We have a suggestion for the new governor of New York, David Paterson. Why not enact a statewide zero-tolerance law for buying sexual services?

When Rudolph Giuliani was elected mayor in 1994, New York City was considered one of the most dangerous urban areas in the world. He introduced a policy of zero tolerance against crime and today low crime rates are a city trademark. As a hard-core crime buster, former Governor Eliot Spitzer earned the nickname "Mr. Clean." Today, he is notorious for spending large sums of money on prostitutes.

Spitzer may have fought fiercely against organized crime, but organized crime, human trafficking and prostitution are closely linked.

In our country, Sweden, Mr. Clean would be facing six months in jail for buying sexual services. While soliciting sex is not a crime in Sweden, it is has been illegal to pay for sex here since 1999. With its focus on demand rather than supply, the Swedish law is unique.

If New York, one of the world's greatest cities, could be inspired by the Swedish legislation, it would be a severe blow to the modern slave trade. The Swedish police support the law because they have seen the results. Human traffickers tend to avoid Sweden because it's hazardous to do business here. The law has also made customers more cautious. Sweden's National Criminal Investigation Department concludes that the law is a barrier against the establishment of organized cross-border prostitution rings.
The Department has called for raising the maximum sentence from six months to one year.

We don't deny that there are prostitutes who are satisfied with their choice of profession. Perhaps the escort who worked for Emperor Club VIP, called Kristen in the media, wants to be viewed as a proud entrepreneur. But satisfied sex workers constitute a sliver in the dire world of prostitution. Most people caught in the business of selling their bodies are poor and traumatized youths. The gap between the demand for sexual services and women who voluntarily want to sell their bodies results in forced prostitution at the hands of organized crime. Few real-world prostitutes live the life of the Julia Roberts character in the popular Hollywood love story "Pretty Woman."

We know what happens when society signals that prostitution is acceptable. Demand increases. The Australian state of Victoria legalized prostitution in 1984. Prior to legalization there were 40 brothels in the state, according to the Coalition Against Trafficking in Women. By 2004 there were more than 100 legal brothels, but the number of illegal ones had grown even more. A growing sex industry is a lucrative business that attracts criminals. Few Australian women want to work in the sex trade. Consequently the jobs are filled by migrants, often without work permits.

In Europe we see the same pattern. Germany legalized prostitution a few years back. Brothels in Amsterdam's notorious red light district have been legal since 2000. Few German or Dutch girls plan on making a career selling their bodies to strangers. On the other hand, many poor girls from countries such as Moldova and Ukraine are lured to Berlin and Amsterdam on false promises. According to the European Union's Police Agency, Europol, traffickers prefer business in countries with a well-developed sex industry. The reason is simple: low risk and high profit.

Sweden and New York could work together toward creating civilized societies in which the human body is not a commodity. Consider zero tolerance for buying sex services in New York, David Paterson. Without demand there is no supply.

Birgitta Ohlsson is a member of the Swedish Parliament for the Liberal Party. Jenny Sonesson is secretary general of Liberal Women of Sweden.

I usually don’t post this kind of stuff, but I really don’t like to see talent get taken advantage of.

A close friend of mine worked for Kink for her third time recently, and had the most traumatizing experience of her life. (No, she didn’t do the Training of O everyone is always talking about) Her injuries after the shoot include numerous lumps in both breasts (from being slapped, whipped with a bamboo cane), bruises and rope burns from head to toe, bleeding from both her vagina and butt, and soreness everywhere from being constantly shocked when she made it known she didn’t want to do it. On top of that, it was shot in a room with running water flowing through the room that was so cold that during the shoot you can see the talent’s breath. On top of that, she can’t sleep because of the pain and flashbacks from the scene in her dreams. She officially quit the business right after the shoot. I’m sure she’s not the only one they’ve driven to leave. It seems as though once they get you in that building, they torment you as much as they can get away with until the talent won’t work for them, or at all, anymore.

People in this industry know the hush money they pay talent to shut the fuck up. I know quite a few girls that they’ve taken advantage of and felt the need to give them extra money after the fact. I’ve talked to producers, directors, and talent - the only people saying positive stuff about them are the ones making money off them.

I know what people will say, this girl is looking for attention: if she was looking for attention she’d post here herself. And no she’s not a drug addict; she had some medical issues as a child that would kill her if she takes almost any recreational drug.

