Report launch on Zoom featuring Elene Lam of Butterfly, Kamala Kempadoo and other noted scholars. A report titled Caught in the Carceral Web: Anti-Trafficking Laws and Policies and their Impact on Migrant Sex Workers was officially launched on Oct. 25, 2021. Facilitated by the McMaster University School of Labour Studies, the McMaster University School of […]
In this drama/comedy students debate dramatize conflicts in ideology regarding trafficking. I found this exciting and unique, and a good summary of where the discourse is. . “The white saviour complex is an addiction of the soul” Students from the course: The Anti-Trafficking Savior Complex, taught by Professor Elena Shih, Brown University, Spring 2016 Created […]
Video Guidebook & SWAN’s full multi-media Harms of Anti-Trafficking project can be viewed at https://www.swanvancouver.ca/harms-of…. More and more people are learning about human trafficking and feel compelled to do something about it. Unfortunately, this desire to take action is not always expressed in productive ways. Some campaigns are ineffective. Some campaigns are harmful, and […]
Survey of history of commercial sex in the US. (2021-30 min) “Unsurprisingly, racism and misogyny are crucial reasons why female sex workers have historically faced harassment, violence, and the denial of occupational rights. But full-service sex workers– from early immigrants to the colonies to the scarlet women of Storyville in New Orleans to the call […]
The International Committee on the Rights of Sex Workers in Europe (ICRSE) launched its latest report on migrant sex workers’ access to justice in Europe on 28 October 2020. This report – developed by ICRSE with partners in 10 countries – highlights some of the key obstacles faced by sex workers in reporting crime and […]
Genres: Documentary Duration: 1 hour 4 minutes Availability: Worldwide Joy left Nigeria to help her family after her father’s death. She knew that she was going to sell sex in France, but she was unaware of the degree of exploitation that she would face. With the help of an association she obtains asylum, but to […]
Click here for more information: The High Cost of Cheap Clothes Cambodia’s aggressive anti-trafficking campaign is designed to rescue and rehabilitate sex workers. But many women say authorities in Cambodia are actually forcing them into a trade where conditions and pay are even worse: making clothing for Western brands. VICE founder Suroosh Alvi traveled to […]
This short video portrays the work of Street Brigade in Mexico. (2016-4:54, Mexico) “Street Brigade Support Women “Elisa Martinez,” AC, is a secular civil non-profit, non-partisan and made up sex workers, transgender sex workers, survivors of trafficking and other supportive women. It has been specializing in the defense of human, civil and labor rights of […]
This film is directed by Sine Plambech, researcher at Danish Institute for International Studies. Beautiful Becky has attempted to travel from Benin, Nigeria twice, and voluntarily. She braves rape and starvation to cross closed borders in search of a better life as a sex worker in Italy. The film is about migration, sex work and […]
Making the Film ‘In the age of the Internet, women in countries far away who used to be the objects of white people’s gaze with no right of reply now have access to the representations that are made of them, and the technological means to answer back.’ VAMP has lost patience with the films that […]
This first person short is one of four stories of the lives of sex workers that came out of a four day workshop held by Sex Workers Education and Advocacy Task Force in Johannesburg. Widowed Muchaneta is a refugee of the economy of her home country, where working as a secretary she still cannot earn […]
Star-Star sex worker collective presents a short video of the events that have been organized for 17th December International Day to End Violence Against Sex Workers. “STAR-STAR recognizes that sex work is work and has nothing in common with human trafficking.” Gorgeous, inspiring footage and music documents this Red Umbrella March and Exhibition ” Sex […]
by Laura Murray (maker of A Kiss for Gabriela) Interview with Gabriela Leite a movement founder who died in 2013. The excellent clip focuses on dynamics of stigmatization, including stigmatization within trafficking. “Gabriela Leite talks about important issues for the prostitute movement in Brazil today. This is part of an interview conducted with Gabriela for […]
Sex workers want their voices heard. This documentary is a collaboration between the 6400-member Women’s Network for Unity (WNU) Cambodia and NGO Filmmaker Paula Stromberg. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cgPfz9ydEp4 The film premiered on International Women’s Day at Phnom Penh’s leading art gallery/theatre, Meta House on March 8, 2013. In Rights Not Rescue, the film’s subjects question Cambodia’s focus […]
An เอ็มพาวเวอร์ Empower film “สาวน้อยผจญภัย – Last Rescue in Siam” This is the first film ever made by sex workers in Thailand. It is a short black and white movie inspired by the tradition of the old silent movies, satirizing anti-trafficking policies and policing. The film accompanies the Empower research report “Hit & Run” available […]
(2012-48:00 min.) by Nichola Mai. Normal brings the real life stories of male, female and transgender migrants working in the sex industry to the screen. Drawing on original interviews with people working in the sex industry in Albania, Italy and the UK, documentary director and anthropologist Nicola Mai reveals their unheard voices. In Tirana we […]
by PJ Starr On June 20, 2012 people against sex work protested in front of the Village Voice, demanding that they shut down Backpage’s Adult Services Section. SWOP-NYC and SWANK–local organizations representing sex workers and their allies–counter-protested noting that closing Backpage would increase marginalization of people in the sex trade and make anti-trafficking efforts more […]
BORDERS “Hot pants at the border: Sorting sex work from trafficking” Julie Ham and Sharon Pickering, Monash University, Australia 26 November 2013, FIRST Community Forum TRANSITions – Navigating Borders Work, Law and Justice SFU downtown, Vancouver, BC, Canada, unceded Coast Salish Territory FIRST, a Vancouver-based national feminist advocacy group working in support of the human […]
(This is a trailer from the longer work, emphasizing interviews with Cambodian sex workers and detainees.) Sex workers in Cambodia have fought against the 100% Condom Use Program and the abuses associated with it for many years. Now Cambodia has a new anti-trafficking law which makes all sex work illegal, and where sex workers can […]
NGOs use The RighT guide to measure the impact of policies against trafficking in human beings. The results can be used to make recommendations for more effective measures that respect human rights of all persons. The RighT guide is a human rights impact assessment tool. It was developed in 2010 by Aim for human rights, […]
MUST SEE expose on creative trafficking in the Greater Toronto. Les Demimondes created this movie in direct response to a news report in Toronto about trafficking. Poking fun at the holy cow.
