Craigslist bows to states' pressure, axes "Erotic Services"

This week Craigslist announced that, pursuant to a deal with several state attorneys general, it will be eliminating its "Erotic Services" section. The news media have framed the pressure on Craigslist as a response to recent crimes against people who used the site. Connecticut Attorney General Richard Blumenthal, who spearheaded the effort, has pitched his campaign alternately as aimed at preventing trafficking and child exploitation, and as a plain morals campaign against "pornography, nudity, and open offers of sex for money." Craigslist initially vowed to require posters on Erotic Services to enter credit card information, but the state officials wouldn't settle for that, so the site is no replacing the section with a new "Adult" section, in which each post will be pre-screened by Craigslist employees.

A coalition of organizations advocating for sex workers released this statement:

With Craigslist’s recent announcement that its Erotic Services category will be discontinued within the week, hundreds of thousands of erotic service providers will become more vulnerable to dangerous predators. Eliminating erotic listings as Connecticut Attorney General Richard Blumenthal and others propose will only drive us further underground.

Policing the masseuses, phone workers, pro-dominants, and escorts using Craigslist fails to protect those of us who are coerced into the sex industry. Preventing the use of Craigslist advertisements also eliminates the advantage of screening clients online, which makes for a safer work experience by filtering out potentially dangerous individuals. Furthermore, keeping us offline hinders police investigations of violent crime. In the Boston murder of Julissa Brisman, it was online tracking that enabled the police to identify the suspect. One has to wonder: are the Attorneys General examining the evidence or simply enforcing their moral values?

“Removing the erotic services category from Craigslist does not help prevent violence against escorts and other sex workers. It only pushes me and people like me out of the places where advertising is available,” said Jessica Bloom, a sex worker from Sex Workers Action New York (SWANK). In the face of increasing criminalization, we insist upon respect. As mothers, daughters, brothers, and members of your community, we claim that sex work is real work, work that we are entitled to conduct in safety. As such, we must be accorded the human right of full protection under the law.

Sex work activist Miss Calico has this to say about the move:

It’s true that Craigslist is a major advertising venue, for prostitutes but also sex workers of all kinds: the largest in the nation. Its loss will have a distinct effect on the people who use it. Here’s how it works: we advertise to attract the clients we want, and screen to eliminate the clients we don’t, but the number of clients we need stays the same. Anything that hurts our methods of attracting clients, like the shutdown of Erotic Services, will affect how stringent our screening can afford to be. It’s pretty clear to me that Craigslist has just made its sex workers more marginalized and more at risk.

Now, Craigslist has no responsibility to provide an advertising venue. But if Attorney General Richard Blumenthal is trying to make sex workers safer, he’s going about it all wrong. He doesn’t need to protect us from ourselves, or from our clients. He needs to protect us from criminals.

At the Sex 2.0 conference this past weekend, Melissa Gira analogized the panic over Craigslist to New York City's "cleanup" of Times Square. Both spaces came to represent the threat of sexual corruption encroaching on "normal," "decent" places. Targeting these spaces allowed politicians to simultaneously appear to be both protecting moral purity and addressing real social problems of crime, etc., without really addressing those problems at all. As Miss Calico points out, sex work isn't going away, and the short term effects of driving online sex work advertising "underground" -- at least until some other site replicates the efficiency, anonymity and ubiquity of Craigslist -- could be harmful both for sex workers and for law enforcement.

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As a side note, none of the news reports or press releases indicate what kind of legal claims the state governments might have had against Craigslist. I've previously mentioned the question of federal immunity under Section 230 of the Communications Decency Act with regard to a still-pending public-nuisance suit targeting "Erotic Services." The Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals recently held, in an egegrious case of revenge porn, that Yahoo! might have lost its 230 immunity only because its staff specifically promised the plaintiff to take the offending material down.

UPDATE: Here's some further analysis of Craigslist's likely legal defense under CDA from the Electronic Frontier Foundation. (More, too, from the Citizens Media Law Project which notes the site's previous efforts to ensure Erotic Services isn't use to exploit children.) Of course, settlements like this are based not only on likelihood of success but on business decisions about public relations and litigation costs. They have previously won litigation over discriminatory preferences in their housing ads, but that doesn't mean they're eager to go through the process again. Ditching Erotic Services was clearly more desirable for Craigslist than fighting several state governments in court and in the media.

