Emerald and Pink Floyd: No More Turning Away (on International Sex Worker Rights Day)
I am just getting home from a long day at work and have not yet blogged about International Sex Worker Rihts day. But I sat down at the computer with a cup of tea and tried to collect my thoughts, and the first thing I saw as I browsed was this:
Today (March 3) is International Sex Worker Rights Day. I would like to observe the occasion here by listing and highlighting some things pertaining to sex work/sex workers’ rights lately that I find cool/uplifting/heartening/lovely. The t-shirt I am wearing in the picture, by the way, was produced by the fabulous and local-to-me organization HIPS (Helping Individual Prostitutes Survive).
Also, if you happen to be in the New York City area, a potluck dinner celebration will be held this evening as organized by SWOP, SWANK and PROS Network.
Okay, on to the aforementioned list:
1) “An open letter from a client” at Harlot’s Parlour. I love that this is a letter to a governing body in support of sex workers’ rights in relation to proposed legislation, I love that a client cared enough to write it, and I love what it says.
2) As posted on Violet Blue’s website, San Francisco-based porn company Pink and White Productions has compiled a recommended practices list for the porn industry/porn performers. I am all about safer sex practices in porn and like Violet am delighted to see a company present a document such as this.
Click here to read Emerald's post in its entirety. It's well worth your time. She ends with what is one of my favorite song lyrics of all times. It touches my activism sensibilities and my righteous indignation nerves every time I hear it. It is from Pink Floyd's "On The Turning Away":
“No more turning away from the coldness inside, just a world that we all must share, it’s not enough just to stand and stare, is it only a dream that there’ll be no more turning away?…”
It is not only a dream if collective we make it real.
Here's to all those who support sex worker rights today and all year long. No more turning away.
Profound appreciation
Elizabeth, I almost fell over just now when I came here and saw this post. I really don't know how to tell you how honored I feel that you mentioned it here. Thank you.
How interesting that you love that particular song and that particular lyric within it as well — it is one of my favorites too.
While I'm here, it so happens that the blog entry I posted on my blog right before the one you mention was thanking sex educators, yourself included (thegreenlightdistrict.org/wordpress/2010/02/to-the-sex-educators/ if you want to read it; I mentioned you by name :)). I do wish to thank you for all the work you do — it is in large part because of the admiration, appreciation, and respect I have felt for it that I feel so truly honored that you read my post and mentioned it here.
Thank you again.
Emerald, you are more than wlecome
So now we can both be grateful. I'm grateful that you are out there doing what you do, and that you are so generous with your thoughts as to be willing to let me share them here. And thank you also for including me in such company as you did in your sex educators post. I hope you think of your own work as important in the same way. The more of us out here taking sex seriously and helping others to do the same, the more likely we are to eventually shift the conversation about sex nation-wide. It's partly a matter of persistence and refusing to "turn away" .
In solidarity,
Elizabeth
...because public space really matters!
Elizabeth
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