We're less than a month away from the 2010 Desiree Alliance conference, which takes place in Las Vegas from July 25th to 30th, so it's high time for me to tell you why you ought to be attending.  If you're a sex worker, curious about getting into sex work, or a genuine ally, it's the event of the year for you to learn new things and network with you kind.  I haven't been before, (the last one was in 2008), but it event seems to garner much praise all-around.

I've not attended many sex worker-specific events in the past, just the 2008 march in Washington DC and the 2009 Sex Worker Fest in San Francisco.  While I've been a sex worker for 8 years, I've mostly just lurked online and kept an eye on what other people are up to.  In the last couple of years, though, I've been aiming to "get out more", both in terms of actual events, and blogging about sex worker issues.  (I used to spend a lot of time debating anti-porn feminists in public and semi-private online forums, but I'm done with wasting my energy on that stupidity.)

At this year's Desiree Alliance conference, I'll be presenting twice, once on my own, and once in a group.  Here are descriptions:

"Solo girl": An introduction to operating your own porn site

A "solo girl" site is adult webmaster terminology for a site that features content primarily of one model/performer, and tends to be focused on nudes, masturbation, and/or fetish content.  Furry Girl has been operating her own solo girl site, FurryGirl.com, since January of 2003, and has also expanded into running a small online store and three other niche porn sites.  Unlike most solo girl or amateur sites that purport to be run by the model they feature, but are actually run by the woman's husband/boyfriend or a company, FurryGirl.com has been mostly solo adventure.  Furry Girl will walk you through the basics of why you might want to run a solo girl site, some legal and business issues to be aware of, privacy concerns, deciding on your online niche/persona, needed equipment and computer gear, why you need to know how to run everything by yourself, content production and editing- including shooting your own photos, building a navigable adult site, billing, promotion, viewer interaction, managing an affiliate program, and networking with other adult webmasters.  (Since she's not a man or a trans person and doesn't have personal experience running queer/male/trans solo sites, the focus of Furry Girl's presentation and its language is on women, but most of the information is applicable to other genders as well.)

Everyone who's always asking me how to start your own porn site - here's your chance to get an introduction to the topic!  I'm probably not going be posting my presentation online afterwards.  I'm wary of setting myself up as a porn advisor because I've already met a ton of unsure time-wasters who want me to hand-hold them through the long process, and those who get pissy at me because I'm not telling them what they want to hear when they ask for my opinion.  I'd rather set the standard that if you're interested in starting a real business, you can trouble yourself to attend a conference for your new chosen profession.  That's really not a huge barrier to entry - it shows that someone is serious, and not just flirting with an titillating concept.

And the panel, which will be the last of the day to allow more room for Q&A:

Safety for Sex Workers Through Personal Privacy: Digital and Real-World Techniques For Safeguarding Your Identity and Your Life

From pornographer/web model Furry Girl: As someone who's a model and a small business owner, I'd like to point out the potential identity breaches rooted in the United State's federal 2257 laws.  I'm not a lawyer - so my focus is explaining from an indie pornographer's sex worker's perspective how 2257 laws put everyone in a bad place and work to stifle free sexual expression online.

From author and escort Amanda Brooks:  Offline privacy and money management.  I will offer simple, legal methods of disassociating your real name/home address from your work name.  It can also be important to keep your real name and actual place of residence separate from one another.  Learn which prepaid card can be used for registering domain names, do business banking without opening a business account, and discreetly move your earnings across state and international borders.

From author and former escort Dr Brooke Magnanti (aka Belle de Jour):  My contribution will be focussing on maintaining privacy in traditional media - how to publish anonymously, sign contracts, and give interviews without compromising anonymity.  It will discuss using limited liability companies to your advantage and managing profits to minimise tax burden.

Professional hacker (and official sexy geek) Alex Sotirov will be covering online/digital privacy, with a focus on how your activities can be tracked online and what steps you can take to try and maintain as much anonymity as possible on the net.

To see what else is in store for attendees, check out the Desiree Alliance schedule.

If you're going to be attending, drop me a comment so I can get excited about hanging out with you.  Also, if you're a sex worker, I'd love to know your questions on either my porn talk or the privacy panel - there might be something I'm missing that I can incorporate into either presentation.  Both talks will be filled-to-the-brim with information, but it's nice to check in with my readers and see what you'd most want to hear on either topic.

