California Proposition K for sex workers' rights

[Buzz]

This seems worthy of consideration by those eligible to vote in California:

Dear Friends,

There is an important San Francisco ballot measure that should
concern you personally because it's the a crucial step in the broad
decriminalization of consensual sexual expression. Proposition K
which supports sex worker rights, health and safety, would
decriminalize consensual sex work.

The struggle for sex workers rights is crucial to so many
communities. Prostitution laws effect diverse people in the US, but
racism, sexism, homophobia, transphobia and economic oppression
results in multiple discriminations. The LGBT community in San
Francisco includes many sex workers, and together these communities
have been in the forefront of this struggle.

We know you are well aware of the numerous harms that result from the
criminalization of prostitution. Criminalization deters sex workers
from reporting violence against us, and greatly inhibits our rights
as workers and our ability to organize to improve our working
conditions. As condoms are used as evidence against us,
criminalization actually discourages condom use!

Arrests can be traumatic. Having a criminal record limits our
choices. Convictions (and even arrests) can disqualify us from many
occupations and impact child custody rights.

Although prostitution is criminalized at the state level, enforcement
of these laws is generally carried out by local law enforcement.
This ballot initiative prohibits local agencies from spending funds
on the enforcement, and instead mandates a focus on crimes against
sex workers including sexual assault, coercion, extortion, battery
and rape. We believe Proposition K will be a crucial first step in
efforts towards statewide decriminalization.

Please visit our website to learn much more about Proposition K and
other prostitution law reform issues at http://www.YesOnPropK.org
(Donations at http://www.yesonpropk.org/donate.html )
You are probably aware of the pressures we face from the right-wing
and prostitution prohibitionists in the US. In an effort to
pathologize sex workers, they manipulate statistics about everything
from trafficking to child prostitution. They insist that the
solution to trafficking includes criminalizing sex workers, and they
even support Bush Administration policies such as the anti-
prostitution loyalty oath, which has resulted in an international gag
order (related to USAID funding) on advocacy for sex worker rights.
These anti-prostitution policies are in the same mode as the attacks
on reproductive rights and safer sex programs, especially those
principally targeted to gay men.

The national forces behind these policies are also funding the local
campaign against us. As reported in the SF Examiner on 8/28/08, "Six
of the nine paid arguments against Prop. K were paid by the No on K
Committee Against Trafficking and Sexual Exploitation, whose three
largest contributors are the Coalition Against Trafficking in Women,
Twiss Butler and Gloria Steinem." This is one of the reasons we
urgently need your support.

As you know, Gloria Steinem does not speak for all feminists in her
opposition to decrim. Many feminists understand that criminalizing
sex work hurts women. Many of these issues are new to public
discourse. YesOnPropK.org works to shed light on issues as we
support Prop K.

YesOnPropK.org is focusing on public education. We organize community
education, media outreach and grass roots advocacy. Your endorsement,
volunteer efforts and financial assistance is essential to our success.

Proposition K will improve:
o Sex worker safety, by enabling sex workers to seek safer working
conditions and to report violent crimes without fear of prosecution.
o Public safety by freeing up the critical resources currently used
to enforce prostitution laws.
o Public health by reducing stigma and encouraging sex workers to
seek health care, carry condoms and negotiate for safer sex without
fear of self-incrimination.

There are many ways to get involved with our campaign. Please pass
this email to others who support sex worker rights.
Click this link now to donate through PAYPAL:

http://www.yesonpropk.org/donate.html

Add your name or your organization to our endorsement list or display
a "Yes On K" sign in your window. You can volunteer no matter where
you live, so call us at (415) 751-1659.

To contribute make checks payable to:

Yes on Prop K


Mail to:Yes on Prop K
PO Box 210256
San Francisco, CA 94121


To add your name to the endorsement list please send us the info below

Individuals:
____________________ ____________________
____________________

Name (please print)
Signature Title


Organizations:

__________________________________________________ ________________
Name of organization (for our records, not to
be published) Director/Officer Name, Director/Officer Contact
Sincerely,


Carol Leigh
YesOnPropK.org

http://www.yesonpropk.org/propk4banner.jpg (http://www.yesonpropk.org/)

[davidperchance]

Like illegal immigrants, sex workers want government protection (etc) but have no interest in paying for those protections.

