Now, I love Babeland, and I refer people there to buy anything that I don't sell myself.  I bought my first couple of sex toys at the Seattle store when I was 18, and still pick things up occasionally.  So this is in no way criticism of the company.

But, in browsing some sex blogs today, I have to say, it was damn funny to see one of Babeland's new advertisements featuring the exact same stock photo used on the cover of a book I found when I was searching for anti-feminist writings:

It reminded me of the Cockeyed article tracking a stock photo model being used to sell everything from high-class dating to a prolife crisis pregnancy center.  I wonder where else this red-haired woman's photo has ended up over the years.

I wish I was that stock photo model.  If anyone does, I have the right to be known to the world as That Ecosexy Bitch.  (Seeing as how I've been a bitch my whole life, and was selling "ecosexy" before most anyone had ever heard of such a strange thing.)

Throughout my life, I have repeatedly had my beliefs and politics put to the test, which tends to end in me doing this thing that terrifies most people: bridge-burning.  Here are three of those stories - most notably, why I refused to speak at last weekend's Sex 2.0 conference due of the involvement of Carnal Nation, and why their presence made event an unsafe spaces for sex workers.  Bear with me - I know this is a frighteningly long post, and it's about my personal experiences as well as just the main controversial issue.

Years ago, I stood in a friend's kitchen on my cell phone, staring intently at his spice rack in disbelief.  I'd just found out that someone I'd considered a trusted friend committed a horrible violation against another person. Later, I burst into tears outside on the street, feeling so sick and pissed off.  Most of this man's friends stood by him.  They made excuses.  They told outright lies.  They came up with explanations about why what he did wasn't actually that bad - if he had done it at all - and why him being such a "good person" basically negated what he might have done anyway.  A man who was very popular in his social circle victimized a lesser-known person, and I was one of the only voices publicly standing up against him.  One of his defenders was perplexed by my anger.  It didn't happen to me.  Someone else continued to live in fear and torment, so why did I care so much?  I was given the choice between many personal friendships, and the political/ethical beliefs I have espoused for years about standing up against those who take advantage of others.  It was theory versus reality.  I made the right choices.  And I lost friends over it.

Last year, a guy in the San Francisco nerd scene posted a "humorous" guide on his blog about how to drug and date rape women.  I Twittered angrily about it.  I asked people to confront him in person at the monthly event he organizes.  I hoped he'd be kicked out of his scene for being such a blatant misogynist.  Nothing happened.  Months later, I brought it up again, and some people who are friends with both myself and Mr. Rapejokes stopped following me on Twitter immediately.  So, given the choice, a sect of the San Francisco nerd world stood by someone who thinks the idea of raping drugged women is hilarious.  I bluntly forced a mutual friend to pick between us, and she picked Mr. Rapejokes and dismissed the topic as "drama".  I was the one who lost friends over what he blogged, not him.  Theory versus reality, and again, I made the right choice and I'm glad I spoke out.

Last week, as my Twitter followers and many others are already aware of, I boycotted the third Sex 2.0 Conference.  I'd attended the first two Sex 2.0 conferences, loved them, and spoke on two panels at the previous one.  I was scheduled to be a speaker this year on a panel about sex work, and I pulled out days before the conference because I refuse to participate in an event that is not a safe space for sex workers.  I've been a sex worker for 8 years, and in case it needs mentioning, I'm big on the idea of places where we can chill out and talk about our lives and our work without dealing with verbal or even physical attacks from those who don't look kindly on us. Real safe spaces for sex workers matter to me.  Sex 2.0 used to be one of those spaces.

Sex 2.0 stopped being a safe space for sex workers when it welcomed in Carnal Nation, an online media company that caters to the sex-positive community.  You see, a while ago, a stalker popped up offering cash rewards for anyone to out/stalk/harass sex workers at their homes.  Carnal Nation defended endangering the lives of sex workers as important "free speech", giving promotion to the stalker and belittling and mocking the women being stalked.  Because of this stalker, people were, and still are, genuinely scared for their safety.

Whatever that official or unofficial connection was, Carnal Nation was allowed by Sex 2.0 organizers to be present at the conference in spite of the criticism of many people.  They could have picked the concerns of sex workers and our allies over a bit of publicity for the conference - barring Carnal Nation from covering the conference - but the organizers picked publicity.  The consolation prize was that if anyone wanted to talk about why they resent Carnal Nation for endangering the lives of sex workers, they were allowed to be interviewed about it. Yeah, I'd love to give Carnal Nation free content for their web site, that's exactly the aim of my boycott.