Last weekend, a conference took place in Boston for an organization called Stop Porn Culture.  Homely academics and anti-sex worker activists gathered to express their latest justifications to one another about why they're afraid of kinky sex and jealous of women who attract the male gaze - er, I mean, why they're against pornography.

Three sex bloggers also went to the conference of (by one estimate) about 150 attendees.  Violet Blue put up a counter-Stop Porn Culture blog, Our Porn, Ourselves, to raise awareness of the fact that lots of women love porn.  (Anti-porn activists struggle to always frame their argument in terms of men versus women and porn versus women, which is an false dichotomy.  They insist that your only choices are that you support women's rights, or you support the sex industry.  They get major constipation-face if you point out the massive plot holes in this gender-segregation story, such as gay porn, dyke/queer porn, and women who are consumers/clients - let alone the issue of women sex workers themselves who are happy with their work.)  Over on Twitter, a group of people were back-and-forthing about the conference, but it was a discussion that mostly left me shocked as to how obtuse and paternalistic some "allies" can be.

At the outset of the discussion, I was reprimanded by several people and told I'm mustn't even joke about porn being evil since I'll surely get quoted out of context and harm the cause.  I wonder what it's like to feel like to be so smugly self-important that you refrain from all use of sarcasm, finely honing every tweet to make sure that no one could ever misquote you or take offense at what you typed, because surely, your 140 character tweets hold within them the future of discourse on sexuality?  I'm always ruining things for the proper upstanding folks - this time, I was guilty of debasing Twitter to a mere vehicle of amusement and brief exchanges, rather than the erudite academic journal for which everyone else uses it.

The core concern from most sex blogger types commenting on the topic, though, is that apparently, "we" need to respect anti-sex worker activists, "be kind" to them, and seek to engage them politely and find common ground - not be angry or sarcastic like me.  Easy for you to say, folks - they aren't trying to put you in prison or take your business away from you.  How big of you to be cordial to those who are not seeking to make your life more dangerous or difficult.  It's no real skin off your enlightened backs to tut-tut philosophically at people about how they should react to their oppression when you're not the one being oppressed.  It's armchair politics at its most offensive.

This isn't just an annoyance of mine with sexuality issues, it's a problem amongst liberals/lefties and how they discuss all sorts of political issues.  I think the underlying problem is that these sorts of people just can't stand the jarring, ego-deflating idea that their opinion as an Very Concerned Outsider isn't as important or valid as the opinion of an insider.  It isn't.  (As a white chick, I would never harangue a person of color about why my opinion of how to handle racism is better than theirs.)

I absolutely do not aim to build bridges with extremists who hate sex workers and want us penniless and in prison, any more than I aim to do so with people who commit anti-queer hate crimes.  I wouldn't really even want to debate them directly, unless I felt the particular forum was large and neutral enough.  People who have devoted their lives to taking away freedoms from other people are not seeking compromises and rational conversation - they are devout ideologues, not misguided random citizens that just need the real facts.

Ours is an info war of changing attitudes, and then laws, to grant us rights, respect, and dignity.  I'm not going to use my energy trying to cozy up with the group of people who are the least likely to ever change their outlook on the issue.  It's simple strategic thinking - when you waste your limited resources fighting impossible battles, you're neglecting a lot of perfectly winnable battles.  For example, if your goal is to get people to become atheists, you don't have to be terribly bright to realize that an effective way of doing so is not by flying to Saudi Arabia and pestering fanatics who have made a pilgrimage to Mecca.  It's not engaging in a "public debate" that could convince a larger audience of your logically-superior argument, it's ramming your head into a wall in a place where the dialog is controlled and utterly dominated by the most hardcore of your opposition.  (I do, however, fully support spying on your enemies in their native environments so you can understand their agenda better.)

One of the women urging "us" to respect people who put sex workers at risk complained that I was "devaluing other opinions".  Twitter being so succinct, I'm not sure if she meant that I shouldn't devalue the opinions of anti-sex worker activists, or that I shouldn't devalue her opinion that we need to work with them and engage them at their own conference.  As I thought about how to parse it, though, I realized it didn't matter.  Why, yes, actually - I do devalue the opinions of people who aren't sex workers that feed a need to tell me what to do.  Whether you're an anti-porn feminist or a pro-porn feminist.

