As a child in school, I was fascinated by the fact that only a few generations back, it was considered normal for a person to own slaves, for women to be denied the vote, for gay sex to be a crime worthy of imprisonment. At the outset, it is almost inconceivable that good people could have bought into a belief system that condoned such things. The vast majority of people living back then must have been so normalized to this oppression that they couldn’t see past their social norms to the greater injustice of it all. In fact, some of most ‘enlightened’ thinkers and leaders would still have been blinded to their own racism, sexism, and bigotry – all the while seeing their society as the new pinnacle of progress.

Carrying on from that idea, it seems only logical that a few hundred years in the future, people will view our society in a completely different light as well. They will most likely see themselves as more advanced than us, just as we see ourselves now. What aspects of our culture are so ‘normal’ to us that we fail to recognize their unfairness or backwardness? What laws are on the books, what beliefs are commonly held, that form our society’s blind spots?

It was from this point of view that I entered into my study of sociology. Taboos have always fascinated me, and sex and drugs are certainly two of our society’s most common ones. But regardless of a society’s acceptance or nonacceptance of certain taboos, once the government becomes involved in legislating them we are looking at a human rights issue.

One could chart the progress of human rights as modern society came to recognize, one group at a time, that regardless of gender or race all humans are born with certain inalienable rights. Since then we’ve examined more closely issues of personal liberty. The sexual revolution, the invention of birth control, abortion rights, and the retraction of anti-sodomy laws all progressed the idea of the individual’s right to his or her own choices, as long as they do not interfere with the well-being of another.

Looking back to drug policy and the sex industry, both issues concern the rights of consenting adults to make these very choices.

The ‘War on Drugs’ and the laws that come with it are very recent inventions. A hundred years ago there was little or no regulation of any substances. As it stands now, the government allows you to alter your consciousness through the intake of any number of prescription drugs or substances like alcohol, nicotine or caffeine – but not through others like marijuana, magic mushrooms, coca leaves, or peyote cactus. This seems random at best, an attack on cognitive liberty at worst. In the scheme of human history drug prohibition is but a tiny blip. Possession or sale of illegal drugs (many of which were sacraments in religious rituals not so long ago) will now land you with a jail sentence and a criminal record.

Prostitution might be the ‘oldest business in the world’ but it wasn’t always demonized and stigmatized in the way it is today. In fact, similar to the use of certain hallucinogenic and narcotic plants, prostitution was seen as sacred in many societies of the past. The idea of the sacred whore might seem like an oxymoron from a modern Western point of view. Indeed many anthropologists object to the term ‘sacred prostitute’, even while admitting to the existence of priestesses devoted to a goddess who accepted payment donated to the temple in exchange for sex. If that’s not prostitution then I’m not sure what is. In those times, the priestess was seen as an incarnation of the great goddess. In her role as priestess she was a teacher of the mysteries, of the healing and restorative power of sexual energy. Maybe what we need to look at is why we have imbued the word ‘prostitute’ with such strong negative connotations that today our society cannot bear to associate the word with anything spiritual or positive.

There are some who will object to the idea that past (and often considered more ‘primitive’) civilizations’ acceptance of sacred drug use and prostitution should bear any weight in the argument to permit them today. So let’s look rationally at the crux of these issues and get past the initial reactions we’ve all been programmed to have when we hear words like ‘drugs’ and ‘prostitute’ in news headlines.

The idea that two consenting adults agreeing to exchange sex for money can be a crime (as it is in the US) is moralistic, and (ironically) out of step with the very principles of a capitalist system. Any number of goods and services are exchanged for money under capitalism, regardless of whether we’d prefer if those services were granted for free by loved ones instead (nursing, childcare, etc). Sex and companionship shouldn’t be any different. We can’t seem to get past the idea that prostitution is selling one’s ‘body’ ‘ or ‘self’ – as if selling manual labor that involves the rest of your body is somehow different from physical labor that can involve one’s genitals.

