Out Their Asses: Discourses on Sex Work in Kiev, Beirut and Istanbul

Illustration by @goykudogan

Almost exactly one year ago, on the anniversary of the Ukrainian independence day, I stumbled upon a feminist protest in a small park in the city of Kiev. A feminist group had gathered to promote the so-called “Nordic Model” to curb prostitution in the country. Also known as the “sex buyer law”, the Ukrainian version of this model forces a fine on sex workers instead of arresting them. It also places most of the criminal burden on the clients who are imprisoned for soliciting sex workers. The Nordic model has been introduced in Sweden, Denmark, Iceland, Northern Ireland, Canada, France and Ireland. Although the law differs slightly from country to country, the Nordic Model offers support and services to sex workers who want to exit the business in terms of housing, psychological support, education and training. The model, according to one action group campaigning on its behalf, is not intended to criminalize people, but to “change behaviour”.

A few minutes into the start of the protest, I sensed the tension rise when another group of women showed up. These women belonged to the Red Umbrella Fund — an international group advocating acceptance of sex work as work, supporting the labour rights and self-determination of sex workers. One of their core values is to oppose all forms of criminalisation or legal oppression of sex work — which explains why they showed up at the square while the other women were promoting the Nordic Model.

There was something about witnessing first hand a feminist protest being opposed by the very same women that they claim to protect that I found darkly humorous. Having witnessed so many inexperienced and uninformed white journalists publish their pieces on all sorts of topics back in Beirut and Istanbul; I decided I could play the same game and posed as a journalist myself. While opposing slogans such as “prostitution is rape” and “we want our bread” filled Kiev’s “independent” air, I conducted my interviews.

First I approached the Red Umbrella group. Three women greeted me with big smiles on their faces and agreed to be interviewed. Tatiana — former sex worker and current owner of a small business as well as an activist for sex workers’ rights — was from a rural area where the job market consisted mainly of heavy physical labour in fruit fields for less than a dollar a day. She believes that the Nordic Model has a glitch that traps women in a vicious circle since they would automatically be forced back into sex work in order to pay the fine if they ever get caught. In the rural area where Tatiana comes from, the fine sex workers would be given is equivalent to around 10 to 15 days of hard labour in the fields.

In her words, she, like many others, was not forced into prostitution, she got in with her own free will — a possibility that no one seems to accept. When asked about violence in her life, Tatiana shared with me stories of abuse, which, contrary to what I was expecting, were concerned with her family and close circle who looked down on her, rather than stories of violence during her time as a sex worker.

Tatiana’s interview left me with many questions that followed me for a year, trying to figure out my stand on a topic that divides the feminist movement around the world. Argumentatively speaking, if we — as feminists — want to empower women, why do we presume their vulnerability? If it is so important for us to make the world understand that a “no means no”, when will we ever accept when a woman says “yes”? If we are pushing for the total liberation of the female body, isn’t imposing laws against prostitution another form of governance? And finally, when will we understand that without complete legalisation of prostitution and possible prosecution of the abusers, their choice of work will render them as deserving of all violence they face on a daily basis?

With Nike shoes and torn clothes, a style clearly showing her infatuation with poverty; a woman from the so-called “feminist” group shared her fears of a terrible fate awaiting Ukrainian women. She believed that a deluge of sex tourists would invade the country if sex work became legal. I could relate to her concerns. Having worked in bars in Beirut for years. I have dealt endlessly with male tourists asking “how much do you cost?” and I came up with numerous ways to dodge their offers and physical harassment.

Still, I didn’t understand how they chose this model, knowing fully well that Ukraine’s economy is degenerating, while corruption lingers and all attempts of reform are obviously not leading anywhere. Even if I wanted to accept her premise for the sake of argument, it is clear to everyone that Ukraine is not Sweden. When i confronted her with the unlikelihood of the Ukrainian government of providing such support services, she told me timidly that the law is at suggestion stage and it still needs to be worked on.

She believed that the women opposing them were mere puppets whose protest was orchestrated by “an international pimp organisation”. She compared feminists like herself to defiant cats and those other women to submissive dogs, suggesting they were simply loyal to their abusers and that, for her, there was no point in having a discussion with them. A bold statement to be made from a “defiant” cat with strong support to a law that is not well thought through.

Keeping in mind that this woman is no representative of neither her group nor the entire feminist movement, I refuse to label what she was doing as feminism. Ignoring the class struggle, disregarding the absence of alternatives, dismissing the consensual decision of a woman and most importantly failing to understand that by legalizing prostitution, these women will have legal power to report any abusive treatment.  At that moment I realized that abolitionist laws — which were primarily pushed by the American Christian Right and were later adopted by Western feminist schools — are now being lobbied for by middle class feminist activists from developing countries who care little about actually protecting women, but would rather turn to the West for their moral compass.

