Portal:Sex work

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Introduction

Sex work is "the exchange of sexual services, performances, or products for material compensation. It includes activities of direct physical contact between buyers and sellers as well as indirect sexual stimulation". Sex work only refers to voluntary sexual transactions; thus, the term does not refer to human trafficking and other coerced or nonconsensual sexual transactions such as child prostitution. The transaction must take place between consenting adults of the legal age and mental capacity to consent and must take place without any methods of coercion, other than payment. The term emphasizes the labor and economic implications of this type of work. Furthermore, some prefer the use of the term because it grants more agency to the sellers of these services. (Full article...)

Selected article - show another

A sanky-panky or sanky is a male sex worker, found in the Dominican Republic. A sanky-panky solicits on beaches and has clients of either both sexes or only women. When with men, the sanky-panky assumes an active (a.k.a. top) role, but when with women, assumes the role of an ideal lover.

While strictly speaking they are not prostitutes, since they do not directly negotiate money for sex, sanky-pankies are more likely to develop a pseudo-relationship which can be continued after the guest returns home. They then might attempt to ask for money to be sent to them primarily by wire transfer, often using elaborate stories of need, involving (for example) sick relatives. A sanky's ultimate goal is often to obtain a marriage visa to the tourist's native country, and marry the tourist before abandoning her.

Another word used for a sanky panky is chapeador (or chapi chapi) A lady is called a chapeadora. This word is derived from the verb "chapear" (to trim or cut, especially with a machete). (Full article...)

List of selected articles

Selected images

Image 1Prostitution Information Centre in Amsterdam (from Prostitution)
Image 2Boat based window prostitute in Utrecht (from Prostitution)
Image 3Sex workers demonstrating for better working conditions at the 2009 Marcha Gay in Mexico City (from Sex work)
Image 4Brothel scene; Brunswick Monogrammist, 1537; Gemäldegalerie, Berlin (from Prostitution)
Image 5An Ancient Greek urn depicts a prostitute and her client. (from Sex work)
Image 6Prostitute c. 1890. (from Prostitution)
Image 7Women in an early San Francisco bordello in 1870 (from Prostitution)
Image 8A prostitute in Amsterdam's red-light district talks with a potential customer. (from Prostitution)
Image 9Kisaeng women from outcast or slave families. (from Prostitution)
Image 10A sex worker in Berlin in 2001 (from Sex work)
Image 11Tart cards in a British phone box advertising call girls, 2005 (from Prostitution)
Image 12Fresco from the Pompeii brothel (from Prostitution)
Image 13A liberated Chinese girl who had been forced in to sexual slavery by the Japanese military sits on a stretcher and speaks to a Royal Air Force officer. (from Prostitution)
Image 14News report about three brothels operating in Albuquerque, New Mexico that were raided by police in 1922 (from Prostitution)
Image 15Prostitutes on display in Yoshiwara during the Meiji Period, Japan (from Prostitution)
Image 16A prostitute and her customer illustrated on an ancient Greek wine cup; the act of prostitution is indicated by the coin purse above the figures. (from Prostitution)
Image 17An oiran preparing herself for a client, ukiyo-e print by Suzuki Haronubu (1765) (from Prostitution)
Image 18A political cartoon from 1787 jesting about the notion of taxation affecting prostitutes (from Prostitution)
Image 19The red light district in Amsterdam (from Sex work)
Image 20The Procuress by Dirck van Baburen (1622) (from Prostitution)
Image 21A detail from plate 1 of William Hogarth's (1697–1764) The Harlot's Progress, showing brothel-keeper Elizabeth Needham, on the right, procuring a young woman who has just arrived in London (from Prostitution)
Image 22World map of prostitution laws
  Decriminalization – No criminal penalties for prostitution
  Legalization (regulation) – Prostitution legal and regulated
  Abolitionism – Prostitution is legal, but organized activities such as brothels and pimping are illegal; prostitution is not regulated
  Neo-abolitionism (Nordic model) – Illegal to buy sex and for 3rd party involvement, legal to sell sex
  Prohibitionism – Prostitution illegal in all aspects (selling and buying)
  Legality varies with local laws
(from Sex work)
Image 23Femmes de Maison, painting by Henri de Toulouse-Lautrec, c. 1893—1895 (from Prostitution)
Image 24
  Legalization – prostitution legal and regulated
  Decriminalization – No criminal penalties for prostitution
  Abolitionism – prostitution is legal, but organized activities such as brothels and pimping are illegal; prostitution is not regulated
  Neo-abolitionism – illegal to buy sex and for 3rd party involvement, legal to sell sex
  Prohibitionism – prostitution illegal
  Legality varies with local laws
(from Prostitution)
Image 25Statue to honor the sex workers of the world. Installed March 2007 in Amsterdam, Oudekerksplein, in front of the Oude Kerk, in Amsterdam's red-light district De Wallen. Titled Belle, the inscription to the piece says "Respect sex workers all over the world." (from Prostitution)
Image 26Stickers affixed to a payphone in São Paulo, 2006 (from Prostitution)

Related portals

Selected general sex worker

Image 1

Mortuary photograph of Elizabeth Stride

Elizabeth "Long Liz" Stride (née Gustafsdotter; 27 November 1843 – 30 September 1888) is believed to have been the third victim of the unidentified serial killer known as Jack the Ripper, who killed and mutilated at least five women in the Whitechapel and Spitalfields districts of London from late August to early November 1888.

