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Anti-Trafficking Laws Are Hurting, Not Helping, but Sex Workers Are Fighting Back

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Coyote (Call Off Your Old Tired Ethics) RI, a sex worker rights organization, conducted a survey of 262 sex workers between April 14 and May 25, 2018. Seventy percent (or 188 people) reported that sex work had been their primary source of income before FOSTA and 77 percent (or 207 people) were the sole providers for their families. Within a week of the laws’ passage, 70 percent noticed a drop in their income, rendering them unable to pay for rent, food, utilities or phone. In one instance, Doroshow told Truthout, the decrease in work forced one of her clients to give up her car, thus decreasing her mobility and safety, and also to forgo health care for her chronic illness, which, without treatment, is now worsening.

This decrease has forced many to compromise safety and boundaries, whether by accepting clients they might otherwise decline or agreeing to acts — including riskier sex and taking drugs — that they would have previously avoided. Sixty percent (or 157) of the people that Coyote RI surveyed said that they now take on less safe clients in order to make ends meet. Sixty-five percent (or 170) reported that someone had tried to threaten, exploit or get free services from them.

Now, with websites shuttering, more and more of the sex workers that she works with are reporting being pushed into dangerous situations. Doroshow told Truthout about one woman who was raped, choked and beaten “within an inch of her life.” She survived, but remains haunted by the attack.

Website closures have also affected organizing for labor rights. In New York City, one dancer, who spoke to Truthout anonymously, said that even before FOSTA, the fear of being fired and blacklisted made many strippers and dancers hesitant to join organizing efforts for improved working conditions. At the club where she worked, dancers began talking about the need for more security to prevent dancers from being sexually assaulted. They also wanted cleaner club conditions. “We never talked about strikes or a union,” she clarified. Still, fear of being fired –and blacklisted among the city’s club owners — made many hesitant to press their demands. With the passage of FOSTA and fewer websites, dancers see fewer work options if they are blacklisted in retaliation for organizing. “If you can’t dance, you can’t just put an ad online anymore,” she said.

The websites’ closures and censorship of sex workers’ content also means that many are turning to street-based sex work. In Sacramento, DiAngelo notes that the number of sex workers in the city’s three strolls (areas for sex-based street work) has increased, including people who have little to no experience working on the streets. Engaging in street-based sex work forces them to make a snap judgment about potential danger from a prospective client.

It also increases vulnerability to predators, including police harassment, arrest and violence. Many cities have ordinances against loitering that are used against street-based sex workers, particularly women of color. “As people are being pushed onto the stroll and off the Internet, cities are continuing to enforce ordinances against loitering,” explained Andrea Ritchie, a police brutality attorney and author of Invisible No More: Police Violence Against Black Women and Women of Color. “Sex workers are being arrested and fined even though the reason they’re doing this work is because they need money. This just drives them into the crosshairs of the criminal legal system and the revolving cycle of fees and fines.”


https://truthout.org/articles/anti-trafficking-laws-are-hurting-more-than-helping-say-sex-workers/
 
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