Practical Answers
The issue as I see it is simply building on practical answers. I do not see Stella as a pimping organization. Their mandate is to help those they serve within a defined niche. The question raised once, all emotion is removed, is equally simple. How does a sex worker leave the business?
A sex worker leaving the business effectively has expressed a desire to integrate back into the mainstream community. Figuring out what you are capable of doing and actually doing it are very different. Also this is not about what you would like to do without the appropriate background.
The community organizations serve as a bridge between the marginal and the mainstream elements of the community with traffic flowing in both directions. They have access to the health services, educational services, an understanding of employment opportunities, access to social services, etc. You will at least get an impartial opinion or assessment of the specific situation with some guidance avoiding paths that may not have a history of success. Also you will have the name of an organizations behind you when you may be all alone knocking on doors for help.
PTSD. We do not have a budget to deal with it for most specific professions or social groups. No psychologists, psychiatrists or others offer guarantees in this area. Conversely PTSD is not limited to the sex worker, it touches virtually all activities. Part of the process of getting back into the mainstream is recognizing that problems that you think are unique to you or your profession are part of the mainstream as well.
gugu said:You see Stella as group trying to convince sex workers to stay in the business? Stella is not a pimping organization. They have chosen not to provide direct assistance to the girls who want to leave the business. It is their choice as an organization. We don’t run their organization. They don’t have the money to do that. Their choice is helping the girls in the business. But should they decide to provide these services one day, I see no reason why they would be unprofessional in doing it. They provide one important type of assistance to them though: they refer them to the available resources. When we push this logic, the best place for help would be la Cles. They will teach them how much prostitution is an evil. The only thing here: an evil for someone may not be an evil for someone else.
Health issues are… health issues. More than 40% of the public spending goes into this area. Scarce service for PTSD? Money not spent where it should be spent? Need to spend even more? Need new rules for funding? Need better funding for community organizations? Need more money for prevention? Need different structures? Those are all good questions. But the fact is: as a society, we chose to have a public planning of our health system. We should expect that you should be eable to get in the system and that once you get in the system, they will diagnose the PTSD and offer a treatment. I understand JAG here. If it is common problem for the women getting out of the trade and we do not have in our health services the tools to deal with that, it is the role of prostitution advocates to make it a claim. It is not prostitution’ advocates’ responsibility to develop and provide theses services. How should this be made available? Who should the empowerers be? Psychiatry, psychologists, social assistance, community support groups? I don’t know. It is a technical question I believe. A very complex question for health system managers. Not much because we are talking about prostitutes, but because treatments, unless by a psychiatrist, is not totally supervised by the medical profession. I doubt that that community organizations are “well equipped” to deal with the complex health issues linked with PTSD. This is a responsibility for the medical profession I think.
The issue as I see it is simply building on practical answers. I do not see Stella as a pimping organization. Their mandate is to help those they serve within a defined niche. The question raised once, all emotion is removed, is equally simple. How does a sex worker leave the business?
A sex worker leaving the business effectively has expressed a desire to integrate back into the mainstream community. Figuring out what you are capable of doing and actually doing it are very different. Also this is not about what you would like to do without the appropriate background.
The community organizations serve as a bridge between the marginal and the mainstream elements of the community with traffic flowing in both directions. They have access to the health services, educational services, an understanding of employment opportunities, access to social services, etc. You will at least get an impartial opinion or assessment of the specific situation with some guidance avoiding paths that may not have a history of success. Also you will have the name of an organizations behind you when you may be all alone knocking on doors for help.
PTSD. We do not have a budget to deal with it for most specific professions or social groups. No psychologists, psychiatrists or others offer guarantees in this area. Conversely PTSD is not limited to the sex worker, it touches virtually all activities. Part of the process of getting back into the mainstream is recognizing that problems that you think are unique to you or your profession are part of the mainstream as well.