Big Australian Horse

Tags

asian brothels, brothels, clients, discrimination, personal stories, sex industry, Sex Work, south australia, the boss, trafficking

I used to work in a ‘Asian’ brothel.  It was owned and run by Maya, a Chinese woman in her fifties. Maya had migrated to Australia with her husband more than 20 years ago. She opened her own business after separating from her husband 10 years later. Maya had dabbled in sex work in China but only took it up full time in Australia after she was made redundant from her bank job. Opening her own brothel seemed a natural progression for Maya and even though business was successful she still continued to ‘jump the desk’ so to speak, servicing her clients,  sucking cock for cash like the rest of us, even after 10 years. Maya was a business woman. She worked very hard and was was proud of her success.

Maya was being extorted by her landlord. He charged her excessive rent for the commercial premises he leased her, smug in the power he had against her. He knew that stigma, discrimination and racism would stop Maya finding another premises to run her business from and he was right. But Maya was no push over, she was was always wheeling and dealing with the landlord, negotiating  improvements and additional inclusions to make up for the extra rent she was paying.

Mayas business was promoted in all the places adult services are advertised, alphabetically listed among other adverts that began with ‘Asian’, which comprises approximately one third of adult services adds in total. Maya and her workers knew their market well and worked it. I was the only white sex worker there, the others] workers came from a diverse range of backgrounds and Maya marketed them all expertly playing on a range of stereotypes that are usually applied to Asian women. Workers convincingly dropped their age by more than two decades when clients wanted younger workers, went from speaking English fluently to using broken English when clients wanted someone new to Australia, they softened their voice for clients that wanted someone submissive and gave each other crash courses in massage techniques to satisfy requests for an authentic Thai masseuse.  Googling countries, cultures and conversation language to assist them in playing the role requested by the client is all part of the service at Mayas.

Id started working at Mayas  after a friend introduced us and she offered me a room rental option It was a great deal, I ran my own advertisements, answered my own phone and paid a small fee per job for use of the work room, clean linen, use of the bathroom, and the staff room. The set up suited me perfectly.

Mayas business was similar to other brothels that id worked at. it was a discreet, converted house with 3 or 4 work rooms (bedrooms) and a separate staff room (kitchen/meals/lounge room)  which offered  the workers privacy from clients between jobs. There were 2 or 3 workers on shift at any time and the routine of meeting the clients and doing the booking was no different than anywhere else. The work was the same, the way we stayed safe from police and the authorities was the same and there was equal attention to hygiene as any other brothel Id worked in. This brothel traded on stereotypes, exploited fetishes, marketed itself in a way that ensured it was able to meet the expectations of the clients and at the same time encouraged potential workers to select it accordingly.Just like any other brothel.

I enjoyed the company of the other workers, like i always have. The staff room of a brothel is a special and unique place. it has the potential to produce moments of intimate connections and friendships with people whose real name you don’t even know. The experience of the work and the stigma associated with it helps to equalise us, our shared rejection of social expectations gives us the courage and ability to be open minded and non judgmental and the individual control over our own privacy allows us a rare degree of honesty and anonymity. This results in things being shared in staff rooms of brothels that may never be shared anywhere else. In Mayas staff room, just as always, we joked about the clients, shared tips and tricks, talked about the stigma and the laws we deal with and a range of other things in between.

But here i had the bonus of fresh home cooked food too! Because Mayas was just like any other brothel I’d worked at but it had some beautiful differences. It was so much more cozy than the often sterile brothels i had been used to. It always had the smell of home cooking, because someone was always cooking and the work rooms doubled as bedrooms for the travelling workers who were staying on premises and the decor had a personal touch. It felt homely because it was a home. The atmosphere was relaxed, workers chose when they worked, when they rested, and when they participated in the sense of community that was always present in the kitchen and dining room also known as the staff room.

Lots of sex workers are concerned about their privacy, and worry about being outed to their friends and family and It was no different in this brothel. Many of the workers i met at Mayas had chosen to maintain anonymity by travelling for work. Different workers came and went and came back and stayed or didn’t. The routine and rotation was different for each worker, depending on their lives and situations, their wants and needs.  Some had a regular circuit from state to state, some worked at Mayas around their study and uni holidays, some came to make a lump some for a specific purpose and had no intentions to continue after that, and some of us had our regular shifts each week. Some of us were local, some from interstate, or overseas. Workers were referred to Mayas by friends, other employers or via the very healthy grape vine that i became aware of.

Even though there were many languages being spoken, and the workforce was transient i quickly learnt that the majority of workers I met at Mayas were connected to a tightnit community of migrant workers that shared information, referrals, contacts and recommendations, that helped and cared for each other as a matter of responsibility beyond the context the work. There was a fully functioning network that spans the seas allowing workers to share important information with their colleagues, for example, the laws in each state or the best places to go for sexual health check ups or free condoms. It was impressive to see it in action. And places to work was just one of the types of information you could get from the network.

Id been working there a few weeks, and was happy with how it was going, but was trying to build my business up. So when Maya asked me if I wanted to pick up more clients i jumped at the chance. She suggested she could advertise me in the Chinese paper and market me to her clients along with the other workers. She proposed I would benefit from increased business and could repay the cost of the advertising from my first job. At first i was unsure if my tall buxom frame and blonde  bombshell image would be profitable with Mayas usual clientele who came to a place that carefully marketed a different stereotype. It felt like a risk to outlay money for the advertisement when i was unsure if would result in more business. But Maya explained that many Chinese clients visit her business because it has been recommended to them, or they don’t speak English or only read the Chinese news paper, these clients  have a variety of requests and fantasies, including buxom blondes. It made sense, so i agreed and Maya went ahead and ran an add in the Chinese newspaper for me.

I normally insist on having control over how I’m advertised, promoted and described to potential clients. I want to be comfortable with the way I’m marketed and i don’t want to deal with disappointed clients who had expected something different, but this time i decided to just let Maya do her thing. Business boomed and surprisingly Maya’s promotion generated a considerable increase in clients for me. The majority of my new clients were Chinese speaking men responding to the add in the Chinese paper that Maya had placed. I needant have doubted her astute sense of business and her knowledge of her market because despite my initial uncertainty her predictions were accurate. She continued to run my add in the Chinese newspaper regularly and I provided her clients the best service I could.

It was a few weeks later when i was chatting to the friend that had introduced me to Maya. I was full of gratitude for the introduction, expressing my satisfaction at how well business had been going. I told my friend how happy i was with the arrangement, and about all the extra business i was getting from the new add. I praised Mayas marketing techniques, explaining how I had initially thought Mayas clients wouldn’t be interested in seeing me, but thanks to Mayas skills and initiative, i had been very successful. My friend told me she had seen my add, and asked who wrote it. I told her i had left all that to Maya, because she knows her market so well. I hadn’t really even bothered to ask what it said. My friend laughed and agreed, Maya really did know her market. My friend told me the the add Maya was running for me that had resulted in so much unexpected work roughly translated into ‘big Australian horse has arrived, looking for many riders’ which she giggled and explained is similar to the ‘town bike’ analogy.

I blushed and we both laughed!  I was glad I let Maya have control over how she promoted me because its not an add i would have written. But if i had have written the add it may not have been so successful with Mayas clients. She really did know her market.

I continued seeing clients who were responding to the add and providing the best service I could with a deeper understanding of what they were expecting. To this day I still have clients who come to ride the big Australian horse and my friend still teases me about it.

the who’s who of punter forums

Tags

brothels, clients, discrimination, forums, online, personal stories, punters, rants, reviews, safe sex, sex industry, Sex Work, south australia, the boss

Once upon time about back when local hookers were just beginning to utilise the internet for business, i met a Annie. She was a tech savvy sex worker with an established online identity who introduced me to a whole new world. She showed me around sex industry forums, review sites and advertising options. It was all new to me and i spent hours reading the various posts and reviews engrossed in this ‘client community’. It felt like i was gaining some kind of inside knowledge about the industry, the workers and our clients. As i read the candid comments by the anonymous ‘punters’ as they refer to themselves, I felt like i was getting a true sense of what clients think, a real insight, a glimpse of our industry from their perspective. I was excited to see if anyone had reviewed me, so i searched my name, but i didnt find any mention. I began to check back regularly looking for my name but i was also curious to read what clients were thinking and saying.

Being the talkative and opinionated whore i am, i didnt last as a voyeur for long. I started joining in with some of the forum conversations, using my work name, keeping my comments sweet and fluffy and trying my best to stay endearing and in character. It wasnt always easy and plenty of times i had to bite my tongue (or sit on my hands as the case maybe) to stop myself getting into heated debate and risk turning potential clients off. I didnt always succeed.

