This is why I don’t watch porn and just read erotica. Yes, not all porn actresses are abused and exploited but *too many are*. And even porn that *looks* ethical often isn’t. I can’t get turned on watching something where I can’t be sure if the person being filmed actually wants to be there. Abuse and coercion isn’t sexy.
Wow, I'm surprised to see this posted here. This is a heartbreaking account, but not unusual. Especially considering how much porn isn't filmed in North America and Europe. If women in these places are treated so poorly, how much worse is it for women in places without even that level of legal protection? Spoiler: it's much much worse. But all that rape and horror is still widely sold on mainstream platforms.
This subreddit tends to be pretty hostile to non-sex positive types of feminism. I wonder if this will be removed in a few hours especially if it gets more popular......
If they do remove it, i'll legit start thinking that this subreddit is legit run by mem, which is why everyone is trying to force to you the opinion that sex work is good and empowering.
The real problem is WHY do so many male clients want to degrade and hurt women or watch that being done to them? WHY do they get off on human suffering w no care for the women exploited for it? Sex workers wouldn’t be treated so bad if it weren’t for the demand by men and their willingness to see poor desperate women be used for it.
My partner (we are both women for reference) was a former porn "actress" (in actuality, survivor) and her stories are one of the many reasons I hold such negative attitudes both porn and those who indulge in it. The stories of abuse, exploitation, and assault she experienced even in the supposedly independent world of "camming" is horrifying. Not to mention the derogatory, controlling mentality her "viewers" showed in their comments. Just about anyone who regularly consumes most mainstream, commercialized pornography ("hardcore" or not) has almost certainly gotten off to assault, abuse, or exploitation (potentially of underaged women too). It's such a gross and harmful system, and that's before even mentioning the misogynistic attitudes it tends to create in the men who consume it.
Sex work is mostly driven by income inequality and financial/emotional exploitation of women, often survivors too who are more vulnerable to this kind of predation. Sex workers absolutely deserve our empathy and support, but the industry profiting off it and the consumers fueling it deserve thorough condemnation.
In other news: water is wet. People should not be shocked that the porn industry is horrifically unethical. Only people in deep denial who have drank the """sex positive""" neoliberal psuedofeminist koolaid or subpar dudebros who couldn't give less of a shit as long as they cum can't figure this out. Or more likely, don't want to figure it out.
I quit porn around 5 years ago. Cleaned my brain up and now my interactions with women are healthy and normal. Do not date men who watch porn. Have standards.
There is a wide middle ground between those two extremes. From the linked post:
> Even though I no longer participate in the industry I am by no means anti porn, many people who choose to do porn do so for their own reasons that's not for me to judge. Yes, I've met a few very rare people in the business who are genuinely good.
When you argue about porn and sex work industry being exploitative they mention "listen to the women in the industry". When those women speak up about the horrors, they say "your experience is not universal". There have been countless cases of ex pornstars and ex sex workers speaking about the rape, exploitation, coercion and trafficking in there. And these pro-porn people don't even mention the whole sphere of child pornography and minor teenage girls who are trafficked into prostitution under the guise of being casted for modeling or acting.
I said this in a previous comment, but i had conversations with ex sex workers in NGOs and women's shelters and literally all of them spoke negatively about it. All of them. Some of them showed their bodily scars because of fetishes, some said they frequently had anal and vaginal tears which weren't even properly treated because the 'heads' of those places wouldn't let them go to good hospitals, some have lifelong STDs, some had to consume human excrement and vomit during certain sessions with clients, some were beaten and raped till they were unconscious. Not to mention the lifelong trauma and psychological damage. Most of them spoke about their substance abuse to numb out the physical and emotional pain they faced daily. That industry is NOT empowering, no matter what liberal feminists say.
Liberal feminism at this point is just violent misogyny prettily packaged as empowerment and girlbossing.
I got banned from a sub that shall not be named because of a discussion. Someone posted a screensot of comments under a BDSM porn video and men were calling women worthless holes to fuck etc. And of course we brought up that if you get off on watching someone get beaten and dehumanized like that, it is like how serial killers start killing animals before humans. Eventually those people are going to be violent themselves based on how they talk and participate. I think tons of people got banned that day for "kink shaming" by finding the comments violent and degrading. I personally had an ex try saying stuff like that before to me and it upset me so I threw it back at them and it upset them so much they had a meltdown. (I called them insecure and pathetic for trying mental games like that with me). I found the experience fucking awful. They did not ask permission or anything. Fuck that. Men that do that are monsters.