Yes, we can all agree that the seedier side of the sex industry needs a serious clean-up, that some horrible things like trafficking and coercion do occur (indeed these are the only times the media reports on the sex industry). But exploitation and trafficking are already illegal, we don’t need anti-prostitution laws to stop them. The simple act of prostitution doesn’t pose any inherent danger to society, unless of course the government is enforcing Judeo-Christian ‘morals’ as law. In which case, we should surely start imprisoning adulterers again too.

Most illegal drugs, whether cocaine (from the coca leaf) or magic mushrooms, originate as a plant in the natural world. In fact human use of mind-altering drugs originates from copying animals in the wild who sought out these plants, after witnessing the unusual effects they had on animal behavior. Some now argue that the desire to consume psychoactive plants is an evolutionary drive that is fundamental to all animals. How can it be illegal for a person to ingest a plant that grows naturally (often sprouting like weeds) on our planet?

A more mature discourse about illegal substances and prostitution will inevitably lead to a healthier culture around them.

Anti-prostitution laws are a reminder that our supposedly free society still has a heavy hangover from it’s Puritanical past. Perversely, we have no problem with someone paying two ‘actors’ to have (often unprotected) sex with each other on camera (pornography), but to pay someone to have sex off-camera is strictly prohibited. These laws make the lives of working girls more dangerous, leaving them in vulnerable situations and unable to go to law enforcement to report true crimes like rape, theft, or violence. They also dehumanize women in the sex industry, feeding exactly the stigma and belittlement that allows some men to justify abusing them (as in their eyes prostitutes don’t need to be treated with the same respect as a ‘normal’ women.)

The American prison population is now five times what it was in 1971 when President Nixon declared a “War on Drugs”. The US has the highest incarceration rate in the world. Of the nearly 2.3 million Americans currently imprisoned, drug offenders constitute 50% of those in federal prison and 20% of state prisoners.

As Terence McKenna once said, “If the words life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness’ don’t include the right to experiment with your own consciousness then the Declaration of Independence isn’t worth the hemp it was written on.”

So lets look again the next time we hear the local news report on a new ‘prostitution sting’ – in other words, the round-up of women who were only trying to make a living, who will now suffer public humiliation and criminal charges. Or when police brag of a huge ‘drug bust’ – imprisoning ‘dealers’ while doctors and pharmaceutical companies make their fortunes peddling legal heroin and speed in the form of prescription drugs.

Not only do these laws infringe on personal liberty, they also perpetuate a criminal underworld of gangs, pimps and violence. The harms often associated with illegal drugs and the sex industry are the product of the black market we ourselves create by forcing these activities underground.

So let it be our own children and grandchildren who gasp reading their history textbooks, incredulous at the idea that in the ‘old days’ people really thought it was okay to lock someone up for the crime of consuming a plant, or selling a sexual service.

As the Daily Transmission is on a summer hiatus, here are a few not-to-be-missed headlines that should keep those juices flowing:

‘Why do we so willfully cover up the failure of the war on drugs?’ asks Angus Macqueen in The Guardian. Macqueen has just completed a documentary series for Channel 4 called ‘Our Drugs War’ which is a well-needed examination of the global ‘War on Drugs’. (Save for another time a discussion of what exactly constitutes a ‘drug’ in the first place… possibly the ‘War on Drugs’ belongs in the same failed category as the ‘War on Terror’?)

For further evidence of failed drug policy look no further than ‘Mephedrone found not guilty, but the next legal high may be a killer’ from former Lib Dem MP Evan Harris. We’re on a road to nowhere, attempting to ban each new pharmaceutical ‘high’ that comes out of a lab. It seems the recipe that got MDMA banned still works: Take tabloid headlines, scare stories and incomplete research, mix in some panicked political bravado, season with a bit of ignorance, and bam! You got yourself a mephedrone ban.