It was only after i began to advertise occasionally online that i got my first review. When I saw my name  I felt almost famous. I read the post and breathed a sigh of relief that it was a positive review. Other clients had commented on the in response, all expressing their interest in seeing me as a result of this recommendation. I felt full of confidence and in demand. I had always had return business and good feedback from my clients in the past but for some reason this felt different, I read it over and over. I had no idea who it was that reviewed me, it could have been anyone and i started me wondering which of my bookings would result in the next review. I kept checking back at the forum to find out the latest gossip and see what they were saying about me. Out of curiosity I read the other workers reviews feeling envious of their outstanding reputations or sympathetic when it wasnt so good.

It wasnt long before i got my second review. It was another good one, followed by more comments from clients who were keen to see me. But reading this review didnt give the same thrill, actually it made me feel uncomfortable. It went into specific gory detail, giving a blow by blow account of his time with me and the service he received. It was almost like reading a tacky story from a picture mag and I couldnt help but cringe. This time i knew which client had written the review because he described the passionate kisses and the extra 10 minutes that I gave him, which was not part of my standard service. That worried me too, I had clicked with this particular client but I didnt want everyone making appointments expecting the same type of service. I realised though, that i was lucky. It could have gone the other way. If he happened to rub me the wrong way, his service might have felt forced and rushed and I could have just as easily gotten a bad review. I thought about the workers who had received bad reviews and felt bad for them. It could happen to any of us, and if a good review has the power to triple my confidence i didnt want to know how it felt to be criticised and insulted in this space.

Sometimes I would read a review that frustrated me. I couldnt believe how indiscreet some clients could be. I would be blinking my eyes with disbelief while i read in detail, how a particular worker at a massage only establishment had offered sex, even though it was against the rules of the business. Or how another worker had offered oral without a condom for extra money even though that was not allowed at the brothel she worked at. These careless clients were so busy gloating about the extra services they got, they didnt seem to understand the potential ramifications for the workers. Apart from having to deal with every man and his dog showing up expecting the same type of extra service described, one of these “good” reviews could result in the worker loosing her job or being ostracised by the other workers.

After that second review, i started getting enquiries from people who made mention of the forum and my reviews. I felt popular and was thankful for the extra business. But every time a forum punter made a booking i felt anxious. Will this be my next reviewer? I began feeling like they were all writing their reviews in their head during the service. Im trying to be sexy as I strip my clothes off and they are judging my body and face, Im rubbing my naked body against them and they are busy scoring my massage, Im trying to be sensual while i go down on them and they are rating my blow job. I was imagining them all scoring each aspect of my looks and service out of 10. It made me self conscious and put me off. Ironically, if i thought they were a potential review writer, their service would suffer.

I still managed to get a couple more good reviews and for a while it seemed like i was the flavour of the month. I was the one to see. But it didnt last. Before long all the forum punter started looking for the next hot tip. The 5 or 6 regular reviewers had seen and written about me already and now all their posts were asking about new recommendations or talking about who new is good and where. And i was old news. Which is fine. I mean at first I was frustrated because I had been reviewed so well, I had done nothing wrong but they still seemed intent on moving on. But I didnt let it get to me, my business wasnt suffering, sure there had been a slight spike during the height of my forum sweetheart days, but it was still steady, no quieter than it had been before the positive reviews. I realised these forum punters were a bonus to my business and not our bread and butter.

A while later I came into contact with a worker who was fairly new to the industry and was incredibly concerned with what they were saying about her online. She, like me, had been the flavour of the month but her stint ended abruptly when she got a nasty scathing review. It really knocked her confidence. I begged her to stop reading, but she couldnt stop worrying about it, trying to figure out how to get back on the good side of the online forum punters. She was beating herself up trying to guess where she went wrong, what she didnt do right, or who was behind the bad review. It really got to her. In her desperation to please them all, she gave them all her power. She began thinking of herself as a failure which affected her business and the whole thing spiraled out of control.

I stopped visiting the forums and searching for my name among the reviews and I became less invested in the punters community. After reading about the situation for sex workers in Hong Kong and just how toxic these review sites can get, I decided they are not healthy for sex workers, and I made a point to avoid them.

I know for some sex workers, avoiding ‘client community’ and review websites is not always possible.  Im sure that for some workers, like those in Hong Kong mentioned in the article above, engaging in these forums is an essential part of their business plan. But for many more of us, its just not necessary. Most of the time, we dont need to hear it. Its not fair or balanced. we have no right of reply, and we dont even know who is behind those screen names! Sometimes its not even a genuine client. It could be our competition, a vengeful ex, or anyone with a grudge. It could be the online equivalent of those douchebags that get their kicks by visiting brothels for intros, just so they can reject all the workers there. We need to remind ourselves that most of our clients arent reading those forums. If we have repeat business, and we are happy with the service we provide its probably best to stay away.

And with that in mind, I invite our clients to consider how they use such forums. I completely understand why you would want to read reviews about a worker before you spent a large amount of money. I do the same with accommodation, with movies, with holidays and restaurants. And i guess i understand why you might want to write a review about your experience good or bad. I have wanted to share my inside knowledge about particular hotels  with other travelers, however, lets be clear, giving my breasts a score out of 10 is not providing inside knowledge. Its also not helpful because its subjective and your taste in breasts is not relevant. I understand that some people might write a review in order to warn others about their dissatisfaction with a service they received. But in the same way as you would if you were sent the wrong meal or over charged in a restaurant, you should give the worker the chance to resolve their mistake before you rush home to tell your murky mates. If you havent given them this option, perhaps dont vilify them online. Tastes and expectations of sex workers vary so much they may not even realise you were not happy.

Given there is probably limited opportunity for clients to share stories about their experiences with sex workers, I guess some people write reviews as an opportunity to debrief or vent. If thats the case why do you have to name the worker, list their contact details,  link to their website etc. And why is there such a tight community of outspoken regular posters on these forums? I cant imagine being as emotionally invested in tripadvisor.com as some of these posters are. Be careful that your online punter gang isnt being used to bully workers or to share information in order to prey on vulnerable workers … “I know she has been desperate to make money lately, if you threaten to walk i bet you could knock $50 off her price” (actual quote i saw not that long ago on a popular punter forum)

Just keep in mind when you are reading or writing reviews in these forums, they have the potential to not just effect our business but they can also seriously effect our self esteem.

And for those of us on the other end of the reviews, remember there is nothing to gain from hearing the boys club compare notes trying to outdo each other. It has been my (limited) experience that we are much better off focusing on the people who are paying us RIGHT NOW.

 

The Madame of the house

Tags

brothels, clients, decriminalisation, feminism, law reform, laws, madames, Melbourne, money, personal stories, pimps, Relationships, sex industry, Sex Work, south australia, stigma, the boss, Victoria, worker rights

This is a story about the time I jumped the desk to become the Madame of the house. Its about running a business in the South Australian sex industry, about who has control over who and about the myth of easy money. I wrote this for the feminists who believe our industry is dominated by male bosses that make big bucks by controlling female workers. I wrote it for every 5^th client I see who has multiplied the money he spends on sex by the hours in a day and the number of rooms in a house and thinks he has hit jackpot. I wrote it for the politicians who worry about organised crime taking over the sex industry. For the wanna be bikies n thugs that fancy playing boss man to some ladies of the night, for the desperado that thinks owning the business will control the girl and for the saviours that honestly believe they would treat their ‘girls’ differently to how we are treated anywhere else. And I wrote it for the sex workers that don’t like their boss, or are sick of having a boss, or think they could do it better, or just feel like trying something different.

This story is from many years ago, sometime after my second brush with law and before my forced break from the sex industry. I was between jobs when a friend of a friend introduced me to Neil who apparently had an interesting proposition for me. I had heard about Neil the wanna be pimp before. I use the word pimp flippantly, I’m not sure Australia has pimps, but if we do, Neil would probably LIKE to be one. He definitely had the sleaze factor to fit the stereotype but lacked the backbone. Neil had a reputation in the industry as a slimy sucker, with more money than sense and a boner for big talking. Needless to say I was curious about his proposal, but wasn’t surprised when he told me he was having another go at opening a brothel. I say another go because, as legend had it, he had tried to open a number of brothels in the past and had failed.

