Structural Violence and Sex Work

I have been thinking about Shawna’s presentation from the Kindred House in terms of structural violence and how sex workers experience this brand of violence. I have narrowed the sex worker’s violence down to two main categories which inevitably have to overlap. The first is colonial and aboriginal violence and the second is misogynistic violence. Both of these violences are directly related to police brutality which is representative of large structures of systematic violence.

According to Shawna, the vast majority of clients at the Kindred House are indigenous women and that these women have a broken relationship with police claiming that they believe they are not protected and respected by the police. I read this violence to indigenous women as a type of unspoken colonial violence in that I think perceptions of these women as sex workers differ from that of their white settler counterparts, and that leads to different modes of interaction with these indigenous women from the police. I also think the lack of support these women receive from the authorities adds to reinforce pre-existing assumptions about indigenous women. There is also a type of colonial violence in this. 

The misogynistic violence I noted is obvious, but I believe it is important to point out. These sex workers are constantly shamed by the police for their trade and not then seriously when they approach the authorities with a case of sexual assault. This non-believing and shaming leads me to think about which bodies are deemed worthy and which bodies are deemed rapeable. By disbelieving and shaming the experiences of sex workers, structural violence is implying that women’s bodies, and in particular, indigenous women’s bodies are bodies that can be violated and assaulted. There is also a brand of trans-misogyny instrumentalized through the shaming and disbelieving of transwomen’s experiences in sex work. By breaking up safer locations like “tranny alley”, the safety of these women is hugely jeopardized. I approach this as an attack on not just cis-women, but all women identified folk. 

From what I understand from Shawna’s explanation of the conditions of sex workers there is a deeply rooted colonial, and misogynistic structural violence being done to these women that will take more than laws and legislation to remedy.