Open Letter to the Media – Educate Yourselves
The Desiree Alliance, The Black Sex Worker Collective, Outlaw Project, New Jersey Red Umbrella Alliance, and the Best Practices Policy Project is partnering with the Center for HIV Law and Policy-CHLP to bring attention to the media’s portrayal of sex work and HIV. Recent articles by mainstream media have once again depicted sex workers as disease vectors and the bearers of transmission. Their ignorance is insulting and not factual. Information put out by the media is outdated and dangerous, not only to all sex workers, but especially to sex workers living with HIV and to anyone who lives with HIV. The language put forth is nothing new. It’s been a tired trope anytime that sex work and HIV are in the same room. In this day of technology, it would seem those representing the media would do an elementary Google search on what science has done for the HIV epidemic; it’s that simple. Instead, we read articles with language that still interprets HIV as a death sentence. The percentages of “Knowingly giving” or , “Knowingly spreading” or “Knowingly concealing” or “Knowingly infected”, etc., is virtually non-existent in any population. The repercussions of this language in print does nothing but create stigma, bad laws, and perpetuates violence against sex worker communities.
As a coalition of sex worker rights organizations, we have fought back against harmful language and laws used against us. We work hand-in-hand with organizations such as CHLP to eradicate laws that create criminalization and prevent PLWHA from leading healthy and productive lives. Journalists are bound to report on facts not opinions. Leave that for the Op-eds. Educate yourselves!