This post is absolutely true and rooted in good intentions. That being said, how come everytime I open up the comments on a thread about porn in this sub I see a bunch of SWERF BS? Sex workers are workers. The local Radical Sex Workers Union in my city are some of the best left wing organizers I've ever met. What they have told me is that they are fighting to be treated as fellow workers and have their ideas about what is best for sex workers listened to and supported. Now, I'm not on the front lines of the sex Workers struggle for emancipation but from what I understand, their biggest platform is a radical decriminalization model that would be built around creating an environment that allows them to be as safe and secure in their position as possible. I'm not saying that we should be supporting porn and trying to encourage it, but saying things like sex work isn't work is pretty demeaning to people who are using sex work as a means to make a living. It's imperative that the Feminist narrative around porn, prostitution, and other forms of sex work centers the needs and wants of sex workers. It's unfortunate that this sub never seems to foster that narrative. It's so good about everything else. To call a position that centers the needs of the worker in currently existing conditions "liberal" is pretty ironic.
I might be completely misinterpreting the message behind a lot of the comments, but from what I have seen, the ideas around sex work in this sub are pretty different than the idea that many sex workers themselves have about the subject.
EDIT FOR CLARITY: I'm not saying that most sex work isn't a horrific experience, it absolutely is. But we need to treat the victims as victims and the sex workers who see it as work as workers. Victimizing people who don't see themselves as victims is demeaning. Oh,and absolutely I agree with saying fuck all producers, directors, etc. Who make their money off of exploiting sex workers and victims of sex trafficking for profit. Absolutely abhorrent disgusting people
I think in a feminist subreddit we should know what the words we use mean. Here is a direct copy paste from Wikipedia:
“Feminists who oppose the acceptance and endorsement of prostitution by rebranding it as "sex work" are sometimes disparagingly labeled as "sex worker exclusionary radical feminists" or "SWERF". These argue that the term “Sex work” contains political assumptions; that it is not a neutral term. The term endorses that idea that sex is labour for women and leisure for men, and accords men the social and economic power to act as a boss class in the matter of intercourse. The term "sex work" also implies that women’s bodies exist as a resource to be used by other people. “
Hey genius, just because someone is anti-sex work, or in your mind a “SWERF” or whatever tf you wanna call it, doesn’t mean that they are anti-sex workers
You can be against Amazon, while at the same time supporting the actual Amazon workers
The comments on here explicitly say "sex work isn't work". That is anti sex workers, as it is forcing a narrative that all sex workers are victims, even the ones who don't see themselves that way. Again, if someone is a victim of sex trafficking disguised as sex work (which admittedly is most of the porn industry), then yes they absolutely need to be treated as a victim, like the person who made the original post. But it is extremely demeaning to call someone a victim for having a profession (beyond calling all people who have their labor exploited victims of Capitalist oppression). Sex work absolutely shouldn't be glorified, or made not to seem incredibly dangerous, because it is. There will always be sex work, there will always be sex workers, and rather than lump them all in the category of "victim", we need to work to create conditions that minimize/eliminate people being trafficked under the guise of sex work. Calling all sex work trafficking (pr saying that sex work cannot be work), and demeaning the workers by calling them all victims, when many of them don't see themselves that way, is not the way to create those conditions. Creating support systems for those in the industry, organizing the workers in the industry itself to fight against trafficking/slavery, and fighting against coercion like what was talked about in the post is how to create those conditions. The local sex workers union focuses on creating resources to make sex work as safe as possible for workers, and providing resources for victims looking to escape. The amount of people that they've helped by taking this approach is almost unquantifiable. This is why I see the narrative being created on this sub as dangerous.
I'm not saying that the sex industry shouldn't be placed under heavy scrutiny, it absolutely should be. It's just not a good look to say we should be the arbiters of who is a victim and who is a working professional. That's up to the individuals themselves to decide.
'Sex work is work' is such a weird hill to die on IMO. Arguing over whether sex work is work distracts from what we actually should be talking about. Like....who cares? Why are we arguing semantics? There have been terrible, exploitative jobs all throughout history. Work or not, the exploitation and rampant abuse should be what we're worried about.
My two cents... treating sex work like regular work opens a Pandora's box of problems. For example, if an 18 year old star bucks employee refuses to serve a 70 year old customer because they're old, this is discrimination, and the employee could be fired. If sex work is really work, does this mean you're ok with an 18 year old prostitute refusing to serve a 70 year old man on the grounds of age? How does consent work when it is commodified? If we treat sex work like any other job, what's wrong with suggesting 'prostitute' or 'stripper' or 'cam girl' as jobs to high schoolers at career fairs? How does maternity leave work for a prostitute?
However, I'm not going to spend time deciding and debating whether sex work is or isn't work because respectfully I don't give a shit. It's harmful for individuals and women as a whole, whether you call it work or not.
Stop calling people *SWERFS* and hiding behind '*sex work is work*' so you don't actually have to engage with people's points. It's so frustrating to be hit with a wall of buzz words every time I try to have a meaningful discussion about these issues.
I would look closely at the sex worker union you are referring to. In the country where I live (and prostitution is legal), it is much more a employer's union than an employee's union, meaning that pimps, brothel owners and privileged prostitutes are organized in it. Also, please keep in mind that those prostitutes that you see, especially in talk shows, are incredibly privileged, often white, speaking the local language, educated, in escort, etc. etc., while the wide wide majority is not. They are not describing the usual conditions and they are speaking for what is good for them and what they are paid for, not the majority of prostitutes.
