WUNRN
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The
May _________________________________________________________________ |
May 16, 2012
Running
By Christine Stark, survivor of prostitution
May 16, 2012
Today I ran through north
45, my heart stocked with joy like a fishery plump with walleye. As I ran I
thought what a gift the warm weather had been, what a tremendous lift in my
mood it created, how much weather impacts the mood and therefore the culture of
that area, and boom-my foot landed, pivoted on sand, jarring my thoughts.
What about those negatively impacted by the warm weather and
paucity of snow, I wondered. Who would they be? Snow blower salespeople. City
plows. Snow shoveling businesses. The teens who shovel snow for a few bucks in
north
prostituted women four other women and I interviewed over the past few years
and the horrific stories they told us, beginning generations ago, often in
boarding schools. Many of them relate the abuses of their lives with genocide.
Now, in 2012, a number of the women shovel snow for $5 so that they can eat at
McDonald’s. My foot scraped along the cement and my heart thudded and my whole
entire psyche dropped like a gate had opened, flooding my heart with sadness.
The high rates of homelessness in a land that was theirs for thousands of
years. The sexual abuse suffered at age three and four, often by white foster
parents; the abuse introduced into their families by boarding schools. The
women need the snow. They don’t have to suck dick for $5 if they can shovel a
walk instead.
The thudding pain and grief for these women turned into
instantaneous survivor guilt because I was enjoying the above average
temperature day while they suffered. I know I don’t have to feel this way, but
it happens, like a switch in my head. I ran on. Cedar fences towering over my
head–separating, dividing, protecting, holding stories. A few more minutes and
I crossed a bridge that arches over a park, the downtown
distillery to my right.
Once I hit the upper middle class neighborhood of Bryn Mawr the
fences disappeared. There’s little need for them here, apparently. No glock
carrying teenage boys sprinting through yards at 2 am with rookie cops chasing
after them. No random pop pop firework-like shots producing bullets that travel
through an alley, into a second story closet where a three-year-old boy is
hiding from the sound of gunshots, one of which will end his life when it
pierces the base of his skull. No women turned out on street corners; their
eyes dark, glossy, vacated.
But even here, in quiet, upscale Bryn Mawr, there are remnants
of racism, colonization, genocide. Two summers ago, a Native homeless woman,
just turned eighteen, was found murdered. Her body dumped on the other side of
a fence that separates Byrn Mawr from the freeway. A line or two appeared in
the newspaper about her body, sprawled out in the tall grasses. There was grief
in the Native community. Silence elsewhere. Her life, thrown away. My Adidas
spun on the sidewalk, crunching sand as I ran back toward north
not even a blip to the people who live where she was dumped.
Fences or no fences, we do not escape trauma. It is all around
us, whether we connect with it or not. What we know from research: around 90%
of prostituted women want out immediately. Help tear down those fences.
May 9, 2012
Racism
and Prostitution
By Ateba Crocker, survivor of prostitution
May 9, 2012
I recently went to
prestigious casino, I quickly felt lustful eyes on me, a feeling that I once
felt 20 years ago as a prostitute. I thought to myself, How can I feel this way? I’m
dressed up in a conservative manner. I’m educated with a graduate degree and
years of corporate experience and now I’m a CEO. Knowing my truth,
I asked a young man about the lustful stares. He explained to me that because
I’m black and walking through the casino, I’m thought to be a prostitute. He
continued but his words were drowned out by my father’s voice spoken over me
when I was young, “You look like a prostitute.”
The following week I went out to a movie and as I waited for my
movie to start, I sat at the bar deciding what to get from the happy hour menu.
I asked two white men next to me what was good on the menu.
We had small talk and then one man said to me, “What’s your
deal?”
I said, “Huh?”
He said, “What’s your angle? Why are you in this part of
town?” He giggled with his partner and then said, “My partner wants
you to suck his dick.”
I said, “I’m not a prostitute.”
He said, “Well I thought you were since you were in this
part of town.”
