Prostitutes, Sex Panics, and Queer Radicals: Public Space Reclamation Activism & New Social...

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Guido Alexander Sanchez

History of Prostitution

Micki McElya

Final Paper

05.06.03

Prostitutes, Sex Panics, and Queer Radicals:

Public Space Reclamation Activism & New Social Movements

Mobilization and activism have taken on a distinct, yet integral feature over the last two

decades. Frequently credited to AIDS Coalition To Unleash Power (ACT UP) in the 1980s,

activist strategies have focused on reclaiming public spaces in order to return a sense of true

democracy and social justice to everyone on a global scale1. Over the last twenty years these

strategies have been actively employed by many “queer” activists and a series of sex-positive

organizations fighting for a multitude of different issues. For prostitutes and sex-workers in New

York City over the last decade, activism and mobilization have been a massive struggle in the

face of public redevelopment policy and other such “quality of life” crackdowns. Faced with a

long history of anti-vice campaigns, particularly in the Times Square area, sex workers need to

begin to resolve to activate politically and radically in order to secure the rights and necessary

infrastructures to protect their own “quality of life” and that of real people, not the imagined

communities mobilized by policy makers and politicians.

1Shepard, Benjamin, “Joy, justice, and resistance to the new global apartheid,” Shepard,

Benjamin & Hayduk, Ronald, eds., from ACT UP to WTO: urban protest and community building in the era of globalization (New York: Verso, 2002): 383.

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Moments when various factors create a visible push towards gentrification or “cleaning

up” urban areas, primarily Times Square in New York City, are not new nor uncommon. While

the execution of such campaigns has taken numerous forms ranging from vice squads, increased

policing, zoning policy, and a number of other methods, the factors leading up to and effects of

these campaigns have remained fairly consistent. In an article written as an introduction to the

“radical” activist organization Sex Panic! in 1997, both historical and modern “vice campaigns”

are historicized in a particular way when noted that “since the 19th century it has been a recurrent

pattern: Public morals and health have been invoked; scapegoats have been found in

homosexuals, sex workers and others who are unlikely to fight back; and a fantasy of purity is

held up as the norm” 2. While there is a clear history of organizing around issues of “safety”

(Who is safe?), “morality” (Who is judged?), “cleanliness” (Who is pushed out?), and / or

economics (Who profits?), the “quality of life” policies and movements aggressively pursued in

New York City over the last two decades prove to be somewhat unique. As Timothy Gilfoyle

comments in his introduction to a history of Times Square’s “contested sexualities,” the policies

made in 1995 (and before and after) represent “the most aggressive effort in New York City

history to utilize municipal or state power to restrict land and property use in regards to sexual

behavior” 3.

2Crimp, Douglas, Pelligrini, Ann, Pendleton, Eva & Warner, Michael, “This Is a Sex

Panic!,” Sex Panic! Organization Brochure (New York: 1997): 1.

3Gilfoyle, Timothy, “From Soubrette Row To Show World: The Contested Sexualities of Times Square, 1880-1995,” Dangerous Bedfellows, eds., Policing Public Sex (Boston: South End Press, 1996): 263.

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The interactions that occur in public sex “venues,” including theaters, sex shops, parks,

and other public spaces, where what some may see as “anonymous” sex occurs, are effectively

(but not unproblematically) theorized about by Samuel Delany in his text Times Square Red,

Times Square Blue. Delany’s text, written between 1995 and 1996, views all of these spaces

through the lens of Times Square redevelopment policy, attempting to reconcile the relationship

between political lobbies and designations and real life. Delany separates the text into two

essays, the first of which is his narrative which recounts his personal experiences of three

decades involved in the community of public sex, written with anecdotes and interviews with

other people “on the streets.” This community Delany elects to be a part of is represented with

two major problems in his first essay. The fact that Delany “elects to be in it” is never considered

in his argument, as agency and economic or other necessity are absent entirely from his text.

While Delany calls the communities a necessity for their cultural and social contributions, his

own location in them is never discussed relative to the other people involved and the factors that

create this community. Secondly, Delany refers to these spaces where (semi) public sex occurred

on a regular basis, being sure to differentiate these relationships from hustling 4, yet never

defining sex. While the first essay reveals that oral sex, mutual masturbation, and voyeurism all

occurred with regularity, ]Delany never takes a moment to define how he is using “sex” and

what “sex” with these people meant to him (or even speculate what it meant to others in the

spaces).

