Kara, a Canadian sex trafficking survivor, has asked us to share this open letter after discovering that some women’s organisations frame prostitution as “sex work” and suggest that women engage in it out of free choice.

To Women’s Organisations in Canada [and everywhere]

After giving a human trafficking presentation, the executive director of a woman’s organization in Nova Scotia made the following statement.

“I do not believe human trafficking can be lumped in with what we call ‘sex work’ because some women claim to be doing that work by their own choice.”

Nova Scotia has consistently ranked among the highest in Canadian provinces for police-reported trafficking cases. This context matters.

I was so disturbed by hearing her say this that I decided to write an open letter, not just to her but to all women’s organisations that defend the framing of prostitution as ‘sex work’. I want to be clear: many groups in Canada are abolitionist, survivor-centered, and work to end demand. They are not the target of this letter. 

Survivors know that the line between prostitution and trafficking is often blurred in ways many refuse to see.  

I speak from lived experience when I say that for many of us, there was no meaningful choice — only survival shaped by trauma, abuse, colonialism, vulnerability, and relentless demand for our bodies.

Night after night.

Like many, I was not kidnapped or held in chains. I was groomed. I was vulnerable long before I was ever purchased. From the outside, it may have looked like I had a choice. For a time, even I believed it. But prostitution strips that illusion away.

From the outside, you may see willingness. From the inside, it was coercion layered with circumstance.

Choice requires real alternatives.

Choice requires safety.

Choice requires the ability to say no without losing housing, food, protection, or stability.

When those are missing, what remains is survival.

There is no choice when a brothel owner takes your passport until you meet a quota.

There is no choice when a buyer grabs your hair and smashes your face into a hotel sink because the service you provided was not to his satisfaction.

There is no choice when addiction becomes the only way to numb the shame and pain of surviving what you endure.

Women in prostitution often dissociate to survive repeated sexual access by strangers. The violence becomes routine. PTSD, depression, addiction, and long-term psychological harm are common outcomes. We learn to leave our bodies because staying present is unbearable. Tell me — does your job require that?

Canadian advocates have long described prostitution as part of a broader system of sexual exploitation — sustained by male demand and normalized by women’s inequality. Many survivors across this country share that perspective. I encourage you to seek them out and listen.

When prostitution is framed as empowerment without centering exploitation, you do more than validate “choice.” You normalize purchase. You protect demand. And demand is the engine of trafficking.

If there were no buyers, there would be no market.  It’s that simple.  

Ending demand is not about punishing women. It is about shifting accountability to those who create and sustain the market. When demand decreases, exploitation decreases. Communities become safer. Vulnerable women and girls face fewer pathways into harm. Resources can focus on housing, healing, and long-term stability instead of managing ongoing cycles of exploitation.

When women’s organizations insist these systems are entirely separate because “some women choose it,” you risk erasing the very women feminism claims to protect. You create a narrative where unless a woman was physically restrained, her exploitation is reframed as empowerment.

I encourage organizations to reflect deeply on another troubling reality: When a government funded organization that claims to advocate for trafficking victims appears in court to support an individual charged with trafficking — rather than the victim harmed — what message does that send? To survivors, it does not feel like neutrality. It feels like abandonment.

If your organization’s work is truly about women’s safety, equality, and dignity, then support must begin with those who were exploited — not those who profited from that exploitation.

If this were simply empowering work freely chosen, why are so many women trying to leave? 

Why does exiting require years of trauma recovery, housing support, and rebuilding from the ground up?

Leaving prostitution is not like quitting a job. It is often closer to leaving an abusive relationship. It means untangling trauma bonds, violence, addiction, poverty, and systems built on demand.

If we normalize the purchase of women’s bodies, what are we teaching men about entitlement? What are we teaching our daughters about their value?

Would you be comfortable if a man paid to have sex with your daughter? 

Would you accept your husband purchasing another woman’s body because society framed it as acceptable?

If the answer is no, then we need to be honest about what we are defending.

To the boards, executive directors, policy advisors, and leaders of these women’s organizations:

You have influence. You shape funding priorities, public messaging, and political advocacy. With that influence comes responsibility.

Align your work with the full intent of the PCEPA-Protection of Communities and Exploited Persons Act [the Canadian Nordic Model law]. Focus your advocacy on reducing demand. Push for law enforcement that holds purchasers accountable. Invest in prevention strategies that target buyers. Expand meaningful exit services for those who want out.

Across this country, abolitionist organizations are already doing this work — providing housing, trauma-informed care, prevention programming, and exit support while also challenging the demand that fuels exploitation. It is possible to support women without normalizing the system that harms them.

Do not sidestep the uncomfortable truth that demand fuels exploitation. Confront it.

Be bold enough to challenge systems that profit from women’s vulnerability.

Be honest enough to acknowledge that normalizing purchase protects power, not equality.

Be courageous enough to stand with survivors whose experiences are overlooked by mainstream assumptions.

Ending demand is not extreme. It is prevention. It is public safety. It is protecting women and girls.

History will remember where institutions stood when survivors spoke.

For many of us, this was not work. There was no empowerment. There was exploitation. 

There was trauma. 

There was survival.

Survivors deserve more than tidy distinctions. We deserve truth.

And I will unapologetically stand with the women who were harmed — even when that truth makes institutions uncomfortable.