Last week, in a ground-breaking win, the UK High Court ruled that forcing sex trade survivors to reveal past convictions was unlawful.

The ruling was handed down after a claim brought by three sex trade survivors who argued that the legislative scheme requiring them to disclose their convictions for prostitution discriminates against women and is contrary to the UK’s legal obligations regarding the trafficking of women.

All three of the claimants had been forced into the sex industry as teenagers, and as a result had multiple criminal convictions of soliciting and loitering. Claimant Fiona Broadfoot, who waived anonymity, recalled:

“I met a pimp aged 15 and two weeks later I was thrown into the violent and abusive world of prostitution. Rape became an occupational hazard but I was arrested, charged and criminalised for loitering for the purposes of being a common prostitute. After more than twenty years out of prostitution, I am still having to explain my criminal record to any prospective employer.  It feels like explaining my history of abuse.”

Another survivor reflected on how the criminal convictions had impacted her life:

 “It doesn’t matter what it is – trying to help out at my kids’ school or the local brownies’ coffee morning, trying to be a governor or a councillor, applying to education or training or employment – even volunteering in so many fields – with children, with the elderly, in care, with vulnerable people, with youth work, with social work – all need a DBS and then you get treated like some sort of pariah or sex offender! But it’s not fair – I never chose that life and I fought hard to get out of it but I’m always being pulled back to it as though that’s who I am but it’s not who I am.”

What we know about men who buy sex

While the women forced into prostitution had spent their lives enduring the consequences of being sexually exploited, including the indignity of having to explain their convictions, the men involved were never arrested, Broadfoot pointed out. 

“When I was arrested, the police referred to my pimp by his first name. Well, why didn’t they arrest him?” she said.

“Not one of those men who bought and used and abused me – even the ones who knew fine well I was a child when first put on the streets – has ever had to face the consequences of his actions.”

Karen Ingala Smith, the CEO of women’s charity nia, said,

“We feel strongly that these women should never have been convicted in the first place. Prostitution is symptomatic of women’s continued inequality and discrimination and a form of violence against women. These women were exploited and coerced and yet it is their lives, not those of their buyers and pimps, that were blighted with convictions. They should not have had to take up this fight, but they did and it is to the benefit of all those exploited in prostitution”. 

Read more at Centre for Women’s Justice

How long can the sex industry deny trafficking?

Most Australians wouldn’t consider the links between sexism, objectification of women and sex trafficking in sport, or even think about it at all.

Click here to read the submission 

It has come to our attention that Merriwa Tavern The Sixty 30 has made an application to vary existing trading conditions to allow topless waitresses or ‘skimpies’.

As an organisation that fights against commercial sexual exploitation of women and girls, Collective Shout strongly opposes this application on the grounds that:

• The use of women’s bodies in sexual entertainment and services is a form of prostitution
• Sexual trade in women’s bodies both causes and contributes to gender inequality by reducing women to mere objects for men’s use and enjoyment, with adverse impacts on women who are directly involved as well as women as a whole
• A significant body of research links sexual objectification of women with violence against women 
• Sexploitation venues pose a threat to women, with women reporting increased incidents of sexual harassment, abuse and violence in areas in close proximity to strip clubs

Adelaide soccer club, Para Hills West, have attracted negative attention after organising a fundraiser with female strippers. The club then promoted this event with a poster featuring a highly sexualised image of a g-string clad woman, in their venue frequented by families and children.

Our Director of Operations, Coralie Alison, was invited to respond to this development in an opinion piece on SBS which we shared on our Facebook page alongside an image of the poster. Supporters of the club were quick to respond with the same old predictable arguments. We’ve addressed these common claims below:

Click here to read the submission

“Their passports are taken. They are told they are here to undertake sexual services and they will not be paid."

As published at Melinda Tankard Reist

AFP reveals sex trafficking based in Sydney brothels

How can the sex industry continue to deny the reality of trafficking in this country? Of course it is in their interests to play it down, given their brothels are hungry for as many women as possible to meet demand. The AFP has provided evidence of trafficking in NSW brothels to a parliamentary inquiry. 

