How dare someone tell another person how they should or should not feel. – Rachel Wotton
Barbie 
I’m sure “feminists” will be much more concerned with analyzing the “sexism” of Barbie’s utterances than with this:
…As part of the Investigatory Powers Bill, children’s…toys could be the next item to be used by the government in an effort to spy on people, claims Antony Walker, deputy CEO of technology trade association techUK…Walker warned MPs of how the…Bill could be abused to turn any Internet-connected device into a snooping tool…Smart Toys, such as Hello Barbie and My Friend Cayla – that come Wi-Fi enabled and have microphones and cameras built-in – could become spying tools for intelligence agencies…After concerns were raised early December by Bluebox Labs, Barbie’s manufacturer Mattel reportedly tightened the security on Hello Barbie that allows kids to talk to dolls over a cloud server connection…
O, Canada!
Canadian “authorities” are nearly as obsessed with “trafficking” porn as US ones:
Ontario needs a police task force to fight human trafficking of girls as young as 13…“They really are the girls next door”…MPP Laurie Scott said…[fantasizing about] the vast majority forced into the sex trade by human traffickers…[and] calling human trafficking an “underground and very fast-growing crime”…
Where Are the Protests?
Woman works for herself selling sex: It’s a national tragedy! “Rescue” her against her will! This story: {crickets}
Every morning at 2 a.m., they heard a kick on the door and a threat: Get up or get beaten. For the next 16 hours…[they] stood in the factory that owned them with their aching hands in ice water. They ripped the guts, heads, tails and shells off shrimp bound for overseas markets, including grocery stores and all-you-can-eat buffets across the United States…Pervasive human trafficking has helped turn Thailand into one of the world’s biggest shrimp providers. Despite repeated promises by businesses and government to clean up the country’s $7 billion seafood export industry, an Associated Press investigation has found shrimp peeled by modern-day slaves is reaching the U.S., Europe and Asia. The problem is fueled by corruption and complicity among police and authorities. Arrests and prosecutions are rare. Raids can end up sending migrants without proper paperwork to jail, while owners go unpunished…
The main reason this goes on? Because the US is too busy forcing Thai authorities to raid brothels for nonexistent “sex slaves” to bother policing its own food supply chains.
Bell, Hook and Kettle
This shelter was not operated by the Salvation Army; however, as I demonstrated just a year ago, the Salvation Army has done very similar things:
A Kentucky homeless shelter said that it has banned all women and children in an effort to stop them from having sex with male residents. Emergency Christian Ministries Director Billy Woodward [said]…he had to put a stop to the “sex problem…It seems like these last days it’s getting worse…the ungodly type”…Emergency Christian Ministries forced up to a dozen women to leave…It was not immediately clear if the women had been able to relocate because Emergency Christian Ministries is the only shelter for the homeless in Williamsburg. A female-only…shelter in Gray, Kentucky was reportedly accepting women. However, that shelter is a 40 minute drive from Williamsburg…
The Public Eye
…many candid, eye-opening stories…populate a new theatrical production in Vancouver called The Hooker Monologues, which brings nine sex workers and…allies…together on stage to deliver real-life stories about the world’s oldest profession…The Monologues were recently workshopped for a select audience, as the performers gear up to unveil their stories at the Firehall Arts Centre next March. They hope to dispel stereotypes about prostitution by giving voice to women who perform sex work…
Skin To Skin
Here’s another good article about one of my heroines, Rachel Wotton:
In Australia and overseas, disability advocacy groups are trying to raise awareness about disabled people and sex. Veteran sex worker Rachel Wotton is one of the co-founders of Touching Base, an organisation that allows people with disabilities to connect with sex workers. She says the stigma surrounding the sex lives of people with disabilities is disheartening. “It’s ridiculous. Just because someone can’t walk the same way as others, or doesn’t have the same technique to use their voice, doesn’t mean they haven’t got the same sexual desires as other people…People need to move away from the idea that sex is intercourse. Our sexuality is expressed in many different ways,” said Ms Wotton, who has worked in the industry for more than 20 years and was featured in the documentary Scarlet Road…
Blunt Instrument
Due to their visibility, massage parlors are taking the brunt of the “sex trafficking” hysteria in smaller cities:
Columbus is banning those convicted of drug- and human-trafficking crimes from obtaining operating licenses for massage or bathhouse businesses…The Columbus City Council…also has approved spending $50,000 to help hire a probation officer…who will focus on [brainwashing]…women convicted of prostitution…City officials said the new laws and new probation officer are efforts to reduce human trafficking, which police [fantasize] is on the rise in central Ohio…
Lack of Evidence (#314) 
I’m sure racist “sex trafficking” myths had nothing to do with this:
A pop group has flown back to South Korea after officials in Los Angeles thought they might be sex workers. The eight members were traveling to America for an album cover shoot but were detained for 15 hours in customs…Oh My Girl…had…been booked to perform at a gala event in Los Angeles…
Backwards into the Future (#334)
[South African] sex workers have made impassioned pleas for the decriminalisation of their trade…to fight…exploitation, abuse, discrimination and violence…In a report…that was unanimously adopted at the legislature…sex workers decried how police officers confiscated their condoms as evidence that they were sex workers and [explained] how they were…denied their HIV antiretroviral treatment when in police detention…
Torture Chamber
No, you assholes; when a guard coerces a prisoner into sex, it’s rape, not “barter”:
…Lowell [state prison in]…Florida…[is] the largest women’s prison in the United States…women who have done time here say Lowell’s quiet veneer belies the corruption, torment and sexual abuse within…[jailers] spit in their faces, threaten to slam them into concrete and call them whores, bitches and porch monkeys…male prison staffers tramp through the showers, make them flash their breasts on a whim and force them to beg for basic necessities…[guards] use their positions of power to pressure inmates to have sex…in bathrooms, closets, the laundry and…isolated areas of the prison…those who yield to the…demands are…rewarded with soap and sanitary pads, cigarettes, drugs and money…[those] who don’t comply…are harassed and humiliated…and…threatened with [solitary] confinement…their belongings [are stolen]…and the privilege of visits from their families [withheld]…
Out of Control (#451)
Celibacy erodes men’s judgment, sometimes until their behavior becomes completely out of control:
A Catholic priest swiped collection-plate donations to pay…[a professional dominant]…a new lawsuit…alleges he…stole…at least $1 million since 2003 while leading churches on Roosevelt Island and in The Bronx, where he is currently pastor of St. Frances de Chantal…[Reverend Peter] Miqueli also spent $60,000 in 2012 alone for “illicit and prescription drugs” he used with [Keith] Crist, bought a $264,000 home in Brick, NJ, and paid $1,075.50 a month for his master’s East Harlem apartment…The suit…also charges that the Archdiocese of New York and Cardinal Timothy Dolan knew about Miqueli’s “illegal scheme” and did nothing to keep it from growing into “the monster it is today”…In addition to skimming $20 bills from the collection plate…Miqueli ripped off money raised to buy a new pipe organ at his former church…He also put Crist in charge of the Cabrini thrift shop, where Miqueli “misappropriated and diverted money . . . for his own personal use” and destroyed financial records to cover up the theft…The suit seeks unspecified damages from Miqueli, Crist, Dolan and the archdiocese on grounds that include negligent supervision, breach of fiduciary duty, fraud and unjust enrichment…
Now They Notice
The hopelessly-square Advocate is slowly coming around on sex work, though its misleading headline makes it sound as though the report is urging politicians to make a special case for transwomen:
A new report on transgender sex work sponsored by the Red Umbrella Project, the National Center for Transgender Equality, and the Best Practices Policy Project urges policy makers and legislators to “repeal criminal laws for prostitution and related offenses.” Building on data from the National Transgender Discrimination Survey, “Meaningful Work: Transgender Experiences in the Sex Trade” concludes that decriminalization is “essential to protect the safety of people in the sex trade and to combat HIV.” The report finds that transgender people engage in the sex trade to forge a better socio-economic existence for themselves, to provide for their families, to find employment alternatives that do not expose them to the harsh discrimination that they may face in traditional workplaces, and to ameliorate high rates of joblessness and homelessness. Black transfeminine individuals are particularly impacted by these problems…
The Pygmalion Fallacy (#573)
I’m not sure which are more pathetic: the poor saps who think they’re going to get artificial, programmable whores in the next few years, or the sociopathic control freaks who want to use violence to stop them from diddling with dolls in private:
…Kathleen Richardson…director of the Campaign Against Sex Robots…[says] “David Levy is taking people’s insecurities and offering a solution that doesn’t exist…Paedophiles, rapists, people who can’t make human connections – they need therapy, not dolls”…It’s a direct path, she believes, from the way we communicate through machines, from social networking, to robots. And this, she says, is dangerous…If the future of sex…is in robotics, then Richardson is right: it requires a thoughtful discussion about the ethics of gender and sex. But while she identifies the relationships that appear to be emerging as modelled on [prohibitionist myths about] sex work – the robot as passive, bought, female; the man as emotion-free and sex-starved – surely rather than calling for a ban on them, to forlornly try stalling technology, the pressure should be to change the narrative. To use this new market to explore the questions we have about sex, about intimacy, about gender…
