Yes, SWEAT

I like SWEAT even more after yesterday.

Sex Workers Education and Advocacy Taskforce (SWEAT) is an organization that advocates for decriminalization of sex work to expand human rights for sex workers. Legalization of prostitution. For those who do not know, I have a special interest in human trafficking, especially sex trafficking and sex work. Ideally I would like it if sex trafficking could be eliminated, but as long as poverty persists and people need money, inevitably they will be people who are “deceived” into doing sex work. There are those “choose” to be in the sex industry; I put choose in quotes, because this term could be arbitrary and are case-specific. If a woman needs money and cannot find a job, sometimes she may not feel she has a real choice. But anyway, that is for another discussion.

For the past few weeks I have been trying to do service-learning and/or conduct research with SWEAT. With the 2010 FIFA World Cup approaching in just a few weeks, many organizations and anti-human trafficking campaigns have taken different approaches to address the expected increase in human trafficking. Researchers and other scholars will disagree on whether they think this a real concern (I have been in contact with different experts in this field, and have very different opinions on the issue.) Nonetheless, it is something being discussed, and one can find many recent articles regarding human trafficking and very different measures being taken by organizations (i.e. Salvation Army’s “Little Treasures” Campaign, policemen’s threat of arresting putting prostitutes in prisons starting a week before the World Cup).

I decided to go to SWEAT’s office yesterday in Salt River just to talk to them. They already said a week ago saying they weren’t looking for volunteers; I just wanted to go and talk to them. The secretary recognized me; she answered the phone two weeks ago when I repeatedly called them. She set me up with Dianne Massawe, one of the main persons in charge.

It was a spontaneous meeting, but for the next hour and a half, we discussed sex work, World Cup, SWEAT, and Cape Town. It was a great—it was a mix of a dialogue, an information session, and an interview. I wrote so many notes and was completely engaged. I left knowing a lot more. Dianne even gave me copies of reports they had written recently and the book Selling Sex in Cape Town. She said she would try to connect me with some people doing research because she knows that was something I was hoping to do. Even if that doesn’t work out, that’s okay. It’s just really exciting learning more this issue I’ve been passionate about, but in a new place, Cape Town.

Next week, I may be meeting with a woman from International Organization of Migration who I think has a very different approach to human trafficking. I may also be meeting with someone from the Human, Gender, and Justice Unit of the University of Cape Town, who doesn’t think that human trafficking is a big deal in South Africa.

By now I would’ve hoped to be starting the planning for a community-based research project in this field, and have my summer planned out. But that was then, and I am in now. Now I’m just taking the time to talk (or at least attempt) to different people just to learn. Even if I don’t get a chance to meet them, I’m learning a lot, just reading about what is being done. Things aren’t going exactly as I had planned, but I’m not sweatin’ it.