One of the difficulties Neil had always encountered was that he was a man. There is not much of a role for a man in a South Australian brothel, other than client. A lot of female sex workers aren’t that keen on having men hanging around on premises and the cops generally aren’t that thrilled with it either. So Neil had decided he needed to pay a female manager. In addition to that, clients are generally put off if their phone calls or door bells are answered by a man, so Neil would also need to employ a female receptionist. It struck me as ironic that in order to brag about being a big brothel boss, he had to remove himself from any actual brothel bossing. He was forced to downplay his involvement in the brothel, hand over control of the brothel, stay away from the brothel, and give up a decent amount of profit from the brothel, in order for him own a brothel.

But Neil must have been impressing someone with his brothel bragging because he was determined to try his hand at the game again. When he met me, he already had the lease on a town house in the city and had furnished it simply and adequately. He knew a few workers from other brothels who were ready to jump ship and take advantage of the new businesses honeymoon period, one of which was the friend that had introduced him to me. At the time I was in a relationship with one of those partners that made it difficult for me to do sex work, and I had been missing the industry. So when Neil asked me to manage his new business, I was excited about the opportunity to be involved in the industry in a role that I hoped my partner would find more palatable. I accepted the offer immediately.

From the beginning Neil and I disagreed about everything right down to the goofy name he had given the business. I fought for what I considered to be fair pay for all the workers of the business, I pushed for flexible conditions and I advocated for an increased budget for advertising. But Neil was stubborn or stupid and wouldn’t give. He had a bottom line that wouldn’t budge. So for those first few weeks, we did it his way. But it didn’t take long before Neil was again learning that the sex industry is not easy money and opening a brothel is not a get rich quick scheme.

Business was up and down and Neil was becoming anxious. After paying the manager a cut, the receptionist her wage, the rent, the overpriced advertising, the utilities and essential supplies for the business, Neil quickly discovered 50% of a coupla jobs a day doesn’t go far. He responded to his anxiety by reducing the advertising budget further, cutting receptionist wages and introducing ‘shift fees’ for the workers.

But it’s a vicious cycle. Without enough advertising, business became even quieter and without clients bringing in the money, the workers became unhappy. When Neil introduced the shift fee, the workers felt disrespected. Who would be happy about coming to work, sitting around all day for minimal pay with the risk being caught up in a raid AND then being forced to pay an illegal shift fee!??! They began to resent working there and those that stayed were unreliable.

Anyone who fantasises about making easy money off the backs of hookers is going to struggle. Hookers are not that easy. Many of us chose sex work for the flexibility it offers us, so we expect a flexible work place. Many of us chose it for the money we can make, so we expect to make money. Many of us chose sex work because we are good at it, so we expect to be appreciated by our employers. Neil offered his workers none of that.

But an empowered hooker is a powerful force. A hooker that knows there are ten other businesses in the vicinity that need staff (and there usually is) will not settle for anything less than what she expects. A hooker that knows its OUR service that makes the money will expect respect. And if that hooker works for a boss that disrespects her, she will disrespect them right back.

None of Neil’s workers respected him, and the business suffered because of it. One typically quiet Saturday I caught out the receptionist and worker on shift doing something dodgy. I knew they had done two jobs, but the bookwork indicated only one. They had decided to not record the second job, splitting the business’s 50% cut between them. I couldn’t blame them. They were making next to nothing and Neil’s decisions were only making it worse.

I was frustrated. I knew Neil was not meeting his target, or even covering costs, but less advertising and unhappy, unreliable and resentful workers was not helping to bring in the clients or the cash. And the expenses were still mounting.

That’s when I decided to go around him and do what needed to be done. I started taking the money from one job a day off the books and used the money to pay for more advertising. I also introduced a small retainer for the staff to cover lunch and maybe a cabfare, on those occasions when they didn’t do any jobs. And when no workers showed up to shift, I did the jobs.

At the same time Neil seemed to have an epiphany. If he wanted money he needed clients, if he wanted clients he needed workers, and if he wanted to keep the workers, he would have to loosen his rules. Since he couldn’t work himself, he was on his knees. He had no choice but to give the workers the flexibility and work conditions they were demanding. Its not unusual for sex industry employers to take advantage of the criminalised setting by attempting to control us like they would an employee but only giving us the pay and conditions of a contract worker. But in a situation where there was little money to be made, not many would accept a bad boss.

So Neil began to back off and let me take a bigger role in managing the rosters and staffing. Sneaking around behind Neils back doing jobs myself and advertising more, started to pay off and I managed to keep the business afloat a little longer. The staff appreciated the token retainer and the more flexible conditions and when I abolished the shift fee that Neil had introduced the mood shifted.

The flexible, fair and friendly work environment resulted in word of mouth reaching the workers of a brothel that had been closed down recently. It was early one quiet weekend when Winnie, an unremarkable woman in her mid 30’s came in for an interview. Looking like a proper house wife dressed in ladies floral and a perfect perm, Winnie was an unlikely looking hooker, but she bought a huge loyal and very regular client base with her. And the good fortune Winnie bought us did not stop there. She immediately sent for her two friends who she had worked with at the previous brothel. They were impressed by the guaranteed retainer our business offered and were keen to start work straight away. So at that moment, our luck had changed and business looked up. Winnie had swept in with a hoard of clients and a couple of fresh faced workers under wing and saved the day, and the business.

And so it was, that due to the decision to treat our workers well, my ability to perform ALL the duties necessary, and a little bit of good luck, business began to boom. And Neil didn’t know the half of it. His pressure was gone and he was making enough to cover his costs as well as a reasonable profit for doing nothing. He could finaly hold his head up high while he bragged round town about his latest business venture. I kept lying to him about how many jobs we were doing so I could use the extra money to continue paying the staff well, stock the business with nice things, pay for adequate advertising and offcourse I gave myself a bonus.

Everyone was happy, business was flourishing under my management, the workers were all content and making money and even Neil was satisfied. Everyone was happy except my partner. The generous pay packet I was bringing home did not sweeten the deal for them. Running any business is hard work, and clearly a sex industry business is no exception. I was on call 24/7, I was stressed about the threat of police, and I was doing lots of unrostered work relieving staff when needed. Stopping sex work and taking up this new role as manager was meant to appease my partner who was uncomfortable about sex work, but instead I had succeeded in making the sex industry a bigger part of my life than it had ever been before. My partner didn’t know about the occasions when Id provided the service myself in order to keep the doors open, but that didn’t matter. They didn’t want me involved in the industry at all.

My job was beginning to cause problems for my relationship which was probably a good thing. Looking back on this time of my life I’m glad my controlling and jealous partner made my life hell to the point I ended up walking away from the business all together. Because I nearly did something that coulda been mighta not ended well.

Neil was a shmuck. Worse than a shmuck. He was a sleazy roadblock to our success and he made me cringe. I was sick of answering to him, lying to him, even seeing him. Basically, I was sick of having him on the pay role. He was the ‘owner’ of the business, sure, but what exactly did he own? The workers? No, certainly not, most of them at this point had never even met him, and would never work for him under the conditions he wanted me to apply. Did he own the clientele? Definitely not, some clients will perhaps follow a worker from location to location, but generally clients go everywhere and belong to noone. And the clients we got came from the advertising I DID, and it was the happy skilled workers that kept them coming back. Did he own the business name? well, sure, he owned a ridiculous goofy name he chose, but that wasn’t the name that I used in our advertising, or the name that the clients had come to know, or the name that the staff and I used. The name we used, was the name I chose. Did he own premises? Well sure, he had the lease on the townhouse we operated from, but, after being there for 8 months and with a steady stream of business coming and going, it would be time to move on soon before we attracted police attention anyways. So what did he own? Some of the furniture was his, but I had also bought a lot of newer pieces for the business since we opened. And he owned the phone number.

The workers and I began talking about ditching Neil and taking complete control of his business by simply shifting the location to a new premises that was in my name. We even joked about diverting business phone to our newly connected number until Neil noticed and got round to disconnecting it.

A sex industry business, in an illegal setting, is nothing. In an environment where businesses have to move regularly, operate discreetly out of residential properties or under the masquerade of health clinics or massage parlours, a reputation or a name, an address or even a permanent phone number is not something any brothel in South Australia has. Places and faces pop up and get shut down all over town all the time, and while certain individuals may have a reputation in the industry, finding a brothel you like, is largely a case of trial and error for both sex workers and clients. So when people talk about buying a business in our industry, I always wonder what they think they are buying, and when I thought about leaving Neil and setting up shop elsewhere, I didn’t feel guilty.

