I’m a recovering sex worker

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This blog has been born out of necessity. I’m a former sex worker and have been dealing with the psychological repercussions of the work that I did long ago as a young girl but that continues to have effects.

The term sex work is inclusive of nude modelling, prostitution, stripping, lap dancing, etc. A google search for ‘recovering sex worker’ brings up scant results apart from the pretty retro and out of date looking Sex Workers Anonymous (I can’t comment on the content – hopefully it is useful to some!).

Lately my facebook feed of generally awesome feminist open minded people seems to be an ongoing stream of completely one-sided ‘stripping is empowering’ and ‘sex positivity’ posts. Any dissenting voices are denounced as ‘slut shaming’. Where is the other view? Due to my new ‘vanilla’ lifestyle (normal job, not ‘out’ about my raunchy past) I find it hard to pipe up in places where I know people and say ‘aherm… maybe it’s not so good for some women?’

There are lots of voices out there speaking without personal experience apart from ‘so and so that I know is a stripper and she’s pretty happy so therefore it’s awesome’. Great. It’s alright for some.

I do think it’s possible to be sex positive, to be a feminist, to be empowered and to be a stripper or an escort or a phone sex worker. However I don’t think that sex work always = empowerment. I think it’s possible to be a sex worker and end up on the other side jaded, screwed up about men, screwed up about your own self. I have seen for myself the addictive nature of the job – the I hate it yet I love it and I can’t give it up aspect.

Ariel Levy in Female Chauvinist Pigs did a great job of exploring the trend for women in our culture to actively collude in our own objectification. Unfortunately she also made a lot of pitying assumptions about women being brainwashed and not aware of the implications of what they are doing, proselyting that her view is the only view.

Women have free will and I don’t want to ban stripping or sex work but I sure as hell didn’t come out the better for it. Isn’t there a balance between the Dworkins / Ariel Levys of this world and the glowingly, blindingly one sided positivity of Carol Queen / Diablo Cody etc?

Let’s find it.