This is just a warning to any girls looking to work for them and people looking to push traffic to them. I just hope you’re okay with promoting sites like there’s with people like that.

kink.com is a torture pornography production company. In January 2007 kink.com purchased a large building in San Francisco, in the Mission District, a community that is in need of affordable housing, that has many at-risk youth, and that for many years has been identified as the Latino heart of San Francisco. In February 2007, the Mission Armory Community Collective demonstrated against kink.com's use of a large and valuable piece of San Francisco real estate - for torture pornography production. Instead of using the block-long building for torture pornography, the Mission Armory Community Collective has proposed that we use of the Mission Armory for affordable housing, a community center, and a space for community nonprofits.

Torture and humiliation are commonplace in pornography. Kink.com is where women and some men are filmed for pornography named Men in Pain, Wired Pussy, Hogtied, Water Bondage, Ultimate Surrender, Fucking Machines, Sex and Submission, and Whipped Ass. Pornography like that on kink.com is real action taken against real women. Observing the making of torture pornography at kink.com, author Stephen Elliott commented: " This is not fake. Satine and Donna are truly in role. Satine is feeling submissive and Donna is definitely on top. Donna is hurting Satine; Satine is being hurt."
http://www.salon.com/mwt/feature/2007/02/07/kink/

kink.com advertises filmed prostitution. Prostitution is advertised online on sites like kink.com where it is indistinguishable from pornography. Pornography is a specific type of prostitution, in which prostitution occurs and, among other things, is documented. The women whose prostitution appears in pornography are prostituted women. The Internet is one way that women are trafficked into prostitution.

Another reader of Elliott's Salon.com article said the site was reminiscent of African women's genital mutilation. Why is there such a great silence regarding the torture of women in prostitution during the making of pornography? Here in San Francisco some embrace torture pornography as hip, sexy, liberal. Lots of folks are afraid to criticize pornography for fear of being labelled fundamentalist, antisex, or homophobic. "Yet when we criticize McDonald's for its unhealthy food, environmentally destructive business practices, and targeting of children through manipulative advertising, does anyone ask whether we are "anti-food"? Of course not, because no one conflates McDonald's with food; we recognize that there are many ways to prepare food, and it's appropriate to critique the more toxic varieties. The same holds for pornography; pursuing a healthy sexuality does not mean we have to support toxic pornography." Bob Jensen and Gail Dines http://www.alternet.org/story/47677

The existence of state-sponsored torture is decried by social critics on the Left, yet the identical treatment of women in prostitution is ignored by those same analysts. Many view torture by the United States of prisoners at Abu Ghraib with shock and horror, yet at the same time consider the identical acts perpetrated (and photographed) against prostituted women to be sexual entertainment. Condemning the Bush administration’s tolerance for torture in the war on terror, one journalist noted the “gleeful sadism” of guards at Abu Ghraib. Yet political pundits maintain silence regarding the same gleeful sadism of men toward women and gay men like that seen at kink.com.

Specific acts commonly perpetrated against women in prostitution and pornography are the same as the acts defining what torture is according to international conventions: verbal sexual harassment, unwanted sex acts, sexual mocking, physical sexual harassment such as groping.

For example, the filming of 251 men’s prostitution of Grace Quek (called Annabel Chong) was sold as “The World’s Biggest Gang Bang.” After being edited down to 4 hours, the film became hardcore pornography. The filming of johns assaulting Quek was stopped after 10 hours because she was bleeding internally. For Quek, the film was not an idea, it was not a narrative, it was not a representation. Real johns perpetrated real sexual assaults on her resulting in real physical and psychological injuries.
(Melissa Farley, 2006, Prostitution, Trafficking, and Cultural Amnesia: What We Must Not Know in Order To Keep the Business of Sexual Exploitation Running Smoothly. Yale Journal of Law and Feminism 18:109-144)

It's great to have this new site up, especially considering that Myspace just kicked 29,000 registered sex offenders off their site.
Go to www.foxnews.com

Don't you wonder how many UNregistered sex predators are still hanging out at Myspace?

This site is a sweet firecrackerish 4th of July present. Here's to freedom from pornography and prostitution.

