One significant difference between sex work and other work is that, even in places where it is legal, the staunchest advocates of its 'normalcy' still make sure they advocate for 'support and pathways' for people wanting to leave the industry. You don't see that for any other work.
Put another way, if I owe my landlord backrent, I might agree to work off that debt by painting the place, doing the garden, even cleaning the toilets in the landlord's property and no one would bat an eyelid. If my payment takes the form of being willing to give him a blowjob, people *should* bat an eyelid. Of course sex workers should be protected, unionised etc. But to treat it as the same as other work is a mistake. I saw a story in the paper a few years back where a woman in Germany was refused an unemployment benefit because she turned down a job as a receptionist in a brothel. I'm with the woman on that, not with the state treating the sex industry as just like any other just because it's legal. When legalisation happened in New Zealand, I supported it, advocated for it, wrote in support of it. I differed from my Mao-leaning comrades on this because Maoists tend to be pretty staunch in drawing a direct line between sex work and sexism. I'm inclined now to think they were right. I certainly haven't seen anything I'd call progress for young trafficked women, indigenous Maori and immigrants in particular, since that law change. Just as class reductionism is a mistake when it ignores the real and parallel oppression that is racism, intertwined with but not simply a subset of class oppression to be resolved "come the revolution", it's equally a mistake when it ignores the parallel oppression that is sexism - the overwhlming majority of sex workers are women (and girls) after all, and their clients men. Many have been victims of abuse before and during their time as sex workers. We should not advocate their criminalisation but we must see it as different from other work. Comradely, John On Sun, Sep 13, 2020 at 8:55 AM Louis Proyect <[email protected]> wrote: > On 9/12/20 4:49 PM, rosalux wrote: > > “The visceral negative reaction that many have to the idea of themselves > or their loved ones engaging in sex work suggests that the left position of > sex work being work is neither intuitive nor desirable. Nonetheless, the > contemporary left has joined hands with liberal feminists, capitalists, > pimps, and bourgeois academics in insisting that sex work is wage labor > like any other.” > > > https://www.thebellows.org/the-folly-of-sex-work-advocacy/ > > > What's this? Max Power returning with a fake name? The Bellows is a dead > giveaway. Will he follow up with a dig at BLM? > > > > > -- "All I ask of our brethren is that they take their feet off our necks." Sarah Moore Grimke, abolitionist (1792-1873) -=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=- Groups.io Links: You receive all messages sent to this group. View/Reply Online (#1486): https://groups.io/g/marxmail/message/1486 Mute This Topic: https://groups.io/mt/76809884/21656 -=-=- POSTING RULES & NOTES #1 YOU MUST clip all extraneous text when replying to a message. #2 This mail-list, like most, is publicly & permanently archived. #3 Subscribe and post under an alias if #2 is a concern. -=-=- Group Owner: [email protected] Unsubscribe: https://groups.io/g/marxmail/leave/8674936/1316126222/xyzzy [[email protected]] -=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-