4Delany, Samuel, Times Square Red, Times Square Blue (New York: New York

University Press, 1999): 148.

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Delany’s second essay, his critical thesis, comprises his densely theoretical analysis of

these social spaces where public sex occurred and the related redevelopment policy / politics

involved in recent decades. The crux of Delany’s argument lies in his adoption of social

interaction theory drawn from metropolitan studies and sociological theorists, particularly Jane

Jacobs 5. Delany bifurcates social interaction into two primary modes, “contact” and “network,”

which he then clarifies that the two are not strict opposites or a rigid binary 6. For Delany,

contact, the more “important” and real of the two forms of interaction, is random and consists of

the serendipitous encounters on the street with people whom are most likely strangers 7.

Networking, on the other hand, consists of the encounters between people of similar interests or

another commonality that links the group which has assembled, frequently of the same class,

coming together for the purpose of gain or advancement 8. Delany’s favoring of contact over

networking derives from two major economic arguments, coupled with his personal biases. First,

due to the laws of supply and demand, networking rarely produces as much benefit as contact as

there are more people with “demand” and less people with “supply” 9. Second, contact not only

produces more “benefit”, (a fairly subjective term that can be material, social, personal, or other)

5Jacobs, Jane, The Death and Life of Great American Cities (New York: Vintage Books,

1961)

6Delany, Samuel, Times Square Red, Times Square Blue (New York: New York University Press, 1999): 129.




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but is a form of interaction rooted in and conducive to interclass contact 10.



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For Delany, groups of people who are involved in public sex (which theoretically

includes prostitutes, hustlers, and “casual” public sex participants) forge an invaluable

community that consists of contact interaction, interclass contact, and relationship building, all

part of a necessity in “queer” (read: gay male) social identity formation 11. Taking Delany’s

theoretical contributions to be true (meaning a community exists; details or commentary on the

particular communities need not be assumed substantiated or even valid), a specific disruption in

these communities occurs with the redevelopment and moral “anti-vice” campaigns that

periodically occur throughout New York City across spatial and temporal histories. While

Delany frames a good amount of his argument around the recent redevelopment structures in

Times Square, many considerations that go beyond Delany’s claims can forge a narrative of the

real effects experienced in these displaced communities.



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David Wojnarowicz’s text The Waterfront Journals contains his “monologues” which is

a primary source account of a self-identified queer hustler’s daily life experiences throughout the

United States, primarily within Manhattan (Times Square, Lower East Side, and Chelsea areas)

in the mid-to-late 1980s 12. Before utilizing the primary source text of Wojnarowicz as

interrelated to the theoretical text of Delany, the differences between “hustling” and “public sex”

must be somehow understood as they are used within the two texts. Delany firmly claims that his

discussion is limited to his own experience, which is limited to sexual interaction that he himself

does not classify as economically rigid enough to be the formal exchange of “hustling” 13.

Wojnarowicz’s sexual interactions are frequently classified by both himself and outside

observers as “hustling” in that there is economic exchange of some sort, whether it be as explicit

as Delany requires for this categorization or not. Thus, for all intents and purposes, the real

interactions and exchanges that occurred in the lives of these two men (and many others in

similar social spaces) can be paralleled, and thus similarly linked between theory and experience.

To shed light on the reality of the “theory” presented by Delany, some of Wojnarowicz’s

experiences can be examined to both support and deconstruct certain facets of the critical

analysis Delany builds on public space, sex, and policy-making. One step beyond Delany’s

communities of public sex, these communities were not just necessary to Wojnarowicz for

identity formation and cultural existence, but they were essential to survival. “It’s okay down

here”, describes Wojnarowicz writing as a young hustler in Times Square, “I got lots of friends

12Wojnarowicz, David, The Waterfront Journals (New York: Grove Press, 1996): ix.


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lots of people watchin out for me [sic]... a couple of prostitutes are like my second parents” 14.

Wojnarowicz cites these support networks repeatedly throughout his text as links to shelter,

travel, social interaction, and other necessities in his day-to-day existence that were derived from

these communities, frequently based around his interactions as a hustler (be they clients or other

hustlers).

