Charter challenge launched against prostitution law

Ah yes, Cubans are so affluent that any money First World sex tourists give youths and women in exchange for sex is merely spent on small luxuries... What a patronizing, infantilizing, deresponsabilizing attitude! Maybe we ought to talk about "sex tourists" (capitalist rapists) themselves  instead of keeping the conversation carefully focussed on women and why oh why do they do it and yes, of course, we must respect their choice to buy little gee-gaws if they want that, big children as they are...

This press release just out from Montreal's CLES about the current Charter challenge in Ontario:

Ontario Superior Court Challenge: Total decriminalization of prostitution is not the solution, says Montreal abolitionist group

Montreal, October 06, 2009 - The Coalition for Struggles Against Sexual Exploitation - CLES - is concerned by the increased violence against women involved in prostitution that could follow from invaliding all Canadian Criminal Code restrictions on prostitution.

CLES includes female survivors of prostitution, women who have been exposed to violence both on the street and behind the doors of brothels and bars. After a year of working together on these issues, CLES is convinced that it is false to affirm that TOTAL decriminalization - including immunity for johns and pimps - would improve women's quality of life. In fact, it has been demonstrated in other jurisdictions that across-the-board decriminalization is usually followed by the adoption of a gamut of regulations and laws that have a number of harmful consequences. Pimps are transformed into mere "business men", clients become legitimate "consumers", and women become more exposed to victimization through physical abuse, trafficking and other forms of abuse.

Where full decriminalization has been attempted, reputable studies have shown that the
sex industry and sexual tourism expand and that society evolves according to a market model, providing ever more women's bodies at ever lower cost for buyers. This specifically happened in The Netherlands, where the government totally lost control over the situation and is now attempting to close down most of Amsterdam's red-light district, taken over by organized crime.

CLES feels that prostitution is violence against all women and that total decriminalization will only legitimate the commoditization of women's bodies.

"Together - female survivors of multiple types of violence -, we say YES to decriminalizing the persons exploited in prostitution and NO to decriminalizing the people who profit from their prostitution: the clients and the pimps. No to the commoditization of women bodies!"

- 30 -

For more information, please contact: Axelle Beniey, Communications Officer, Coalition for Struggles Against Sexual Exploitation (CLES)
514-750-4535
[email protected]
http://www.lacles.org

I apologize if i hurt anyone's feelings but it is important that everyone know exactly who has filed the lawsuit (sex workers) and who is bankrolling the challenge.  I am no longer in this industry but am still hot about it. I am sorry
In return, I would ask martin, politely, to stop appropriating sex workers' voices. Is it really too much to ask for him to stop calling sex workers "prostituted people," to stop appropriating testimony, and to stop insinuating that sex workers, that's right SEX WORKERS are victims, or trafficked? How do you think it feels to be made to feel like damaged goods by another name?
And stop calling yourself a sex worker because Stella is a group you despise, because they support legal sex work and you have said so on record here.

Conversely, none of the prostituted women (present and former prostituées, passive tense of the verb prostituer) that work at CLES, or that the organization has met and interviewed for its upcoming documentary The Oldest Lie  identifies with the term sex worker ("travailleuse du sexe"). They apparently shun like the plague this essentialist identity. So please avoid shoehorning them and me into using nothing but a label that includes - in Montreal, at least - part of their exploiters. Thank you.

just one of the concerned wrote:

Seriously. Sex workers do not self-identify as "prostituted people" can we at least refrain from using that term in this forum???

Does "prostitute" and "sex worker" mean exactly the same thing?  I thought it was more of an umbrella term.

just one of the concerned wrote:

I apologize if i hurt anyone's feelings but it is important that everyone know exactly who has filed the lawsuit (sex workers) and who is bankrolling the challenge.

Why? Shouldn't the arguments being presented be the deciding factor rather than who is making them?

For example, if Harper proposes expanding the size of an enviromentally protected area I am not going to fight him on it just because I can't stand Harper or the Conservatives.

Michelle I hope it didnt seem that I was calling for you to force everyone what to say as a moderater. And there is no "official" terminology. I just think some terms are rude such as that one, and asking if we could refrain from calling people names they don't call themselves

There are many, many stated  positions, by sex workers, who consider themselves prostituted  people, in the documentation that Martin has provided, that clearly indicate what he stated is factual. There are even links to activists who were former sex workers that he has provided.

These are all well worth the read, if one still has an open mind about it all.

All views should be presented and discussed, and leaving portions out, or asking them to be left out, is not looking for open discourse it is looking for entrenched positions. I myself, still dance the line of indecision, and want to read all sides an positions.

Just because there are 2 live voices here stating something, does not mean that the other view points are not out there and thus are not presentable here.

As presenting other views does not abstract it, at all.  Just as presenting different views of feminist thought, that may not bere presented here, by those subscribing to it, does not abstract the lives other feminist women live, under their own view.

Under Susan's own description, of who  is in her model of included voices at the table, are the John's, as they are considered stakeholders too.

Long ago now, Martin made a very difficult confession about his own life as a john, and how he feels about.

Thus, I would suggest there is significant reason for his voice to be heard by those in the sex industry, and by ourselves too. As he is the voice of an ex-john than can attest to, and is willing to be truthful, and put himself out there, to expose the reality of some men's, not all men's, motivation for utlizing  sex workers.

