TAG: sex work

On Rentboy, Sex Panics, Feminism, and More

By Yasmin Nair August 25, 2015 We woke up to the news that Rentboy, a popular online male escort service, has been raided by the feds. An NBC report says that the raid was part of a “money laundering and state prostitution investigation.” Newser quotes U.S Attorney Kelly Curie in a statement dripping with puritanical […]

Largest Online Male Escort Service Raided

A criminal complaint was unsealed today in federal court in Brooklyn charging the CEO of Rentboy.com, Jeffrey Hurant, and six Rentboy.com employees with conspiring to violate the Travel Act by promoting prostitution. The defendants were arrested this morning and are scheduled to appear before United States Magistrate Judge Marilyn Go at the United States Courthouse, […]

London: Launch of the Global Sex Work Law Map

Tuesday 15 September 2015 16:00 to 18:00 Westminster Kingsway College, Soho Centre, Peter Street, London Register to attend The interaction of law and poverty is a focus of the work on sex work of the Sexuality, Poverty and Law Programme of the Institute of Development Studies. As part of that work it has produced an online map […]

Intersectionality of sexuality, inequality and poverty

I recently had the pleasure (and challenge) of being part of a team of Research Assistants working for the Institute of Development Studies (IDS). My two colleagues and I were tasked with coding, analysing and summarising eighteen IDS Sexuality, Poverty and Law programme Evidence Reports under five thematic areas, one of which was ‘Economy, employment […]

Amnesty International: should sex work be decriminalized?

“We speak to this issue from experience and evidence. Having many years of experience between us of work on sexuality-related human rights, we are seized by a sense of urgency on this issue. A report on sex work and the law in Asia and the Pacific, compiled by the UNAIDS joint programme on HIV/AIDS with the […]

The sexual politics landscape in July 2015

In July the hottest topic to be reported on is, undoubtedly, the global controversy that emerged when Amnesty International made public a draft policy defining a new line of work aimed at the protection of the human rights of sex workers, to be approved by the forthcoming meeting of its International Council (beginning on August […]

‘I am someone, like everyone else’: A story about a migrant sex worker in Johannesburg, South Africa

Photo: Elsa Oliveira, taken at were Sisonke Sex Worker March, held on March 7, 2013, In Johannesburg A story told by Vanessa Klass1 to Elsa Oliveira It was after I gave birth to my daughter in 1999 that I began to work as a sex worker in Hillbrow 2, an inner-city suburb of Johannesburg. I […]

Sex work and human rights: Under the shadows of (de) regulation

Michelle Agnoletti [1] In July 2015 a heated controversy around sex work and human rights erupted globally. A campaign was launched by international organizations that advocate for the abolition of prostitution to eradicate the trafficking of persons against a new policy, announced by Amnesty International, to support the human rights of people involved in sex […]

SPW compilation of statement, letters and articles on Amnesty International’s proposal for decriminalization of sex work

In English Global Advocates Issue a Call to Amnesty International in Open Letter – Coalition Against Traffickin in Women ICRSE, 1100 organisations and individuals ask Amnesty International to support decriminalisation of sex work – International Comittee on the Rights of Sex Workers in Europe Hollywood v. Amnesty International: The big battle over sex work – […]

Why Amnesty International Must Hold Firm in Its Support for Sex Worker

by Sebastian Kohn July 28th, 2015 Amnesty International seems poised to support the decriminalization of sex work—a move that would improve the health, rights, and safety of sex workers everywhere. Who could argue with that? One of the world’s leading human rights organizations is on track to do something that could benefit thousands of people across the […]

Hollywood v. Amnesty International: The big battle over sex work

Exclusive: Hollywood stars have taken offence at Amnesty’s latest proposal to decriminalise sex work, but the human rights organisation tells Radhika Sanghani there’s been a big ‘misunderstanding’. Read more on the Telegraph.

WHO Launches groundbreaking report: Sexual health, human rights and the law

The WHO Human Reproduction Program has made public this week (June 15-19th, 2015) a new groundbreaking report titled Sexual Health, Human Rights and Law. The document results from of extensive research and consultation globally over a period of seven years. It establish conceptual references to guide the application of human rights and the the […]