Margo St. James: Founder of the Prostitutes' Rights Movement in the U.S.
What's a nice girl like you? was the usual reaction of men to my
becoming a feminist as well as my becoming a prostitute. The
difference for me was I chose to be a feminist, but I decided to
work as a prostitute after being labeled officially by a
misogynist judge in San Francisco at age twenty-five. It was
1962. I said in court, "Your honor, I never turned a trick
in my life!" he responded, "Anyone who knows the
language is obviously a professional." My crime was I knew
too much to be nice girl.
The forerunner of COYOTE was WHO, Whores, Housewives and Others.
Others meant lesbian, but it wasn't being said out loud yet,
even in liberal bohemian circles. The first meeting of WHO was
held on Alan Watt's houseboat. The name COYOTE came from
novelist Tom Robbins who dubbed me the COYOTE Trickster. I was
living in Marin. Richard Hongisto, a liberal sheriff elected in
San Francisco about that time attended my parties. He had been a
cop, and had a sociology degree. I cornered him at a party once
and asked him what it would take to get NOW, and Gay rights
groups to support prostitutes' rights, because he seemed to have
most of the support of the liberal groups in town. He said that
we needed someone from the victim class to speak out, and that
was the only way the issue would be heard.
I decided to be that someone, even though I had only worked for
four years, and wondered what effect speaking out would have on
my life. I received support from my family, my mother, the
housewife-secretary, my sister, the gospel singer with eleven
children, my sailor brother, my son, the salmon fisherman, their
families. Together with friends across the country and around
San Francisco, they convinced me that speaking out was the right
thing to do. My father stopped talking to me.
In 1973 I decided to reconnect with the lawyers and bail
bondsmen I had known and I hoped the hookers would join me The
PR people responsible for getting the sheriff elected
volunteered to help me with COYOTE. They still remembered me. I
had gained some notoriety at the time of my trial and I
successfully appealed the conviction, but it didn't help me find
other gainful employment. A professor at UC gave me some good
leads and resources. Another old friend got a job as a jail
doctor, so I had inside information from him and from the girls.
Prostitutes were still being quarantined at the time which meant
you had to be examined for VD before you could get out of jail.
We stopped the practice the following year.
A liberal mayor was elected, George Moscone, and he hired an
out-of-town Police Chief who the cops didn't like because they
had so far managed to keep minorities and women off the force.
We all know what happened to the Mayor, and a Gay Supervisor,
murder by a former cop. The climate changed after the murders,
and the liberals became afraid to speak up about the issue.
I started organizing internationally with a close friend,
Jennifer James, an anthropology professor in Seattle in 1973.
She coined the word decriminalization and was responsible for
getting NOW to make it a plank in their 1973 convention. COYOTE
published a newsletter from 1974-79 and the Hooker's Ball became
popular, attracting 20,000 people in 1978 at Cow Palace.
I began attending international conferences starting with the
United Nations Decade of Women Conferences in Mexico City, the
1976 Tribunal of Crimes Against Women in Brussels and the 1977
International Women's Year Conference in Houston, the 1980
Decade of Women Conference in Copenhagen, and 1976 Democratic
Convention in New York, where St. James orghanized 'loiter-ins,'
and the Republican Convention in Kansas City. She worked closely
with Gail Pheterson, (editor of Vindication of The Rights of
Whores from Seal Press and author of Prostitution Prism from
University of Michigan Press) beginning in 1983 in Rotterdam,
and with Priscilla Alexander (co-editor of Sex Work from Cleis
Press) since 1977. In 1984 COYOTE hosted a Hooker's Convention
and drafted a Bill of Rights which was the underpinnings for the
World Whores' Charter drawn up by the International Committee
For Prostitutes' Rights in the European Parliament in Brussels.
The conservative swing in the US and the women's movement
prompted me to move to Europe so I could put more energy into
international organizing, Although those wanting to abolish
prostitution were more active than ever, there are politicians
and women's groups willing to stand up for prostitutes in many
countries.
In 1993 I moved back to the United States, married San Francisco
Examiner journalist Paul Avery, and resumed my efforts to repeal
the prohibition and claim human rights for hookers in San
Francisco, which had been my home since 1959. COYOTE was going
strong again thanks to the efforts of Samantha Miller and others
who kept it alive.
Original Link: http://www.bayswan.org/margostory.html
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