And for a shining example of where rational thought ends and politics begins, Sky News reports on why legalizing prostitution works (in Australia) – but ends telling us why prostitution laws in England are not likely to be changed any time soon:

There are not many votes to be won by decriminalisation and, potentially, many votes to be lost if it sparked a moral crusade by opponents of reform.

But that’s why we elect politicians, isn’t it? So they can get in power and ignore what they think is right in order to ensure getting re-elected?

There was an interesting article in the Sunday Times today called “How teenage access to pornography is killing intimacy in sex”. Natasha Walter addresses the issue of internet pornography and it’s effects on a generation of children who see their first hardcore porn at a younger and younger age.

According to a London School of Economics study in January 2002:

Nine out of 10 children aged between eight and 16 have viewed pornography on the Internet. In most cases, the sex sites were accessed unintentionally when a child, often in the process of doing homework, used a seemingly innocent sounding word to search for information or pictures.

I clearly remember attempting to visit the website for the US government and making the unfortunate mistake of typing in whitehouse.com rather than whitehouse.gov at a very young age. But I would imagine that as we see children dealing with adult themes earlier and earlier in their lives, a lot of this viewing is not unintentional.

We mustn’t make the assumption that children viewing sex at a young age is necessarily harmful – however, the problem is that most popular pornography is a very skewed and one-dimensional portrayal of sex. As a teenager, I personally thought of sex as something one does because men like it – that was the impression I had gotten from my exposure to porn on the internet. It wasn’t till years later that I would start to understand female sexuality, and then my own.

It would be great if our education system could provide sex education that taught more than just the prevention of sexually transmitted diseases. How about teaching our children something about sexuality as an important way humans express intimacy and sometimes love?

I agree with Walter when she writes that:

“If the rise of pornography was really tied up with women’s liberation and empowerment, it would not be increasing women’s anxiety about fitting into a narrow physical ideal.

and

“…women are still encouraged much of the time to concentrate on their sexual allure rather than their imagination or pleasure.”

Unfortunately the article goes downhill from there, as she goes on to attack the sex industry across the board.

I was disappointed to see the conflation of the entire industry with the intimacy-less portrayal of sex in much popular porn and culture.

Walter completely ignores the shifting trend in the sex industry away from the “porn-star experience” (PSE) prostitute in favor of sex workers who offer the “girlfriend experience” (GFE). Many men are not interested in paying for sex without intimacy. The highest paid call girls in the industry are those who provide more personal interaction – not just completing a sexual act, but focusing on things like kissing, cuddling, foreplay, and conversation.

For more on this I highly recommend Elizabeth Bernstein’s “Temporarily Yours: Intimacy, Authenticity, and the Commerce of Sex”. In this model, intimacy is being sold along with sex. Sex workers are seen as just another kind of service provider (in line with therapists, masseurs, etc.) in a capitalist economy where (let’s face it) we all prostitute our time and labour for money in one line of work or another.

Walter claims that “women are scarred by the myth that selling sex is a positive career choice” citing two girls who worked in the sex industry as examples. But when she refers to the bestselling memoirs of prostitutes such as Belle de Jour, she completely ignores the validity of their experiences as empowered sex workers. Denying women’s agency and subjective experiences – is that not typical misogyny?

Surely we can do better than that Ms. Walter.

He’s compared himself to Rosa Parks, but don’t laugh.  Read what 25 year-old “Markus” has to say in his interview with Details first.

Markus is America’s first legal male prostitute after Nevada finally changed it’s health codes in December.  Male prostitutes were previously unable to qualify under these codes because they specified that prostitutes must undergo “cervical” testing for sexually transmitted diseases.  Talk about confirming the assumption that the word prostitute always implies a female worker!

It’s great that Markus is a political crusader who wants to make a point through his employment:

“This actually isn’t about selling my body. This is about changing social norms.”

Having empowered straight male prostitutes who work legally in Nevada will probably help build the case for de-stigmatisation and legalisation of sex work across the country.  Somehow the fact that he’s so heteronormative stops people from reverting back to a prostitutes-as-victims discussion.

