Episode 96: Laura Ramirez of Af3irm on decolonizing "sex work"

On this episode of the en(gender)ed podcast, our guest is Laura Ramirez, the Program Coordinator at Coalition Against Trafficking in Women (CATW).  In that role and as a member of Af3irm, a transnational feminist organization, Laura speaks to us today about the ways in which health care policy and, in particular, COVID-19 or the coronavirus impacts human and sex trafficking, prostitution and pornography..  We will explore the ways in which the global demand for prostitution puts women and girls at particularly high risk of harm and exacerbates systemic gender disparities in income, wealth, mobility, and health outcomes.

During our conversation, Laura and I referenced the following resources and topics:

• The difference between "sex trafficking" and "human trafficking" and the definition offered by the Palermo Protocol
• Sex trafficking as a gendered crime given that over 90% of global victims are women and girls
• "Sex work" and labor rights
• NYC's proposed bill to decriminalize prostitution
• The difference between legalization or decriminalization of prostitution and the Equality or Nordic Model
• The work that New Yorkers for the Equality Model is doing to oppose the decriminalization bill
• The impact of COVID-19 on the prostitution industry across the world
• How the Nordic model has shifted the shame from those prostituted to the buyers as a deterrent to prostitution
• Pornhub's offer of free premium porn as a response to the COVID-19 pandemic and mask donation
• How coronavirus porn is going viral
• The recently passed "Child Parent Security Act" in NYS which legalizes commercial surrogacy
• NYC's "Sex Worker's Pop-Up" that is sponsored by the Open Society Foundations

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