This site really DOES have 101 great, creative, fun, subversive action plans.
Here are the first 10 out of 101:

1. Don’t buy or use pornography or have any form of it in your house.

2. Don’t support companies that sell pornography. (I.e. Video stores that sell it, or hotels that rent or sell it. Porn-free hotels are listed at CleanHotels.com.

3. Don’t allow your partner, children, or anyone in your house to use pornography. If your partner won’t stop using pornography and it is clear they have no intention of doing so, end the relationship. (See information regarding children at the end of this list.)

4. If your partner is willing to consider ceasing to use pornography but is having difficulty doing so, and you want to salvage the relationship, insist that they get professional help. They must understand how it harms them, you, your relationship, and women. Make it clear why they need to stop and that they must do so or you will end the relationship.

5. To help ensure that a partner does not use pornography, or that they are held accountable if they do, you can use Internet filters such as the ones listed at TopTenReviews.com, and/or accountability software such as X3. If the professional help, an Internet filter, and/or accountability software doesn’t result in your partner ceasing to use pornography in a reasonable amount of time, then end the relationship.

6. If you are dating, bring up the issue of pornography early on and make it clear that you won’t tolerate a partner using it and why.

7. Don’t allow others around you to joke about pornography. Call them on it and make it clear the harms of pornography are no joke, and it’s not OK with you for them to make light of them.

8. Take the NoPornPledge, let others know about it, and encourage them to take the pledge themselves.

9. Encourage strict enforcement of rules concerning access or use of pornography in your work environment, or propose and get guidelines implemented if none exist. Solutions for filtering and monitoring pornography in business environments are available from ContentWatch.com.

10. Educate yourself about pornography so you can better educate others about its harms, and more effectively take action against those harms. (See educational resources and links throughout this list and at the bottom of it.)

Justice for the abused children of Mexico!

Please contact Jorge Zepeda at zepeda@diasiete.com to sign a statement of support for Lydia Cacho and to protest the lack of Mexican criminal justice system protection for citizens who report filmed sexual abuse of children.

In retaliation, Succar Kuri's protectors, Kamel Nacif and Mario Marin,arranged to have Lydia Cacho arrested and taken on a torturous 20 hours ride to the state of Puebla, threatened with rape and murder all the way. After this ordeal, her adversaries had a psychiatric evaluation done, which they recently released in an attempt to brand her as crazy and thus influence the Supreme Court. There has already been much interference with the process of justice: death threats against Cacho's first two lawyers, who dropped the case; the disappearance of important evidence; and a recent attempt to assassinate Cacho by sabotaging the armored car she rides in.

In 2006 Mexican journalist Lydia Cacho wrote a book called The Demons of Eden, exposing a child pornography ring in Cancun which involved the sexual abuse of many young children and the production of child porn videos for sale in the United States and Europe. One of the men involved sued her for defamation and arranged a judicial kidnapping and she has since been threatened her death so often that she is now under 24 hour police protection

Refusing to be intimidated, Lydia Cacho sued those involved, including Mario Marin , Governor of the state of Puebla, and Kamel Nacif , a big sweatshop operator known as the "Denim King," for violating her human rights. In January 2 nd 2007 she was found not guilty in the defamation case; now her own lawsuit went trough Congress and is before the Mexican Supreme Court. A conviction in the case could be a breakthrough not only for the violated children of Cancun but for millions of others, including journalists, who suffer from the collusion of Mexican government officials and criminals. However, the culture of impunity is very strong in Mexico and international pressure is needed to bring such powerful men to justice.

What is at stake?
Nothing less than the integrity of the criminal justice system is at stake here. The persecution of Lydia Cacho and of the children who testified against Succar Kuri has reinforced the opinion of the eight out of ten Mexicans who do not report crimes because they know the authorities won't protect them. The Courtmust recognize the evidence that implicates the authorities in Puebla in child pornography and trafficking networks, and hold them accountable for their actions. We urge all Judges of the Supreme Court to recognize existing evidence and rule accordingly.

This is an historic opportunity for the Supreme Court judges to show that the Mexican people can trust in the rule of law, and to show the world that the purpose of the Mexican criminal justice system is to protect citizens and their human rights, not to perpetuate corruption and impunity.