However, as Gawker pointed out, his business plan is a bit flawed.  For now, women who purchase sex are a serious minority in the sex industry, and the competition is rough.  Judging from the fact that he’s not much to look at, he probably stands a better chance in the world of gay prostitution, a market with a higher demand. Society seems to allow men the right to pay for sex, so prostitution is more accepted among free-thinking homosexuals.  

So unless he’s the charmer of the century, he may have to reconsider the idea that his “sphincter is not for sale”.  Even if he only wants to service women, how about all the potential clients who enjoy pegging?

Funny how we pick and choose which social norms to deconstruct, eh Markus?

Today’s outrageous headline comes to us from Change.org, where Alex DiBranco reported ‘Don’t Carry Condoms in D.C. – You Could Be Charged with Prostitution’.

That’s right, police in Washington D.C. have the right to arrest anyone suspected of sex work – and carrying three or more condoms has been used as proof of intent to sell sex.

In any sane society, you’d think the police would be relieved to find prostitutes carrying condoms. After all, sexually transmitted diseases are one of the most common ways we tend to stigmatize prostitutes.

But we live in an insane society, because apparently New York and San Francisco use condoms as evidence of prostitution as well.

In New York:

Some businesses are even afraid to offer the city’s snazzy free condoms because they can also be used as evidence of “maintaining a premises for prostitution”.

Apparently public health is lower on the agenda than a moral crusade against sex work.

Will the madness ever end? Only if you want it to. Sign the petition on change.org now to tell D.C., San Francisco and New York that condoms aren’t a crime!

President Obama might have laughed off the question at a Pennsylvania Jobs Town Hall, but legalizing prostitution, drugs, and gambling makes sense both in terms of personal rights and economic growth.

The fact is that these things go on anyway, untaxed. That is a major source of government revenue lost every year. On top of that, because all these industries are forced underground, criminal gangs get involved and violence enters the picture where it certainly shouldn’t have to. Leading, of course, to the government instead spending endless money fighting the crime that arises and a “War on Drugs” that can’t be won.

Never mind the fact that nothing involving two consenting adults, or the ingestion of a substance by personal choice should really be illegal.

Why is it that we are so far from making these changes that our so-called “liberal” president can literally just laugh off the question?

Of course these things aren’t going to become legalized overnight. But decriminalization would be a first great step. We could learn a lot from Portugal’s 2001 decriminalization of all drugs, for example. Seven years later the data is in, and the policy has been a “resounding success”.

What really killed me was President Obama praising the student who asked the question for “doing exactly what you’re supposed to be doing,” in college by “thinking in new ways about things.”

Well yes, Mr. President, exactly. Something that shouldn’t end in college. Something we need to see more of in this country’s social policies across the board. You campaigned on the concept of change. Isn’t it about time we saw some?

As you may have noticed, there’s been a hell of a lot of writing about prostitution in the last week following Belle de Jour’s coming out on the cover of the Sunday Times. Here is the Daily Transmission’s pick of some of the more interesting articles and commentary from this past week:

Belle Lays Bare The Myth That Every Hooker is a Victim

Belle De Jour’s Mother Proud of ‘Brilliant’ Daughter Brooke Magnanti (Heart-warming!)

Brooke Magnanti’s Surprisingly Logical Call Girl Confession: That’s DR. Belle De Jour To You

How Belle de Jour’s Secret Ally Googlewhacked The Press

There is No Shame in Admitting if You’re a ‘Happy Hooker’

More Myths About Students Going On The Game

Enough Hand-wringing On Prostitution

Belle de Jour and the Myth of the Happy Hooker

Brooke Magnanti Says She MIsses Parts of Old Belle de Jour Life

Of course, there will always be some who manage to call themselves feminists and yet deny the validity of a woman’s account if she dares to claim an experience that doesn’t suit some feminists’ political agenda. Here’s a classic example:

Belle de Jour: I Don’t Believe Brooke Magnanti Was a Happy Hooker

All too predictable. Belle de Jour may have made a brave first step in opening a new dialogue on prostitution, but it seems we still have a long way to go.

