From Desiree Alliance

End Demand Fact Sheet
A coalition of advocates and sex worker rights organizations have produced materials critiquing "end demand" style programming. Proponents of "end demand"-style programming such as "John's Schools" or increased arrest of clients of prostitution, claim that the measures only punish the men who purchase sex and protect women who sell sex. However, programs working with sex workers across the United States have found that intensive "end demand" programs increase law enforcement activities against all people in public space. Furthermore, these programs allow conservatives to channel hard won social service funding into policing efforts. This downloadable fact sheet cites research that illustrates the real results of "end demand" programming. We were able to do this analysis and produce these fact sheets via a grant from the Urgent Action Fund in early 2006. Groups involved in developing analysis of changes in the Trafficking Victims Protection Reauthorization Act include: the Desiree Alliance, Sex Workers Outreach Project-USA (SWOP-USA), the Woodhull Foundation, Bayswan, Best Practices Policy Project and local service providers in the District of Columbia. Below is the fact sheet. You can download the fact sheet here as a Word document. You can view the text of the End Demand legislation here. You can download the End Demand legislation here as a Word document.
Initiatives to “end demand” for prostitution harm women and undermine service programs
The Bush Administration is aggressively pushing the idea of ending demand for prostitution, claiming that programs oriented toward an “end to demand” are evidence- and rights-based, protecting “vulnerable” women and girls exploited by men. For example in December 2005 new provisions about “ending demand for commercial sexual services” were incorporated into the Re-authorization Act of the Trafficking Victims Protection Act (TVPA).[1] In reality these programs do not stop men from seeking sexual services, but rather, they harm women and channel social service funding into policing efforts. This frequently harms sex workers by pushing them, and their clients, to adopt strategies that heighten their risk for violence, HIV, and more.[2]
What are “end demand” programs?
Typically when people speak about “ending demand” they are referring to a range of efforts such as diversion programs in the court system and increased policing of men often accompanied by the imposition of new laws. Diversion programs such as “Johns’ Schools” and public shaming campaigns (i.e. naming people caught for solicitation on bill boards or on websites) are thought to deter men who might consider purchasing sexual services, thus “ending demand.” These programs are often developed in tandem with heightened policing of poor neighborhoods where sex workers reside and work, in order to enforce anti-prostitution laws. These policies are construed as “progressive” because rather than targeting and policing sex workers, they instead target anyone, including clients and organizations working with sex workers. The new legislation thus “punishes” men while “helping women,” an approach developed by Swedish conservative legislators and feminists in the 1980s. Claims have been made that sex workers are provided health care and training in other forms of work with the funds obtained from arresting men (i.e. fines). Police also claim that they arrest fewer women because they are focusing on male clients of sex workers.
Do these programs work?
Proponents of end demand style programming claim that they reduce prostitution without harm to sex workers, deterring men from purchasing sexual services and helping women.[3] Swedish proponents claim that criminalization “will affect relations between women and men in the direction of greater gender equality.”[4] They also that claim statistics on reduction of arrests of both sex workers and their clients prove these programs are working and improving the lives of women and girls. Evaluations of end demand style programs reveal a very different picture:
· Prostitution in general is not reduced by “Swedish style legislation” and sex workers are made more vulnerable to violence. An evaluation of Sweden’s legal experiment concluded that it did not greatly reduce the number of women engaging in street sex work: figures from Stockholm show that the total number of women on the street remained stable from 1999-2003.[5] However, the report found that during this period street sex workers were increasingly exploited, pressured to reducing prices and to provide unprotected sex.
· Highly touted end demand style programs, such as “Johns’ Schools,” have little or no deterrent effect above and beyond the effect of arrest and criminal proceedings.[6] One study found that before and after participating in the program, 1 in 10 men said that they would likely seek commercial sex services again. This rate is 4 times higher than the officially reported recidivism rate of 2.4%.[7]
Rather these programs end up targeting and arresting clients who are poor, people of color and immigrants.[8] These men plead guilty even though many of them may not have been doing anything illegal at the time of arrest and would have been found not guilty had they gone to trial.
· End demand programs rely on fear tactics that endanger women’s safety. Researchers observing Johns Schools in action found that presenters cautioned participants that “drug addicted prostitutes… have stabbed their clients with AIDS infected needles”[9] as a way of “scaring men straight.” Consequently sex workers are portrayed as violent, dangerous and diseased, thus increasing stigmatization and making prostitutes more vulnerable to violence.
· End demand programs that are financed by “user fees” paid by participants lead to corruption and conflicts of interest between the police and NGO service providers. Often funds obtained by arresting people are insufficient or are used by the city for other purposes. Research shows that close relationships between policing and funding undermine service providers’ accountability to communities served. In one case, numerous police joined the board of directors of an NGO overseeing a Johns School program. Eventually a police representative became Chair of the board. The researchers noted that “[s]ince the social service organization’s financial welfare depends… on the number and volume of prostitution offenders diverted to the ‘John School’ programme [sic], and given that this volume largely depends on the level of prostitution enforcement, it becomes apparent how… considerable conflicts of interest can arise.”[10]
What can you do to help sex workers in your area?
We are a coalition of sex workers, service providers, advocacy groups and concerned community members who are concerned that “end demand” style programming is undermining service provisions for women in need. We are also concerned that all people engaging in commercial sex (men, women and trans-people) be provided with real social support. If you are concerned about these issues we ask that you join us by contacting representatives of the following organizations in our coalition:
Desiree Alliance, http://www.desireealliance.org/
Sex Workers Outreach Project http://www.swop-usa.org/
Best Practices Policy Project, http://www.bestpracticespolicy.org/
[1] See complete text here.
[2] For example, carrying condoms can be cause for arresting someone for prostitution. Condoms are needed to practice safe sex, yet policing policy makes this practice problematic.
[3] The developer of the John’s School program, Norma Hotaling of SAGE, claimed that 98% of men going through the program were “rehabilitated” (Jerome and Rowlands, 1998).
[4]Working Group of the Legal Regulation of Sexual Services, 2004, Purchasing sexual services in Sweden and the Netherlands: Legal regulation and experiences: pp14-15
[5] Working Group of the Legal Regulation of Sexual Services, 2004, Purchasing sexual services in Sweden and the Netherlands: Legal regulation and experiences:
[6] Wortley, S., Fischer, B., & Webster, C. (2002). Vice lessons: A survey of prostitution offenders enrolled in the Toronto John School Diversion Program. Canadian Journal of Criminology, 3(3), 227-248: 394. Monto, Martin A. and Steve Garcia. 2001. "Recidivism Among the Customers of Female Street Prostitutes: Do Intervention Programs Help?" Western Criminology Review 3 (2). [Online]. Available: http://wcr.sonoma.edu/v3n2/monto.html.
[7] Wortley, Op.Cit: 389
[8] Fischer, B. , Wortley, S., Webster, C., Kirst, M. (2002). The Socio-Legal Dynamics and Implications of Diversion: The Case Study of the Toronto 'John School' for Prostitution Offenders. Criminal Justice, 2(4), 385-410: NEED PAGE #.
[9] Wortley, Op.Cit: 373.
[10] Fischer, Op. Cit: 393.

Desiree Alliance is a coalition of sex workers, health professionals, social scientists, professional sex educators and their supporting networks. We seek to encourage a better understanding of human sexuality by promoting ethical and unbiased research into sexual subcultures; to promote saner and more sensible approaches to policies relating to adult sexual health and behavior. We use this information to educate and empower the public to have healthy and rational attitudes about sexuality.
Desiree Alliance is a Project of Social and Environmental Entrepreneurs (SEE), a 501(c)(3) non-profit.

I don't know

if these men are innocent or guilty. I don't know the situation. Maybe I'll never know. But there's a strong likelihood that-- if it wasn't these men it was someone else--somewhere someone was assaulted and the perps got away with it. It happens. It's all part of the backlash. It's overwhelming. Every time I step outside I have to face this.

The Duke Case

I don't know what went on here, if she was or wasn't raped (apparently she was, just it's unknown by whom) but those Lacrosse players, or at least (shit I forgot his name) the big one, he is a pompous asshole in my opinion, and it's completely wrong to go after the District Attorney and say he "fabricated" rape charges or whatever he did.

