Speaker 1: 0:00

Hello and welcome back to Behind a Padder Podcast with me, pulse and Victoria. So last week we talked about my story, about how I was charged with brothel keeping and just all the details and how it really affected me, and it still does to this day, sadly. I also forgotten to mention about how previously I did start a podcast with somebody and that relationship was already breaking down but the police interference made it break down even more, made it break down even more um to find out they were quite honestly anti-sex work, and found out a few more things about them, about how, um, they're not really wanting or open to the idea of what the UK government recently passed with their women's bill. And they were the ones who told a bunch of clients my story, which they had no right to do whatsoever, which obviously impacted me massively. And we did a bunch of podcast episodes I think maybe 10, maybe a little bit more. One of those episodes was the beginning of how I came into sex work and the police took that as evidence. I don't like I don't know why they would take that as evidence, honestly, because yes, it does show how I got into sex work, but it doesn't show that I was like trafficked or anything like that. I was a, very honestly, silly child when I got into sex work. Silly child when I got into sex work and I think after this episode I'm probably gonna tell and share my experience of how I got into sex work. And it's a doozy, it really is. So, yeah, I just thought I'd mention about that because I just it was one of the few things they took as like evidence for whatever reason. It's so weird and just the thought of the police listening to me talking about how I was a little deviant, shitting on, shitting on camera at the age of 15.

Speaker 1: 2:47

Yeah, I very much did explore sex work very young and I do not recommend it. I don't really recommend you getting into sex work in the first place. There is a lot of negatives, a lot that will follow you throughout your life if you do dive into sex work in general. So, yeah, I'm definitely not one for promoting sex work. I will happily talk about my job and what the pros and cons are and talk about how it definitely should be decriminalized for the people who love it and the people who have to do it to survive. And, yeah, decriminalization is definitely the way.

Speaker 1: 3:44

So what we're going to talk about now is what does brothel keeping actually mean and why it's so vague, so dangerous and so consistently used to target women like me. So we're gonna talk about how the law is genuinely being used as a weapon not to stop harm. Not to stop harm but to criminalize connection. And you're listening to behind the battle podcast me posting victoria. I think I've already said this, but we can say it again. That's fine. So we've talked about the knock at the door, the lovely 20 police officers, the riot van the cell, the interview.

Speaker 1: 4:40

In Scotland it's called section 11 of criminal law consolidation Scotland act of 1995. In England and Wales, because obviously we all have to be different, it's section 33a of the sexual offenses act 1956. That is ridiculously old. So they both say the same thing more or less that if two or more people working together from the same premises or offering sexual services, even for safety, even by choice, even just for company, that's a brothel. Now again, this doesn't have to be, they don't have to be there at the same time. It can be say, for instance, somebody is renting an apartment or a dungeon or a house to a sex worker and then the sex worker leaves. They could be there for a day. It could be an airbnb, it could um be a b&b, it could you know. It could be a place where you book by the hour, because you can book, um, not so much in Scotland, but in England. I do know that you can book for like half a day. But if somebody else uses that premises after you for the same sexual services or sexual activities, then that's classed as a brothel and it's a criminal offence. And it doesn't matter if there's no pimp, it doesn't matter if there's no drugs, it doesn't matter if you're not being forced, it doesn't matter if there's no exploitation, it doesn't even matter if there's not any clients present. It's the act of working together that makes you a criminal, whether they're there at the same time as you or not. Sex work alone not a crime, sex work with a friend. Now you're running a brothel and that's not a loophole. That's the point. This law exists not to protect people, but to control them. So the English Collective of Prostitutes has been saying this for decades.

Speaker 1: 7:33

The brothel keeping law is the most frequent way police prosecute sex workers who try to work together for safety. This law drives women to work alone, increasing their vulnerability to violence and abuse, which is so true, and I don't like. People can see this. The police force can see this massively, but they just choose not to, and so can the government. The facts are all there and they call it what it is a tool of state violence, a law that kills, because when we're forced to work alone, that's when rapes happen, that's when clients get violent and that's when women disappear. I know from my own experiences I've been stealthed and I've had a guy have his hands around my neck, all because he has paid me and he thinks that he can do that which isn't right. Paid me and he thinks that he can do that which isn't right, and I felt, like even before the raid, that I couldn't go to the police, especially if I was sharing an apartment, whether that be for safety or to half the price of the rent. There's many reasons why sex workers work together. So in 2020, 21-year-old Agnes Wanjiru was found murdered after being forced to work alone due to brothel keeping fears in Nairobi.

