Stonewall Riots
"Sex workers participated in nearly all of the iconic queer uprisings of the era. Indeed, they helped create the conditions that made such uprisings possible. In San Francisco, for instance, a group of street youth — largely trans and queer kids, many of whom sold sex in the Tenderloin — came together in 1966 to form a new organization called Vanguard. By publishing a revelatory newsletter, meeting with city officials and organizing actions, marches and speeches, members of Vanguard raised awareness about the conditions faced by those on the streets. As the historian Laura Renata Martin has noted, for “Vanguard, resistance to the criminalization of sex work and police targeting of sex workers was woven in with resistance to harassment based on gender expression and sexual identity.”
'The story of one June night in 1969 in Greenwich Village often doesn’t mention how the outlaws and outcasts who patronized the Stonewall Inn made their living,” the historian Melinda Chateauvert has commented. But many of the queers who threw bottles, bricks and garbage at the police that night were hustlers, hookers and other sex workers. Indeed, Marsha P. Johnson and Sylvia Rivera — two trans women of color who have both been credited with throwing the proverbial “first brick” at Stonewall and who are being honored for their activism with a new monument in New York City — had sold sex. The work was “the only alternative that we have to survive because the laws do not give us the right to go and get a job the way we feel comfortable,” Rivera once said. According to Johnson, it was possible for trans women to hold down “straight” jobs at this time, but only if they hid who they were: “I think it will be quite a while before a natural transvestite will be able to get a job,” she once said, using the parlance of the time. Yet, for some, sex work could also be a means of asserting one’s personhood. “[W]hen I go out to hustle I don’t particularly care whether I get a date or not,” Johnson remarked. “If they take me, they got to take me as I want ’em to take me." - Time
The Stonewall Riots by ISBN: 9781479858286Publication Date: 2019-05-07Published on the fiftieth anniversary of the moment the first brick (or shot glass?) was thrown, The Stonewall Riots allows readers to take stock of how LGBTQ life has changed in the US, and how it has stayed the same. It offers campy stories of queer resistance, courageous accounts of movements and protests, powerful narratives of police repression, and lesser-known stories otherwise buried in the historical record, from an account of ball culture in the mid-sixties to a letter by Black Panther Huey P. Newton addressed to his brothers and sisters in the resistance. For anyone committed to political activism and social justice, The Stonewall Riots provides a much-needed resource for renewal and empowerment.
Out in Time by ISBN: 9780190686604Publication Date: 2019-06-03Out in Time explores the life experiences of three generations of gay men --the Stonewall, AIDS, and Queer generations - arguing that while there are generational differences in the lived experiences of young gay men, each one confronts its own unique historical events, realities, and socio-political conditions, there are consistencies across time that define and unify the identity formation of gay men. Guided by the vast research literature on gay identity formation and coming out, the ideas and themes explored here are seen through the oral histories of a diverse set of fifteen gay men, five from each generation.Out in Time demonstrates how early life challenges define and shape the life courses of gay men, demarcating both the specific time-bound challenges encountered by each generation, and the universal challenges encountered by gay men coming of age across all generations and the conditions that define their lives.
Sex Workers Unite: a history of the movement from Stonewall to Slutwalk by ISBN: 9780807061398Publication Date: 2014A provocative history that reveals how sex workers have been at the vanguard of social justice movements for the past fifty years while building a movement of their own that challenges our ideas about labor, sexuality, feminism, and freedom Documenting five decades of sex-worker activism, Sex Workers Unite is a fresh history that places prostitutes, hustlers, escorts, call girls, strippers, and porn stars in the center of America's major civil rights struggles. Although their presence has largely been ignored and obscured, in this provocative history Melinda Chateauvert recasts sex workers as savvy political organizers--not as helpless victims in need of rescue. Even before transgender sex worker Sylvia Rivera threw a brick and sparked the Stonewall Riot in 1969, these trailblazing activists and allies challenged criminal sex laws and "whorephobia," and were active in struggles for gay liberation, women's rights, reproductive justice, union organizing, and prison abolition. Although the multibillion-dollar international sex industry thrives, the United States remains one of the few industrialized nations that continues to criminalize prostitution, and these discriminatory laws put workers at risk. In response, sex workers have organized to improve their working conditions and to challenge police and structural violence. Through individual confrontations and collective campaigns, they have pushed the boundaries of conventional organizing, called for decriminalization, and have reframed sex workers' rights as human rights. Telling stories of sex workers, from the frontlines of the 1970s sex wars to the modern-day streets of SlutWalk, Chateauvert illuminates an underrepresented movement, introducing skilled activists who have organized a global campaign for self-determination and sexual freedom that is as multifaceted as the sex industry and as diverse as human sexuality.