14Wojnarowicz, David, The Waterfront Journals (New York: Grove Press, 1996): 26.

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Wojnarowicz’s sexual interactions and sexual social spaces also support Delany’s

theoretical positions on other levels, revealing validity in the experiences and analyses

represented in the texts. The concrete sexual interactions that Wojnarowicz described were

structured in the precise way he wished them to be (the majority of the time) which included

them being necessarily reciprocal. In one encounter with someone Wojnarowicz thought was

“interesting”, he describes how he decided not to pursue the encounter “because he wasn’t into

being mutual in sex I figured fuck this” 15. While this clearly fits into Delany’s definition of

hustling, as Wojnarowicz “set the price beforehand” and as “payment [was] not agreed to, no

encounter [took] place” 16. In this definition, “price” is not limited to material exchange.

Delany’s fairly vague definitions are proven to be overly ambiguous by Wojnarowicz’s real life

experiences, which complicate Delany’s discussion. In the end of his analysis, Delany cites his

own sexual relationships (the non-hustling, contact based, social building ones) as “semiotic

exchange”, reducing all relationships to “always relationships of exchange” 17. While Delany’s

argument is already internally inconsistent (as exchange becomes hustling yet all relationships

include exchange), Wojnarowicz’s experience in which nonmaterial exchange is set and required

in his interactions proves parallel to Delany’s own sexual interactions, in which reciprocity is

required for proper exchange. Thus the line between public sex and hustling is blurred

significantly.




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While other minor points in Wojnarowicz’s real life experiences can both exemplify and

disrupt aspects of Delany’s theoretical framework, the reflection on redevelopment remains

intricately connected and the reality of the situation is impossible to escape. Delany’s theoretical

basis (beyond the social theory and economic review) lies in his consideration of Times Square

redevelopment policy. In his more personal essay (Times Square Blue) Delany traces how the

lives of real people “on the streets” are affected and feel about the redevelopment of Times

Square, which includes the integration of larger corporations who also dedicate time to “cleaning

up” the space, primarily to profit off the buildings and increase aesthetic pleasure for tourists and

“small-town folk” who visit the city. As Timothy Gilfoyle begins to theorize in the final

paragraph of his historicization of the area, “reformers at the end of the century have been

preoccupied with representations of such behavior” 18. Thus it is proposed that “deviancy in the

1990s is defined less by an act and more by an image”, negating the basis for much of the

argument used in redevelopment politics 19. Also deconstructing the discourse around

redevelopment, Delany cites, with reasonable evidence to support, that the “cleanliness” is in

fact less safe for natives to the city and more safe for tourists (even than their own hometowns).

Wojnarowicz’s tragic experiences with redevelopment and living his “life in exile” include his

observations about the environmental and structural changes occurring, with less overall insight

(as he wrote simultaneous with the policy shifts). Wojnarowicz notices in Times Square that

18Gilfoyle, Timothy, “From Soubrette Row To Show World: The Contested Sexualities

of Times Square, 1880-1995,” Dangerous Bedfellows, eds., Policing Public Sex (Boston: South End Press, 1996): 283.


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“some TV station did a film on the Square and now the cops go around in a van and arrest ya if

they think you’re hustlin [sic]” 20.


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Wojnarowicz’s life, which I referred to earlier as tragic, is constantly cited as one of exile

and tragedy, and his most autobiographical text Close to the Knives is subtitled “A Memoir of

Disintegration” 21. While Wojnarowicz’s life reveals far more tragedy (an inherently subjective

term) than what resulted from the policing of public space, the link between this shift in the

political hegemony and policy development are clearly factors adding to the difficulty of existing

as a queer, a street prostitute, or both. Tony Kushner, an activist and author whom was also

friend of Wojnarowicz’s, sums up the time Wojnarowicz spent his life in New York City

perfectly in his introduction to The Waterfront Journals. “It was written during a time of savage

Reaction...with the savagery increasing exponentially with every passing day” 22 describes

Kushner, defining the volatile time for queers, hustlers, or any similarly viewed “deviant” (an

incredibly problematic term which assumes there is something inherently normal that exists on

the opposite end of the spectrum) as savage, a label that seems more than appropriate.