Speaker 1: 9:28

Here in the UK, cases rarely make headlines, but they're everywhere Women mugged, beaten, stolen and always alone, always alone. A 2023 report from National Ugly Mugs found that 87% of sex workers had experienced violence or harassment on the job. Only 7% felt safe contacting police. I know that I have been harassed Absolutely On the job. Have I felt like I can talk to the police? No, no.

Speaker 1: 10:13

I remember I had a client shouting all sorts at me and he had paid for the session up front and he was talking about borders and how, people on benefits and oh horrible stuff which I do not agree with, and I didn't feel comfortable completing the session and so he started to harass me, call me this and that, and I tried to stand my ground. So much, um, we've not given him the money back. And yeah, him mentioning the police as leverage, that that was scary and that was, yeah, it's horrible because it is sort of a sex worker's weakness the police, who are meant to be here to help, but they're not, and so clients can use that against us because we have no safety net when it comes to if we're harmed or if there's violence or harassment. I had a client recently who turned out that he was an arsonist and he was actually wanted by the police and after seeing me, he wanted a refund because he wasn't happy for whatever reason, and I didn't give him that refund and so he threatened me and that was not fun and I didn't realize that he was wanted for arson or anything like that, and so when I searched up his name, that was quite a shock.

Speaker 1: 12:18

Now there is crime watchers where you can report um, so I did use that, thankfully. But crime watchers the person who I spoke to, I think, lacked the knowledge of a sex worker because I described my job and everything like that you can ring up anonymously. But they did insist on me ringing up the police and like giving my name and everything. And I was like no, no, and this was after um, the raid and everything. And I was like no, thank you. Yeah, it's those same police who show up at our doors with barren rams, the ones who we're meant to go to to be protected. No, mate, I now have PTSD whenever there is a knock at the door, whenever I, whenever I see a high-vis jacket. No, how am I fuck trusting them? So there was a Scottish sex worker led organization called Scott Pep. Sadly, they are not around anymore. I could not get in contact with them whatsoever. They were an organisation who I did try to get in contact with when the case started.

Speaker 1: 13:53

They quoted the current law encourages dangerous isolation. Many sex workers choose to work with others not because they're a part of a criminal enterprise, but because they don't want to die. Now let that sink in. This law doesn't punish trafficking, it punishes solidarity. And what does it look like when the law is enforced? It looks like at my front door at 9.50am in the morning. It looks like 20 police officers. It looks like being thrown in a riot van. It looks like a concrete cell and a quote burned into your brain about how my pockets won't be so flush now that I don't have a place to work from, now that I don't have a place to support my family, now that I don't have a place that helped me put food on the table. And this is happening every day. And it disproportionately targets women of colour, migrant workers, trans women, single mums and disabled sex workers. Because when the country criminalises care, it always punishes the most vulnerable first.

Speaker 1: 15:27

Let's be absolutely clear here. There is no legal way for sex workers to work together safely in the UK None. If you share a flat with somebody and both of you see clients, you're committing an offence. If you let your friend crash at your place while she works from her room, you're now keeping a brothel. You're now assisting with a brothel. Even a security guard, a receptionist or a driver can be charged with controlling prostitution. Under current law, that means no shared costs, no team up for bad date screening, no receptionist for safety, no cleaner, no ads run jointly Any of those things equals criminal conspiracy. They tried to get my ex-partner on assisting brothel keeping. They try to do that. They will try anything to rattle you and currently, with the policing and crime bill right, bear with me with this there's quite a lot.

Speaker 1: 16:51

So under the proposed amendments, anyone who purchases sexual services could face criminal charge. So they want to bring in the nordic model. They want to slyly, sneakily bring it in. Even if fully consensual adult transactions, you will still get charged. So it mirrors the nordic model which is in used in sweden, norway and france. Now we have covered this in revolting prostitutes. Um, this thursday, I think, will be the last pages that we're reading from the book, episode one all the way up to, I think, episode 22. Now, please, it is such good information, so good, and you will hear about how sweden has admitted it doesn't bloody work the nordic model, but they still want to use it and the supposed goal of the crime and policing bill and the Nordic model is to reduce the demand, but, as I've just said, the real world data shows that it just drives the industry underground, making it more dangerous for workers, making it so clients think they can get away with a lot more because we can't go to the police. Lot more because we can't go to the police.