Sex 2.0 and "I Am a Sex Worker" PSA

I attended the Sex 2.0 conference in Silver Spring, MD this past weekend, and it was an absolute blast. It was great to meet bloggers and activists I admire (like Elizabeth Wood), catch up with my college classmate and former sex-educator colleague Maria Diaz, see a lot of other familiar faces, and share in discussions of the Internet, social media, sex blogging, erotica, sex work, and sexual freedom activism. One of the many cool things I was turned on to was CARAS, an organization of academics that supports and promotes community-based research on alternative sexualities. Another was this awesome PSA from Sex Work Awareness:

Roundup

This week in Washington:
- Obama reverses Bush's ban on federal funding for embryonic stem cell research
- A provision of the just-passed budget bill will help make contraception more affordable for many
- Today the White House launches a Women & Girls' Council, which hopefully will be more than symbolic

In Saudi Arabia, a 75-year-old widow has been sentenced to four months in prison, forty lashes, and deportation for having two unrelated men in her home. The two men -- one of whom is her deceased husband's nephew, and both of whom have also been sentenced -- were apparently bringing her some bread. Her lawyer plans to appeal. More at Religion Clause.

On a much less weighty note, a law professor at the University of Montana complains that the student newspaper's sex advice column "affects my reputation as a member of the faculty" -- no, really --and has suggested the state legislature should tighten restrictions on student publishing. According to the paper in question, the prof complained that legislators should set "criteria for giving someone a job as a columnist writing in an area of 'alleged expertise' or for reviewing objectionable material." Being a law prof, she's come up with proposed restrictions that just pass the First Amendment red-face test, but something tells me this isn't going anywhere. Are authors in student papers really expected to be experts? And what standards should the legislature set to qualify as a sex columnist?

Finally, Cook County, Ill. Sheriff Tom Dart is suing Craigslist, claiming its "erotic services" ads are a public nuisance. Sex worker rights advocates have, naturally, criticized the suit, which probably amounts to little more than a publicity stunt. Craigslist says it's "mystified" by the suit, pointing to its cooperation with law enforcement in Illinois and elsewhere to minimize use of the site to violate the law. One Internet law expert has opined that the lawsuit can't stand, because under federal law Craigslist can't be held liable for users who seek to violate the law unless it actively helps them do so. (Said lawyer also wonders whether there are actually many "erotic services" posts on Craigslist that are only advertising legal services, but a quick search of the many postings specifying "no sex" suggests that yes, there are; most of them are for pro-Dommes.)

NYPD targeting gay men, pro Dommes

New York City police are being accused of targeting gay men for false and/or entrapment-based arrests for prostitution/solicitation in the city's sex shops. From The Advocate:

The Gay City News reports that at least 27 men were arrested for prostitution in eight porn shops in Manhattan in 2008. Since 2004 there have been 52 such arrests in eight difference businesses.

According to a statement by [Coalition to Stop the Arrests], the arrest is usually set up so that an attractive younger officer is sent out to approach middle-aged gay men. The officer allegedly entices the man to have sex. If the man agrees, the undercover officer says he wanted to pay the man for sexual favors, and then, before the man can accept or reject the transaction, he is surrounded by police to make an arrest.

Simultaneously, the city is being criticized for targeting the lawful work of professional dominatrices, twisting the prostitution laws to apply to non-sexually-explicit conduct. The only judicial decision on the subject, from 1994, held that NYC's prostitution law doesn't cover BDSM activities that don't involve actual genital contact. Yet in a recent meeting with reps from the National Coalition for Sexual Freedom, a prosecutor said that the city interprets the law expansively, based not on a limited set of acts but on "what is arousing to the participants." So, if spanking turns you on, paying someone to spank youis prostitution. This is questionable as a matter of the definition of "sexual conduct," not to mention policy and constitutional concerns. NCSF is currently planning a campaign to protest this policy.

I'm guessing from all this that NYC has finally run out of real crime to fight. Or maybe Bloomberg is hoping to follow in the footsteps of his predecessor and try to spin a reputation as The Man Who Ran Sex Out of NYC into a losing, but highly entertaining, presidential bid.

