AUGUST 2010

• Monday, August 9th, 7:30 p.m. to 9:30 p.m.: Medical Clinic.

• Floating Legal Clinic: Do you have legal issues? Do you have trouble with the law? Make an appointment with our volunteer lawyer specialized in criminal law; he knows also basic family and immigration laws.

• Thursday, August 26th, 5:00 p.m. to 7:00 p.m.: if the weather is nice, we'll have a picnic and we'll meet at the park de la Rivière, corner of de Lorimier and De la Rivière. If the weather is bad, we'll meet at Stella.

• You are a sex worker and you want to get involved at Stella? Don’t be shy to contact us!

STELLA-POSITIVE
Stella-Positive is a group for women who are living with HIV (either sex workers or ex-sex workers). We meet once a month for activities like lunch, museum visit, go to the beach or just hanging out and talk. It’s all free! In you want more info, to join us or if you have a suggestion for the activities, contact Marilyne at 514.984.6297.

STELLA VIOLENCE SUPPORT GROUP
This group is for any sex worker or ex-sex worker who wants to reduce her negative experiences of violence:
• Domestic violence when you were a child
• Sexual abuse in childhood or adulthood
• Domestic violence (including the experience of being "pimped")
• Violence from an aggressor while you were working
• Criminal harassment and stalking
• Abuse by the criminal underworld (drug dealers, streetgangs, "bikers")
• Police brutality or from correctional officers
• Any other experience lived as violence.
The group is open to 2 to 8 participants; participants may join the group or leave it at any time. The objectives are:
• Naming the violence
• Identify the negative consequences of violence (short, medium and long term)
• Allow participants to share their tips to control and reduce the consequences of violence
• Turning the trauma into victory.
Since May 11th, we meet every 3 weeks for an hour and a half (at 7 p.m.). To register, contact Pascale at 514.285.1599 or at pascalerob@videotron.ca. Pascale is also available for individual meetings.

FREE MASSAGES
Do you need to treat your body to some relaxation? Are your muscles craving the professional touch of a masseuse? Stella is offering free massages. Join Rosalind, our experienced massage therapist, as she offers you 1 ½ hours of deep relaxation and body work. Come treat yourself and your body to a heavenly experience. During your session, we will take the necessary time to offer you a professional massage in a relaxing ambiance where you will transcend space and time and allow all of your senses to rejuvenate and spring to life. Massage sessions are between 1 to 2:30 p.m. and 3 to 4:30 p.m. The next sessions are on August 6th and 20th. By appointment only. Contact Mylie.

AGENDA 2010
• September 1st - CKUT: AUDIO SMUT
• September 19th - Montréal: Ça marche 2010 - Sponsor our General Coordinator
• From October 12th to 17th: World March of Women 2010
• From July 3rd to 7th 2011 - Ottawa & Gatineau: Women's Worlds 2011

STELLA DEBOUTE!
Share your experiences about how the law effects sex work! Your stories are very important to us and we want to start collecting them.

Stella is starting a project to document the criminalization of sex work so that we can educate the public on how the laws make our work more dangerous and complicated. We have created a questionnaire for sex workers that will help to expose the conditions of our work and help us challenge these laws and fight for our rights!

This research will then be in the form of an affadavit. This means that the answers to your questionnaire, with your real name or not, will be witnessed by a commissionaire which will give it legal credibility. Whether you use your real name or not, your story will help to educate and empower.

There are 3 ways to participate:
1) We keep your statement confidential. We use the information that you give us to help educate and sensitize the community but we leave your name unpublished and you remain anonymous.
2) You keep your real name and we publish it along with our materials and research.
3) You keep your real name as mentioned, and it is published with the research, and we can contact you in the future if we decide to use the affidavits to challenge the laws criminalizing sex work.

This information can help Stella and sex workers all over Canada and the world in our united fight against criminalization! For more information email stelladeboutte@gmail.com or call Anita 514.984.0103.

STELLA HUMAN RIGHTS AND ANTI-VIOLENCE WORK
• Stella offers support, accompaniment and information to sex workers who have been victims of violence and to their loved ones
• List of Aggressors and Bad Clients
• Advocacy Against Laws and Policies that Fuel Violence
• New Projects at Stella Dealing with Violence and Human Rights.
Read more.

NEW BAWDY-HOUSE SENTENCING REGULATIONS WILL HARM AND STIGMATIZE SEX WORKERS
The Conservative government has introduced troubling new Criminal Code regulations that reclassify a number of existing offences as “serious offences” – indictable offenses for which the maximum punishment is imprisonment for five years or more. But a sex worker advocacy group says there is no rational basis for making it a serious offence to keep a bawdy house, and that the move goes against all evidence and expert advice. Read more.

CRIMINALIZATION OF HIV NON-DISCLOSURE
Are you accused of HIV exposure or transmission? Do you want to appeal a conviction? The Canadian HIV/AIDS Legal Network wants to know your story and to help you. They can provide background material to assist you and your lawyer for the court. Please send relevant information and inquiries to criminallaw@aidslaw.ca.

