review of Melissa Gira Grant's 'Playing The Whore: The Work of Sex Work'
http://rabble.ca/books/reviews/2014/05/working-it-sex-work-labour
Gira Grant dedicates time in the book to what some have termed the "rescue industry" -- an economy entirely parallel to sex work, run by feminists and like-minded individuals dedicated to "abolishing sex work."For Gira Grant, this presents an interesting contradiction in terms. Abolishing sex work is not the same thing as ending "prostitution." Sex work has been around forever, but because the archetype of the prostitute only emerged relatively recently in history, the moral industry surrounding ending sex work once and for all, is itself fairly new.
Gira Grant compellingly underscores the uncomfortable fact that those who labour in this industry are able to eat because they are invested in wresting control of the sex work narrative away from the workers themselves.
In her discussion of anti-sex work feminism, Gira Grant also highlights a key concept that feminism seems to have missed acknowledging in the leap to condemn "slut shaming." And that's what Gira Grant and others have termed "whore stigma." Modern iterations of feminism have condemned sex work and the idea of sexualizing or objectifying oneself as negative not just for that person, but for all women.
By assuming that sex workers are literally "selling themselves" rather than offering a service, some feminists are able to claim that sex workers have destroyed their "self" in the sense that they have hollowed themselves out and the value of their sexuality has become degraded to the point that it symbolically effects (and objectifies) all women.
When you think about it though, what women do with their bodies (and make no mistake, discourses around the bodies of sex workers presume female-bodiedness), particularly in terms of expressing sexuality and sexual agency, remains equally objectionable despite the occupations of those women.
The difference between behaving like a "slut" and like a "whore" is the exchange of money or goods for sex. As long as women aren't making a living from sex, feminism remains indefatigable in their defense.
Somehow, whores have been left out of the protective bubble that "slut shaming" offers. Perhaps -- and this isn't something we'd ever want to admit -- we tend to view whores as less than women.
This slut shaming has led to another death
http://america.aljazeera.com/articles/2014/5/22/alyssa-funke-suicideporn...
This is a reflection of how words are used against sex workers: continued use of the terms using the word 'prostituted' for example. Sensationalist, and attempt to take the control/power away from sex workers. Diminishes what they do, who they are as well as their ability to speak for themselves. If you say they've had something done to them, you can claim them all as victims, and more than that, diminished capacity to think for themselves. Take that power away from them, and you can do anything to them, with the pretense of 'helping'.
In any other situation, what someone does would still be called work, whether they were smuggled/trafficked/coerced or otherwise threatened. The tree planters know this, the construction workers know this, and the domestics/nannies know this. All of those workers have had circumstances where someone somewhere took advantage of them for their work or to make money off of them. All of these employers were charged with the appropriate laws. The same laws that can deal with any coercion or forced work by sex workers. The same laws that are being laid against at least a half dozen people reported in the news in this month, and the past couple of months.
There are no new laws that are needed to protect the rights of sex workers, even those who chose to work for an employer (like an agency). Even those who are confined and don't have a choice, even those who do this face charges based on laws that forbid forced confinement and procuring.
This again is a blatant disregard for what the SCC laws overturned, and what remain on the books. More than enough to charge the ones who commit real crimes. Providing a legal service to someone who is willing to pay for it, should not criminalize the client.