One of the defenses of Carnal Nation's presence at Sex 2.0 is that no one had to be interviewed - it was just a media outlet that you could talk to.  I've never said I was opposed to Carnal Nation's involvement because I thought they'd force all attendees at gunpoint to give interviews, the point is that Carnal Nation was allowed in the door at all.

What if Carnal Nation was a company known for mocking gay-bashing and dismissing groups that advocate violence against queers as "important freedom of speech"? I have no doubt that such a media outlet would have been barred from Sex 2.0.  Sex workers, however, are apparently not a vulnerable minority that deserves to come together in a space free of media companies that think our safety makes for nothing more than an amusing libertarian argument.  Well, sorry, Carnal Nation, but the women being stalked are not abstract philosophical constructs.  Two of them are my friends - not debate fodder about the importance of yelling fire in a crowded theater.

As a scheduled speaker, I felt as though refusing to attend was the biggest stink I could make as just one person.  (I got a refund for my Sex 2.0 ticket and donated that money to the Desiree Alliance conference - a sex worker event going on this July in Las Vegas.)  This did get people talking: online, on the Sex 2.0 email discussion list, and at the conference itself - both in sessions and unofficially.  I wish I had something prepared for public dissemination last week, however, I've been mulling over exactly what to blog and gathering input from others.  I hope this full explanation makes more sense of the issue to those of you not already familiar with what happened.

I won't be linking to the exact article because of its menacing content, and I ask that if you comment about this issue, you don't link the article, either.  I ask that you not name or link to the web site offering cash for people to out/harass sex workers.  I ask that you do not state the names of the women who are targeted by the stalker's web site without their permission.  Basically, be the opposite of Carnal Nation - be respectful and responsible.  When and if Carnal Nation posts a defense of itself on its own web site, I hope you will ignore it, rather than pouring your energy into their comments section and giving them traffic.

John Pettitt, owner of Carnal Nation, wrote in his short article about the controversy,

While we regard [stalker] as repugnant CarnalNation believes in the right to free expression, if Larry Flynt can offer a bounty for cheating Republican politicians it's equally defensible for somebody to pay for information on sex workers. Neither is a morally defensible position but morals are personal and free speech transcends personal morals. It comes down to a simple truth It's the unpopular speech that needs protection.

In the spring of 2010 CarnalNation will begin letting our users publish their own content in personal blogs. One of the reasons we decided to provide this service is the fact that a well orchestrated mob can cause a service like blogger to remove content they don't like by flagging it for terms of service violation. We won't do that. In fact if it's legal (that is a court hasn't told us to remove it) it will stay up no matter how much we disagree with it. That doesn't mean we won't be critical but it does mean we can only disagree with attempts to silence [stalker].

So, according to Carnal Nation, the most important thing in this situation was that stalkers need "protection" to harass sex workers, because a stalker's "free speech" rights trump safety concerns from a highly vulnerable population that is regularly attacked, raped, and murdered?  Further, that the stalker is the real victim in the situation because people had been trying to get the stalker's blog taken offline?  Of course, John Pettitt tried to cover his ass by saying the site is "repugnant", but he still still gave it tons of free publicity and defended how important it is that we stand up for "unpopular speech", aka, harassing/outing sex workers.  Having the stalker promoted and legitimized on a well-known "sex-positive" web site was done, in my opinion, simply to get a lot of comments and traffic.

And comments there were!  In a section a mile long condemning and debating John Pettitt, sex-positivity super-heroes and sex workers including Monica Shores of $pread Magazine, Heather Corinna, Tasty Trixie, Kat of Kat's Stories, Mistress Matisse, Melissa Gira, Sarah Sloane, Annie Sprinkle, Jill Brenneman of SWOP East, and Sadie Lune spoke out against this irresponsible and dangerous behavior from Carnal Nation - and that's just on Carnal Nation's own web site.  Much more has been said elsewhere.

Carnal Nation has proven that they are happy to cover sex workers as titillating new items, but will quickly kick us in the teeth when we're down.  (Hey, that sounds exactly like the hostile mainstream media!)

Speaking of using sex workers to make a profit, former writer for Carnal Nation, and $pread Magazine editor, Monica Shores, has been involved in a multi-month battle trying to get paid for articles she'd written for the company in the past.  She believes Carnal Nation is refusing to pay her because she's criticized the company, and as of now, has still not be paid for work she did months ago.  Whether or not she ever will ever be paid still remains to be seen. [Update on 6/15: Monica has finally been paid.  But, I've heard from another sex worker and former Carnal Nation writer who is owed money by the company.  It's an interesting trend.  Are there any more people out there who've worked for Carnal Nation and not been paid as promised?]