I'm so mad about this. Whether or not these guys did it, it makes me think that I could be raped or killed out there, and it's likely nothing will be done about it.

My friend said in her neighborhood these frat boys desecrate the streets every night, throwing beer bottles, pizza, knocking over trash cans, screaming at the top of their lungs. Or a bouncer in the club scene talked about these guys who "come in here and throw their money around...." and that he had to break up 20 fights in three days. What is happening here? Has it always been this way? What can I do?

I love my sister, but I'm mad that she chooses to associate with these people. It's the environment she grew up in, I guess.

he is eating chicken wings in slow motion

tries to button his pants. The button pops off because he's gained so much weight. There's a half-drunk pitcher of beer on the table....he starts to cry.

The Christina Aguilera song "Beautiful" is playing....

He said,

How did you feel, the last time we were together?

I said, it was good, but I was a little afraid at times, like I didn't know what you were going to do.

He said, well, to be honest, it's kind of a turn on that you were afraid.


I need to stop thinking about D, but I still have feelings for him although I am really, really mad at him. He did "trap" me. He got away with it.


But in any event, it looks like I will be going somewhere: LA LA LA yippie! I have to brush up on my driving....

Beat It

I've become obsessed with music videos, and have been watching the above mentioned one over and over. It's fascinating to me, and superbly acted. Love it, love it.

Others worth mentioning: Madonna/Britney Spears Me Against the Music, Gwen Stephanie What You Waiting For, Hollaback Girl, Madonna Sorry, Maroon 5....well, Adam Levine is cute so, for that reason.


I read Indymedia on the way home on the train and maybe I need to read something else. It's relentlessly grim. I'm glad Bush was greeted by protest after protest: I have to hand it to people in their ability to organize, against obstacles, in the face of other people's wrongdoing. But it's depressing to read about all the money that the US has given to these fascist and corrupt military dictatorships and to think anyone would support that----it just put me in a really foul mood. So I'm mad but it all makes sense; because every day I brush up against people whose energy is just in plain English horrid. I see, in certain people, the same narcissism, year after year and realize they'll never change. These are all the same people who created the Iraq war and Halliburton....what is it: narcissistic personality disorder, sociopathy? There was another article about how a squat, or something like that, in Denmark was brutally raided and the people evicted....all of which has been protested throughout Europe and a thousand or so people have been arrested....I could go on about this when I have more time--just that there's something really, really wrong going on here. Conspiracy? I can't say definitely, but look what happened to the Street Harassment Project. I don't know all the reasons I only know the ....manipulation that went on, I don't know yet....but somehow all this intense energy was snuffed out. I felt terribly alienated in my last days there, out in the wilderness, it's hard to describe, maybe because it was winter, but the whole atmosphere was bleak. Something went really, really wrong there. But this is for another article.

On to another topic: another place I recommend visiting in my neighborhood is Connetitcut Muffin, on the corner of Myrtle and Waverly. They make fabulous lattes, muffins (including lowfat) and have a wide selection of alternative news. Go, go, if you're in the area.

my friend

said a guy grabbed her wrist and screamed in her face, "You come in here with your feminist bullshit.....when are you going to realize men will always be in charge? You women don't deserve to have any rights.....I hate all of you...." while ....well, this particular guy isn't very popular. The thing is, he's being up front about it at least. How many people think this and don't say it?

Sometimes I think women are guilty, too. In different ways.

So...on to a lighter topic. Here are some of my recommendations if you ever visit my neighborhood in Fort Greene, Brooklyn:


Yummy Yummy Chinese food, Myrtle Ave off Vanderbildt. I get the cold sesame noodles with vegetable rolls....just my recommendation.

Green Apple Cafe, Dekalb near South Oxford. Little place, good muffins and lattes.

Videos I'm watching: Michael Jackson's Thriller and Beat It


Madonna: Papa Don't Preach and Hung Up.

Summer is a mixed blessing. I love hot weather and wearing tank tops, not feeling chilled and miserable going out, but the down side is these people, mostly guys, hanging around the street who make a hobby out of pouncing on any female who walks by. I saw a gang of guys leave the projects last night and it was not a good feeling. The police station is right there....on the same block. Gangs of men in general....I don't like it. I don't support the prejudice that goes on in the world but I also am not going to tolerate the wrongful treatment of women by men, regardless of where it's coming from, and it just doesn't change from one place to another. Especially after I was assaulted last summer, well, things were bad, what can I say? It's supposed to be changing, but regardless, women are a target. I don't feel free to go out at certain hours and I have to be able to do that. I'm a night person. I don't know....don't know if it's worth staying here.

poisoned pet food

http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20070324/ap_on_re_us/pet_food_recall

It's so upsetting, my heart goes out to these people who have lost their pets. My cat got sick a few months ago with a mysterious near kidney failure, and I wonder if it was the food. It's scary.....I have to watch closely.

more

I know there are many groups working to confront street harassers. I am all for women standing up for themselves and fighting back. But realistically we're confronting well-trained soldiers here. Safety IS an issue, and has a lot to do, I believe, with why most women don't respond to these guys. I've been through many confrontations in my life and it's an ugly, painful thing to go through. Plus, it nearly got me in bad situations. Groups like Hollaback have the right intentions, but you may get a guy who freaks on you if you snap his picture. I did that to a couple guys on the street once and they just made a joke of it. I just don't think that is going to change their behavior. What IS the solution? Anti-street harassment legislation? That may actually be--I'm all for grass roots mobilizing but really are we going to get all women to take up Uzis and become Navy Seals to fight these guys off--in an ideal world that would happen but it's not the world we're living in. I don't know. I don't know. And a part of me felt really empty after the counter harassment parties, even though I know these women had their hearts in the right place. But it felt ....like I wasn't reaching anyone, just creating or exacerbating negative situations. I am NOT saying we should just do nothing or wait for a law to be passed and just sit passively meanwhile, but the solutions so far have seemed superficial to me, and frustrating. There's no issue in the world quite like this one, and names like "Ëve teasing" just cuten the meaning, make it look like flirting.

I'm pissed. I live with this feeling every day.

And I just got back from a family get together which stressed the hell out of me. I love my mother but I can't deal with her and I was on the verge of never wanting to see her, or any of them, ever again. I finally was willing to forgive her, though anyone else I wouldn't, but it is the same result over and over whenever I go there. Now, I come home and the cats want food, my room is a mess, I have to go to the store for coffee and contact lens rinse..... and it just never, never ends, you know? So as soon as I come back from the store I am going to try to mellow out with wine and a joint. That will maybe restore my sanity.

Street Harassment is a Political Problem

Not every woman's individual, personal one.

I love summer, but this is one of the drawbacks. Guys lounging around leering at women.....on the subways, everywhere, there's no escaping this male attention. It is not harmless flirting. And they'll say they're doing it to meet women; they're not. Most of the time I don't dress up, much, and I get far more when I am. That pisses me off, as well. I wonder if we're going back. It's worse than ever. How do I get away from it?

Am I the only one who finds this somewhat comic?

http://www.examiner.com/ArticleEmail.cfm?articleID=613045

this has to set a record for one of the shortest trips ever taken by anyone....