The money paid for sex is a gift and therefore not subject to federal income taxes. What?

[tsntx]

if they tax it and control it like a real job .... sure why not

[tsmandy]

Like illegal immigrants, sex workers want government protection (etc) but have no interest in paying for those protections.

The money paid for sex is a gift and therefore not subject to federal income taxes. What?

Did you even bother to think before writing this? Though I'm not an illegal immigrant, I do think that the vast majority of undocumented workers in the US would happily obtain citizenship and pay taxes if amnesty was offered.

As for sex workers:
People in porn do pay taxes, strippers pay taxes, phone sex operators pay taxes, many escorts do pay taxes (otherwise its awful hard to ever qualify for a mortgage or credit of any sort).

I don't know about other girls, but I'm not asking for government protection, I just don't want to be afraid of getting locked up for doing my job.

[SarahG]

This is a step in the right direction.

Prostitution was generally legal until the end of the 19th century in the United States, it didn't stand a chance once the socialists, progressives, and religious nutcases independently started lobbying for laws to outlaw it.

Prostitution prohibition laws have a very real history of being oppressive to people of all kinds of situations beyond sex workers themselves. Some cities have laws prohibiting unrelated (by blood) girls from living together at the same address, I think in Buffalo NY there is still a law on the books that having 4 or more GG's at one address who aren't related by blood is legally defined as a brothel... even if its just a bunch of college girls splitting rent costs (I doubt it gets enforced much anymore, but it should be removed from the books).

The Mann act was just plain evil, for a while it was a felony to transport girls across state lines for an immoral act (immoral could be whatever a DA or jury said it was). Untold thousands did jail time & lost their voting rights because they were going across state lines with their GF's without being legally married.


Thought to ponder:
As far as the law would be concerned, a girl fucking a guy after getting an engagement ring is legally prostitution, especially if the sex would not have occurred without the transaction.

As far as the law is concerned, we live in a country that for the most part, does not recognize common law marriages.... and instead requires people to marry through marriage licenses. This, in addition to making marriage a secular, government institution, makes it a BUSINESS CONTRACT where asset sharing, and care systems are formally defined, and hence divorce court. If the concept of marriage hadn't existed for who knows how many centuries, the modern version of it would have never been allowed to come into legal existence under prostitution regulation policies.

[Justawannabe]

A couple in Wisconsin got nabbed last year at a hotel under co-habitation laws. Just because we think the law is archaic doesn't mean it doesn't still get enforced, it just means that enforcement is even more random and arbitrary than normal.

Sean

[cantos03]

A couple in Wisconsin got nabbed last year at a hotel under co-habitation laws. Just because we think the law is archaic doesn't mean it doesn't still get enforced, it just means that enforcement is even more random and arbitrary than normal.

Sean

Random enforcement is a violation of the equal protection clause in the Fourteenth Amendment

[Buzz]

NY Times coverage (http://www.nytimes.com/2008/11/01/us/01prostitute.html) of Proposition K (please vote tomorrow in California!)

http://graphics8.nytimes.com/images/2008/11/01/us/01prostitute_span.jpg

November 1, 2008
San Francisco’s Prostitutes Support a Proposition
By JESSE McKINLEY

SAN FRANCISCO — When Proposition K was added to Tuesday’s ballot, many people likely snickered at the possibility that San Francisco might take its place alongside such prostitute-friendly havens as Amsterdam and a few rural counties in nearby Nevada.

But this week, it became readily apparent that city officials are not laughing anymore about the measure, which would effectively decriminalize the world’s oldest profession in San Francisco. At a news conference on Wednesday, Mayor Gavin Newsom and other opponents seemed genuinely worried that Proposition K might pass.

“This is not cute. This is not fanciful,” Mr. Newsom said, standing in front of the pink-on-pink facade of a closed massage parlor in the Tenderloin district. “This is a big mistake.”