21Wojnarowicz, David, Close to the Knives: A Memoir of Disintegration (New York:

Vintage Books, 1991)

22Kushner, Tony, “Introduction,” Wojnarowicz, David, The Waterfront Journals (New York: Grove Press, 1996): xv.

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While this time of “savagery” is one which disrupted invaluable communities of people

and was filled with racist, homophobic, and classist political undertones, it was not a time of

hopelessness by any means. Delany’s own text is severely utopian, textually problematic yet at

points hopeful and inspiring. While less theoretically insightful and far more “radical” and

“reactive” than Delany, Wojnarowicz protested the “savagery” of the environment through his

writing and art. Wojnarowicz’s art (by which I mean his writing, painting, photography and

everything else he created) is all intensely political, and the implications of his artwork and the

popularity he posthumously received as an artist and public figure are important to consider.

This intriguing analysis would require a discussion of consumer culture, the relation between

“taste” and art, social and political commentary in art, and far more issues than I can include

here. The bold and powerful nature of Wojnarowicz’s art is key in my analysis to understanding

urban protest and hope for change during this time of oppression (which has arguably not ended

in 2003). Kushner follows up his description of the savagery that Wojnarowicz existed in,

commenting that “the fact of such vision promises the possibility and proclaims the urgency of

resistance”23. This particular mode of resistance Kushner speaks of can locate much of its history

during this era, and is key to understanding how prostitutes, hustlers, and sex workers can

mobilize around such troubling and controversial issues.

23Kushner, Tony, “Introduction,” Wojnarowicz, David, The Waterfront Journals (New

York: Grove Press, 1996): xv.

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Activism and urban protest for the last two decades have typically been characterized by

an attempt to reclaim public space, especially during times of dissent. In an attempt to build a

history of this “new” (newly visible) form of social movement, Benjamin Shepard and Ronald

Hayduk edited an anthology entitled from ACT UP to the WTO: urban protest and community

building in the era of globalization. The essays contained serve an incredibly important purpose

in representing a variety of social movements over the last two decades, the experiences

involved, the links between, and the methods used to push for social change. The anthology as a

whole represents histories of activist movements, most crediting ACT UP for their “radical”

methods of protest. The activist organization ACT UP has become the starting point and

“creator” of the activist movements which have followed over the last two decades into the

present day. From shutting down Wall Street in 1987 through a demonstration of nonviolent civil

disobedience through creating what would soon be mobilized as one of the most powerful logos

in AIDS activism, “Silence=Death” (11), ACT UP became one of the intensely visible

demonstration of grassroots organizing of such an effective (effect defined here as a statement

successfully being made) degree around issues of public space, social change, and sexualities24.

24Shepard, Benjamin, “Introductory notes on the trail from ACT UP to the WTO,”

Shepard, Benjamin & Hayduk, Ronald, eds., from ACT UP to WTO: urban protest and community building in the era of globalization (New York: Verso, 2002): 11.

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Tracing the history of ACT UP and a series of other grassroots organizations ranging

from environmental to labor issues, historicizing this “form” of protest reveals the direct

correlation that exists between the movement and the economic and political shifts that were

occurring simultaneously, particularly the widespread use of the abstract concept of

“globalization” and the resulting deregulation and privatization. To do little justice to the history

of the movement and abridge the histories represented, I will attempt to illuminate the key

concepts in order to understand what I refer to as “public space reclamation activism”.

Movements rose with a goal to “democratize the public sphere” in such a way that true

democracy would take shape and social justice would be the primary objective. In order to

democratize the “public sphere”, a number of various links needed to be made and communities

were built around this new mobilization. The foundation of the new style of movement is the

term “glocal”, which refers to the notion that the global and the local are intricately linked, an

ideology that is at the center of most of the various movement’s tactics and standpoints 25.

Technology such as the internet was able to help intricately link movements, thus building what

is referred to as a “hubs and spokes” model of mobilizing 26. This model functions with smaller

“affinity groups” which are localized movements that link together to “co-activate” against a

particular target, each group maintaining their own individual interests. While the theory is

problematic, the general foundation for the movement revolutionized the way activism could

25Shepard, Benjamin & Hayduk, Ronald, “Introductory Notes,” Shepard, Benjamin &

Hayduk, Ronald, eds., from ACT UP to WTO: urban protest and community building in the era of globalization (New York: Verso, 2002): 5.

