Prostitute Speaks on Sex Industry
April 9, 2007 - 1:00amThe normally taboo topics of peep shows, pornography, stripping, seduction and domination were all fair game during sex worker Sarah Katherine Lewis’ presentation at Carol Tatkon Center last Friday night.
Lewis, who is promoting her book Indecent: How I Make It and Fake It as a Girl for Hire, has worked in the sex industry for 12 years after first securing a job at Butterscotch’s Live Lingerie Adult Tanning at age 23. Short on cash and discouraged after years of minimum-wage work, Lewis decided to try her luck at the cryptically-named Seattle establishment.
“I pretty much assumed that I was applying for a job where I would wear a bustier and clean tanning beds. I had no idea about the masturbation. I had never seen a man masturbate before and had no idea how that worked. So I learned a lot,” she said.
After reading a graphic and poignant excerpt detailing her initiation into the industry, Lewis opened up the floor for questions.
Lewis, who was raised as a feminist and often frequented the women’s studies section of the public library, claims that she initially saw her position as a sex worker as a means of economic empowerment. But after several years in the industry, the financial benefits began to be overshadowed by the detrimental social and emotional effects.
“I started thinking about love and started thinking about what sex really is,” she said. “I started thinking about what that was actually for, and I thought: it’s to communicate love, it’s to communicate affection, it’s to communicate lust, it’s to communicate trust ... And it occurred to me that the sex industry was this disturbing perversion of that ... There was no love, and there was no caring; there was no gentleness. There was nothing erotic about it in any way, and the communication was all lies ... Frankly, it broke my heart. And that’s when I started writing my book.”
Though she said that sex work is part of the larger problem of commodity fetishism — that is, the reduction of human relations to that of producer and consumer — Lewis also said, “The difference between the ugliness of me not seeing the fry-guy [at McDonald’s] as a human being and a guy who gets jacked off by me not seeing me as a human being ... [is that] it enters such an intimate, sexual realm, which is, by definition, something you do to get close to another human being. I think sex work is a really efficient way of alienating human beings from each other.”
Lewis went on to cite the experience of sex workers who have trouble differentiating between sex acts with clients and sex acts with romantic partners.
“I had always viewed the sex industry as both a valuable means of income for women of lower economic backgrounds, though likewise had believed making a human being into a commodity was despicable,” said Kristen Alldredge ’09. “Sarah made an excellent point that, while the sex industry is exploitative of women, it goes both ways. She said she was equally exploitative of the male customers, whom she eventually failed to view as humans.”
Lewis, who is still active in the sex industry, also struggles with her underlying ideology, at times filled with “self-loathing” for allowing herself to be incorporated into an oppressive patriarchal system and at others deciding that “the most feminist thing I can do today is earn the money to pay my rent.”
“When I wake up and I feel the best, I think, a) I’m going to pay my rent and buy food for myself — that’s a profoundly feminist act for a working-class woman, is to take care of herself — and then b) I’m going to use the money I make and the time that I have to go out and spread the word. So that’s how I can be at peace with myself, but it varies.”
According to Lewis, one of her goals in publishing her memoir was to humanize sex workers in the eyes of those who believe they are not worthy of legal protection. As an example, she described the difficulty of working under Seattle law, which allows performers to strip naked but forbids simulated sex acts onstage. According to Lewis, the subjective nature of this statute, combined with law-enforcement quotas, can lead to selective issuing of tickets, which many strippers are wary of contesting for fear of openly revealing their status as sex-workers.
The presentation was coordinated by Ashwin Iyengar ’09, a Cornell Gay-Straight Alliance co-facilitator, and funded by Haven, an administrative network for Cornell’s Lesbian Gay Bisexual Transgender and Questioning groups. Iyengar, who first came across Lewis’ book in the gender and sexuality section of Borders, ascribed Lewis’ appeal to her unique perspective.
“She’s not the stereotypical, ditzy ... ‘hooker,’” Iyengar said. “At the same time she’s not like the protagonist in a lot of books I’ve read, where it’s the doctoral student working on her dissertation, and she happens to strip on the side. She does this for a living.”
Heroin addict does not equal feminist
Sarah Katherine Lewis should admit that it was her raging addiction to heroin that prompted her start and continue her course of prostitution, lingerie modelling, and stripping.
As nice as it is to tie it up into a feminist curiosity, it is not the truth. Her judgement and reasoning for getting into the business was her need of her next fix. This was publicly documented by her on her web journal for years. It is sad that she cannot own up to the truth: that she is yet another drug user looking for means to an end. Whether you tie that up for yourself with a feminist bow or not, selling sex for drugs is nothing new or interesting or remotely feminist.