I started looking for a new place to operate from and found a perfect house. It was fully furnished, in a central location and it oozed executive luxury, which was a long way from the plain and simple townhouse Neil had rented. The landlord approved my application and I was excited, nervous and determined to break away from Neil. But the night before I was due to sign the lease, my partner gave me an ultimatum. My relationship or the sex industry.

To be honest, I didn’t think too long about it. I was so sick of fighting about this, and the stress at home combined with the stress of running a business was getting too much. I allowed my partner to believe that our relationship won and the sex industry lost the competition for my loyalty. In reality, I knew I wasn’t leaving the sex industry, just leaving this role in the industry.

I suddenly realised that while there was some satisfaction and profit in successfully running my own business, it was also hard work, with big legal and financial risks. I reminisced about how easy life was when I just had to suck cocks and count cash. That night spurred on by my partner’s ultimatum, I did a 180. The next day I left the business, its workers and Neil to fend for themselves. And the next week I left my partner and went back to fending for myself.

Soon after I heard that Neil’s business had been visited by police and had been closed down. I felt a mixture of regret and relief about what was and what could have been.

Now when I reflect on the business owners and employers I have known in our industry I notice that those that have survived in the industry the longest are current or ex workers themselves, and I think that’s due to the fact that they willing and able to jump back over the desk and into the bed, in order to keep the doors open when business is tough.

The South Australian sex industry is also made up of lots of collectives of workers and private and independent workers. Having these choices easily available to us is an important aspect in ensuring we have the power to negotiate pay and conditions that suit us.

However, the fear of the police and the law does mean many workers are reluctant to work for themselves, as part of a collective or open their own business. Criminalisation does mean that many workers will not be willing to risk taking out a lease on a property in their own name and instead will opt for working anonymously for a boss. We NEED law reform urgently in this state, but any new laws we consider must support our choice to work in a variety of ways. We do not want laws like those in Victoria that favour big business and make it impossible for the average worker to try out other roles in the industry, or to work for themselves, or that stops a group of sex workers from working together. Any new laws must not take away the power we DO have. That’s one of the reasons I advocate for decriminalisation. It is the only model of law reform that protects and empowers sex workers allowing us to work for ourself, in collectives, or even to open our own small business. It’s the only model that supports our cottage industry here in SA.

But until we get decriminalisation I will continue to giggle and enjoy the stories I hear about bosses who attempt to rip off workers but end up getting ripped off themselves. Because its true that the most successful businesses are those where the workers are happy and respected.

Show me yours and I’ll show you mine…

Tags

bodies, body image, brothels, clients, disability, self esteem, sex industry, Sex Work, sexuality

I wanted to write something about the human body in all its naked and diverse glory. I wanted to share the unexpected gift that sex work gave me; forgiveness for all my physical imperfections.

Working as a sex worker for many years I have seen naked bodies belonging to my clients, my co workers and myself in all sorts of positions, settings and lighting. Over the years I have become incredibly comfortable with human bodies and getting naked but that wasn’t always the case.

Taking my clothes off and showing my naked body to someone I just met, AND  having the nerve to expect them to pay me for it, was my first and most persistent fear about starting sex work. Before sex work my experience of being naked in front of people had largely been in the dark, after foreplay and with lots of anxiety. Each time i let my mind wander  what it would be like to do sex work, I would get stuck at the bit where I had to take off my clothes.

And it wasn’t just a concern for the first booking, every time I went back to sex work after having a break I would confront the same insecurities. None more pronounced than when I returned after having carried a 9 pound baby full term. I was paranoid about my changed body shape, my new stress lines, decreased sexual confidence, stretched skin, my more mature attitude, everything.

There were times when I tried to hide the bits that worried me. Id leave my skirt on to hide my mummy tummy, id leave shoes on to hide my feet, id wear wigs to change my hair, stockings to cover cellulite, id leave the lights low, id do a combination of all of the above. And other times I adopted a ‘fake it till you make it’ attitude and strut my stuff as if I had not a care in the world.

Each time I got naked and got paid it got easier. To the point I barely think about it anymore. Yeah sometimes I notice clients looking at my stretch marks as they ask how many kids i have. But I have just as many clients who admire my legs or my bum or even my uneven boobs.

The raw commercial reality of selling sex and desire makes it increasingly obvious that beauty really is in the eye of the beholder. That phrase gets new depth and credibility when you see its sentiment play out again and again in the intro rooms every night. Sex work taught me that for every body there is someone who thinks its sexy enough to pay for it. Even more than that, its possible to work your insecurity and turn it into your money maker. Your big ass or hairy legs could be the just the thing this client is into.

And its not just my body that I have become comfortable with, but ANY body.

Through my work I have seen bodies of all shapes and sizes with all sorts of bodily functions and dysfunctions. I’ve noticed and critiqued the changes that  occur  to my own body in the  quick glimpses of myself that I catch in the strategically placed mirrors as I massage and make small talk. Ive cleaned up all sorts of messes that  were made by various bodies. Ive learnt when to be gentle and work sensitively with my own and other peoples insecurities and body image issues. I’ve ignored, discussed, nurtured and pleasured every type of physical and sexual hang-up you can imagine.

Sometimes clients try to hide what they think is their abnormality for fear of rejection, humiliation or judgement, and some will be completely upfront in an attempt to avoid experiencing judgement or rejection at a later stage. Either way don’t let it effect your self esteem. Sex workers can decide who they will and wont see as a client for any reason they want. For example some sex workers wont see a client from the same cultural background as them (for confidentiality), some may decline because they suspect those skin tags are actually warts or due to the clients disabilities. Some sex workers may even have a preference for age or any other kind of physical appearance. That’s completely up to them. But there are just as many sex workers who will not see young men, or football players, or clients with lots of muscles, for just as many reasons. And the majority of us only care that our clients are hygienic, respectful and prepared to pay our price.

Ive seen so many different genitals and tummys and feet and chests and bottoms and backs and bodily and sexual function and dysfunction and attitudes and egos and insecurities, penis sizes and shapes, circumcised willys, loose foreskins, foreskins so tight its joined at the top,  pearls and rubies inserted underneath forskins, hard cocks, soft cocks, cocks that go up and down, wet orgasms, dry orgasms, lots of cum, barely any cum, cum that squirts in all directions, warts, skin tags, herpes, sunburn, blotchy skin, shaved skin, hairy bodies, lost hair, big ones, small ones, ultra sensitive and over stimulated, cock rings, female condoms, eczema, swollen pumped up penises, catheters, cum before their pants are off, requires specific actions to make cum, stretched skin, stretch marks, burned skin, bruised, scars, tattoos, dry rough and scaly, super soft and silky, one testicul higher than the other, one ball gone, hanging low or high and tight balls, good kissers, bad kissers, pacemakers, gastro tubes, old, young, all teeth, false teeth, some missing. business suits, surfers clothes, tradie blues, golfing gear, trackies and tshirt, work uniform, jeans and polo, poking out nipples, inverted nipples, guts and man boobs, tupe’s, home d bracelets, medical alert bracelets, piercings, hairy back, muscles, skinny, ugly feet, warts, freckles, missing limbs, differing abilities for fitness and positions, germaphobes, people from many cultures with many religions, scars and birthmarks, noisy bodies, weird sounds, injuries, sores, wounds, sex aids, medications, and I’ve seen all these things across all genders n ages n abilities.

I am always reminded that we are all human. We are all vulnerable. Whether we are being paid to use our bodies to sexually arouse others or if we are paying for our body to be aroused. We all bleed and excrete and have lumps and bumps. And we all have insecurities. Too many of us are too worried about our average and regular bodies. We are are own worst critics.

Dear South Australian MPs and sex worker allies

Tags

brothels, clients, consent, councils, decriminalisation, discrimination, feminism, law reform, laws, licensing, mandatory testing, Melbourne, nursing homes, personal stories, Queensland, rants, regulation, safe sex, sex industry, Sex Work, south australia, stigma, street workers, the boss

Dear Ms. Key, Ms. Gago, members of the South Australian parliament, people with influence and anyone following the latest attempt at sex industry law reform in this once progressive but now somewhat stale state.

Please stop it! You’re making it worse!

You may think you’re doing the right thing but The bill you’re debating has been cut and paste so much in order to appease and play politics that what remains is not workable or fair and will not improve the lives of sex workers or anyone else. It’s not a game of bluff, nor is it a matter of compromise. The bill you are considering is a big step backward.

