These powerful and moving pieces were sent to us through our Share Your Story page, which provides a space for women to tell of their experiences of the sex trade in their own words.
Liliam Altuntas
I did not choose as a child to be a prostitute and then as an adult I had no other opportunities and then I was in a foreign country and since I was a putanna I had to continue even if it was not what I dreamed of being…
It is easy to say, ‘This body is mine and I do what I want and prostitution is a job.’ Only that body is not yours at some point because when the client pays for those minutes, ‘your body’ is the client’s and he will do what he wants…
The sex workers that call for prostitution to be considered a job are mostly middle-class women who prostitute themselves for a new dress, a fashionable phone and to make a good impression on a walk downtown on a sunny day…
And the men who are in favour of legalization are like ill-educated children who do not want to lose their ‘toys.’
I say this because a real prostitute – a woman who was coerced into it or entered because of the precarious conditions of extreme poverty, or because it’s the only way she knows how to survive after being deceived into believing the Pretty Woman fairy tale – knows that this is not a job.
What we want is the opportunity and the right to get up with dignity when we fall and not to eat the crumbs of the pigs! Prostitution is like a scar and a black mark that gets under your skin and never leaves you even after you leave prostitution.
Prostitution is the most ancient and ignored SLAVERY in the world.
Liliam Altuntas is a Brazilian woman, who now lives in Turin and works as a cake designer. She is a survivor of human trafficking and prostitution, and is an activist with Resistenza Femminista.
Bashie
I am a 56-year-old South African Indian who has been in the sex trade for 20 years. I was married for 33 years but I deceived my husband for 17 years while he worked away on construction in Africa.
My dad sexually abuses me
I-I can’t tell you…
I would tell if I could…
I can’t tell you…
Kate
I am 27 years old, and to this day I am still angry. Angry because I didn’t use my voice when I was a child.
I was sexually molested for a few years when I was young. My dad’s excuses were things like, Your mom’s not around. He made it about his needs.
I have very vivid memories from the days I lived in the PMQ and TRAILER we grew up in. I was three years old at the trailer for sure (I found a dated photo).
I was told by my mother that when I was a baby, he would tape my mouth shut with a pacifier in it. I remember the belt beatings all the way up to fifth grade. The slapping my mother around, the angry growl with his words, the freezer room that locks from the inside. The PJs I wore when he pulled my pants off…
Recently I came across some old photos from back in the 90s mostly and a lot of those pictures started to remind me of things I experienced. Like my father whipping out his penis when he took me and my sisters camping without my mom. Like when he would come into the room I shared with my sister and I had to listen to her cry and beg him to take Katie instead… Begging for her older sister to help daddy out instead….
Yeah.. Sad life of being the oldest. Or even just sitting on the couch watching porn with all of us or one of us. Take your pick really.
I have noticed his temper has changed and he’s a lot more laid back but, he’s still selfish, cares about his needs, won’t admit his wrongdoings, calls me names when I’m calling him out on his bull. He has a history of being a drinker and that hasn’t changed, he raped my mother when they were married (bum… She couldn’t sit for three weeks without pain).
He wouldn’t have a pension if we weren’t so terrified to actually speak up as kids. We would be threatened to get hurt or mom would get hurt more if we didn’t behave like he wants. I haven’t dealt with my trauma as a child but I am finally angry enough to say something. I shouldn’t be throwing pictures from my childhood and crying because something reminded me of my father defiling my younger sisters and me…
Share your story
If you’ve been in the sex trade, or have been affected by it in other less direct ways, and would like to share your story anonymously, please see our Share Your Story page.
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