Blog @ Work

Art and sexworkers

TWENTY FIRST day of backpacking across Europe with "30-Day Blogging Challenge ON HIATUS"  [13+]

Since I am not that much interested in miniature trains or bikes, I elope for the day to go visit art in the Hamburger Kunsthalle: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=C0Mv21NsE2k Wow, the most exquisite paintings and sculptures I ever saw. Worth every minute of it.

Its extraordinarily large historical breadth from the early 15th century to the end of the 18th century distinguishes the Collection of Old Masters. Also important groups of works and outstanding single objects characterize the Modern Art collection, which has among the most important holdings in Germany. And starting from the origins of the modern period in Classicism and Romanticism, the arc spans from Realism and Naturalism to Impressionism, touching on contemporaneous salon painting, and finally ending with Symbolism. The Kunsthalle covers it all, very impressive.

I am not that interested in the Red District either, although the Reeperbahn of Hamburg is quite famous. So I end up talking to those sex workers and listening to their stories. "Things have been going downhill fast in the last five years," says Andrea, a local streetwalker. She works on Herbertstraße, which runs parallel to the Reeperbahn and is famous for its sign declaring "Men only". She charges tourists 5 euros to answer their questions. "How many customers have you had today?" I ask. "None!" she replies. "What about yesterday?" "Also none."

Statistics suggest that sex workers as a whole consider their personal lives to be more difficult than their life at work. Both the income levels and experience within the sex industry skew towards buyers of sex rather than sellers of sex. As of 2014, the average income of a sex buyer is approximately $60,000 per year; the average for sex providers is about $39,500 per year while the managers take home a mean annual income of $42,000.

According to the University of Victoria survey, 15 percent of the sex workers who took the survey reported having gone through a work-related injury while performing services for a client. Research states that about 97 percent of workers are tested for HIV/AIDS on a regular basis while sex purchasers get tested only 68 percent of the time, which implies that nearly a third more workers monitor their sexual health with diligence. Considering the percentage of sex buyers who are not tested for serious diseases such as HIV/AIDS, the fact that not all sex workers use condoms while on the job represents a frightening risk that some buyers and sellers take each time a transaction takes place.

The majority of sex workers are female, with 77 percent in the sex industry identifying themselves as women. Men represent 17 percent of sex workers while six percent identified as other genders. Only 45 percent of workers in the sex industry consider themselves fully heterosexual, which is less than half of the typical percentage of straight people reported in surveys of the general public. (The internet)

It’s been again a full day with lots to think about. In the evening, I join the others for food, fun and games.

Day TWENTY NINE "Give It 100!"