On December 20th the Supreme Court of Canada released the Bedford decision, striking down Canada’s prostitution laws as unconstitutional, suspending the decision for one year. As an interested law student, I shadowed a member of one of the intervenors in the case, the Asian Women’s Coalition Ending Prostitution (“AW”), at the media scrum on the day the decision was handed down. AW is a group from British Columbia concerned for the safety and rights of Asian women in Canada, and was compelled to intervene in the case. There is disproportionate representation of Asian women in the sex industry that is highly visible in Vancouver. AW expressed concern that Asian women are especially vulnerable to the sex industry due to factors such as trafficking, poverty, language barriers and racism. Furthermore, the group made it clear that racialization in sex industry advertising reinforces racial stereotypes of Asian women (for instance, the submissive Chinese doll stereotype).
In light of these concerns, the group approached the case with a nuanced legal position. They argued the Supreme Court should consider the sex industry through the lens of gender and racial equality, given that equality is a key value of the Charter of Rights and Freedoms. They ultimately advised applying Canada’s prostitution laws to johns and pimps but not prostitutes. The position was also shared by another intervenor, the Women’s Coalition for Abolition (a coalition that included groups such as the Canadian Association of Elisabeth Fry Societies and the Native Women’s Association of Canada). “Prostitution should not be fully legalized, nor fully criminalized because it would only exacerbate the equality issues Asian women and other women of colour face – that is why we proposed this third option,” I was told by Sarah Mah, of AW.
As a Vancouverite myself, I am convinced the disproportionate representation of women of colour in the sex industry is common knowledge. The racial stereotypes of Asian women in the sex trade have been the topic of jokes in my conversations with others in Vancouver. Asian Women backs their analysis of race and racial stereotypes with studies they conduct on print and online advertising. For example, Craigslist and the Georgia Straight, a Vancouver newspaper infamous for its back-page “massage” advertising, have been sources of information for the group. Extensive academic research also has revealed the racism in prostitution. One study randomly interviewed prostitutes in Vancouver, finding 52% of them to be Aboriginal in spite of the fact that Aboriginal women made up around 5% of Vancouver’s population at the time, acknowledging the reality of disproportionate representation of Aboriginal women in prostitution.
While racial equality issues may not have been addressed in the Bedford decision, there is no valid reason to ignore them in the larger debate about how prostitution should be dealt with legislatively. Nevertheless, the mainstream media has been largely silent on the issue of racism. This silence is nothing new: A 2010 study done by communications students at Simon Fraser University took a sample of 105 relevant newspaper articles published by major media companies discussing prostitution in the context of the lower court Bedford decision; they found that while a small percentage of articles mentioned gender inequality, none mentioned racial inequality as a factor in prostitution. Moreover, the study found the articles gave almost no voice to NGOs representing racial minorities, in spite of the fact that prostitutes are vastly overrepresented by women of colour. The latest coverage and my experience at the media scrum on December 20th revealed similar disregard for matters of racial equality and for groups representing racial minorities.
The silence on the issue of racial equality and prostitution is troubling. As a white male I can only begin to imagine the challenges and barriers faced by women of colour and how prostitution intersects with those challenges. That the major media has not approached or voiced the opinion of key groups representing those most affected by prostitution only distorts Canadians’ ability to understand and have a reasonable opinion. Perhaps if we included these groups adequately in mainstream coverage and debate, we would be talking more about prostitution in the context of equality.
In the coming year, Canadians and Parliament need to ask serious questions about prostitution. The Supreme Court of Canada in the Bedford case acknowledged that many women are not in prostitution because of choice but rather because of economic necessity, addiction, mental illness or coercion. Based on the reasoning of the court, the government therefore has a responsibility to ensure that laws around prostitution do not worsen the dangers of the sex trade for women. In accomplishing this, Parliament also has an opportunity to draft prostitution laws that are truly designed to promote equality in Canada.
Moving forward, the appropriate course of action is not to simply frame the matter under isolated notions such as “freedom” or “consenting adults” as has been done in the mainstream media. The appropriate course of action is to hear from all affected groups, as they are best situated to express widespread experiences and concerns as well as viable solutions. Many of these groups are already represented and have for some time been speaking on this and other important issues. As law students in privileged positions of leadership in our communities I hope, at the very least, that we listen.