Speaker 1: 18:21

So the bill includes provisions to ban websites that allow people to advertise sexual services, a key tool many sex workers use for safety, screening and financial independence. This could criminalize website owners, developers or even admins of forums or platforms where sex work is discussed or promoted. It would likely force sex workers off digital platforms and back into isolated street work or hotel work. I do not know what I am going to do if they ban my adverts. I'm gonna struggle. I can tell you that much. And then they want to indirectly criminalize no. So while the bill may appear to decriminalize the person selling sex, nope, it preserves brothel-keeping laws, meaning sex workers who choose to work together for safety will still be prosecuted. So also a friend who screens clients, answers the door or helps with advertising could be criminalized under pimping or brothel keeping definitions. This especially harms disabled, migrant and trans workers who rely on assistance or co-working, and mums as well. It harms so many people, so many sex workers, everything, every single one of us. So, of course, migrant sex workers already face increased scrutiny, deportation threats and surveillance. Any criminal charge under this bill as buyer, co-worker or facilitator could trigger immigration consequences as well.

Speaker 1: 20:26

I am so freaking privileged that I am white and that I am not a person of colour, and that I am not a person of colour. I, even though I'm pansexual, I'm not, say, trans, and therefore I'm so much more privileged and I hate it. I really do. I just hate. Other people are suffering because of how they look and how they are, who they are, and it's wrong. It's so wrong on so many freaking I'm trying to not swear right. That's why I'm saying freaking on so many levels. So who does this really harm? Well, clients become criminals. Sex workers become even more isolated. Support networks become the potential co-defendants. Digital safety tools become criminal infrastructure. As sex workers, we live in fear, not of clients, not of strangers, but of that knock Of the door breaking down, of the police who won't listen Because they don't care if you're safe, they don't care if you're compliant.

Speaker 1: 21:52

So now we're going to talk about how I've been attempting to heal. A lot of therapy, I'll tell you that, and how. Not only am I just fighting back, but how sex workers across the uk are rising up to demand change from the grassroots, from trauma, from truth. We're now going to look at full decriminalization, what it looks like, where it works and how we can get there, because we're not criminals, we're not villains, we are not disposable, we are workers, we are survivors, and we're so done being fucking silent. So there's one question which I've been asked quite a bit, and that's how do I heal from being treated like a criminal and when all I did was just try to stay alive, try to stay afloat? How do I heal from that? Truth is, I'm still trying to figure that out. I don't know how I'm gonna heal from this, healing from a country.

Speaker 1: 23:24

Sanctioned trauma isn't linear. It's not something where I can click my fingers and just make it all go away. It's not something I can treat it with a bar of chocolate, you know, just a nice tub of ice cream. You can't do that. There's no road map for where. There's no road map for when the violence is legal, when the ones in uniform are the ones who took your piece. But I can tell you this I'm not the same woman that they took into that van. I'm fucking louder and I'm coming with vengeance. And I'm coming with vengeance, oh, I fucking am. I am gonna scream from the rooftops my story and what has happened and how things need to change.

Speaker 1: 24:28

After the raid, I fell into a deep depression and, honestly, I spiraled. The anxiety, the shame, the crushing silence of when you don't know who to tell. Who can you tell I couldn't work. I felt like I couldn't trust anybody. I felt like any client that spoke to me on the phone, whether it was by text or by call, was the police, was going to be another sting operation to freaking, trying I don't know what, because there was nothing that could catch me up, because I wasn't doing anything wrong women working for safety should not be criminalized at all and I just kept reliving the knock over and over and the words, oh my god, and the fear of them taking my child away. That doesn't. You can traumatize me all you like, but the fear of taking my kid away, no, no, that I will always have and in my, in my bringing in my heart, you know that feeling of what is going to happen. Do I have to prepare for somebody to take my kid while I go to court and tell them what to do in the next steps? If I get taken in that day and I can't see my kid again day and I can't see my kid again? Am I gonna have to prepare that? Because I was fucking preparing it? I don't want to think I would ever be found guilty, but I was still gonna put up a fucking hell of a fight and when I reached out to ECP and other organisations, I realised that it was happening to others on a massive scale.

Speaker 1: 26:57

When I did the research, when I looked into it, about what was happening all over the world and what was happening in the UK, in New Zealand, sex work was decriminalised in 2003. It's been over 20 years and there's so much evidence to show that sex workers in New Zealand are safer. They can report crimes without the fear of arrest. They've literally said this. They can work together legally. There is no increase in trafficking and no explosion in street-based sex work. In fact, a 2022 government review showed that most sex workers reported being able to refuse clients more easily, access police protections and work under better conditions. Post decriminalization and work under better conditions post decriminalization.