Unlike the other four canonical Ripper victims, Stride had not been mutilated following her murder, leading some historians to suspect Stride had not actually been murdered by Jack the Ripper. However, Stride's murder occurred less than one hour before the murder of the Ripper's fourth canonical victim, Catherine Eddowes, within walking distance, and her act of murder is suspected to have been disturbed by an individual entering the crime scene upon a two-wheeled cart. In addition, both women had been murdered by slash wounds to the throat, leading most authors and researchers to consider Stride to be the third of the Ripper's canonical five victims. (Full article...)
Image 2

Carmen Luvana on Set Black In White

Michelle Sandoval (born 23 August 1981), better known by her stage name, Carmen Luvana, is a Puerto Rican film and theatre actress and retired pornographic actress. (Full article...)
Image 3

Jane in 2013

Cynthia Ann Howell (July 16, 1980 – c. January 24, 2024), known professionally as Jesse Jane, was an American pornographic film actress. She became one of the few adult film performers of the 2000s to make the transition into mainstream film and television roles.

Jane was an exclusive contract performer for Digital Playground between 2002 and 2014, starring in the Pirates series of pornographic films. She retired from the adult film industry in 2017 after a career spanning nearly two decades. She was a member of the NightMoves Hall of Fame, XRCO Hall of Fame, and the AVN Hall of Fame. (Full article...)
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Wane in 2008

Taylor Wane is a British actress, model, and former pornographic film performer. She was inducted into the AVN Hall of Fame in 2005 and the XRCO Hall of Fame in 2014 as well as Legends Hall of Fame. (Full article...)
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Jessica Rizzo is a former Italian pornographic actress, stage actress, and entrepreneur. (Full article...)
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Cole Taylor was a pornographic actor who primarily worked in gay adult film in the 1980s. He debuted in 1984, delivered a notable performance in a bisexual film, and starred in what may be gay adult film's first safe sex film in 1985. He died in 1989.

He made his debut in the Nova Studios production Heroes (1984). His acting debut was inauspicious. One reviewer for Manshots magazine noted, "...Taylor was certainly cute, but he lacked the look or sound of mature authority needed to play the role of a teacher convincingly. That was however, the role assigned him by [the director]." "...Taylor's line readings sounded so frothily coy and cheerful, you'd have thought he'd studied with Billie Burke. Miscasting, then had sabotaged a key part of the old Nova formula: That nothing in a man's looks, environment, or voice should seem stereotypically gay." (Full article...)
Image 7

Lane attending a fashion show at the Cabana Club in Hollywood, California in 2009

Tory Lane is an American fetish model, exotic dancer, pornographic actress, and pornographic film director. She was named among the top twenty pornographic actresses at the 2007 Adultcon and has won two AVN Awards. In 2017, she was inducted into the AVN Hall of Fame. (Full article...)
Image 8
Max Konnor is an American gay pornographic film actor and webcam model. After starting his pornographic career under the name Isaiah Foxx in 2009, he left the industry in 2012 to pursue a career in stage and television acting. In 2017, he became a webcam model on CAM4 and started pornographic accounts on OnlyFans and Twitter. He soon started performing in studio-made pornographic films and later became the most-followed Black gay pornographic actor on Twitter and CAM4's first male ambassador.

As a pornographic film actor, he has won five Grabby Awards, five GayVN Awards—including for Performer of the Year in 2022—the XBIZ Award for Gay Performer of the Year, and two Fleshbot Awards. Outside of pornography, he was one of the subjects of the 2021 documentary Being Black in Porn, has appeared as a main cast member on the OutTV reality television series X-Rated: NYC since 2023, and starred in the off-Broadway musical Waiting in the Wings: The Musical in 2023. In 2019, he launched Haus of Konnor, a pornographic agency and studio geared toward gay pornographic actors of color. (Full article...)
Image 9
Bunko Kanazawa (Japanese: 金沢文子, Hepburn: Kanazawa Bunko) is a Japanese adult film actress, who was mostly active in the late 1990s and early 2000s. She has been called "one of the biggest AV idols in Japan". (Full article...)
Image 10
Virginie Gervais (born 24 June 1979), also known as Virginie Caprice, is a French glamour model, television personality, and former pornographic actress. (Full article...)
Image 11

