking but no one who liked this kind of advertisement.

Anti-trafficking campaign with movie star: Emma Thompson doing good

What are we to make of this photograph? Who is saying HELP ME? Is this a men’s toilet or a women’s? Is the victim hidden behind the wall? There’s something fundamentally wrong with the grammar of this warning. And then Emma Thompson – is she identifying with the person crying help? or perhaps a bit nonplussed, or distracted by the dirtiness of the sink.

Here Emma is on surer ground: the correct response is dismay and disapproval that sexual acts could be written on a list with prices next to them. Unless it’s the prices that bother her – or the amounts of time. Do the men beside the movie star not look slightly uncomfortable? Of course the menu-price list is a fit-up invented by some intern who didn’t know how these things work.

Emma with Mr Costa of UNODC. Is that an anti-trafficking mural painted on the wavy metal wall? It turns out to be part of a giant installation. The fake bathroom and price list must be inside.

The big letters on top spell JOURNEY.

Here’s that picture from the front. Now it’s clearer that the viewer is being asked Is this sexy to you? At least I think so. But who is meant to answer? And what if some viewers’ response is Yes, in fact, I find it sexy ? Awkward.

My point is not to claim that trafficking is a joke or efforts to stop it always ridiculous but to suggest that many attempts at campaigning (these included) are confusing, non-educational and belittling to real victims. Or is the whole exercise simply meant to demonstrate a set of values for people who already share them?

Fish for money, not for sex: opportunistic sex work

My question about this warning against the temptations of sex was: Are the women portrayed considered sex workers, in the context of the poster? The reply was: I think they are keeping their options open. In other words, the fisherman is being warned not to waste his money on women – paying to wine, dine and possibly have sex with them. Selling sex is often opportunistic, a snap decision unrelated to any professional identity as sex worker or prostitute (whether celebrated or deplored). As a story from Angola had it the other day, people may prey on others’ desires to have fun if there is money to be made from it. But the ‘preying’ may also be what those with money want – that those who know how to provide fun come and present themselves! Traditional language of the market (workers, clients, soliciting) masks the realm of ambiguity and opportunism inherent in many sex exchanges. Note too a recent post about the meanings of prostitution in Egypt.

The poster was produced by Young Men as Equal Partners (YMEP), with support from SIDA (Swedish development agency), Family Health Options Kenya and RFSU (Swedish sex education).

Good sex, equal sex: Do feminists have better sex?

The concept of Gender Equality needs examining. I’ve started doing that in the place where Gender Equality is not only an official state policy but a way of life and, in the eyes of many people, a genuine fetish: Sweden. Not that there aren’t all sorts of positive aspets to this, but there are problems, too. I was very provoked when I read that Sweden’s feminist political party now claims Feminists Have Better Sex and wrote the following piece. It’s the third in a series, this time on the topic of equality in our sex lives and how we rate ‘quality’ sex anyway. Earlier I wrote about how the idea of Violence Against Women has got carried away and about the existence of dissent about Gender Equality in Sweden.

Good sex, equal sex: Who has the best sex?

11 January 2010, The Local

Feminists have better sex is the latest catchphrase from Sweden’s feminist political party, Feministiskt Initiativ. That’s right, people supposedly interested in personal and class liberation sound as though they are engaged in a one-up-manship that says Our way of living is better than yours.

People who are alienated by this sort of stuff dismiss and hate feminism. Some years ago, I came to terms with the fact that there are different sorts of feminism. That is, many people who call themselves feminists believe in different, and sometimes opposing, ideas. I don’t see much future in endless battling about what ‘correct’ feminist values are. But this supposedly feminist claim about better sex is provoking.

One aspect of traditional value systems many dislike is how hierarchies are used to rank every aspect of life: grades, ratings, point systems all show how some people are better than others. Everyone can’t excel, many feel inferior and it all takes up too much time and energy.

It’s hardly significant that I don’t like FI’s catchphrase. But I wondered about the research that supposedly backed up the ‘better sex’ claim. Written by two psychologists at Rutgers University, Rudman and Phelan, the article is called The Interpersonal Power of Feminism: Is Feminism Good for Romantic Relationships? The quantitative survey research asked participants to consider three items about sex: My relationship is sexually satisfying, The sexual side of my relationship could use improvement and How often have you considered having a sexual relationship with someone other than your partner?

The basic finding was modest: ‘Contrary to popular beliefs, feminism may improve the quality of relationships, as opposed to undermining them.’ A measured conclusion hardly substantiating FI’s catchphrase and Schyman’s claim in her article Lycka kräver reservationslösa relationer (Happiness requires unreserved relationships).

Elin Grelsson responded in Expressen that the FI campaign sets up a new set of ideals for everyone to feel inadequate about, another demand that we live perfect lives. State Feminism tends to produce rigid, utopian formulas proclaimed the only proper way to live. Schyman and Svärd objected and agreed that they know sexual satisfaction comes in many forms. But their reply’s title still uses the phrase ‘better sex’, continuing the same old idea that some sexual experiences are superior to others. Which is not what the authors of the original research said.