This is ridiculous. Why are politicians sitting around and deciding how sex workers should best practice safe sex. Why should they be able to criminalise some consensual sex acts between adults just because there is payment involved? Why do they get a say on how adults are allowed to negotiate sex and money. And why do we need to be kept 500 meters away from schools? Is it me who is the danger to children and does that include my own children? Or is it my client who is the dangerous monster? What is it about paying an adult for a sexual service that you think has anything to do with kids at school? What exactly are you scared of? And we’re not talking about inappropriate signage or amenities, because that is covered by different laws. And frankly, sex workers and our clients are generally discreet. You don’t even know that I’m selling sex from my home right next door to yours! And why is no sex work allowed near churches? Who is that clause designed to protect anyway? And why bother even worrying about schools and churches when the bill gives all the power for approving any kind of sex industry business to the councils, who have made it clear that they will never support brothels! So even if I tried to comply with this new law and secured a suitable location and put in a planning application, it’s going to be rejected on moral grounds and I will be back to square one. In reality councils will have about as much luck of stopping sex work from occurring as they do now. And just like now, most will be sex industry businesses will be forced to remain unregulated and underground.

And why is it anyone else’s business who I entertain in my own home or how they compensate me? Can you see through walls? And what’s the deal with all the hate on sex workers who solicit in public places? What exactly is so offensive about a woman standing on the street at night time anyway? And I don’t believe that she is propositioning your children, because it’s unlikely your children could afford it. Personally I feel more uncomfortable walking past a building site in the broad daylight than I do going to the pizza shop on Hanson Road.

And why should we have to deal with police on regular basis. I have had a lot of different jobs in my time, and never did the police come and check to see if I was bending at the knees when lifting nursing home residents, or displaying a slippery when wet sign when I mopped the floors of woollies. Why are we still being treated like this? Sex workers are not criminals. Stop making us into them. In some states of Australia it is illegal to discriminate against sex workers but the bill you are debating is discriminatory. It treats sex workers differently to other workers in comparable industries and it discriminates against different ways working in the sex industry. But even less forgivably, it will make our lives harder, not better.

Yes it’s true that most sex work in South Australia is currently criminalised. And that most of us already dodge laws, deal with police, and work underground. It is true that our laws are the oldest in the country. But please don’t change them just for the sake of it. Do not change them unless you are changing them for the better. Sex workers know what we need, its decriminalisation. Every credible report from the last 10 years names decriminalisation as the only model that will promote sex workers health and safety. Every state and Territory in Australia has a different model of regulation for the sex industry and if you need any more proof that the only workable model we know of to date is decriminalisation, all you have to do is speak to sex workers about our experiences of working across Australia. NSW and NZ have successfully decriminalised sex work for more than a decade. In those places sex workers are not criminals. We have full access to all the services and structures, protections and rights that every other worker does, and employers have the same obligations as any other employer. Sex workers all over the world are begging for decriminalisation. Its not rocket science.

In stark contrast Victoria and Queensland have different versions of licensing mixed with criminal laws that govern various aspects of the industry. Special bodies have been set up to monitor the laws and the police are still heavily involved in regulating sex workers work spaces. Not only have those laws been ineffective but they have also been expensive and dangerous.

When I went to Victoria to work I had very little option but to work in a brothel for a boss under their rules. I wasn’t able to work for myself because the only way I could advertise was to first register myself as a prostitute with the government. This process is expensive and it is unclear who has access to those licensing records or if it is possible to get your name removed from the list. Even if I was willing to buy a licence and register, I would still not have been allowed to have the clients visit me in my hotel or home. The law states that I was only allowed to visit them at their home or hotel. So I worked for a brothel. But before I was allowed to work, I was first forced to have a full medical examination, as is the law. The nurse visited me at the brothel and took swabs while I lay in an undignified way on the brothel bed. The nurse insisted I needed an anal swab too, even though I objected and told her that I did not provide anal services to my clients. But unlike when my clients ask for this service, this nurse was not going to take no for an answer and she unconsentually and unnecessarily stuck her swab in my ass.

If I didn’t want to work for a boss in brothel conditions and I wasn’t in a position to register myself with the local authorities, my only option was to solicit publicly. Street based sex work is illegal in Victoria, but obviously still exists and in larger proportions than here in Adelaide. Victorian police have taken to dealing with this by placing female police officers posing as sex workers on the streets in order to bust potential clients. What criminalising our client’s means is that sex workers are pushed further underground in order to ensure their clients safety and the booking. It means the possibility that only the clients with nothing to loose will be willing to take the risk of visiting sex workers who publicly solicit. Essentially it decreases the amount of “respectable” clients willing to see street based sex workers and leaves us more vulnerable and fewer options.

Another huge slap in the face was working recently in  QLD. I worked alone from a hotel which is legal as long I work completely alone. Not even with a friend. This is obviously not ideal, but it’s workable. Until I found out that I also can’t work in same hotel as any other sex worker. I can’t do doubles with another worker unless the client organises it. Infact I cant even have any friends who are sex workers. I was told to be careful even having lunch with another worker whilst answering my work phone. It felt crazy. I got the distinct feeling that I was viewed as a piece of property by QLD government. As a sex worker in QLD I must belong to one of the only 25 government approved registered brothels in the state or I must completely exile myself from the rest of the industry. I must rely only on my clients or my employer for support. And on top of all this, they have entire sections of the police force dedicated to ringing up private workers and trying to convince them to offer a double service or a blow job without a condom, so that they can bust them. All in the name of protecting sex workers.

And then I come home to Adelaide where the old and unworkable laws are……. well, old and unworkable. I can advertise and work for myself in ways that I choose with minimal difficulty. I can work with friends as a collective, I can work from home, I can work for a boss or opportunistically. Its all equally illegal, and easy to remain anonymous, unless I’m a victim of crime and need police assistance, or unless I’m working in a brothel that police have singled out for a raid, or unless I don’t know my rights, or unless I haven’t yet learnt the police evasion strategies. Our current laws are bad, but the new laws being proposed will only make our lives harder. They won’t work and rather than address community concerns they will highlight them. The issue of sex work regulation will not be resolved until we get sensible fair and workable law reform.

We already have sophisticated systems to deal with all areas of work, industry, OH&S, public health, zoning, amenities, child protection, industrial rights and any other areas of concern. Stop with the politics and just let us access them already.

Welcome To My Boudoir

Tags

brothels, clients, escort, friends and family, laws, Melbourne, money, personal stories, sex industry, Sex Work, south australia

Yesterday I got the keys to my new work space, my very own unit! And today I did my first jobs from there.  I have worked in so many different spaces over the years, both for myself and for other people but I have never had my very own place just for me. It’s all mine and mine alone and it is very exciting. Setting it up and slowly settling in, I have been enjoying the challenge of decorating my new workplace in practical and attractive ways that are economical. I refuse to spend money that I haven’t yet earned, I’m not a gambling woman. Pilfering from my home, accepting donations of old furniture from friends and  towels and linen from ex workers and  watching my ideal work space come together, dreaming about future white goods and artwork. I can put things where ever I want, and they will still be there in the same spot when I come back the next day. It’s so fun not having to compromise with other people!

So because workrooms, brothel décor and furniture placement is what is on my mind I have decided to write about the places I have been paid to fuck in. There have been so many different places I have had paid sex but some things were always the same.

My first ever sex work booking was in a gym after hours. I had just started escorting and my first client was the Gym Manager. During that booking his desk became my workbench, I laid back on it with my legs in the air and he fucked me. The building was dark, big and a little daunting. Afterwards I washed at the basin in the ladies toilets. These days, after so many beds,  it would be a fun and interesting job, but back then for my first time, a well-lit private bedroom would have been preferable.

Over the years during escort bookings I have fucked in offices, in ware houses, in cars, in trucks, in the kitchen of a golf club during business hours, on couches, in wives beds, on the floors of empty houses with for sale signs out the front, in backyard sheds, in make shift floor beds, on spare single beds, in spa’s, in caravans, in hotels and motels and probably plenty of other places that i cannot think of.

Being in a clients home is never predictable, the clients might be but their homes and hospitality vary massively. Some clients will show you straight to the makeshift bed on the lounge room floor. Out of respect for their partners they wont do you in the marital bed or even let you close to the bedroom. Others don’t care and will have you in their bed with wedding pictures and children’s toys all around. Sometimes you get the distinct impression there might even be kids asleep in another room somewhere. I have been lucky to not be chased out of a house by an angry partner. Yet. It is a fear though, so I always keep my clothes and money close!

Some want you to have a drink with them or listen to their music or show you their garden or play a game of pool or introduce their dog or show off their big screen tv. Some wont want you anywhere near their things. Some have immaculately clean houses, some don’t. Sometimes you’re at a bachelor share pad in the middle of the day while the other house mates are at work and it doesn’t look like someone has cleaned the shower in years, let alone washed a towel for you. Sometimes you do it on their parents bed because they are away for the weekend and its cleaner than your clients bed.