Oppressing sex workers isn't an opinion.  It's an action.  I could care less if these nutters sat in their cat-filled spinster apartments and didn't like porn - that's an opinion.  But they're not content to just not watch porn themselves, they try to force their world view on the rest of us.  Anti-porn and anti-sex worker activists are political organizations that take actions by lobbying governments to restrict sex workers' access to safe working conditions and to imprison them for being indecent and sinful.  Since we're getting technical here, I do "respect their right to have an opinion", but these people stopped having merely "an opinion" a long time ago.  It makes me think of those who were defending the Mormon church for "just having an opinion about gays" in 2008 when they illegally financed the massive propaganda campaign that took civil rights away from queer couples in California.

Being more "kind" or "respectful" towards people who've built profitable careers creating panic, purposefully lying to the public, pressuring governments to pass bad laws, and bashing sex workers isn't going to make them switch teams.  These are not people who can be engaged with in a reasonable debate using facts, calm voices, and warm handshakes.  Being a smart activist means knowing the difference between those who are distinctly and unabashedly your enemy, and those who are on the fence and could benefit from hearing from you.  Being a smart sex worker ally, I would further contend, includes not spending your time patronizing me about why I ought to respect people who seek to drive me out of business and into jail.

(PS: After I wrote this post, I did more catching up on blogs and found that Audacia Ray had already written something on the chatter and counter-organizing around the Stop Porn Culture conference. Here's her post that also discusses the pointlessness of debating anti-porn radicals.)

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've had a lot of smut thrust at me over the years as awful examples of "women being degraded", but none of that has ever truly pissed me off quite like ForTheGirls.com.  It's with that long-standing annoyance that I was disappointed to see that the only porn site to ever really offend me with its disgusting amount of sexism is up for a Feminist Porn Award.  For The Girls (and others in the genre) takes sexuality back about 50 years, insults viewers' intellect and their libido, and tacitly says that all women are vanilla heterosexual chicks who squirm and giggle at the very thought of penises.

For The Girls and other smaller "porn for women" companies feature cheesy soft-focus images, putting forth the idea that in order for women to be aroused, a sexual situation must be framed in terms of love and cuddling.  I love snuggling, too, but it's obscenely offensive to me to suggest that women are such delicate little flowers that we can't handle sex without it being about love.  That, to me, is exactly the sort of mentality that feminism was supposed to be fighting against.  (But, I have that sentiment about a lot of matters when it comes to feminism, which is why I abandoned that sinking ship.)

I don't need saccharine romantic story lines to get wet - I want to see relatable people and fucking.  ("Porn for women" rarely features shots of penetration and other things that supposedly frighten women.)  When I look at porn, I want to see people getting sweaty, aroused, smiling and laughing, being "imperfect", and in realistic locations and situations, not a "fantasy hay loft where the muscular stable boy makes sweet gentle love to me while never ruffling my feathered hair."

For The Girls is just as bad as mainstream "male-centric" porn in the type of body images it promotes- oiled up beefcake guys with muscles, who generally look like they were photographed for some gay porn mag.  The women have flawless thin bodies, just like what you'd see on any mainstream porn production.  The sex - what little of it is shown - is of the extremely staged variety where the focus is on camera angles and keeping the performer's makeup and hair looking perfect.  (Nevermind the fact that most "porn for women" looks like it was shot in the 80s and 90s.)  Apparently, "women" like their porn tacky, contrived, and like something out of a letter to Penthouse Forum from 20 years ago where it's obvious a man is writing his fantasy from the perspective of a woman.

Why is For The Girls' content so similar to mainstream porn, you ask?  Because it is mainstream porn - and I don't mean that just as a personal judgement.  In talking with the site's owner on an industry message board several years ago, she explained how she gets the material she uses on her site.  For The Girls' owner buys cheesey mass-market heterosexual porn content, and removes all the shots of the actual sex, since women don't want to see that sort of thing.  She also buys generic softcore male content and deletes any photos that look too gay.  She then writes flowery introductory text to make the content romancey and (supposedly) appealing to women.  While the site's audience is led to believe that the content is special, "made for women", and focusing on women's pleasure and desires, it's just random porn produced under whoever-knows-what circumstances, with all the icky sex and the icky gay stuff deleted out.  Very feminist and sex-positive, don't you think?

(I've had a number of online conflicts on this topic with the owner of For The Girls, and I wish I had them screencapped for posterity.  Our fights were on a couple of different message boards for women in the porn industry, both of which are now offline.)

For The Girls and the "porn for women" niche is just dripping with the idea that women actually don't like or want sex.  It's deeply misogynistic in ways that aren't obvious on the surface.  (The whole thing reminds me of an Onion article about a woman masturbating to the thought of having a husband, a house in the suburbs, and 2.5 darling children.)  For The Girls' owner wouldn't even bother me if she peddled her product as "softcore romance porn", but don't beat your chest and make a fuss about how your conservative anti-sex "porn" is is what all women - as a blushing hivemind - want.

