On Saturday, November 16th, we tabled (for the first time ever) at Zine Fest Houston–and wow, were we ever over the moon! We’re still riding the high from all of the beautiful DIY community, grassroots organizers, artists, and neighbors who came through and shared their love, support and solidarity with us. We got to see some comrades from Austin, the Bay Area, and Portland, and make new friends and comrades in Houston. Shout out to the gorgeous venue, The Orange Show Center for Visionary Art!
We tabled next to the fierce baddies, Youth Voices Empowered collective of Grace Place, and learned about their critical healing and advocacy work for queer and trans youth, neighbors experiencing housing insecurity and discrimination in Houston. Please follow and support their efforts! We also got to IRL meet the combabes from F*ck You Pay Me (zine) and WOW, we were fan-femme-ing HARD! Definitely seek out their zines!
We reached, and slightly exceeded our fundraising goal (the first time at a zine fest this year)! Big gratitude to everyone who donated and snagged some zines! We debuted our latest zine, “all the Hookers in me are tired,” at the fest too! This mini zine came about because of some big frustrations we’ve had with whorephobia on the left, and we really want non-sex working people to sit with our anger and then help us make the organized left a safer place for sex working comrades.
We distributed over 25 drug testing strips (to test for fentanyl and xylazine) and talked extensively with many fest-goers about how to access and download our free digital publications like our letter writing guide, our resources for teaching or health care provision and our SW Syllabus. We loved seeing and hearing other zinesters discuss abortion as a community responsibility, emergency contraceptive access and distribute condoms at their tables! More of that at all zine fests please!
Our Austin, Tx crew had such a blast—thank y’all so much for the hospitality Houston!
A lot of people asked us how to get involved, THANK YOU! While we’re still a closed collective (meaning not actively recruiting at this time), there are absolutely ways to support our work, and the movement to destigmatize and decriminalize the sex trades.
Here are a few action moves we suggest:
- Start a reading group with your chosen family and/or co-workers. We recommend to begin sustainably, and be gentle and flexible with each other. Pick a time every other month, read a chapter or an article or watch something together for starters, involve food or drink, and schedule time for both discussion and gossip. You can use our SW Syllabus as a jumping off point, but there’s so much more that’s been published/created since we did those initial readings! Be sure to check out Bluestockings Cooperative’s Sex Work titles.
- Get involved with Harm Reduction organizations. Where’s there solid harm reduction work being done/offered, you can bet sex workers are involved. Nothing says you care like carrying Naloxone/Narcan, drug testing strips, condoms AND knowing how to use them all. Whether clean needle exchange programs, building safer sniffing kits, or learning how to reverse an overdose gets you excited, you’ll be sure to get plugged into decrim and destigmatization work locally. Check out the N.I.C.E. Project, the Texas Harm Reduction Coalition, Houston Harm Reduction Alliance and Space City Anarchist Organization.
- Support our ongoing fundraising efforts. Right now, we’re engaged in a number of grassroots fundraising efforts to support our comrades and co-conspirators. By giving and/or sharing these campaigns, you’re helping us directly reach new communities with our radical whore agenda! If supporting sex working/trading parents and care-givers is your thing, check out our t-shirt drive. Maybe you want to ensure that one of our political homes can keep its doors open? You’ll want to check out how to support Bluestockings here. A few of our comrades have to pay heavy restitution fees even after doing time in federal prison. You can help them out here. Just want to make sure our crew has what they need? See our “donate” page.
- Support our fellow comrade workers like Massage Parlor workers, Street Vendors, and other criminalized economy trades by showing up when demonstrations are called, defending workers both politically and socially, shutting down racist and classist rhetoric about these workers, and obviously…be a good patron! Read up on the linked orgs that are fighting alongside workers for rights, workplace protections, destigmatization, and an end to police intimidation!
- Hire us, tip us, and pay for your porn. No really…we quite literally need our clientele’s $$$ to exist in this capitalist hellscape. Whether you’re going to the club, signing up for a fan subscription, picking us up, or scheduling a date, be cool, be respectful, be about giving us money.
💋Where can you find us next?💋
Texas: 💥Mark your calendars to join us for San Anto Zine Fest 2024! 💥December 1st, 10am-5pm 💥Sociedad Fraternal Cruz Blanca at 1619 W. Poplar, San Antonio TX, 78207 💥Free and All Ages welcome 💥Masking required and free masks provided 💥Featuring zinesters from near and far, zine workshops, and new t-shirts!💥The theme is Lucha Libre! 💥
Chicago: Save the date for another Dante’s Originals event, 7PM, December 21st!
NYC: Want to get involved with work to decriminalize the trades in NY? Check out our comrades in DecrimNY (a coalition of orgs and individuals, that we are founding members of). DecrimNY is responsible for the proposed bill Stop Violence in the Sex Trades Act (SVSTA) and regularly engages in public demonstrations, lobby days, mutual aid efforts and more. Fill out their interest form here.