Sex work a sex crime? Um, no.

Image by famed San Francisco prostitute (and aristroctrat) photographer Albert Arthur Allen, via brooke8trout.

According to a new November ballot measure (Prop K) here in San Francisco we’re trying to make the ‘world’s oldest profession’ that for some weird reason ‘won’t go away’ not legal per se, but decriminalized. For a lot of really good reasons, like health, safety and eliminating the horrors of human trafficking. Do read my even-handed SF-Barbary Coast history based SF Chronicle column, mostly because I think you’ll like it. Seriously: everyone I’ve run into on the street here in the past 2 weeks, whether I know them or not is asking me how we can pass this measure for safety reasons alone. Carol who like me never sleeps, *just* wrote me saying, “LOVELY prop K piece!: I esp like Pink Rush. You devil. Love you–xoxox–CQ” My column and interview is called Sex Work Is Not a Crime: Violet Blue explains why we need Prop K and decriminalized prostitution more than ever. Snip:

We’re called a lot of things here in San Francisco, but there’s a damn good reason we’re called the Barbary Coast. When the California Gold Rush hit in 1848, it was only the beginning of our city’s midnight visits with vice and virtue. But I’ll tell you, by 1860 a romp with Virtue on Nob Hill cost only a little bit more than a quickie on the waterfront with Vice.

For men who preferred sex with women seeking fortune during the birth of our fair city, they were pretty much out of luck – until the first six months of 1850, when around 2,000 women arrived by ship at the Port of San Francisco: prostitutes, many of whom were from France, New York and New Orleans. After that (the Pink Rush?), working girls arrived on virtually every single ship that came into port, and San Francisco possessed a red light district (many, actually) several times the size of those in other cities in the world. And speaking globally, there was not one country in the world that was not represented on the streets or high-class parlors by at least one sex worker. Most of the accomplished and sought-after courtesans were French and accompanied by their pimps, called macquereaux, a term shortened by savvy San Franciscans to “macks.” Just in case you wondered where that word came from. I’m talking to you, William Safire.

We built this city not on rock and roll, dear readers.

According to Herbert Asbury’s “The Barbary Coast,” “The foundation upon which the Barbary Coast reared its fantastic structure of crime and debauchery was a system of commercialized prostitution that occupied semi-legal status.” Sounds to me like the groundwork for Proposition K — the hot-button prostitution decriminalization issue on November’s 2008 ballot — was, ahem, laid long ago (and tolerated for nearly three-quarters of a century).

As with Proposition K now, back then anti-sex hysterics decried voluntary sex-for-pay for every reason under sun, moon and Golden Gate Bridge, for both moral and health reasons. It wasn’t the clergy who raged and rallied (and paid for their 50-cent pussy like the rest of ‘em), but the Board of Supervisors and the San Francisco Board of Health who in 1911 set up a Municipal Clinic for sex workers. It compelled, by way of police enforcement, every working girl to get regular exams and treatment (if needed) every four days (including a blood test), and no woman was permitted to enter a brothel or work without a health certificate including her photograph and a booklet of exam history. Fail to produce proof of health before going to work and go to jail. Within the two years the clinic operated (until pressure from clergy groups had police protection withdrawn and the clinic was shuttered) — the clinic had reduced sexually transmitted diseases and infections in San Francisco by a stunning 66%.

That was a century ago. Nowadays, we have the St. James Infirmary, Bayswan, COYOTE, vociferous anti-sex-work opposition to all of the above, and dangerous conditions for prostitutes a-plenty (not to mention wasted city resources). But most importantly, on the ballot this November we have Proposition K. Alternet’s recent post about Proposition K, Should Prostitution Be Legalized? featured a poll showing that 73% of respondents not only supported decriminalization but legalization as well. I asked Patricia West, sex work activist and current sex worker, a few questions about Proposition K, what it would really mean to San Franciscans, and how it would impact the city, if it passed.

Violet Blue: When local porn company Kink.com purchased and moved into The Armory (cleaning it up and fixing all the outside lighting) a small group of protesters claimed that because it is a sex-related business, Kink’s influence would harm the neighborhood (the same protesters also compared the consensual BDSM of Kink’s subject matter to Abu Ghraib). What is Proposition K’s response to people who will surely say that decriminalizing prostitution in SF will be “harmful to families and communities?”

Patricia West: Proposition K will not stop the enforcement of laws against lewd acts in public, littering, or other “quality of life” offenses. It will allow sex workers to organize for their rights and safety. Proposition K will also free up critical resources currently used to enforce prostitution laws so that those funds can be used to combat higher priority crimes truly “harmful to families and communities.” (…read more!)