Helloo and welcome back to another week of musings!
Selling intimacy: the oldest profession in human history. Yet combining two of the most taboo topics in our culture – “intimacy” and money – it’s far from being the most accepted profession.
What does being an intimacy provider look like in Canada currently?
What are we fighting for? What’s our ideal?
I think it’s important for intimacy providers, and our allies, to understand the current laws and what we are collectively hoping to achieve. Many people assume that legalisation is the ideal situation… Myself and many other advocates of the profession think otherwise.
This work is illegal…. Or legal…?
The laws around selling intimacy greatly shift depending on the country in which you are working. In many countries, being an intimacy provider is illegal. It’s criminalised, and therefore it’s a crime if you sell these services.
Criminalisation: In this context, everyone involved in the industry – including sellers, buyers, and third parties – are all doing illegal activities if they engage in intimacy services. Most countries follow this model, with varying penalties for those who engage in it.
I’m personally based in Canada. Here, we have a bit of a unique model, kind of allowed, but also illegal…
What’s with the Swedes?
The “Nordic model”: This regulatory context is a mix between criminalisation and legalisation. It was first introduced in Sweden, hence the name. Other countries that follow this hybrid include Norway, Iceland, France, most recently, Israel.… And Canada! My home!
Our government rolled this out after Canada v. Bedford was brought into action by the Supreme Court in 2014. It was marketed to those who were open minded to the industry but not well informed, tricking people into seeing this as a progressive act.
Under this model, providers are legally allowed to sell services. Awesome? Almost.
With all the restrictions around the reality of what selling services actually looks like, it is still seeking to stop the industry from being able to take place.
Under the Nordic model, selling intimate services is not illegal. That’s cool! Until you learn that everything necessary to sell the services is not permitted.
This form of regulation sees the intimacy industry as exploitative, with workers as victims and clients as criminals. Its aim is to eradicate the industry.
You can sell, but no one can help you run your business. Doesn’t matter if you want help for the benefit of your income or to enhance your safety. You have to work alone, otherwise it’s seen as exploitation.
Want a driver who doubles as security while they wait outside your booking? Illegal. Want an admin assistant, who screens your clients for safety and checks in with you after bookings to make sure you’re out ok? Illegal. Want to work with another provider, so you can not only share space costs but keep each other safe? Illegal.
The law in Canada even says “Living with [an intimacy provider], in the absence of evidence to the contrary, is presumed to be proof of such a benefit”. If you have a partner living with you and you’re paying some of the rent, they’re exploiting you. Apparently.
You can sell, but you can’t advertise your services. If you stumble across someone and intuitively know they want to purchase services, you can sell them, sure. Let me know how that goes.
For advertising, the Canadian law states “Everyone who knowingly advertises the sale of [intimate] services is liable to imprisonment”. Yes that’s what it says, imprisonment. Now I know a lot of workers, all of whom advertise, myself included, and I’ve personally never heard of charges being laid for this. But still. Technically I’m breaking a federal-level criminal code posting ads. For the services that I’m permitted to offer. Sorry what?
You can sell, but clients can’t buy. You heard that right. YOU can sell your services, but should your client pay you for them, they are committing a high level federal crime.
In Canada, “Obtaining [intimate] services for consideration is punishable by imprisonment and fine”. So I can sell it, but you can’t buy it? That makes so much sense…
With the purchasing of it criminalised and charges potentially leading to imprisonment, it might as well be illegal to sell, in terms of safety.
Even if what you’re doing is allowed, if on the clients’ end they can face criminal charges, they’re going to be a lot more concerned about being identified than if they were able to purchase services without reprimand. This means far less people are willing to screen, leading to you possibly feeling forced to see strangers without having any sort of insurance they won’t be harmful. If the good clients feel the need to be anonymous, and that’s able to become the norm, it’s far easier for the unsafe ones to slip through unnoticed.
This decrease in our ability to screen potential clients, increases the risk of violence.
According to Canada’s national “intimacy provider” law reform advocacy group, linked in the notes, “The criminalization of [the intimacy industry] results in a constant police presence, social and racial profiling, harassment, surveillance, arrest and detention — all of which contribute to isolation and vulnerability to violence”.