Signed by:

Alfonso Cuarón, Alejandro González Iñarritu, Guillermo del Toro, Luis Mandoki, Berta Navarro,Gael García Bernal, Diego Luna, Lorena Maza, Mariana Rodríguez, Dana Rotberg, Carlos Reygadas, Sasha Sokol, Daniel Gimenez Cacho, Kate del Castillo, , Patricia reyes Espíndola, Carmen Gimenez Cacho, Gabriela García Luna, Elena Poniatowska, Denise Dresser, Angeles Ochoa,Sergio Aguayo, Jorge Zepeda Patterson, Alberto Ruy Sánchez, Carmen Boullosa, Sabina Berman,Humberto Musachio, Enrique Berruga, Maria Idalia Gómez, Salvador Camarena, Salvador Frausto. Jenaro Villamil, Debora Holtz, Héctor de Mauleón, Alejandro Paez, Rita Varela, Marco Lara Kahr, Cri Rodríguez,Huberto Bátiz, Berta Hiriart, Clara Jusidman, Angeles Mastretta Carlos Fazio, Clara Scherer, Diana Washington Valdéz, Epigmenio Ibarra, Federico Campbell, Jordi Soler,Guadalupe Loaeza, Héctor (Eko) de la Garza, Jorge Fernández Menéndez, Grupo Elefante, Saul "Jaguares",Liliana Felipe, Jesusa Rodríguez, María de los Angeles Moreno, María Elena Chapa, María Teresa Priego, Marie Claire Acosta,Marina Arvizu, Mónica Lavín, Patricia Mercado, Ricardo Rocha, Rosa Nissan, Rosaura Barahona, Sara Sefchovich, Sergio González Rodríguez, Maximiliano Vega Tato, Alberto Begné, Margarita De Orellana, María Consuelo Mejía, Blanca Rico, Alicia Leal,Gerardo Garcìa
Together with their US supporters Amnesty Intel.USA, CPJ New York.

Prostitution Research & Education joins with UN Watch click here and The Institute for Religion and Public Policy, the Coalition Against Trafficking in Women click here and other groups to demand her immediate release.

Ms. Huda has noted that it is essential for governments to acknowledge the role of men's demand for prostituted women in addressing trafficking. (United Nations, Commission on Human Rights, Report of the Special Rapporteur on the Human Rights Aspects of the Victims of Trafficking in Persons, Especially Women and Children, 9 U.N. Doc. E/CN.4/2006/62, Feb. 20, 2006. Sigma Huda is a powerful voice for women's human rights.

1. Work to help women gain supportive housing and jobs that pay a living wage

2. Advocate for shelters and clinics equipped and staffed to offer medical and psychological treatment for women

3. Educate young girls and boys on the harms of prostitution and how to avoid becoming a victim of sexual exploitation

4. Challenge society’s sexist views of women. Fight against pornography and other forms of media that continue to objectify women

5. Change language- stop using words such as “pimp”, “ho” and “whore” and challenge your friends when they use similar language

6. Support legislation aimed at stopping sexual exploitation and expanding options for prostituted individuals

7. Make sure the needs of sexually exploited individuals are being addressed in the domestic violence community, the sexual assault community, among homeless rights advocates and among individuals working to fight substance addiction

8. Pressure local CAPS and police enforcement to go after those purchasing sex instead of those selling it

9. Hold media and financial institutions accountable in regards to the ads they run that promote prostitution

10. Raise public awareness! Host book clubs, film screenings and art projects to raise awareness about the issue. Also join in local awareness raising initiatives such as the upcoming Rescue and Restore campaign.

They're making money, they're happy, and they're there voluntarily. Isn't that what all pimps coerce the women they control to say? Before the woman's physical safety is assured, and before violations of her human rights are addressed - prostitution apologists pressure us to debate whether or not she is prostituting voluntarily. This is a situation where most would agree that the women were coerced by poverty, debt, and/or prior domestic abuse - yet because money is paid for sexual exploitation, and because the women smile - then it's voluntary trafficking.

What is wrong with this picture?

Go to click here

Then scroll down to the May 7 entry, underneath “Bush calls Queen a Mother” and you’ll see Ethel’s comments about gentlemen’s clubs. Here's her startup:
"There are a lot of billboards on the way to my school that advertise Gentlemen's clubs. They all have pictures of women who are dressed up like prostitutes and look like they are on roofies. I don't think these men are gentlemen, but I guess gentleman really means a man who likes to pay for women to service him...."

