James Myself and Annie attended as both delegates and journalists. This is the event that kick-started my own activism for sex workers rights, which I continue to this day. Yearly on December 17th we come together for a candlelight vigil to honor sex workers we have lost each year, this year including a special dedication to Priscilla Alexander. The work to decriminalize and de-stigmatize sex work continues. Rest in Power Margo and Priscilla. James and Gail Pheterson. For Margo St. This has brought her closer to the source of her strongest support, the whores of Europe.
We shared a bedroom with Tatiana, a young lawyer from Ecuador who works with prostitutes. Some of the delegates wore masks. They feared such recriminations as losing custody of their children. A few of the Third World women were afraid for their lives. But most of the whores remained unmasked. A press conference is scheduled for each of the three days of the Congress, but very few journalists were permitted in the plenary sessions.
Because Annie Sprinkle and I were delegates to the convention as well as journalists , Forum was the only American magazine granted this unique access. Two hundred participants filled the general assembly. Seventy percent of us were whores. Almost all were women. There were two gay male prostitutes: Danny from Canada, Geoff from Australia, and Dolly, an Italian transvestite β a platinum blonde in a backless black dress, clearly the sexiest outfit in the room. The translators enclosed in glass booths around the amphitheater made it possible for us to understand one another in nine different languages.
We were grouped together by delegation. The U. Even in countries where the exchange of sex for money is not considered illegal, many of the aspects that surround prostitution are illegal and make it impossible for a whore to live anything near a normal life. Italy gave the first report. The problems encountered by Italian whores were echoed by many of the prostitutes. Pia, a petite blonde, introduced herself as the secretary for the Committee of Human Rights of Prostitutes in Italy.
There was opposition to the closing of the brothels, but the opposition failed. Prostitution is not illegal in Italy. It is just not protected. Laws such as that forbidding brothels ultimately are used against whores. Two prostitutes who live together can be seen as operating a brothel. Prostitutes have no social benefits, yet they are expected to carry out the duties of normal citizens.
