Folks: The recent exchange on prostitution came to an end and I am not interested in reopening it where we left off, but I think most of you will find the following communication of considerable interest. It comes from Sera Pinwell, a woman working in the sex industry in Australia --one who is also active in the political struggles of that industry. I have been contacted by another prostitute, from New York, also an activist, whose comments were very similar. It is nice to have people come forward and verify that your ideas about them and their struggles are on target. Harry PS:I am reproducing this with Sera's permission. I have deleted the names of two others mentioned only tangentially. ............................................................................ ---------- Forwarded message ---------- Date: Mon, 18 Aug 1997 13:03:37 +1000 From: WISE <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> To: [EMAIL PROTECTED] Subject: Prostitution Dear Harry, __________ posted some of your correspondence with James Craven on Whorenet (for sex workers and interested others), and I have to say that I think Craven's arguments are so typically thoughtless and patronizing. A bit of background: My name is Sera Pinwill. I am the co-ordinator of Workers In Sex Employment (WISE) in the ACT Inc., which is a sex worker education/advocacy group in Canberra, Australia. I have worked as a whore on and off (no pun intended) for the past 15 years, both on the streets of Melbourne and Sydney, in brothels and massage parlours, and for myself as a high class call girl. It enrages me to hear other people - people who have absolutely NO IDEA of how I feel and what my life is like, making assumptions and judgments on my behalf, and that is exactly what Craven has done. You wrote: >Why can you not imagine that sex workers hire other prostitutes for real >pleasure? Why do >you jump to the interpretation that they just want someone to abuse? Why >do you keep repeating horror stories or dreaming up possible horror >stories instead of accepting the possibility that there are attitudes and >behaviors different from those you have encountered. If you refuse to >accept any evidence that differs from your own, then there is no point >to discussion --and your own understanding will stagnate. Of course - this is my truth and the truth of many, many women and men who I am involved with on a daily basis. Knowing how much pride I take in my professionalism, I am much more inclined to seek out the services of a professional during the times when I feel that I need someone to cater for my desires. I do not abuse them, nor they me. We fulfill each others needs. We are adults engaging in consensual and pleasurable activity - and to suggest that I am abusive or deluded in my thinking is patronizing and shows egomania in its extremes. Craven wrote: >In the course of that work, I interviewed literally > hundreds of prostitutes (always in confidence and not one was ever > turned in and they knew it). I never met even one "sex worker" who > looked forward to going to work or who did not have dreams of using > the money "to get out of the business. And of course, these workers being interviewed are, by the nature of their work, experts at reading people. They know what the interviewer wants to hear, while the interviewer is in the position of power over them ( he could have turned them in to police) they will tell him what he wants to hear. With Craven's attitude - I sincerely doubt that even if someone did confess to enjoying their work or gaining job satisfaction from it - he would not hear them anyway...... Craven wrote: >Further there are some unique > dangers and forms of degradation involved when, as you put it, the > commodity being exchanged is "use of genitals". Why? Where are these unique dangers and forms of degradation? They are in the mind of someone whose sexual repression is so complete that genitals = dirty. I am not arguing that all prostitution is equal and consensual. Of course there are some women and men who are forced to work in the industry and some who are forced by economic circumstances when they would rather not be there. But I can clearly and categorically state that the evidence from Canberra - which is much the same as any other city of its size - shows that by far the large majority of women and men who are sex workers, are doing it BECAUSE THEY WANT TO. Because they enjoy the financial freedom it brings them, because they enjoy the sex, because they enjoy the flexibility of the hours - and for lots of other reasons. To say that all these people are abusers/abused, deluded etc, etc, etc, is denying their reality. In a study that was done by myself and ___________ from the National Sex Worker Rights Organisation in Australia (The Scarlet Alliance) of sex workers in the Canberra district, both brothel workers and those working privately from home, those who reported being sexually assaulted as children was around 15%. This is, in fact, LESS than the national average, which runs at about 25% - so go figure...... I think your attitudes towards prostitution are well thought out and take into account OUR reality. Keep up the good work. Yours in solidarity, Sera Pinwill WISE Whore
