Is this Feminism? Murphy and more. Pioneering Sex Worker Advocacy on Connecticut

As an exited woman, former call girl, ex-hooker, whatever title you prefer, I have to say that my experience of the women you are slating in this piece is very different from yours. This is not about conjecture, but about personal contact and interaction with both Melissa Farley and Meghan Murphy. Before, and if I even go into it at all, the talk on research, I am keener to discuss these women’s intentions, which are completely misunderstood. For them, and many others who I hear slated, the perception, or what is put out there as being the perception others have of them, is wholly inaccurate. I have found them to be loving and caring of women in prostitution. They are respectful, they listen to their voices, and they do what they do because of love for women, not hate. There is no moral judgement in why they support abolition - it is about ending violence against women. If someone really hated people in prostitution, they would not spend their time trying to protect them from abuse.

I have known a great many women, some men, and some transgendered people in prostitution over the years, and apart from one man, who I don’t know whether he did or didn’t suffer rape and/or assault, every single other woman, and the few men and transsexuals I knew, had all been raped and most had also been beaten on jobs as well. Yes, there will be some people in prostitution who have not been raped or beaten. I haven’t met them in person, but I have corresponded with them online, and I am not denying their experience. Of course, there will be some people who are lucky in prostitution, just like there are some people who win the lottery. But most who enter don’t win the lottery, and most in prostitution don’t escape rape and assault.

Comparing prostitution to any other job is impossible, because no other job puts you at a 70% chance of being raped multiple times, a 67-68% chance of developing posttraumatic stress disorder, and a very high (some say 95%) chance of ending up with a drug problem. Let alone the increase in the risk of being murdered. These stats show that being in prostitution is like being in a warzone, and even if you disagree with the stats, there are enough exited women sharing this experience for it to be heard directly from them. I am massively insulted that the writer of this piece has compared selling sex, which is a traumatic and dangerous way to earn a living, to being a server and bartender!

There is a stigma against women, and men, and transgendered people, in prostitution, and it is NOT from these women you are accusing. It is from the ignorant bigots who judge people who sell sex, see us as immoral, fallen women, husband-stealers and corrupters of innocent men. They believe that if we ‘choose’ to get into prostitution, then we deserve what we get, whether that be beatings or rapes, if we disappear or are murdered. These are the people we all need to educate. These are the people who see us as a sub-class of unrapable disposable goods.

Sadly, after having an article published a few days ago here http://www.litro.co.uk/2013/02/denial-a-former-call-girl-shares-her-story/, which I am sure some of you would rip into from other angles, a woman informed me that I got what I deserved. That I deserved to be raped, to be beaten, and anything else that may have come my way because I ‘chose’ to be a call girl and stole other women’s boyfriends and husbands. This is what needs to be changed in society - sick, perverted opinions of ignorant, hateful people.

And who stood by me and stuck up for me, not that I can’t stick up for myself, but this stuff really hurts. I know I didn’t deserve to be raped when I was, and I know I didn’t deserve to be beaten, but for someone, even a stranger, to think that I deserved that, it tears at something inside me. I’ve lived with that kind of stigma against me from when I entered prostitution in my early-twenties and when I exited a few years later, the stigma did not leave me, and more than a decade on, here I am still feeling it. And that very same stigma is the one felt by all women, men, and transgendered people, in prostitution and those who are exited. It is something we all share in suffering to varying degrees. So when Meghan told this woman that I did not deserve to be raped because I was prostitute, that I, nor any other woman in prostitution, stole other women’s husbands, and that it is these very attitudes, which prevent women in prostitution reporting rapes against them, it is completely clear that she cares about people in the sex trade, that their welfare and safety is important to her, that they do not deserve to be judged, that they should be able to report crimes committed against them - things that I would hope we all here agree on!

theres many things people can all agree upon

"what is the most important?" probably

"what is the most important right now?" good luck with that

it's great that there is light at the end of the tunnel, but not everyone is moving or can take even one step

