$pread presents…
Grind the Vote: Sex Workers From Pole To Poll
“From the Bay Area to the Big Apple, sex workers are organizing for political and economic justice. It’s time to organize our sex worker electorate into a political force and “Grind the Vote!”
We already have voter registration events scheduled for New York City and Washington DC, but we need you to help us Grind the Vote all over the country! Volunteer to organize an event in your city or town, email infoatspreadmagazinedotorg”
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This is an exciting development. I would love for sex worker rights to become a more talked about political issue. Is it possible? Definitely. Not too long ago politicians would never talk about gays, let alone gay rights. I’d like to see sex worker rights get taken seriously by the candidates.
Posted by Vixen as Activism, Sex Workers at 10:07 PM CDT
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The best of this week’s blogs by the bloggers who blog them. Highlighting the top 3 posts as chosen by Sugasm participants. Want in Sugasm #132? Submit a link to your best post of the week using this form. Participants, repost the link list within a week and you’re all set.
This Week’s Picks
Kink
“A bill outlawing the possession of “extreme pornography” is set to become law next week.”
M is for Mine
“You comment on my wetness.”
The Story Behind the Waxing
“I tend to go to people that I trust really know what they are doing when it comes to my pussy.”
Mr. Sugasm Himself
Keeley Hazell Regrets
Editor’s Choice
The sadistic impulse
More Sugasm
Join the Sugasm
See also: Fleshbot’s Sex Blog Roundup each Tuesday and Friday.
Panties and heels courtesy of Long-Distance Sub.
Posted by Vixen as Sugasm at 8:22 PM CDT
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From AVN:
Facebook Sets Safeguards, Obscenity Blockers
“Social networking website Facebook has instituted a number of enhanced privacy safeguards and obscenity blockers.
The move on Thursday was part of an agreement with 49 state attorneys general to increase the level of protection for the site’s younger users.”
—
And here I thought Facebook was the adult version of Myspace.
Posted by Vixen as News at 11:41 PM CDT
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When a client asked if I watched a certain tv show I replied that I didn’t. When asked why not I answered that I didn’t own a television. To which he said:
“I’m sorry but that sort of freaks me out. TV is my everyday friend.”
-client
(silence)
-I was biting my lip to keep from laughing.
“How do you get your news?”
-Surprisingly I get this question a lot.
“I read.”
-me
“Oh.”
-He quickly changed the subject. I let him.
Posted by Vixen as Quote Book at 10:33 PM CDT
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The model looks like she’s either going into or coming out of the cat pose. There’s another picture in the gallery where she’s about to do a backbend.
Posted by Vixen as Sexy Sensations at 10:12 PM CDT
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A new client asked if I would indulge his burp fetish. I immediately told him I could. You see, burping on command is one of my odd talents. My cousin taught me how to do it when I was twelve. She also taught me how to burp the alphabet and how to burp talk.
He said he’d call soon to talk but I haven’t heard from him since. Damn. I was looking forward to doing a call with a new fetish. Oh well.
Posted by Vixen as PSO Confessions at 11:22 PM CDT
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Sex Worker Profile
I’m a former escort, now running Sex-Kitten.Net, a lifestyles site for women who admit that sex is a part of their lives. SK, as we affectionately call it, has many regular columnists as well as guests (both male and female). I started it nearly a decade ago!
If you’d like more of my bio, please see here.
What kind of sex work are you currently doing?
Technically I’m a writer and an editor; but I see myself as a facilitator of conversations.
Are you active in sex worker activism? If so, what are you doing?
I consider myself an activist in the sense that I work very hard to keep sex from being a dirty taboo. By keeping the dialog open and ongoing, I hope to further understanding and acceptance of sex by society. If ‘mainstream’ society doesn’t accept sex, neither sex work nor the workers will be respected.
How I do this is by facilitating conversations and by providing a forum for these conversations.
I believe that it is through conversations that women identify, scrutinize, question, confront & come to terms with their concerns & needs. As women communicate with each other from a place of mutual respect, individual as well as partner needs, insecurities, & desires are exposed & understood.
In short, and I’m not known for being succinct *wink*, I believe that having a place to share and connect, to ask and to answer, to face their own fears and see them mirrored in the insecurities of others, is a place to not only build awareness but to exercise tolerance and understanding of others.
And I help others market their adult sites, products and services as The Marketing Whore.
Similarly, by keeping an open dialog between mainstream and adult marketers, I hope to break down barriers by showing that business is business and that ethics are a part of our business (quite often more than in mainstream business).
What do you think is the best way to promote solidarity with fellow sex workers?
Honestly, I often think the largest problem currently facing sex worker solidarity is ourselves.