Performance, Mo Pitkins

So my friend Alex and I did a show there and people loved us! Good news. These things are never easy to pull off. I've been rehearsing like mad and preparing for auditions around the city. This one woman got on the mike to do a performance piece and said something to the effect of, "I've recently gotten interested in feminism. When I was growing up in California, we were told that feminists were women who refused to shave their armpits and were lesbians. But then I got involved in the movement and realized that there were a hundred variations of feminists....socialist feminists, anarcha-feminists, conservative feminists....and it's like, which category d?" And Reverend Jen yelled out, "There's only one kind of feminist, and that's someone who believes women should have the same rights as men. Whether they shave their armpits or not." Awesome comment!

end of the cold!

good news is, I feel hopeful, and I'm finally getting free after several days of menstruation and stress, big time. So I've been working super hard and under loads of pressure. That demo took so much out of me and was exhausting grunt labor. It's such a struggle to get the world to acknowledge feminist issues beyond abortion rights or workplace sexual harassment, and even those topics are an uphill battle. Someone made a remark about a media blacklist on feminist issues, although cameras did show up. That's so exciting. And I realized, my activism is as a performing artist. I want to cheer, I miss it. I hope to go down to DC for the war march and I believe wholeheartedly in what I do. I express myself by jumping and screaming and channel my anger into that, which I believe creates such a better atmosphere than the negative confrontations at demonstrations. Never mind that people don't take us seriously and either bombard us with comments and pictures or else, like these women I demonstrated with, rolled their eyes and dismissed us as frivolous because we wear short skirts and even say we set the women's movement back. Well, that's bullshit. These women don't experience the backbreaking work that goes into cheering. They haven't stayed up til 5AM coming up with moves or doing exercises. But what can I do? Never mind that it's also a struggle to get them to acknowledge sex workers' rights beyond this kind of knee-jerk emotion of, prostitution is exploitation and has to be done away with, which, because of the "sex slave" argument that systems like the German one only trap women further, includes keeping it illegal? Or else they praise the Swedish model and...well, I've been on this topic before.

That said, though, I have great faith in Redstockings and this demonstration. I believe there's hope, and I believe there will be a new kind of protest, rather than just trying to re-create 1968 or something like that. Although sometimes I feel I was born in the wrong era. I am a warm weather person and my high school years were spent lounging around the parks in the city.

So, on that topic, I want to go to Colombia, a lot. But people keep telling me it's too dangerous and over and over I hear how I'll be kidnapped as soon as I get off the plane and even people from there tell me not to go. I wouldn't, except that I'm intrigued by it and the Spanish spoken there. Others say it isn't as bad as its reputation. The other place was South Africa.....so it'll happen it just wasn't the right time. I miss England, too. The men there, in the whole UK and Ireland, are all gorgeous and when I go there I actually get turned on but I just am aching to get away. For now, it'll probably be Miami, again. I loved it down there last year so I keep that in mind, when the wind stabs at my bare skin again.

today

more like yesterday. I'm really tired and stressed right now but I want to say this before it leaves my mind. The demo went well; it was so uplifting to see that we're not alone; there are so many women who feel the way I do and have the same problems. It can feel like you're alone, like no one is suffering like you are, although I know there are those with worse problems. But it's hard to connect with people regardless.

So that makes moments like this very fulfilling. It's also very informative. I drink all this literature up, and I learned a lot as well. One activist, when we were in the cab later said, the FBI probably has files on all of us, because we're activists.

ok I'm fading now, but before I forget....I ran into someone I've known, a guy, for about ten years, a friend of my ex, who is a cop. His personality is very atypical....he is funny, smart, goofy....and from what I've heard he doesn't get along with other cops and they hate him. Anyway, he was telling me, "They [his higher ups] wanted me to lock people up....for stupid stuff....for being homeless, and I would argue with them...."and he went on to say he was subsequently demoted, to a different station. I met a woman at a Social Wage meeting who was a prosecutor, with a particular interest in prostitution, which she saw as wrong and harmful. She said she would refuse prostitution cases...in other words didn't want to lock people up for that. She never came to another meeting, though, that I know of.

Join Us At the UN March 8, 2007 12:39 PM

Hope to see you there!

NY: Feminist Speak Out at the United Nations, NYC
(Ralph Bunche Park, 1st Ave & 43rd St)
On International Women's Day, Thurs March 8th 12:30pm

FL: Feminist Speak Out, Gainesville FL
(Hoggetowne Middle School, 3930 NE 15th St)
On International Women's Day, Thurs March 8th 6pm
(more info at the bottom)

Redstockings will expose and protest the myth that U.S. women are the most
liberated in the world. On March 8th, International Women's Day, at the
United Nations in New York City, women will testify from personal
experience on the true conditions we face here, and join ranks with women
of the world to fight for women's liberation. Feminists with the National
Organization for Women and Gainesville Women’s Liberation will hold a
sister action in Florida to join Redstockings’call for exposing this "Myth
of America" and demanding for us what most countries in the world already
have.

Women in the U.S. are supposed to be thankful to be the "freest." U.S.
women don't have it all, we do it all: long hours of paid work, and the
unpaid care work in the home.

The U.S. is one of only five countries out of 173 surveyed recently by
Harvard and McGill Universities that does not guarantee some form of paid
maternity leave. Fathers are granted paid paternity leave or paid parental
leave in 65 countries, including 31 offering at least 14 weeks of paid
leave. Many countries have public quality childcare available to all
residents. Every other industrialized country in the world has a national
health insurance system, taking health care coverage out of jobs and
marriage. These advances make women less dependent on men and employers
and it spreads the work of caring for the next generation and those who
need long-term care across the whole society.

Our government doesn't guarantee any of these programs. In the U.S., our
society runs off the backs of women underpaid or unpaid.

Send a donation to help us continue spreading the word and building the
Women’s Liberation Movement.

To support our work, please send a donation:
Gainesville Women’s Liberation
(Attn Women’s Liberation Task Force for National Health Care)
P.O. Box 2625
Gainesville, FL 32602-2625

Contact us to find out how you can join the Women’s Liberation Task Force
for National Health Care: womensliberation.org
646-285-1723 or 352-262-6234
redstockingsfeminism@hotmail.com


Join us in NY or Florida or tell us about a speak out you are organizing.
******************************

**********************************
Redstockings Speak Out in NYC:
Thursday March 8th, 12:30-1:15
Across from the UN, Ralph Bunche Park, 1st Avenue & 43rd Street
For More Info: Contact Allison Guttu at 646-285-1723 or
redstockingsfeminism@hotmail.com
www.womensliberation.org/socialwagecommittee.html

****************************************************************

Feminist Speak Out on International Women’s Day in Gainesville, FL:
Thursday, March 8, 2007, 6:00 p.m. – 7:30 p.m.
Hoggetowne Middle School
3930 NE 15TH Street
Free dinner and childcare provided
Contact: Natalie Maxwell 352-262-6234 or Jessica Livingston 352-335-0320
Email: ga_now@juno.com
Speak Out Sponsored by: Gainesville Area NOW, Gainesville Women’s
Liberation, & the Women’s Liberation Task Force for National Health Care


www.gainesvillenow.org
www.womensliberation.org/socialwagecommittee.html
www.redstockings.org

dream, dream

Really haunting, this one. I'm at this guy I know Kevin's house. I meet some other guy, younger, who is a friend. I start hanging with this guy, and we end up going to a hotel upstate with some other people. But he's running or hiding from someone, and we keep agreeing to meet but we see other people in what look like animal cages, but are actually 'hotels." The police are everywhere, and I'm attracted to this guy, I like him, but he's elusive, always running, in some kind of trouble. I also am back at my father's house for a while, talking to him. But then they guy takes off, telling me to meet him or follow him, but then he's gone. So I'm back in the hotel this time with some young people. I get on a roller coaster with some people, a huge one, with a terrifying climb and drop. A voice says, this is you and David. I start screaming because I don't like roller coasters. We're climbing back wards and I see the drop is massive; I'm screaming because I don't want to drop, but we do, and I'm still screaming, we're up and around..... then I'm back in the hotel, which is a skyscraper. The walls, bedspread is yellow. The police are everywhere, and people are telling me and others, leave now. Suddenly the young people in the hotel with me are taking their suitcases and climbing out the window. Some are crying. The police are outside. I ask, what is going on? Someone says, they want us to come with them. People are going down the fire escape, and jumping long distances down, throwing their luggage down. A woman cop says, come out now, don't try to escape. I'm thinking, what will they do to us? We're trapped. Then I woke up, thinking, thank God that was a dream.

Decriminalization: Why?

"feminist" negation similar to antifeminist division of women into good/bad categories

"rescue" operations used to harass and jail prostitutes

fear of assault/arrest

harassment/violence from police, customers

having no protection, virtually, from violence, no voice under the law, invisibility

discrimination against women?

no job protection, health insurance, well....any of the usual benefits


fear of discovery; parents, friends, police

constant condemnation and judgement, even from women who call themselves feminists; being considered immoral, degenerate.....much of this given ammunition from the popular image of hookers as deranged, abused, drug-addicted and disease-ridden, ect. ect.

being treated by "crisis centers" or even organizations that purport to support them as victims or "sinners"with a kind of almost punishing attitude; of "Let's get you out of this asap...."

