ANC has it wrong with resolution on the sex trade
This week’s resolution by the ANC to apparently fully decriminalise not only those who are sold for sex, but also pimps, brothelkeepers and buyers, is a horrifying thought and goes against the growing global trend.
As a sex-trade survivor
I know that the experience of being in prostitution is always destructive.
Despite efforts to normalise it and supposedly reduce “harm”, there is no way to make it safe. Violence is an inherent part of it and is carried out by pimps, traffickers, brothel-keepers and buyers.
Those people (overwhelmingly women) who experience the brunt of it are more often than not from a less-privileged background. I have yet to meet a single woman whose entry into the sex trade was not spurred by some form of socioeconomic desperation.
In South Africa this is exacerbated by the fact that almost all those sold for sex are black. Racism is perpetuated by apartheid. In prostitution black women are considered to be objects that can be used for sexual gratification by white men.
There are two schools of thought on what is the best policy on prostitution. Sex-trade survivors and women’s groups want what is called the equality model. This approach, which has been successful in Scandinavia, Ireland, France and Canada, is based on the concept that we cannot reach equality as long as the highly sexist and violent sex trade continues to exist. It proposes decriminalising and supporting women in prostitution, while criminalising pimping, brothel-keeping and buying sex.
International organisations such as Amnesty International, which do not focus on gender equality — or those which are coerced because of funding issues — often support the alternative position of not only decriminalising those selling sex, but also pimps, brothel-keepers and buyers.
Some high-profile South African individuals, such as retired Justice Zak Yacoob, have also called for full decriminalisation, but this argument means that those of us who were sold for sex cannot enjoy equal human rights.
Open Society Foundations, one of the largest funders in the world, has also fed this harmful narrative. It has affected the policies and work of groups such as
S.W.E.A.T., an organisation I worked for until I saw that women in prostitution were being sacrificed for a funder’s political agenda and management didn’t seem to care.
Unfortunately, some women who are still in prostitution also call for pimping, brothel-keeping and buying sex to be decriminalised. As somebody who was in the same position, I understand why they may be forced to say this, but it makes as much sense as survivors of rape calling for more lenient sentences for the perpetrators. I have nothing but empathy for any woman who has been forced into the sex trade, but women like me who have been through this know that there is nothing worse than legalising, and therefore concealing, the abuse that I endured daily for over nine years.
In South Africa, Embrace Dignity, other groups and brave sex-trade survivors have also worked for many years to get us to the point where the National Council of Provinces’ petitions committee will recommend this equality-based approach to parliament in the coming months. The South African Law Reform Commission recently issued a report where it recommended the equality model as one of two options and Justice Minister Michael Masutha has spoken in favour of it as his preferred approach.
We need to be clear how the exploitative sex trade operates. We need to understand how funders and vested interests can influence the discussions. We need to recognise how it undervalues and forces usually underprivileged black women to not only endure exploitation but to become some of the biggest proponents.
We now wait patiently for the South African government to decide if we are worth protecting.
Women in prostitution were sacrificed for a funder’s political agenda