There have only been a few times in my life when I’ve been
optimistic about the future of the world and its human
inhabitants.
Like when discussing the need for buying drinking cocoa from
both a fair-trade and a nonprofit company with a guy in
Bluestockings Bookstore in New York City, or the sight of a poster
advertising the statement “Good Catholics Use Condoms”
with a picture of a gay male couple, paid for by a Catholic
organization.
Most recently the feeling struck me while talking to Annie
Oakley, the founder of the Sex Workers Art Show, and other
participating artists after the conclusion of the show Tuesday
night in Northwest Auditorium.
While the poster simply gave me a warm feeling of, “Yes,
maybe everything is going to be all right,” the other two
experiences have a lot in common. They were encounters with people
that believe in a beautiful future, and are doing everything in
their power to make that future come true.
You: What? A sex workers art show promoting a beautiful
future?
Me: Yes, exactly.
The Sex Workers Art Show is a group of sex workers and artists
that have experience in all areas of sex work ““ anything from
striptease to prostitution. They are touring all over the country,
including a lot of stops on college campuses.
Oakley started the group nine years ago while she was an
anti-war activist in Seattle and was told by coworkers that she
couldn’t be both a feminist and a sex worker. She is a
self-declared control freak and runs almost every aspect of the
show herself.
The explicit purpose of this show is to present sex workers as
humans as opposed to objects, but according to Oakley, the Sex
Workers Art Show does more than demystify the workers behind the
sex industry ““ it is “disrupting capitalism through
performance.”
As Oakley sees it, and I must say I very much agree, in order to
live in a capitalist society “you have to forget about the
people behind what you buy.”
If you spend too much time thinking about all the people
exploited to produce that one can of Coca-Cola or that Adidas
jacket, you’ll go insane.
And what about sex? It is oftentimes just another commodity that
you buy. And just like with shoes and soda, there are real people
behind the service that is being provided.
Sex workers are not objects or dolls; they are people, some with
partners and children, all with hopes and dreams. By bringing to
light the people behind the product, whether it be a porn video or
a lap dance, the audience is forced to confront the people that
their potential purchases directly affect.
The blurb on the inside front cover of the program put it
perfectly: “This show aims to be a starting point for a
larger discussion on issues of gender, race, class and capitalism;
linking the struggles of whores with the struggles of all people
for the right to safety, dignity and self-determination.”
I spoke with a couple of artists including the one male
performer, Juba Kalamka. He explained that his performance, titled
“Requiem for a Ho-Ass Nigger,” was commenting on
multiple issues of pornography and race.
These included how blacks are portrayed in all media including
porn; “people’s public disgust with porn, but how they
then privately consume it”; the “performativity”
of sex work; and lastly, how he fit into the show as the only male,
and a gay black one to boot.
Post show I sat down and listened to his hip-hop CD. The world
would benefit from more people like Kalamka.
You: What’s with this political anti-capitalist,
anti-racist garbage? Did you see naked people?
Me: Absolutely.
The show opened with artist Julie Atlas Muz coming out on stage
dressed in a thong, nipple pasties and a thick rope wrapped around
her torso and hips, so that she could walk, but not move much else.
She started to “escape” from the ropes that were
tightly wound around her body.
At the end of the show she returned completely naked, carrying a
plastic heart (shaped realistically, arteries and all) filled with
fake blood. She proceeded to pour and smear this fake blood all
over her body. Can I say hot?
Nonvisual performances included the reading of an excerpt from a
graphic novel called “Rent Girl” by author Michelle
Tea. It was her reading that really gave me an idea of what it
meant to be a sex worker and drove it home that it is work ““
not play. The horrible oral sex the girls received in “Rent
Girl,” and the dry, nonexistent sex with a flaccid penis that
the girl had to endure in the short story were situations I feel
most sexually experienced girls can relate to.
The idea that this is how these workers make sure they have
enough food to eat causes me to have a great amount of respect for
them. These excerpts made me realize how hard sex work is, and how
much it deserves to be respected.
Other performances included a humorous striptease and
song-and-dance number performed by artist Simone De La Getto, a
song by musician Scarlot Harlot about the stereotypes that fat
people have to face, and a rampant search for clothing by Bridget
Irish.
I had forgotten how much hair a bush could have until Irish
walked onto the stage stark naked and unshaven. It’s sad, if
you think about it ““ that I haven’t seen a completely
unshaven bush since … I don’t even know.
The humor in these performances and the messages they were meant
to portray brought the people behind the sex work to life. I
laughed, I was entertained, and I was enlightened.
These artists are more socially aware than most college students
I know. Maybe that says something about our education, maybe it
just says something about how isolated we are from the working
class.
But to Oakley and her artists all I can say is, the world needs
more people like you ““ passionate idealists with the will to
fight.
Lara wants to start a collection of nipple pasties. Help her
out on this quest. E-mail her at lloewenstein@media.ucla.edu. Send
general comments to viewpoint@media.ucla.edu.