I guess I can't emphasize enough what I said about women who say they are even radical feminists who say they are on the side of the underdogs, who would even scream out at every chance their support of sex workers who, when confronted with these women face to face, insulted and pretty much damned them.


Several thousand dollars are spent virtually every day to arrest prostitutes: which in turn can stigmatize them for life and even destroy their lives; why isn't this money spent on basic needs such as health or child care?

Finally, it's one of the ways women can earn independence from men and employers; set their own hours, choose their own customers, and have more free time for other pursuits


it's hard work. Women's work is always undervalued

smoking is rude

it took two years but eventually my side won. I complained about smoking neighbors in my old apartment and at the time there was little I could do. It became a major issue. Now, smoking is no longer legally protected. I have this problem everywhere I go, smoking neighbors. I quit, anyone can. It killed my father. Quit! Smoking is lazy and rude. There's no excuse.

pet peeves

Maybe it's a difference in upbringing or culture, but the way I was raised, you're not supposed to talk in libraries. There are signs everywhere saying to turn off cell phones and talk quietly. Talking in libraries is RUDE behavior. So is direct, intense eye contact. I know some people mean well by it, but I hate it. Also, not observing another's personal space, like bumping into someone on the street, or anywhere. It's just disrespectful.

Walking home, I see these schoolchildren and I can see also the bullies, and I think, some things never change. Someone I know told me how this kid who had been a sociopath at school became a cop, he found out, and he said, "Someone actually gave him a gun?" He found out he was later kicked out for police brutality.

I don't really sentimentalize children. Call me mean. I just don't like them, that much. I believe to a degree people are born with good or bad personalities. Considering what I went through as a kid, I think a bad seed is evident, well, almost from the beginning. I do want my own children some day, and some kids are cute. But there are so many who are "troubled." There's little likelihood of changing them. Best thing to do is avoid them.

I guess

I was harsh in my last post but what I'm reading is shocking. Among the different classes of whores, life is very different. The call girls and independents live the best, with relative freedom, although it's not all a day at the beach. But what I was reading about streetwalkers and massage parlor workers is one devastating story after another. Arrest, police brutality, rape, well, the list goes on, over and over. These are just regular people trying to live, maybe they have kids, pets. That humanity can be so brutal, evil really, is a rude awakening. I never loved the police, but I thought we had something of a justice system. It's an uphill battle, but you have to win your freedom.

Also I got upset. I feel bad, I flaked out on Garrett and missed the time I was supposed to meet him. He was really mad at me, I guess for good reason, but it's still so awful to be screamed at, and I remember why I vowed never to be in another relationship again. It's one damnation to slavery after another. I have been in relationships since my teens and I know the story; it is pretty much always that way, that is what it turns into. Even my ex said, most men don't respect women. He would talk about how men he knew would interrupt, talk over or dismiss what their wives and girlfriends were saying. We always would blame ourselves, consider ourselves failures. If only I hadn't gone out after midnight, worn that skirt, said what I said, ect ect.

Women should be able to walk around any time day or night, dressed any way, and not fear assault or harassment. It is that way in countries like Germany and Egypt, and these aren't feminist-oriented societies. In Egypt religion makes women second class, and those horrid tales of female genital mutilation.....do happen (though not to everyone), and women are often forced into marriage....yet there's far less rape and sexual harassment there and women are virtually never raped or attacked by strangers and can walk around at any time of day or night. So.....if it's like that there it should be that way here. In Germany prostitution is legal and it's also basically safe.

I've been feeling really sad. February is a gruesome month, it's been hell. Someone told me February is the month of evil spirits. Not that it's all bad. But getting yelled at, the disastrous audition a few weeks ago, illness, taxes and feeling always like this horrible human being, a deviant, and living in fear....in my women's group they talked about how fear is a method of control; keeping people in a state of constant uncertainty. Garrett would get angry at me for my lateness (never admitting that he's also been late) but Simone de Beauvoir wrote something about how women are late as a form of revenge; that it's making up for the long wait that's her life.

So I know, there are many advocacy groups out there for sex workers, but this women in my group said how all these "exploited" women were not the ones who started the revolution. If one is worn out just trying to survive on the most fundamental level, there's hardly any energy left over to fight for change. Is this true? Most women activists I know do work, at shitty jobs often. But the constant demands of work impede real progress; and energy is spent on getting the basic necessities like food and shelter. Still, I've known women who do have freedom and leisure and don't become activists.

reading

a book on sex work, and one article discusses police violence against street prostitutes, which included rape. What I don't understand is where is the fight? the fight back, the outrage? I know, there are people everywhere who think prostitution needs to be decriminalized, and some good activists. But it's not enough. There's so much confusion, and even these well-meaning feminist groups which are struggling for women's full reproductive freedom (but shouldn't decrininalization be part of that; a woman's decision to do what she wants with her body? I KNOW, they've been linked before, but in every day dealings it's always an extra effort on my part to remind people, other activists, of this) and Indymedia, to their credit, did publish articles somewhat on the subject.....but it seems such a struggle to achieve real unity to stop this. Why aren't these cops going to jail for arrest or assault, and to arrest someone who has no power, really, in the world, who is herself a victim of real violence out there....I had been brought up to believe we have at least some justice system. But I have never witnessed worse injustice than that against prostitutes, and it's downright sex discrimination ( I know there are male prostitutes but since overwhelmingly women enter this profession and it's always been that way, I see this as gender-related still. That of course doesn't negate what the male ones go through). THey, the cops, should be sued. I'm mad. I'm outraged. Why aren't these feminist groups, like the ones working for increased health care, child care, abortion rights, jumping on this issue? Why are the ones I encounter, who consider themselves on the far left, ignoring this issue?

Fiat justitia, ruat coelum

"Let justice be done, though the heavens fall." I always loved that quote.

Right now I'm sick, my apartment is never warm enough even though I have two space heaters, the oven, stove and thermostat going at full temperature. I get runny nose and allegies, I'm swollen and dizzy, but I have to work, ect. ect. I am ready for warm weather. I don't know how people live in cold climates.

Sexy Sadie?

I've always found her fascinating, since I read my dad's copy of a book about the Manson Murders when I was sixteen. When I read that Trent Reznor moved into the "Tate" house in Rolling Stone I thought, that has to be bullshit, but I guess it isn't. But I can see people's obsession: this was a one-of-a-kind thing, like ritualistic. Now Susan Atkins is saying she didn't stab Sharon Tate, but who knows..... After reading her biography, I can see there's more to her life and story than what is commonly known. She really is gorgeous, with a unique face and intense eyes.

So where this current interest? Garrett managed to transfer one movie to my ipod: about cults, and the Manson family was one of the featured ones. There are so many layers to this story: one on top of another on top of another on top of another. Atkins is now a born-again Christian.

update---long time no write

So I'm so busy with work and auditions and performing everything is so chaotic, so hard. My "love" life is non-existent, yet I found a much better alternative. Relationships for women are a form of slavery, hell. I didn't get much out of any of mine. I still love them, I love one person still, more than one, but I refuse to be a carpet to walk all over.

But anyway....what else? I'm trying to get organized and stay on top of stuff but it's hard, you know. I'm wearing lots of layers cause it's winter and I'm here, I'm dealing with it, it isn't so bad. I still plan to go to South Africa but it's not the right time. It WILL happen, though. But it turns out I may be able to go...somewhere. That's the hard part: where? Colombia, maybe? I don't know if it's safe enough; I hear different reports. Mexico, ....well so many options. The winter sucks, but it's not THAT cold folks. This is NYC and it's much colder in other parts of the world. I am very sensitive to cold, but I wear a hat, gloves, warm coat, and move a lot; then I'm fine. Speaking of which, I met a girl from Siberia once, who said the coldest day in NYC is the warmest day there. Whew! Makes you think.