I've heard that For The Girls does sell well, which is sad, because it's not the only option.  There is a lot of porn out there for vanilla heterosexual women that doesn't belittle them, and is actually directed by women, focused on women's pleasure, and features performers who love their work.  (As well as amazing porn directed by men and transfolk, and porn that's not so vanilla or heterosexual.)  There is just so much kick-ass erotic material out there these days for all women, of all different tastes, and it's a shame to see one site claim a monopoly on knowing what's best for the fairer sex.  It's especially sad to see For The Girls mentioned in the same breath as Buck Angel, Jamye Waxman, Madison Young, Shine Louise Houston, Carlos Batts, Courtney Trouble, and Tristan Taormino - and all the other people who create beautiful erotic material that doesn't condescend to their audience by "protecting" them from sex.

My trip to New York City was a whirlwind of amazing, and I've barely had time to wash my clothes and read my email before I'm back to the airport tomorrow- although, this time, for a family visit.

I knew I was going to visit New York this fall to shoot for Cocksexual.com, and the universe was especially kind in putting together a great week of pervert events so I could have fun in the evenings, too.  Alongside a full dance card of taking pictures of cocks, there was also a sex-positive drinkup, the Sex Worker Literati reading series, the 2010 Sex Blogger Calendar release party, and Audacia Ray's second screening of her Pay As You Go collection of shorts.  (Thank you to the organizers of these events!)

I was able to shoot 8 new models for the site, from cute boner-filled posing to an amazing double-penetration scene.  (This was my first time shooting a DP, and I found it challenging to know what to focus on when there's so much hotness happening all at once.  I love meeting new challenges!)  The cheapie light kit has been great to work with- it packs down small enough that I can fit everything in a large backpack.  In spite of some hurdles like missed trains, lost models, and the A and C subways not operating, everything still ended up working out, and 23 gigs of great porn was shot.

I feel as though I was dragged quickly through a massive scrumptious buffet, and barely had a chance to stick my fork in but a few trays of food as I passed.  I met and caught up with many great sexual intellectuals, but it was all so short.  Ten minutes of conversation here, a late-night dinner there, a quick hug and "nice to see you!" shouted in a crowded bar in the middle, and I have found myself back at home, wondering what happened to me.  As a bit of a recluse, that level of constant social interactions dazzles me, and I wonder if that's actually just what every week is like for normal people- the ones who don't work at home, in fleece pants, cat on their lap, with podcasts to keep them apprised of the outside world.

I've officially declared February 1st to be the launch date of Cocksexual.com, so that's when you'll get to see all the great stuff I've been doing.

As always, I am seeking models, but right now, I am most interested in finding cisgender (non-trans) men to work with in the Bay Area or Seattle.  If you are a cisguy, partnered to one, or know one who might be interested in being pegged on camera, check out my casting page.

A parting shot:

I was recently in the Bay Area for two noble purposes: shooting strapon porn and attending the third Arse Elektronika conference.  And, somewhere in-between, accomplishing plenty of eating, drinking, and socializing with many of my favorite nerdverts.

On the porn end of things, I got a lot done.  I shot my first five models for Cocksexual.com, including this lovely lady:

There was much cuteness to be had, as well as hot cocksucking, fucking, drag and gender play, jerking off, and a certain amazing woman who can suck her own dick.  (You'll have to wait until February 2010 to see who!)

I also had a great time at Arse Elektronika.  Here's Annalee Newitz (currently of io9.com fame) presenting her talk on the history and future of love, with potential scenarios for how we might be having relationships 300 years from now.

Thank you to all of the awesome people with whom I had a chance to re-connect or meet for the first time!  It would take me too long to list you all, but know that you're still my beautiful and unique snowflakes (of frozen sexual secretions).

One of the themes of conversation for the weekend was how We (in the most royal and vague sense) would like to live in a world where They accept our kinks, geekery, genders, and modes of sexual expression.  While I was in that frame of mind for the conference, many San Franciscans were spending their Saturday having a daytime rave.  The BART into the city was besieged by young people in their best "freak" outfits comprised of shiny/neon things from American Apparel.  They were there to have fun and play weirdo dress-up for a day, and then go back to being frat boys and Forever 21 clerks or whatever it is that normal young people do.