The only thing the workspaces on my escort bookings have had in common is privacy. I do insist on privacy.  The cars have been parked on private property (like in the warehouse haha), the trucks have cute little private bed cubicles and I wont go into a house if I think there is more than my client at home. But once my client is horizontal, my handbag of tricks becomes my portable workstation containing all the tools of my trade such as condom, lube, massage oil, toys, wet ones and a mobile phone sometimes even some lip gloss.

But I prefer in-house work, where the client visits me and I get to control the environment. I pick the music, offer the drink, invite them to lay on my bed, set the lighting and make sure I have clean towels. Make my sex work space is the way I like it. The first brothel I worked at taught me everything I know about a good sex work space. Back in those days the police were very active and my boss used to move the brothel from townhouse to townhouse in order to evade the police or reopen after a bust. She told me it was important to have a place with an address that was simple and easy to find and impossible to confuse. It was so important to reduce the likelihood of clients going to the wrong door and  causing neighbours to complain and alert the police.

The town houses were 3 bedrooms with two bedrooms converted into work rooms and one being used for a client waiting room. There was a private space for workers (usually the kitchen)that was off limits to clients and whole place would be immaculate and clean.

In our work room we had a queen size firm and stable bed. No creeks or squeaks to distract  our clients during the important bits. Condoms in different sizes and flavours and sachets of lube in the bedside drawer. Tissues, wet ones, massage oil and talcum powder on the bedside table. A chair for clients to put their clothes on, a CD player with something like enya or sade playing, prettily rolled up fluffy towels stacked on a small stand and another towel on the bed folded into a fan like (wh)origami. After taking the clients money we unfold the towel flat onto the bed so the client could lay on it, decreasing any spills onto the bed sheets. And ofcourse there was a clock.

Most of the brothels I’ve worked at since then were pretty similar to this set up, although with varying degrees of cleanliness, classiness, and attractiveness. In Adelaide our brothels are so basic because the illegality prevents people from investing in them. Noone wants to put in spa’s and ceiling mirrors when it could be closed down any minute. Brothels are mostly rented premises in residential areas with usually only two or three work rooms.

Some of the brothels I worked at did not have condoms or lube in the room because they were worried about them being used as evidence, so they would be kept under lock and key only distributed sparingly as needed.

Some  staff rooms double as a waiting room for clients, meaning workers are always on display and on duty even between jobs. I hate that. Who wants to get stuck talking to someone elses client for twenty minutes while he waits for his worker? You have to be sweet and polite and noone is even paying you!

While most brothels I have worked in have been nicely decorated, with classy and sensual framed prints hanging on the walls there were some exceptions. One place I worked was decorated with framed photographs of the owners parents, children and family members. I always found this bizarre and slightly off-putting. I wonder if it was yet another strategy to throw the cops of the scent.

And then there was Melbourne, an eye opener. Ten work rooms, a shop front where the clients just let themselves in, big massive dressing room for the workers, showers built into every room, music playing in hidden speakers in every room, special purple lamps to do STI checks on clients, buzzers and intercoms in our rooms. And this brothel also had a couple of themed rooms, a B&D room with a big wooden chair with buckles on it, a rack with lots of toys and pain inflicting devices, and bed with bars and handcuffs attached to it. It also had an orgy room with a king size bed, a day bed and a spa in the room. But even with all the new features and modern conveniences, everything else was the same, there was still a bed, the towel folding, the tissues, wet ones, condoms and lube.

In my private work I have rented rooms with or from other workers and in hotels, motels and apartments. I bring my own towels, I put on the clock radio on for music and I take my money down to my car between jobs as there is often nowhere to hide it when in a small hotel room with your client right there. I put on the big room light for doing business and a softer bedside lamp for doing….. business. I have the same set up with my whorigami on the bed, my tissues, wet ones, lube, oil, talcum and sometimes my toys on the bedside table. I hang my sexy costumes and lingerie in sight for decoration and eye candy.

And there have been times when I worked on the floor, behind a screen on my friend’s apartment floor, or times when I worked on my other friends couch whist visiting her in Darwin (she was working from her bedroom). Times when I rented a room from the Asian parlour around the corner or from the busy suburban brothel 2 suburbs away. Each time I do my best to try ensure the space is private, clean, practical and comfortable and has some ambience or atmosphere. But even when I don’t, it doesn’t stop the clients from paying.  I have always felt guilty when inviting clients somewhere that I consider not up to scratch but they never seem to care. They are not there for the towel folding or the music playing.

But I am really enjoying being  able to offer my clients a shower in private, playing good music in the background and buying lots of fluffy soft towels. Maybe I should put my prices up?

But baby, just think of what we could do..

Tags

brothels, couples, discrimination, feminism, friends and family, Love, money, parenting, personal stories, Relationships, sex industry, Sex Work, single mothers, south australia, stigma

Another love story. Complete with love, lies, sex, summer holidays and a little bit of communication. When I met Luke I was happily hooking in a brothel 2 shifts a week, studying part-time, working a ‘straight’  job and parenting but I still found time to do a little partying. I was single, my kids spent a couple of nights a week with their father and I was still young so every now and then I’d go out on the town with my besti’s and on some of these occasions I got lucky. Or I should say, sometimes I went home with someone and they got lucky!

By this point in life I had made a decision to keep my sex work job a secret. I had children to think of, I had an ex partner, the father of my kids, who I didn’t want to give ammunition, I had study, a straight job and a future. I was not ashamed of my sex work, it was just such a non issue that I couldn’t be bothered dealing with the stigma if I didn’t have to, and I wanted to protect my children from it. It was sex work that had allowed me study part-time, given me the freedom  to be a single mum rather than stay in an unhappy relationship, allowed me pick and choose straight jobs, only accepting those that were flexible and willing to work around my family and my study. It  was sex work that meant I could buy the expensive texts books I needed for Uni, and take my kids to overpriced music lessons and still left me with enough money to have a big night out every now and then. I was desperately scared of having to give all that up and I thought that keeping it a secret would prevent that from happening.

And it worked. I didn’t tell Luke the night I met him at the party. Actually we had met quite a few times over the years, but he had never really left an impression on me before. But that night he did and we spent the night together and then later in the week another night and then an afternoon. I didn’t want to tell him my secret because then it’s not a secret. What if we stopped  seeing each other after a short time and then he told everyone else. I decided it was none of his business and that if we were still seeing each other after 3 months I would tell him.

3 months came and went and Luke and I were still seeing each other. He spent time with me and the kids and it was getting fairly serious. I had dropped my shifts in the brothel back to only one per week, and I didn’t want to tell him. I knew by now that he would hate it. I knew that he would make me stop. I knew he would be upset I had kept it from him. And I knew it didn’t have to be that way. We were not living together so I still had my own expenses, and my brothel shift just moulded seamlessly into my busy and respectable life, I wasn’t technically lying…… I just said I was going to work.

I didn’t want to give up what I viewed as my independence and so I kept sex working and I kept it a secret. For nearly two years.

Possibly not the right thing to do, but I am certainly not alone. Half the people I worked with at the time were hiding it from their partners as well. It seems easy to justify when you know it’s just work. And as time went on, it just seemed more and more impossible to tell him. I wanted him to know, sometimes I felt like he just didn’t want to know. I mean, why didn’t he ask more questions, Even if he didn’t notice the extra money I was sure I was dropping hints. But no, I worked once a week in a brothel for more than 18 months and it seems my partner had no idea.

And then one day, in the middle of a big blow up argument, about something unrelated and I can’t even remember what now, I yelled the words at him. “I DON’T CARE, I’VE BEEN A PROSTITUTE THE WHOLE TIME YOU’VE KNOWN ME”

I meant it as a cutting end to our argument, to our relationship, to my lies, and possibly to my job. I had thought about what would happen if he found out and I knew he’d be pretty pissed! I wouldn’t have been surprised if he put a hole in a nearby wall. But I screamed it at him and he just looked at me blankly and said “you are not!”

And so I told him everything. His calmness floored me, so my manner changed. I lost my anger and I felt guilt and sadness for hurting him. I explained myself, I consoled him, I explained myself some more, I apologised and, of course, I did the inevitable. I promised to stop working. We  talked and to my surprise  he was willing to forgive me, and I guess that made him even more appealing to me.