I agree, she invalidates her
I agree, she invalidates her message because she's being dishonest about why she chose sex work. (Because of her drug addiction.) She treats her feminist readers like tricks, telling them what they want to hear. It insults us.
That's pretty vicious of you
Even if she did get into sexwork to support a drug habit -- which she absolutely did not -- how does that make her an insincere feminist? Some people choose soul-sucking jobs to support a habit of cable television. Does that invalidate their work experiences?
I think what the above
I think what the above poster means is that since the author was not truthful about her drug use, it makes one wonder what else she's not telling us. I can see both sides. I read the book, it's interesting, she's a good writer. But I don't think she's really got a "message" of any kind, it's just stories. I went and looked at her blog, and she seems very troubled and conflicted. So she should stick to writing about her own life and working out her issues, and not try to position herself as a feminist leader or anything.
i don't think she was ever
i don't think she was ever trying to be a feminist leader. she just wrote about her *personal* experiences in the sex industry, and her *personal* opinions on it.
Heroin addict does not equal not-feminist, either.
The book was largely about Lewis's industry experience, not about her personal life, which is probably where she places her past tangles with substance abuse. Even regardless of substance abuse's role in her career, her book has excellent points and insight that can't be devalued by one person's prejudice.
As someone who has read her
As someone who has read her LJ for several years, I can accurately say you are full of it. Her experiences with heroin did not pre-date her introduction into the sex industry, and were short lived. Addiction was simply not her reason for earning money the way she did.
absurd
Just because you were a reader of her previous Livejournal incarnation does not mean you have any understanding of the woman herself. She is most certainly not a role-model feminist. More likely, she is representative of the same soul-sucking thieves that assisted in her initial descent. Her writing skills are impressive, but do not mistake that for fact.
I was surprised to see her on the lecture roster for this year, and, while I enjoyed listening, know better than to trust any of her writings as truth. There's something truly disingenuous afoot. That's a shame, because actually opening up her life may have proven to be a much grander read.
I agree, she's usuing the
I agree, she's usuing the same skills she learned in prostutution - editing and dissembling, using flattery and pretending to be "honest", when it's really just leading us on and wearing a mask. I hate being treated like a trick, literary or otherwise, it's so condescending. And what's sad is that she's probably not very in touch with the fact that she's doing it. It just seems normal to her.
Sarah Katherine's Intellectual Flexibility
Surprise! Sarah Katherine has told many lies in her LameJournal.
The only reason she's a "feminist" now is because it pays. As a long-time reader of her journal you should know that.
Fallacious Conclusions
What would her drug use have to do with the conclusions she reached due to her experience as a sex worker? Why would drug use make her any less a feminist? That's like saying that my bulemia negates my experiences climbing Mount Everest. One fact does not negate the hypothesis. Logic tells us that.
And where are you getting your info on her drug use? What she relates in her book in no way resembles the story you're telling about her getting into the industry to support her habit and I doubt anything she said in her speech lead you to that conclusion. Do you happen to know something the rest of the world doesn't? Do you know her dealer, perhaps?
So, what we have here is an erroneous conclusion based on an unfounded rumor. I hope none of you are journalism majors.
She posted about buying illegal drugs in Mexico in January.
I'd call that a relapse, for someone who has supposedly "kicked".
http://markedformetal.livejournal.com/72728.html
Quote: "BUT, I'm stoked because I just successfully purchased pharmaceuticals on the black market without getting robbed or stabbed, despite my shameful inability to speak Spanish. Hence my look of weary relief....
And no, you can't have any of my drugs! They lie when they say it's easy to buy drugs in Mexico. Yeah--codeine, and other woo-woo small-time second-tier dope that you could get just as easily in America by complaining of back-strain or premenstrual syndrome to your general practitioner (unless you're like me and it says "BEWARE: DRUG SEEKING" all over your medical records--but I digress). Anyhow, codeine wasn't what I was looking for. I wanted something specific and I got it. So nyah."
I think you need to post the
I think you need to post the whole truth, not just the part that backs up your arguement. Many people gets their meds from Mexico and Canada either by traveling there themselves or via internet. Not all of these drugs are illegal street drugs, they are medicines that are cheaper to get outside of the US. I think you could have researched more and figured out that she wasn't trying to buy smack.
Aside from that, your attacks on the author border on violent, and I'm left wondering what else is really bothering you? Do you know her personally and have a great dislike for her? The voice of your posts come off as a person scorned who needs some sort of retaliation.
Her past drug use does not make her expose on the sex industry any less valid. While reading the book, I, too, wanted more of her personal life revealed; however, the purpose of the book seems to be simply to show a view of the sex industry. And I also do not understand how someone's drug use rules them out as a feminist or any other variety of definitions one chooses to live by.