26Klein, Naomi, “The vision thing: were the CD and Seattle protests unfocused, or are critics missing the point?,” Shepard, Benjamin & Hayduk, Ronald, eds., from ACT UP to WTO: urban protest and community building in the era of globalization (New York: Verso, 2002): 267.

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occur.

Combining the functional model of mobilizing described above with the “radical” and

nonviolent civil disobedience rendered highly visible by ACT UP in the 1980s, social

movements have been able to employ public space reclamation activism as an undeniably visible

and (subjectively) successful means of protest. Clearly taking Delany’s theoretical framework as

a basis of analysis, Jim Eigo, author and member of both ACT UP and Sex Panic!, forges

elements of Delany’s theories into a tool for activists to mobilize around in his essay “The city as

body politic / the body as city unto itself” 27. The city, according to Eigo, becomes the

preliminary factor that nurtures public space reclamation activism, based both on the city’s

cultural elements and its physical set-up. As a case study in his attempt to prove these ideas

about the city as a “body” of activism and the reverse (the body as the “city” scape), Eigo

explores the “Giuliani administration’s war on sex”, an analysis which blends the issues of

public sex, hustling / prostitution, and queerness all into one incredibly rich and highly

politicized discourse 28.

For Eigo, the city is conducive to “sex contacts between people of minority sexual

tastes”, providing social spaces for “like-minded people” to interact, fulfilling Delany’s need for

“contact” interaction and community building 29. Eigo continues to describe the city’s

27Eigo, Jim, “The city as body politic / the body as city unto itself,” Shepard, Benjamin &


28Eigo, Jim, “The city as body politic / the body as city unto itself,” Shepard, Benjamin & Hayduk, Ronald, eds., from ACT UP to WTO: urban protest and community building in the era of globalization (New York: Verso, 2002): 184.


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“rezoning” policies which would physically push most of these spaces, frequented by casual

attendants, habitual regulars, and sex workers, to the outskirts of the city leaving them

unregulated, dangerous, and at high risk of closure for a variety of reasons, including economic

failure and increased police harassment. These policies are mobilized within a political discourse

in a number of intensely homophobic, racist, sexist and generally oppressive ways. Public health

concerns become the primary justification for the policies, all structured in a bifurcated way in

which the binary of carriers versus “clean” people becomes a way to justify the persecution of a

particular population 30.


30Eigo, Jim, “The city as body politic / the body as city unto itself,” Shepard, Benjamin & Hayduk, Ronald, eds., from ACT UP to WTO: urban protest and community building in the era of globalization (New York: Verso, 2002): 185.

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The history of prostitution in most areas is saturated with similar public health discourses

- from the “vessels of contagion” discourse of the 19th century through the criminalization of

prostitutes during times of militarization as not to “infect” the soldiers 31. Similarly, racism has

been mobilized through diseases such as HIV / AIDS with Haitian populations in the early 1980s

onset of AIDS and more recently SARS, the recent infection dubbed “Severe Asian Racism

Disorder” by comedian Margaret Cho 32. Institutional homophobia has more recently targeted

homosexuals as the scapegoats for HIV / AIDS in the 1980s, yet historically homosexual

populations have been branded as disease carriers in an almost identical discourse as

prostitution. In Allan Berube’s “A Century of Sex Panics” from the Sex Panic! literature,

“antigay columnist” Charles Denton is quoted as saying in 1965 that “the homosexual belongs in

behavioral quarantine until he is cured” 33. This labeling process becomes a simple way to

produce divisive and unjust politics under the heading of protecting the “public health”, in which

the “public” becomes a very particular class, race, and sexual orientation.

31Rosen, Ruth, The Lost Sisterhood: Prostitution in America, 1900-1918 (Baltimore: The

Johns Hopkins University Press, 1982)

32Cho, Margaret, The Revolution Tour. Performance 25 April 2003: Red Bank, New Jersey.

33Berube, Allan, “A Century of Sex Panics,” Sex Panic! Organization Brochure (New York: 1997): 6.