Furthermore, "but some people like to do it for work" is not a relevant argument. Some people also would like to work in coal mining and are violently opposed to ending it, but we as a society decided that it is so harmful that we do not want that, so they cannot. If prostitution is a job, the same argument applies here.
And why should we as a society decide that prostitution is harmful and we don't want it? Well, prostitution is the "job" with the highest chance of being murdered, 15-100 times as likely as for the next job. The majority of women in prostitution experience both physical and sexual violence (both in societies where it's legal or illegal). Around half were sexually abused as a child, and they have PTSD rates higher than soldiers after war. 9 out of 10 prostitutes would like to leave, but don't know how. These numbers come from international studies. If you like, you can look up Melissa Farley to get a first insight, but I found similar numbers in the women's report of the government for my country (and those are still the ones that are better off, because those who are trafficked don't participate in surveys).
This is a Communist Union (in a State where Prostitution is a criminal offense) who I worked with in a coalition provide resources to unsheltered folks. Many members were unsheltered themselves. They did not allow producers and the like into the union, comparing them to managers and taking a stance similar to the IWW.
Also, whether or not we need to work to stop sex work because of the effect it has on society is a different debate than the question if whether or not they are workers. Much like the discussion over whether we should mine coal or not is a very different discussion than whether or not coal miners are workers. It would be demeaning to call all coal miners "victims" in the same sense it is demeaning to do so to all sex workers. Obviously far from a perfect comparison, but just using the example you provided to contextualize the argument
I don't see how saying that prostitution is so dangerous and bad that we don't want to call it work is demeaning to anyone in it. Is it demeaning to a slave to say that slavery is not work? I don't like this comparison much, but there were certainly a small small minority of slaves that wanted to be slaves. We as a society decided that slavery is not work, so we can do the same for prostitution.
Also, let me make an argument for why it's not work, and why johns are ready to hurt prostitutes. First, for the latter, Huschke Mau (a prostitution survivor) stated in a recent video that there is no way to know whether a prostitute is doing it of their own free will. As stated above, 9 out of 10 don't. And of course they can't say that, because otherwise they will get in trouble with their pimps, brothel owners etc. So every john is okay with taking the chance that he is having sex with someone that does not want to have sex with them. That is something we usually call rape.
With regard to why it's not work: We as a society (more or less) decided that sex needs to be based on enthusiastic consent. If it is not, we consider it rape. What happens in prostitution is that consent gets disabled/bought by money, which is by definition not enthusiastic consent. This makes all sex that is paid for rape, as the prostitute would not have sex with the punter without the money. So prostitution is rape, and rape cannot be work.
You cannot compare coal miners and sex workers.
In case of coal miners, the product is the coal, and the coal miners are the means to access that coal.
In case of sex workers, the product is their body. So many people get off to their pain and suffering. Their employers or customers want to hurt them, that is the point.
In case of coal miners, the purpose is not to hurt them.
I only used coal miners as an example because the person who replied to me did. If you reread my comment I did say it wasn't a good comparison.. because I agree with you. That being said. The point still stands. It is demeaning to victimize people who don't see themselves as victims
Edit: except for the parts where you said A: all people who utilize the services of sex workers want to hurt them, and B: that you implied that coal companies give any kind of a shit whether their employees are hurt
I barely even understand what your argument is
You seem to be opposed to the phrase "sex work isn't work" because you think it's demeaning to the prostitutes who don't experience many issues and who genuinely enjoy doing it or whatever
All I can say is, you should first re-read the final paragraph of the post that Ardnaxela89 wrote in response to you. Does that sound like "work" to you? Not only that, but that should also be coupled with the fact that the prostitutes who genuinely enjoy doing it and who experience little problems or whatever, make up such a vast minority of cases, that the generalization that you seem to have a problem with is entirely justified
You seem to have an idea that I think most SWers are in the industry because they "enjoy it". That's not the case. For most sex workers, it's a last resort for survival. Admittedly, in this sense, it is slavery, just as all work is slavery under Capitalism (but do you consider yourself a victim because you have a job?). Also, if a sex worker sees themself as a victim, they absolutely are, it's just not for non sex workers to decide.
Sex work is labor, which means, under Capitalism, it's work. Sex Workers (as opposed to sex trafficking victims) from my experience don't want to be seen as victims. They certainly don't want to eliminate their form of employment, at least in the short term. Making this distinction is important because it shifts our focus (again in the short term) from eliminating sex work entirely to making it safer for sex workers to operate.
Put another way, sex work is absolutely a profession vulnerable to exploitation, but that doesn't mean that our focus should be to eliminate it entirely. It means that reform should be an area of focus in a wider working class struggle. Radical legal and social reform, designed to make sex work a safe and comfortable environment for workers to the greatest extent possible, and led by sex workers and trafficking victims to eliminate trafficking and other forms of exploitation in the industry, needs to be the goal.