I wanted to comment on this article, as a survivor of prostitution, as an exited prostituted woman, but it is hard to go back there this often. Every time i do It causes so many panic attacks, and depression, it also causes me to disconnect from myself, and i have no control over that, this is just the deal with ptsd. also, what happens after i write out all this stuff i have a hard time shifting back to regular life, because i don't feel anything, i am empty, i am gone, and i feel like i am in that world again, i feel dirty and ashamed. yet, aware of it so it is even worse, i have no denial to protect me, nor can i use drugs or alcohol to escape all of this. i don't feel human so i have trouble relating to others, cognitively yes, but it is like i am empty shell, and it feels horrible. because if i am not human how can i relate. usually after this much focusing on my past it takes days to recover, and as of late i have been doing so in all sorts of ways, i have to pace myself, but as i am writing this babble response, i am crying, panicking, sick to my stomach, and i am on deadline for the show i work on, so being this debilitated, causes me not to get work done, talk to friends, see my family. i know i want to, but i need to just take a bit of a break. Please no one read this as anyone's fault, or somehow i am being pressured to support others, for that is not at all the case. Nor feel sorry for me, nothing like that, you know it is what it is. it just hurts sooooo much. I am just letting you know why i can't finish writing. And, also this might help others - understanding the impact of the violence of prostitution, and how this damn, i want to call her names, this woman is causing so much damage!!!!!!!! Meghan Murphy who is trying to protect us, save our lives, while you bash her, and destroy us all in one swoop. i cannot emphasize enough the damage you are doing not only to all of us involved in this moment, but other exited prostituted grrls/women who sees this mess, it triggers so much just reading what you wrote, and for grrls/women still being prostituted, if they see this stuff, at least me when i was in that world, and newly out, i needed to believe your type of lies because i couldn't face the reality of what i lived through, which only causes more damage - the longer one is in denial the more the trauma is entrenched, the longer it takes to seek help, you feel me ?! like what you are doing is so harmful just like the rest of the deniers and ones who go after Meghan Murphy, they are killing us !

What is the point of a sex workers rights forum?

Is it really to attack any one who is a sex workers rights advocate?

CPage251 wrote:

 

2. Meghan brazenly states that I am "obsessed" with her. This is obviously egocentric and absurd. I am offended and insulted by what Meghan stands for and by her writing, and as both a sex worker and an activist, feel a duty to expose her through my writing. This is not "obsession," this is education and activism. 

Thank you

Christina Page

Legalizetoprotect.com 

I've read your blog, read throught the lines and lines of Facebook postings you so carefully reproduced within the blog.  While I don't always agree with all points of Meghan's perspective, I can certainly agree with her that you're displaying what I can only call an unhealthy obsession. Your blog post has all the hallmarks of a vicious and personal attack. 

Feminism is not a monolithic movement or POV.  The sex trade also has many sides, many differing experiences. It would appear that you, and many others, find it empowering. Others do not share that experience.

I saw that other side when I worked as an advocate for street youth in downtown Toronto. I didn't see a lot of choice or empowerment - quite the opposite. I saw addiction, mental health issues, PTSD, all exploited for sex. I saw what happens to a teenaged girl when a cop forces her to give him a blow job to keep from being picked up for solicitation. That's not choice or empowerment. That's the wanton destruction of a fragile self-esteem, already brutalized by the dysfunctional home life she was forced to leave.

When teenaged boys and girls have to sell their bodies, then pool their resources so that they can hole up in a cheap hotel to avoid spending the night in a shelter where they stand a good chance of having their few possessions stolen and/or having the shit kicked out of them, that's not choice or empowerment. That's survival.

I respect Meghan's intelligence, passion and position - even when I disagree. I suggest you consider doing the same. It would be much healthier.

This is a forum for sex workers' rights, and should be respected as a safe place for sex work advocates. It is not, however, a platform for personal attacks against those with opposing viewpoints, particularly when those viewpoints are expressed outside the forum. As Catchfire has pointed out, that's unacceptable both here, and everywhere else on babble.

Lagatta, taking this to a different forum - feminism for instance - is perhaps the best solution.

lagatta wrote:

Yes, I'd be interested in writing a short critique of the Spectator article, which I find overstated and simplistic, and marred by some bourgeois crap (no surprise from the conservative Spectator) about "morals". The renovation also involves the evergreen: real-estate speculation.

Please do - I look forward to reading it when you're done.

XLondonCallGirl wrote:

 This is not about conjecture, but about personal contact and interaction with both Melissa Farley and Meghan Murphy. Before, and if I even go into it at all, the talk on research, I am keener to discuss these women’s intentions, which are completely misunderstood. For them, and many others who I hear slated, the perception, or what is put out there as being the perception others have of them, is wholly inaccurate. I have found them to be loving and caring of women in prostitution. They are respectful, they listen to their voices, and they do what they do because of love for women, not hate. There is no moral judgement in why they support abolition - it is about ending violence against women. If someone really hated people in prostitution, they would not spend their time trying to protect them from abuse.

There is a stigma against women, and men, and transgendered people, in prostitution, and it is NOT from these women you are accusing.

i will have to disagree. perhaps this but was meant as satire, but since there are no valid explanations, and just these hateful words on a page, i will have make my own conclusions.

i became a prostitute because:

 I like getting fucked by the football team, the fraternity brothers, and law
students at graduation parties. I realized that gang rape could be a
transcendental experience.

5. I figured that laying on my back and
getting fucked by hundreds of men, and getting on my knees and sucking thousands
of dicks, was the most profound empowerment a woman could have.

