sex work
There’s a pretty depressing post on the Blowfish Blog today talking about the paranoia and persecution that surrounds sex workers…
But the “Pink Scare” that SWANK refers to is part of a larger paranoia about sex, especially the commerce in sex, that is nothing new. To hear SWANK tell it, “From New York to California, daily reports of Pink Scare-fueled police busts, e-stings and raids, even at legal venues like strip clubs and dungeons, have reached a fever pitch.”
I guess I shouldn’t be too surprised… America has always had issues with sex… But it saddens me that we’re still so paranoid about it, and that people still feel the need to persecute those who make a buck from sex work.
There’s also a creepy quote from Deborah Jeanne Palfrey, the ‘DC Madam’ who apparently committed suicide.
“If taken into custody, my physical safety and most probably my very life would be jeopardized,” she wrote in August 1991 following an attempt to bring her to trial, “Rape, beating, maiming, disfigurement and more than likely murder disguised in the form of just another jailhouse accident or suicide would await me”
That’s from a letter to a judge back in 1991…