I hear too many sex workers discussing the differences between types of sex work and debating the definitions of sex workers ~ and not just in a marketing sense. Like the political ‘red states vs. blue states’, we are focusing on the smaller differences which keep us apart, forgetting that we have much more in common than not, and making it more difficult to come together in terms of understanding & acceptance of one another. This also makes it much more difficult to unify and work for the understanding & acceptance of sex and sex work by the public at large. But this fragmentation of our industry is also far more insidious.
When I hear one pro belittle another pro, my heart aches. When I hear one sex worker claim superiority over another, I feel quite sick to my stomach. I’m not talking about individuals with ethics problems ~ we most certainly should be calling one another out and holding one another accountable for adding to the negative stereotypes; I’m talking about the sex workers who fall for the moral arguments, believing in lines & using them to keep some sense of purity… The “I’m not that kind” thinking not only divides us, but is proof that at some level the person has fallen for and accepts that sex work is dirty (in a bad way).
Bad ethics aside, there is no bad sex work.
Higher rates do not make one sex worker more pure than another; nor do specific acts. Escorts, hookers, hos, those who work directly with flesh & fluids, are no dirtier (or cleaner) than phone sex operators who work with words. Those making or selling sex products for the purpose of sexual gratification (toys, erotic stories, porn films & publications, etc.) are no more (or less) involved in sex work than an escort, a pro Domme, a PSO, etc. Those who write non-fiction works; who create educational sex films & guides; who report on sex health issues; who fight for better reproductive rights; who push for better policies & treatment for gender issues; who treat, medicate, counsel, & create tools with which to better treat, medicate, etc. ~ they all can claim themselves sex workers, should they wish to don the scarlet letters and cloaks.
And I hope they do.
For each one of us wants sexuality to be safe, sane, consensual, and pleasurable ~ be it free or paid. Yet every time we justify our work as better, more pure, more acceptable than the work of another, or limit entrance into the movement or industry, we move away from those goals.
We are all part of the same struggle. We should be welcoming one another with open hearts as well as open minds. After all, that’s what we are asking others to do with us, with sex work.
What project(s) are you working on now?
I am an editor, not just for the website, but two book imprints:
Sex-Kitten books
Gracie Passsette Productions
I also will be writing at Women Blogging For Democrats with hopes that ’sex’ can appear as part of a political platform ~ heaven knows there are plenty of these
issues, such as reproductive health, sex education, and basic rights which are linked to gender and sexuality, which should be a part of every candidate’s platform.
—
Gracie’s comment “If ‘mainstream’ society doesn’t accept sex, neither sex work nor the workers will be respected” really hit home with me. She’s right but she’s also timely. If ‘mainstream’ society didn’t have such a stigma around sex would Jeane Palfrey still be alive today? But this idea reaches beyond her. How many murdered prostitutes might be alive today? How many women who hide their sex worker past could come out of the closet if they were free from stigma? Would sex workers be able to put their work on a resume for a ‘normal’ job without fear of discrimination? The list can go on and on.
We have a lot of work to do to get the acceptance, respect and rights we want. I believe we can get them, though I’ll admit it’s a long road. Gracie makes an excellent point about sex workers getting caught up on our smaller differences. It’s a trap many activist groups fall into. Focusing on our similarities instead of our differences is vital.
I like to focus on the little details that we share in common. I was just talking to Jesse Cox earlier tonight. We were laughing about how our clients want to buy our expensive panties. She never sells the panties she wears on stage and I don’t sell the panties I wear in photos. We’ve carefully picked them to coordinate with our work clothes. Getting rid of the panties would ruin a good outfit. Though she strips and I do phone sex we find a lot of similarities in our work.
She comments that “We are all part of the same struggle. We should be welcoming one another with open hearts as well as open minds. After all, that’s what we are asking others to do with us, with sex work.” Well said Gracie, well said.
Sex Worker Solidarity Series
Sex Worker Solidarity: Introduction
Sex Worker Solidarity: Audacia Ray
Sex Worker Solidarity: Dallas From Babeland
Sex Worker Solidarity: Secondhand Rose
Sex Worker Solidarity: Rachel Kramer Bussel
Sex Worker Solidarity: Libertine
Sex Worker Solidarity: Jesse Cox
Sex Worker Solidarity: Amanda Brooks
Posted by Vixen as PSO Confessions, Interviews, Sex Workers at 11:33 PM CDT
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The best of this week’s blogs by the bloggers who blog them. Highlighting the top 3 posts as chosen by Sugasm participants. Want in Sugasm #131? Submit a link to your best post of the week using this form. Participants, repost the link list within a week and you’re all set.
This Week’s Picks
Gross Spelling Errors Turn Me Off
“Here are a few other word issues that come up in sex writing that throw me off and drive me crazy.”
L’Artiste
“I want time to sip my whisky, to drink you in as you unveil yourself, as you offer your body to my steady gaze.”