In speaking out on the issue of Carnal Nation at Sex 2.0, I lost friends.  I made sure I'll never be welcome in the Seattle kink community.  I even received a not-too-thinly-veiled threat against myself if I continue to speak out against Carnal Nation. But you know what really fails to motivate me to shut up about my concern for creating safe spaces for sex workers?  It's threats to my personal safety.

I hope that this whole mess will allow more people to take a moment to think about what it really means to create safe spaces for sex workers.  You would think it wouldn't be that hard for supposed allies to grasp the basics like, "Don't allow in companies that defend violence against us", but apparently, it is.  This was an instance where I felt the need to point at one conference as the perfect example of how not to make an event safe and welcoming for sex workers.  This is a bigger fight than just Carnal Nation, so while I do hate to give them so much attention, and will no doubt be called a hypocrite for doing so, I also want my community to know their true face, and to be on the lookout for more wolves in sheep's clothing.

I feel like an activist cliche to write profusely about a problem, but offer no concrete solution.  I hope all sex-positive people can talk about ways to make more spaces welcoming and safe for sex workers, because it's not just about one offensive web site or one stalker.  It's about living in a culture that has no regard for our safety, our human rights, our dignity, and our lives - and trying to change that culture, bit by bit.  My little bit to add right now is publicly calling out Carnal Nation and hoping that in the future, they will be banned from spaces that are supposedly safe for sex workers.

Conferences are about like-minded people getting together, talking about common interests, meeting old friends, making new ones, and that buzzword that's everywhere now: networking.  In an age where people treat "networking" like it's the only currency that will ever matter, we get nervous about speaking out on controversial issues, even when we know something is wrong.  We don't want to lose a friend, a blogroll link, an ability to use a connection to ascend social or career ladders.  So, what does "networking" mean to you?  Does it include overlooking things people do that are dangerous or abusive, or allowing people to defend those who are dangerous and abusive?  Will you keep your mouth shut so as to not come across too angry, oversensitive, and socially ungraceful?

I'm not afraid to do battle about the issues that matter to me - and every time I do so, I know I'll lose friends and burn bridges.  I do it anyway.

I don't even know what a fucking bridge looks like any more and how easy it must be to have a world filled with them.  But after a lifetime of being a loud-mouthed cunt, I'm a damn strong swimmer.

* * *

(You can read Sequoia Redd's blog post for her perspective on this issue.)

I was christened into the jizz biz in May of 2002, at 18, with a day of shooting softcore porn in LA.  (I wish I could remember the exact date.)  I opened the doors of my first porn venture in January of 2003, at 19, and over the next few years years, gradually moved away from socializing in forums for amateur pornographers, and towards more politicized and woman-friendly spaces.  So, while I didn't start my own blog until last year, I lurked, I read, I occasionally commented where The Smart People were.  These bloggers I followed were "my people".  At last!

The amateur porn scene contains a lot of conservative swingers - a subset of which I once heard candidly (or drunkenly?) described as a bunch of ignorant hicks who "very accidentally got rich" by profiting off their wives.  Not all of them, of course - I admire many of the pioneering porn amateurs like Jen N Dave for seizing the day and starting the very first adult sites 15 years ago while the big porn companies were still mailing out wank material on VHS tapes.  (And, as far as I know, Kat Vixen was the first porn site with a leading lady who declared herself a feminist in her bio page, probably before most of today's renowned feminist pornographers could even legally appear in a porn.)

So, to hell with fighting with Fox News-loving people on adult webmaster boards, and desperately trying to connect with like-minded people - I was going to start a blog!

One of the things I knew about getting into blogging was that it would mean I would undoubtably have falling outs with other bloggers.  It's hard-coded into the sex blogger community to have epic public drama with one another - drama that can dangerously bubble over into the offline world.  After having circulated a bit in the sex worker and sex blogger scene, both online and offline at a few events, I felt reasonably liked by pretty much everyone, or at least tolerated.  I liked most of the people I met, too.  I was aware that I had some significant ideological/political clashes with some of them, but they weren't aware they had those clashes with me, so we could all share a meal together in peace.  I knew that peace would end if I started blogging my thoughts about things - most specifically, about feminism - and was sad to acknowledge that some of these people I'd happily guzzled pitchers of booze with would some day be people with whom I'd have dramatic clashes.

