As seen in the Intersectionalist Magazine
Trigger Warnings: Rape, police brutality, power-based abuse, substance abuse, eating disorder
On Feb. 26, The Berkeley Beacon Magazine published “An Intimate Look Inside the Lives of Student Sex Workers.” The article covered the lives of several student sex workers on the Emerson College campus.
Anne E. Matica and Dana Gerber’s column is missing several extremely important pieces of information. The lack of these details in the column glorified sex work instead of painting a full picture that acknowledges the rampant violence against sex workers. While they are correct that criminalizing sex workers is not the answer, it is important to acknowledge the discrimination sex workers face as a method of calling out the system that oppresses the subjects of their story.
The article was unsafe and exploitative of its sources. It described details of the students’ personal information including where the students reside, the locations of where they work, their majors, and even referring to one of the interviewees by her OnlyFans handle, opening the door for her subscribers to learn her personal information, including that she lives alone.
Sex workers have an added layer of defenselessness. Outing someone as a sex worker can cause them to lose their housing, job, education opportunities, or personal relationships.The writers and editors clearly lack educational sensitivity training in addressing the reality and discrimination of sex workers and how best to be an ally. I hope the risk the authors took of putting their subjects in harm’s way was worth having a new cover story.
Exposing the personal information of a vulnerable person—a practice known as “doxing”—is a barbaric and vicious act. This is especially true when the victim is someone working in a profession that carries as much stigma and personal risk as sex work.
In almost all of the United States, aside from parts of Nevada, and other countries where sex work is criminalized, going to the authorities is often not a viable option—for sex workers, and for women in general. One erotic dancer I recently interviewed for a short documentary I am making about sex workers struggling to survive during the pandemic stated: “I have been in multiple situations where I feared I was going to die from clients beating me over and over again. I couldn’t go to the hospital. I couldn’t go to the cops. I was silently suffering and had no support.”
Sex workers and prostituted women often have nowhere to run. They experience systematic abuse from the police and are blamed when they are raped and told “it’s part of the job.” For Matica and Gerber’s article to successfully fight for the decriminalization of sex work, it needed to address the fact that, in the eyes of the law, people in the sex trade are seen as both criminals and victims. This causes abused sex workers, such as the person I interviewed, to not seek help from authorities in fear of getting arrested or heavily fined.
Although the criminal legal system isn't always the answer to helping someone who has been victimized, not having the option to report abuse to the authorities can have a negative impact on one’s mental health. As someone who has been a part of the sex trade and has been advocating for the fundamental human rights of sex workers and their communities for years, I am disgusted at the glorification and naivity behind the Berkeley Beacon article.
Many erotic providers do not get into the industry by choice. Many are “forced” into it by trafficking, poverty, violence, and homelessness. Why would you choose to only amplify the precious few who are privileged enough to actually choose sex work as a career? Sex work is not always fun and harmless––it comes with violence, substance abuse, homelessness, and vulnerability. Not privilege. I am under the impression that the majority of the students in the article are financially privileged, as they explained their immediate family members paid every penny of their college tuition.
“Not only is the doxing very concerning, but the overemphasis on portraying sex workers on OnlyFans as people who can afford luxury goods and other incidentals demonstrates a certain ignorance about how class and equality intersects sex work,” said Brady Baca in an Instagram comment linked to the Berkeley Beacon’s post.
Similar to the students in the article, I found sex work to be empowering at first. It even helped me gain body-confidence during my battle with anorexia. But after constant verbal abuse, threats of spreading my information, and at one point being stalked, I slowly started to find it less empowering and more horrifying. But I was already trapped. I needed the money.
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