Sex Workers Blow Spitzer a Farewell Kiss
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
Contacts
Madeleine Dash, Sex Workers Action New York (SWANK), 877-776-2004 x 2
swank@riseup.net
Audacia Ray, 718.554.1714
Sarah Bleviss, Sex Workers Outreach Project NYC (SWOP-NYC),
swop.nyc@gmail.com
Prostitutes of New York (PONY), pony@panix.com
Desiree Alliance, http://www.BoundNotGagged.com
Sex Workers Blow Spitzer a Farewell Kiss
New York, NY – In the wake of former Governor Spitzer’s resignation, sex
workers and human rights advocates remain concerned about the
representation and future of “Kristen” and other sex workers, who do not
have the legal and social privileges that will be afforded to Mr. Spitzer.
The identity of the sex worker implicated in this case has already been
made public, a situation mirroring many a sex worker’s worst nightmare.
“Kristen’s” exposure may entail not only bring her legal repercussions,
but invasion of privacy, financial hardship and social opprobrium.
Rather than continuing to sensationalize Spitzer’s actions and those
directly involved, we urge the press and the public to shift their focus
to the legal climate under which sex workers operate, while respecting
“Kristen’s” agency to have chosen sex work as a viable source of income.
“Everyone wants to know how high her rates were, all the salacious
details, but the real issue at stake here is that the hypocrisy of
criminalizing sex work has been exposed! It’s a part of our society, of
every society, and we need to take this opportunity to stop with the value
judgments and start coming up with policies that respect the human dignity
of all people, sex workers and all workers. ” says Dylan Wolfe of SWANK
(Sex Workers Action New York).
Former Governor Spitzer took a lead role in developing the NY State
Anti-Trafficking Law as well as other initiatives that stigmatize sex
workers and their clients. It is the stigma of sex work that leads many
individuals like “Kristen” to keep their occupations a secret, creating
further isolation and opportunities for exploitation. This same stigma
compromises the safety and well-being of people like “Kristen” when their
private lives become public knowledge. Sex workers are then forced to
work further underground, rendering them more vulnerable to abuse, while
denying them access to the basic civic participation, health and social
services available to other people. “Hopefully Mr. Spitzer’s unfortunate
public decline will send a message to all like him who pass laws that
endanger the safety of sex workers while indulging in the service
themselves,” Sarah Bleviss of SWOP said, “Sex workers clearly provide them
a very valuable service; it’s time for lawmakers to return the favor.”
Too little attention has been paid to what the repercussions of this case
will be for those most directly concerned, sex workers, and more generally
to the impact of laws and attitudes that marginalize them. It is time for
a change.
Spitzer pushed through penalty enhancements against clients of all sex
workers. Sex worker advocates fought against such provisions because these
policies drive people who need help further underground. Often
prostitution is wrongly conflated with trafficking and vice-versa. People
are trafficked for many kinds of work, be it domestic labor, farm work or
other jobs, and this kind of exploitation undoubtedly needs to be
addressed. The majority of men, women and transgendered people working in
sex work, however, are ‘normal’ members of society who have used their own
intellectual agency to decide to make a living in a sexually-oriented way.
Laws, like the Mann Act (against inter-state transportation for the
purposes of commercial sex), are too often used for punishing sex workers
and their clients rather than those who profit from their exploitation.
Sex workers make a living in an industry with the potential for high risks
and little by way of protection from abuse. The stigma surrounding our
work can be lethal at its most extreme: we are often the targets of
notorious serial killers, like the Green River Killer, Gary Ridgway who
targeted prostitutes because he thought he “could kill as many of them as
[he] wanted without getting caught.” If sex work were decriminalized and
legitimized as a form of paid labor like any other, or seen simply as an
intimate exchange between consenting adults, the associated harms would be
greatly diminished. Furthermore, sex workers could access their basic
human rights and social services without fear of legal reprisal or
personal upheaval. “Eliot Spitzer has represented himself to the public as
a law and order man, and ironically, has been in the vanguard of further
criminalizing sex workers and clients. . . However, it’s a shame that so
much time, energy, and tax payer resources are being spent to criminalize
consensual sex between adults. It’s time to decriminalize prostitution.”
says Sarah Blake of Prostitutes of New York (PONY).
Incoming Governor Paterson and other law-makers need to create policies
that actually reflect the realities of their own lives and those of their
constituents, including sex workers, rather than the harmful legislation
of morality, whereby private matters become public scandals.