Green River LibGuides: The US Carceral System & Injustice: Street-Based Sex Work &amp; Incarceration

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Street-based sex work

Sex workers aren’t always a part of the conversation about police brutality, but they should be. Police regularly target, harass, and assault sex workers or people they think are sex workers, such as trans women of color. The police usually get away with the abuse because sex workers fear being arrested if they report. If we lived in a world that didn’t criminalize sex work, sex workers could better protect themselves and seek justice when they are harmed.

--From "Sex Work Is Real Work, and It's Time to Treat It That Way"
(linked & cited below)

Associations between Sex Work Laws and Sex Workers’ Health: A Systematic Review and Meta-Analysis of Quantitative and Qualitative Studies
A 2018 article from PLoS Medicine.
The Development of the Police Practices Scale: Understanding Policing Approaches Towards Street-Based Female Sex Workers in a U.S. City
A 2020 article from PLoS One.
Exposure to Police and Client Violence Among Incarcerated Female Sex Workers in Baltimore City, Maryland
A 2020 scholarly article from the American Journal of Public Health
Homelessness among a Cohort of Women in Street-Based Sex Work: the Need for Safer Environment Interventions
a 2011 article from BMC Public Health
The Impact of Criminalisation on Sex Workers’ Vulnerability to HIV and Violence
A brief from the Global Network of Sex Work Projects
Is Child to Adult as Victim is to Criminal?: Social Policy and Street-Based Sex Work in the USA
A 2012 article from Sexuality Research & Social Policy
A National Overview of Prostitution and Sex Trafficking Demand Reduction Efforts
A 2012 report, prepared for by the National Institute of Justice
Revolving Door: An Analysis of Street-Based Prostitution in New York City
A 2003 report from the Sex Workers Project at the Urban Justice Center
Sex Work is Real Work, and it's Time to Treat it That Way
A 2020 article from ACLU
Structural vulnerabilities and HIV risk among sexual minority female sex workers (SM-FSW) by identity and behavior in Baltimore, MD.
A 2020 article from Harm Reduction Journal.
SWOP Behind Bars
"SWOP Behind Bars uses a harm reduction framework to offer various resources, community-building projects, educational programs, and advocacy to end violence and stigma against sex workers in the criminal justice system."
The War on Sex Workers
A 2013 article from Reason.
You Catch More Flies With Honey: Sex Work, Violence, and Masculinity on the Streets
A 2016 article from Sociological Forum.

Source Citation: Holston-Zannell, LaLa B. "Sex Work is Real Work, and it's Time to Treat it That Way." American Civil Liberties Union, 10 June 2020, www.aclu.org/news/lgbt-rights/ sex-work-is-real-work-and-its-time-to-treat-it-that-way/.

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