Here's a funny about a (secretly gay) guy, "He's so far in the closet he's in Narnia."

maybe it's the wine I drank at lunch

but I've been feeling dizzy and the scene here is demoralizing. This is after coming from a feminist meeting that was so uplifting, but I left that and went into the hell death trap that is lower Manhattan, now. It's all suburban or private school kids and these big beefy guys that storm through the streets, on foot, bike or cars, push people out of the way, leer at women in a way that makes it uncomfortable to go down the street, and these women that may be the second generation Stepford wives, or Stepford daughters? It's as if we've regressed a whole century. Is it a bunch of coincidences or is there poison in the air? I was feeling sick, tired, dizzy and miserable. I'm trying to stay upbeat, but it's like the energy was sucked out of me. I can't live without creativity and I know it's around, it's everywhere, but it's such a constant struggle to keep it in my life. Why is that? Why is there so much more noise and confusion everywhere? Every hour, it seems, I'm battling something. What is it?

dreams and ipods

I keep having 9/11-related dreams. In one, I'm watching Austin Powers and Dr. Evil is flying in a chopper over NYC and heading for the Empire State Building, I think. I'm thinking, they think this is funny well this film was made before 9/11, then the heli crashes into the building.

In another, I'm on a bridge, up high with no way of getting down, having to jump, or go down a slide sometimes, and a voice is saying, "Where do want to be when it falls?" Over and over it's the building on fire, about to come down.

My ipod, which I just got, froze on the Nine Inch Nails song "Piggy."

On another somewhat lighter note, I was walking down the street listening to Hall and Oates and the lyrics said, "If you're in it for love, you ain't gonna get too far..." and I looked up and saw the name David Z on someone's bag....

I hate smoking

I used to smoke and thank heaven I quit. I'm trying to live a healthier lifestyle and just walking down the street and smelling people's smoke, especially in the morning, makes me nauseous. I think people can always help it. I quit. It was hard but I did it finally. It's rude and lazy to smoke, and I don't know how anyone can do it in the morning. I am not trying to be mean but it's true. Quit quit!

I'm trying so hard to stay on top of everything but it's not easy. I'm making slow progress. But I believe in my career, and I know somehow I am doing the right thing by being a performer instead of getting a full time job. Or am I? Stability. The American way of doing things. I can't work 9 to 5. I don't have it in me. I have to work harder but it's the right thing; this is what I'm good at. It's what I'm meant for. I wasted too much time, too many years, listened to bad advice, worked pointless jobs, and I was young, pretty, smart, talented; fuck it; I was meant for better things. That's the truth as well.

Money talks

Put a high price on yourself, and suddenly you're treated very differently. As a random stranger on the street, interchangeable with thousands of others, you get no respect. But asking for money, a lot, raises your value, and lowers the aggression against you. It's all about power, but there you are: women don't make the world, they never did. They don't invent, really. Most men I talk to don't seem to have a lot of the bitterness I've seen in women, the edge, the meanness. Not that there aren't a legion of jerkoff guys out there, but I'm talking about the ones I know. It's because they're free, and they're in power, and they're not condemned to drudgery most of the time, they're not sexually harassed the minute they step outside, they're not turned into objects in public and they're free, somehow, to create. Even their work....I don't know. There are talented female artists....so....

a day in Laura's life

alarm goes off, I think to myself, No, no, I want to sleep. No, no

cats start meowing for me to open the door or feed them. This has been going on every hour just about, while I was sleeping

I open the door and let the cat out, saying, come on, don't bother me

I tell myself, get out of bed, don't be lazy. My whole body, entire being is fighting me. Get out of bed, get up, get up.

I sit up and think, hard part's over.

I go to the stove in the kitchen, put on some water to boil for coffee, because I'm addicted and can't wake up sans it.

I stumble to the bed and say, I'll sleep til the water is boiling.

five minutes later I hear it boiling, and get up again.

I go to the fridge, open it for milk (skim, cause I'm dieting now), and, GOD damn it, there is no milk. Argh! Life can't be this cruel.

I get some cat food out of the cupboard, open it and give it to the cats in the room next to my bedroom. I close my bedroom door cause I don't want the cats in my room messing up my new sheets. I fumble through my clothes looking for something to wear. I put on sweats, sneakers, socks, and a change of clothes in my back pack. I go into the bathroom, open the cabinet to find sunscreen, and put some on my face. I run first before everything, and plan to change later. I've slept maybe four hours.

I make the journey up dekalb, or wait for the bus. My head is throbbing and I desperately need coffee.

But first I have to get coffee. The stuff where I am is terrible, cheap stuff, so I head a few blocks up Myrtle to Conneticut Muffin, where they make the best stuff and have the best muffins in the city. I try to control my hunger as much as possible, and order latte, large, with skim milk. I go out of my way to go to this place but I'm damned if I'm not going to have good coffee in the morning. I sit down to drink it, look at my book or magazine, whatever is nearby. I finish, finally feel energetic, and head for the gym.

I get there, and want to go back to bed, I dread exercise. But I force myself to do it even though my ipod is broken and I need music, so I watch the videos on the tv there. This is how I discovered all these bands.

Finally that's over, and I'm starving. The shower room is too cold at this gym, so I get out of my sweat-soaked clothes and change into dry ones. I take my stuff to the gym on 8th avenue to shower there because they have a sauna. One of the trainers approaches me, telling me she saw me practicing my monologue in the bicycle room (and I was). That in itself is freaky.

I am barely able to move I'm so hungry, but I shower, dry in the sauna because I'm cold getting out of the water. I need a hot room to shower in. I dress, comb my hair after conditioning it, put on jewelry, realize I look like a wreck and have no makeup on, so I try to groom myself a little.

I go out to this Thai place in the neighborhood, and order the same dish I always order: panang tofu and Thai salad. This place makes it the best. I've been to several other Thai places that don't measure up to this.

Then I have a ton of emails to answer, class to go to, work, plays to find, movies to watch, books to read, and before I know it the day is over. Then friends call and want advice on this or that. I go home, feed the cats again, pick up laundry and groceries. I watch a movie, go back to work some more in manhattan, take a cab home, clean up a little, feed the cats again, have a drink and head for bed. Sleep, wake up, ect ect....


I dream a lot about cathedrals, yellow walls, priests speaking from their pews, or sometimes violent stuff, like I'm held hostage or in jail, or about water, water slides, trains running up and down, like a roller coaster, above the rivers.

pix effing around

Sometimes I worry

and think, oh my God, what if my mother finds this blog. But what can I say? I have a sex life, and I want to write about it.

So, I still want to travel, and plan to, but I'm here for now, in the cold, but I'm dealing well. I have warm coats and boots; I'm far better off now than I was last year. I have bills, taxes, all kinds of stupid stuff to deal with, but I am not giving up: I will travel. LA is a place I'm thinking of. I have to polish up my driving and I'm listening to some California bands to gear myself up. But for now, it is nice being in Fort Greene in the winter cause the park is here and it reminds me of Michigan, from my childhood, outside. They sell apples at the farmers market Sunday and Michigan apples were a big part of all those trips then.

As for now, I'm trying to stay afloat with my dance classes, auditions, mailings, work, cats, friends....I hardly have any time to myself, to read or watch a movie. I need that. I'm working on it.

ready to travel?