Protecting our children

Via Feministe: despite promises from Democrats, the proposed Omnibus Appropriations Act retains most funding for ineffective abstinence-only education. Click here to tell Congress to stop funding this nonsense.

Meanwhile: Waking Vixen asks why, when minors involved in prostitution are apparently being treated more leniently than adults, minors who produce their own amateur pornography are treated more hashly than adults. It seems the same concerns would apply to both situations involving possible coercion, later effects of the fact of involvement on the minor's life, and the possibility of feeding a market that promotes abuse of minors generally are applicable in both contexts.

WV's post is prompted bythe FBI's recent arrests in various cities of a large number of adult sex workers and their clients, which is being touted by the FBI as part of a campaign against child prostitution.

Time for a new approach to human trafficking

Melissa Ditmore and Andrea Ritchie of the Urban Justice Center's Sex Workers Project have a great new post up at RH Reality Check. The post is based on the Project's new report: "Kicking Down the Door: The Use of Raids to Fight To Fight Trafficking in Persons":

We found that while there have been some successes, raids are generally an ineffective anti-trafficking tool, and in many cases are harmful to people who have been trafficked. Trafficked women reported that they were repeatedly arrested, in some cases up to ten times, in police raids on brothels and other sex work venues, without ever being identified as trafficked. ...

The Obama administration has the opportunity to reassess this failed federal approach to human trafficking. The recent passage of federal anti-trafficking legislation championed by Vice President Joe Biden offers a fresh start - and a chance to avoid repeating the mistakes of the past.

A good first step would be to move away from high-profile, resource-intensive and largely ineffective raids and to address the economic and social circumstances that increase vulnerability to trafficking....Expansion and targeted enforcement of labor laws in [sectors where trafficking flourishes] would not only go a long way toward locating, identifying and assisting trafficked persons, it would also protect the rights of all workers.

For the long term, strategies led by individuals and communities with knowledge of and access to trafficked people are far more likely than raids to meet with success....

Trafficking victims by definition have sought opportunity in the United States only to find themselves in coercive and abusive situations. We owe it to them to find better ways to locate, identify and assist them, and to develop anti-trafficking initiatives that prioritize their needs, choices, and self-determination as human beings. A good way to start would be to extend a helping hand that is not also holding a gun.

As I've noted in this blog before, the Sex Workers Project is doing some truly outstanding advocacy.

Another step the Obama administration could take would be to re-examine the equation of prostitution with trafficking under various provisions of federal law, including in restrictions on international aid. Some of these policies make providing life-saving services to sex workers more difficult, and distract from the serious problem of human trafficking.

Miscellaneous updates

The Pittsburgh Post-Gazette reports on the upcoming trial in U.S. v. Extreme Associates, with the headline: "Obscenity case begs question: Whose standard? Extreme Associates trial may be catalyst for change." (H/t How Appealing.)

Womanist Musings discusses the invisibility of Black LGBT people and looks at some relevant data. Notably, the post points to one survey showing that among Black LGBT folks, relationship recognition ranks third as a movement priority, after tackling HIV/AIDS and hate violence. (H/t Feministing.)

hunter of justice decries the lack of any openly LGBT federal judges at the appellate level, and reports on a gay British judge's revelation that he was subjected to veritable witch hunt when he first sought appointment in 1994.

Greta Christina asks why, under the First Amendment, we treat sex differently from, well, everything else.

Sex in the Public Square notes that Sweden's National Board of Health & Welfare has eliminated the classification of gender variance, BDSM and sexual fetishes and psychological disorders. Sweden is also set to allow same-sex couples to marry come Spring. So I'll forgive the Swedes, for the moment, their flawed approach to reforming prostitution laws.

More links from Int'l Day to End Violence Against Sex Workers

Crackdowns on Sex Work Make Things Worse

You Think You Don't Know Us, But You Do

International Day to End Violence Against Sex Workers

Yesterday was the International Day to End Violence Against Sex Workers, an annual event involving grassroots vigils, marches and other events in North America, Europe, Australia and Hong Kong. As part of the December 17 activities, I joined the first National March for Sex Workers Rights. It was a modest affair, but one that brought new visibility to the (inextricably intertwined) causes of ending violence against sex workers and decriminalizing prostitution. You can see my coat and my right hand in a photo in the Washington Post's coverage, holding a banner that reads "OUTLAW POVERTY NOT PROSTITUTION."