6. My vocational counselor and I discussed a
whole lot of possibilities: doctor, lawyer, women's-studies teacher, legal
secretary. I was offered a four-year scholarship at Stanford, but frankly,
prostitution seemed the most rewarding job option available.

so forigve me for not trusting the person who wrote that to be my advocate and ally. forgive me for not thinking she is listening to my voice. these don't sound like the words of someone who is loving and caring, someone who won't judge me. and tbh, this type of 'joke' is why don't trust most feminists as a whole.

http://www.prostitutionresearch.com/WhyIMade.html

Since when is writing a piece on one's blog an unhealthy obsession? That's some problematic and very egocentric thinking. I read Murphy's article and was repulsed and angered by it, so I tweeted her and wrote my own article. I'm not the only one who feels this way. There's been a HUGE outpouring from other individuals who feel that Murphy's writing is hateful and hurtful. Comparing rape to sex work is especially harmful to someone who has actually experienced both, rape AND sex work. Guess what Murphy? I've been on both ends and they are not the same, and you should be ashamed for saying so. Do you even think before you write? 

If she thinks I'm "obsessed," she needs a reality check. Come back to earth and get you head out of the clouds- sex workers and activists are just sick and tired of being spoken for by the "rad fem" community. If we speak up, we are silenced, we are trivialized and mocked (for example, by claiming that we are "obsessed"). I'm beginning to think that this is an MRA message board, not a "feminist" space. I'm shocked at the attitudes here, although I should be used to them by now. I am not exiting this space, as my time is better spent continuing to work, write, and expose frauds like Meghan. 

Thank you so much Susan for your words and the work that you do. I am moved to tears. It is BULLSHIT how we are treated by these "feminists" and abolotionists, and you're right. They are not interested in our voices. They are interested in their funding, in their own agenda, and they will silence anyone who goes against it. And why the hell should we listen to a researcher whose credibility is in question- EXACTLY! I would be honored to repost your comment as it's own article on my blog, with your permission. If you want to contact me directly, you can at [email protected] or my twitter handle is Cpage251. 

Susan, I am listening. Sex work advocacy isn't my area of knowledge, I'm not an abolitionist - I don't think that's an effective way of dealing with safety issues in sex work. However, my job here, in babble, is to ensure that the discourse is respectful and follows babble policy. I have no influence around what happens outside babble, though I can and do express opinions about both rabble and babble content in staff meetings and I do occasionally write for rabble on other issues.

It may interest you to know that last year I did put forward your name as someone who could offer a counterpoint to Meghan's when the issue was brought up by another staffer. I know they were floating a number of names around, but I don't know what the result was/is. I can follow up if you'd like.

I do expect and encourage debate, so long as it maintains a tone of 'I respectfully disagree and here's why'. Not those words precisely, but the general tone.

CPage251 wrote:

Rebecca with all due respect, my tone changed when Meghan accused me of being "obsessed" with her, yet I don't see you commenting on that. I suppose it's perfectly acceptable to insult sex workers & those on the opposing team.

Unfortunately, the only insults I've seen in this thread, thus far, have come from you.  That has nothing to do with your sex work advocacy or your being a sex worker. It has to do with overt hostility and a lack of respectful discourse.  If you choose to twist my words to represent some kind of bias on my part, you are welcome to do so. Anywhere but here.

Quote:

There is no feminist war on sex workers
By
Meghan Murphy February 4, 2013

I’ve become increasingly frustrated by what feels like a barrage of articles coming from self-described progressives claiming that feminists are the real enemy of sex workers. It seems as though some of those who position themselves as ‘sex worker rights activists’ are intent on creating rigid divisions among women, placing the prostituted woman in a category of her own and placing feminists in some illusory moralistic war against sex....

Where to start?
As Rebecca West points out "Feminism is not a monolithic movement or POV.  The sex trade also has many sides, many differing experiences...."

So who is "creating [a] rigid division among women" lamented by Murphy, Murphy who makes a rigid division between apparently ALL feminists (worthy of the name) and her quote-mark-devalued "sex worker activists"?

How can someone who uses the blanket abolitionist term, "prostituted women" not be considerered attacking those women who choose sex work ?

That term literally objectifies all women in sex work as mere objects of the action of "prostituting"--with the unavoidable sense that they are either unwilling victims of an external agent, or deficient in some way.
 
Is this the only way to maintain an abolitionist's impermeable ideology-- to demean those who make sex work a choice, by denying that they made a choice or are incapable of really doing so?

