Sex Future.

I have been a sex-worker for 30 years now & am now semi-retired. Spending most of my time now writing & advocating the rights of sexworkers. I also am a woman who feels that it is important to begin to truly respect & understand the issues around sex/sexuality & sexual behaviours from sexworkers themselves.
Many sexworkers are just used by the media & organisations to flaunt the abusive side of sexwork & therefore uses `victims` of sexwork to press this point home.
I disagree with this methology. We all know about victims but have little time for those who have valid, wise & understanding attitudes about both sex & sexwork. Victims are there in life anyway & sometimes the time spent trying to focus on these, means that we can miss a bigger picture & a better way of helping those with problems.
In the mid-seventies, a client tried to kill me, but instead, I killed him. Was charged with murder & remanded, but after a trial by jury was acquitted on self defense. The law afterwards refused my application for criminal compensation, saying` that because I choose a career in prostitution, I put myself up for violent scenario`s`, so was refused.
This would not happen now, as afterwards I continued to petition to the Home Office for a change in law, appertaining to people in the sex industry who survived attacks by violent clients, & their right to criminal compensation.
This was changed & the victims that survived the Yorkshire Ripper were the first to get this compensation.
So in a way I did win for those that followed, but failed for myself.
This set my on a road to better understand violent sexual people, rather than wallowing in self-pity.
I became a Dominatrix, because this gave me the control, the power & the opportunity to get a deeper understanding of sexual behaviours & psychology of sex.
Also because I had always felt there was unacknowledged good within my own personality, I sort out a spiritual outlet, but failed due to morals of recognised religions.
I do though not see myself as a `Goddess` type but do know there is a spiritual content to all of us & within the Sacred Whore mythology, can see the corrolation to sexual pyche as well.
I am determined to try & get society to acknowledge the wisedom, experiences & healing that many prostitutes offer to society. There is aspects of sex & sexual behaviour which is not examined because those who hold that value (sexworkers) are not accepted, respected members of community.
If, society began to view these aspects of sex work from certain sexworkers viewpoints & educate themselves further into the essence of sex/relationships/history/sociology, as well as spirit, this I feel could affect the way society sees sexwork as a whole & in doing so could go some great way into beginning to understand the influence of violence in our cultures ,relationships & emotions.
Re-claiming the respect into prostitution.
I have seen you are or have been a sexworker yourself & have a degree of some sort. Your stance in sexwork has been profound & beyond what many sexworkers do.
I feel it is time that strong, intelligent people who have or are involved in sexwork to some degree or another, should now begin to have the opportunity to get a platform of sensible, intelligent discussion on mainstream TV, ie :C4 or BBC 2...not as a titillisation, but as straight & honest viewpoints that show valid reasons who prostitution should be more honoured than it already is...not just for the sexworkers themselves but the way it could help & affect society at large.
people are not bothered regards prostitutes safety, but if they think it affects them they are all ears.
I think sex education for children should go beyond what is already taught & involve real issues around relationships & emotions, which does NOT include religious morals.
There are few people in this country that I can find who have enough about them to begin to focus on these forward areas of thinking, they instead seem to spend their time healing those in abusive or sexual pain, instead of projecting real alternatives & real sex issues.
Lynne Tansey,
Dominatrix, writer, sexworker advocate & artist.