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THE STIGMATISATION OF SEX WORKERS
Nicole Fick

During the 16 days of activism campaign to end violence against women
and children, some thought needs to be given to adult sex workers,  
who experience violence on a number of levels: from police, agency  
bosses, clients and on a domestic level like other women. Sex workers
are isolated and stigmatised and this prevents them from being able  
to access the protection services of the police. It also means that  
law enforcement agencies often discriminate against sex workers,  
denying them assistance when they experience violence and crime.

Stigma can be defined as a brand, a mark of shame or a stain on one’s
character. Social stigmatisation of an act entails severe disapproval
from society for behaviour that is considered to be outside the  
bounds of social norms.

The normative message that society has traditionally given to women  
is that sex is only acceptable within marriage or at least within a  
significant relationship. [1] This message can be understood as part  
of society’s attempt to keep women’s sexuality controlled within the  
bounds of marriage. Sexual relationships that do not occur within  
marriage, or at least within a committed relationship, are seen as  
deviating from this social norm. The further a relationship is from  
the norm-setting nuclear family the more likely it is to be  
categorised as “abnormal”.

Thus, for example, unmarried heterosexual couples are still close  
enough to this norm to be considered nominally acceptable, while  
homosexual relationships fall further outside of the norm and are  
thus often seen as “suspect”. Sex with a stranger, as part of an  
economic transaction, is as far away from the norm as you can get.[2]

Selling sex is thus seen as “abnormal” and therefore morally wrong  
and sex workers as a group are stigmatised.[3] It is significant,  
however, that the resultant “whore” stigma does not only apply to sex
workers and is often attached to any woman that is sexually assertive
or seen as impure or unchaste.[4] Gail Pheterson speaks of the  
“whore” stigma as a stigma that aims to silence and degrade those  
that it targets, emphasising their “shameful differentness”.

This stigma also prevents women from “freely exploring, experiencing  
and naming their own sexuality for fear of being called a whore”.[5]  
The sex workers in this study spoke of their “shameful differentness”
and of their own experience of feeling stigmatised.

“I don’t think anyone is born a prostitute, so I think at any given  
time, doesn’t matter whether she has been brought up ill treated or  
abused or whatever, she never actually has that image in her mind of  
her doing that you know... because society condemns it... you still  
look in the mirror and you still know that you are inevitably you are
still selling your body for money... so you have got inner conflict  
already you know trying to lift your spirit and not breaking yourself
down.”

“I know that people believe - that there’s that perception out there  
- that prostitutes are filthy.”

For one participant one of the main things that she finds difficult  
about her work is coming to understand what she does and justifying  
it to herself. Another participant spoke of her feelings of guilt  
after having been with a client and how it makes one question one’s  
worth as a person:

“You have all got a conscience and conscience means that you will,  
that after you have been with a client you obviously will feel dirty.
You feel like am I worth this or whatever? Especially, especially  
when how the clients, some of the clients do treat you ..... You will
finish a booking, sometimes when you have finished a booking you just
have to get out.”

At the same time, one of the participants speaks articulately about  
how being involved in sex work allowed her to think more critically  
about this kind of stigma and how she has started to explore her own  
sexuality:

“I’ve come to terms with my own sexuality, I think. I’ve definitely  
sort of realised that it is just, well in my opinion, a physical act  
of pleasure. It’s OK for a woman to actually enjoy sex. There I’ve  
grown in leaps and bounds, but just coming from ... a conservative  
upbringing, you know as a woman you are brought up not to sleep  
around. And then you’re a slut and a whore and so on...”

Consequences of stigma
The way in which the participants quoted above speak about themselves
illustrates how stigma can sometimes become internalised. Often the  
perceptions that others have of us can become the perceptions that we
have of ourselves. Resisting the internalisation of these derogatory  
perceptions is difficult and it can be easier just to accept these  
insulting labels than to challenge them.[6]

Persons engaged in sex work are often blamed for social problems or  
perceived as victims.[7] Some of the myths and stereotypes that exist
about sex workers are that they are dirty and spread disease, that  
they all come from dysfunctional families, that they all abuse drugs  
and alcohol, that sex work is always associated with or the cause of  
other crimes, or that sex workers are women that need a sexual outlet.

Participants in the study use some of these stereotypes to describe  
themselves when they talk about themselves as “dirty”, or when they  
make the assumption that sex workers come from families where they  
are ill treated and sexually abused. They also expressed their  
awareness of the condemnation of society, as well as their own  
feelings of guilt and self blame for doing the work they do:

“I think it’s sort of coming to understand or justifying what you do.
And then sort of coming to terms with it. And forgiving yourself or  
you can sugarcoat it any which way you like, and justify it as much  
as you can, but it still is what it is, you know.”

