Donna Moore is from Belfast, and works as an administrator.
Gaye Dalton, a former sex worker and long-time sex worker rights activist, was kind enough to give some of her time up to discuss the ‘Nordic Model’ of sex work with me. The transcript of the interview follows. Gaye, many thanks for agreeing to this interview.
Q. For those who may be unfamiliar, would you please outline your background?
A. How long have you got?
The basics will have to do.
I left home in 1972, aged 13 and I have known people who sell sex since then. I was a survival sex worker myself at times between 1980 and 1987, full time between 1987 and 1993. I have been an activist, on and off, since then, most recently in opposition to the Nordic Model.
Q. What is your personal stance on sex work?
A. Viscerally, when I was actually doing it I only experienced it as work, never as sex at all. It was work I did not like and wished I did not have to do but I could tolerate it reliably, unlike more conventional things and it paid well, so I could feel safe for the first time in my life.
In a more abstract way I believe sex work is something that should be a personal choice and no society should ever leave anyone in a position where they have to sell sex because all their alternatives are worse, but, of course, every society always does and always will.
At least sex work is honest.
There is no justification for criminalising any aspect of honest work just because we do not like the idea. I would rather die than work in a mortuary or clean high rise windows but that does not justify criminalising any aspect of either.
A sex worker’s should be in the same legal position as a gardener or a car mechanic.
I believe in exit resources, but I would extend the right to exit resources to anyone who feels that the work they are doing is harming them in any way.
(Few people realise that, when asked, anywhere between 75-95% of people hate their jobs and desperately want out, loads of surveys online show this)
Q. How does this stance contrast with the ‘Nordic Model’ which forms the basis of sex work legislation in both Northern Ireland and the Republic of Ireland? And what, in your view, are the key flaws in the ‘Nordic Model?’
A. 1. The Nordic model primarily attacks the sole income source of people who sell sex, at times, perversely, even using the fact that they need the money desperately to justify that approach. Persecuting sex buyers makes every aspect of a sex worker’s life harder and more dangerous with no other discernible impact, which should have been obvious all along.
2. The Nordic Model depends heavily on misrepresenting the needs and natures of people who sell sex, with a string emphasis on infantilising them while undermining their intelligence, ability and autonomy. A lot of effort goes into silencing any objection sex workers make to object to that or assert reality, as a result, Nordic Model based “resources” tend to be useless and even harmful.
Q. Why, in light of the documented problems that exist with this ‘Nordic Model,’ does it retain support from the relevant authorities and NGOs on the island of Ireland?
A. Because they have developed a sophisticated civil society clique that has spent years fulfilling ambitions and deriving funding and influence from the Nordic Model. There is a PDF document on my blog which gives some idea of how that works in relation to terms.
A lot of interest in the Nordic Model began with the US Federal Government mandating an anti-prostitution pledge in 2003, which ended up sharply restricting US aids and other funding to organisations that opposed sex work. Here is a detailed account of another strand of how that developed from Medium.
Sex sells, moral panic sells even better, both are a handy “go to” to distract from the desperate need to resolve the real, underlying social issues that are responsible for a significant number of people trapped in selling sex with no viable way out…cry “pimps and traffickers” loudly, and often, enough and the people of privilege are off the hook and free to give each other awards for doing nothing of the slightest use or benefit and, too often, a load of harm.
Q. What alternatives should be looked at?
A. I have my own personal alternative version of exit provision that I have been revising since 1993, it would work and benefit the wider society but not pay out huge sums of money to worthless NGOs to junket and “raise awareness” of nonsense, so nobody will ever be interested in doing it.
Q. Is full legislation a viable alternative, or are there issues there? And is there a distinction between ‘legalisation’ and ‘decriminalisation,’ in your view?
A. Legalisation is taken to mean full state regulation, like the licensed trade. It never seems to work well anywhere and is a really poor fit for the sex trade in Ireland where, in effect, it would be striving to drive sex workers who are mostly independent into some kind of contract work if not full PAYE employment which would be a very unfortunate step to take.
Decriminalisation, on the other hand, takes sex work out of criminal law and places a sex worker in the same position as a mechanic, and that is where every sex worker deserves to be.
Q. What hope do you have that the situation on the island of Ireland in relation to sex work will improve?
A. With the current fascist resurgence will we even still have a planet next year?
I do think the current political environment in Ireland and Europe could not be worse for sex workers, and I can only see things getting worse, and when they do it will all be about self-interest within politics and civil society without even a casual glance at the best interests of the people who sell sex.
For more of Gaye Dalton’s work, visit My MythBuster.
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