It was a contrast that highlighted an important social division for me.  Some of us try to de-stigmatize our communities, while others work to stigmatize themselves (in shallow, temporary ways).  It's interesting to observe which subcultures revolve around which approach.

In the next few, I plan to visit New York for Audacia Ray and David Henry Sterry's new reading series, Sex Worker Literati.  In her blog post after the event, Audacia wrote,

The evening also made me reflect on an annoying phrase that gets thrown at sex worker activists: “the happy hooker lobby.”

In the sex work versus trafficking debates, one of the things that happens is that people who focus on trafficking (and specifically on the idea that all people in prostitution are “prostituted” and essentially being raped every day at their jobs) try to derail and discount the perspective of people who identify as sex workers by calling us the “happy hooker lobby.” But here’s the thing: most of the people who use the phrase “sex work” and address the issues in the sex industry from a labor and human rights perspective haven’t had a straight forward “empowering” or uncomplicated experience of the sex work that they’ve done. This much was certainly reflected in the stories told on Thursday night.

It's always been interesting to me - as a part of the "happy hooker lobby", I suppose - how we lobbyists seem to be the ones with the longest lists of grievances about our industries and how things could be improved.  This is because we live it, rather than putting on airs after reading an article on the internet, or having gotten offended/titillated when our crabby women's studies professor told us how degrading she imagines sex work must be.

But, informed critique requires more than theory and self-righteous outrage to even know to complain about things like strip clubs charging stage fees, or escort services taking too large a chunk for too little client screening, or a porn company spitefully reselling a model's images to sites on which she didn't want to appear.  That sort of stuff requires, you know- listening to sex workers.  And learning about how the industries really work.

The people with no stake in a given issue tend to be the ones most prone to moral absolutism.  The less they're invested - the less they're truly interested, even - the more people can project their perfect black-and-white-isms onto the lives of others.  ("Pornography is always exploitative," "no prostitute genuinely consents to the work," etc.)

So, for the ambiguous and fascinating good stuff, I encourage folk to attend (or watch videos from) Sex Worker Literati, the first Thursday of every month in Manhattan.

Organizer Scarlot Harlot during a screening. I thought she looked lovely in this light.

At the beginning of June, I spent 10 days in the Bay Area.  I was in town primarily for the 2009 Sex Worker Film Festival, but I also had a chance to go to shoot photos of Roxxie (and vice versa), pick up a new fuck buddy, tour Kink.com, get kissed and spanked by a number of cute boys and girls, and have lunches with famous folks like Dr. Marty Klein, Violet Blue [photo], and Thomas Roche, so it was a well-rounded (and sleep-deprived) adventure.

Of the many events of the festival, I attended Whore-A-Palooza, which included movies and performances in a bar; Sex Work, Trafficking and Labor Migration: Views from Inside The Sex Industry, which featured movies and discussion; Cirque X, a benefit for the St. James Infirmary; and the main event, the Sex Worker Film Festival at The Roxie, which ran all day on Saturday.  (However, in true slut fashion, I didn't make it until the 6pm block of movies because I'd been up past sunrise the night before screwing in a hot tub after the benefit party. Many thanks to Match for supplying me with condoms and lube for said screwing. You're a true sex worker ally, baby.)

The main movie event was a powerful night of hanging out in the Roxie with sex worker activists, allies, and other interested folk. The materials ranged from horribly sad to sweet and funny, and the real standout for me was Carolyn Allain's A Safer Sex Trade.  The 48-minute film covered the lives of three different people in Vancouver, Canada: a middle-aged escort/madam who'd been in the business a long time, a young independent escort with high hourly rates, and a former street worker turned volunteer who delivers free food to women still working outdoors in dangerous parts of the city.  (Read more about the film, view the trailer, or order the DVD here.)

I'm really glad I made a point of traveling for the event, and I look forward to the next one.

If you're looking for a way to contribute to meaningful sex worker projects, I highly recommend donating to San Francisco's St. James Infirmary, which has been facing severe budget cuts this year.

I'll be in the Bay Area next week for the San Francisco Sex Worker Festival. Here's a summary of scheduled events, make sure to check the web site for full details.

* Saturday, May 30: Radar Spectacle Benefit with Michelle Tea and more
* Sunday, May 31: BelleBazaar: An Orgy of Shopping
* Sunday, May 31: SWOP Benefit Party at Diva's
* Monday, June 1: SWOP Roundtable and Hospitality Day
* Tuesday, June 2: Whore-A-Palooza
* Wednesday, Thursday, June 3 & 4: Army of Lovers
* Friday, June 5th: Migration, Sex Work and The Evil Empire: Movies and Discussion
* Friday, June 5th: Cirque X, a St. James Infirmary benefit
* Saturday, June 6th: Movies at The Roxie
* Sunday, June 7th: Intersections: Krip Sex! Krip Sex Work!

