Sunday Candy + Fruit for Thought: A Whore-Identified Woman (Patreon Crosspost)
I am a poor Black cis bisexual erotic laborer and woman. The order of these is important, as each of the previous identities modifies the next. I have sometimes identified myself as a “survival sex worker” though recently I have begun to denounce that term because of its classist implications. I am not a feminist, though I briefly identified myself as such. I am a womanist. A proheaux womanist to be more specific. I am not a “dabbler,” a word which means “to play at, to be an amateur, to amuse oneself with.” And so in writing this I am not only mounting a defense of myself as a whore-identified woman but of others who would have their politics and labor quantified and qualified by internet baby feminists whose politics rely on the choice/coercion binary and have little substance. And although these are merely words, and we define the words, these distinctions are critical to my analysis of the thing. Though many Black women have performed erotic labor in one way or another whether for direct financial/economic reasons or as a simple trade for love, housing, drugs, and/or affection, sex work (politics) remains niche in feminism and the broader world alike, a single-issue. I will be approaching this topic with the common terms used and I will try to define anything that I feel is unclear, but if you have any questions on terminology please do not hesitate to comment and ask.
Carol Leigh began her journey as a feminist, in feminist lesbian circles, and said she had yet another revelation as she began to work and identify as a prostitute, and wrote about what that meant for her feminism. She was a student and eventually a poet, actress, and a host of other wonderful things. One of her inventions was coining the term “sex work” to be used to describe our profession, to center what we now call “full-service sex workers” and to connect feminists and prostitutes. In her collection, she highlights all manner of prostitutes — many of whom are part-timers, who moonlight as prostitutes after or around their legitimate day labor or entrepreneurial pursuits. Many creatives and activists have moonlit as prostitutes and strippers, including Maya Angelou and Malcolm X. And yet, because I have gained some modicum of notoriety on the internet via my amassment of a large following of my words, I am being stripped of my identity in order to be condemned. Here it how it goes: we begin as a large group. We separate into kingdoms, dividing like cells, combining certain politics with those of others we have learned. We then divide again, into smaller groups… phylum class order family genus species. Poor Black cis bisexual sex worker woman. We reduce.
This is the crux of the thing. There are some of us who are able to sell our erotic services and make it a full-time gig. There are some of us who engage in various areas of informal labor in order to make ends meet. For poor and working-class women this might mean cobbling together an income from at least 3 sources. In (online) sex work politics there is a reduction happening wherein we attempt to classify one by the amount of perceived social capital they happen to acquire. Social capital=currency on social media to a lot of people, but does not often put money in one’s pockets, no matter how many cash link posts one makes. Although we have discussed Black women’s hypervisibility many times, we regard those Black women who have gained some form of popularity or notoriety as “powerful.” We approach them as if they represent us, in the same way we say “you need to behave and act less niggerish because otherwise, all white/nonblack people will see all Black people this way.” And though these same people calling me a “dabbler” claim that I do not represent them (Black erotic laborers) as a whole, they behave as if I do. This is a symptom of internalized anti-blackness and misogynoir, a denial of the effects of racial capitalism on my life and labors, a result of them assigning me a power that I do not actually have.
Now the approach and what it has to do with choice. We see a subtle reinforcement of class and the choice/coercion binary. For how does one who previously identified as a “survival sex worker,” who has remained poor, suddenly become a part of a power matrix that “speaks over” (and therefore subjugates) other Black erotic laborers with impunity? They see harassment and hypervisibility as a social reward when it has brought me nothing but misery, a nonprofit board position, and a few panel gigs and unpaid academic citations. Stripping me of my class identifier means identifying me as an oppressor: “thotscholar is actually a dabbler (not a real whore) and I have receipts” implies that only that which I post to social media sites is considered valid — my offline work, my years of experience as a stripper and prostitute, my inability to pay for commercial ads for my erotic services, my failure to find “gainful” employment as a stripper or day laborer, my anti-work sentiment (let the girls on Lipstick Alley know that this is a socialist philosophy), and my stint as a camgirl are rendered invalid. All that I am is my curated social media profiles and a few DMs shared without consent. My choice to focus on my writing, the thing that is currently making me money, and my following gained from this, suddenly renders my experiences and intersections void.
This is why I am wary of how we utilize the phrase “sex work is work.” Are we saying sex work is valid (yes) or are we trying to create an aura of “professionalism?” Do we need to professionalize erotic labor in order for it to be legitimized? How will that play out if, like certain white/advantaged sex workers discussed, we require (paid) licensing and regulations for sex workers? Who will determine the regulations/requirements after we accomplish decriminalization and what will that mean in the context of white supremacy and classism? When we are out here calling “survival sex workers” dabblers, more committed to dividing into sectors and somehow claiming that a poor Black stripper has any advantage other than current legality over a white escort, or claiming that presenting oneself as a “legitimate” escort online is what makes one a full-service sex worker and not, as one Twitter user so kindly put it — a dabbler — what are we saying about intersectionality? What are we doing when we engage in these kinds of additive analyses? Are we fighting together for social and political power and a radical rehaul of body/erotic/reproductive politics as it pertains to the multiply marginalized? Or are we fighting for power over one another?
Although the phrase clearly states “if you big enough to hit, you big enough to get hit back,” because I have a large following I become the big Black woman aggressor no matter what defense I mount. I am no longer a fallible human being, I am an entity with acolytes and “beliefs” to be destroyed.
There is room for all of us, but apparently not really.
Don’t forget to clap and support me on Patreon: patreon.com/thotscholar