In addition to marching through the streets and in front of the Department of Justice, the marchers delivered a letter to President-Elect Obama, calling for actions to stem violence against sex workers, and especially for involving sex workers themselves in policymaking.

Much more media coverage and video from the DC march is at Bound, Not Gagged - the blog of the Desiree Alliance.

More on December 17 and sex worker rights from around the blogosphere:

Stopping the Terror: A Day To End Violence Against Prostitutes

Audacia Ray's Speech from the NYC Vigil

Remembering violence against sex workers

International Day to End Violence Against Sex Workers in the United Kingdom

In this spirit, I urge readers to contribute to the Sex Workers Project of the Urban Justice Center, which provides legal and social services for sex workers in New York City, and advocates for sex worker rights.

More on N.H. pornograhy/prostitution case

For more on the ruling I discussed yesterday, see coverage at AVN. For more on the facts of the case, see coverage at the Concord Monitor. Something I left out before: our bailiff and would-be-pornography was also convicted on a second prostitution charge involving another couple, and in that case he offered to pay them only to watch, not to videotape. He challenged that conviction on the basis that the prostitution law was overbroad on its face because it could apply to protected speech, but the N.H. court held that the law was facially valid, and its application to protected speech could be challenged in a case that actually implicated that concern.

This week's decision overturning the second conviction was that as-applied challenge. So our defendant still stands convicted in the first case, because he didn't plan to film the action. Notably, the county prosecutor may be considering charging him again in the other case, and attempting to prove that his purpose was in fact personal sexual gratification, not making a film -- in which case it would still be constitutional.

I think the distinction drawn here between paying for others to have sex for the purpose of film and paying for others to have sex for the purpose of getting your personal jollies is somewhat problematic, because the two are far from mutually exclusive. It gets more complicated when you add in the scenario of the director-as-performer. The moral of the story, perhaps, is this: don't try to use "making pornography" as a mere cover for paid personal sexual gratification; you may still fall afoul of the law.

N.H. Court: Pornography ≠ Prostitution

New Hampshire's Supreme Court held this week (PDF) that producers of pornography cannot be prosecuted for prostitution, because paying individuals for the right to videotape their sexual acts is constitutionally protected to the extent that the payor's purpose is to videotape the action rather than to get laid.

As Marc Randazza has discussed in some detail at the Legal Satyricon, few courts have previously addressed this issue. The leading case is People v. Freeman, in which California's Supreme Court reached the same conclusion. In an older case, a New York trial court reached the opposite conclusion.

Here, the defendant offered a couple he met money to tape them having sex. To make a long story short, under the provision of the prostitution law he was charged under, it was not necessary to prove that he paid the couple for the purpose of personal sexual gratification; any payment for sexual conduct would do. The court said that this provision was overbroad as applied to this case, because such application would bar the commercial production of constitutionally protected pornography. The court noted that it would have been fine to charge him under a different provision, under which the jury would have to conclude that the payment was made for purposes of sexual gratification, rather than for the purpose of making a film.

This is essentially the rationale of Freeman: (1) Pornography is different because the payment is made for purposes of making a film, not purposes of personal gratification, and (2) If the two were treated alike, a broad category of sexually explicit films could not be produced. The court rejected any distinction between making and selling pornography. If you have a right to produce porn, you must have a right to pay people to perform in it.

Eugene Volokh @ the Volokh Conspiracy is suspicious of this distinction, but I think it makes sense: pornography and prostitution are very different transactions, which is why many porn performers wouldn't engage in prostitution regardless of the law. A prostitution rap makes even less sense in this particular case than in the typical case of professional producers and performers, because the defendant here was soliciting couples who, presumably, were going to have consensual sex with each other regardless.

So hurrah for the First Amendment and pornography production in New Hampshire. On second thought, who makes porn in New Hampshire? Judging from this case, courthouse security guards soliciting random couples they meet at work. Let's hope the court's decision leads to a higher class of New Hampshire-based pornography...

