POWER PLAY: Is the sex industry REALLY empowering Miscellaneous

We often hear that ‘sex work’ empowers women – but how true is that, really?

The Cambridge Dictionary defines ‘empowerment’ as 'the process of gaining freedom and power to do what you want or to control what happens to you'.

When your job is to service someone else, is that ‘gaining freedom’? Does being alone in a room with someone twice your size make you ‘powerful’? When you’re behind closed doors, how much can you really ‘control’? When you’re pushed into ditching your initial boundaries, are you in control of what happens to you?

Is it ‘freedom’ to constantly be on call to a ‘sugar daddy’ twice your age? Is it ‘freedom’ not knowing who is watching your webcam livestreams? Is ‘freedom’ handing half your pay check to the hosting platform? When someone records your online content and uploads it to a porn site, does it make you ‘powerful’? What about when someone releases your home address on the internet?

Come along to hear about these issues from women who have had first-hand experience of the sex trade.

PROGRAMME:

Heli St Luce: Where did the idea that prostitution is a normal job that can be empowering for women come from and why did it gain ground so quickly? What are the key policy approaches to prostitution and who supports them?

Fiona Broadfoot: Drawing on her own experience in the sex trade and her many years working with marginalised women and girls, Fiona will discuss the reality of prostitution and how any sense of empowerment is often illusory.

Sugaring the Pill: The acceptable face of the sex industry? A performance of writing from young women about their experiences of webcamming, “sugar dating” and OnlyFans.

Short break

Esther: Drawing on her inside knowledge of the sex industry and her extensive legal research, Esther will discuss the health and safety, employment, equality law and safeguarding implications of considering prostitution a regular job.

Kellie Ziemba: As someone with lived experience of the sex industry and as a leader of an organisation that supports, advocates for, and empowers women subject to or at risk of sexual exploitation, Kellie will discuss the need to provide effective support services to women involved in prostitution and what this involves.

Q&A

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