I took note of the area that I was in. It was a predominantly
white neighborhood, just like where the prestigious hotel and casino had been.
All I could hear this time louder were the words from my father, “You look
like a prostitute.” My dad’s words made me question my identity as a
little black girl and now these two situations made me question it again. In my
mind, I held stereotypes about the little white girls living their childhoods
as princesses, playing tea party 7 days a week, since for me it was a different
reality. It wasn’t until Bill Cosby’s TV show aired in 1984 that I saw another
view – I never saw Bill Cosby abuse his on-screen daughter Vanessa or call her
a prostitute. He was a black man that cherished his wife and loved his family,
especially his daughters. No matter how beautiful the image was that Bill Cosby
showed every Thursday night, that was neither my reality nor many other little
black girls’ realities either.
A false stereotype of black woman being devalued continues to
linger still today that attaches a for sale sign to our backs. A hidden tragedy
of stereotypes and perceptions traces back to slavery when black women were
considered property and because of it were legally raped. I don’t blame my
father, in general people, make decisions based on learned behavior or what is
perceived from the past to be true about themselves and others, and in turn
reflect their belief on to their children and society–feeding racism and
prostitution in
May 1, 2012
More
Survivors are Stepping Up to Lead
La Madre Tonantsin.
Copyright © Collette Crutcher, 1992. Mural at Instituto Pro Musica de
California, 7 X 32 feet,
at Sanchez,
By Stella Marr, survivor of prostitution
May 1, 2012
Survivors Connect Network, an international online network of
trafficking/prostitution survivors, now has 44 members from seven different
countries. It’s been recognized that the absence of survivor leaders in most
major anti-trafficking NGOs has created a void. Survivor knowledge and insight
is essential. But it’s become increasingly clear to the NGOs that survivor
leadership will make the movement’s success inevitable. Demand
Abolition is setting an example by inviting seven survivors to participate
in their Arresting Demand colloquium May 3rd and 4th in
An exciting example of collaboration among survivor groups
involves the
have been valiantly educating the public about the harms of the Bedford ruling
— which upholds the criminalization of prostitutes on the street — who are
almost always crime victims- while it empowers and legitimizes their predators,
the male and female pimps who own brothels and escort services.
So we survivors recently voted to issue a statement
against the Bedford decision. Dozens of us joining our voices in political
action is a big deal. Here’s the statement:
We the members of Survivors Connect Network
stand with the women of the Aboriginal Women’s
Action Network, SexTrade101, La Concertation des Luttes Contre L’Exploitation
Sexuelle (CLES), and Educating Voices.
We are sad and shocked by the Bedford
ruling. It’s especially troubling that this decision upholds the criminalization
of prostitutes selling sex on the street, as these women are almost always
traumatized crime victims who need support not arrest. Meanwhile the ruling
empowers the male and female pimps who terrorize and exploit women in
prostitution by making it legal to own brothels or escort services.
Researchers have found the women in prostitution
suffer from the same levels of trauma symptoms as the victims of
state-sponsored torture. It
forever changes how we face the world. After going through
trafficking/prostitution everything you do is an act of will — you must summon
and form a new self from your fragments. And yet as the survivors of torture or
trafficking/prostitution rebuild our selves and find our voice, we can develop
extraordinary abilities to connect with, inspire, and understand others.
Nelson
Mandela exemplifies this type of rebirth. Most everyone understands that
Mandela’s experiences of
being held 27 years in a prison infamous for torture make him unique. When he
was finally released few denied the vast injustice done to him. No one expected
him to act like everyone else. Instead South
Africa and the world stepped back, and waited to see how this extraordinary
man would transform the terrible wrongs he’d been through — they gave him a
chance to bring something new into being.
As more trafficking/prostitution survivors speak out, the public
will recognize we’re people society has wronged. They’ll understand we’ve been
changed by the pain and harshness we’ve experienced. At present public denial
of the sex industry’s violence and prostitute-blaming forces many of us into
hiding. But as more survivors lead, we’ll be empowered to bring something new
and beautiful into being.
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