I am. I'm missing Egypt all the time. Every time I put on sunscreen in the morning it reminds of me of mornings in Cairo, the smell, and the coffee. Is this cheesy? I guess, but it always hits me like clockwork. I haven't been out of the US in two years, yikes! I need to renew my passport....but I'm itching to go. I want to go back to London, Paris, then to South Africa. Or LA, another option. That's the problem with traveling: it's time to plan the trip and suddenly you feel like you're choosing between your children, and if you choose one you neglect the others, it's torturous. There's something to be said for every place. But I do think about Egypt. A lot. I want my family to visit me there, I want my mother to see it. I didn't spend enough time there, but the short stay was LONG. It was exhausting financially and emotionally, but I've learned from the past. If I go this time around, I hope it's for the long haul. Though to gear up for LA, I need to polish up my driving. I have my license, but I'll start lessons again cause I remember so little. But I'm ready! Well, you're never really completely ready but the time is coming. And my friends like G and A, they need to go places as well. I know work is important but so is this. There's a solution to this somewhere.

decriminalize prostitution

I will go back to this because I've been reading up on it again. The more I read the madder I get, that in this day and age this blatant discrimination still occurs under the guise of "morality" or "family values." Police arrest people for having sex, consenting adults, and meanwhile....incidents like Imette St Guillen and others are allowed to occur. I've heard stories of cops who told people they were "on their donut break" when they were approached about a guy beating his girlfriend on the street. Now this has been twisted into some kind of...I don't know what....even a lot of feminists won't look at this situation realistically because they believe that prostitution degrades women or that legalization will encourage sex slavery. I don't know if "sex slavery" even exists and I used to be on the front lines of those working to stop it. I thought sex work was degradation but that was a different time in my life and now I see the other side, though I was never blind to it. This is life or death, and I'm frustrated by the failure of many people I work with to get on this case, feminist or not. Like when I went to the NOW conference over the summer, this one young woman was very dismissive and derogatory to these sex worker rights activists and talked about how ideal the "Swedish model" of arresting customers is. I wanted to say, one of these days that will be you working as a hooker....you think it won't happen to you? But I'm saying it is hard to believe in this day and age these out of date and fascist, really, morality laws are terrorizing women, and gay men as well. We could be assaulted or raped, even by a police officer, and what will be done about it? Because they are government employees they're holy? No, my vision is turned now. If this sex slavery is that rampant, it should be stopped, but WHERE is it? Where are these people?

staring and checking out

You hear all the time how men can't help it and they're predestined to try to get with any woman they can who's at all good looking. But in fact, we're complex and live in a complex world and have free will. I can't go out in public, unless it's on a deserted street, without this feeling of visibility, like I'm being sexualized, rated, and every woman. It's, I think, though I haven't done any measurements-- it feels worse than ever. Worse than it was ten or twenty years ago. This did happen back when I was in high school but I think it's increased. I just feel like it has. I feel it in legion amounts where I didn't in high school, that much. Men (and quite a few women also) push women and practically knock them over to get by, get "impatient" with them while standing in line (as happened to me), and....bottom line, this attention, unwanted, drops down on me every time I go into Manhattan. I don't think it's a coincidence. It is probably part of some massive scale backlash, like Simone de Beauvoir talked about. She said that since the publication of The Second Sex in France, French men began harrassing women more in public like when they were in coffee shops or on trains, which hadn't happened as much before. Honestly I don't know the cause. Only that this era is super conservative, dare I say fascist, and all that protesting we did a few years ago.....well, I don't know where those people are anymore. All I see on the street are kind of the "frat boy/sorority girl" types or the "yuppies" and don't get me started on them. But still, having lived in Bed Stuy, I can be thankful to live in a neighborhood where I feel somewhat safe walking around, at night, which I do a lot. I'm a night person. If I'm in an area where I can't go out and feel relatively safe after midnight I get very on edge....I NEED to have those late night walks. I liked living across the street from the convent because I like dark, quiet places to live in. I do my partying outside. But midtown Manhattan is "safe" sort of, supposed to be, but it's not peaceful and there've been more than a few incidents of violence against women. But women are sexist against women, too. That's another story, for another entry.

no relationship

Been there, done that. I've experienced it all. For twenty years. They'll cheat, they all fucking cheat.

"Be careful, very careful. He's driven girls to suicide...."

from Choses Secretes

finally I could log in again

because I switched email addresses and haven't had the time/energy to maneuver my way around these new requirements, I couldn't log into my blog. But I'm in now.

So...I'm listening to Hall and Oates. I used to be madly in love/lust with Daryl Hall when I was a little kid during a horrid time in my life. I lived in Evanston and would get attacked by these local kids til I was forced to fight back. It was a nasty retaliation back and forth. Yuck. But the town itself is beautiful. So ironic that my sister chose to go to school there when I couldn't get out of there fast enough. People say to me, you must have been so traumatized moving from Chicago to NYC at age thirteen, people like my ex shrink, and on top of that having divorced parents; which apparently has damaged me. They don't believe me when I say that transition was one of the best things that happened to me, and no, I wasn't hurt, but the opposite. It was my wish. We moved into the West Village, and I'd read Daryl Hall lived there. No regrets. I never looked back.


Some recent dreams: that a baby was born. I have that dream a lot. I do want a kid of my own some day. I don't have forever. I just don't want to get fat and I DON'T want a relationship or to be tied or dependent on a man. We don't have a support system in the US like those that exist in other countries. And it's wrong. If you're a conservative, this is your fault.

But anyway I'm digressing: another recent dream is that I was having sex with Jude Law. I was thinking, is he going to pay me or does he just think the fact that I'm with him is enough. Then afterward he got up and said, I'm a man with a wife and baby, you know, I have to move on. And I'm thinking, you bastard.....so for some reason we were in Detroit in a hotel. He asked me how to get to an auto plant, as he wanted to walk, and I said, you're in Detroit you have to drive it'll otherwise be a long walk. Then he left.

She fell in love with a man who sent her pictures of his dick to her cell phone.....


one on one ooh oooh

oh, I forgot. This is kind of cheesy, but my dad took me to see Hall and Oates when I was around eleven. The song "Back on the Chain Gang" was on the radio, as we were driving through Chicago, which I must say is a gorgeous city, gorgeous city with an ugly name. But the skyline is stunning. I heard DH is gay, I don't know....

so....what happened?

to these people.....from high and junior high school. I was on the Web and for the hell of it started looking up names of people I was once friends with but haven't seen in years. And years.....like this girl Jen from high school, who was very pretty but troubled, but through no fault of her own. She was beaten, by her father. She left our school to go to her local one but hated it there. I miss her, and it saddens me to think back on those days which are way over, the past now. But thinking back I can feel it like it's happening now.

Or another ex friend who just stopped talking to me....although I didn't try to repair things, either. But I can track her, because her name registers when I look it up. Jen...I only found someone with her name living in Brooklyn. I really truly hope she is not living with those same parents.

Do I really want to see these people? I almost don't want to know where they are now, or to see their faces older. But thinking of her brought those days back so strongly and I'd almost forgotten....

update: it's been a while

No I haven't disappeared off the face of the earth. I'm fine, for the most part, for all that I'm menstruating which is very tiresome to go through. Right now I'm putting, or attempting to put, music on my ipod which is Fleetwood Mac (the Tusk album....my favorite personally!), Kim Wilde, J Geils Band....yeah all this stuff I listened to as a kid I'm still listening to. I'm obsessed with this stuff.....back in elementary school my dad had a neighbor who was a promoter for a record company. He got all these promotional copies which he'd give my dad, which I'd listen to. This is some of the stuff....

I love this music, still. Not that I don't listen to modern music, but I'm obsessed with the 70s and early 80s, which were really an extension of the 70s. I also got Planet Funk, a modern group. I don't listen much to rock music....

So for those people trying to contact me at laurasaiter@earthlink.net, I'm no longer at that address. You can get me here now: lauramsaiter@gmail.com.

Sparkles.....love

thinking back

As much as junior high was a horror show in many ways, strangely I am feeling many good thoughts about it in retrospect. There were a lot of great bands just springing up and that's what I remember most. But it's something else, so hard to explain. There was something really powerful ïn the air" just don't know how else to describe it. Something sexual. When we left Chicago for NYC when I was thirteen my mother was regretting that she'd made a hasty decision and given up her independence, and my sister wasn't born and knows nothing about this, never knew things any other way, but I remember. That must be why we're so different. But I never once regretted leaving Chicago. I felt absolutely......my shrinks and school counselors would tell me how "traumatized" and messed up I was by being upsurped out of my environment, i.e. Chicago, and my parents' divorce....but I am telling you I felt no remorse whatsoever about leaving there, and that Republican school I was in. I don't miss the kids, black and white, who ganged up on me after school and against whom I was forced to fight, or the ones who made comments about my protest of animal experiments on cosmetics. To be honest, people resented me because I'm smart and so is my family. We read and didn't watch TV for the most part. When I have kids, they won't watch TV. What's the point? I saw through all the layers. That threatens people.



