resurrection.

This is my return, my attempt to resurrect this space – after falling out of touch while in Dubai over a year ago, I have made a lot of changes in my life – and by now I can say they were mostly for the better.

As far as the past year and a half goes… I completed my MA in Interdisciplinary Women’s Studies in December of 2008 and returned to Dubai for this past summer to continue/complete the field work we had started last time. (I’ll be talking about Dubai in some upcoming posts.) I was accepted to the Columbia Mailman School of Public Health for an MPH degree, and am currently in the middle of my first semester. I think it has been my coursework at Columbia that has really inspired me to return here at this blog, because the program I am in is called Sociomedical Sciences, and as much as I love what I am learning, I miss the specific angle of Women’s Studies/Gender Studies and really feel a need to have an outlet for that kind of material.

There will be more (many) upcoming posts, but in the meantime I wanted to share some links to articles I have been reading:

 

The Mismeasure of Women

Are there asexuals among us? The possibility of a fourth sexual orientation.

The dark side of Dubai.

The high cost of poverty.

From Bangkok to Berlin, hard times hit the sex trade.

Jay Smooth and hipster racism (video). – transcript can be found here (in comments).

dubai.

so i will most likely not be posting as frequently (which i know, isn’t that frequently to begin with), as i am currently in dubai researching women and migratory sex work.  but i will try to post as much as possible, and i’m sure i will have plenty to post upon returning in the beginning of july.

 
…

renegade evolution on allies.

please read.

i’m going to leave it at that, this is an incredible post.

food for thought: feminist solidarity?

On Feminism and Sex Work, (excerpt from a personal academic paper):

While feminism ideally represents the rights of women, feminist reconciliation of sex work with women’s rights has been historically confused and divided over the issue of prostitution. Within feminist ideology, there is a strong movement for the abolition of all sex work. As Gail Pheterson notes, “strategies are typically geared to reform the whores, punish the pimps, and discourage the tricks.” (1) Furthermore, she argues, within this ideology, “[p]rostitution is perceived as the ultimate objectification of woman and the ultimate alienation of labor [. . .] Empowerment within prostitution is, according to such an analysis, an ideological contradiciton in terms.” (2)  Movements within feminism to abolish prostitution do not acknowledge the existence of voluntary prostitution. Instead, as Priscilla Alexander argues in “Feminism, Sex Workers, and Human Rights,” all prostitutes are defined as “passive, helpless, degraded victims.” (3) This ideology reinforces the whore stigma in its indication that all women are incapable of sexual and bodily agency and autonomy. Moreover, Pheterson suggests that a prostitute who asserts her agency in the presence of abolitionist feminists loses her ‘status.’ She notes, “[w]omen who claim self-determination as prostitutes lose victim status and ideological sympathy. In other words, a whore is viewed either as a casualty of the system or as a collaborator with the system.” (4) Thus the message maintained by abolitionist feminist ideology continues to subscribe to the notion of female dishonor: prostitutes are either victims or collaborators, reproducing the binary of honor/dishonor. Feminist ideology that is not explicitly abolitionist is often silent, participating in the perpetuation of the whore stigma and its implications, by not supporting sex worker rights through omission and inaction.

Where do we go from here?

When things have calmed down after I get back in July, I’m hoping to expand more upon this, and instead of just stating the problem, offer some thought.

And as a starting point, I’ll be using karly kirschner’s post on Bound, Not Gagged (which I was honored to be mentioned in), which should have been posted on every major feminist blog, but somehow, wasn’t.

 

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1. Pheterson, Gail, “Whore Stigma: Female Dishonor and Male Unworthiness,” Social Text 37 (Winter 1993(: 57.

2.  Ibid, 57.

3. Alexander, Priscilla, “Feminism, Sex Workers, and Human Rights,” in Whore and Other Feminists, ed. Jill Nagle (New York: Routledge, 1997), 83.