Lynn at the Consumer Electronics Show in Las Vegas, Nevada, January 2002

Porsche Lynn (born February 14, 1962) is an American exotic dancer and pornographic actress. (Full article...)
Image 12
Lulu Devine (born Cynthia Stathopoulos on November 17, 1955, in Boston, Massachusetts) is a former American big-bust feature dancer, model, and pornographic video actress. Lulu turned to dance as a feature dancer during the late 1980s, and by 1990 began a pornographic video career. Lulu is also the older sister of fellow big-bust feature dancer and porn actress Toppsy Curvey. (Full article...)
Image 13
Steve Drake (born April 20, 1954) is a pornographic actor and director. He has performed in over 800 films since the 1980s, and was inducted into the XRCO Hall of Fame in 1999. (Full article...)
Image 14
William Randall Daniels (born September 25, 1951), better known by the stage name Billy Dee, is a retired American adult film actor. (Full article...)
Image 15

Leena or Leena La Bianca (born January 5, 1963) is a former pornographic actress. (Full article...)
Image 16
John Robert Stillman (July 11, 1946 – April 7, 2009), billed professionally as Jack Wrangler, was an American gay pornographic film actor, theatrical producer, director, and writer. He performed in both gay and straight films.

Open about his homosexuality and adult film work throughout his career, Wrangler was an icon of the gay-liberation movement. The 2008 feature-length documentary Wrangler: Anatomy of an Icon examines his life and career. (Full article...)
Image 17

Éva Henger (born 2 November 1972) is an Italian-Hungarian actress, television personality, singer, model, internet personality, and former pornographic actress. (Full article...)
Image 18

Michelle Ferrari in 2007

Michelle Ferrari, (born 22 December 1983) is an Italian pornographic actress and television personality.

Born as Cristina Ricci in La Spezia, Ferrari started her career in 2005 with an amateur film shot with her boyfriend of the time. She chose her stage name thanks to a vague resemblance to the television personality Michelle Hunziker. (Full article...)
Image 19

Ribas in 2013

Toni Ribas (born 13 June 1975 as Antoni García Cabra) is a Spanish pornographic actor and director. In 2010, he was inducted into the AVN Hall of Fame.

Ribas began acting in pornography in 1994. Ribas worked for Brazzers and performed in 78 videos as of 2 November 2018. He performed in about 1,300 videos in his pornographic career. (Full article...)
Image 20

Sunset Thomas attending the AVN Awards Show at the Palms Casino Resort, Las Vegas, Nevada on January 9, 2010

Diane Thomas (born Diane Fowler), known professionally as Sunset Thomas, is an American artist and former pornographic actress. She was runner-up for Penthouse Pet of the Year in 1998 and is a member of the AVN, XRCO, and Legends of Erotica halls of fame.

She is also a boxing journalist. (Full article...)
Image 21

Jaymes in 2014

Jessica Redding (March 8, 1979 – September 17, 2019), known by her stage name Jessica Jaymes, was an American pornographic actress. She was Hustler's first contract model and the "Hustler Honey of the Year" in 2004, the August 2008 Penthouse Pet of the Month, and the co-founder of Spizoo, a pornographic film studio. (Full article...)
Image 22

Mitchell in 2006

Sharon Mitchell is an American sexologist and former pornographic film actress and director. In 1998, she founded the Adult Industry Medical Health Care Foundation (AIM), which tested over 1,000 adult film performers per month before a 2011 data breach led to a lawsuit and the clinic's closure. (Full article...)
Image 23

Hart in 2002

Jane Esther Hamilton (born October 27, 1956) is an American former pornographic actress and current adult film director who performed under the stage name Veronica Hart during the 1980s. She is sometimes credited as Jane Hamilton, V. Hart, Veronica Heart, Victoria Holt, Randee Styles or just Veronica. Hart is a member of the AVN Hall of Fame.
Director Paul Thomas Anderson has called her "the Meryl Streep of porn." (Full article...)
Image 24

Angel in 2010

Buck Angel (born June 5, 1962) is an American sex educator and former pornographic film actor and producer. He founded the media production company Buck Angel Entertainment. Angel is a transsexual man. He currently works as an advocate and educator. Angel served on the board of directors of the Woodhull Freedom Foundation from 2010 to 2016. The Foundation works to affirm sexual freedom as a fundamental human right through advocacy and education. (Full article...)
Image 25
Bill Gray, known professionally as Billy Santoro, is an American gay pornographic actor. He first began performing in gay pornographic films in 2013 as an exclusive model for Men.com, and appeared in Lucas Entertainment's first-ever bareback film alongside his then-boyfriend Seth Santoro later that year. He became a popular performer in the mid-2010s and appeared in over 200 gay pornographic films by 2017. He later became known for his controversies, including his tweets advocating for the shooting of Black people during the George Floyd protests in 2020. (Full article...)

Did you know...

... that a Harvey's franchise known for being a hub for sex work was described by one artist as a "legendary Toronto icon"?
... that Lea Ackermann, a German nun of the Missionary Sisters of Our Lady of Africa, fought against forced prostitution and sex tourism in East Africa?
... that the posthumously released documentary Clean centered on the life of Sandra Pankhurst, a former sex worker, drag queen, and crime scene cleaner?
... that Indonesian politician Sanusi's parents discouraged him from becoming a government employee, because his salary would be paid partly from taxes on alcohol and prostitution?