These are the same laws that were created by Western governments under the guise of protecting “poor, helpless Third World women” from the danger of smuggling and exploitation. Proponents of these laws have a duty to face the harsh reality that these very same governments are in fact responsible for many of the dangers and risks of exploitation. These women are oppressed by border regulations, immigration laws and labour legislations. This is a familiar kind of white saviour oriented humanitarianism,  which is fierce when it comes to moralising about female sexuality, yet instantly vanishes when asked to recuperate for years of exploitation of our lands and people. In brief, a humanitarianism that I can’t and won’t relate to.

A few months later, as I was closing down our small leftist collective cafe in Istanbul, I overheard a group of people angrily arguing outside. Unfortunately the conversation was mainly in Turkish, a language I only pretend to know. Through some help with interpretation, I figured out that my comrade was defending the rights of prostitutes while the rest — all males and self-proclaimed anarchists — argued that pushing for legalisation of prostitution is a step back in our struggle, because allegedly it promotes the female body as a commodity and that “the government will, in that case, turn it into some capitalist business, bro”. Amazed by the lack of understanding of her comrades, my friend angrily left.

In an attempt to approach the issue from a more practical point of view, I suggested to the remainder of the group how we, as anarchists, can prevent capitalism taking over prostitution by supporting self regulatory boards and collectively owned brothels while at the same time pushing for making the job itself legal so abusers within the industry would be held accountable by law even if we did not believe in it. A dead-end conversation that proved to me the dominance of men even within our anarchist circles. Even their own comrade shouting simple humane logic and actual practical anarchist examples can get through their thick macho skins. But even though these guys were prepared to sideline their utopian ideals by taking up a day job to pay the rent while still believing that they’re exploited by the capitalist system, they drew an idealistic line in the sand when it came to standing up for the safety of women and their free choice.

Going back to my early days in Beirut, I remember the day my first boyfriend told me how he lost his virginity to a prostitute, he told me that she was very sweet and guided him well when he got really nervous. I was furious at that moment,  I felt too disgusted to touch him. It was the worst thing I heard and I think I hated him more because he saw it as a positive experience. I hated the woman also, for no reason, I just hated the idea of her existing — I didn’t see her as human being.

It took me years of personal growth, questioning everything I believed in and trying to deconstruct every single emotion and thought I had, to unlearn reactions society had taught to me to have. Years of exploring my sexuality, concepts of right and wrong, detecting in my own thoughts the residues of religious concepts that society had pushed down my throat and western values that I had absorbed.

In 2016, I heard the story of Chez Maurice, a brothel in Maameltein, north of Beirut, where 75 women were kept jailed and forced into sex slavery. Luckily, few women found a way to escape and, with the help of a bus driver, they went to the police station and told them about the horrors they had experienced. They provided information that helped police raid the place and get the rest of the women out. These women, were mostly smuggled through the borders from war zones, promised to have their residencies fixed and have proper jobs before they realized they fell into a trap. The owner of Chez Maurice and all the ring leaders were released and are probably back in “business”. They had strong connections to the Syrian regime — one of the ringleaders was a former interrogator in Syrian air force intelligence service. Officials in Lebanon were “shocked” by how they went “unnoticed” for so many years. I, personally, wasn’t.

It is the kind of stories that the West uses to justify the moral urgency for raid and rescue missions they conduct in developing countries or what Prabha Kotiswaran refers to as “sexual humanitarianism” in her research on anti-trafficking laws. She talks about how international organizations blend terms such as trafficking, trafficking for sex work and sex work, in order to promote their abolitionist laws. Stories like Chez Maurice are usually used to showcase prostitution as the hell of every woman. These cases are displayed to prove that prostitution is morally wrong. The truth is, everything else is wrong here.

When a migrant comes to our country, we close the borders and keep them vulnerable to smuggling circles. When a worker goes through the legal system, we enslave them through the Kafala system. When women, immigrants or sex workers ask for safety, they ask it from the same warlords and corrupted politicians who protect their abusers. When women come forward, they get locked down with a permanent criminal record and their abusers just roam free... And finally, when our local feminist organisations come to the rescue, they turn to the west for their so called progressive agendas, such as KAFA, our local abolitionist organisation that was in-charge of taking care of the women from Chez Maurice. A conspiracy of international NGO’s and institutions sounds far more plausible than a nebulous conglomerate of pimps described to me by my Ukrainian interlocutor.  

As Frantz Fanon reminds us, colonial discourses are deeply embedded in the psyche and behavior of the colonized; We will not fight smuggling and sex slavery through laws made by the same Western governments that ignore the struggles of people from the colonised world . We will not provide safety for women that do choose sex work as their profession if we still demand laws that don’t provide the complete acceptance of this profession, support for their choices and the possibility of resorting to law in case of abuse. As long as we do not adopt an all inclusive intersectional form of feminism, Ukraine’s trafficking rates will never go down, Turkey will stay the route of all smuggling routes and Lebanon will not seize to be a living hell to all those who inhabit it.