Address: Outside the Cambodian Embassay, 5 Canterbury Crescent, Deakin (Canberra)
Date: Tuesday 24th June 2008
Time: 8 AM

A crisis in anti-trafficking measures in Cambodia has resulted in violence, rape and the deaths of sex workers in detention centres. You are invited to join supporters outside the Cambodian Embassy on Tuesday morning to take a stand for sex worker rights.

"Cambodia has recently passed an anti-trafficking law which equates all sex work with trafficking and has led to massive closures of brothels and widespread human rights abuses against sex workers," Andrew Hunter, spokesperson for the Asia Pacific Network of Sex Workers, said today. "Sex workers have been forcibly detained in rehabilitation centres where they have been raped and robbed by police and guards. Thousands of women have lost their livelihoods and HIV positive sex workers have great difficulty in accessing Anti-Retro Viral medications - both in and outside the detention centres."

Link:http://blip.tv/file/970833

"Criminalising sex work does not result in the abolition of sex work. Instead it creates an underground sex industry that makes sex workers more vulnerable to corruption and exploitation and less able to access mainstream health and protective services. History has proven that efforts to abolish the sex industry have been attempted many times in many countries and have failed in every case," Elena Jeffreys, President of Scarlet Alliance, Australian Sex Workers Association said today. "The collapse of HIV prevention amongst this vulnerable population is a tragedy for sex workers and, potentially, a disaster for the general population."

"Perhaps most shocking is the fact that almost every sex worker has been raped either by the police or when they are put into detention centres. If the police that conduct the raid demand sex from the women and they refuse, they are beaten up and raped by them. Rape by security guards at the detention centre is routine. Some women do not to resist in order to avoid physical pain from the security guards while others, especially those being arrested for the first time, are reporting more severe violence and rape," Socheata of the Womens Network for Unity, Cambodian Sex Workers Union, stated today. "Attempts by the women to get the rapists to use condoms are usually ignored and we can assume that many of the police and guards are HIV positive and transmitting the virus through these criminal activities."

Australian sex workers will be delivering a letter to the Cambodian Embassy. The letter, signed by sex workers, sex worker organisations, and supporters, recommends that:

- sex work not be conflated with human trafficking and other human rights abuses
- the situation to be urgently addressed by the government of Cambodia and for UNAIDS and other UN agencies to openly declare their support for sex workers human rights and reject the anti-trafficking laws as a violation of sex workers human rights
- the anti-trafficking laws in Cambodia be repealed immediately.

For more information please contact:
Elena Jeffreys, President, Scarlet Alliance, Australian Sex Workers Association 0401 317 102

It just sort of struck me that it's getting close to my due date. No, not pregnancy, I don't do anything kinky like vanilla sex! I mean the possibility of moving back to California.

In some ways I'm eager for it. I enjoyed the weather, and I miss my friends, and Kinky Salon. I miss the queerness of SF as well. And my grandma, of course!

But in other ways, I'm not. I love the transit here, even when it sucks- it's still better than California. And I don't miss the drama... or how sex work is illegal. And I genuinely feel in love with London the city- the oldness of bits of it really resonates with me.

The biggest draw here though is the sex work. It's lucrative, it's fun, and I'm something unique here in a way I'm just run-of-the-mill back in California. The punters treat me like a goddess instead of a slut, too, which I enjoy. I leave my sessions feeling empowered, sexy, and desirable, while that happened much less in California. I felt more often like a cum spittoon when I was there. Again, I think it being illegal has a lot to do with how I was treated. Here... I feel like I can change people's minds, give them pleasure they never imagined. It's different, here.

I don't know. I mean, on some level, I won't have a choice- if C leaves, I leave, as I can't stay here without his income as a support government-visa-wise. I'm such a Capricorn- I want something solid to hold onto! Ah well. Deep breaths, and going with the flow...

The temperature is getting hotter, yet somehow I'm finding myself dragged out in the evenings more instead of less often. Generally, hot weather makes me inclined to hide in a dungeon and play video games til it cools down... perhaps it's the lure of cold cocktails, or maybe it's the sexy women I've been seeing, who knows?