“... many a times we feel down and... we feel broken because of the  
type of business we’re in...” “They just, we all just feel that we  
are not, we are not good enough, you know, and that makes you just  
let yourself go. I know I’ve let myself go... I just felt I wasn’t  
worthy of anybody...”

Participants in the study also spoke about experiencing feelings of  
guilt and self-judgment, particularly when they had just started  
doing sex work. A number of researchers describe this internalised  
stigma as one of the worst dangers that people engaged in sex work  
face and they assert that it is mainly stigma that causes  
psychological distress for sex workers.[8] One participant describes  
this experience as follows:

“What I really find difficult is the stigma, the stigma that gets  
attached to you, by society. They don’t understand why, and people...
That’s the thing that I find the worst is the stigma of the work.”

Some of the psychological consequences of internalised stigma are  
difficulties with self-esteem, feelings of shame, despair and  
powerlessness.[9] A participant in the study spoke of people she  
works with who become depressed as a result of the stigma attached to
the work and who then use drugs as a means of escape:

“Yes there is, self esteem, just because you’re in the industry, you  
don’t, yes this is probably the last thing that a lot of people will  
consider doing, okay... As we feel dirty when we have been with a  
client, some of my colleagues, or ex colleagues that actually went  
into a depression. Like in the sense of, this is not really for me  
and, and their way is also to cut it off, doing like abuse in order  
for you to escape from what you are doing...”

Research has shown that one of the main strategies employed by sex  
workers to cope with stigma is distancing. One of the distancing  
techniques used by some sex workers is to avoid referring to what  
they do directly, referring to it as “working” and never directly  
mentioning the sexual aspect of their work.[10]

This has also been our experience, with some sex workers preferring  
to speak of themselves as “working girls” rather than “sex workers”,  
thereby distancing themselves from the sexual nature of the work they
do in the way that they speak about the work.

Most of the women we work with also use a pseudonym as their working  
name. Taking on a different name when working is another distancing  
strategy that allows sex workers to separate their identity when  
working from their private selves. A sex worker interviewed in  
Campbell’s study explains it in this way:

“My street name is not the name I take home with me. At home I am  
just an ordinary person like my name is...” [11]

Participants in this research also spoke of keeping their work  
identity and their home identity separate from each other.

“Ek is nie ‘n hoer nie. Hierbinne doen ek my werk. As ek buitekant  
toe gaan, is ek ‘n hele ‘different’ tipe mens. Ek vat nie eers ‘n man
se nommer buite nie...”

[I am not a ‘whore’. I do my work here inside this place. When I go  
outside, I am a totally different person. I don’t even take a man’s  
number outside this place...]

When people are stigmatised for doing something, it is natural for  
them to attempt to hide the activity or the attribute for which they  
are being stigmatised and to attempt to pass as “normal”.[12] But  
hiding is not always effective as a strategy to cope with stigma.  
Passing for “normal” requires constant alertness to ensure that you  
don’t expose yourself and so can create additional anxiety and  
isolation. Although our experience at SWEAT shows that some sex  
workers are open about the work they do, many hide the nature of  
their work. Eleven of the seventeen participants in this research  
spoke about the difficulty of keeping the work they do a secret from  
family and friends as well as more generally in their everyday  
interactions. A participant in the study indicated that hiding the  
work she does is important to protect her children, who are still at  
school, from stigma.

“No one knows I do this work. First of all, it’s like, when I leave  
this house, it’s like I’ve got my own life outside.”

“Nobody knows in the community that I am doing this kind of a job...”

“Difficulties in my personal life, is basically the fact that we have
to lie about this. And people do start asking questions. It gets a  
bit tough...”

“No. We don’t actually describe this work to people. You lie.”

“And some people say, what type of work do you do and then you feel a
little afraid to say, no, I’m a sex worker and then you just say, I  
work under (name of an organisation)... Do you understand? And  
because you don’t want to have people looking down on you...”

Participants also spoke of their constant worry and anxiety that  
someone they know will find out about the work that they do:

“... hoping that your parents doesn’t find out, friends doesn’t find  
out, that kind of thing, you know.”

“Other things worrying me, is basically people coming in here that  
may know me or my family. Probably one of the main things...”

“So you’re always lying and making up excuses... ‘Where you going?’  
‘I’m going to work.’ ...especially with your friends as well, when  
they wanna drop you off at work. Now you have to let them drop you at
the hotel. And then you have to walk, always check, not actually  
running yet. Hoping no one’s gonna see you.”