I quit my job, took up extra hours in my straight job, and moved in with him to save money. I felt like I gave up some of my independence  but I was ok about that. I kept it up for around 12 months but after a year of no sex work, and less flexibility in my other job, I was suffering financially. So was my partner, he had acquired an instant family to help support and we were all feeling the pinch. I had been faithful to my pledge to not do sex work, but we were struggling. It was on my mind, and I began making jokes about it. The bills would come in and he would be complaining so Id say, “one night in a brothel, I could clear them for us”, he would ignore me or give me an annoyed look. But neither of us could deny that money was tight and something had to give. I kept making my jokes, but I started throwing in extra sweeteners “we could even go on a holiday!”

“But honey, just think of what we could do!”

He still didn’t agree, but he seemed more open to the idea the more I kept bringing it up. One day he snapped at me “Oh for gods sake, you want to go back to work, just do it then”. I nearly squealed with excitement, but thought that might be an unhelpful reaction. So we sat and had a very open and long conversation about it. I asked him what his main concerns were. He said he trusts me, he knows it’s just work. I reminded him that he knows it wont effect our relationship, because I had already been doing it in the past and he didn’t even know. Eventually he confessed one of his biggest fears about me being a sex worker, was that I might fuck one of his friends or colleagues as a client, or I might be recognised and outed in public.

Jealousy is an awful emotion, and one that is difficult to control. Everyone experiences it differently and for different reasons. His fear seemed silly to me, but I was glad he was able to figure it out and communicate it to me. It meant that we could find a way for me to do sex work that he could live with. We decided that I would go away to work outside Adelaide, where it was unlikely I would see anyone either of us knew and where I could remain anonymous. So for the next 12 months I went away once a month to rural and regional South Australia for working weekends with friends.

And because I felt privileged to be able to go back to work with my partners blessing I used my money very wisely. I knew we were taking a risk in our relationship and I wanted to make it worth it. In 12 months, I managed to pay off our credit card debt and saved enough money to take us on that holiday I had suggested.

I used to joke that I was bribing my partner to “let me” work by paying for us to go to the Greek Islands, but it wasn’t actually like that. I did have to convince him to be ok with me going back to sex work, but we were a partnership, and I felt equal in that partnership, we had developed an arrangement that worked well for us, and sex work had become a part of that arrangement.

And it is hard to argue while holidaying in the beautiful Mediterranean summer!

Stop the Trafic – The Red Light

Tags

brothels, consent, discrimination, feminism, laws, money, rants, sex industry, Sex Work, south australia, stigma, the boss, unions, work, workers rights

This is part three in my series of posts about trafficking. I previously wrote about my suspicions in regards to the portrayal of sex trafficking in the media, and the motivations of the anti trafficking industry in Peak Hour, and the negative outcomes of the trafficking hysteria in The Car Crash. This post is the answer. A green light for migrant sex workers and a red light for trafficking.

If you follow on from my original post the answer seems really obvious to me. There are many sex workers all around the world who travel or would like to travel. Just let them do it.

Let people apply for working Visa’s in Australia as a sex worker. As I have mentioned, I personally have the contact details of at least 10 sex workers currently working in China who would love to come to Australia to work in your brothel, if they could get a Visa. The barrier is that they are unable to get a working Visa as a sex worker. Not to mention the process of applying for Visa’s to enter Australia is extremely difficult because we conveniently do not translate the required documents, so people who do not speak or read English, often need a third person to help them apply for their travel documents. Some of the sex workers I referred to have considered paying a third person a lot of money to assist them in travelling to Australia to work, and some knew other workers who had done that. Obviously being in a lot of debt to the person assisting you travel or your employer does create vulnerabilities for the worker though, it can take away a some of their bargaining power and in some cases could restrict the sex workers choices.  A few simple changes could allow sex workers from around the world to come to Australia willingly to work. There would be no demand for stolen or coerced non sex working Asian women in the sex industry, because lets face it while having sex slaves in place of willing workers might be slightly better for short term profits, it has got to create some serious challenges. Cut out the middle man and the demand by allowing migrant sex workers to enter and work in Australia legally and independently.

That is ofcourse if your concern is stopping trafficking, and not stopping sex work.

It might also be useful to educate all sex workers, our employers, our clients and the general community about our rights, in appropriate and useful ways. Through our peer organisations and that are supported to make sure they can outreach to all sex workers from all backgrounds making sure people know their rights. Make sure we all know what we should expect and what is not OK at work so that we are less likely to be exploited or treated badly and we know what to do or who we can get more information or support from if we do have problems at work.

Of course, where I live in South Australia that would mean giving us some rights in the first place. Decriminalise sex work, and give us our rights!

Educate the wider community, health and welfare services and the police to treat sex workers with respect. Help break down the stigma of being or seeing a sex worker, so that we can talk to people about what’s going on without fear of being judged. The discriminatory perceptions that exist about sex workers and our clients doesn’t make it easy for us to share anything openly or honestly, or to voice our concerns.

Take crimes against us seriously. Dont turn it into a witch hunt on an entire industry, or blame my choice of work, just give me the support I need and deal with the crime at hand. Create safe spaces for people to report crimes, concerns or suspicions and then treat those reports seriously, and respectfully, like you would if the crime or complaint had been committed in a restaurant.

Encourage and  support our organising. In Australia, we havent got our own union, but we have our own workers rights groups and organisations. Many sex workers are members of those organisations and many many many more sex workers receive support, information or advocacy around workplace issues from these groups and organisations. They are also fighting for our workers rights at a state and national level. Strong sex worker organising reduces the risks of us being exploited at work.

Stop the police raids. Stop pushing us and our workplaces, industry, employers and clients so far underground that we can barely see the light. Change the approach and try protecting sex workers instead of scaring us. Save the raids for actual crimes.

Is it really that difficult? Want to stop slavery? Free the slaves.

Seriously, allow sex workers to travel to Australia and work in the sex industry legally, educate them on how to do that, give us rights, make sure we know our rights, create safe and supportive spaces for us or our clients to report crimes or concerns or to make complaints, treat those reports with respect and take them seriously, stop thinking and suggesting that being treated badly is part of doing sex work, support us to organise to improve our work conditions for all sex workers and make the cops protect us instead or raiding us.

sex work 101

Tags

brothels, clients, consent, disability, discrimination, friends and family, laws, Love, money, nursing, parenting, personal stories, rants, Relationships, safe sex, sex industry, Sex Work, sexuality, single mothers, south australia, stigma, the boss

Your beginners course in understanding my work. Written in the interests of answering the common questions and misconceptions and saving sex workers from having to deliver a sex work 101 class to every person they disclose to.

1. I have good sexual health. I know this because I get tested. I get tested twice a year and more if there have been any risks. Some workers go more often. I use condoms for oral and full sex, i do visual checks on my clients for STI’s, I use lots of lube and have access to a variety of sizes in condoms, I know my condoms are in date and stored properly, I put it on, I take it off, i regularly check the condom during sex to make sure it is in tact and in place and for all of these reasons, I rarely have a condom break or slip. I also use condoms on toys and on  fingers if they are to be inserted anywhere. Sex workers in this country are known to have better sexual health than the general public. We are professional about our sexual health.

2. Being raped or assaulted is not a part of my job. I have never been raped or hit during my sex wok job. When it happens to a sex worker it must be taken seriously and dealt with appropriately, not written off an inevitable part of the industry.

3. My clients come from all walks of life. There is no typical client. As long as they are clean and respectful, then I am happy to provide them a service. If they are not clean, I don’t mind waiting while they take a shower.

4. There is no typical sex worker, I know sex workers of all ages, I have a friend in her late 60’s and I know of even older. Fat or thin, tall or short, everyone can make money in the sex industry.

5. The sex I have at work is work. For me it is not comparable to the sex I have for pleasure or with a partner. That doesn’t mean I never enjoy it. Compare it to working in a childcare centre looking after other people’s kids all day, i might enjoy it and I might like those kids but it is very different to how feel when i care for my own child. It is just a service, an intimate service yes, but there are many jobs where people provide intimate services for money, such as childcare.

