Just came across this synopsis of the 2011 San Francisco Sex Worker Festival:
From artists' models to muses, from hetaira to geishas, sex workers have been vital participants in arts communities through the centuries. Despite their influence on the arts and culture, polite societies rarely acknowledge the contributions of the demimonde who have also been painters and poets themselves. Lately a growing number are working in contemporary media, film and video, and performing in solo, ensemble theater and in burlesque revues.. Sex worker art festivals and performances, spanning the globe, chronicle contemporary sexual mores with a vision that penetrates our hypocrisies. Films and videos will focus on sex; prostitutes' rights; organizing efforts and working conditions for strippers; more sex; global sex work and sex work as a labor issue on the international agenda; sex workers as heroes and heroines; sex workers as saints; sex workers as jerks and perverts; sex work and gender identities; queer sex workers; sex education; sex art; sex panic; sexual orientation; sexual identity; porn and erotica; portraits of strippers, prostitutes, doms, madams and much more.
Not sure what to think about it. It's one thing to find innovative ways to discuss the harsh realities of human trafficking and the sex trade but this seems a bit too much like it's glorifying behaviors that clearly subjugate people.
What's your take? Are we missing the point?
Share your thoughts in the comments below.