This was confirmed by participants in the study who spoke of their  
fear that a member of their family would drive past while they were  
standing in the road, working. Those working at agencies said that  
they worried about their boyfriend walking in at the agency where  
they work. This constant need for subterfuge can have an isolating  
effect on sex workers.

One participant indicated that she purposefully doesn’t initiate  
contact with people in order to avoid having to constantly lie or to  
deceive them about what she does.

“You don’t allow someone in your life. I cut most of my friends, most
of my family. And of course it’s not something ... You can’t explain  
where you’re going, you can’t make friends when you’re in this  
business. There’s always lying, deceiving. And I don’t like that,  
that you can’t. So while you’re in this business you’re actually very
cut off from the world and people. You don’t really actually make  
friends or allow people, as you would if you weren’t in the business.
I love making friends, but you just don’t. You actually reflect being
a bad friend or, but you’re not really, you just don’t know how to  
tell them, or you don’t want to tell them, or you think they won’t be
able to handle it, so you don’t go there. You just avoid friendships  
at all costs.”

Participants spoke of the kinds of stresses that the hidden nature of
their work also places on their personal relationships. Two  
participants spoke about difficulties with trust in their personal  
relationships:

“Yes. I guess because we’ve both been in the industry, and we know  
the emotional stress that it leaves behind, in the personal  
relationships, it kind of messes you around. Trusting-wise. That kind
of thing.” “You struggle trusting men... As you should. Alsostanding  
behind the door as well you know... if you understand what I mean.  
You’re doing something that you don’t actually want other people to  
know. Therefore they can’t trust you 100% and therefore you won’t  
trust them 100% because you are deceiving them in the first place.”

Difficulties were also experienced by participants in hiding what  
they do from their intimate partner although, as one participant  
says, it is a difficult situation to cope with, whether your partner  
knows about the work you do or not:

“I think that every girl that works in this industry that has either  
families that know about it or has a partner, and if the partner  
knows about it, it makes it even worse. I think it makes it difficult
if the partner doesn’t know about it. Because then you sort of,  
you’ve got to watch what you do, your times, you know the whole  
story. And I’ve got such empathy for them. I can imagine it’s like  
not easy at all. And if you have a partner that knows about it,  
there’s always, always little fights and tiffs and things like that.”

Sometimes hiding the work they do makes it very complicated for sex  
workers to manage their personal and social lives. For one  
participant this means planning her social life in order to keep the  
people in her life who know of the work she does completely separate  
from those who do not know:

“I don’t have any friends of the past that have stayed in my life  
that I’ve kept this from... Friends that don’t know are the friends  
that I’ve met while I’m in the industry. And that gets a bit tricky  
because then you have to start lying about what you do, your working  
hours, where you’re working, what do you do, that kind of stuff. So  
that’s a bit tricky. ... Try not to intermingle the friends because  
then everybody’s got to be on their toes and nobody really, everybody
likes to relax. Say if I go out and have a braai or something I’ll  
only invite the friends that know, what each other do cause it’s ...  
more relaxed.”

Managing a life where you hide the work you do is not only stressful,
but it also makes it more difficult to use normal sources of social  
support like family or friends if you have a problem or something  
that you need to talk about.[13] A participant in this study spoke of
not being able to share even day-to-day difficulties with family or  
friends:

“In sex work even the girls downstairs in the street, some of them  
don’t have some people to speak to... Because obviously their family  
doesn’t know what they’re doing, and you can’t actually go and speak  
to your mother regarding what happened at work, as if you’ve got sort
of a normal job... So you can’t go to your mother, oh this happened  
on the streets today. I’m sure she will chuck you out of your, out of
the house.”

• This is an extract from a report by Nicole Fick of the Sex Worker  
Education and Advocacy Taskforce entitled “Coping with stigma,  
discrimination and violence: Sex Workers talk about their  
experiences”. The full report is available on www.sweat.org.za

• Please send comments to editor@pambazuka.org or comment online at  
www.pambazuka.org

References
[1] Goffman, 1968; Pheterson, 1998)
[2] Augustin, 2001
[3] Alexander, 1998
[4] Pheterson, 1998
[5] Alexander, 1998: 184
[6] Erikson, Butters, McGillcuddy & Halgren, 2000
[7] Erikson et al, 2000; Pheterson, 1998
[8] Erikson et al, 2000; Vanwesenbeeck, 2001; Benoit & Millar, 2001
[9] Goffman, 1968; Moane, 2003
[10] Campbell, 2000
[11] Campbell, 2000
[12] Goffman, 1968
[13] El Bassel cited in Vanwesenbeeck, 2001