{"id":1083,"date":"2013-03-05T16:39:40","date_gmt":"2013-03-05T11:09:40","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/asap-asia.org\/blog\/?p=1083"},"modified":"2014-02-07T11:59:35","modified_gmt":"2014-02-07T06:29:35","slug":"an-old-profession-fights-for-its-rights","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/asap-asia.org\/blog\/an-old-profession-fights-for-its-rights\/","title":{"rendered":"An Old Profession Fights For Its Rights"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><em>Not all women have the same story to tell. Their experiences are different, and so are their reproductive needs. \u00a0Join ASAP this Women\u2019s Day, and walk in the shoes of women whose needs have become marginalized.<\/em><\/p>\n<p>Today we start with Sex-Workers. Here is a video interview with Michael Babu Raj, Senior Regional Manager of the Karnataka Health Promotion Trust, which works for sex workers\u2019 reproductive rights.<\/p>\n<p><iframe src=\"http:\/\/www.youtube.com\/embed\/J7OQvwN0ZII\" height=\"360\" width=\"640\" allowfullscreen=\"\" frameborder=\"0\"><\/iframe><\/p>\n<p>I met Michael at the <a href=\"http:\/\/www.cehat.org\/go\/HhrCourse2013\/Home\">CEHAT Post-Graduate Course on Health and Human Rights<\/a> held very recently in Mumbai. He has worked for the rights of sex-workers to affordable Anti-retroviral drugs, effective contraception and safe abortion.<\/p>\n<p>Michael and I had long conversations over tea breaks on the lives of health workers in districts around the Indian city of Bangalore. He has seen several women they \u00a0work with being arrested on false charges, abused by the clients or by local police officers, beaten by brothel owners and of course stigmatized by the community where they live.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cIt is hard for any single woman in India to get a house or to move around without her neighbours suspecting her of some immoral behavior,\u201d he said. \u201cYou can imagine what life will be like for a sex-worker.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>While the stigma does not allow them to move about society freely, they do find friends within their own community. \u201cOlder sex workers teach young ones about condoms, and sometimes even adopt abandoned girls,\u201d he said. \u201cIf you try to take away the sex-work from them, then they will lose this community, and the society will not accept them back either.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Sex work has been one of the oldest professions in history and yet today sex workers \u2013 both male and female \u2013 are finding themselves having to fight very hard to get legitimacy for their profession. It is partly because of the stigma that surrounds sex. But in part, it is the health risks like HIV and its accompanying stigma that prevent these communities from living a life of dignity.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cUnless the sex worker recognizes her own job as a profession, she won\u2019t feel like speaking openly about disease or accessing care,\u201d said Michael. \u201cSo when we talk of rights, we first need to help them understand that they have rights and that they can ask to be free of abuse.\u201d<\/p>\n<figure id=\"attachment_1032\" aria-describedby=\"caption-attachment-1032\" style=\"width: 300px\" class=\"wp-caption alignleft\"><img fetchpriority=\"high\" decoding=\"async\" data-attachment-id=\"1032\" data-permalink=\"https:\/\/asap-asia.org\/blog\/feb-14-rising-against-misogyny\/_dsc0670\/\" data-orig-file=\"https:\/\/asap-asia.org\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2013\/02\/DSC0670-scaled.jpg\" data-orig-size=\"2560,1700\" data-comments-opened=\"0\" data-image-meta=\"{&quot;aperture&quot;:&quot;14&quot;,&quot;credit&quot;:&quot;&quot;,&quot;camera&quot;:&quot;NIKON D90&quot;,&quot;caption&quot;:&quot;&quot;,&quot;created_timestamp&quot;:&quot;1360751710&quot;,&quot;copyright&quot;:&quot;&quot;,&quot;focal_length&quot;:&quot;105&quot;,&quot;iso&quot;:&quot;1250&quot;,&quot;shutter_speed&quot;:&quot;0.016666666666667&quot;,&quot;title&quot;:&quot;&quot;,&quot;orientation&quot;:&quot;1&quot;}\" data-image-title=\"_DSC0670\" data-image-description=\"\" data-image-caption=\"&lt;p&gt;This 14-year old girl (second from left) is the daughter of a sex worker (the mother is not in the photo). She rose against violence on Feb 14, to speak about the rights of sex workers to a life free from fear and abuse.&lt;\/p&gt;\n\" data-medium-file=\"https:\/\/asap-asia.org\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2013\/02\/DSC0670-300x199.jpg\" data-large-file=\"https:\/\/asap-asia.org\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2013\/02\/DSC0670-1024x680.jpg\" class=\"size-medium wp-image-1032\" alt=\"This 14-year old girl (second from left) is the daughter of a sex worker (the mother is not in the photo). She rose against violence on Feb 14, to speak about the rights of sex workers to a life free from fear and abuse.\" src=\"https:\/\/asap-asia.org\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2013\/02\/DSC0670-300x199.jpg\" width=\"300\" height=\"199\" srcset=\"https:\/\/asap-asia.org\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2013\/02\/DSC0670-300x199.jpg 300w, https:\/\/asap-asia.org\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2013\/02\/DSC0670-600x399.jpg 600w, https:\/\/asap-asia.org\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2013\/02\/DSC0670-1024x680.jpg 1024w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 300px) 100vw, 300px\" \/><figcaption id=\"caption-attachment-1032\" class=\"wp-caption-text\">This 14-year old girl (second from left) is the daughter of a sex worker (the mother is not in the photo). She rose against violence on Feb 14, to speak about the rights of sex workers to a life free from fear and abuse.