For just $40, buy a pass to most of the week's events here.

I'm proud that my company is a sponsor, along with a lot of other great companies and groups.

Conference organizer Match and I at the porn and brownies party. We're 2 of only 4 people at the conference of 166 who don't call ourselves feminists. Photo by Diva.

Since the weekend in DC, I've been decompressing in a friend's place in Manhattan, objectifying his body and eating the city's most delicious vegan foods.

This year's Sex 2.0 conference had at least 50% growth since last year's event in Atlanta. There were a lot of awesome faces, a sexycute porn shoot, tons of cupcakes, a strong representation of sex worker issues, oodles of intelligent conversations, and very few creepers. On the down side, I barely got to say hello to some people since there was just so much good stuff happening. For a reclusive pervnerd like me, it was overwhelming, but in a positive way. FurryGirl.com has been online for over six years and receives over half a million unique visitors per month, but this was the first time I really felt like anyone has ever heard of me. Even when not wearing my name tag, I had some people do the "O hai, you're Furry Girl, right?" Strangeness.

In my mind, Sex 2.0 2009 kicked off online, with a critical post by previous conference organizer Amber Rhea. Coupled with the many comments, it was a perfect microcosm of why I longer identify as a feminist. It was like playing a game of Cliche Bingo, down to how the commenters (basically) split apart into two camps of opinion: The Feminists and The Sex Workers. (And, of course, it didn't occur to any of the feminists that if the sex workers and a transwoman felt unwelcome by feminists, then maybe the problem wasn't that the sex workers and transwoman were the ones who needed to modify their beliefs.)

There was a pinch of other random bitching and moaning here and there at the conference- complaints that carried as much weight as freaking out about how unfair it is that Wikipedia's entry on your favorite subject is only a stub. While I do plenty of criticizing the world myself, I'm not one to knock a transparently-organized unconference for not reading my mind and creating the panels I wanted to watch. One of my greatest hot buttons is when people complain about that which they have taken absolutely no steps to positively remedy, instead, choosing to pick at people who are doing something.

Moving on- I was a part of two panels. (See the list of the all talks/panels here.) I even wore my Inter-Web Debaters Club shirt so as to solidify my commitment to not fighting too much with people in person. I experienced not one real clash, bless my caustic little heart.

The first panel, Customer Relations for Sex Workers (with Sabrina Morgan, Renegade Evolution, Kimberlee Cline, Monica, Ellie Lumpesse, and David) started in a really solid direction to address issues of safety, how we've changed how we relate to our clients over the years, and a bit about how to screen clients for sex workers who do offline work. The conversation got a bit derailed into a discussion on one's rights when arrested and how to deal with the police, but it only goes to show how many different sex work topics the audience was interested in talking about. A group of us later convened in the hotel bar over champagne to get into a lengthier discussion about the ways in which we stay in touch with clients, the development of genuine friendships, fantasies we feel uncomfortable with (forced feminization and race play were two topics), and an annoyance with sex workers who engage in shit-talking on clients with "weird" fetishes.

The second panel I was a part of, Revisiting Naked on the Internet (with Audacia Ray, Amber Rhea, and Melissa Gira) had me as a bit of the odd-duckling-out. Not being a professional writer or someone who's changed a lot in the two years since the book's release, I didn't have much to give as an update. Dacia turned the conversation to online feminist spaces, where I had to try and not panel-jack by briefly explaining why I no longer identify as a feminist and why the term doesn't mean anything to me any more. (The writer from Feministing.com didn't even jump out of her chair and stab me in the eye with a fork, which was pleasantly surprising.) I told the group, "I was sick of seeing 'feminism' as a euphemism for 'awesome'." Jack hollered out at me, "Are you an awesome-ist?", to which I replied, "I am a militant awesome-ist!" (Thank you, dear Jack, for helping me inject some levity.) One of the other issues brought up in the panel was how profoundly exhausting is is for sex workers (and their allies) to always be on the defensive and doing "101" work. Surprise: We get tired of having to justify our existence to feminists who can't be bothered to educate themselves about our real issues and demands.

All in all, an excellent fucking weekend.

« Go to newer posts