Corporate Censorship Redux: Sex Bloggers Calendar

Recently I noted the various censorious corporate moves by companies like Citibank and Google that made life difficult for sex writer and filmmaker Audacia Ray. Ray's online store is now playing host to another victim of private regulation of online sexual speech: the Sex Bloggers Calendar, which has had repeated troubles with PayPal. Saith the Sex Bloggers:

We believe what has caused PayPal to twice now review our account is the word “sex” in both our email address and the actual calendar title. ...It is obvious to us and many others in this community that PayPal is not good to use for anyone in the adult industry. We were aware of others who had had their accounts frozen and their funds taken by PayPal for what PayPal felt was a violation for their TOS. We did not think when we set up our Paypal account we would have this problem because there is no nudity in our calendar. As a matter of fact our calendar shows less skin than the Sport Illustrated calendar does but we do not want to take the risk of having the funds in our account seized.

Proceeds from the calendar go to Sex Work Awareness, a public education project that seeks to reduce the stigma and challenges faced by sex workers.

Scattered observations on the election

At Bilerico, Jillian Weiss recalls Barney Frank's statement last year that "if we can pick up 15 Democratic [House] seats, then I think we are in a good position to pass a transgender-inclusive ENDA." As Weiss notes, House Democrats picked up at least 19 seats. By the strategic standards of those who supported a non-inclusive ENDA, the time for that strategy is behind us. It is time to move forward with a fully inclusive bill.

Chris at Sex in the Public Square and Renegade Evolution have some reflections on the effort to pass Proposition K in San Francisco.

It now appears that even when all the votes are counted Prop 8 will pass. There is already litigation underway to challenge it. I've previously opined that attempting to challenge the substance of Prop 8, as somehow irreconcilable with the rest of the constitution, is a loser. But the leading argument being made now seems to be that Prop 8 is such a significant change that, under the state constitution, it should have been approved by the legislature before going to the voters (which would never have happened). The alternative argument is that the amendment isn't retroactive. It's not clear to me how strong these arguments are, but how the state's high court rules on them could well be an issue in the justices' 2010 retention races. Arthur Leonard gives a rundown of these suits, as well as the probably constitutional challenge to the Arkansas foster parenting/adoption ban.

Ballot measure, election results!

How Appealing collected the following AP headlines:

"California gay marriage vote still undecided"
(though it's not looking good)

"Florida voters pass amendment banning gay marriage"

"South Dakotans reject second try at abortion ban"

"Colo. voters soundly defeat anti-abortion measure"

"Ark. voters OK unmarried foster, adoption bans"

"Neb. voters approve ban on affirmative action"

Also, Federal Marriage Amendment standard-bearer Marylin Musgrave lost her house seat in Colorado!

In San Francisco, the tally on Proposition K is reportedly around 57-43 against. I don't know what those heavily involved in the campaign think, but to me that looks like a very strong showing for a highly controversial measure. It has sparked a lot of debate and perhaps will be back in the future.

The election results have me wondering about the following questions:

• Which Justice(s) will be announcing their retirement from the Supreme Court come next summer?
• How will the changed political landscape change the fight over trans inclusion in the Employment Non-Discrimination Act?
• Will any LGBT rights legislation move in Congress in Obama's first year in office?
• Will Proposition 8 (if it passed) be held to be retroactive?
• How many years will it be before voters consider reversing Proposition 8?
• When Arkansas's new adoption ban is inevitably challenged in court, will the Eighth Circuit Court of Appeals split with the Eleventh Circuit, which upheld Florida's ban?
• Will the defeat of the "embryo rights" amendment in Colorado and the all-out abortion ban in South Dakota forestall a push for similar measures in other states? (Hopefully so, and likewise the failure of the anti-trans measure in Montgomery County, MD to make it on the ballot!)

Props 8, 4, and K

The good news is that the latest polling shows Proposition 8 down 44-52 in California. This is encouraging, because recent polls showed Prop 8 edging ahead. It's likely to come down to persuading people who say they are against same-sex marriage that it nevertheless shouldn't be banned:

Despite opposition to the ballot measure, the state remains split over the underlying question of same-sex marriage, said Mark Baldassare, director of the poll. In a separate question in the survey, 49 percent of those questioned opposed allowing gay and lesbian couples to legally marry in California, while 47 percent were in favor.