The Nordic Model, also known as the Abolitionist model, followed by Canada’s approach to regulating this industry, makes our work semi-legal but mainly illegal; it is a sly government move to look progressive, while in reality still treating intimacy providers as if we are a vulnerable group who is being exploited without us even realising it. As if we are immoral, needing to be saved without our consent for our own safety and that of our surrounding communities.
The system gives face value support to the industry, while really trying to eradicate it.
Social reprimands of criminalisation
All of these laws regulating and punishing the selling of intimacy services not only creates more dangerous working environments physically, but socially as well.
With the profession being regulated by criminal law – versus bylaws, health units, associations, etc. – it is still seen not as work, but a crime. Something that is morally unjust, something that people should be ashamed of. Something that means we are less than and can be treated as such.
I love what I do, I truly do. But like any work, there are parts of it I don’t like. You know what the biggest one is?
Being in love with my job, yet not able to share that.
Yes, I’m coming out more and more. I’m literally sharing all of this with you here, which warms my heart to be able to talk about this industry.
But what about when I’m applying for a place to live, and while I make good money and can afford the rent, my employment makes me “risky”; will I get housing?
Or when I want to seek another job, and even though I’ve learned so many skills from being an entrepreneur, it feels hard to choose between being honest or having a huge gap on my resume; would the employer be an ally, or will I lose employment opportunities?
What about when I’m making casual conversation with someone I just met, and they ask what I do; will I be safe if I tell the truth?
Again, yes, I’m very gratefully fortunate to be out to the majority of people now, and generally don’t experience much discrimination. This is enhanced by my social privileges, being a white cisgender woman. But I definitely have my fair share of at best awkward moments, and I do often wish I had a job I could share with whomever without feeling the fear of judgement and differential treatment.
Still, I’m a lucky one; my situation is far from the reality of many workers. If you’re working in the industry and unable to disclose to people in your life, my heart goes out to you.
This work isn’t for everyone. Particularly if doing it can put you in danger should people find out, it may not be the path for you. Danger doesn’t just mean physical; social stigma and discrimination wears on your mental and even physical wellbeing, particularly hard to pull through when your supports are not supporting you.
I know not everyone does this work because they genuinely love it. For many people, it’s about survival. But if it’s genuinely not good for you, I really truly hope you are able to find something else that is.
The really scary side of criminalisation
A huge danger about regulatory systems that criminalise this work is that by pushing the whole industry underground, making it this secret hidden world, it’s easier for those who need help to be hidden.
If a client sees a provider, who they suspect is not working on their own free will, rather someone being trafficked, do you think they will run to the authorities? Some may, perhaps, and I applaud them. Others likely won’t, given they’ll have to admit to a potentially imprisonment-worthy crime to say how they know this information.
Many people conflate intimacy providing with trafficking. Those people, my friend, are very misinformed. So so wrong.
I’m choosing this line of work on my own, I’m choosing to do it. I don’t need to; I have two university degrees and experience in various fields, I can support myself in other ways.
I do this, by choice, because it allows me to live a life I love. It fits the way my brain works, what interests and motivates me, makes me feel good, gives me financial freedom… Check out my first episode for more details about the things I love about working in this industry (as well as the cons, because let’s be real, no job is perfect).
While I know it is not the field for everyone, it’s the field for me. I’m so happy to be in it; no one is making me do this.
I am working. I am paid for my services. This is my job. This is work, real work.
If someone is being trafficked in the industry, forced to provide labour against their will, with no material or otherwise benefit to themselves… They are not “working”.
They are being trafficked.
Let me make this so very clear… If someone is providing intimate services, without their consent, they are not an intimacy provider. They are a victim of human trafficking. This, if it is not blatantly obvious, is not ok.
Intimacy providers are working in the intimacy industry. People being trafficked into the industry are being exploited within the industry. It’s not the same thing, it never has been, it never will be.
