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Asian politics
Banyan's notebook
Making sex work safe
Stigmata
Oct 20th 2010, 7:07 by Banyan
MORE than two years ago a report prepared for the United Nations by an independent “Asia Commission on AIDS” confirmed what had long been obvious to people working in the field: that “men who buy sex are the single-most powerful driving force in Asia’s HIV epidemics.” It estimated that about 10m Asian women sold sex to 75m men, who in turn had a further 50m regular partners.
Yet it took until this month to convene a meeting that brought together government officials, the UN, NGOs and several dozen of the region’s sex-workers to discuss responses to the HIV epidemic. Eight countries (Cambodia, China, Fiji, Indonesia, Myanmar, Pakistan, Papua New Guinea and Thailand) were represented. The meeting was held in Pattaya, a Thai seaside resort (selected not for its aptness—it has one of Thailand’s highest concentrations of go-go bars, massage parlours and other shop windows for the sex trade—but because nearby Bangkok is still under a state of emergency).
It was the wholehearted participation of the sex-workers that made the meeting seem a breakthrough. In the past they have tended to be excluded from such international gatherings, partly because of language difficulties (“We learned English from our clients,” as one Thai sex-worker, a man, complained), and partly out of an attitude of official condescension, which saw the sex-workers more as the problem than as an important part of the solution.
Despite that, there has already been great progress. Thailand’s is perhaps best-known. The first country in Asia to launch the “100% condom-use programme” in the early 1990s, it managed to cut HIV prevalence sharply. The danger now is of complacency.
More surprisingly, Myanmar has an HIV-prevention scheme seen as a model. The “Targeted Outreach Programme” is a “peer-to-peer” service with 18 drop-in centres around the country, where 350 staff, mostly former or present sex-workers themselves, dispense advice, information, treatment for sexually transmitted infections and discounted condoms. Kay Thi Win, a manager of the programme, says that HIV prevalence among sex-workers has dropped to just over 9%. (The UN’s own figures show a drop from over 30% in 2000-06 to 15% in 2007 and 18% in 2008.)
However, a Burmese sex-worker made a passionate intervention at the conference lamenting the stigma her profession carries. There as elsewhere, sex-workers are subject to harassment, violence and extortion. And the police and officials who should be protecting them are often the worst perpetrators.
An example that has drawn a lot of recent attention is Cambodia, recognised for its success in bring down HIV prevalence, partly through its own 100% condom-use programme. But a 2008 law on “the Suppression of Human Trafficking and Sexual Exploitation” led to the closure of brothels and the shift of the sex trade to bars and other places, complicating HIV-prevention measures. Worse, according to Human Rights Watch, it has helped “police abuse sex-workers with impunity”. They have been beaten, raped and robbed—or forced to pay a bribe—to free themselves.
This is an extreme example of two problems besetting efforts to help sex-workers. One is that, in most places, sex work is illegal. As a recent Economist debate showed, arguments for and against decriminalising prostitution are fierce. But as long as it remains a criminal act, sex workers will be vulnerable to arbitrary abuse.
Second, the debate about sex work has become drowned in an international campaign against human trafficking. That campaign fosters the assumption that all sex-workers are plying their trade against their will. But most migrant sex-workers have left home for good reasons of their own—that they prefer to work away from their families, and where the commercial opportunities are better. This is a debate as old as the oldest profession: some see those who sell sex as always inevitably the victims of exploitation; but those seeking to have their voices heard in Pattaya wanted recognition as independent actors who have made their own choices, but demand the dignity and rights anybody deserves.
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Like alcohol (think 1920s prohibition) and drugs (think home-grown marijuana), sex is ever-present and will not go away. If you do not want it, you can ignore it. But no-one can ban it out of existence, only inflate its market costs. See "Sex,Drugs, and Economics" for discussion.
The Western world is on a path to understand this and liberalise and rationalise the market, provided the fundamentalists - Islamist and mid-west bible thumpers - do not drag us down first.