The Gay Liberation Movement by ISBN: 9781538381342Publication Date: 2018-12-30This book explains the emergence of the modern gay liberation movement, from its early years prior to the Stonewall riots of 1969 and its continuation into the 1970s. Readers will learn about the Stonewall riots, the Compton's cafeteria riot, the Gay Liberation Front, the Lavender Menace, and more. This book also discusses the contributions of important people such as Harvey Milk, Audre Lorde, and many others. The difficulties and legacies of that era will become clear to students who may know only the outline of the early history of the movement.
Playing the Whore by ISBN: 9781781683231Publication Date: 2014Recent years have seen a panic over "online red-light districts," which supposedly seduce vulnerable young women into a life of degradation, and New York Times columnist Nicholas Kristof's live tweeting of a Cambodian brothel raid. But rarely do these fearful, salacious dispatches come from sex workers themselves, and rarely do they deviate from the position that sex workers must be rescued from their condition, and the industry simply abolished -- a position common among feminists and conservatives alike. In Playing the Whore, journalist Melissa Gira Grant turns these pieties on their head, arguing for an overhaul in the way we think about sex work. Based on ten years of writing and reporting on the sex trade, and grounded in her experience as an organizer, advocate, and former sex worker, Playing the Whore dismantles pervasive myths about sex work, criticizes both conditions within the sex industry and its criminalization, and argues that separating sex work from the "legitimate" economy only harms those who perform sexual labor. In Playing the Whore, sex workers' demands, too long relegated to the margins, take center stage: sex work is work, and sex workers' rights are human rights.
Toronto Bathhouse Raids and Riots
"On 5 February 1981, patrons of four bathhouses in downtown Toronto (The Barracks, The Club, Richmond Street Health Emporium, and Roman II Health and Recreation Spa) were surprised by 200 police officers in a series of coordinated raids, called “Operation Soap.” Law enforcement officials claimed the raids resulted from six months of undercover work into alleged sex work and other “indecent acts” at each establishment. Bathhouse patrons were subjected to excessive behaviour by police, including verbal taunts about their sexuality. When the night was over, 286 men were charged for being found in a common bawdy house (a brothel), while 20 were charged for operating a bawdy house. It was, up to that time, the largest single arrest in Toronto’s history. Most of those arrested were found innocent of the charges. The raids marked a turning point for Toronto’s gay community, as the protests that followed indicated they would no longer endure derogatory treatment from the police, media and the public."
"Over one-quarter of homeless youths identify as LGBT, and many more live in poverty or face discrimination from employment, particularly if they are transgender. The lack of options due to the prejudices of society means that LGBT people are more likely to depend on sex work as a form of income, particularly trans people.
Arguments for the criminalization of the trade are quick to dismiss the basic fact that any laws against sex work would simply punish the most vulnerable further. It would not tackle the basic issues such as poverty and discrimination that LGBT people are at greater risk of experiencing. It certainly would not stop abuse and exploitation but would merely drive sex work underground and make it incredibly difficult for sex workers to access support if they were harmed during the course of their work." - Huffington Post
"Criminal law has perpetually trapped sex workers within dualities of criminality and victimization. Whereas the previous criminal offences concerning sex work framed sex workers in terms of nuisance and criminality, the passage of the Protection of Communities and Exploited Persons Act (PCEPA) in 2014 legally enshrined sex workers as victims, invalidating the labour of sex work in addition to the agency and consent of people who sell or trade sexual services." - HIV Legal Network
- Unknowable Bodies, Unthinkable Sexualities: Lesbian and Transgender Legal Invisibility in the Toronto Women's Bathhouse RaidDrawing from R. v Hornick (2002) a Canadian case involving the police raid of a women's bathhouse, this article explores how lesbian and transgender bodies and sexualities are actively rendered invisible via legal knowledge practices, norms and rationalities. It argues that limited knowledge and limited thinking not only regulate the borders of visibility and belonging, but play an active part in shaping identities, governing conduct and producing subjectivity.