Such is the price you pay for telling the world what you really think about everything.  I've been accused by many of having "no filter" and needing to learn how to be fake-polite in the interest of facilitating smooth social interactions with assholes I want nothing to do with.  (Why I would want to do that is beyond me.)  I'm happy to have a career where I can pretty much disregard such advice, resting soundly in knowing that while my real self drives some people away, it also attracts more genuine friendships with the people I actually like.

So, it's with my caustic, cunty self in mind, that I introduce my ten most popular/controversial/commented-upon blog posts from the last year.  (Topping the list with the most divisive thing I'll probably ever utter in the American sex worker scene.  I don't regret a thing I said, but I don't want to keep re-hashing it either, so I'm listing it for completeness rather than a desire to re-open the fight.)

* Speaking of faux ho bloggers, what about Amber Rhea? [December 2009]

* I want to read a book written by someone like me, except smarter and better at writing [April 2010]

* Want to play BINGO with the antis? [February 2010]

* Three out of four ain't bad: my thoughts on Audacia Ray's post on the dominant narratives of sex work [April 2010]

* Does everyone actually want to be an escort, given the right circumstances? [April 2010]

* What's so "feminist" about being anti-sex? The 2010 Feminist Porn Award nominees and the "porn for women" niche [March 2010]

* Religions on sexuality: same-same, but different (the Dalai Lama and Buddhism edition) [February 2010]

* Biography of a pornographic polemic [May 2009]

* Daddy's little capitalist [October 2009]

* Somewhat disjointed grievances on porno pay rates, transparency, and a pinch of boring labor politics [September 2009]

Some of these don't develop fully unless you read all the comments.  If you have something to say about any of these past topics, please comment in those post's own comments area, not here on this post.

As for what's coming next, I'm currently interviewing a bunch of my favorite indie pornographers for what I think is an important piece about the realities of queer/feminist/"different" porn.  It's been floating around in my head for a while, but I want to devote a big blog post to screaming at a certain elephant in the room.

I've kept up the habit of posting around something once a week, which I hope to stick with as I enter year two.  We'll see how things go.  Writing, for me, is a time-consuming project with almost no financial rewards.  It would be nice to be able to change that, because it is something I enjoy.

As always, if you want to properly congratulate me on how awesome my blog is and how brilliant I am, I will continue to shamelessly solicit gifts from my Amazon wishlist.  (Sort the list by priority to see what I want most.)  If you hate me and all that I stand for, you should apologize for such insolence by donating money to my favorite charity, San Francisco's St. James Infirmary, a clinic that serves sex workers.  Either way, I win!  Mwahaha!

Welcome to the second installment of my series of advice that's for would-be sex workers.  (The first one is here.)

I am happy to help rational, professionally-minded potential sex workers fill in some of the blanks they've missed in their own research.  (I've stopped bothering to try and hand-hold anyone through the basics they could read online if only they'd ever heard of Google.)  Most people, once they do real research, figure out that sex work is not actually a real-life version of this carnival game, where you jump in the windy box, grab fistfuls of cash, and then exit without having done any real work.

Of all the emails I receive with questions from new and would-be sex workers, I think that every single one of them has failed to ask an extremely important question: where they can find a good lawyer or a good accountant.

This week, I was asked by another sex worker for advice on what amounted to be, I take it, how to commit tax evasion.  She explained that her finances were a mess, she had no idea where to start, had never filed a tax return, and didn't want to pay taxes on what she was earning, and figured there must be some way out of this problem.  (Honey, none of us want to pay taxes.)  I replied with one simple line, "Sorry, you need to hire an accountant and an attorney."  She replied in an angry huff because I wouldn't give her "any quick advice" on what to do.  My second, and final reply on the matter was, "You need serious legal and financial advice FROM PROFESSIONALS, and I will not risk being held legally liable for conspiracy charges for giving you any suggestions on how to avoid paying taxes."  The part that pissed me off the most was her assumption in the first email, "It seems you are in a similar position to me so I was wondering how you do it."  No, I am not in a similar position.  Plenty of sex workers file and pay taxes.  We're not all taking cash under the table and burying it in coffee cans in our yards or whatever.  Asking me for my advice on doing something dodgy because you're assuming I do it myself is extremely rude.

So, here's golden rule number two for new/prospective sex workers:

You absolutely need to hire an attorney who specializes in adult businesses in your area.  Also, hire an accountant who specializes in adult entertainers.