I've started watching "Sex in the City" out of a curiosity around what all the fuss is about. I can't help but think that while the sex they have stays pretty safely on the 'nilla side, they do ask a lot of the same questions I do more often than not. I keep wanting to sit them all down and tell them to be better communicators, but then it'd be a boring show, I s'pose. Samantha is, of course, my favorite, though Miranda would make an excellent drag king and Carrie an excellent faux queen. Charlotte... well, I harbor a couple of fantasies that would make her character shocked and appalled, which, of course, is hot.

Anyway. Beyond that, it's been fun playing with forced femme on my girly, hehe! Nothing like some summer dresses to make her look alarmed. Again, sexy as hell, when her eyes open wide and she shakes her head with that "oh no PLEASE not frills!" look...

That's been it, for the most part. A little travel, a little pro work... and Mr. Benson to read. Delicious.

I was watching a show about a girl who was pregnant at 13, here in the UK. In it, they discussed how, in her town, she was spat at, punched, and insulted regularly for having been pregnant so young... by adults as well as children. Her brothers were also hit with beer bottles and beaten up by people who, I suppose, thought their morals enabled them to make those sorts of judgments.

In this show, the school was pointed at as an issue because they gave out condoms, morning after pills and assistance to under-18s. The girl's parents felt this undermined their influence and wishes- as they preferred abstinence-only sex ed (and we know how well that works in the US)... the father even brought his daughter to an anti-abortion rally with her child (how messed up is that? Even while she was having contractions he was saying shit like "you going to do this again? would you recommend this? you didn't think it was going to be like this, huh?".) I was kind of shocked, not at a 14-year-old mum, but her father's insistence at rubbing her face in her experience. His lack of compassion was horrendous.

And, of course, there was the fact that the father of this baby went into hiding, didn't deal with violence, and his grandmother challenged that he was, in fact, the father, while still wanting to see the great-grandchild!

I'm surprised at how outraged I was. But I wasn't surprised when, close to the end, the young mum decided to enter the Catholic Church- the only people who were kind and not judgmental towards her and her experience.

All of this just got me thinking about how the responsibility for safer sex falls to the female, and yet how knowing too much about sexuality can label you as a tart anyway. You're the virgin mother or the worldly whore, and either way you run the risk of being beaten down. I wonder if my choice to play "worldly whore" from an early age also gave me a tougher skin to reflect the jabs and insults of others about my sexual choices.

This will, of course, run into a longer post about "what is choice, anyway" at a later point. I'm a bit too scattered to write down my thoughts about that much larger issue. It also hits on this weird thing I keep picking up- feminists saying that if I was true to my femininity or something, I would reject sexual diversity (whether that means I would be a no-penetration lesbian as "all penetration is violent", or I would reject S/m as it's degrading) or possibly sexuality altogether. I was reading one article that said women's new found sexual freedom of expression was really just women seeking to be like men.

I honestly doubt we'll be able to do much in the realm of rights for women as long as womens sexuality is placed on a pedestal so high even we can't reach it.

We took him to the vet, who felt that it was worthwhile giving him antibiotics and cortisone- they said this would likely improve his quality of life no more than 3 months, but I think that's worth it. He hasn't hidden under the bed, and he's still snuggling me, so he's not ready yet. I'll do what I can to make things pleasant until it's his time.

...and I'm devastated.

This cat has been my best friend and the source of an awful lot of the affection I need. I adopted him in October, along with his fellow kittycat, Disco- both had feline leukemia, which is almost always fatal when diagnosed. Disco died right before Christmas, and I told Greebo he wasn't allowed to die until two weeks after my birthday (January 8th).

He was still kickin' it, and I was joking with the documentary maker (who filmed him) that Greebo might just never die, because he was in such good spirits. Then we noticed he wasn't eating with his usual gusto- we figured he didn't like his food, we tried some new stuff, including tuna. He eats with gusto for a minute or two, then loses interest and wanders off. He's definitely skinnier now, and struggles a bit walking and jumping.

This is familiar. This is what happened right before Disco hid upstairs and wasted away, til I brought him to the vet to be put to sleep.