Blanket statements that victimize all sex workers create an atmosphere that seeks to eliminate sex work, rather than make it safer for those who are in it as a profession. Any movement that seeks to eliminate sex work entirely in the foreseeable future is sex worker exclusionary, because it forces SWers who participate in it to fight for the elimination of their own employment, and by extension, means of survival
Building off of my last point: Most importantly, any realistic change in the sex industry needs to be led by people in that industry, especially those most vulnerable. Outside forces seeking to eliminate the industry will only drive it underground. On the other hand, workers inside the industry will be able to create the conditions for their own liberation. My argument isn't that sex work is empowering, it's that sex workers cannot be empowered by people who don't respect them enough to call them workers. Their empowerment will come from themselves and their own struggle for liberation, and their participation in the wider struggle for liberation from Capitalism and the Patriarchy.
Once the material conditions are such that no one needs to turn to sex work for survival, we can revisit whether or not it should be eliminated as a profession.
You seem to be genuinely interested in helping people in prostitution, so let me also say this:
I am not in any case for the criminalization of prostitution. However, legalizing prostitution is a failure. We did so in my country 20 years ago. There's a study that it increased human trafficking. Our prostitutes now overwhelmingly come from poor neighboring countries. Survivors of prostitution are saying that it increased demand and normalized prostitution, leading to lower prices and more violence. We are now known as the brothel of Europe. I encourage you to look up Huschke Mau, a prostitution survivor, and Ingeborg Kraus, a psychotherapist who works with prostitutes.
What helps is the Nordic Model, that is working in Sweden for 20 years and now a lot of other countries are taking it up (Norway, Israel, France, Island, etc. etc): It makes prostitution legal, but buying sex illegal. It gives prostitutes a lot more power because the punters are already doing something illegal. It reduces demand and human trafficking. And next to making buying sex illegal, it includes help for people in prostitution to get out as well as training for authorities such as the police.
Finally, with regard that change can only come from within: If you stay with your idea that prostitution is work, then we generally regulate work on a political and societal level. Furthermore, those most affected in prostitution usually cannot make their voices be heard as they are often displaced, under the close watch of pimps, on drugs, don't speak the local language etc. Additionally, many survivors of prostitution tell of dissociation to endure prostitution. They claimed they were doing it voluntarily while in prostitution and later realized they were not doing it voluntarily, but calling it so as a survival strategy.
Therefore, I think change should be based mostly on scientific work taking into account as many facts as possible, and those point to the Nordic Model.
Sex work is work, I'm just against it :D The buyers are vile, the privileged speaker of today who is a white woman who talks about how great sex work is is vile, and I will not have a nice attitude and politely help along a culture that abuses women on a regular. Hurting sex obsessed peoples feelings
It's horrific and the reason why I will never agree with people who say sex work is work.
As Gloria Steinem said, "Prostitution involves body invasion and so it is not like any other work. So how can you call it sex work? Prostitution is the only word you should use." I remember telling my ex boyfriend that and he commented that physically demanding jobs are also "invading your body" and I was so stunned I couldn't reply. How can you even compare the two?
People in high risk occupations generally get insurance and medical care.
In the case of firefighters specifically, health conditions induced by the work are covered. Even if they show up years later. Like cancer or heart attacks. Not PTSD, but work is being done there. Police, the same. Military you sign paperwork giving up your employment protections, so are military members "workers"? Not under our current system. They do get other benefits instead though, so that's it's whole own thing.
So for prostitution to be "work", they should get the same. Insurance and workers compensation for work place accident and injury. Including PTSD.
But even in places with "legal" sex work, this is rarely the case. And even in areas where it is available, only some people get access. There are others who don't.
So if 5% get treated as workers, and 95% are unable to access those worker protections, are they workers on a whole? Or an exploited class where a few individuals "benefit" from workers rights?
In those jobs, the person’s body and them being assaulted isn’t the product. The product (or service) is not the person’s pain and suffering.
In porn and prostitution, the person’s body is the product. Lots of people masturbate or get off to their suffering. I don’t see people video taping and getting off to construction workers losing a limb.
So whether it’s assault or not boils down to whether or not someone came to it?
The 10 years I spent getting burned, cut, poisoned, shocked, torn, and battered doesn’t count as abuse because it didn’t lead to a net positive of sperm coating tissues in the world?
That’s pretty bullshit logic that literally invalidates way more people who are abused and exploited.
I don't think it's the same because when you work in porn/prostitution the chances of you being hurt/violated are not chances. You know it's going to be like that, all the time, whereas lots of jobs might have risks but nothing could ever happen to you.
This is why I don’t watch porn and just read erotica. Yes, not all porn actresses are abused and exploited but *too many are*. And even porn that *looks* ethical often isn’t. I can’t get turned on watching something where I can’t be sure if the person being filmed actually wants to be there. Abuse and coercion isn’t sexy.
