This week’s Coffee & Conversation topic: Sex and Power
Join us on Zoom this Friday, March 26 at 3 PM EST as we explore the relationship between sex and power in America.
Last week’s domestic terror attack in Georgia, which resulted in the deaths of six Asian women and two other people, reignited a national conversation about sex work. Investigators and police from Cherokee County assured the public it wasn’t a hate crime, saying the gunman indicated “the spas were a temptation for him that he wanted to eliminate.”
Why would a sex-based crime not be a hate crime? What does that framing of the violence say about our ideas of sex, sex work and the people who typically do that work?
Why, in this day and age, is there still such stigma around sex? Who or what systems and structures reinforce these stigmas?
How is that reflected in the sex education curriculum in US schools?
What can be done to shift the Overton Window on this subject with the general public?
Suggested Reading:
- Sex Work is Care Work (GQ)
- A Quarter of America’s Youth Learns About Sex From Porn (Psychology Today)
- How ‘sex addiction’ has historically been used to absolve white men (NBC News)