"I've said since August that it could be a close election because the state is so split on the same-sex marriage question," Baldassare said. "About 20 percent of likely voters oppose same-sex marriage but say they'll vote 'no' on Prop. 8."

The bad news is that Proposition 4, which would endanger teens' health and safety by requiring parental consent for all abortions, is ahead 46-44 - with fully 10% undecided. As with Prop 8, the campaign for Prop 4 is a dishonest one, as the LA Times notes in its editorial against the measure:

The supporters of Proposition 4 have managed to frame their campaign around two ideas, both misleading, that hold particular appeal for voters. One is that, in addition to allowing girls to seek court permission for an abortion, it will give those who justifiably fear telling their parents an "out" by allowing them to notify another adult relative instead. This would indeed give the measure more credence, if it were true. But in order to use it, the girl would have to accuse her parents, in writing, of child abuse, with the accusation to be forwarded to law enforcement authorities. It's the equivalent of telling girls they can get an abortion by walking into a police station and having their parents arrested.

The campaign also assumes a kinder face by saying that this is about protecting girls from adult sexual predators; newly knowledgeable parents would put an end to the sex crimes. But a study released in September by UC San Francisco found that few girls have relationships with significantly older males and that the percentage of those who do does not appear to change with notification laws.

For better or worse, I'm not aware of any polling data on San Francisco's Proposition K to decriminalize sex work. But check out this fairly balanced examination of the measure and the debate at Huffington Post. Notably, the measure has split the city's two LGBT Democratic organizations, named after Harvey Milk (for) and Alice B. Toklas (against) respectively. I'm not sure about Alice, but I'm pretty sure Harvey would have supported Proposition K. (Speaking of which, can you believe Sean Penn is playing Harvey Milk?!)

Belated Coming Out Day Post

Bad Things happen when political and legal decisions are made without the participation of those people most affected - and even worse, when no one in the conversation even knows any of those people personally. This is what we mean when we say that coming out it a political act. But for many, coming out is still a dicey and difficult proposition, so those conversations remain deeply and dangerously impoverished.

In this instance, I'm not talking about coming out as gay or lesbian; I'm talking about coming out as a sex worker. Tobi Hill-Meyer at Bilerico talks about feeling "a desperate need to be silent about my experiences" doing sex work:

The obvious issue of police harassment aside, I felt like anything that I could say might have harmful consequences.

If I talked about the parts of my work that were painful, I feared I would be perpetuating the myth that sex workers are only victims without any agency. If I talked about the parts I enjoyed, I feared I would be silencing those who don't enjoy their work. If I talked about being a trans sex worker, I feared I'd perpetuate the stereotype that all trans women are sex workers. And if I talked about the role sex work plays in my activism and activist priorities, I was afraid that all the non-profit and political organizations I worked with would shrink away from me in fear of being associated such a politically unsavory population.

That last one was one of the biggest motivators to break that pattern and actually start talking about this issue. When I take stock of the LGBT issues that are impacting my community, I see police harassment, prisoner rights, decriminalization, health care access, and punitive laws that unduly pile punishment after punishment onto "unsavory" survival crimes such as sex work, at the top of my agenda. Yet the LGBT rights organizations around me are barely even aware of those as LGBT issues.

Hop over and read the full post.

Pro dommes team up to tackle recession, repression

From Gothamist:

After a number of vice squad crackdowns on Manhattan S&M clubs, some outraged dominatrices are bonding together to defend their profession, which they say has been wrongly maligned as prostitution. The Post sent a reporter over to Dungeon Alley (a cluster of S&M clubs in Midtown) and Chelsea's Le Salon De Sade, where the dominatrices "were dressed to the hilt with no one to flog. " De Sade's owner Mistress Johanna says, "It's never bee worse. Business is down 70 percent. We've had all these busts, and now the economy is out of control. The uncertainty is torturing us." Investigators say that the raided clubs were essentially prostitution houses, but a lawyer hired by over a dozen dominatrices and dungeon owners insists
"everyone was operating under the belief that what they were doing was legal." Besides retaining an attorney, the group is forming a union and even a political action committee (DomPAC!) to lobby lawmakers for legal protection.