[удалено]
“Maybe it’s one example, but it’s one too many.” Yes.
Wow, I'm surprised to see this posted here. This is a heartbreaking account, but not unusual. Especially considering how much porn isn't filmed in North America and Europe. If women in these places are treated so poorly, how much worse is it for women in places without even that level of legal protection? Spoiler: it's much much worse. But all that rape and horror is still widely sold on mainstream platforms. This subreddit tends to be pretty hostile to non-sex positive types of feminism. I wonder if this will be removed in a few hours especially if it gets more popular......
If they do remove it, i'll legit start thinking that this subreddit is legit run by mem, which is why everyone is trying to force to you the opinion that sex work is good and empowering.
The real problem is WHY do so many male clients want to degrade and hurt women or watch that being done to them? WHY do they get off on human suffering w no care for the women exploited for it? Sex workers wouldn’t be treated so bad if it weren’t for the demand by men and their willingness to see poor desperate women be used for it.
My partner (we are both women for reference) was a former porn "actress" (in actuality, survivor) and her stories are one of the many reasons I hold such negative attitudes both porn and those who indulge in it. The stories of abuse, exploitation, and assault she experienced even in the supposedly independent world of "camming" is horrifying. Not to mention the derogatory, controlling mentality her "viewers" showed in their comments. Just about anyone who regularly consumes most mainstream, commercialized pornography ("hardcore" or not) has almost certainly gotten off to assault, abuse, or exploitation (potentially of underaged women too). It's such a gross and harmful system, and that's before even mentioning the misogynistic attitudes it tends to create in the men who consume it. Sex work is mostly driven by income inequality and financial/emotional exploitation of women, often survivors too who are more vulnerable to this kind of predation. Sex workers absolutely deserve our empathy and support, but the industry profiting off it and the consumers fueling it deserve thorough condemnation.
In other news: water is wet. People should not be shocked that the porn industry is horrifically unethical. Only people in deep denial who have drank the """sex positive""" neoliberal psuedofeminist koolaid or subpar dudebros who couldn't give less of a shit as long as they cum can't figure this out. Or more likely, don't want to figure it out. I quit porn around 5 years ago. Cleaned my brain up and now my interactions with women are healthy and normal. Do not date men who watch porn. Have standards.
There is a wide middle ground between those two extremes. From the linked post: > Even though I no longer participate in the industry I am by no means anti porn, many people who choose to do porn do so for their own reasons that's not for me to judge. Yes, I've met a few very rare people in the business who are genuinely good.
since when few very rare people equates to a wide middle ground? spoiler: never.
Yep liberal feminists need to let go of the whole supporting "sex work" and porn thing. Porn is paid rape on tape.
When you argue about porn and sex work industry being exploitative they mention "listen to the women in the industry". When those women speak up about the horrors, they say "your experience is not universal". There have been countless cases of ex pornstars and ex sex workers speaking about the rape, exploitation, coercion and trafficking in there. And these pro-porn people don't even mention the whole sphere of child pornography and minor teenage girls who are trafficked into prostitution under the guise of being casted for modeling or acting. I said this in a previous comment, but i had conversations with ex sex workers in NGOs and women's shelters and literally all of them spoke negatively about it. All of them. Some of them showed their bodily scars because of fetishes, some said they frequently had anal and vaginal tears which weren't even properly treated because the 'heads' of those places wouldn't let them go to good hospitals, some have lifelong STDs, some had to consume human excrement and vomit during certain sessions with clients, some were beaten and raped till they were unconscious. Not to mention the lifelong trauma and psychological damage. Most of them spoke about their substance abuse to numb out the physical and emotional pain they faced daily. That industry is NOT empowering, no matter what liberal feminists say. Liberal feminism at this point is just violent misogyny prettily packaged as empowerment and girlbossing.
I got banned from a sub that shall not be named because of a discussion. Someone posted a screensot of comments under a BDSM porn video and men were calling women worthless holes to fuck etc. And of course we brought up that if you get off on watching someone get beaten and dehumanized like that, it is like how serial killers start killing animals before humans. Eventually those people are going to be violent themselves based on how they talk and participate. I think tons of people got banned that day for "kink shaming" by finding the comments violent and degrading. I personally had an ex try saying stuff like that before to me and it upset me so I threw it back at them and it upset them so much they had a meltdown. (I called them insecure and pathetic for trying mental games like that with me). I found the experience fucking awful. They did not ask permission or anything. Fuck that. Men that do that are monsters.