Now personally, I waiver on the edge of believing that it should be made a flat out trade, that requires education. But that does not address the  problem of prostituted women, who are not in the trade because they want to be.

What I don't agree with is a man defining for a woman what she should and can call herself.
I agree and in no way did I do that.

Having read back over martin's post again, I do not believe he did that. He was indicating  incorrect usage of the word  "ALL", that Just used.

As he has so aptly presented here, with concrete evidence, there is no greater "ALL".  In a similar vein, all  feminist's are not of the same feminist thought.

Moreover, as a john,  or as a former one, he does not want to be labelled thusly, as a sex worker, either. As the models Susan has posted state johns are sex worker stakeholders too.

Now this goes beyond Martin's male genderness and voicing a "male opinion" in the feminist forum, this topic relates directly to what  he was, and in part why he became a feminist.

Perhaps you could have asked stargazer what it was she did not understand about your commentary, or how she got that from it, and then clarified what it was you meant, instead of assuming she was being disengenuous, as that is the charge that you are levelling at her.

And frankly,  it is not very pleasant to read such an imperious post.

just one of the... writes: ...Stella is a group you despise, because they support legal sex work and you have said so on record here.

Excuse me but, no, I have never written anything of the kind. Care to substantiate that charge?

Fair enough, and I know exactly how you feel when you say:

"I don't appreciate having to deny things that have absolutely nothing to do with what I said. I have noticed that my words are not being quoted either."

People who have issues with people's words  would do well to quote them and ask what is meant by them.

In fact, earlier I jumped to a conclusion about another's words, and should not have, but I did quote them so said person would know directly what I was speaking about. And then it was resolved.

But anyway this is a thread derailment.

And Martin I am sorry for insisting that you had no place in this conversation. Your opinions are welcome and you provide a lot of research and links.
I am opposed to any legal answers which criminalize johns and am prepared to defend that, but it is good to have opposition as it keeps a person on their toes.

Please read my most recent posts and nobody here supports forced sex work or human trafficking for the millionth time.

I'll re-post Libby Davies' press release of [b]September 2002[/b], when she was NDP Social Policy Critic. It's probably more appropriate in this thread anyway:

[url=http://www.libbydavies.ca/news/pressrelease/2002/09/17/federal-solicitat... Solicitation Laws Put Sex Trade Workers at Risk[/u][/color][/url]

Quote:

"Current laws on prostitution are making street-level sex workers vulnerable to selective enforcement laws, as well as exploitation and violence," said Davies. [...]

"[b]The illegal nature of the sex trade has a dramatic impact on the safety and rights of those working in the industry.[/b] Street-level prostitutes are criminalized by Canada's laws against solicitation and are less likely to ask for police protection when at risk," said Davies

Numerous studies have shown that a majority of sex-trade workers have received treatment for a physical injury while working in the sex trade. In the 1990's, murders of prostitutes made up 5% of the overall homicide rate of women in Canada.

Infosaturated, please get off my back. You've been on me since you started posting (or so it feels) if you have a problem, contact the mods. This is getting silly and I am quite sure people are noticing.

i would also like to comment on the term "prostituted people"

why do we have seperate terms for a person exploited in the sex industry and those exploited in other ways? seperating violence against women in the sex industry and violence against other women makes it seem as if violence in the sex industry is somehow different, less, or unimportant.

why do we need 2 sets of laws? could we not say exploited person? this kind of othering is why police services and other support mechanisms do not take violence against us seriously. i remember a female officer who i was talking to while standing on the street corner wherei worked, completely refusing to take a report of rape and assault from a fellow sex worker who approached us during our conversation.

"i just had a bad date, you wanna here about it?"

female officer "not really..."

my fellow worker burst into tears and stormed off to the hotel where we lived to clean the blood off her face and change her ripped clothes so she could return to work....

on another occassion a trans worker i know tried to report a rape and assault to police;

worker "i just got raped!" police officer "good"

in my work with provincial victims services, we were looking at the victims compensation program and barriers that exist for sex worker trying to access supports and counselling we discovered we must be able to atribute our trauma to one particular event and so do not qualify for victims compensation or counselling services. apparently, we have been raped too much. the victims compensation representative also implied sex workers  were greedy and would continue to collect our $8 an hr maximum 40 hrs a week victims compensation even after we didn't need it any more, thus she would never grant financial support to a sex worker who was the victim of a crime....so biased.

the very systems intended to protect us denying us access to supports that could save our lives.

i myself tried to report a rape by the man convicted in the trial in the case of the missing women in 1991. 3 times, i waited for police and no one came to take my report. imagine if sex workers were treated equally and my assault taken seriously, how many of those women would be alive today? was 49 he claimed?

we must try to stop seperating violence against people in the sex industry as different. it is contributing to systematic failure and barriers for sex workers seekng protection.

especially if a worker was forced into the industry, why brand them a prostitute or prostituted person? doesn't it make sense to protect the from the shame and stigma associated with that term. should we not try to protect the from further harm as a result of being "damaged goods" sexually ruined.... and all the other things people think about sex workers?

whycan't we say exploited person, survivor of unlawful confinement, rape survivor? a person forced to engage in sex work is a rape survivor after all,  every forced client is a rape. why is rape of a person forced into sex work different from a rape of a person not in the sex industry?

Since this thread is almost long enough to close, I'm going to close it and redirect everyone to this thread, where we can continue the discussion on prostitution laws.