I knew NYC was the city for me when we moved into Sonny's West Village apartment. People may think....I didn't grow up with two parents and a white picket fence atmosphere and I certainly view the world differently from people who did, but I don't consider myself "damaged" because of that. I don't see how growing up with parents who have to stay together, like my sister and mother did, is healthy either. Or in a household where the woman is under a man's rule. This is part of what Bush calls "family values...."



But....there was something really positive about my first year in NYC, full of hope. I made friends I still have to this day. There was a very strong connection. I live in this town for a reason; I must belong here. I need to live on the coast. Some of the people from those days, I still feel close to them even though I don't see them. I do look back on that period all the time though. Certain people I had feelings for, I really believed in. I still do.

love religion

I always am bothered by how people turn other people into God. I think, they're people, their fame is man-made, as is the media. Or rather hu-man-made. But I understand in part how people feel. I've turned some men into God. I turned them into Jesus and expected them to save me. They didn't, though. They fucking didn't. I always wonder, to those that want me now, where WERE you when I was buried alive and had to claw my way out? So why should I feel grateful for your attention now?

De Beauvoir wrote about how women have no religion of their own. But men become that. For gay women I suppose it's different, but I was raised on Cinderella and to believe in Prince Charming who will take care of you. In spite of the women's movement and everything that came with it most women are still waiting for him. But the years have gone by and he hasn't appeared, and the ones I thought were turned out to be......even if I was in love with them another part of me lived in fear of them. A sterile hell.....that's what she wrote. I'm disillusioned. What can I say? The story is, there' s no Prince Charming, face reality. You wake out to find out the man you married turned you into his slave. Once the wedding's over.

street harassment

I am wondering if I.....today it was so bad it made want to never wear a miniskirt again. Constant whistles, leers, "hey how are you"s and it's so fucking endless, endless. Yesterday I was walking around the downtown Manhattan area with my mother who has bright blond hair. We passed construction sites (yep, a cliche but sadly there's truth to it) and it was unbearable, the invasion of space by these men. I know it's not all black and Hispanic men (or Middle Eastern) who do this, but in my neighborhood, Clinton Hill/Bed Stuy, it's out of control. I'm not prejudiced and it's hard to write this because I really don't want to get into a nasty place here, but the reality is in these communities it's horrible, incessant. And physical attractiveness plays a role here, a big one. No, actually, when I was walking home there was this white guy turning around and staring at the women who passed him, like checking them out. Frat boys too......so, it falls on all races and classes. And I'm thinking, I actually have made myself less attractive in the past to avoid this attention. Plus, I was having a rough day to begin with and feeling really unsexual. Sexual harassment is rampant, still, and how do we escape it? And if it's not men on the street it's men in the higher levels, ones with real power, who can get away with it. And women are criminalized, along with gay and trans people. We can go to jail for having sex. We're damned, if we get "compromised" when it's men who created these situations and put us there--but we get punished. But it's not hopeless, just a never-ending fight. One hurdle is climbed, only for there to be another. Still, if we don't, we might as well just go back to the feudal days. This is intolerable, this situation. I can't take anymore, and I won't. One of these days a woman is going to go ballistic on these men man it's only a matter of time. And for big-chested women; I don't know how they take it. If I so much as wear a tank top I have to deal with stares; it's so bad unbearable. What should be do, go out in nun outfits? Why is the human body made to be this bad thing, like we're bad for showing it? Cause that's what it amounts to.

I will never be a slave

and I won't be a victim. Like the line from American Beauty where Annette Benning says, "I refuse to be a victim"

I refuse to be a victim!

I made a mistake before and stupidly believed in love and relationships, not knowing the hell and degradation they really are. I have no faith in love, romantic love. Men just turn their women into slaves. I will never believe in it again. I'll tell my daughters not to.

what is it?

I'm so angry....maybe cause of an incident with my family last night, cause of the situation with D in which I believe I was tricked, terribly, the treatment women get by men in public, or even women's treatment of each other......the inequality that exists when I was raised and told we're equal, our problems are solved, so don't complain, don't make excuses.....

and by and large, none of that was true. We were told a big lie. And it's not new, either. We were always told that. Maybe it's the liberal vs. radical debate, that's part of it. I don't see myself or women as "peacemakers" and, really, if you have eyes you can see the world is not peaceful. That's a lie, also. But meanwhile, people are in pain, the problems of life are real, and there's no end to it. I don't feel serene. Maybe I'm alone in feeling this way. But I'm not. I was raised to be loving, forgiving and kind, but I.......am nothing like that. Am I a disappointment? I don't think I'll ever feel kind and at rest or whatever it is I'm supposed to be or feel. I don't want to feel that way. I am not that way.

you're a feminist when

you realize your personal problems are not just yours individually but political, and you stop blaming yourself for the bad circumstances you're in. You don't blame yourself or shame yourself if you're raped or harassed. You don't blame other victims. You stop telling yourself and others that things will get better once you try harder or change your attitude.

Why is it after all these years men are still in control in relationships? Why am I made to feel grateful when they call? Or shamed if they don't? Men have too much power; it's not that easy to go to war with them. It's overwhelming. But that doesn't make it right. I've just heard and read one horror story after another. There needs to be another movement. I just don't know how it will happen. Sisterhood was blind, too general a concept. I wish that the world were a peaceful place but it's not; to keep lamenting how it should be that way is just turning a blind eye. I'm not at peace, my family never was, the world isn't; the pain is unendurable at times. But I am mad. I have had enough. I made a mistake with these people and I can't just say what's done is done: it's tearing me apart and I need to do something. I don't know what. But I do.

hiking

A week ago I went with Garrett up to Cold Spring in upstate New York. It's a super cute and charming town. We rock climbed and hiked.....which was exhausting, dangerous and scary.....but it was helpful to get out of the city for a day, into the countryside. It was really crowded, though.....as it was a Saturday. I did this on no sleep practically, as we had to get up around 5am. I've never rock climbed before and wasn't planning on that....you're taking a chance in this place and people have fallen to their deaths here before. Or, you can get seriously injured. I got stuck a few times, as it was nothing but a wall of rock and nothing to hold onto. At one point a voice in my head said, whatever you do, don't look down. Garrett saw me and yelled out, "What are you doing there? That's dangerous.....that's a 500 foot drop. Stay in the lines [the white guiding lines which were drawn in various places]." I got out of that.....fortunately. In these circumstances you have to listen to your intuition, and I don't enjoy being afraid or in high places. Garrett told me people get vertigo from looking down....and it was up, up for five hours. Next time I'll bring better clothes because I'm very sloppy here, and not prepared, and hiking shoes which I almost bought before.....but I'd do it again. I don't think I can handle camping for long and being without heat, and running water. I desperately needed a shower afterward. Anyhow......here's what was recorded of that experience:



There's also an abandoned Welsh farm in these woods that's allegedly haunted; it looked that way anyhow.

We also saw hawks and eagles flying above the mountains.....stunning.

sick of being eroticized every time I go out

I went to Cafe Pick Me Up where I go all the time. I'm tired and starving. They don't have much of a selection. On the train, in a restaurant, fucking EVERYWHERE I have to deal with "attention from men" and I'm sick of it, and really mad. I have to deal with being stared at, men deciding if they want to hit on me or not. Being rated or made to feel grateful that I'm wanted. And every female treated the same. But too often, women contribute to it.

At this gym I go to, this girl was sitting really close to a guy in this skimpy top, and giggling while talking to her girl friend, while this dumb jock type was leering at her and practically hovering over her. Hello? No one deserves to be raped, but in America that kind of body language and behavior makes these guys think you're loose and it's only a matter of time before one of them puts it to the test. I hear one bad story after another, like someone I know being told by a guy, "In my country, women will always be inferior." But women too often don't resist. What I read of de Beauvoir says that women aren't trained to be aggressive, political.....and it's up against men who have thousands of years of martial arts, politics, engineering, and nation building behind them. Women didn't create cities, rocket ships, governments, armies.....or the CIA. Sad but true. All we've done is ape men, and that's considered equality. De Beauvoir wrote women have no religion of their own. So many women are narcissistic, and stupid.....so just trying to get respect in public is an uphill battle.....and the women's movement....the problem is they underestimated their opponent's strength, so they suffered a big loss I mean sorry but it's the truth. Still, change is possible. I think those working to create justice in the world will always be a minority and encounter huge waves of resistance and anger along the way.