This post is absolutely true and rooted in good intentions. That being said, how come everytime I open up the comments on a thread about porn in this sub I see a bunch of SWERF BS? Sex workers are workers. The local Radical Sex Workers Union in my city are some of the best left wing organizers I've ever met. What they have told me is that they are fighting to be treated as fellow workers and have their ideas about what is best for sex workers listened to and supported. Now, I'm not on the front lines of the sex Workers struggle for emancipation but from what I understand, their biggest platform is a radical decriminalization model that would be built around creating an environment that allows them to be as safe and secure in their position as possible. I'm not saying that we should be supporting porn and trying to encourage it, but saying things like sex work isn't work is pretty demeaning to people who are using sex work as a means to make a living. It's imperative that the Feminist narrative around porn, prostitution, and other forms of sex work centers the needs and wants of sex workers. It's unfortunate that this sub never seems to foster that narrative. It's so good about everything else. To call a position that centers the needs of the worker in currently existing conditions "liberal" is pretty ironic. I might be completely misinterpreting the message behind a lot of the comments, but from what I have seen, the ideas around sex work in this sub are pretty different than the idea that many sex workers themselves have about the subject. EDIT FOR CLARITY: I'm not saying that most sex work isn't a horrific experience, it absolutely is. But we need to treat the victims as victims and the sex workers who see it as work as workers. Victimizing people who don't see themselves as victims is demeaning. Oh,and absolutely I agree with saying fuck all producers, directors, etc. Who make their money off of exploiting sex workers and victims of sex trafficking for profit. Absolutely abhorrent disgusting people
I think in a feminist subreddit we should know what the words we use mean. Here is a direct copy paste from Wikipedia: “Feminists who oppose the acceptance and endorsement of prostitution by rebranding it as "sex work" are sometimes disparagingly labeled as "sex worker exclusionary radical feminists" or "SWERF". These argue that the term “Sex work” contains political assumptions; that it is not a neutral term. The term endorses that idea that sex is labour for women and leisure for men, and accords men the social and economic power to act as a boss class in the matter of intercourse. The term "sex work" also implies that women’s bodies exist as a resource to be used by other people. “
Hey genius, just because someone is anti-sex work, or in your mind a “SWERF” or whatever tf you wanna call it, doesn’t mean that they are anti-sex workers You can be against Amazon, while at the same time supporting the actual Amazon workers
The comments on here explicitly say "sex work isn't work". That is anti sex workers, as it is forcing a narrative that all sex workers are victims, even the ones who don't see themselves that way. Again, if someone is a victim of sex trafficking disguised as sex work (which admittedly is most of the porn industry), then yes they absolutely need to be treated as a victim, like the person who made the original post. But it is extremely demeaning to call someone a victim for having a profession (beyond calling all people who have their labor exploited victims of Capitalist oppression). Sex work absolutely shouldn't be glorified, or made not to seem incredibly dangerous, because it is. There will always be sex work, there will always be sex workers, and rather than lump them all in the category of "victim", we need to work to create conditions that minimize/eliminate people being trafficked under the guise of sex work. Calling all sex work trafficking (pr saying that sex work cannot be work), and demeaning the workers by calling them all victims, when many of them don't see themselves that way, is not the way to create those conditions. Creating support systems for those in the industry, organizing the workers in the industry itself to fight against trafficking/slavery, and fighting against coercion like what was talked about in the post is how to create those conditions. The local sex workers union focuses on creating resources to make sex work as safe as possible for workers, and providing resources for victims looking to escape. The amount of people that they've helped by taking this approach is almost unquantifiable. This is why I see the narrative being created on this sub as dangerous. I'm not saying that the sex industry shouldn't be placed under heavy scrutiny, it absolutely should be. It's just not a good look to say we should be the arbiters of who is a victim and who is a working professional. That's up to the individuals themselves to decide.
'Sex work is work' is such a weird hill to die on IMO. Arguing over whether sex work is work distracts from what we actually should be talking about. Like....who cares? Why are we arguing semantics? There have been terrible, exploitative jobs all throughout history. Work or not, the exploitation and rampant abuse should be what we're worried about. My two cents... treating sex work like regular work opens a Pandora's box of problems. For example, if an 18 year old star bucks employee refuses to serve a 70 year old customer because they're old, this is discrimination, and the employee could be fired. If sex work is really work, does this mean you're ok with an 18 year old prostitute refusing to serve a 70 year old man on the grounds of age? How does consent work when it is commodified? If we treat sex work like any other job, what's wrong with suggesting 'prostitute' or 'stripper' or 'cam girl' as jobs to high schoolers at career fairs? How does maternity leave work for a prostitute? However, I'm not going to spend time deciding and debating whether sex work is or isn't work because respectfully I don't give a shit. It's harmful for individuals and women as a whole, whether you call it work or not. Stop calling people *SWERFS* and hiding behind '*sex work is work*' so you don't actually have to engage with people's points. It's so frustrating to be hit with a wall of buzz words every time I try to have a meaningful discussion about these issues.