Sex workers and advocates for sex workers say why it’s important to include them, and their clients, in the fight against sex trafficking. They ARE part of the solution, but criminalization and harassment by law enforcement often prevents them from doing so. A public service announcement from www.redlightdistrictchicago.com (2011- 3:21 min.)
by Maymay While purported rights groups and activists like Amanda Kloer at Change.org, Norma Ramos at the Coalition Against Trafficking in Women, and Melissa Farley at Prostitution Research and Education claim to be fighting for the rights of women by ending “sex trafficking,” they often betray their real purpose and agendas: lobbying for pro-censorship legislation […]
US Premiere! Indian sex workers in Sonagachi, Calcutta’s sprawling red light district, have organized one of the world’s largest and most powerful sex worker trade collectives. In this short film, Durbar Mahila Samanwaya Committee (DMSC) association puts pressure to bear on law enforcement in Calcutta to protect sex workers, handles the situation of a young […]
Sex workers in Cambodia have fought against the 100% Condom Use Program and the abuses associated with it for many years.Now Cambodia has a new anti-trafficking law which makes all sex work illegal, and where sex workers can be sent for mandatory rehabilitation.Cambodian Sex Worker groups and APNSW have fought against both of these abusive […]
by FrauenLesbenFilmCollectif in cooperation with Mucolade http://www.lasotras.de/otrasv.htm Mucolade (Mujeres contra la deportación = women against deportation). This video documentary was produced in collaboration with Mucolade (Mujeres contra la deportación = women against deportation). Mucolade is a group of Spanish-speaking women who provide assistance to migrant women working in the sex industry. Diverse women including Transsexuals and […]
Taking the Pledge is a 13-minute video featuring sex workers from Bangladesh, Brazil, Cambodia, Mali, Thailand and more! They describe the problems created by the ‘anti-prostitution pledge’ required to receive USAID and PEPFAR funds as applied to services to assist individuals in relationship to HIV and trafficking. In English, Khmer, Thai, French, Portuguese and Bengali, […]
This documentary by anthropologist David Feingold is a departure from all other such documentaries on trafficking, the only such movie that does not promote a xenophobic anti-prostitution analysis. As DER Films describes: “Narrated by Angelina Jolie, Trading Women enters the worlds of brothel owners, trafficked girls, voluntary sex workers, corrupt police and anxious politicians. Filmed in […]
San Francisco filmmaker Ellen Bruno offers her view of the sex trade in Thailand. This early trafficking movie (1998) presents an example of this emerging 20th century genre. Bruno constructs this poetic documentary with tragedy as a vehicle for the subtext, an anti-prostitution conceit. http://www.pbs.org/pov/sacrifice/
A new anti-trafficking law has been passed in Cambodia. It defines all sex work as trafficking and makes all sex work illegal. Thousands of women are now out of work as police close down brothels and crack down on street workers. Sex workers also report shocking abuse at the hands of police and the organisations […]
This confused melodrama (documentary) begins by claiming that it will stray from the usual stereotypes about prostitution and trafficking, then goes on to confirm them. Mixing some rights-based politics with anti-prostitution assumptions, this work was one of the primary ‘educational’ tools that launched the onslaught of anti-trafficking legislation in the U.S., as it screened in the […]
Human trafficking has been labelled a ‘modern-day slave trade’. Yet there is little evidence out there, is this because it’s a hidden crime? Critics say it’s a misleading label, which refers to diverse forms of migration and employment and the best way to help migrants avoid taking dangerous journeys is to open the borders. ‘Rescuers’ […]
Highlights from the BBC World Debate in Luxor, Egypt, in December 2010 with Laura Agustín, the Naked Anthropologist. Edit by Laura Agustín and Carol Leigh. The full programme is online: http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/9365967.stm (2012-6:27 min.)
“Just Sign on The Dotted Line: The Anti Prostitution Loyalty Oath” narrated by Cosi Fabian, presents a history of a policy regulating provision of foreign aid. The policy requires that recipients of USAID funds sign an oath that they will not support sex workers’ rights. This policy is a telling example of how the U.S. […]
