published at Feminist Current November 9, 2012
I am thrilled that California has just passed two laws addressing the
harms of the sex industry. Measure B mandates condom use in porn among
other sensible workplace safety preventions for the legal porn industry,
and Prop 35 increases consequences for illegal pimps, child
pornographers, and sex traffickers while decriminalizing victims of
commercial sexual abuse. These laws are a done deal, hooray, yet my
abolitionist work on the issue continues as long as the public debate
does, and people are not done talking about Prop 35.
For over a decade I have actively tried to lessen the human losses of
prostitution, and in that time I’ve heard an unbelievable number of
excuses against strengthening sexual exploitation laws. Sometimes I
shrug it off as the universal impetus behind Woodrow Wilson’s famous
quote, “If you want to make enemies, try to change something,” and
sometimes I think less magnanimous thoughts about those who would thwart
the passage of anti-rape laws.
Despite Prop 35’s predictable win – and more importantly despite my
extensive history of reading specious sex industry position papers – I
gave naysayers the benefit of the doubt that maybe this time they had a
point. Let me share some of the excuses I’ve seen made for opposing Prop
35 (full text and summary here for reference.)
First, let’s zoom past the complaint about crowding the sex offender
list because databases exist. Imagine if we set a limit on fingerprint
collection because oy, ten from each person! If police truly must print
out sex offender lists and scan them with biological eyes then they
definitely need the extra money Prop 35 would take from pimps to upgrade
past 1995 home computer technology.
Some No on Prop 35ers are very concerned about the families of
convicted sex offenders. Similarly, right now in Kennebunk, Maine some
prostitute-using men believe they should be exempt from having their
crimes known publicly by begging mercy for what the community outcry
will do to their children. Forgive me for slipping myself another easy
one at the start, one where men are responsible for considering the
impact of their decisions before choosing to break the law.
The flimsy boogeyman of sex workers’ families being labeled
traffickers was raised in 1999 when Sweden passed its revolutionary law
criminalization johns. No Swedish sex worker’s children have been
charged as traffickers in Sweden after twelve years of much stronger
anti-exploitation laws than Prop 35. Regardless of this reality, Feministing
is sure thousands of innocent sex workers and their families will be
jailed and bankrupted as they claim Prop 35 just criminalized the entire
sex industry (and their families) in California.
The “locking up rapists overcrowds prisons” one has also been around
since the early days of the Swedish model when naysayers predicted many
nonviolent, merely ‘naughty’ men would be thrown in jail by the Swedish
Gestapo. Turned out men don’t need hookers so much when there are
negative consequences to their actions because soliciting reduced
dramatically and few johns were jailed. Did the low jail rate vindicate
Swedish model advocates? Heck no! They used the low number of jail
sentences to suggest the law was unnecessary and ineffective. There’s no
pleasing some people.
Melissa Gira Grant
creatively made a new use for an old line that’s been shutting down
discussions about porn for years when she suggested “sexual
exploitation” can mean anything at all and no one can know if what goes
on under that label is criminal or not. Postmodernists who say words
have no distinct, shared meanings are blaspheming linguistics and
manipulating language to their own ends like three-card Monte cheaters.
Once upon a time there was no such thing as sexual harassment or
domestic violence, now that time has passed and taken with it ignorance
of how sexual exploitation harms people.
I saved the worst for last.
Behold the euphemism for child pornography that a pornsturbator at California’s Ventura County Star
concocted against Prop 35, “Also, individuals could face severe
penalties for very limited, indirect involvement with artistic or other
creative works that later are found to have used minors illegally.”
Prostituted kids needs to be decriminalized at the very least,
however sex worker groups who call decriminalization their goal have
never put decriminalizing kids on their legislative agenda. It’s
abolitionists who get laws passed erasing the criminal records of
exploited children and giving prostituted women the right to sue pimps
for damages.
Not only aren’t sex worker groups working for safe harbor laws, in addition to Prop 35 they tried to kill New York’s law
from passing when it was proposed by a coalition of activists led by
survivor Rachel Lloyd of GEMS. Sex industry advocates wanted the law,
including the part decriminalizing kids, rejected because they didn’t
like that youths could be placed in care facilities which didn’t allow
them to come and go as they pleased. Variations on safe harbor laws have
been passed in 13 states, leaving 37 states, leaving no time like the
present for sex work advocates to get the jump on abolitionist lawmakers
by pushing forth the first child decriminalizing laws they won’t
protest.
Prop 35 passed with a mandate-making 81% of the vote. Eyes are
watching to see how California’s authorities wind up applying the new
law, and there’s always some lag time between implementation and
results, but there will be results eventually. When Prop 35 follows
Sweden’s lead and doesn’t result in strippers’ children having to
register as sex offenders, will any of the people who tried to roadblock
Prop 35 find the grace to apologize?
Copyright © by genderberg.com All Right Reserved.