6. I’ve been known to partake in a recreational drug here and there but I do not have a drug habit to support, and I do not need to be wasted to work. Drug use is a characteristic of our industry, in that it’s slightly more accepted in some (not all – many try to distance themselves) workplaces. If drug use itself is higher in the sex industry than in other industries (say for example the nursing sector) then I offer the following explanations: Firstly,obviously the money in sex work is better. If you have a drug addiction to support or if your vice of choice is expensive, sex work is an attractive financial option. This is also true for big gamblers, shoppers, travellers, spenders, and those in debt. Secondly the flexibility of sex work makes it an attractive work option for those who don’t fit neatly into the mon to fri 9- 5, stay in your box and conform-or-else,  type jobs. What I mean is, as a sex worker you can work for yourself, you can work for boss, you can work a few hours or you can work a few days solid, you can work regularly or on and off, you can call in sick all the time and still have a job. This means that people who need some extra money to score today, and the people who can’t get stable work because their life is not stable, or those people who can’t work long shifts because they need to self medicate, or people who get sacked from ‘straight’ workplaces because they were found out for using their sick leave to detox, still have a job option. I’m not using this post to weigh in on the ‘drugs are bad mmmkay’ debate, but I will say, people who use drugs either recreationally or habitually, can and are, and should be encouraged to be productive members of our communities, and it is up to everyone to make that possible. The sex industry has managed to make that possible and I think that is why drug use is more visible in our industry.

7. I personally do not have a mental health diagnosis. I think that makes me the opposite of normal these days. My point is, you don’t have to be damaged or deluded to exchange sex for money. Getting paid for sex also doesn’t cause Post Traumatic Stress Disorder, depression or any other label. What can cause a whole array of mental health problems is ongoing stigma and discrimination, harassment, criminalisation and all its associated issues, unsafe workplaces, isolation, and any other number of life experiences and chemical reactions. There is nothing inherently damaging either physically, emotionally or mentally about getting paid for sex, though there are often factors associated with sex work that can cloud our experiences. And many sex workers do live with a mental illness and I doubt it is over represented in our industry. But like drugs, i think it is more accepted in our industry and the flexibility means that people with health considerations can find suitable work in the flexible sex industry, allowing them to manage their health and stay gainfully employed. Again, I think rather than giving our industry a hard time, other industries should be taking note. Stop with the exit strategies for sex workers,  how about “entering strategies” rolled out to the employers whose work conditions are so rigid ensuring they are not accessible to people with caring responsibilities, with health considerations and disabilities, or to people who use drugs, older people, people with less English skills, or students, people with gaps in their resume’s and people with criminal records, or to people who need extra help or people who just want some control of their own working lives. These are the benefits of the sex industry, not the negatives.

8. There are no Madame’s and Pimps. OK, well there are female brothel owners and we do call them Madame’s, but they are really just an employer. They don’t generally have any other special role in our lives, just like any employer and employee relationship.  And there are boyfriends/partners, drivers, drug dealers and runners, security and bosses. And maybe in other countries they are called pimps, but not in Australia. There people in abusive relationships who are being pressured to work when they don’t want to on in ways they don’t want to. But that is domestic violence, not pimping. The reality in Adelaide is that there are lots of brothels and lots of bosses, some are good and some are bad but there is even more sex workers who work for themselves or in small collectives who have total control.

9. Yes the money is good, but not ridiculous. It used to be much better but an increase in the industry and a decrease in disposable income has meant it is not the gold mine i once felt like (or maybe I’m jut getting older 😉 ). Adelaide sex workers are among the cheapest sex workers in Australia. A mixture of different services offered by different workers, no labour rights or baseline wages in force, competitive market and vastly varying overheads make it difficult to negotiate pay rises across the industry or individually. When I first started sex work 20 years ago the average rate for an hour ‘fully inclusive’ session in a Adelaide brothel was $110 – 160 and about 5 years ago we had our first big price hike and now the going rate is about $160 – $240 for an hour. The sex worker generally gets about 50 – 60%. Keep in mind that most brothels also offer half hour or shorter services (I once worked in a brothel where I got paid $25 fr a quick fuck! needless to say I didn’t stay there long)and will provide discounts for longer bookings, some take shift fees or other cuts, and many sex workers offer ‘extras’ for extra cost or provide a different service for a different cost, private workers set their own prices based on overheads, services, commercial factors and their style of doing business. Give or take a few tips and noshows and there is no way I could give you any kind of average earning.  I can tell you that if I work for an 8 hour shift in a brothel I would expect to earn between $200 and $500 but depending on the business, the time of day/year, the number of workers on shift, the price of service and cut I got, and a massive range of other factors, including luck, it would not be unusual for a sex worker in Adelaide to leave an 8 hour shift with anywhere between zero and thousands.

10. I currently do pay tax on my sex work income. I have to if I want to participate in the world of house and car loans, or any other significant financial transactions. I haven’t always paid tax on my sex work income because I feel it is unfair to take my tax money but afford me no rights in return. Infact the opposite, I pay tax on my income but my assets can be confiscated as ‘proceeds of crime’, my cash could have me charged with ‘illegal possession’, my business could be closed down at any point and my livelihood gone, without compensation, my health and home and professional insurance is not valid due to my illegal activity. But regardless of any of that, if I want to spend my money, I have to declare it. And many other sex workers and sex industry businesses are in the same boat. The glaring contradiction comes from the fact that a) The Australian Tax Office doesn’t care how you make your money as long as you pay tax on it, in one of their staffers words ‘even a hit man can declare their income and claim their expenses’ and b) Australia’s tax system is a national system and our sex work laws are state based and every other state has some form of legal sex work. Now ofcourse, being a cash based industry, I’m sure not every cent is declared, and being very good at evading authority and remaining undetected, I’m sure not all brothels are paying tax, and why should they until their business’s are deemed legitimate. But the truth is that three things in life are inevitable – your born, you pay taxes and you die.

My Two Faces

Tags

brothels, discrimination, friends and family, money, parenting, personal stories, sex industry, Sex Work, single mothers

I choose sex work for many reasons. Obviously making a decent income is one major factor, as is the flexibility. I don’t make an obscene amount of cash, I’m not the most successful or motivated hooker in town, but its a decent income. Comparable to what Id make doing the job I’m qualified to do but with less stress. And in hours that suit me.

The flexibility is definitely my favourite thing about my job. It has always worked around my social engagements, my studies, my parenting, my travelling, my other jobs, my relationships, my passions. Whatever. It’s always been there for me while I run around doing my thing.  I wouldn’t go so far as to call it a reliable source of income because it is so up and down, but I’ve always felt secure that I wont starve and I can put a roof over my head (even if it’s just the roof of the brothel im working at).

But Its more than just that..

I ALSO LOVE THE DRESS UPS!

When I broke up with the father of my children, I hadn’t done sex work for a number of years. I had myself a straight job and a family. But once we separated, still in my mid twenties, I knew what I wanted to do. After starting sex work again, I decided I had what it took to further my education. What it takes, as a single mum, to go to uni is, passion, motivation and a flexible well-paying job that lets you study between bookings, and having a mouthy whore attitude helps to insist the system works for you.

So back to you Uni I went, if you were around those parts in my day you might remember me because I took the opportunities  that university affords and indulged in self-expression. I had bright pink long dreadlocks.

And I studied hard and went home and did my best at playing perfect mum, and on Sundays I worked at the brothel.  Every Sunday the kids went to their dads. Every Sunday I worked from 10am until midnight.

Nobody knew what I did on Sundays. It really was my secret back then. No one at uni, none of my family, none of my friends. I’d had enough trouble telling people in the past and I just wanted to avoid it. I knew what I wanted to do, and I was just going to do it, my way, so I did.

For 2 years I Showed up to work every Sunday morning with my crazy hair, daggy jeans, sneakers and my bag of tricks. It was fun. Id enjoy watching myself in the mirror while I began my transformation. The other workers would watch and sometimes we’d laugh about it. I covered my dreadlocks with a shoulder length dark wig with a sharp fringe, id do my make up to match, darker around my eyes, red lips. I swapped my groovy glasses for bright green contact lenses and paint my nails pretty. Under my daggy clothes I’m scrubbed, moisturised and If I got around to it, waxed. Id take off my comfortable undies and put my sexy (but often cheap and tacky) lacy red matching bra and knickers, slinky one piece black nightclub dress (for easy slip off and on), stay up stockings and amazing heels. I was a different person. I loved it. I was so different under those brothel lights that you wouldn’t recognise me as the pink haired mother at uni. It was nice having a reason to be super sexy. Just as it was nice having an excuse to indulge in pink hair.

My favourite thing about my transformation was when new workers would start a shift in the middle of my long shift.   They would only see me as the dark-haired hooker Id transformed myself into. We’d work and chat for hours. And when the clock struck midnight, the spell would be broken. Id pull of my wig and shake out my long pink dreads and grin at them. I loved the look of shock and the surprise they would express by the time my transformation was complete, all showered clean of make up, back to my cotton undies and jeans.