I'm really gutted. I've been crying, and probably still would be if I wasn't feeling self-conscious about keeping my partner awake. Instead it's just that painful knot in my throat, rough and raw, biting and ripping me from the inside out.

I spend so much time in this flat that being without a cat would be unbearably lonely. But when I don't know if we're moving away or not, it's not fair to adopt a cat we can't take with us back home. It can be terribly lonely here as it is, during the day, or even evenings, since my boyfriend likes his alone time. Greebo gave me comfort, and company- I cried into his fur many times, and he snuggled me and purred til I felt ok, like I could go on. He was there through some of my hardest periods here.

I don't know what I'll do without him. I love him deeply. I love him enough to let him go, however- I don't want him to suffer.

But I'm heartbroken.

I'm experimenting with different formats and layouts, as more than one person has asked me to change the layout to dark font on a light background... I figured pink-on-pink was probably not going to work, so I'm going to see if I settle into this color scheme.

It feels a little wild west- I keep refraining from calling my personal pages "my whorin' page", hehe!

In other news- in about 40 minutes I'll be doing an interview on phone sex. O.o What have I gotten myself into?? It's for a documentary. A short documentary, but still... and here I am, with a cold, blowing kilos of mucus into tissues that're forming a mountain in my room. Aaaa!

I did get the house mostly clean. Cleaner than usual. I'm wondering if this will shatter the idea that phone sex girls are glamorous and spending all their time naked and wanking...?

Even at the least customer-oriented of jobs, I suck when sick. In fact, the more I've learned to rest and let my body get over being sick, the more impatient I am about catering to someone else's needs when sniffly, coughy, or otherwise not well.

However, I figured I'd try anyway, just doing a phone shift or two. Can't be that bad, right? No dressing up involved, very little effort on my part, just listening and talking dirty.

Oh, I was so not ready. My head throbbed, the client wasn't giving me much to work with and didn't seem to like the things I did, and... well, it felt like having someone beg you for sex, then lie there like a dead fish while you pumped and grunted away. I could not be bothered. I felt badly, because I try hard to give good service, but I wanted to scream "if you don't know what you want WHY DID YOU CALL ME". Struggle struggle struggle. I just want to be Not Sick anymore!!

Ladies High Tea and Pornography began its life as a tribe group filled with hot, young, queer women. I joined it years ago, enjoyed the banter of the forum, and the silliness of the idea. Something about the properness of high tea coupled with pornography or various sorts made for an interesting juxtaposition.

We considered actually holding a high tea and porn meeting, but never got around to it. The Bay Area is filled with loads of stuff to keep us entertained, and there was never quite enough time, or a good idea of how this would solidify. So we kept ourselves to double entendre and flirtation, and didn't take it further.

But when I got to London, I felt isolated, trapped. Yes, in some ways there's a lot of fetishy events here, but they're different in flavor to the ones in San Francisco, for sure. There's far fewer queers in the general London fetish scene, for starters, and it generally seems to be taken Very Seriously. Without hundreds of pounds in clothing and gear, and without years of knowledge that people either had or lied about having, I felt out of my league and unsure if I even wanted to be IN that league. I was very stressed, wanting to meet a social group that would click for me but unsure who that would be, or where to look, and additionally feeling very overwhelmed with working and moving to a new country.

With the intention of meeting a few girls to date, I posted up a gumtree ad. I only vaguely remember what it said- a little about me, my open relationship, my fondness of geeks and feeding ducks. I'd post it up but Gumtree doesn't save your ads the way Craigslist does. I met a few girls through that ad, and meant to meet more but didn't get around to it- suddenly my life went from slow plodding pace to vrooom! But I still wasn't fond of the girly scene here, and the fetish scene was hard to get into without friends.

Meeting these cute, geeky girls suggested to me that they would enjoy meeting each other. We were amusingly all bisexual with male primary partners (or a tendency that way) but a desire to play with women and a queer sensibility. And we were all sex-positive, porn-lovin' girls. As we were also in England, the idea of a real life Ladies High Tea and Pornography Society was born- and we began a monthly sit down, potluck style, with tea and biscuits, cheese and crackers, quiche and tea sammiches. And it's been a delight and a blast.

