Segment 1 - Featured Interview
Our guest was Elizabeth Wood, feminist sociologist, activist and writer. She is assistant professor of sociology at Nassau Community College on Long Island (New York) and co-founder of Sex In The Public Square, a community-building web site dedicated to expanding the space for open, public discussion of sex in all its manifestations. She is a strong believer in the importance of maintaining and expanding public resources, in the importance of sex in human lives and communities, and in the power of organized individuals to make change in the world. She lives in New York City and is beginning work on book about the development and maintenance of the sex commons.
Sex In The Public Square recently held an online public forum titled their forum Sex Work, Trafficking and Human Rights. The forum addressed a range of topics including labor rights, individual freedoms, and immigration, and impact of global consumer driven markets. Participants included academics, activists, sex workers and interested readers.
Segment 2 - March 3rd International Sex Workers’ Rights Day & Music Video
March 3rd, International Day for Sex Workers’ Rights was founded by a sex workers’ organization in Kolkata, India named Durbar Mahila Samanwaya Committee (DMSC). Founded in 1995, the DMSC is an exclusive forum of 65,000 sex workers (male, female and transgender) and their children. As part of an on-going programme to put sex workers rights on the global agenda in the new millennium, the DMSC organized a carnival of sex workers from March 3-6, 2001 in Kolkata. It was a meeting ground for sex workers from across the country and beyond, as well as organisations and individuals committed to the rights of sex workers. This Mela provided a unique opportunity to discuss various issues ranging from sex and sexuality, state and patriarchy, rights of minorities and decriminalization of the sex industry. The sex workers there felt strongly that sex workers should have a day that needed to be observed by all sex workers globally. As such, during the Carnival it was proposed to observed march 3rd as Sex Worker Rights Day.
The San Francisco Sex Worker Film and Arts Festival premiered a sex worker anthem, Courtney Trouble’s “The Burnout,” a music video by Scarlot Harlot and Courtney Trouble in English, Chinese and Thai.
In this video, a ‘day in Courtney’s life’ parallels her journey from phone sex to sexual representation/pornography as well as her political journey, interwoven with sex worker demonstrations, clips and photos from various sex worker rights organizations. This music video reflects a personal and local story, and a political story that reaches out to individuals and organizations which resist discrimination and work towards social justice and human rights for sex workers. Many find a common voice in Courtney Trouble’s frustration, pride and defiance.
“How soon I got over, waiting alone at home for the telephone. Why do you care…you can’t see me…don’t wanna know me at all but I know you wanna get off.”
Trouble’s frustration evolves into a recognition of her mission to ’seize the means of production.’
“It’s just like anything else, it’s just a job, but we’ve got the guts to profit off our own skin. They won’t acknowledge us until we own enough to control it. They won’t respect us until we give them no other choice.”
You can view the video here.
Music
Goodbye Cruel World - Hormonally Yours - Shakespeares Sister
I Don’t Care - Hormonally Yours - Shakespeares Sister
The Trouble With Andre - Hormonally Yours - Shakespeares Sister
The Burnout - Courtney Trouble
My 16th Apology - Hormonally Yours - Shakespeares Sister
Listen
Download the show here - http://secure.ckut.ca/64/mp3.20080305.18.00-19.00.m3u
[...] Wednesday night I was interviewed by Seska Lee on Audio Smut, a feminist radio collective that broadcasts on CKUT in [...]
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