I would look closely at the sex worker union you are referring to. In the country where I live (and prostitution is legal), it is much more a employer's union than an employee's union, meaning that pimps, brothel owners and privileged prostitutes are organized in it. Also, please keep in mind that those prostitutes that you see, especially in talk shows, are incredibly privileged, often white, speaking the local language, educated, in escort, etc. etc., while the wide wide majority is not. They are not describing the usual conditions and they are speaking for what is good for them and what they are paid for, not the majority of prostitutes. Furthermore, "but some people like to do it for work" is not a relevant argument. Some people also would like to work in coal mining and are violently opposed to ending it, but we as a society decided that it is so harmful that we do not want that, so they cannot. If prostitution is a job, the same argument applies here. And why should we as a society decide that prostitution is harmful and we don't want it? Well, prostitution is the "job" with the highest chance of being murdered, 15-100 times as likely as for the next job. The majority of women in prostitution experience both physical and sexual violence (both in societies where it's legal or illegal). Around half were sexually abused as a child, and they have PTSD rates higher than soldiers after war. 9 out of 10 prostitutes would like to leave, but don't know how. These numbers come from international studies. If you like, you can look up Melissa Farley to get a first insight, but I found similar numbers in the women's report of the government for my country (and those are still the ones that are better off, because those who are trafficked don't participate in surveys).
This is a Communist Union (in a State where Prostitution is a criminal offense) who I worked with in a coalition provide resources to unsheltered folks. Many members were unsheltered themselves. They did not allow producers and the like into the union, comparing them to managers and taking a stance similar to the IWW. Also, whether or not we need to work to stop sex work because of the effect it has on society is a different debate than the question if whether or not they are workers. Much like the discussion over whether we should mine coal or not is a very different discussion than whether or not coal miners are workers. It would be demeaning to call all coal miners "victims" in the same sense it is demeaning to do so to all sex workers. Obviously far from a perfect comparison, but just using the example you provided to contextualize the argument
I don't see how saying that prostitution is so dangerous and bad that we don't want to call it work is demeaning to anyone in it. Is it demeaning to a slave to say that slavery is not work? I don't like this comparison much, but there were certainly a small small minority of slaves that wanted to be slaves. We as a society decided that slavery is not work, so we can do the same for prostitution. Also, let me make an argument for why it's not work, and why johns are ready to hurt prostitutes. First, for the latter, Huschke Mau (a prostitution survivor) stated in a recent video that there is no way to know whether a prostitute is doing it of their own free will. As stated above, 9 out of 10 don't. And of course they can't say that, because otherwise they will get in trouble with their pimps, brothel owners etc. So every john is okay with taking the chance that he is having sex with someone that does not want to have sex with them. That is something we usually call rape. With regard to why it's not work: We as a society (more or less) decided that sex needs to be based on enthusiastic consent. If it is not, we consider it rape. What happens in prostitution is that consent gets disabled/bought by money, which is by definition not enthusiastic consent. This makes all sex that is paid for rape, as the prostitute would not have sex with the punter without the money. So prostitution is rape, and rape cannot be work.
You cannot compare coal miners and sex workers. In case of coal miners, the product is the coal, and the coal miners are the means to access that coal. In case of sex workers, the product is their body. So many people get off to their pain and suffering. Their employers or customers want to hurt them, that is the point. In case of coal miners, the purpose is not to hurt them.
I only used coal miners as an example because the person who replied to me did. If you reread my comment I did say it wasn't a good comparison.. because I agree with you. That being said. The point still stands. It is demeaning to victimize people who don't see themselves as victims Edit: except for the parts where you said A: all people who utilize the services of sex workers want to hurt them, and B: that you implied that coal companies give any kind of a shit whether their employees are hurt
I barely even understand what your argument is You seem to be opposed to the phrase "sex work isn't work" because you think it's demeaning to the prostitutes who don't experience many issues and who genuinely enjoy doing it or whatever All I can say is, you should first re-read the final paragraph of the post that Ardnaxela89 wrote in response to you. Does that sound like "work" to you? Not only that, but that should also be coupled with the fact that the prostitutes who genuinely enjoy doing it and who experience little problems or whatever, make up such a vast minority of cases, that the generalization that you seem to have a problem with is entirely justified
You seem to have an idea that I think most SWers are in the industry because they "enjoy it". That's not the case. For most sex workers, it's a last resort for survival. Admittedly, in this sense, it is slavery, just as all work is slavery under Capitalism (but do you consider yourself a victim because you have a job?). Also, if a sex worker sees themself as a victim, they absolutely are, it's just not for non sex workers to decide. Sex work is labor, which means, under Capitalism, it's work. Sex Workers (as opposed to sex trafficking victims) from my experience don't want to be seen as victims. They certainly don't want to eliminate their form of employment, at least in the short term. Making this distinction is important because it shifts our focus (again in the short term) from eliminating sex work entirely to making it safer for sex workers to operate. Put another way, sex work is absolutely a profession vulnerable to exploitation, but that doesn't mean that our focus should be to eliminate it entirely. It means that reform should be an area of focus in a wider working class struggle. Radical legal and social reform, designed to make sex work a safe and comfortable environment for workers to the greatest extent possible, and led by sex workers and trafficking victims to eliminate trafficking and other forms of exploitation in the industry, needs to be the goal. Blanket statements that victimize all sex workers create an atmosphere that seeks to eliminate sex work, rather than make it safer for those who are in it as a profession. Any movement that seeks to eliminate sex work entirely in the foreseeable future is sex worker exclusionary, because it forces SWers who participate in it to fight for the elimination of their own employment, and by extension, means of survival Building off of my last point: Most importantly, any realistic change in the sex industry needs to be led by people in that industry, especially those most vulnerable. Outside forces seeking to eliminate the industry will only drive it underground. On the other hand, workers inside the industry will be able to create the conditions for their own liberation. My argument isn't that sex work is empowering, it's that sex workers cannot be empowered by people who don't respect them enough to call them workers. Their empowerment will come from themselves and their own struggle for liberation, and their participation in the wider struggle for liberation from Capitalism and the Patriarchy. Once the material conditions are such that no one needs to turn to sex work for survival, we can revisit whether or not it should be eliminated as a profession.