All the predictions made by scientists (working for the Pharma) failed to materialize such as the depopulation of Africa, the spread of AIDS into the straight population of Europe and US, etcetera: what else do we need to realize the HIV-AIDS is but another clever marketing strategy?
I read this: “men who buy sex are the single-most powerful driving force in Asia’s HIV epidemics" and must question the sources.
Actually the results of the past several years of the Bangkok Metropolitan Authority's HIV/AIDS Monitoring Program does not find sex tourism to be the primary contributor. This monitoring program is a leader along with similar monitoring programs throughout Asia. The single most powerful driving force for the spread of this disease in Bangkok is among youth at the vocational high schools, followed by mother-to-child infections. They found that prostitutes are some of the best informed and most proactive in terms of condom use and other protections.
Why is it that the UN could get correct information through WHO but then ignore it in favor of a Western personal morality-driven "hunch" and organize a meeting based on old assumptions that may have had more validity in the 1980s? This is clearly just jockeying for funds and a disgrace to HIV/AIDS monitoring and public health workers. Funding for such conferences demonstrates utter lethargy.
Sincerely,
Dr. Donald Persons
Former Foreign Expert
ASEAN Institute for Health Development
Mahidol University
Thailand
Sex worker, the oldest profession should be accorded dignity and respect equally the same as the other professions as long as it is being carried out fairly and humanly for a reason. All of us are equally created by God on this planet.
Legalise & decriminalise prostitution. Afterall its the 'oldest profession' in the world. The sooner the powers-that-be, globally, acknowledge that sex is strongest & most powerful human force, the sooner they will see the rationale in legalising prostitution.
Sex workers are just as human & equal as anyone else. So treat 'em with respect & fairness & protect them from predators. Once brothels become licenced & supervised entities & sex traffic is regulated & controlled, HIV & STDs will come down dramaticaly & the world will be a "happy" place once more..
It's time for a sexual revolution of the pragmatic & logical kind..
@roddalitz
I wonder what the Christian fundamentalists have to say about Saint Mary Magdalene?
@Bromide
While total population statistics doesn't show depopulation, age-group demography of sub-Saharan African countries shows the ravages of AIDS epidemic as clearly as mid-20th Century European demography showed the impact of World War I.
@Nirvana-bound
The perennial problem with the Oldest Profession has always been that the demand for its services consistently and greatly exceeded supply, resulting in many people being forced involuntarily into the said Profession to make up the shortfall. How do you propose to remedy THAT problem?
I'm sure not all sex workers are victims of exploitation, but the ones who are are not very likely to show up to this conference, are they?
I think we ought to start thinking of prostituted women as people. Commodifying alcohol and drugs is NOT the same as commodifying human bodies. I believe that we can and we should start moving towards a society that views the purchase of a woman's body as atrocious and a violation of her human rights. We can do this by decriminalizing the women, and criminalizing the pimps and the johns.
@Bromide
You bring such an interesting and valid point to this discussion. What is true of the research is that there is a very capitalist end-goal in mind, whether it is selling condoms, selling HIV/AIDS vaccines (which they don't seem to have yet), or perhaps selling women's bodies. It is very problematic.
I know that Canada, where I live as a citizen, is a source country for sex tourists that go to Asia to fulfill some make-believe sexual fantasy based on stereotypes of Asian women, and these stereotypes are perpetuated by pornography, and now by mainstream media.
It's not about religion. Prostitution is not women's liberation. What it is, is male entitlement to women's bodies. We should be providing exit and prevention services to women so that they aren't forced to prostitute. In doing this, we would be supporting their freedom, safety, and health - something that inadequate harm reduction cannot do.
By definition, prostitution is the commodification of a person's body into a product to be sold and used and, as a result, despite our protestations, we are naive to think that a sex worker will ever be treated with the dignity and respect their humanity deserves.