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Focusing for a moment on the specifically gay politics in the public space debate, Jim

Eigo states that “when local government actions infringe on the sexual activity of some gay men,

all gay people are endangered” 34. This call to action is the basis for my definition of public

space reclamation activism - when someone is being oppressed or denied equal social justice,

everyone must react in order to preserve democracy and necessary human rights for everyone

else. The entering of public space becomes two-fold. On the one hand, most forms of social

oppression of “sexual deviants” (particularly queers and sex workers) occurs by denial of access

to public space - the privatization of certain areas and control by corporations underhandedly

creates a class-exclusive area, while increased policing has been found to be inherently racist.

On the other hand, the way to protest this oppression is through the reclamation of public space -

through nonviolent civil disobedience which immediately draws attention to the cause, picketing,

boycotts, poster campaigns, and any other public space intervention which results in increased

awareness and increased mobilization amongst communities. While queer activism has arguably

employed these tactics of resistance for the last two decades as homosexuals are frequently

targets of these policy shifts, the recent discourse of redevelopment is far more broad and is

aimed at a number of varying populations in addition to queers (particularly sex workers).



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An incredibly insightful analysis by Eigo of the political discourse on public space over

the last decade reveals that “one thing united the range of businesses that rezoning targeted: they

dealt with sex”. Thus mobilization must not be limited to queer radicals, but all people who can

be victimized when “sexual deviants” (read: non heterosexual, public, people of color, non

monogamous, non middle class populations) are targeted and “sex-positive” discourses are

silenced. Sex Panic! the public space reclamation activist organization founded in 1997 as a

“pro-queer, pro-feminist, antiracist direct action group” was founded around creating

“democratic urban space” and eliminating all oppression in public space political discourse,

which also negates proper safer sex education through elimination of service and funds and

silencing of such movements 35. Positioning the problematic public health discourse at the

forefront of their literature, Sex Panic! declares that “the more isolated and privatized we are, the

less we know about each other and the less we care”, immediately mobilizing the notion that

these policies disrupt communities, a disruption which is detrimental on a number of levels 36. In

this capacity a number of other organizations have been formed, including AIDS Prevention

Activist League (APAL) and Community AIDS Prevention Activists (CAPA) to “insist on the

preservation of gay public sex spaces as venues for distributing safer sex education literature and

condoms” 37. While much of the literature on these and similar activist strategies use the words

“gay” and “queer”, both of these categories can be replaced with “sex worker” or “prostitute” to

35“Mission Statement,” Sex Panic! Organization Brochure (New York: 1997): 1.

36Crimp, Douglas, Pelligrini, Ann, Pendleton, Eva & Warner, Michael, “This Is a Sex Panic!,” Sex Panic! Organization Brochure (New York: 1997): 1.

37Redick, Alison, “The Mixed Constituency of Sexual Commerce,” Sex Panic! Organization Brochure (New York: 1997): 31.

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build a similar literature of strategy for these populations to mobilize around.

While sex work and mobilization strategies are rarely linked and prostitute activists have

little visible history, the documentary film Live Nude Girls Unite! illustrates how public space

reclamation activism (in this case of a very particular economic and labor specific variety) can

lead to the desired social recognition and the granting of certain basic and just rights, in this case

for erotic dancers 38. In the film, director and organizing activist Julia Query documents the

struggle that the erotic dancers of the Lusty Lady in San Francisco went through in order to

unionize, initiated by the incredibly poor working conditions and racist hiring practices of the

club. Becoming the second union of strippers in the United States (the first disbanded soon after

it was formed), the women eventually got most of the demands they made (it took almost a year

of negotiations) and formed the Exotic Dancers Union. But beyond the negotiations, recognition

in all its forms was near impossible for the women to get, primarily because their labor was

viewed as “sexually deviant” for its very public sexuality, and thus deemed less important and

less worthy of the standard rights all other labor unions receive.

38Live Nude Girls Unite (2000).