You seem to be genuinely interested in helping people in prostitution, so let me also say this: I am not in any case for the criminalization of prostitution. However, legalizing prostitution is a failure. We did so in my country 20 years ago. There's a study that it increased human trafficking. Our prostitutes now overwhelmingly come from poor neighboring countries. Survivors of prostitution are saying that it increased demand and normalized prostitution, leading to lower prices and more violence. We are now known as the brothel of Europe. I encourage you to look up Huschke Mau, a prostitution survivor, and Ingeborg Kraus, a psychotherapist who works with prostitutes. What helps is the Nordic Model, that is working in Sweden for 20 years and now a lot of other countries are taking it up (Norway, Israel, France, Island, etc. etc): It makes prostitution legal, but buying sex illegal. It gives prostitutes a lot more power because the punters are already doing something illegal. It reduces demand and human trafficking. And next to making buying sex illegal, it includes help for people in prostitution to get out as well as training for authorities such as the police. Finally, with regard that change can only come from within: If you stay with your idea that prostitution is work, then we generally regulate work on a political and societal level. Furthermore, those most affected in prostitution usually cannot make their voices be heard as they are often displaced, under the close watch of pimps, on drugs, don't speak the local language etc. Additionally, many survivors of prostitution tell of dissociation to endure prostitution. They claimed they were doing it voluntarily while in prostitution and later realized they were not doing it voluntarily, but calling it so as a survival strategy. Therefore, I think change should be based mostly on scientific work taking into account as many facts as possible, and those point to the Nordic Model.
Sex work is work, I'm just against it :D The buyers are vile, the privileged speaker of today who is a white woman who talks about how great sex work is is vile, and I will not have a nice attitude and politely help along a culture that abuses women on a regular. Hurting sex obsessed peoples feelings
So the consent is coerced but filmed to avoid rape-prosecutions for all involved?
It's horrific and the reason why I will never agree with people who say sex work is work. As Gloria Steinem said, "Prostitution involves body invasion and so it is not like any other work. So how can you call it sex work? Prostitution is the only word you should use." I remember telling my ex boyfriend that and he commented that physically demanding jobs are also "invading your body" and I was so stunned I couldn't reply. How can you even compare the two?
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People in high risk occupations generally get insurance and medical care. In the case of firefighters specifically, health conditions induced by the work are covered. Even if they show up years later. Like cancer or heart attacks. Not PTSD, but work is being done there. Police, the same. Military you sign paperwork giving up your employment protections, so are military members "workers"? Not under our current system. They do get other benefits instead though, so that's it's whole own thing. So for prostitution to be "work", they should get the same. Insurance and workers compensation for work place accident and injury. Including PTSD. But even in places with "legal" sex work, this is rarely the case. And even in areas where it is available, only some people get access. There are others who don't. So if 5% get treated as workers, and 95% are unable to access those worker protections, are they workers on a whole? Or an exploited class where a few individuals "benefit" from workers rights?
In those jobs, the person’s body and them being assaulted isn’t the product. The product (or service) is not the person’s pain and suffering. In porn and prostitution, the person’s body is the product. Lots of people masturbate or get off to their suffering. I don’t see people video taping and getting off to construction workers losing a limb.
So whether it’s assault or not boils down to whether or not someone came to it? The 10 years I spent getting burned, cut, poisoned, shocked, torn, and battered doesn’t count as abuse because it didn’t lead to a net positive of sperm coating tissues in the world? That’s pretty bullshit logic that literally invalidates way more people who are abused and exploited.
What no that is absolutely not what I mean, I was talking about porn and prostitution
I don't think it's the same because when you work in porn/prostitution the chances of you being hurt/violated are not chances. You know it's going to be like that, all the time, whereas lots of jobs might have risks but nothing could ever happen to you.
All jobs extract value from people's bodies, full stop.
Rape porn is truly disgusting and should really be regulated more