What can you do?
1) See the movie Black Gold
2) BOYCOTT Starbuck's coffee until they sign an agreement with Ethiopian coffee cooperatives that gives the growers a fair price (a 1% increase in the price of Ethiopian coffee on the world market will result in billions of dollars going to Ethiopia and will enable them to survive without US economic aid).
3) When you discuss the needs of women and children who are trafficked, always address the issue of economic justice. Trafficking does not exist in a vacuum separate from other sexism, racism, and poverty.
4) Locate some Ethiopian coffee that is FAIR TRADE coffee in your town. It is some of the best in the world.
Melissa Farley

"Who needs a brain when you have these?"
- -message on an Abercrombie & Fitch T-shirt for young women

In the recent shootings at an Amish schoolhouse in rural
Pennsylvania and a large public high school in Colorado, the
killers went out of their way to separate the girls from the boys,
and then deliberately attacked only the girls.

Ten girls were shot and five killed at the Amish school. One girl
was killed and a number of others were molested in the Colorado
attack.

In the widespread coverage that followed these crimes, very little
was made of the fact that only girls were targeted. Imagine if a
gunman had gone into a school, separated the kids up on the basis
of race or religion, and then shot only the black kids. Or only
the white kids. Or only the Jews.

There would have been thunderous outrage. The country would have
first recoiled in horror, and then mobilized in an effort to
eradicate that kind of murderous bigotry. There would have been
calls for action and reflection. And the attack would have been
seen for what it really was: a hate crime.

None of that occurred because these were just girls, and we have
become so accustomed to living in a society saturated with
misogyny that violence against females is more or less to be
expected. Stories about the rape, murder and mutilation of women
and girls are staples of the news, as familiar to us as weather
forecasts. The startling aspect of the Pennsylvania attack was
that this terrible thing happened at a school in Amish country,
not that it happened to girls.

The disrespectful, degrading, contemptuous treatment of women is
so pervasive and so mainstream that it has just about lost its
ability to shock. Guys at sporting events and other public venues
have shown no qualms about raising an insistent chant to nearby
women to show their breasts. An ad for a major long-distance
telephone carrier shows three apparently naked women holding a
billing statement from a competitor. The text asks, "When was the
last time you got screwed?"

An ad for Clinique moisturizing lotion shows a woman's face with
the lotion spattered across it to simulate the climactic shot of a
porn video.

We have a problem. Staggering amounts of violence are unleashed on
women every day, and there is no escaping the fact that in the
most sensational stories, large segments of the population are
titillated by that violence. Weíve been watching the sexualized
image of the murdered 6-year-old JonBenet Ramsey for 10 years.
JonBenet is dead. Her mother is dead. And weíre still watching the
video of this poor child prancing in lipstick and high heels.

What have we learned since then? That thereís big money to be made
from thongs, spandex tops and sexy makeovers for little girls. In
a misogynistic culture, itís never too early to drill into the
minds of girls that what really matters is their appearance and
their ability to please men sexually.

A girl or woman is sexually assaulted every couple of minutes or
so in the U.S. The number of seriously battered wives and
girlfriends is far beyond the ability of any agency to count.
Weíre all implicated in this carnage because the relentless
violence against women and girls is linked at its core to the
wider societyís casual willingness to dehumanize women and girls,
to see them first and foremost as sexual vessels ó objects ó and
never, ever as the equals of men.

"Once you dehumanize somebody, everything is possible," said Taina
Bien-AimÈ, executive director of the womenís advocacy group
Equality Now.

That was never clearer than in some of the extreme forms of
pornography that have spread like nuclear waste across mainstream
America. Forget the embarrassed, inhibited raincoat crowd of the
old days. Now Mr. Solid Citizen can come home, log on to this $7
billion mega-industry and get his kicks watching real women being
beaten and sexually assaulted on Web sites with names
like "Ravished Bride" and "Rough Sex -- Where Whores Get Owned."

Then, of course, there's gangsta rap, and the video games where
the players themselves get to maul and molest women, the rise of
pimp culture (the Academy Award-winning song this year was ìItís
Hard Out Here for a Pimpî), and on and on.

You're deluded if you think this is all about fun and games. It's
all part of a devastating continuum of misogyny that at its
farthest extreme touches down in places like the one-room Amish
schoolhouse in normally quiet Nickel Mines, Pa.