De Beauvoir also wrote of how women will throw themselves at religious statues without stopping to think they, and the churches and temples, are man-made. The same way, today, they throw themselves at celebrities without stopping to think they're human, that the media, photographers and reporters are all human, that their image is manufactured. They degrade themselves, but that used to be considered virtuous.

Cause now as ever, women aren't valued for intelligence (there are too many brilliant men in the world) but for youth and beauty and the ability to raise a child. Child rearing is hard work but children are exhausting to deal with, and we're under pressure to always be pretty but makeup gets smeared, the bag, no matter how expensive, gets torn, stolen or worn, the clean house gets dirty the next day, the washed dishes will pile up in the sink in an hour, sauce spills, nail polish chips, and really women's work, the work that's necessary for survival but is uncreative, leaves no individual achievement, is endless and eventually mind-numbing. I've worked those kinds of menial jobs and at the end of the day I was too tired to think, and always bitter and angry, and afraid. The work is unrewarding, and you're existing on the lowest level. So because women and slaves were around to do this work men could study, write, draw, do math equations, take long walks with which to think, design cities, buildings and rocket ships, and trained to be aggressive, not decorative.

tonight Felix da Housecat

I just got back from Crobar I'm so tired now but it was so rad. He is from Chicago and watching him and the people he was with took me back to when I was there but it was freaky too cause now every time I am outside NYC I'm out of my element.

But these people were awesome and so was the show!

symbols?

I walked around Times Square where someone was selling those plaques with people's names on them. It makes me sad to see that, cause I feel for those people selling that stuff. But I see all these names in flowers and trees, but then there was a plaque with his name on it, the only one against a backdrop of the NYC skyline, with the World Trade Center in the background. I almost started crying, I mean, how fucked up. Why put that anywhere, or next to someone's name. I think that's a sign I just don't know what of.

I haven't gotten closure in this thing. I feel like it hasn't ended. I can't stop thinking about it. I want to know more, there's something significant going on. It'll come together at some point.

Then, I was on 1st ave near 3rd street, the corner, and these people were getting into a car, and they mentioned something about a black star. Just talking about this stuff freaks me out, occult stuff, but I studied numerology, and 1 and 3 is 13, plus those two words.......

then I saw a guy that looked like him, and the word Stone was right behind him.....

I just have to write this down. I'm a little weirded out by all this........

fed up with men

OK, I know there are some decent men in the world. I have to keep saying that. But I'm really mad right now. I always have to watch my back with people, men or women for different reasons, and I can't be in a relationship with a man without wondering his intentions, like if I'm being used, as a body. It's so hard for me to believe I'll be happy, with anyone, and I am losing more and more hope because nothing I do individually will really solve the problem. The world will be what it is. But my youth turned out to be a constant battle against some idiot trying to shove his hand down my pants and take whatever he could get. How stupid I was, I could have used some guidance here and there. But I had none. A relationship to me is a kind of death sentence, and I hate the thought of being married. I can't understand for the life of me why any woman would want it. But if I'm unmarried I'm looked upon as a poor thing, and people will always wonder why I'm not married. I had my fantasies as well, but my relationships have all ended unhappily and my mistake was allowing one man to have me I wish I never had. But I still love and hate the same person. But I think men turn women they're in relationships with into slaves, and they're all cheaters, they're all pricks. I feel like it's a curse, a terrible one, to be a heterosexual female. I may never say never to a relationship with a woman but I'm not gay; still, I don't know how I can ever feel happy anymore. I rode the bike home and was harrassed three times in 15 minutes. I yelled at them but it won't change them; they'll still do it over and over. A part of me wishes I could be at the Dahab hotel with him and crawl into bed with him with the space heater on, I long for that, so much, so much.....but it's 6 am and he's not here and I'm in Brooklyn, I'm wondering if I'll ever get out of here and I HAVE to get out of here. I was not sexy tonight I was in my helmet, glasses, ugly sneakers but, yeah, I rolled up my pants cause they were getting caught in the chain, so my leg showed, but, big disappointment, I was NOT trying to seduce any of these men on Flatbush Ave. I find it fascinating how women are turned into criminals if they go out after 1am, or whatever the time is, and how men treat them as if they deserve harassment, as if they're punishing them. I was NOT walking around in sexy clothes in a drunken stupor, as those women who were raped and killed allegedly were. That still doesn't make what happened to them OK. But if I complain about these guys, like to the cops, they'll probably say I brought it upon myself.

take back what I wrote

I said to my friend last night, my problem is, I don't fall for "nice guys." Men know this, that's the problem. Not that there's any excuse for bad behavior, but my friend said she has no interest in men who bring her flowers. Men have said to me, women don't like nice men who love them but as soon as he starts treating her like shit that's when they love these men. Not completely true.....

So D was the only one I couldn't manipulate, well not totally, but it doesn't mean I'm a victim. I refuse. I learned from the brutal past. I'm pissed. I'm not OK. But I learned.

ok Houston ready for countdown four three two one

Earlier today I was listening to the KLF song "Last Train to Transcentral" and I've been reading de Beauvoir where she talks about transcendence.......

I'm taking a chance reprinting KLF lyrics. Justified Ancients of MuMu..... so.....found more pix as I finally got my digicam set up.....

Here is a cheerpic where we all look like we're throwing up.


In another, this is the Hollaback event, and I don't know who the guy in the white shirt is but he's cute....:)


This was all a mystical time in my life. It was May of this year, and I was living in this beautiful apartment which I had to leave, as it belonged to this woman lawyer who was moving upstate with her boyfriend. I loved this place, it reminded me of the apartment in Choses Secretes....

ÖK, everybody lie down on the floor and keep calm...." KLF Sample


















Guess it doesn't look like much but I didn't get the brick wall.....I just love wood floors. It's my dream place. That pic of me is around that time. That was around the time D was telling me there's something about me that makes him want to force sex on me or otherwise be really rough.....I mean, what is "forced sex"? Is that rape? Was he serious, it was only me he felt this way about? Or was it a conniving manipulation on his part?

another pic from then: was fucking around with the camera


Later on, D would tell me he fantasized about raping me.....this time he said rape.....he said, he visioned us in ä room" somewhere where he just "takes" me. I'd say why don't you call me and he said, what, ask, can you come over here so I can rape you? I laughed, but he looked like he wondered why I was laughing, like he was serious. But later, he'd say, Ï'm just messing with you...."I figured he wouldn't really do it......you know.....


And I fell in love, so in love, with Columbia U, the campus, gorgeous, with such awesome people.......


Later, when I was assaulted, I went back to that same spot the next day. It was under a car that had a University of Michigan sticker on it....and he's from that town....


I'm a radical feminist who fell in love with her rapist....I'm not unaware of that irony.......


so here're some recent pix.......








This pic looks like kiddie porn, not that I'd know, but like some offensive ads I've seen.....


This is me as a wannabe raver....














This is my good friend Luca, a very nice person:









This is my kitty West

Finally this is me outside my show, Happy Hour.

I used to be obsessed with the KLF. I won't print their lyrics here cause I don't know the copyright laws, ect. I listened to The White Room thousands of times when I was living alone in Park Slope often with only a dark window.....right when I started dating Al.....

D I miss you I love and hate you.....you went through me like a knife.....how can I ever recover? I can't. I can't pretend I can. I want to beat you up, too.

It's not meant to be, not this time, maybe not ever.

dyke march

I found this photo on flickr.....my crazy cheering days.....not over yet.....



I'm in the black bikini top with the braid in my face.....the camera is merciless adding weight....

LIstening to Sasha and Digweed and Oakenfold

I just love DJing and this piece is fucking super amazing......beautiful


DJing fascinates me, it's hot. Religious. Sexy. Awesome.

See me in Happy Hour Fri November 10

7:30 PM 141 Ridge Street Manhattan

Take the F to Delancey

or the J or M to Essex

I'm waiting to see if I have clearance for the Plath play. I hope. I pray. Please, whoeve's out there.......