(Of course there are those women who are essentially enslaved by pimps and anything that can be done to assist them out of lives that they don't want to be in is commendable, but that is not the nature of Murphy's attack)

I'd suspect that those who have actually made a choice of sex work would find the language of Meghan Murphy considerably more dehumanizing and demeaning than the work they have chosen, despite her oxymoronic claim that she "doesn't hold prostituted women in judgement".

susan davis wrote:

also, i was just reading about the cop forcing a teenage girl to give him a blow job.....how is that related to prostitution? she is a youth and he exploited her. he is a cop, he assaulted her....where is the prostitution angle? is it becuase she worked as a prostitute? that means its prostitutions fault that the cop exploited and sexually assaulted her?

susie

No where did I say or suggest that it was the fault of prostitution.  I simply related my experience working with homeless youth who used prostitution as a means of survival - as opposed to choice - and the exploitation they faced.  The more vulnerable you are, the more open to exploitation you are, regardless of what work you do.

It's not pro or anti-prostitution. It's just a fact of reality, one of many aspects of the sex trade. 

My personal position, as previously stated, is that abolition is not a viable response to the potential safety and exploitation issues , issues which I don't think anyone can argue don't exist. I'm not anti-pornography, I'm not anti-sex work, but I do have serious concerns about the safety of vulnerable people working in those sectors. 

Please correct me if I'm wrong - because you know a great deal more about the issues than I do - but I think it takes a certain robust personality and a degree of self-esteem and personal empowerment to be successful in sex work.  

Full-time feminist pro sex work contributor? Hey, I didn't know rabble was hiring for a full-time ANYTHING? Most people who work with rabble do so on a volunteer basis unless they've pitched a particular article and been told they'll be paid for it. If rabble is actually hiring, let me know. I think people who've contributed on a volunteer basis such as bloggers and podcasters like Meghan Murphy should be first on the list to get hired though, lol.

"Hi Susan. Where do I reference Farley or, as you say "cit[e] melissa farely as the "bible" on sex work"? Also, where have I framed "all sex workers as rape victims"? I'm not sure what you're referencing? The problem with the OP is that it doesn't address anything I actually argue or believe."

Really..? I actually have direct quotes and screen caps from you in my blog article, in which we discuss Farley and her "solid" research. Also, your newest article compares rape and consensual sex work. I didn't think I needed to point out your own words for you. 

And you keep pointing out that I have 2 twitter accounts. Yes, one is my personal accoun and one is my work (aka porn) account. 

susan davis wrote:

my issue is with the constant belittling of my fellow sex workers in the name of saving us. why can't abolitionists as feminists listen to us and hear all sides. why when faced with a different perspective is the reaction to dismiss? why is citing a "researcher" whose credibility is in question deemed ok? it wasn't good enough for the supreme court but its ok for abolitionists?

we are told that there is no war but yet here we are again. why can't sex workers speak for themselves and why is it that only the perspective of those workers whose experiences mirror what people expect to hear is believed?

 

will you ever listen to us?

they won't ever really listen, because they don't care. they never have, and they never will. they are too busy saving us from ourselves, or mocking us by suggesting we think gang-bangs spirtual experiences.

your responses are beautiful and eloquent, and i love reading them, so please keep posting. please also know i am on your side, because i am in the same situation, being shamed by both sides for my choices, without ever really being heard. i know exactly what type of people abolitionists are, and i know i need to protect myself from them as much i need to protect myself from law enforcement and the right wing. they don't have everyone fooled!

Rebecca West wrote:

This discussion has been going seriously downhill almost from the get-go. I understand these are issues that people are passionate about, but if the participants don't stop the hostility, vitriol and personal attacks, I'm going to, reluctantly, shut it down.

i don't know what to say anymore. i would love to have a serious discussion about my experiences, and those of other sex workers, but every time i open my mouth i am told i am "hurting all women" or "i am a victim" or "my experiences are wrong" then farley's little 'why i chose prostitution' bit reaffrims what i knew. that because i am a sex worker, i will never be listened to or respected. that's what this is about. being heard. nothing is worse than someone speaking for you, when you have you own voice. i have a voice, but nobody wants me to use it. and now i am epxected to believe that people who insult me have my nest interest at heart, and i shoudl trust them?

are you familiar with the expression "don't piss on my back and tell it's raining out"? and people think i am too stupid to notice, and yeah that makes me angry.

susan davis wrote:

how is abolitionism a pro sex worker point of view?

That's a good question.

The subject area title reads:

Quote:

sex worker rights
A place for sex workers and their allies to discuss issues around, and advocacy of, sex workers' rights.

I guess some pre-defined limitations of POV "safe spaces" are not as safe as others.

Either that, or the word "allies" gets defined by those who say: "we are your allies even though you don't think so because you make invalid decisions and choose unacceptable work."

This forum has been designated a "safe space for sex workers"? Whereabouts was it designated and what does it mean? No discussion of the issues surrounding prostitution because it's not safe for sex workers? Who is policing that?

I'd be interested in hearing the discussion from the point of view of those who have worked, or are working, in the field. This was the problem before, if I recall, is that we didn't have those perspectives from both sides of the debate who are actually speaking from personal experience. Now it appears we do, so I hope the thread stays open.

Has Megan Murphy ever worked in the sex trade?