Speaker 1: 27:59

So let me ask you this If it works in other countries, why hasn't the UK followed? Not long ago, the UK wanted to ban abortions. They've taken so much away from the people in the UK. They very much. I feel that they want to control us, especially the women. The government knows full well that decriminalisation improves safety. Their refusal to act is not based on evidence. It's based on moral panic and political cowardice. It's sadly still seen as a taboo my job, and it shouldn't be. The truth is our government is failing to protect us. Every single day, every single second, they are working against us. The government is choosing not to, because if they wanted to make sex work safer, they could, but instead they cling to brothel keeping laws, to soliciting charges, to raids, to shame. And yet our voices will be heard. Sex workers' voices are louder than ever, and I believe this shows that we will never shut up. You will never silence the whores, and I love that. I love that you will never silence us. We won't be silenced, no matter what.

Speaker 1: 29:46

Across the uk, sex workers are organizing. We're marching, calling out the laws that are literally killing us, fighting for the right to work without fear fighting for our labour rights, and I'm proud to be a part of that movement and I want to be forever a part of that movement, the movement which has helped me so much through this horrendous time, and it is still helping me. And I want to help other sex workers who have been affected by this, because I will not let what happened to me be buried. It will never, ever be buried and I will always keep telling my story. So this podcast, this episode, or fucking all of them, it's a part of my protest. In wanting freedom for everybody, it should be a very clear right that we should have freedom. So, after I've wiped my tears away, how do we stand with sex workers? Well, you can support sex worker led organizations like ECP, english Collective of Prostitutes, nom, national Ugly Mugs and SWARM, sex Worker Advocacy and Resistance Movement.

Speaker 1: 31:33

We have DecrimNow and, of course, scotland for Decriminalisation. We so need it right now. We need decriminalisation and when someone calls us criminals, say no. When they say we're trafficked, ask who they're listening to. Question them genuinely. Ask them where they're getting these quote facts from. Tell them to actually ask sex workers, not politicians, not people they see on tiktok. Ask the actual sex workers.

Speaker 1: 32:21

There is a very big difference between sex trafficking and sex workers and I do believe I did do a previous episode on what the difference is between sex trafficking and sex workers. So I touched on it in episode 64, where the title is punishing the wrong people how criminalizing sex work hurts trafficking victims. So please go check that out if you want to learn more about the differences. I might make a new episode more solely on the differences, but I'm pretty sure in that episode I did pretty well. It's like an hour episode, so clearly I had a lot to say about that.

Speaker 1: 33:09

So another thing you can do is write to your MP hell, you can even call them and you can demand that they repeal brothel keeping laws and you can ask what they think about decriminalization. You can see where they stand on the policing and crime bill, but always demand decriminalization, not legalization. We do not need more policing, we need more freedom and we need to let the silence break and we need sex worker stories to be heard, because once you hear the truth you can't unhear it. If you go on the ECP's website, you will be able to put in your postcode and it comes up with a default letter to your MP in that postcode and you can just send it off. Simple as talking about how we need decriminalization and the policing and crime bill should not be passed. I mean, we already have the safety act. That's gone through. Everybody regrets that now, don't you? Yeah, sex workers warned you. We told you about that two years ago now also, a strangulation bill has passed as well, where strangulation porn is banned.

Speaker 1: 34:49

Um, you can't share it, you can't do anything like that, you can't watch it, and that includes educational ones, educational, educational videos about it. So it stops a lot. It's, quite frankly, stupid. It's putting a band-aid on a bigger problem, and the bigger problem is lack of education. It honestly is how about that? If you think you are mature enough to have a child and to look after another little human being, right, then you should be mature enough to have that conversation About sex, about kinks, about what they see in movies and about their bodies. You should be able to have that adult conversation with your child. So finally, to my fellow sex workers whether you're in a dungeon, a flat, a hotel or online, whether you're in full-time, part-time, masked, anonymous or loud like me, you're not alone and you're certainly not a criminal and you are not shameful, you're not weak, you're brave, you're surviving and you are part of a long and powerful legacy of resistance. Each and every one of us, even the ones who say they're not sex workers, you're still a sex worker and strap on is sexual.

Speaker 1: 36:35

Just saying this, has been behind the paddle podcast with me Paulson, victoria, and, yeah, I hope you've enjoyed my story and I hope educating you about brothel keeping laws has been educational and eye-opening and we all deserve safety. So I'm gonna keep speaking, I'm gonna definitely keep fighting and if you enjoyed this episode, please, um, you can leave a comment. You can review us on Spotify, apple, wherever you're listening it. It really helps a lot and if you have any fan mail you can send that. You can go into Buzzsprout and through there you'll be able to send fan mail. You'll be able to find us on Instagram and Twitter. We don't really use Twitter that much and twitter we don't really use twitter that much, mainly instagram. And yeah, thank you. Thank you for listening everybody. Bye.