Click here to read submission (PDF)

AUSTRALIAN MEN TAKE THE PLEDGE AGAINST SEXUAL EXPLOITATION

 - PROSTITUTION - I DON'T BUY IT - 

Join men from across Australia who are coming together to take a stand against sex trafficking and the commercial sexual exploitation of women and children worldwide.  

Stand for the promotion of human dignity and the prevention of the commodification of women and children through prostitution. 

Sign the Nordic Model Australia Coalition (NorMAC) pledge - Prostitution - I Don't Buy It. 

In Ireland earlier this year, Tom Meagher, husband to murdered journalist Jill  Meagher who was murdered in Melbourne in 2012, spoke at a similar Irish campaign launch. 

Jill Meagher’s killer, Adrian Bayley, had a long history of raping and abusing prostitutes. 

Adrian Bayley is on public record as stating that he had a ‘right’ to rape prostitutes, because he ‘paid for it’.

At Ireland’s campaign launch Tom Meagher spoke about men's role in prostitution –

‘This dehumanisation [of women] comes from knowing that what they are doing is not right.  If you pay for sex, the money is not buying consent, it is paying for the temporary suspension of the woman’s right not to consent’.

Mr Meagher spoke of the lies of ‘consensual transactions’ and the ‘pernicious lie of the male libido being beyond the control of the man who owns that libido. That feeds into a lie that we can’t help ourselves’.

He said there was a ‘need to end the lie that this is about sexual liberation. It isn’t, it is about sexual exploitation. The circumstances are usually coercive, but even if they are not, the buyer has no way of knowing.

Ultimately, the only person making the choice is the buyer and the choices we make absolutely matter’.

http://www.irishtimes.com/news/ireland/irish-news/new-campaign-urges-irish-men-to-take-stand-against-sex-trafficking-1.2185276

In signing the NorMAC pledge - Prostitution - I Don't Buy It - men commit to:

Understanding that the commodification of women's bodies for sexual purposes is harmful and undermines women's human rights, dignity and gender equality.

Actively raising public awareness with other men the myths surrounding prostitution and sexual exploitation and trafficking, especially in Australia.

Assisting the curb for the demand for sexual services by supporting the introduction in Australia of Nordic model laws on prostitution, in recognition of the urgent need to provide peace and security for all women.

I agree to make the above pledge for the Prostitution - I Don't Buy It campaign

I agree to have my name listed on the pledge webpage at normac.org.au

Name                            Email                                                            

Signature

Please forward your signature and contact details to [email protected]. 

Amnesty International turns its back on prostitution survivors, sides with pimps

Amnesty International has long been known as a global movement working to defend and protect human rights, to speak against exploitation and abuse, and to stand up for some of the most vulnerable and oppressed people in the world.

This is why their prostitution policy to legalise pimping and purchasing women for commercial sexual exploitation has attracted an outcry from advocates, human rights organisations, activists and survivors of prostitution and trafficking throughout the world.

Rather than standing up for women exploited in the global sex trade, Amnesty is on the side of sex trade profiteers, voting to legalise pimping, brothel keeping and sex buying on the basis that it access to women's bodies for sex is a "universal right" that should be free from state interference. In short, men's "right" to buy and sell women is being prioritised above women's rights to live free from abuse, violence, exploitation and rape. What was Amnesty thinking?

UK pimp takes credit for Amnesty's prostitution policy after infiltrating the movement

Collective Shout has joined with over 400 advocates, human rights orgs and survivors of prostitution and trafficking, in an open letter calling for Amnesty to vote no on their plans to legalise pimping, brothel keeping and sex buying. Other notable signatories on the letter include Meryl Streep, Anne Hathaway, Kate Winslet, Carey Mulligan, Emma Thompson, Emily Blunt, Angela Bassett, Kevin Kline, Lisa Kudrow and many more.

TAKE ACTION

You can add your name to the open letter. 

Email your local Amnesty branch, urging them to vote NO to decriminalising pimps and johns. (Find your branch here.)

Contact @Amnesty on Twitter using the hashtags #NoAmnesty4Pimps and #QuestionsForAmnesty. You can follow @NoAmnesty4Pimps here and retweet them too.

Like 'No Amnesty 4 Pimps' on Facebook for continued updates.