One thing we've discovered is that it's more comfortable for us to watch porn we can giggle and snark at- "Pirates" being, of course, the number one opportunity for such. I don't know if we would ever be comfortable enough together to have a High Tea turn into an orgy- probably, so thank goodness one of the sofas turns into a bed! We've watched a lot of weird stuff, for sure. But I feel confident now that if women have access to good quality, good production values porn where the women seem into it, then they'll enjoy pornography. I don't think that's anti-feminist, though that's a discussion for another blog.

First of all- I don't know how I lived my life without a Hookers For Jesus teeshirt, especially as it's pink and black. Not that I completely agree with their mission, but I respect it, considering they try to be non-judgmental in their assistance. I also like the fact that it reaches out to people who could really use it- there's a number of sex workers who DO struggle with their faith and being a sex worker, and it seems like it'd be a good resource for them. Plus, Hookers for Jesus- BEST NAME EVAR.

But what I had here was an actual post about something that always gets to me, over and over again in depictions of sex workers in the media. This belief that sex workers can't afford to love. A belief usually spoken dramatically with much wistful looking into the distance and heaving sighs.

Says who? On my budget, I can afford to do the love boogie more than most! Romancin' costs $$, whatever the propaganda says, and with every tongue-licked boot and reddened ass I'm earning myself a couple of nice dinners, some good wine, and skirts that make my chickadee look embarrassed in that incredibly cute, sexy way (you know the look- halfway pleading, "PLEASE don't make me wear that..." while secretly begging you to force her). Yeah, ok, so we could do the budget holding-hands-by-the-river, but that's made endlessly nicer with some tasty food in our tummies, for sure.

Ah, but that's not the sort of "affording" they mean. They mean emotionally. Anyone who has sexually charged encounters for money, especially if they involve that deified thing called intercourse, must not be emotionally available for anyone else. At least, that's what is implied- if your body is for sale, you can't afford to "lose your heart".

But see, my heart isn't something I lose. I don't misplace it, like I do my keys or occasionally my wallet. It's also not something I give away. Love is something I enter into with hope and a contract, with stated boundaries and a certain amount of sense. Sometimes I wonder if I'm losing out by not being as giddy and starry eyed, but I have enough experience to suspect that starry eyed tends to end badly when not tempered with discussing how to deal with the hard and serious stuff. I adore my partner, and my girlies- but I also filter extensively the people I date. He and I sat down after 2 days and we discussed our budding relationship as if it was a work contract- something that lacks romance but so far has stood up to difficulty and hardship. The girls I date I met through a carefully worded Gumtree ad that was quite effective in stating what I wanted and what I was looking for- and I got just that, to my delight.

Just as my heart isn't something I lose, as my body isn't something I sell. I rent myself out as a service provider. No one suggests that masseuses can't afford to love, or acupuncturists, or therapists, and what they're offering is intimate in nature as well, in different ways. I'm offering my skills as a Top, along with my creativity and my undivided attention. I'm offering a hand job from a girl who empathizes with wanting to get off with someone else and yet not wanting to go through the dating dance steps. I'm offering someone who will talk about sex with you, and communicate clearly and effectively, and with any luck will have rubbed some of that off on you.

Just because you cum on my hands and you pay me for it doesn't mean I'm suddenly unable to love people.

I'd almost think that in my experience of being a sex worker I'm better prepared for relationships and love than I was before I did sex work. I'm better at separating love and sex- I'm better at stating what I want and what is and isn't ok- I'm more likely to experiment sexually. I hypothesize that this is, in part, because I'm out to my lovers and can say that I had a hard Domme scene and need something a little more chill for the evening if that happened. Not all sex workers have that luxury. Additionally, the men I see are not so inclined towards penis-in-vagina sex, so I don't feel sore (sometimes, dare I say, more's the pity).

Many people don't learn emotional boundaries or how to stick up for themselves when something is uncomfortable. I'm fantastic with that usually, which is why I can be open and honest with my punters as well as with my lovers. So to that myth of sex workers being unable to afford falling or otherwise being in love? I say phooey.