A few observations: pro dommes (and the few pro submissives out there) have suffered from the vague wording and aggressive enforcement of prostitution and adult business laws. The "legal protection" they're seeking is clarification that what they are doing -- BDSM with no direct sexual contact -- falls on the right side of the law. Of course, some pro dommes do break the rules, and one imagines that organizing will produce more effective peer pressure to strictly obey the law for the good of all; the more it appears that prostitution is going on, the more all pro dommes will face intimidation and possible arrest. Finally, one wonders what else these pros can do to reduced demand in what - even in NYC - is a limited marketplace. A PR campaign? Whatever their plans, I wish this effort the best of luck.

More on the stripping-for-legal-services case

The reports of the disciplinary hearing board and review board confirm that the lawyer in question was sanctioned primarily on the basis of extensive findings regarding his abuse of the lawyer-client relationship and criminal acts of sexual assault, as well as lying to the police.

While I wrote before the Illinois does not have a codified per se rule against lawyer-client sexual conduct, it turns out that like some other states, Illinois nevertheless has a judicially-crafted per se rule. The board had no need to decide whether receive exotic dances alone constituted a sexual relationship, because the lawyer engaged in much more direct, and unwanted, sexual contact. Accordingly, he was sanctioned more severely than lawyers who had sex with consenting clients.

In other words, this was really a case about straightforward abuse and misconduct, not about the use of exotic dance as in-kind payment. However, the hearing board did say this:

[Lawyer] admitted [client] performed nude dances for him in his office in exchange for a reduction of his bill. This admission alone is sufficient to support a finding of misconduct. However, because of our other findings, we need not, and do not, base our recommendation on this finding alone.

The review board agreed that this conduct "is reprehensible in and of itself." But because this case involved additional and much more serious conduct, neither body made clear its reasoning on this point.

The reports I've linked to are lengthy, and boil down to "don't assault your clients (and by the way also don't play games with the definition of 'sexual relationship' either)." But I can't help pointing out this icky-squicky moment, from a tape of a conversation between the parties:

[Client]: It's been more than that. I know it has. But every time I'm here, there's been touching and groping and stuff like that, every time.

[Lawyer]: Not every time you've been in my office, no....

[Client]: If it was dancing, I have no problem with dancing. I love dancing and I love - that's my job, but you took it a lot further than that, I mean -

[Lawyer]: Well, only because you let me.

Gah. Which is why even exotic dancers who want to trade their services for legal help will be glad this guy isn't practicing law for awhile.

Exotic dance and the lawyer-client relationship

A Chicago-area lawyer has been suspended following complaints by a client, who happens to be an exotic dancer. The Chicago Tribune provides this lead for the story:

A DeKalb lawyer was suspended for 15 months Thursday for arranging to have a female client perform nude dances for him in exchange for credit on her legal fees, a state commission said.

Puzzlingly, only in the latter half of the article is it mentioned that this same client also made allegations of sexual assault against the lawyer. (A grand jury failed to indict him.) It is not at all clear from the article to what extent the disciplinary action was taken on the basis of the assault allegations vs. the exchange of dances for legal services. Sexually assaulting or even sexually harassing a client would certainly be sufficient grounds for discipline, in and of itself.

Whether the exchange of exotic dance - including, here, nudity and at times the privacy of the attorney's office - for legal services is itself grounds for discipline is an interesting question. Nothing in the Illinois Rules of Professional Conduct prohibits in-kind payment, of which this is one kind; clients pay lawyers with services like plumbing. Interestingly, unlike the ABA's Model Rules, Illinois does not have a rule prohibiting sexual relations with current clients. If Illinois had such a rule, it would raise the question whether private nude dances constitute "sexual relations."

Since Illinois doesn't have a sexual-relations rule, this conduct would have to fall under either Rule 1.7(b) (personal conflict of interest interfering with competent representation) or Rule 8.4(a)(5) (conduct prejudicial to the administration of justice). I really don't think receiving exotic dances is prejudicial to the administration of justice, and if it is the legal profession has some serious culling to do. However, it is not hard to imagine this situation presenting a conflict of interest. Although on one level the transaction between exotic dancer and patron is one of fee-for-service, it is also a kind of service that is not unlikely to generate strong feelings (of lust, romantic interest, etc.) on the part of the patron- particularly the regular patron. The professional boundaries typically maintained by dancers would also be eroded by giving dances in a private setting. It is not hard to imagine the lawyer developing an attachment of one kind or another to the client that could interfere with competent representation.

