EDUCATION AND PUBLICATIONS
Community Education Presentations
PEERS Victoria staff are available for community education presentations to media, schools, government, and other agencies, as well as law enforcement, civic, and other groups. Please call 250 388 5325 to discuss your group’s needs.
Publications and Research
PEERS staff provides information to former and current sex trade workers on training programs, other government programs and appropriate community resources. We document the needs of Sex Trade workers, young and adult, in relation to education, training, employment, support, housing and health. PEERS helps to identify barriers to existing programs that sex trade workers encounter and attempts to assist in overcoming these barriers. PEERS strives to develop new services to meet identified needs. We encourage feedback from Sex Trade workers as our programs and our organization as a whole is completely accountable to them.
Behind Closed Doors: Summary of Findings
November 2008
The goal of this three-year study was to connect with a minimum of 88 indoor sex workers on a number of subjects ranging from how they like their current workplace to specifics on working conditions, possible presence of sexually exploited youth, and barriers to making a transition to mainstream work and culture. This report provides insights into a highly secretive but well-developed industry that employs thousands of British Columbians. Behind Closed Doors: Summary of Findings [104KB PDF]
Dispelling Myths and Understanding Realities—
Working Conditions, Health Status, and Exiting
This study began with training ex-sex workers as research assistants who became involved in activities ranging from recruiting respondents, interviewing them, inputting questionnaire data , and transcribing tape recorded interviews creating a genuine community-academic collaboration. The sample included 160 female, 36 male and 5 transgendered sex workers for a total of 201 respondents. Of the total, 147 were currently active and 54 were exited from the trade. The research looks at the sex trade from a work perspective, arguing that there is an urgent need to give voice to sex workers located in indoor as well as outdoor venues.
The key findings showed that: For the vast majority of the respondents, the sex trade is their main means of making a living; those working on the street experience comparatively less occupational control and more harassment than counterparts located in indoor venues; sex workers operating out of their own homes are in the best relative position to determine their own cost of labour, net earnings, pace of work, clientele and the sex activities performed; the criminal nature of the sex trade in Canada has a dramatic impact on workers’ rights and safety; the majority of respondents report that their health is not what they would like it to be; only a minority of respondents escape from their situations through the use of illicit addictive substances; even those who have permanently exited continue to struggle with mental health and related problems; respondents said they are in need of a variety of frontline and preventive health services; and, they describe themselves as active agents with varying degrees of control over their work and health rather than as mere victims.
"Dispelling the Myths and Understanding Realities" [60k PDF (short report)]
Impossible Eh? The Story of PEERS
This is the story of one group of sex trade workers who decided they wanted a choice and set out to create one for themselves. It includes several perspectives and provides both a historical overview and detailed information on how PEERS works for communities who are interesting creating their own organization.
"Impossible Eh? The Story of PEERS" [1.5MB PDF]
Is Anyone Listening? A Gender Analysis of Sex Trade Work
Through the support of Status of Women Canada, PEERS has done a gender analysis of the sex trade. We held a series of focus groups to find out the differences and similarities for men and women in the trade. The final report is now complete and available at our main office.
10 Ways to adjust your perspective on Sex Work
- Think about whether you have moral judgements about consensual sex.
Why do you think you have them about sex and perhaps not about other
instincts such as food or sleep? - Does an image come to mind when you hear the word “sex worker”,
“prostitute”, “hooker” or the like? Get rid of it. It’s wrong. As is true about
any other occupation, every sex worker is an individual. - Do you speak up when you hear someone referring to another person as a
“ho” or a “slut”? It’s time to start. Sexual activity doesn’t make anyone
deserving of disrespect. - Talk to someone who is or has been in the sex trade. Try to get to know
them without bringing up their experience in the trade. - Poverty, Classism, Racism, Sexism, sexphobia, stereotypes and
unexplored stigma make Sex Work more dangerous than it has to be. Pick
one. Fight it. Or pick them all. - Learn about sex work. It is complex, complicated, and incredibly varied.
Then talk to your friends. - If you feel that sex workers should be in control of their work, and that
it’s okay for them to do this work, how do you feel about the clients who
use their services? Is it alright for the workers but not for the users? Why
or why not? Yup, more exploration time. - Question political candidates about their attitudes toward sex work. Vote
for those who are dedicated to improving safety for sex workers. - Think of times you’ve had sex for something other than love or lust. Did it
change who you are as a person? - Start to pay attention to how sex workers are portrayed in the media and
in casual conversations; notice how often violence against them is
suggested, talked about and sanctioned. Don’t let it pass without
criticism.