I only hope you loose the blinders that shade your world so that you may get more out of all your experiences in the future. To allow one small thing to take away from something that is larger and has so much more to offer really is quite limiting.
I saw her when she came here
I saw her when she came here to speak, and I've looked at her journal, but I've never spoken to her, so no, I'm not a pissy ex-girlfriend or something.
And drug use in itself doesn't make someone's opinion invalid. But lying about it by omission does. And I'm sorry, saying she didn't have space to include in the book it is so specious. If she had spent five hundred words, in a preface or postscipt even, acknowledging that the issue existed, that would have been one thing. But she's pretending it didn't happen.
I don't like dishonesty and hypocrisy especially by someone who's selling something. Ms Lewis's book reminds me of one of those Christian right women who had an abortion and then "saw the light" and now makes a living going around telling everyone how bad abortion is. Now that the author is done using the sex industry to get money from men, she wants to milk women for money, and she slants her story to do that. It's just more of the same. How does this support/empower other women? It doesn't.
You certainly have drawn a
You certainly have drawn a lot of interesting and viperous conclusions about her life and how she lives it now, especially with having never even spoken to the woman. I hope someday when you're in need of a little compassion in regards to your own mistakes, someone is more generous in their review of you than you've been with her.
'pharmaceuticals' as in,
'pharmaceuticals' as in, lets see, medication maybe?
Because busloads of senior citizens never, ever trek north into Canada to purchase 'pharmaceuticals' for exactly the same purpose?
Oh.
Wait.
http://temagami.carleton.ca/jmc/cnews/13022004/connections/c3.html
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-srv/politics/issues2004/battleground_midwest.htm
http://www.google.com/search?hl=en&q=%22senior%22+%2Bbus+%2Bcanada+%2Bmedication&btnG=Google+Search&meta=
Oh dear.
BAD granny.
Sorry Sarah
Space constraints lead to massive editing when writing ANY book. Given 231 pages to write on a topic that you spent 10+ years of your life at precludes you from including 30 minute updates on your life. Most of her experiences in New Orleans were edited out because it was still very emotional for her and there was little space to print beyond what was relevant to the topic. Same with her Bi-Sexuality, which is hinted at but never 'announced'. I bought a book that gives an honest look at the sex industry from one person's point of view. That's what I got. The main point of the book is that she got into sex-work for the money. She could have spent 10+ years working 50 hours a week as a Barrista at Starbucks but instead she decided to employ herself.
So if she was a diabetic and had to resort to sex-work to afford her insulin shots, would that invalidate her as a feminist sex worker (or her message in general) to you? Lewis may not included her drug history in the book. Like many aspects of her life it is there for you if you dig deeper. She herself admits that she started her heroin troubles 5 years AFTER she started sex work and years later now that she is no longer using she STILL does sex work. This invalidates your argument right there.
Sadly - your post seems to be directed at "Who should be labeled a Feminist and who should not; because of their past histories" Lets leave that kind of thinking to the politicians "Who should or should not be members of the (insert political affiliation here) party because of their past histories"
Lewis considers herself a Feminist because she decided to employ herself and take charge of her life, taking it out of the hands of the economic powers that hold many to slave wage jobs. In the end who can judge? I consider myself a Caucasian - but if you were to dig deeply into my past... The book is a memoir - not an autobiography. Case closed.
I suspect most of the people
I suspect most of the people commenting won't know a thing about life on this planet for another decade or two.
Er...
Drug addiction is a disease. Like any disease I can think of, it can affect people of any philosophy or ideology.
A person can be a feminist and be a diabetic, an epileptic, an anorexic, an alcoholic, a heroin addict or loads of other hard to handle diseases. Some feminists will overcome them, some will manage them and some will die from them.
Compassion for those struggling with an affliction - be it cancer or heroin addiction or whatever - seems to track quite well with my definition of feminism. Respect for those who have overcome such obstacles does as well.
"Feminism is the radical notion that women are people."
People are flawed and at times our victories of today are earned against our mistakes of yesterday. But those victories should garner respect - even when those people are women.
"If she had spent five hundred words, in a preface"
"If she had spent five hundred words, in a preface or postscipt even, acknowledging that the issue existed, that would have been one thing"
You really know nothing, don't you?
Do you know what a publisher does?
Because apparently not.
Who knows if the publisher told her to omit that when she really didn't want to.
And who cares if she "had a herione addiction". What if Martin Luther King JR smoked pot?
WHO CARES.
Does that make his message any less valid?
What if Martin Luther King JR was actually affiliated with White-Power supremists? Would that make his message any less relevant? I don't think so.
Now. I'm not saying Sarah-Katherine is some revolutionary. But you're saying that she's a fake with no proof or validation what-so-ever.
Next time, before you have the urge to say something?
Think before type/speak.