This is not unique to exotic dancing, or other kinds of sexually-charged entertainment. There are other kinds of services that would probably be inappropriate between lawyer and client for the same reason - say, for instance, psychotherapy. (Many sex workers will tell you that their job can be a bit like being a shrink!) At least, they would be inappropriate as an ongoing method of payment. The story here indicates that the dance transaction began inadvertently when lawyer and client ran into one another at the client's workplace, after speaking about legal representation on the phone. I don't think this by itself would create a conflict, even if they realized it after the lawyer received a dance or two. Similarly, a lawyer could probably represent a therapist whom she saw for a few brief sessions in the recent past.

So a situation like this could present an interesting question and possibly a serious ethics problem, even in the absence of more clear-cut misconduct. Unfortunately, the Tribune decided to go for the titillation factor rather than provide the whole story.

H/t to How Appealing.

Clothed pole dancing aerobics = "adult business"??

Today we'll discuss that favorite bugaboo of feminist discussions on sexuality and pop culture: pole-dancing aerobics!

No, we're not here to debate whether this popular and lucrative trend is is a route to sexual empowerment, a symbol of a pernicious "raunch culture," or is tacky but harmless fun. Instead, we're discussing something that I know is also dear to the hearts of feminist readers here: zoning. Come on, you know you love zoning, especially zoning + gyration.


Stephanie Babines is a fitness instructor whose business, Oh My You're Gorgeous, offers classes in hula, salsa, belly dancing and yes, pole dancing. As I need hardly tell you, pole dancing is a great workout for your thighs and abs - and it's all totally clothed. But when Babines sought a permit to move her instruction from house parties and rented venues into a storefront dance studio, Adams Township, PA rejected the permit. The local officer who made the call said he didn't bother interviewing Babines because her website looked all sexy. The Legal Satyricon quotes the complaint:

[The enforcement officer] said he did not need to interview Ms. Babines regarding her intentions for the property because her website spoke for itself. He testified that regardless of whether the activity involved nudity, the dance forms Ms. Babines intended to teach were “provocative” and contained sexual “innuendo,” and her dance studio should therefore be classified as an “adult business.”

[He] further testified that the pink-and-black color scheme of Ms. Babines’ website and the high-heeled shoe in her logo indicated to him that she intended to operate an “adult business” at the 222 Mars-Valencia Road property.

No, really!! See, it's in the New York Times, the AP wire, and the Wall Street Journal's blog!

A cheeky Pittsburgh columnist basks in the positive attention this is getting for nearby Adams Township

I'm probably going to get into trouble with my editors, but I'm going to be blunt and call Babines exactly what she is: Someone possessing a master's degree in project management who currently works as a senior information technology professional.

Would you want someone with that track record starting a business in your community?

Thankfully for the righteous, Babines selected the wrong locale to try to open her den of iniquity. She chose Adams Township -- a place where the moral indignation runs deep, and the legal expenses appear ready to run high.

Thank God for the ACLU - they'll stick up for you when everyone else thinks it's beneath their dignity. The Pennsylvania ACLU filed suit on Babines's behalf last week. Their complaint (PDF) recounts the facts in interesting detail - from the development of sexy aerobics as a national trend to the descriptions of OMYG classes, and calls the town out for violating the First Amendment and misapplying its own ordinance.

Adams Township is going to lose. The Supreme Court has upheld restrictive zoning ordinances applies to strip clubs on the basis of dubious "secondary effects" on the local community. The court will have no difficulty saying that this case is different: you're unlikely to have drunks spilling out into the streets and dancers engaging in prostitution when everyone is there to dance, not watch.

More to the point, the "secondary effects" doctrine is based on the assumption that exotic dancing sits at the "outer perimeter of the First Amendment" - it enjoys minimal protection because it ostensibly it is only barely "speech." Here we're talking about not just booty-shaking, but booty-shaking classes. Thus, the court won't have to address the very interesting question of where clothed pole-dance aerobics sits with respect to the "perimeter" of protected speech.

As for Adams Township, presumably their campaign to stamp out "innuendo" and "provocative" businesses will soon extend to shuttering bars and nightclubs and blocking the Fox network.