4.  Pheterson, “Whore Stigma,” 58.

press release: the PINK SCARE: of Ms. Palfrey and Sex Panic

the following is a press release from SWANK, SWOP-NYC, PONY, and the Desiree Alliance:

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE (source)

PRESS STATEMENT
Dylan Wolfe – Sex Workers Action New York (SWANK), swank@riseup.net
Michael Bottoms – Sex Workers Outreach Project – New York City (SWOP-NYC), swop.nyc@gmail.com
Susan Blake – Prostitutes of New York (PONY), pony@panix.com
Desiree Alliance, info@DesireeAlliance.org

The Pink Scare: Of Ms. Palfrey and Sex Panic

New York, NY – The activists at Sex Workers Action New York (SWANK), Sex
Workers Outreach Project New York (SWOP-NYC), Prostitutes of New York
(PONY) and the nationally-based Desiree Alliance are saddened that Deborah
Jeane Palfrey, also known as the D.C. Madam, passed away on May 1st in an
apparent suicide. We – prostitutes, strippers, pro-dommes, porn stars, sex
experts, and allies – extend our sympathies to all of those hurt by this
most recent chapter of the “Pink Scare,” in which oppressive legislation
and social stigma partner to generate hysteria around what, for us, can
prove to be simply a decent way to make a living.

The circumstances surrounding Ms. Palfrey’s death suggest that Americans
reconsider the current state and federal policies that govern sex work, as
well as the stigmatization and sensational treatment of those who
participate in this industry. From New York to California, daily reports
of Pink Scare-fueled police busts, e-stings and raids, even at legal
venues like strip clubs and dungeons, have reached a fever pitch. These
oppressive patterns regularly marginalize and terrorize our communities,
with barely a headline to show for the mass arrests. In contrast, coverage
of high-profile cases include yellow journalism exposés published at the
expense of sex workers’ privacy, dignity and livelihood. In an interview
with Lori Price, it was Ms. Palfrey who said, “Without question in my
mind, escort and adult service businesses. . . are being used as the new
weapon of choice in American politics.” The public figures implicated in
this type of case often receive little more than a slap on the wrist and a
second chance from a forgiving public. Ironically, among the exposed we
regularly find the very same lawmakers and other insiders who claim to
protect people from vice through moralizing legislation. Former State
Department official Randall L. Tobias was a Palfrey patron, though he
implemented the abstinence earmark in programs such as the President’s
Emergency Plan for AIDS Relief (PEPFAR) and, with it, the
“Anti-Prostitution Pledge” that has resulted in diminished funding for sex
worker-run organizations. Annually, our government spends millions in
taxpayer money to apprehend and prosecute participants in the sex trade,
while more effective policies like harm reduction-based approaches,
including the multiplication of living wage alternatives, are dramatically
under-utilized.

In both the highly-publicized scandals and under-documented daily
struggles, many sex workers now face financial ruin, emotional hardship
and social opprobrium at the hands of the Pink Scare simply because their
work, though it takes place between consenting adults, may be illegal and,
to some, may be offensive. In two instances associated with Palfrey’s
case, Ms. Palfrey and her former employee, Ms. Britton, oppressive laws
and stigma cost the implicated their very lives. Why did Ms. Palfrey die?
In response to this question, an activist with the International Union of
Sex Workers wrote, “Whether she died by her own hand or her suicide is a
cover for murder, she has been killed by the state.” Given the highly
political nature of these events, SWANK, SWOP-NYC, PONY and the Desiree
Alliance call for an independent investigation of the circumstances
surrounding Ms. Palfrey’s untimely death. Furthermore, we, as activists
and advocates, would like to stress in this instance that the
criminalization of sex workers and our labor only drives us further
underground, making us and our dependents more vulnerable to client and
police violence, and even death, as we are further isolated. The
unfortunate events of the D.C. scandal bring many of these broader issues
into sharper focus. It is high time that we challenge the morals and laws
that harm so many, so deeply, with so few gains and so many lives
destroyed.

via Bound, Not Gagged.

deborah jeane palfrey, the whore stigma, and the systematic silencing of sex workers.

So upon hearing the news today of Deborah Palfrey’s death, I had two immediate reactions. One was a visceral shock and awe of how far the american  legal system takes the shaming of sex workers, the implications of this shaming, and the immense sadness I feel that Palfrey felt compelled to end her life in the face of condemnation, shaming, and wrongful impending imprisonment. My second reaction questioned the validity of the reported suicide, knowing that there were many powerful people on her client list that would rather have her silenced then face their own public shaming.

Upon some searching, I found that Palfrey had recently appeared on the Alex Jones show, and had explicitly said that she was not suicidal, nor would she attempt to take her own life. She also predicted that she would be “suicided” as a way to keep her quiet. Contradictory to this, Palfrey had also stated that she would end her own life if she were forced to serve time. She had been imprisoned previously and did not feel she could endure it again. Taking these two statements together makes it impossible to know (or even begin to guess) which now rings more true.

