Image by Sam Taylor
I am both white and a feminist. But I am not what you would call a White Feminist, capital letters, for I am also trans. White Feminism is a special club but membership doesn't rest solely on race. White Feminism is about privilege. Ladies who lunch and feel hard done by because a man held the door open for them on their way in to the Four Seasons. White Feminism is many things but it is not inclusive, or, in fancy feminist lingo, "intersectional." The voices of the "wrong sort" of women—black women, trans women, sex workers, and so on—get drowned out, just as "bad" women have been silenced and shamed by privileged women, men and society in general since time immemorial. White Feminists have the biggest media platforms and are able to do this. They can launch patronizing campaigns to save "fallen women" who cannot possibly be expected to make choices for themselves, or, if they do, to understand the implications of those choices like the clever, educated ladies of White Feminism do. White Feminism always knows best. It is paternal and judgmental and, in many cases, indistinguishable from the partriarchal dictatorship it ostensibly seeks to dismantle. I am just saying.Read: How Borderline Personality Disorder Put an End to My PartyTake the open letter to Amnesty International, signed by Lena Dunham, Meryl Streep and Emma Thompson last week. It attacks the human rights organization for "the outrageous act of speaking to people who sell sex, listening to what we say, and then drafting its draft policy on sex work to reflect the evidence," as sex worker Molly Smith put it in the Guardian. Here's Amnesty bigwig Thomas Schultz-Jagow on the same subject:
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Evidence, evidence, evidence! What does all this annoying evidence reveal? That the "Swedish Model"—criminalizing clients, not sex workers—doesn't make anyone safer. In fact, in Norway, Amnesty found that sex workers were regularly made homeless by the police, and, as a result, were reluctant to report crimes such as rape. What sort of "feminist" solution leaves women afraid to report rape? What the fuck, White Feminism?!I wonder what White Feminists will make of a report, published last week by the Institute of Economic Affairs, that suggests prostitution may "help to reduce sexual crime rates." Dr. Catherine Hakim, who authored the report, says prostitution laws are outdated and there are too few studies to conclude that the sex industry damages women: "The very concept of prostitution is no longer workable in today's world of fluid sexual markets, where anyone can meet anyone on whatever terms they choose. Decriminalization is the only workable way forward." But what the hell does she know? She's only a bloody sociologist, not an actress or anything!The draft policy draws upon extensive evidence, including testimony from sex workers and research from agencies like Unaids, the United Nations AIDS-fighting agency, and the World Health Organization, and positions from UN Women and other human rights groups.
We must remain focused on the evidence and what it says about the best way to protect the rights of sex workers, one of the world's most marginalized groups.
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