Norma Hotaling: Prostitution: Getting Women Out – Keynote Address

“Hopefully, we'll be able to start creating a world where women are not seen as prey and men are not acting as predators.”

“How are we trained not to look at the women and girls that are no longer with us? How are we trained to walk down the street and not see the women and girls crying out for our help? How are we trained to talk about prostitution through the eyes and the voices of the perpetrators? We call it women's rights, and women's rights is a wonderful thing to line up behind, right? Prostitution as a woman's right. But when we line up behind this, what are we really lining up behind? Aren't we lining up behind the rights of pimps? Of johns? Of traffickers? Aren't we saying it's their right to kidnap, to traffic, to use, to buy, to kill, destroy, and disappear hundreds and thousands, if not millions, of women and girls around the world? How are women trained never to see that there's a customer involved in prostitution? How are we trained never to talk about the men?”

“People ask me all the time, how do you do this work? How do you do this work? The reason I can do this work is I see the women when they're out. I see the beautiful, vital, wonderful, intelligent, fun, funny,  mothers, sisters, wives. I see that.”

“Everyone in here has the right to be a prostitute. Fighting for prostitutes' rights is not what we need to do. We need to start fighting for women and girls' rights not to be prostitutes. That's what we don't have. Every woman in here. Every woman in here. You do not have to fight for your right to be a prostitute. You got it. It's there. From the youngest to the oldest woman in here. From the most disabled, from the most hurt, from every, sector  of society, you have your right, it is your right, because you have a vagina, and you are a female, and you don't have power, and economical, and political power in the world. You have a right to be a prostitute. Thank God we got jobs to go to, right?”

Abstract:

Norma will address programmes which help women get out of prostitution, discuss who uses prostitution and talk about her experiences in the prostitution industry. 

Norma is Executive Director of the Standing Against Global Exploitation (SAGE) Project, a service which is dedicated to creating a continuum of care for all women who are survivors of abuse, and individuals escaping prostitution. Norma has extensive personal and professional experience working with issues of violence, sexual exploitation and prostitution. As a survivor of prostitution, a recovering heroin addict and formally homeless woman, Norma has counselled thousands of prostitutes throughout the United States. She has designed and implemented model programmes that have been adopted nationally and internationally and is on the Advisory Board of Probation Officers Working to End Recidivism (POWER) and the Coalition Against Trafficking in Women. Norma has conducted research with prostitutes investigating violence and Post Traumatic Stress Disorder in San Francisco and Thailand. She is the recipient of the 1996 Patient Rights Advocacy Services, Advocate Award and the 1996 Health Education Alumni of the Year Award from San Francisco State University. 

Since 1996:

Norma continued her activism against prostitution and human trafficking, including her work with SAGE, until her death from pancreatic cancer in December 2008.