Supporters of the measure say it is a long-overdue correction of a criminal approach toward prostitutes, which neither rehabilitates nor helps them, and often ignores their complaints of abuse.

“Basically, if you feel that you’re a criminal, it can be used against you,” said Carol Leigh, who says she has worked as a prostitute for 25 years and now works as an advocate for those who trade sex for money. “It’s a really serious situation, and ending this criminalization is the only solution I see to protect these other women working now.”

The language in Proposition K is far-reaching. It would forbid the city police from using any resources to investigate or prosecute people who engage in prostitution. It would also bar financing for a “first offender” program for prostitutes and their clients or for mandatory “re-education programs.”

One of the measure’s broadest prohibitions would prevent the city from applying for federal or state grants that use “racial profiling” in anti-prostitution efforts, an apparent reference to raids seeking illegal immigrants.

The fight over the ballot initiative has become an awkward test of San Francisco’s dual attitudes of live-and-let-live and save-the-world. In the campaign’s closing days, the rhetoric on both sides has heated up. Supporters of the measure accuse the city of profiting from prostitution through fines. They also imply that laws against prostitution are inherently racist because minorities are disproportionately arrested.

Proposition K, they say, will increase safety for women, save taxpayer money, and cut down on the number of murders of prostitutes at the hands of serial killers.

But opponents dismiss the notion of legions of prostitutes happily romping through the city’s neighborhoods. “This isn’t ‘Pretty Woman,’ ” was how one put it.

Anti-Proposition K forces paint grim pictures of girls and women from across the country held against their will in dark and dangerous brothels here, forced into unsafe sexual behavior, and often beaten, intimidated and raped.

“You’re going to have young girls recruited and brought to San Francisco, and they are going to be standing on these corners,” said Norma Hotaling, the founder and director of Standing Against Global Exploitation, an outreach project here. “And there’s not going to be any services for them to go to, and the police are not going to have any means of investigating the cases.”

The measure seems particularly abhorrent to San Francisco’s district attorney, Kamala D. Harris, who has made fighting human trafficking a priority.

“I think it’s completely ridiculous, just in case there’s any ambiguity about my position,” Ms. Harris said. “It would put a welcome mat out for pimps and prostitutes to come on into San Francisco.”

Central to Ms. Harris’s objections is the theory that prostitution is a victimless crime. Instead, she said, it exposes prostitutes to drug, gun and sexual crimes, and “compromises the quality of life in a community.”

She also dismisses the argument that prostitutes would be more likely to come forward if their business were not illegal.

“We’re in the practice and habit of protecting victims, not criminalizing victims,” Ms. Harris said, adding that she often reminds juries that the law protects people even if they are prostitutes or drug users. “Our penal code was not created just to protect Snow White,” she said, noting that 65 percent of cases handled by her department’s sexual assault unit involved sex workers as victims.

Officials with the State Attorney General’s Office would not comment on the measure.

The city’s Board of Supervisors, several of whom have expressed support for the measure in the past, would have the power to amend Proposition K if it passed. San Francisco, which has an exotic dancers’ union and a well-established history of sexual freedom, is not the first liberal outpost to mull legalizing prostitution. A decriminalization bill was defeated by voters in Berkeley, Calif., in 2004.

Heidi Machen, a spokeswoman for the opposition, said her side was hoping for a solid defeat. “We want this to fail by a landslide,” she said. “So it doesn’t come back.”

A local CBS poll released Thursday found that 35 percent of likely voters supported the measure, while 39 percent were opposed. But 26 percent were still undecided.

On Thursday night, about 50 supporters of the measure gathered at a church to press their case. One of them, Patricia West, 22, said she has been working for about a year as an “independent, in-call escort.”

Ms. West said that she enjoyed her work and believed that Proposition K would allow prostitutes to organize into collectives and negotiate for safer working conditions and better wages.

Ms. West concedes that what she does for a living “can be dangerous.” But she hoped Proposition K would make her occupation safer and more legitimate. “Working in a coal mine can be really dangerous, too,” she said “but it pays a lot of money so you’re compensated for your risk.”

http://www.yesonpropk.org/propk4banner.jpg

[BBaggins06]

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