The United States government and the society which prescribes to the puritanical, sanitized ideologies of sex and sexual expression, have directly caused this to occur. Whether or not Palfrey was murdered or committed suicide, her death was the result of a society unwilling to accept sex work as a legitimate profession. The public shaming of Palfrey before, during, and after the trial is a testimony to the pervasiveness and persistence of the whore stigma which reaches every aspect of American society, from politics (Ashley Dupre in the Eliot Spitzer case) to religion (Mary Magdalene) to the media (see recently the slut-shaming of the artistic photography of Miley Cyrus, or anyfemale in th spotlight) to schools (abstinance only education) to any and every realm of America. Whether Palfrey committed suicide because of her own public shaming or whether she was killed by those who wanted to avoid their own shaming, this is not an isolated incident that can be forgotten. The United States is guilty of systematic structural violence which silences sex workers and disempowers women and female sexuality to the point of death.

 Much more thoughtful commentary at Bound, Not Gagged.

food for thought: germaine greer.

I found this article via 3quarksdaily. It is a commentary on the Miley Cyrus photograph, taken by Annie Liebotvitz, and I think provides relevant and critical analysis by a feminist icon.

“We Like Our Venuses Young” by Germaine Greer (excerpt)

“. . . . We train female children to be manipulative and to exploit their sex. From the time she is tiny, a girl in our society is taught to flirt. She is usually dressed like a mini-whore in pink and tinsel, short skirt, matching knickers, baby-doll pyjamas, long hair falling over her face. She learns to court attention and, when successful, to hide her face. If she’s lucky enough to get to be a big sister she might get over this sleazy conditioning, but very few daughters these days get to grow out of being “daddy’s girl”. When the time comes she is likely to reject approaching womanhood, desperate to keep her thighs skinny, and nearly as desperate to acquire hard, high breasts. The idea of growing into her own body is charmless, frightening. One thing we know about the Leibovitz photograph is that Cyrus saw nothing amiss in clutching a satin sheet to her apparently naked bosom, and looking at the camera over her shoulder. Girls are taught to look at the world in that sidelong fashion from the time they come to consciousness.

For her photograph of the teenage celebrity, Leibovitz chose a palette strongly redolent of the dirty postcards of yesteryear, sepia embittered with black, a suggestion of eye-blue and lip-red, as if retouched by hand, with never – thank our stars – a hint of pink. The light is centred on the child’s sallow, unformed cheek. Her eyes are shadowed and puffy, her lips slightly set, as if she is waiting out the slow shutter-click of an obsolete camera. Nobody has run a comb through her disordered mass of dark hair, which seems greasy and damp, as if with sweat. As one of her now ex-fans shrieked in his blog, “She looked like she is freshly f**ked in these photos!” The subject of Leibovitz’s photo could be a child prostitute from Casablanca, vintage 1900, the camera in the hands of a sex tourist who is about to toss a few coins to the doorkeeper. It is Disney, after all, that is merchandising this child, and the suggestion of pimping will cling to it. Leibovitz may be cynical, is obviously cynical. She is also, as usual, justified.

Now Disney accuses Vanity Fair of drumming up controversy and deliberately manipulating a 15-year-old in order to sell magazines, as if its own motives were not identical. The photo shoot for Vanity Fair was probably carried out weeks ago but the brouhaha has been timed for the very day the magazine appeared on the newsstands. Disney could have refused to make its star available for a shoot with Vanity Fair, or, if what it wanted was to protect its brand image, it could have demanded the right to vet the pictures. Cyrus was not undefended in the clutches of Leibovitz; her parents and minders were present and apparently saw nothing amiss in the offending photograph, which, in its original state, probably looked less like a dirty postcard than it does on the pages of Vanity Fair.

Before Leibovitz, Cyrus was regularly photographed on red carpets dressed as a 35-year-old in sequins and chiffon with heavy makeup, hair extensions, fuck-me shoes, and occasionally a segment of baby breast escaping at an ill-cut armhole. Otherwise she dresses as a schoolgirl in long socks, very short skirts and the same hanks of rather gluey-looking hair. These publicity shots are far cheaper and far nastier in implication than the Leibovitz image, which has class. Meanwhile, in a series of candid snapshots apparently of Cyrus that have found their way on to the internet, Cyrus the professional virgin is apparently happy to show herself nipples akimbo in jersey underwear, pulling down a vest to display a green bra, and disporting a bare belly on a bed with a boyfriend. All tacky, all in circulation, and all displaying the usual knowingness. . .”

Read the entire article at the guardian, here.