The mobilization effort on the part of the women at the Lusty Lady was not simply the

involvement in negotiations, but the public space activism the women used as a tactic, which

was a huge contributing factor to both the initial decision to negotiate and the eventual outcome

of the negotiations. During the initial mobilizing efforts the women at the Lusty Lady picketed

outside of the club, organizing around such slogans as “No Contract, No Pussy” and other such

catchy phrases, simultaneously gaining visibility for the movement and educating customers

about the reasonable needs of the women who worked there and the denial of these basic rights

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as laborers. Through this picketing in the public space immediately in front of the club, the

dancer activists were able to generate public visibility and even force the club to shutdown for

three days. During the negotiations the women also made sure to produce a series of educational

flyers detailing the harsh working conditions these women faced, generating more public

education and invading the “public space” with their mobilizing efforts. One flyer detailing a

harsh and offensive comment one of the original lawyers had made was rumored to have been

adapted and utilized by the carpentry union in their own organizing efforts. The public space was

invaded with word of these mobilizing efforts, and once the union was won, leading organizers

were asked by other erotic dancers across the United States to assist in their own mobilizing

efforts, proving the success of public space reclamation activism. Once the issue was no longer

private and the women were no longer simply “sex workers” it moved forward in a direction

towards social justice and democracy.

Writing shortly after these mobilizing efforts succeeded in unionizing erotic dancers in

San Francisco, Pat Califia authored an essay entitled “When Sex Is a Job” 39 which describes the

relations of prostitute and sex worker activists and the police in San Francisco around 1999.

Falling in line with Timothy Gilfoyle’s claim that imagery and visibility of sex work in public

space was far more problematic for policing and politics 40, Califia describes how police targeted

particular classes of prostitutes. While “street walking” has long been a more prominent target of

39Califia, Pat, “When Sex Is a Job,” Califia, Pat, ed. Public Sex: The Culture of Radical

Sex (San Francisco: Cleis Press 2000): 131.


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policy makers compared to “escort services” 41, with the onset of a new brand of activism which

attempted to reclaim public spaces and heighten the public awareness police were forced to

respond with different modes of controlling the public visibility. In response to the high visibility

of prostitute activists in the area, “the cops [seemed] to be targeting prostitute-rights activists”,

as proven by Califia’s two case studies in which “high class” escorts who perform services

within the privacy of their own home typically find themselves free of police harassment were

entrapped by police officers and arrested 42. The connection lies in the fact that the “dozens” of

women prostitutes who were arrested were also members of activist organizations, and the

primary targets who received the most difficult policing situations were the organizers. While it

must not be discounted that the police are not simply the controllers of moral standards and did

accept money as a way for the victim to be released, what Califia dubs “a system of ‘official

extortion’” 43, it cannot be denied that the onset of arrests were targeted at people who had taken

up the cause and were public figures who employed particular strategies of activism which

invaded the “public sphere”.

41Gilfoyle, Timothy, City of Eros: New York City, Prostitution, and the

Commercialization of Sex 1790-1920 (New York: W.W. Norton & Company, 1992)

42Califia, Pat, “When Sex Is a Job,” Califia, Pat, ed. Public Sex: The Culture of Radical Sex (San Francisco: Cleis Press 2000): 133.


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When Allan Berube declared that the discourse around public sexualities in New York

City which condemned and effectively eliminated public spaces for public sex, he concluded that

it will also “wipe out queer sexual behavior outside - and inside - the home” 44. Similar to the “if

it hurts some of us, it hurts all of us” ideology, the elimination of “vice” (read: public sex) from

public spaces threatens all sexualities - particularly those of queers and sex workers. While queer

radicals have found their voice in the reclamation of public spaces through activist mobilizations,

sex work remains silenced by the legislative and social policy discourses which negate the

possibility of any agency existing in sex work. Pat Califia demands that “standing up to the cops

does shift the balance of power” 45. Nonviolent civil disobedience, educational campaigns,

teach-ins, rallies, protests, poster campaigns, and general activism must occur in public spaces to

demand any recognition. ACT UP targeted the public sphere and effectively shutdown certain

institutions to demand its message be heard, leaving it to be considered one of the most effective

radical public space reclamation activist organizations in the histories of activism. Just as these

organizers affected change in communities which may be considered by some a minor step in the

grand scheme of things, it is still a step towards social justice and democracy. Sex workers,

queer radicals, hustlers, prostitutes, pornographers, and truly anyone that has sex is threatened by

these policies and must begin to mobilize in the form of public space reclamation activism in

order to create a discourse in the public sphere, which is the only way to fight for change in that

same public world.

44Berube, Allan, “A Century of Sex Panics,” Sex Panic! Organization Brochure (New

York: 1997): 5.


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