Respecting Sex Worker Rights

Mar 8

This International Women’s Day, we’re centering a cause that mainstream discussions often ignore. Falling within the same month as IWD, March 3rd is Sex Worker's Rights day – originating in 2001 when a sex worker rights group, the Durbar Mahila Samanwaya Committee, organized a festival of over 25,000 sex workers in India despite efforts from prohibitionist groups.

Unfortunately, today laws that govern sex work in Canada are still influenced by anti-sex work groups and rhetoric that equates all sex work with exploitation, conflates human trafficking with sex work and ignores the real needs of sex workers. The Protection of Communities and Exploited Persons Act (PCEPA) falls under this category, a set of laws that currently criminalizes the clients who purchase sex work, as well as advertisers and third parties in a misguided attempt to “protect” sex workers.

To provide further background, the PCEPA was implemented in Canada after the Supreme Court struck down previous anti-sex work laws as unconstitutional in 2013. Sex worker advocates Terri Jean Bedford, Amy Lebovitch, and Valerie Scott, successfully argued that previous laws created unsafe working conditions for sex workers, violating their right to security of the person. In response the Harper government rapidly enacted the PCEPA in 2014, which reproduced the very harms it claimed to dismantle.

The PCEPA follows the Nordic Model of sex work, also known as “asymmetric criminalization”, which creates barriers to purchasing sexual services with the aim of decreasing demand and ultimately ending sex work. This framework is inherently problematic, because it condemns sex work as a social vice that must be eradicated. It also forces transactions underground, making it harder for sex workers to effectively screen clients and report instances of violence.

In a 2022 Rabble article addressing legal reforms, Canadian sex worker Natasha Darling asked, “Why doesn’t the Parliament of Canada wish for us to work in safety and dignity instead of tying our imagined trauma to an exit story? How can one be concerned about the safety of a fellow human while taking away the mechanisms that a person and their community, more broadly, use to feel safe?”

Despite sex workers and allies spending the next 6 years advocating for the government to uphold their Charter rights, Parliament failed to make good on its promise to review the PCEPA within 5 years. In 2021 a national coalition of sex workers and advocacy groups known as the Canadian Alliance for Sex Work Law Reform went to court to challenge the law on the grounds that it forces many sex workers into isolation, places them at risk of eviction or losing safe work spaces and inhibits their ability to communicate with clients about health, safety and consent.

In response, the House of Commons Standing Committee on Justice and Human Rights released a June 2022 report that proposed changes to the law informed by their meetings with sex workers, advocates, and researchers. While recognizing that the PCEPA endangers sex workers, this report falls short – making recommendations that could especially harm Indigenous, migrant and transgender sex workers and failing to support decriminalization across the board.

At Choice in Health we believe that sex work is work, and that categorizing all sex workers as victims is an infantilizing, false narrative that removes sex workers' agency. We also recognize that the right to engage in legal, safe sex work has parallels with the right to legal, safe abortions. Both involve bodily autonomy, choice, and the right to “life, liberty and the security of the person.” Criminalization of either can have dire consequences for marginalized communities, putting their lives and well-being at risk. We support the complete decriminalization of sex work so that sex workers have the tools to protect themselves and work and live in safety and dignity.

With our current federal government stalling on meaningful sex work reform what is the way forward? “For local labour councils, activists and unions that are operating across Canada there’s nothing stopping you right now from reaching out and connecting with your local sex worker justice organization and taking the position that sex work is a real and valid form of work,” said Ellie Ade Kur, a member of Maggie’s Board of Directors, in a 2022 The Breach article. Maggie's Toronto Sex Worker's Action Project is a long-standing Canadian sex worker-led organization, which provides a supportive community space, weekly drop in programs, street outreach, education and advocacy for sex workers. Butterfly Asian and Migrant Sex Workers Support Network is another incredible grassroots organization based in Toronto which supports and advocates for Asian and migrant sex workers, regardless of their immigration status.

There are many ways to support your local sex work justice organizations, including donating or volunteering, voting for politicians who are pro-sex worker rights and stand for decriminalization, and educating yourself about the social and legal stigmatization of the sex work community so you can take a stance and educate others.

Below is a list of Canada-wide organizations you can support today:

The Canadian Alliance for Sex Work Law Reform - Canada

Sex Professionals of Canada - Canada

HIV Legal Network - Canada

Maggies - Toronto

Butterfly Asian and Migrant Sex Workers Support Network - Toronto

Sex Workers Action Program Hamilton - Hamilton

SafeSpace - London

Sex Workers’ Action Network - Waterloo

Supporting Women’s Alternatives Network Vancouver (SWAN) - Vancouver

Sex Workers United Against Violence Society (SWUAV) – Vancouver

PACE Society - Vancouver