Made with Love

Toni Mac: The Laws that Sex Workers Want

Anneliese

Well-known member
Joined Jan 18, 2013
Messages 239
"People worry that selling sex is degrading. Ask yourself: is it more degrading than going hungry or seeing your children go hungry? There's no call to ban rich people from hiring nannies or getting manicures, even though most of the people doing that labor are poor, migrant women. It's the fact of poor migrant women selling sex specifically that has some feminists uncomfortable. And I can understand why the sex industry provokes strong feelings. People have all kinds of complicated feelings when it comes to sex. But we can't make policy on the basis of mere feelings, especially not over the heads of the people actually effected by those policies. If we get fixated on the abolition of sex work, we end up worrying more about a particular manifestation of gender inequality, rather than about the underlying causes."

I currently work as a RN in Homecare in which my job is to supervise a team of more than 40 PSWs most of whom are immigrant women from the Philipines, Africa and the Carribean. All of whom have no job security, given only casual work, are extremely low paid, minimal to no benefits and are frequently taken advantage of, having to work all over the board and every day to make the money needed to have a decent income. When I started my job, I was appalled and horrified that in Canada in 2016 these poor, immigrant women were living and working under conditions more suited to a 3rd world country than a 1st. Plus, they are doing personal support work that is highly physically demanding, emotionally and physically abusive in many instances with ever increasing dementia patients, unappreciated socially or financially. These women are my heroes. I am a RN, but it would be a cold day in HELL before I ever consented to do the work that they do, and quite frankly would far rather do sex work.... better pay, more autonomy, better hours, and certainly better clients. It's all relative, and entirely subjective....

Moral implications aside, I can see far worse jobs to do than fucking for money, and snooty rich people condemning sex work as conducive to sex trafficking need to look in their own backyards and their use of nannies for their bratty kids, nail salons for their weekly Manipedis , and PSWs for their neglected elderly family before they cast stones. Like Toni Mac stated; " you can't just legisilate a better world into existence." so until things in all aspects of our society improve and the discrepancy between rich and poor is decreased, vulnerable people will be used and choose to engage in work that is unsafe, unfair, and abusive because that is all that is available to them. I find all of those choices unsavoury, regardless of the degree of sex involved which in my opinion is irrelevant. Toni Mac has some great points and awesome insights. Sex work is no different in terms of its degree of degradation and exploitation than any other number of jobs that target the poor.
 
C

cristycurves

Guest
Thank you for posting that, very informative and well done. Hopefully many will heed her advice.
To add to your second post, sex work doesn't involve just the poor and unprivileged. Many are educated men and women who choose this line of work for their reasons, not simply out of need.
Regardless of why many are in it, the fact remains that it is a profession and a lifestyle many choose and will continue to choose regardless of laws, so time for politicians to wake up and correct the unjustified laws. Sex exists in every job, through every walk of life. I've worked as a teller, salesperson, esthetician, model,etc and in all those jobs I was hit on by a superior. Even as a patient in a hospital, and when I hired a lawyer, and on other occasions, I've been hit on. So my point....it's not just those who *sell* sex that deal in sex or exchanges for sex. Many are giving and taking of sexual services and often times unfairly and with little recourse, it's in these situations that some should concern themselves, not when adults of legal ages consent with one another to exchanges. Time for society to get it's head out of it's moral asses and realize sex happens in many ways all the time and when it occurs between consenting adults that are both willing to exchange something that should be the least of anyone's worry and nobody's business but those exchanging!
 

Pamela

Well-known member
Joined Jul 30, 2015
Messages 127
cristycurves said:
To add to your second post, sex work doesn't involve just the poor and unprivileged. Many are educated men and women who choose this line of work for their reasons, not simply out of need.

In adding to what Cristy has stated, I'd like to chime in on behalf of all the single mothers out there who work this job as a job in order to provide our children with not only the financial benefits obtained through sexwork; but also the abundance of time which we parents are in turn able to spend with our children due to being our own bosses and setting our hours around the needs and schedules of our kids.

I've been a single mom for 13 of my 15 years as a parent, and through that time I have worked many jobs in order to provide for my children, sometimes 2 and 3 jobs at a time. I've been an aesthetician, a waitress, a reach truck driver, a department manager, a night shift worker, a door to door sales person, a factory worker, had been employed in countless retail potions, and had done many other things in an attempt to provide for my children while staying within the constructs of social propriety. What those "socially acceptable" jobs provided me with was barely enough money for us to live and little to no time for my children, which when you are a single parent and the only parent your children have in their lives, is completely unacceptable!

I value my children more than anything in this world, and I value my position and influence as mother just as highly.

I choose sexwork because it allows me to be the mother my children need and deserve in their lives, while being an active part of their lives, and I consider myself very fortunate to have such freedom of my time.



Through sexwork not only am I able to give my children the benefit of my time; but also I am able to provide them with a better quality of life, some periodic luxuries, and my good example as I make my way through getting my own university degree.


I could go on and on about the ways this job has benefited me/my family; but the long and short of it is that I have been truly empowered by sexwork!



It's a shame that society would condemn us and make us feel shame for taking an active role in the improvement of our own lives...
 

Madman

Reviewer
Joined Aug 12, 2011
Messages 17,534
More and more need to speak up because the loony abolitionists are ramping up their stupid conflated stats to force the new government's hands. i.e. the gran prix campaign last weekend in Montreal. This needs to be stopped and these groups need to be pushed back and challenged.

The speaker is amazing, I'm in love and it's with her mind.
 
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