SESTA NO SIESTA

Yet another important bill is coming up for voting about “anti-trafficking’ on March 12th. The Senate will vote on SESTA, the Stop Enabling Sex Trafficking Act. Late last month, the U.S. House of Representatives passed House Resolution 1865 — titled the Allow States and Victims to Fight Online Sex Trafficking Act, or FOSTA — legislation intended to penalize operators of sites that facilitate online sex trafficking by holding companies like Facebook, Google, and Backpage.com legally liable for content their users post. Backpage has already shut down its erotic service ads and even though all the sex workers have seemed to move their ads to the personals section, just this small shift in perception and presentation has changed the market. When I advertise on BP pretending to look for dates, it is not as effective as when I am able to post the services that I provide and my website link. Some workers feel like it’s perfectly the same to charge seekers for sex in the dating section, because dating is something like prostitution anyway they reason, but I don’t really agree with this line of thinking. There are lots of sex workers who NEVER have sex without getting paid. They view this as “unpaid sex work.” Again, this is not the way I feel about dating men, and I make a clear line between the way I act while I am working and use plenty more discretion when I date people for free versus when I see clients. Facebook is already fucking nuts about their censorship of race, sexual topics and female nipples, either yourself or someone you chat with frequently on Facebook has been in “Facebook jail” for showing a nipple or talking about some censored topic that they shared for artistic expression, activism, community support or because it was their own body and they should have the right to show it if they wanted to. I tried to advertise as a professional cuddler on craigslist, the first site to voluntarily knock down their own erotic service section, I got flagged within minutes in the therapeutic section even though I could tell their were other sex worker ads listed. I also tried to look for someone that was mixed race like me because I am seeking cultural connection and understanding, and that too was flagged on craigslist. In Trump’s America, I don’t have a lot of hope for the future of good laws. FOSTA already passed, and whoreaphobic Kamala Harris is running for president in 2020. She worked with Gavin Newsom when they were both in San Francisco City Hall to do really racist “anti Asian sex trafficking” campaigns to boost their career paths up. It’s really easy to do blanket legislation on sex trafficking because all you have to do is arrest a bunch of consensual adult sex workers and voila! You have met the requirements for being tough on trafficking and you win the race for mayor/president. Here is a petition that sex workers are running to create awareness for the SESTA bill March 12th. The lawmakers voting on this bill do not know how it would actually work. We are sex worker rights advocates and we know that this piece of legislation will harm more people than it will help. Sign the petition to tell the U.S. Senate and Trump not to pass FOSTA/SESTA. They must find a better way to shut down trafficking that doesn't make people less safe.” My best friend and life long sex worker rights advocate Scarlot Harlot has been talking about this stuff since before the internet. White Slavery was the first “anti-trafficking” act of the 1800s, so it seems like internet or not, this savior campaign is just NOT EVER GOING TO DIE. It’s like a fucking zombie in the Walking Dead and we have to figure out a way to get it right between the eyes for good, and if we have to slay some celebrity Hollywood martyrs and a Black feminist running for president in the process, oh well.