DOWN WITH STERILE CIVIL STATUS RULES! TRANS PEOPLE DEMAND THEIR CITIZENSHIP
Today in Québec, trans-identified, or trans, people do not enjoy the same civil status rights as other citizens. Trans people are subjected to long, complex, restrictive, and not universally accessible regulations. Their right to equality and physical integrity is not respected, since they must undergo compulsory sterilization in order to obtain the right to have their designation of sex legally changed in civil status documents. Sign this petition.

TRANS HEALTH NETWORK
The Trans Health Network works to promote health, well-being and social justice for trans people in Québec. For more information and resources related to trans health, or to request a training for medical and social service providers, contact one of the following members: Project 10, 2110 Centre for Gender Advocacy, Stella or ASTT(e)Q (at 514.847.0067 x207).

COMING BACK TO THE JOB MARKET?
Need help finding work? Interested in returning to the job market? You may benefit from the Centre des femmes de Montréal’s Employability Services Optionelle. Optionelle helps women to take the necessary steps to integrate the labour force. They can be reached by phone at 514.842.6652, or by email at optionelle@centredesfemmesdemtl.org.

DEMOLITION IN A BOX
It's just the way business is done in Montreal (or anywhere for that matter). More info at Save the Main.

MAKING SEX WORK

NOT GUILTY, NOT VICTIMS
This video is a polyphonic conversation gathering the words of some of the protagonists at the European Conference on Sex Work, Human Rights, Labour and Migration (in Brussels in 2005, a few months after the Forum XXX). They speak of the complexity and nuances of the sex industry and their lives: the challenges and the struggles of being a sex worker in Europe today, the repressive policies affecting their lives, and the strategies of resistance enabling them to do their work, build their desires and plan their futures. By Sexyshock and the International Committee on the Rights of Sex Workers in Europe.

DECRIMINALISATION OF SEX INDUSTRY POSITIVE MOVE
Decriminalisation of New Zealand’s sex industry has resulted in safer, healthier sex workers, a new book shows. Since decriminalisation seven years ago sex workers are more empowered to insist on safe sex, Gillian Abel’s book Taking the crime out of sex work – New Zealand sex workers’ fight for decriminalisation shows. Abel edited the book with Lisa Fitzgerald and Catherine Healy. They interviewed 772 sex workers for the book. Read more.

DECRIMINALISATION OF SEX WORK IN NEW ZEALAND: REVIEW SHOWS NO EVIDENCE OF PREDICTED SOCIAL HARMS
Opponents of the decriminalisation of sex work initially hailed the review of the first five years, published on May 2008, as a vindication of their position that New Zealand's Prostitution Reform Act has been a failure in terms of its objectives and that sex work should be eradicated because decriminalisation has little impact on violence in sex work. This is disingenuous at best, but is likely to be something we will continue to hear about. Read more.

BEHIND THE HAPPY FACE OF THE SWEDISH ANTI-PROSTITUTION LAW
Laura Agustin: Wherever I go, wherever I live, I always meet people with critical, original and non-conforming views, and Sweden is no exception. Today’s special post comes from Louise Persson, whose book on ‘classical’ feminism came out last year. A longtime critic of the Swedish law criminalising the purchase of sex, Louise wrote this article about the report on the government’s evaluation of the law, which was published on July 2nd, 2010. Links to numerous other Swedish critiques of the inquiry and report are at the end: many Swedes don’t like the law, but, since the government treats it as a symbol of Swedishness, these voices are rarely heard in public forums. Remind anyone of other governments we know?

WE WANT TO SAVE YOU! AND IF YOU DONT APPRECIATE IT, YOU WILL BE PUNISHED!
An interview with Pye Jacobsson, a sex worker activist from Sweden, about the legislation around prostitution and its impact on sex workers’ lives in Sweden. An HCLU-SWAN film. Read the transcript here.

RIGHTS, NOT RESCUE
During a lively and busy meeting November 10th 2009 in the Balie in Amsterdam, the international women’s social change fund Mama Cash brought together 150 sex workers, activists and interest groups from the Netherlands and abroad. While authorities focus on rescuing sex workers, the concerns of sex workers themselves are ignored and their human rights are violated. "If you take away my right to say ‘yes’, then how much is my ‘no’ worth?" sex worker and activist Ruth Morgan Thomas asked. Read more.

SEX AT THE MARGINS
Laura María Agustín tells to the Spiked review of books that feminists, NGOs and government bodies dedicated to combating the sex industry have ended up criminalising migrant workers. Her provocative new book, Sex at the Margins: Migration, Labor Markets and the Rescue Industry, really does what it says on the back cover: ‘[It] explodes several myths: that selling sex is completely different from any other kind of work, that migrants who sell sex are passive victims, and that the multitude of people out to save them are without self-interest.’ Read also this great interview of Laura by Susie Bright.

SEX WORK AND THE UNITED STATES POLICIES ON HIV
sexworkerspresent Taking the Pledge, a 13-minute film featuring sex workers from Bangladesh, Brazil, Cambodia, Mali, Thailand and more! They describe the problems created by the 'anti-prostitution pledge' required to receive USAID and PEPFAR funds. In English, Khmer, Thai, French, Portuguese and Bengali, with English subtitles. Produced by the Network of Sex Work Projects. For more infos, read our leaflet Sex Work and the United States’ Policies on HIV while listening to this STAR WHORES' Karaoke.