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<p>This brings me to another story that unraveled in Mumbai on Feb 14, V-day when the city rose with the world to oppose violence against women. At the event held at the Bandra Band Stand, a young 14-year old, the daughter of a sex-worker rose for the rights of her mother. \u201cI have watched my mother being abused \u2013 beaten and raped \u2013 for a long time,\u201d she said. \u201cBut like other women my mother has the right to say no. She need not have sex unless she chooses to.\u201d This young girl is currently writing her board exams and is planning to go to college very soon. How? Because her mother found a profession that could help her educate her daughter.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cWhen people talk about getting women out of sex trade, they often forget that they\u2019ve already knocked on other doors,\u201d said Michael. \u201cThis was the final resort that proved lucrative. It is cruel to take it away from them.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>There are many organizations that work for the rights of sex workers around the world. At Mumbai Rising we ran into Meenu Seshu, who works with Sangram. (<a href=\"http:\/\/www.sangram.org\/\">http:\/\/www.sangram.org\/<\/a>). Sangram has worked actively around India but predominantly in the states of Karnataka and Mumbai to empower sex workers\u00a0 to fight for their rights. They believe, \u201c People should believe that they can change things. It is not about a few activists fighting for other people\u2019s rights. Anybody who has imbibed this understanding should be able to go and fight for their rights.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>One such right that they are fighting for is the right to safe abortion. When sex-trade itself is stigmatized, it becomes very difficult for the sex worker to access another highly stigmatized form of basic health care \u2013 safe abortion.<\/p>\n<p>Unsafe abortion is a big concern in Karnataka, Michael informs me. In the districts where he works, men believe that their pleasure is incomplete if the semen does not touch the vagina. So, even if a sex worker successfully negotiates a condom, some clients tear it with their fingernails before ejaculation.<\/p>\n<p>When sex workers have an unwanted pregnancy, they sometimes have no where to go. \u201cDoctors are not very sensitive to a sex worker wanting abortion. And also some of them think it is illegal,\u201d said Michael. This might actually be true in other countries around Asia, but India has legalized abortion since 1972.<\/p>\n<p>Despite this, \u00a0he still sees several unsafe abortions around him. \u201cThere was a case, when a woman put her hand in and pulled out the fetus,\u201d he said. \u201cShe died from hemorrhage.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>I asked him if they had access to abortion pills. \u201cThey know about abortion pills in our districts,\u201d Michael said, \u201cbut they don\u2019t know what it is called. They can get it over the counter sometimes, if not they just try some unsafe method.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>As we discuss a wide span of vulnerabilities over the week, we will see how marginalized women have worse access than others to health care. But among these women, sex-workers occupy a unique place. They exist because patriarchal societies have exploited women (and some men) for sex historically. But now paternalism is becoming their worst enemy, as conservative heads would rather criminalize sex work and put these women out of a job. This further marginalizes them cutting their access to basic health care and a dignified, healthy life.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Not all women have the same story to tell. Their experiences are different, and so are their reproductive needs. \u00a0Join ASAP this Women\u2019s Day, and walk in the shoes of women whose needs have become marginalized. Today we start with Sex-Workers. Here is a video interview with Michael Babu Raj, Senior Regional Manager of the&hellip;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":14,"featured_media":4097,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":false,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[276,279,252,413,298],"tags":[255,254,253],"class_list":["post-1083","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-access-and-barriers","category-events","category-international-womens-day","category-marginalized-women-access-and-barriers","category-blogs-on-abortion-stigma-and-other-social-barriers","tag-marginalized-community","tag-sex-worker","tag-womens-day"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/asap-asia.org\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2022\/06\/blog-featured-image-logo.png","jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p3O7nG-ht","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_likes_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/asap-asia.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1083","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/asap-asia.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/asap-asia.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/asap-asia.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/14"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/asap-asia.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1083"}],"version-history":[{"count":7,"href":"https:\/\/asap-asia.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1083\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1170,"href":"https:\/\/asap-asia.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1083\/revisions\/1170"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/asap-asia.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/4097"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/asap-asia.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1083"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/asap-asia.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1083"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/asap-asia.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1083"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}