Guest guest Posted November 5, 2002 Report Share Posted November 5, 2002 Dear Rod Daldry, Of course there are many male sex workers in India. The concept of MSM (men having sex with men or men seeking men) developed by AIDS projects cover them along with gay, higra and other male sexuality minority communities with local specialities. As you say, there really is a silence about male sex workers also. The point I am trying to make is that they are addressed through the MSM concept in the prevention of HIV transmission. But as sexuality a taboo subject, the male sex workers are the most 'unpleasant' of the lot. When we helped the sex workers of Kerala to organise themselves we did include male sex workers also. So is the case of many sex workers organisations of India. But the AIDS Control Societies of States and NACO do hide behind the concept of MSM which is convenient for them to ignore the ostracization and the harassment they undergo. Again if they accept male sex work a reality then they couldn't sing about ' rehabilitation of sex workers, those poor downtrodden women, no sex work only exploitation, poverty=sex work ' saga. Suddenly ' male exploitation of women ' frame work has to be dropped and the concept of ' sex work a reality ' has to be accepted. This will lead to difficulties, which they do not want to address for political and social reasons. Again there are many sexuality minority communities with different names in different states also. Some of the members of these communities now live as sex workers, so there is a confusion also in categorising male sex workers. But after considering all factors and organising them we think we need the category of male sex workers. Because many MSMs are not sex workers and they don't want to identify themselves as sex workers. So to keep them together as a community and doing the AIDS prevention projects is not possible. But then writing reports in AIDS prevention projects is a fantasy, so no problem there. Anyway thank you for raising this unpleasant subject. By the by please don't use ' commercial ' in front of sex work, as any other profession is commercial we don't have to specify it. Or if you want it badly then please add, commercial doctors, commercial lawyers, commercial poets, commercial social workers and commercial politicians. They also get paid for their services also. Love Maitreya E-mail: <maitreya@...> _________________________________________ Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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