Yesterday, Guardian columnist Tanya Gold wrote “Dr Brooke Magnanti says she enjoyed life as Belle de Jour. Please don’t let this distort the grim reality of prostitution.” Why does a liberal newspaper like the Guardian consistently publish such reactionary commentary when it comes to sex and prostitution?

Tanya Gold is confounding the issue and confusing her readers by assuming that the sale of sex necessitates exploitation and coercion. Gold asks “can we ever untangle those two soul mates: violence and prostitution?” What a preposterous notion! We might as well ask whether it is possible to untangle exploitation from the textile industry. The obvious answer is yes. It is a matter of regulation and unionization, just like any other service industry.

The disfunction that occurs in the sex industry is a byproduct of its underground status. It is the constant stigmatization of prostitutes that allows some people to see them as less than human – seemingly giving license to a small percentage of clients to behave violently.

Otherwise, a sexual service provider should be no different from any other service provider. You hire a nanny to care for your child, a masseuse to give you a massage. In a perfect world there would be a full time mother taking care of the kid and your husband would be able to relieve the tension in your back but we accept that life’s not always like that. We pay for service providers.

Prostitution is just another service industry, providing intimacy, therapy, and the relief of sexual tension. It is an ancient, and I think noble, occupation. That’s not to say there isn’t a lot of cleaning up to do. We need to address conditions in ‘working class prostitution’. We need to look at trafficking, under-age workers, and other forms of exploitation.

Dr. Brooke Magnanti could be seen as a middle class prostitute. And that is why she is so important. She can be a model for what the world of prostitution could and should look like. So no, Tanya Gold, violence and prostitution are not soul mates. I’ve interviewed enough sex workers in my own research to know that violence is a rare occurrence for most. But of course all violence in the world of prostitution should be eradicated. On that I think we can agree. So how to move forward?

De-stigmatisation, legalisation, and unionisation. Got it?

Yesterday the Sunday Times cover story was “Belle de Jour reveals her biggest secret: she’s a research scientist”. Yes, the anonymous call-girl blogger turned writer whose books became the TV series Belle de Jour played by Billie Piper has revealed her identity. And about time too.

Time for the estimated 90% of prostitutes who work indoors to start coming out and speaking up about their experiences. Time to realize that most of our common knowledge about prostitution comes from street workers – primarily through police records – hardly representative of a massive industry that operates entirely underground. Time to find out just how big a minority women like Dr. Brooke Magnanti are in the sex industry.

Yes, that’s right. Dr. Brooke Magnanti, an educated research scientist who worked as a call girl while writing her PhD. Her experiences were in such contradiction to our cultural folklore about prostitution that many decided she must be making it up, that it was male fantasy, a complete fiction. But no, there are thousands of women like Dr. Magnanti who have these experiences in their past. Who don’t speak up because of the stigma. But its time to start talking, because whoever has got the mic has got the power. And right now it seems everyone’s had their chance at the podium except working girls themselves.

The Daily Transmission is proud of Dr. Magnanti. Maybe it’s time for a coming out party?

They say the road to hell is paved with good intentions.  I have no doubt that in Harriet Harman’s mind, she’s working fervently to fight for women’s rights.  But when it comes to her attitude towards prostitution or ‘sex work’, she would do well to spend a little time speaking to some working girls herself.  The Labour deputy leader urged California governor Arnold Schwarzenegger to “terminate” the “sinister” website PunterNet, an online community she claims “fuels the demand for prostitutes” and puts women at risk.

