Safer sex work

The opinions expressed here are solely those of the author and do not reflect the opinions or beliefs of LA Progressive.

Harm reduction has long been touted as a nonjudgmental, evidence-based approach to drug use that reduces overdose deaths and infectious diseases—adverse outcomes exacerbated by the war on drugs. But few people know that this compassionate, community-centered approach has applications beyond substance use, including reducing potential adverse outcomes associated with sex work.

For decades, people in the sex industry have been raising awareness of the damaging effects of criminalization on their livelihoods and well-being. Their demands have largely remained the same: sex workers want safe working conditions, decriminalization of their work, and an environment where they can address violence and exploitation when it occurs.

Unfortunately, the rampant criminalization of sex workers and their clients has remained a barrier to these fundamental human rights. Body Autonomy: Decolonizing Sex Work and Drug Usean anthology I put together proposes an immediate step: strengthen harm reduction within the sex industry to equip sex workers with the knowledge and resources they need to prevent and address violence and exploitation in their work and personal lives.

Shame is not a productive force for change, and depriving people of resources only diminishes their chances of survival.”

As I write in the book, harm reduction is “the realization that shame is not a productive agent of change, and that depriving people of resources only diminishes their chances of survival.” Sometimes harm reduction can involve providing safety supplies, such as condoms, lubricant, disinfectant, boric acid, and bad date lists. Other times, harm reduction can involve safety planning and ensuring that there is community accountability and space for self-care. Harm reduction can also include broad access to affordable housing for low-income people, safe spaces for drug use, and rights-based policy changes. Harm reduction is a “blueprint for survival and a belief in something beyond survival,” I write. “‘Just saying no’ is not as effective as ‘What do you need to be OK?’”

Currently, the war on sex trafficking is the dominant sociopolitical approach to sex trafficking in the United States. Most local, state, and federal anti-trafficking laws conflate consensual sex work with sex trafficking, driving sex work underground where trafficking, violence, and sexually transmitted diseases are actually more likely to occur. Virtually everything the mainstream media tells us about sex trafficking is distorted and sensationalized, including the number of people trafficked. When social services consider consensual sex workers to be survivors of sex trafficking, it skews the data, further stigmatizing sex workers and endangering those who are trafficked.

In contrast, consent, self-reliance and leadership of sex workers are essential for harm reduction.

Harm-reduction programs that focus on sex workers, including SPARC Women’s Center in Baltimore; GLITS, a Black transgender-led advocacy organization in New York City; and Aileen’s, a peer-centered organizing and hospitality space for sex workers in Seattle, offer one-on-one care and classes to help sex workers cope with police harassment and other forms of state violence. These organizations also offer workplace health and safety resources; meet sex workers where they are, whether they’re on the streets or online; and offer peer support that’s free of shame, stigma, and sensationalism. In these programs, sex trafficking survivors self-identify as such and are connected to additional services upon request.

Related: Serving Justice

Body autonomy illustrates the ways in which sexuality and sexual labor have been colonized and weaponized against women, femmes, and queer and trans people of color. It offers antidotes from global majority healers who encourage us all to reclaim the sanctity of our bodies and our bodily autonomy. “If everyone on earth felt fulfilled, healed, whole… or at the very least knew how to access a platform for healing… the world would be a different place,” says Melodie Garcia, an erotic service provider, harm reductionist, and writer, in her piece in Body autonomy“It’s absolutely true that people can find this through sex, kinky stuff, art and drugs.”

The truth is that marginalized sex workers, including sex workers of color, transgender sex workers, undocumented sex workers, and sex workers with disabilities, experience the most harm in the sex trade, from criminalization to sex trafficking. When policies and social services are designed with these most marginalized populations in mind, everyone benefits.

As the consensual sex workers I worked with for Body autonomy affirm, sex work is work – and it is neither inherently disempowering and exploitative, nor inherently empowering and glamorous. Like most forms of work, it can often be a combination of all of these characteristics and more. If we as a society can embrace this truth, then we can work toward a world where compassion, care, and collaboration are prioritized.

To keep sex workers safe, we need to relearn and reframe concepts of public safety and public health, foster compassion, and consider new worlds. Embracing harm reduction can help us get there.

Taken over from YES! Magazine