In fact, it’s impossible to measure sexual relations, so we can’t know who has good ones and who does not. The surveys mentioned simply asked people to say whether or not they felt satisfied. People who say they never enjoy sex, or it always hurts or disgusts them, are probably not having the same experience as people who say they always enjoy sex. On the other hand, maybe they are having the same experience but evaluate it differently (yes, it’s thorny).

But most people’s experiences fall between the two extremes: sometimes they enjoy sex and sometimes they don’t. There isn’t any formula for good sex: even someone who has managed to figure out what pleases her or him and how to achieve it has different experiences on different occasions. Too much to eat or drink, a bad day at the office, a thrilling film: all have the capacity to change how we perceive an experience that is, on the face of it, ‘the same’ as the last time. Sex education and sex therapy are forced to rely on descriptions of acts, diagrams of bodies and formulae about consent – as though always asking people if they want things were proof that all is well.

The term Gender Equality is usually used as though its meaning were obvious. Nowadays, equality in its most general sense is widely agreed to be a good idea; we believe human beings ought to enjoy equal opportunities to live, work and progress. In the abstract, it doesn’t seem difficult, but problems appear when we consider sex. Proponents of Gender Equality have a hard time understanding that people can consent to activities that don’t sound equitable (always being the ‘bottom’ or ‘top’ in sexual relations, one person having fewer orgasms than another). Continue reading →

What does sex work have to do with climate change? Anti-prostitution campaign at Climate Conference, Copenhagen

Susanne Møller, SIO

Sex workers in Denmark are protesting a campaign against prostitution during the UN Climate Change Conference. The city of Copenhagen wants to discourage delegates from buying sex, despite the fact that it is perfectly legal there and has nothing to do with climate change. The sex workers’ interest group, SIO (Sexarbejdernes Interesseorganisation), was not consulted and so, annoyed, they are offering free sex to any conference delegate who turns in his ridiculous postcard (see below), which also went to 160 hotels.

This is sheer discrimination. Ritt Bjerregaard is abusing her position as Lord Mayor in using her power to prevent us carrying out our perfectly legal job. I don’t understand how she can be allowed to contact people in this way. – SIO Spokeswoman Susanne Møller

The unfounded idea at the bottom of the city’s campaign is that prostitution increases enormously when big events come to town and therefore trafficking and exploitation must. Meanwhile, legal businesses are punished. The below Norwegian story focuses on SIO’s ideas.

Derfor tilbyr Susanne gratis sex

Pål Nordseth, 7 december 2009, Dagbladet.no

Susanne Møller, prostituert i København og talskvinne for Sexarbejdernes Interesseorganisation (SIO), sier deres kampanje under det kommende klimatoppmøtet er et svar på det de oppfatter som årelang hets fra kommunens side. Ved å framvise offisielt akkrediteringskort for FN-møtet, samt et postkort fra kommunenes anti-prostitusjonskampanje, vil delegatene kunne benytte seg av 79 organiserte sexarbeidere helt gratis.

Vi gjør dette for å skape oppmerksomhet om et problem: At København kommune under toppmøtet profilerer seg selv på bekostning av en helt lovlig bransje. Dette rammer sexarbeiderne, som ikke er blitt rådspurt på forhånd, sier Møller til Dagbladet.

Nekter for toppmøte-oppsving
Mens både Norge og Sverige har kriminalisert sexkjøp, er det fortsatt legalt å betale prostituerte for sex i Danmark. Susanne Møller avviser blankt at sexmarkedet i København får et oppsving under store internasjonale hendelser i byen, slik det hevdes i kommunens behandling av anti- prostitusjonskampanjen.

Dette er helt udokumenterte påstander. Vi lever av våre faste kunder, og kommer det noen ekstra til under slike møter, er det ikke noe vi legger merke til. . . Selv om det var slik, er det feil å se på det som et problem. Om delegatene har sex eller ikke under toppmøtet, er det en privat sak. Det vi gjør er helt legalt og skader ingen, og som alle andre forretningsdrivende ønsker vi selvfølgelig flere kunder og bedre omsetning. Jeg synes det er forkastelig, det kommunen gjør. De innfører sin helt egen kriminalisering, legger hun til.

Talskvinna sier så drastiske tiltak som å tilby gratis sex er nødvendig for at de prostituerte skal kunne nå fram med sitt budskap.

Kommunens mål er å få en prostitusjonsfri by. Toppmøtekampanjen er bare et ledd i det som har vært en årelang hets av sexarbeidere. Vi går gjerne i dialog med kommunen, men har så langt ikke hørt fra dem. Heller ikke at vi gikk ut med vår motkampanje. – Susanne Møller

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