Jenn Clamen:
"Imagine working as a mechanic but being prohibited from working out of a garage"
Wednesday, March 16, 2005, in Montreal
Jenn Clamen
for the Canadian Guild of Erotic Labour
Submission to Subcommittee on Solicitation Laws of the Standing Committee on Justice, Human Rights, Public Safety and Emergency Preparedness
My name is Jenn Clamen. I am both a member of the Coalition for the Rights of Sex Workers, and the co-founder of the recently formed Canadian Guild of Erotic Labour. I have been involved in the struggle for sex workers' rights for five years. Throughout that time I have met hundreds of sex workers and encountered many obstacles in our plight. Some of the main obstacles, which I will highlight in my talk today are:
A lack of recognition for sex workers lives, work and voice;
An inability for people to accept sex workers into society as people who work, have voice, and speak about their own experiences;
And
a serious disconnect between sex workers' experience and the interpretation of sex work from the outside.
These are realistic and understandable misconceptions given the way that sex work is portrayed in the media, pop culture, and in our opinions and every day conversations. Sex work is rarely perceived as a form of work, but rather as a social problem that requires elimination or some sort of containment. Sometimes, this entails viewing sex work as a morality issue, other times it involves constructing sex work as a negative manifestation of women's sexual exploitation, poverty, or individual pathology.
While issues of economic insecurity and violence are at play in some sex workers' lives -- as they are in the lives of many women -- they do not define who sex workers are or what sex work is about. Instead, a more accurate definition is achieved by understanding sex work the way that the workers themselves experience it -- as a means of generating income and thereby supporting themselves, their families, their needs, and their aspirations. In a word, sex work is work.
Understanding sex work in these terms is easier when we have a better sense of what the work is about. Whether working in massage parlours, in strip clubs, on the street, or in other locales, sex workers are providing services of both a physical and emotional nature as well as interacting with clients, colleagues, management, and the physical work environment. Like workers in other sectors, those in sex work worry about low wages, personal and workplace safety, the ability to take time off when they are sick, and access to state and employer benefits that enhance both their own and their families' well-being. Unfortunately, the stigma surrounding most forms of sex work, and the accompanying resistance to treating it as 'real' work, have hindered sex workers' ability to access basic labour rights, including those of minimum wage, maximum hours, enforceable contracts and secure working environments free of discrimination and violence.
These obstacles are compounded by the continued criminalization of many aspects of sex work, especially prostitution. Although prostitution itself (the exchange of sexual services for financial compensation) is not illegal, the criminal code prohibits the public solicitation of business ("communicating"), the management and use of regular work sites ("bawdy-houses"), and any other managerial activity ("procuring").
The absurdity of these restrictions becomes clear when one contemplates their hypothetical application to other work sectors. Imagine working as a mechanic but being prohibited from working out of a garage or hiring staff. Or envision being a hairstylist who is unable to advertise or open a salon. These are ludicrous scenarios, yet sex workers are currently legally required to work under such circumstances if they wish to avoid arrest and incarceration. Needless to say, most workers are unable to meet these requirements.
The criminalization of managerial involvement creates further complications when it comes to realizing the labour rights of sex workers. Because the labour-management relationship is often illegalized, many sex workers have difficulty seeking rights and protections under labour laws and before labour boards.
While there are many supporters of sex workers' rights, some folks see the issues as being distinct to the sex trade and disparate from other workers' struggles. Nothing could be further from the truth. While workers in every sector have their own specific sets of concerns, the commonalities override the differences. This is particularly true in the case of workers who have been cast to the margins of the labour market. Like many sex workers, growing numbers of working people in multiple sectors have been relegated to the rank of independent contractor, denying them the various benefits associated with employee status.
Women workers, including those in the erotic trades, make up the majority of the part-time, contingent, temporary labour force, and this precarious status undermines both their economic security and organizing efforts. Migrant workers, including those in some erotic trades, are rendered vulnerable through the government's foreign workers programs which create a market of temporary, expendable, underpaid labourers who lack the rights of either workers or citizens. Migrants who don't have formal status under these or other programs are further illegalized and made open to super-exploitation and abuse.
It is hard to imagine that some members of our society are denied rights and protections under the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms. It is equally difficult to imagine that labour rights, as an extension of our fundamental rights, are not applied to all workers. But this is the reality that has arisen out of a reliance on antiquated laws to govern and control sex workers' lives.
I come to this meeting today, in all honesty, a little frustrated, exhausted, and disillusioned. My understanding was that, based on the horrific murders of over 60 sex workers in Vancouver, there was an acknowledgement that the current laws place sex workers' lives in danger. It was also my understanding that the committee wanted to review these laws, in the efforts to make the lives and work of sex workers less dangerous.
Since that time the committee has heard from people who support the view that sex workers are not able to speak on their own behalf, people who view sex workers as second-class citizens, and those who conflate issues of migration and coercion with sex work. I urge the committee to take the sex workers' perspectives that they have heard at Maggie's in Toronto, and that they will hear at [Montreal's prostitute drop-in] Stella this afternoon, as expert testimony from those who have first-hand and legitimate claim to experiences in the sex trade. Sex workers voices are often ignored or not taken seriously, in the blind hopes of unveiling a real portrait of sex workers.
We urge the committee to take a serious look at decriminalization, what that means to sex workers, and what these workers have to say about the needs of their industry. In Montreal, we have already begun a project that critically looks at what decriminalization would mean in terms of licensing, zoning, paying taxes, etc. We invite you to begin this process on your own.