SEX WORK TOOLKIT

Due to criminalization, sex workers face significant stigma and discrimination. Because their work is criminalized, stigmatized, and pushed further underground, sex workers are made more vulnerable to predators and to violence.

Street-based sex workers are targeted for violence  much more frequently than most workers due to the isolating impacts of Section 213 of the Criminal Code of Canada, which makes it illegal for sex workers to solicit in a public space. This limits sex workers’ ability to screen out potentially violent and dangerous clients and situations, which can lead to bad dates (defined as something that happens to a sex worker that they wouldn’t want to happen to anyone else). This can include robbery, harassment, assault, kidnapping, time wasting and more. Street-based sex workers are more vulnerable to exploitation by third parties such as owners and managers of sex-industry establishments, security guards, drug dealers, personal partners, clients, pimps and madams.

Due to their visibility, street-based sex workers are sometimes blamed for things that they might have nothing to do with. For example, the presence of sex workers is often blamed for an increase in residential or automobile break-ins even though they have not participated in those crimes.

Sex workers are at risk of violence and danger on a daily basis, although the levels of violence depend on the type of venue in which they work. Sex workers who work in the most isolated environments experience, by far, the highest homicide rates of any occupational group. Much of the violence is perpetrated by customers.

Historically, sex workers often have not felt safe reporting violence to law enforcement due to police brutality across sex work sectors. Migrant sex workers in particular fear arrest, detention and deportation due to enforcement of parts of the Immigrant and Refugee Protection Regulations (IRPR) which criminalize sex work for migrant workers.

Sex workers just need to be able to do their work in peace and safety. To increase safety and decrease isolation, some sex workers choose to connect with peer groups or local frontline organizations that offer a variety of services, such as drop-in spaces, health supports, bad date reporting, job and income tax assistance, and more. To learn more about organizations and programs supporting sex workers, click here.