#Pierced may have been here

Are you friends with a sex worker? Here’s what being a bestie - and an ally - really means.

Whether you smell good. Whether you’re freshly shaved. Whether you’ve bothered to put on a clean shirt. When you make an effort, your worker knows you’re investing more than just money into the encounter - that you see the meeting as a special occasion.

Whenever my job is mentioned in newspapers, blogs, or magazines, the same tropes tend to pop up: moral panic, drug abuse, violence. Journalists quote us selectively, so that it sounds as if we’re living out the sex-negative, whorephobic stereotypes the public are used to consuming.

As an Adult Entertainer, aka Sex Worker, this lifestyle can get pretty lonely. Especially for those of us that aren’t close to our family

The lives of 19th century women are known to us today mainly through their letters and writing, but also through the then new (black-and-white) portrait photography, and the vivid paintings, pastels and watercolours of impressionist artists.