If the intimacy industry is permitted, those who are working now get to do so with increased safety and dignity. Not only that, it also makes it harder to hide those who are being trafficked. If we intimacy providers are working in ways which we do not have to hide, there’s nowhere for the traffickers to blend in.
So we want it to be legal then…?
Don’t get your sandwich boards written up just yet, let’s dig into it a little.
Legalisation: In this context, the industry – including sellers, buyers, and third parties – are all legally allowed to engage in intimacy services. But heavily regulated.
Special laws around the industry are created, allowing some legal ways of doing this work; the industry is split into legal and illegal categories. In this scenario, the most marginalised workers who are unable to comply with all the regulations are still criminalised, therefore at risk of exploitation.
Some countries in which this work is legal include Austria, parts of Australia, Bolivia, Ecuador, Germany, Greece, Peru, Switzerland, and Taiwan.
This model involves heavy surveillance measures, unnecessary and a poor use of community resources. This supports corruption in the industry, diminishing workers’ access to safety resources.
With heavy regulation, a two-tiered system is created, in which big business brothels can afford to comply, giving workers very restricted bargaining power. It continues to push independent workers, who often cannot afford licensing fees, to work unprotected, still in a criminalised context. This means they are still at risk of physical violence and social stigmatisation, with fear of legal prosecution. It does not impact trafficking rates, given the underground market still persists.
Legalisation is a very impractical and exclusionary system.
Its face value is the support of the industry; its reality is that the rich are able to create big businesses, profiting off the work of intimacy providers, while the individual workers receive little to no benefit, often facing new situations of potential exploitation.
So… What should we be fighting for?!!
We are fighting for this work to be seen as real work; what other industry is regulated by the federal criminal code? Answer: none.
So rather than treating the industry like a crime, making it criminalised or legalised, we want it removed from this form of regulation. We want the industry to be decriminalised.
Decriminalisation: Ceasing to treat the industry as a criminal offence.
The only countries that have decriminalised the intimacy industry include New Zealand and parts of Australia.
Again referencing the Canadian advocacy group fighting for intimacy worker rights, linked in the notes, they assert that “removing [intimacy] work-specific criminal provisions is a most urgent and effective first step to protect, respect and fulfill the human rights of [intimacy] workers”.
Doctors, teachers, lawyers, nurses, and so forth are regulated by provincial governing bodies, professional associations, and municipal bylaws. We’re not saying the intimacy industry should be a free-for-all. We’re saying it should be considered legitimate work, and regulated as such.
By “using a labour framework that engages provincial legislation related to public health, occupational health and safety, and employment law”, intimacy providers can be empowered to screen and negotiate with clients, regularly attend health and social services without discrimination or fear of prosecution, and seek justice in instances of sexual and labour exploitation.
Unlike legalisation, decriminalisation will support the most marginalised workers, such as migrant workers, those providing services from the streets, transgender providers, youth, and workers living with addictions. Whereas legalisation only protects the privileged providers, decriminalisation gives full access to rights, support, and services for all.
Workers and allies can fight for change
If you’re in Canada and want to learn more about the laws and how we can fight to change them, I suggest looking into CASWLR.
This national intimacy provider advocacy group was initiated “to create a unified and cohesive response to law reform, and to strengthening the capacity of our communities to engage with legislative processes that impact on our lives”. They have conducted great research around the impacts of the current Canadian laws governing this industry, as well as resources for how to advocate for change.
You can find links to their resources in the notes below. Let’s not let all that great knowledge sit dusty on a shelf somewhere.
For those in the industry and our allies, knowledge is power, and fighting for decriminalisation is fighting for our rights to autonomy, inclusion, and safety.
Thank you for reading this latest post! I think understanding the laws around the work that we do is very valuable, both for our individual profit and wellbeing, being able to advocate for the evolution of the industry.
Whether you’re new to the industry or curious about joining, I hope you found some useful knowledge nuggets to support your journey. I’d love to hear your thoughts, and for you to share with those in your life who you feel may benefit.
This industry can be great; this greatness is best obtained when we support one another to achieve it.
Much love,
Juno
xox
Useful links to check out!
Comments