Learning My Limits (Part 1)
“It hurts. It’s gorgeous. ”
Mr. Sugasm Himself
24-Months of AVN Online, $0
Editor’s Choice
The Few, The Proud, The Pornless
More Sugasm
Join the Sugasm
See also: Fleshbot’s Sex Blog Roundup each Tuesday and Friday.
Half-Nekkid Thursday courtesy of Tara Tainton.
Posted by Vixen as Sugasm at 10:55 PM CDT
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From Xbiz:
Dupre Seeks $10M, Forfeit of GGW Websites
“The $10 million lawsuit filed Monday against Girls Gone Wild creator Joe Francis, his company and a man purportedly involved in creation of two websites contends that Ashley Dupre was underage at the time she signed a contract.
Dupre is the call girl linked to the downfall of former New York Gov. Eliot Spitzer.
Entertainment attorney Richard C. Wolfe claims in the suit that Dupre was 17, intoxicated and thus not legally competent to enter into a contract when she was cherry-picked by Girls Gone Wild execs at Miami Beach’s Chesterfield Hotel.”
—
I wonder how this will turn out. Personally, I’m hoping she gets a juicy book deal.
From the BBC:
Austrian ‘hid daughter in cellar’
“A 73-year-old Austrian is under arrest on suspicion of hiding his daughter in a cellar for 24 years and fathering seven children with her, police say.
The existence of the woman, believed missing since 1984 and now 42, emerged after a teenager said to be her daughter was taken to hospital.”
—
By now I’m sure you’ve heard of the secret lair, kidnapped daughter and incest grandchildren in Austria. But there are two more stories I want to include here.
Also from the BBC:
‘Second man’ at Austrian cellar
“A lodger at the Austrian house where a father allegedly imprisoned and abused his daughter says he saw another man go to the cellar where the abuse happened.”
(snip)
“Mr Dubanovsky, rented a room in the Fritzl house for 12 years.
He and other lodgers were forbidden to go down to the cellar under threat of eviction, he told the BBC. ”
(snip)
“However, officials believe that no-one was aware of the existence of the purpose-built dungeon, citing DNA tests.
“I think we can rule out accomplices,” Leopold Etz, chief of homicide investigations for Lower Austria province, told the Associated Press.”
From ABC News:
Incest Dad Left Children to Go on Vacation
“While crime scene investigators are continuing their inquiries, more details about the man who held his daughter and children captive in Austria are coming to light.
Most upsetting to many Austrians may be a home video obtained by German TV station n-tv.
It shows the man who confessed to imprisoning, raping and impregnating his daughter, Elisabeth, for 24 years on a “boys holiday” in Thailand in 1998, as she and her children suffered in a secret dungeon in the family home thousands of miles away.”
—
This story is so crazy that when I first heard about it I thought it was the plot of a book rather than real life. The situation is just so fucked up I don’t know what to write about it.
From Prison Planet:
Overwhelming Evidence Points To Murder Of DC Madam
“Evidence is stacking up to suggest that the alleged “suicide” of DC Madam Deborah Jeane Palfrey was in fact a calculated murder, as the manager of Palfrey’s Florida Condo reveals that Palfrey was not suicidal when he spoke to her Monday and told him of her fears about a contract being out on her life.
The new testimony is backed up by at least four other recorded public statements on behalf of Palfrey attesting to the fact that she would never commit suicide and if she was found dead to immediately suspect murder. ”
(snip)
“Though never confirmed directly, Palfrey strongly insinuated that both Dick Cheney and John McCain were possibly involved in the DC Madam scandal, and this could have been one of the primary reasons why she was murdered.”
—
So on Monday Jeane Palfrey seems fine and yet by Thursday she kills herself? Her death is just too convenient. She knew that some very powerful politicians were clients of her business. She likely had the power to ruin quite a number of careers. With her “suicide” this knowledge apparently dies with her. Definitely suspicious.
The speculation over McCain being a client I find especially interesting.
Lina from Uncool did a great blog post listing different bloggers coverage of Palfrey’s death. You can read that here.
From DNA India:
Sex workers seek recognition on Labour Day
“Over 3,500 sex workers took out a candle-light rally shortly after midnight to press for their rights and social recognition as labourers on the occasion of Labour Day on Thursday.
“We took out the rally from Sonagachi area (Kolkata’s largest red-light district), and finally converged at College Square at around 2 am on Thursday.
“We held this rally in demand of our social rights as sex workers,” Bharati Dey of Durbar Mahila Samanwaya Committee (DMSC), an NGO working for sex workers’ rights said.”
—
Yay, a rally for sex worker rights. It’s good to have some uplifting sex worker news after this week.
Posted by Vixen as News at 11:15 PM CDT
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The blog’s acting funny so this is just a test message.
ETA: Got it fixed.
Posted by Vixen as Musings at 11:13 PM CDT
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