I consider Ren a good friend, so a congratulations of a personal nature is in order. Yay! Squee! And so on.

But what makes this particular inclusion so special – other friends of mine are on the list as well, including the lovely Daisy – is that Ren’s blog is the blog of a sex-worker: sometimes caustic, sometimes scary, often embattled, and always straight-up and honest.

I know that some people reading this right now are going “whatever. You’re just happy that Ren was included because she perpetuates the myth of the Happy Hooker. And that myth allows you to sleep at night. Jerk.”

Of all the people I know, Ren is among those who are least likely to sugarcoat anything. I don’t believe in sugarcoating when it comes to this subject either – especially as it pertains to things like trafficking, et cetera. But I also believe that the real reason why Ren is accused of being a liar and a shill is because one of the main ideas behind her blog is that sex-work first needs to be a choice, and a safe choice at that.

What she doesn’t say is that sex-work everywhere must be wiped out. Neither does she say things like “well, it’s all horrible, but I’m a realist, so let’s make it as safe as we can first and then worry about getting rid of it.” No. She likes her job. And that grates on people in a big way.

Most often, people who attack Ren and her blog point to any number of truly distressing blogs and/or negative accounts of women in sex-work and say: “Do you see? This is the REALITY that Ren is trying to deny.” Or else they say, “Ren’s the minority anyway, why should she count?”

First of all, Ren isn’t trying to deny anything. She’s truthful, sometimes brutally so. Of course, she also doesn’t buy into the idea that almost all of the developed world’s sex-workers hate what they do. She believes that nobody is blissfully happy for every moment that they spend in this industry either. That there are many people who are clearly forced, others who saw no way out, others who are very conflicted, others who are somewhat conflicted, others who love it and hate it, others who are “blah” about it, and so on – she believes, overall, that the sex industry is made up of human beings

When I complain about, say, some person promising me an article and then forgetting about the deadline and acting like a huge ass about it later – it’s not at all the same as Ren complaining about abusive men shouting racist insults at her while she’s out doing her job as a stripper.

Sex-work, like working as a miner or a career soldier, can turn dangerous in a flash. If you have a bad day as a sex-worker, there is a chance that it’s a really bad day.

But, when you hear about a mine collapsing in Donbas, you don’t go – “shut down those freaking mines.” Instead, we say – “how can we make these people’s jobs safer?” Not so with sex-work.

Many people think that human civilization can somehow be re-educated, so that sex-work will one day disappear. I don’t know whether or not this belief is erroneous, I cannot peer into the future of the human race, but I do know that this belief is used to dismiss people like Ren. Hell, on a bigger scale, this belief is used by society to sweep the concerns and needs of sex-workers aside, even when it comes to those who just desperately need to get out of the industry or else desperately need better conditions. They must all wait for some form of enlightenment, you see.

I believe that one of the reasons that Ren *should* in fact be listened to, whether she is in a minority or not, is because as a sex-worker herself, she has excellent insight. If I were to wake up tomorrow and find myself President of the United States – Ren would be on my anti-trafficking task force. She would be one of the women advising my committees on what to do about child pornography, prostitution of various kinds, obscenity laws, etc. Her voice is not only important, she is also practical. She treats people like individuals, including those women who hate the business she likes, and she understand that there is no such thing as a consensus on the issue, that it’s nuanced, and that no one’s experience is universal.

Also, if I were to wake up tomorrow and find out that one of my friends who is currently in sex-work wants to get out and needs help, I would not go to the people who spend most of their time talking about the evils of sex-work (even though I agree that there are many sex-workers experiencing many evils). I would call up Ren. And ask for advice. I know that, like with everything else, the advice I would get would be honest.

Ren isn’t going to giggle and go, “but why? WHY? Why does your friend want to get out of something as wonderful as sex-work? What’s her PROBLEM?” Because, no matter what people want to say, she’s not like that.

So even though she doesn’t call herself a feminist, Ren is, in fact, an Important Feminist Blogger. And this isn’t a fluke, and neither it is due to the fact that those of us who read her are clueless or otherwise invested in the idea that the suffering that goes on in the sex industry somehow doesn’t matter. It does. If we are to continue adequately tackling that suffering, we need someone as bullshit-free as Ren on our side.

…The administration also wants to deny funding to organizations that help victims of sex trafficking if they also advocate legalized consensual prostitution. These and others can be found on ProPublica.org’s list of midnight regulations.

Awesome. Once again, slavery and sex-work are being defined as exactly the same thing – an unproductive approach that’s going to make sure that an entire group of people is not going to get help it needs and deserves, because their concerns for having a safe working environment just don’t count.

Just like there are “good rape victims” and “bad rape victims” – there is now a “good trafficking victim” and a “bad trafficking victim.” The bad one was thinking that maybe she can still do sex-work, you know, on her own terms, without having some meat-headed pimp keeping her in a room with bars on the windows. But we can’t have that, can we? Gross, icky, disgusting! Save her from herself!