Let me say that again, since it obviously needs to be said, and no one listens to me when I implore them of it:

You absolutely need to hire an attorney who specializes in adult businesses in your area.  Also, hire an accountant who specializes in adult entertainers.

I value a lot about the sex worker community and people coming together to help one another out, but I am sick of seeing non-lawyers and non-accountants exchange incorrect advice about their legal and tax issues.  How many times have you read one escort advise another that if you ask the client if he's a cop, he has to tell you?  Or if he gets naked (or has sex with you), then it means he's not law enforcement?  If plenty of sex workers still believe in some 1970s-era crime movie idea about the legality of entrapment, who knows what other inadvertent, dangerous untruths they are sharing amongst each other.  Leave the lawyering to the lawyers, folks- and focus on what you do best.

The very first thing I did when I decided to get into porn was to hire one of the best adult industry attorneys to advise me on how to incorporate, and the laws that impacted me.  In the first couple of years, I hired him for an hour here and there to give me advice on my business and how to keep things above-board.  I will never see that as money poorly spent, even though I was eating ramen noodles and buying my work clothes from Ross Dress For Less.

I cannot stress enough how important it is to talk to a lawyer, and it probably costs less than you'd think.  (I spent $1000 initially, and that was before I ever had a single paying subscriber.)  The law is complicated and changes all the time, on local, state, and federal levels, and your sister sex workers, no matter how smart, are not qualified to dispense legal advice on your problems.  In fact, it's illegal to dispense legal advice if you're not a lawyer.  Lawyers possess specialized knowledge that can keep your cute ass out of jail.  (My first attorney has since retired, and he sold his business to JD Obenberger, who you might recognize from Red Light District Chicago's video series.)  Sex workers can be great for helping each other understand their basic universal rights, like the right to not incriminate yourself if you've been arrested, but for anything beyond that, please, pay a lawyer.

Secondly, hire an accountant who specializes in adult entertainers.  I didn't do this soon enough myself, and I wish I had.  Back in 2003, I think, I hired someone I knew only as "TaxGrrrl" in Michigan off an adult industry message board to do my taxes, and she screwed up, leaving me with a fine for almost $1000.  Now?  I am thrilled to have Lori of TaxDomme.com keeping my financial life in working order.  (And believe me, I am the world's sloppiest housekeeper when it comes to financial organization and orderly creation of spreadsheets, so if she can make my business tidy, she can make your life tidy, too.)

Sex work is about being a responsible professional, and sometimes, that means knowing when you need to turn to other professionals.

"Assigning all the inevitable but blunt or difficult or dangerous work to robots means to keep them away from the kind of activity which is perceived as human.

Faced with this state of segregation between wo/men and robots, Roboexotica is trying to get interaction with end-users back on the agenda of robotronics.  The aim is a reversal of the classic alienation process used to determine the robot-human-relationship on the basis of a capitalist logic.

So, if we were asked to come up with some of the differences between the old-school-scifi-utopia based on robots and the semi-utopia and quarter-scifi-world we're living in, we would point out:

'First, there are no robots in my household - or at least no robots with which I could have that good old slaveholder-servant-conversation my parents and grandparents were dreaming of.  Fuck, I was promised I could be a Southern Gentle(wo)man without the moral implications.  And now there are plenty of intelligent machines running my life - but they don't have a HAL-voice and they don't have feelings like Data in 'Star Trek' enabling me to poke fun at them and to experience tragic moments.  They are just tools I can trust.  And what I find most frightening: they never ever try to kill me and take over.  They are just boring automatons and AI-bullshit.  They are slaves that are no fun.  No weeping kids at night, no 'Uncle Robot Tom'-bestsellers, no liberation movement to make us middle class people feel good in supporting it half-assedly - just dull machines which never complain.  No deep, sad and touching musical expression lies within robot slavery to be enjoyed by dissident slaveholder kids.  Maybe that is just the price we pay for not giving them a soul and maybe future investigations into the resoulment of robots would bring relief.  I mean, what's the point in having slaves if they don't suffer from it.'

[...]

Thus, Roboexotica wanted to work on a collective interface to remind us of the pristine idea of robots serving us and to focus again on the full cultural meaning of robots: capitalist slaves for all tomorrow's cocktail parties."

-- Frank Apunkt Schneider and Gunther Friesinger in Mixing robots with discourse by having them mix drinks, in the monochrom-published Roboexotica book.

(I realize this is off-topic for my blog, but I loved these sentiments and wanted to share them.)