What Ms. Harman doesn’t mention is the fact that PunterNet and other online communities are some of the few tools that working girls currently have at their disposal to keep each other safe.  One only has to enter the PunterNet UK Community Forum to see the “Dangerous Punter Warnings” board where working girls alert each other to such dangers as “another ripping condoms idiot in suffolk”, “Oxford Warning – Theft”, and “abusive caller: gt yarmouth,norfolk”.  There aren’t many such places where sex workers can congregate anonymously (as they must do considering the social stigma inherent to their work) to give each other crucial warnings.

Never mind the fact that apart from protecting each other from abusive clients, these websites can provide a rare opportunity for sex workers to express themselves, share their experiences with people who can relate and won’t judge.  I’ve spoken to quite a few independent escorts who mention social isolation as one of the most ‘damaging’ aspects of their work.

It all stems from a crucial misunderstanding that Ms. Harman has of the sex industry.  Not only will it always exist, but there is no reason it shouldn’t do.  That is not to deny abuses that take place – but it doesn’t help those working in the industry to constantly conflate the issues of sex work and trafficking or underage workers, for example.  Indeed, navigate to the “UK & Ireland General Discussion” board on PunterNet and one of the very first posts (a permanent “sticky” thread at the top of the page) is called “What to do if you suspect an underage or trafficked girl.”

There are many women working as prostitutes, escorts, or call girls (whichever name you prefer) who are doing so out of choice and with agency.  They are making informed decisions, selling an intimate service that combines the physical labour of a professional masseuse with the emotional labour of both a therapist and actor.  It is by no means an ‘easy’ job – but then most are well compensated.  It is these women who we should be talking to in order to ensure a sex industry that does not thrive upon coercion and abuse.

If Ms. Harman really wants to help protect women’s rights, she should be in constant dialogue with such organizations as the English Collective of Prostitutes and the International Union of Sex Workers.  Some deny the existence of non-victim sex workers but it is through these organizations, as well as on the very websites that Ms. Harman would have shut down, that one is able to have a small glimpse into a world usually hidden from society’s eyes.  For indeed, if a sex worker is not suffering physical abuse, involved with drugs, or being trafficked into the country, law enforcement will not be aware of their existence.  And most statistics we have on sex workers are based solely on police records (imagine how ridiculous it would be to draw conclusions about any other entire industry based only on those workers within it who attracted the attention of law enforcement.)

Considering the general public conception of sex workers, there’s little incentive for satisfied sex workers to come forward and speak up about their experiences.  So I’ll leave you with some of the words of working girls themselves, as written on the PunterNet thread about Ms. Harman’s call for its “termination”:

“Harman then goes on to complain, “…In a stinging attack on the financial sector where, Miss Harman said, women are paid on average 44 per cent less than male employees, the minister set out proposals for compulsory pay audits, which will force firms to reveal salary scales for staff of both sexes.”

In her post, Inna says: “Well I am working in a sector where women earn a lot more than men, and Punternet is part of ensuring that benefit

I think Punternet is one of the best ways of protecting yourself as a WG, and it certainly keeps many of us away from harm by helping those who want to organise their lives as independents rather than having to work through agencies or parlours or whatever.

Her comments are so cheap and show no respect for working women, especially sex working women.

“I hold strongly different views to her on freedom to choose, democracy in general and prostitution in particular. IMO the day prostitution is illegal and forced underground, the consequences for the girls, punters and society in general will be to make it very much worse. She has no understanding of the misery that banning prostitution will cause…”

And in another post, ’6upxxx’ says: “It would simply be beyond her intelligence to grasp the fact, that a woman of 20 now, might choose prostitution, enjoy the financial benefits and socialising/sex with men even men much older than themselves. That this same woman might later in life be a doctor, teacher or yes even a politician and she has not harmed society but given a lot of pleasure and comfort, by her actions along the way.  The labour party should stop wasting time and resources pursuing us and instead concentrate on the true criminals and focus on improving society. Is that so much to ask?”

Others were more appreciative of Ms. Harman’s comments saying:

“ooher thanks HH means the site will be very busy today as peeps google it to see what she is going on about” – BethofKettering

All’s well that ends well.