Any Other Way: How Toronto Got Queer by 
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ISBN: 9781552453483Publication Date: 2017*also available as an ebook*
Toronto is home to multiple and thriving queer communities that reflect the dynamism of a global city. Any Other Way is an eclectic and richly illustrated local history that reveals how these individuals and community networks have transformed Toronto from a place of churches and conservative mores into a city that has consistently led the way in queer activism, not just in Canada but internationally. From the earliest pioneersto the parades, pride and politics of the contemporary era, Any Other Way draws on a range of voices to explore how the residents of queer Toronto have shaped and reshaped one of the world's most diverse cities. Any Other Way includes chapters on: Oscar Wilde's trip to Toronto; early cruising areas and gay/lesbian bars; queer shared houses; a pioneering collective trans archive project; bath house raids; LBGT-police conflicts; the Queen Street art/music/activist scene; and a profile of Jackie Shane, the gay R&B singer who performed in drag in both Toronto and Los Angeles, and gained international fame with his 1962 chart-topping single, 'Any Other Way.'
The State’s Key to the Bedroom Door”: Queer Perspectives on Pierre Elliot Trudeau’s “Just Society” in an Era of Bathhouse Raids: In No Place for the State by ISBN: 9780774862424Publication Date: 2020-07-15"There's no place for the state in the bedrooms of the nation," Pierre Elliott Trudeau told reporters. He was making the case for the most controversial of his proposed reforms to the Criminal Code, those concerning homosexuality, birth control, and abortion. In No Place for the State, contributors offer complex and often contrasting perspectives as they assess how the 1969 Omnibus Bill helped shape sexual and moral politics in Canada by examining the bill's origins, social implications, and repercussions. The new legal regime had significant consequences for matters like adoption, divorce, and suicide. After the bill passed, a great many Canadians continued to challenge how sexual behaviour was governed, demanding much more exhaustive changes to the law. Fifty years later, the origins and legacies of the bill are equivocal and the state still seems interested in the bedrooms of the nation. This incisive study explains why that matters.
Queerly Canadian: An Introductory Reader in Sexuality Studies by ISBN: 9780889616202Publication Date: 2022In the second edition of this remarkable and comprehensive anthology, many of Canada's leading sexuality studies scholars examine the fundamental role that sexuality has played--and continues to play--in the building of our nation, and in our national narratives, myths, and anxieties about Canadian identity. Covering both historical and contemporary perspectives on nation and community, law and criminal justice, organizing and activism, health and medicine, education, marriage and family, sport, and popular culture and representation, the essays also take a strong intersectional approach, integrating analyses of race, class, and gender. This interdisciplinary collection is essential for the Canadian sexuality studies classroom, and for anyone interested in the mythologies and realities of queer life in Canada.
Street Sex Work and Canadian Cities by - This link opens in a new window
ISBN: 9781772120059Publication Date: 2015Shawna Ferris gives a voice to sex workers who are often pushed to the background, even by those who fight for them. In the name of urban safety and orderliness, street sex workers face stigma, racism, and ignorance. Their human rights are ignored, and some even lose their lives. Ferris aims to reveal the cultural dimensions of this discrimination through literary and art-critical theory, legal and sociological research, and activist intervention. Canadian cities are striving for high safety ratings by eliminating crime, which includes "cleaning" urban areas of the street sex industry. Ironically, sex workers also want to live and work in a safe environment. Ferris questions these sanitizing political agendas, reviews exclusionary legislative and police initiatives, and examines media representations of sex workers. This book has much to offer to educators and activists, sex workers and anti-violence organizations, and academics studying women, cultural, gender, or indigenous issues.
Selling Sex: experience, advocacy, and research on sex work in Canada by ISBN: 9780774824484Publication Date: 2013Despite being dubbed "the world's oldest profession," prostitution has rarely been viewed as a legitimate form of labour. Instead, it is often criminalized, sensationalized, and polemicized. In Selling Sex, Emily van der Meulen, Elya M. Durisin, and Victoria Love present a more nuanced view of the sex industry. They bring together a vast collection of voices - including feminists, researchers, advocates, and sex workers of every stripe - to challenge dominant narratives surrounding sex work. Presenting a variety of perspectives on such diverse topics as social stigma, police violence, labour organizing, and human trafficking, Selling Sex is an eye-opening, challenging, and necessary book.