Yes, evil, Russian W H O R E S are after this man’s livelihood! His very existence! He even has fancy statistics to prove it (he doesn’t cite them, but what can we expect from a terrified victim holed up in a basement somewhere?). They’re about to burst through his front door, devour him alive, and steal his good silver while they’re at it. Anti-trafficking activists need to drop whatever it is we’re doing, and help him out!

I know, I’m crying about the terrible injustice of it all as I type this post. I mean, how could I, when writing an essay such as “Natasha From Russia” forget to mention that the real problem isn’t trafficking and murder and rape, it’s the egos of all those guys who thought that their dollar bills were going to buy them an Angel in the House from an impoverished community, only to have the Angels turn out to be not sufficiently grateful for it all. I need to take that essay offline and done some sackcloth and ashes in the desert for a while. Maybe then I can live with myself.

I have sympathy for anyone whose love life crashes and burns (the key word in all of this is “love”). I have zero sympathy for anyone who never learned the words to the Beatles’ “Can’t Buy Me Love” and proceeds to lecture me about the evil nature of women who have used men’s own racist fetishism against them. See, it’s OK for Western men to approach Russian women purely from a mercantile perspective, but when those women adopt the same tactics and beat them at their own game? Boo hoo! Unfair! I have an owwwwwie! You must sit and listen all about my owwwwwie if you’re going to dare to bring up the subject of the trafficking of these women! Having my stupid ass handed to me by someone who turned out to be my equal (equality? The nerve!) is totally more important than someone being anally raped by a bunch of thugs, to be tossed out on the street when she’s past her expiration date! Pay attention to meeeee, I’m in pain here!!!

Anyone who wants to respond to this gentleman directly can do so at the link I provided.

One of the things to remember about human trafficking, and I’ve said this before and will say it again: many people are betrayed into it. And women are often just as complicit as men (this piece mentions a “she-pimp” who operated in Dubai, for example). It’s also true that many people enter the sex-trade aspect of human trafficking knowing that they will be prostitutes. But that makes them no less deserving of help, no matter WHAT anyone says (and seriously, another person who will make the opposite claim to my face might get bitch-slapped). It’s also important to note how trafficking relates to other phenomena: widespread corruption, particularly within law enforcement, is just one example. Too many times, when we talk about trafficking, we reduce it to the rape, the humiliation, the dehumanization. Obviously, these things are as real and as horrible as those on the outside can imagine, and sometimes more so. But this is not the whole picture. Financial motives must be discussed. Networks must be mapped. The psychology of the perpetrators and their enablers must be probed.

This is why I like the New Yorker piece by William Finnegan: he speaks about the practical side of trafficking as well as the emotional side. Far too many writers and activists and agitators just don’t want to “go there,” I have noticed. We don’t want understand this phenomenon from all angles, because we fear that in doing so, we might somehow legitimize it. But that’s not what usually happens, and it’s not what I see in Finnegan’s piece at all. Understanding something is not the same as excusing it.

Sure enough, Finnegan mentions s e x work. He doesn’t do a whole lot of editorializing on the subject, but I think it is rather counter-productive to repeatedly conflate s e x work and trafficking. Obviously, the phenomena do overlap, but that doesn’t mean that they are always one and the same. At the very least, not in my opinion. I suspect Finnegan might agree, or he may not. Either way, this is a great piece.

On a random note – Stella Rotaru’s name reminds of pop-star Sophia Rotaru, except, you know, with a job that saves lives (although Sophia is no slouch herself – by reputation a very charitable and intelligent woman).

It makes a good point – estimates say that 90% of slavery has little or nothing to do with pro[stit]ution. Often, we tend to forget that. When I talk about a distant relative of mine who was trafficked, people automatically assume that the relative is a “she” and that this “she” was sold into a br[oth]el. It would not have been any less depressing, of course, but the truth of the matter is that the person in question is male, and was trafficked across several countries for the purpose of being enslaved at a construction site.

German police saved the day before he was brought to his destination, and he got off easy. Well, unless you count a life-threatening trek across a marsh in sub-zero temperatures, that is.

Skinner says that: “Pr[os]titution is always degrading, and it is often brutal — but it is not always slavery.” I agree with the last part of that statement, and the middle, but the first needs a closer look. Always degrading? Depends on who’s looking and participating, I would wager. It is degrading from the position of the mainstream, if only because we continuously allow “wh[or]es” to be defined and treated as not-quite-human beings.

His later point is very spot-on, however: “Equating the scourge of slavery with run-of-the-mill, non-coerced pr[ost]itution is not only misleading, it will weaken the world’s efforts to end real forced labor and human trafficking.” *ding ding ding ding ding ding ding*

Of course, we might argue as to what “non-coerced” truly means. Some people will say that the minute that money enters the equation, coercion also enters. Frankly, I disagree, but I welcome dissenting opinions on the matter regardless.

Check out my collection of links to fabulous pictures of Soviet actresses.

Thanks to Neeka for the hat-tip.

Either a client or a pimp intent on staking out his territory beat up and raped “the blond one.” The women moved out shortly thereafter, leaving behind some perfume and champagne, and talking about going to Germany. I hope that they weren’t trafficked to Germany, like so many are from Ukraine.

