NEWS & LETTERS, February - March 2009
Sex workers network
The International Day to End Violence Against Sex Workers was started in 2003 by the Sex Workers Outreach Project (SWOP-USA), a national network of sex workers and their allies. It was started in response to the murders of over 60 prostitutes in 21 days committed by Gary Leon Ridgeway, the "Green River Killer." Ridgeway, convicted of 48 of the murders, stated, "I thought I could get away with killing hookers because nobody cares about them. I was doing the cops a favor by cleaning the trash up off the street."
This year, in Washington, D.C., the march started with a rally in Franklin Square Park and ended with a vigil at the Justice Department, where the names were read of sex workers who had been murdered and assaulted worldwide that year. They included Deborah Jeane Palfrey, the "D.C. Madam," and Brandy Britton. They both committed suicide under suspicious circumstances.
Marchers chanted "Sex Workers' Rights are Human Rights" and carried signs saying "End Violence Against Women, Decriminalize Prostitutes!" "Outlaw Poverty, Not Prostitutes!" "Stop Shaming Us To Death!" and "Nothing About Us Without Us!" Speakers discussed the attitude of society and police that sex workers are expendable, not even human. This attitude is reinforced by sexual shame, which, along with the illegal status of prostitution, keeps sex workers and their allies from speaking out against violence and reporting assaults and rapes, which are sometimes committed by the police.
Speakers made the point that this march was one step towards dispelling that shame. They made the connection between violence against sex workers and violence against all women, LGBT people, and people of color, also stating that attackers especially target sex workers who are Transgender and people of color. Speakers stated that sex work is usually done for the purpose of survival and that Transgender people sometimes resort to it because they face massive discrimination in employment and educational opportunities.
SWOP sent a letter to President-elect Obama and select cabinet appointees demanding policy changes including decriminalization and the classification of violence against sex workers as a hate crime. The letter states that listening to sex workers is important because they are at the forefront of the struggle against human trafficking and have been recognized by the Commission on AIDS in Asia as being important in the fight against the disease.
Ban Ki-Moon, the UN Secretary General, has called for an end to discrimination against sex workers, stating that this would give them access to resources to help prevent the spread of AIDS. Their letter also calls for a repeal of the Anti-Prostitution Pledge in PEPFAR (President Bush's Emergency Plan for AIDS Relief) that forbids funding to any international organization that does not condemn prostitution.
The International Day to End Violence Against Sex Workers was observed by other groups in the U.S. and worldwide. It is a time to force the public to acknowledge as a tragedy the violence it would rather ignore or trivialize. It is also a time to affirm that the solutions to the problems surrounding sex work can only come from the sex workers themselves.
--Adele
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