After what happened, both women were as cheerful and chatty as they ever were. The cops had actually expressed admiration for them. In Kiev, you have to be brave to do what they did with no “roof” – i.e. no protection from criminals by other criminals, no one to “watch over them” or just beat them and take most of their money.

A good friend of mine works in law enforcement, and he and I talk about incidents like this. He’s more blasé than I am – he has to be. He was the first person to remind me of the fact that different Ukrainian sex-workers relate to their work differently, as human beings are wont to do. And if things are to change for the better – wherein more and more women will no longer feel that they have to be prostitutes in order to succeed or survive – we will have to work with the power establishment to improve the economy.

While living in the United States, and hearing about the Feminist Revolution that’s just around the corner, I’ve still had to accept that in order to help actual people today – one has to choose practical means (this is aside from the fact that I’m allergic to the word “revolution”). This is especially true wherein Ukraine is concerned. Talk to any person doing work against trafficking and forced prostitution here – and most of them are making gains by petitioning powerful (and, in most cases, corrupt) politicians of all persuasions.

My friend says that for every two women who wish to get out of the business, one will say that what she’s really concerned about is being able to freelance – working outside the organized crime structure, without an abusive pimp. It can be argued that most of these women have internalized the oppressive conditions of their environment. They do want to get out – they just don’t admit it. I am certain that there are thousands of women like that here – but in order for things to change for them we have to, once again, think about improving the economy.

“Do you know what [prostitutes] yell about?” My friend asks me over a couple of beers. “They yell, ‘Let me earn my living, asshole!’ They look at going abroad to prostitute themselves as a great opportunity, despite the risk of being trafficked.”

Things are tougher here than I’d feared.

At this point in my life, my cynical eurotrash feminism is largely being informed by the conditions in Ukraine. Hence, I’ve got no time for pronouncements that the only real goal should be an unequivocal end to all prostitution – even though I sympathize with a lot of the sentiment expressed. I’ve got no time for people who say we shouldn’t talk to men and women who go to prostitutes. One such man calls them over when he rents out the banya (bathhouse). Like many men who hire prostitutes, he’s married and has a child – unlike many, he opens up about WHY: his marriage is sexless, he likes having sex with women who are “good actresses,” they feign adoration and care, he pays them in dollars, and there is no romantic attachment, which he fears most of all. These women are college-educated, but their “education feels useless to them, when salaries are so small.” Is it fair? No. Is it real? Yes. Someone like this doesn’t believe he’s using a woman, neither is he there to explicitly humiliate her (for more on the subject of humiliation, from one specific viewpoint, see here) and screaming at him won’t make an iota of a difference. Only honest, open conversation may encourage him to see if his “regular girls” actually want to get out, and so on

In Ukraine, the most a radical feminist of the Western persuasion (and I’m using these terms rather loosely here, so please forgive me if I am lumping a bunch of people together) can do for a prostitute is to encourage her to find an “honest” job with a laughable salary. Even women who can manage to survive on this salary will not be able to buy items they consider essential – be they make-up or computer games. Telling them to just “examine their choices” doesn’t work- most are perfectly capable of examining them, and going on with their lives as they see fit.

Much like in Muslim countries – home-grown Ukrainian feminism differs widely from the feminism flourishing say, in Britain and the United States. The most radical Ukrainian feminists often turn out to be Christian fundamentalists at heart – women who are personally opposed to make-up, who consider most romantic relationships dumb and delusional, who will… babysit a prostitute’s neglected kids. Priests who preach domesticity and lots and lots of child-bearing are also people who risk their lives confronting abusive pimps and johns. A large number of people helping rescue women from the most horribly violent and degrading situations imaginable are active members and vocal supporters of particularly patriarchal organizations, the government or the church (or, for that matter, male-dominated law enforcement).

A Christian fundamentalist who nearly drove me insane when she suggested that I had been to blame when I was targeted by an abuser is also the same woman who has worked on improving the lives of prostitutes in her neighbourhood – counseled them, offered them food, took care of their kids, and so on. I can’t ignore that.

It’s important for me to qualify all of my statements with my spiritual beliefs. The Dostoevskian “we are all guilty” rings true for me here. What are we guilty of? Every evil little thing. I think all people are essentially oppressed by the human condition – as silly as this may sound in today’s world. I have to admit as much, so that people aren’t confused about where I’m coming from.

I also believe that, we as thinkers of different stripes have much to offer one another. I was, for example, happy to discover the blog of Victoria Marinelli – whose opinions, although different from mine, we should ponder further. I am much less in tune with feminist rhetoric like Witchy Woo’s, on the other hand, because it doesn’t ultimately address what I see happening around me on a daily basis (yes, yes, I’m wading into some Great Feminist Blog-War territory here – apologies all around for those bored with the subject).

Thoughts are, as always, appreciated. Flinging poop and other refuse is not (that’s for the monkeys at the Kiev zoo).

Ah, “civilization. “

A big thank you to the founder of this project – the incomparable E S.