Rachel Moran Biography
- Title:
- Co-Founder of Survivors of Prostitution-Abuse Calling for Enlightenment (SPACE) International
- Position:
- Con to the question "Should Prostitution Be Legal?"
- Reasoning:
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“I entered the sex trade — as most do — before I was even a woman…
[A]t 15, I met a young man who thought it would be a good idea for me to prostitute myself. As ‘fresh meat,’ I was a commodity in high demand.
For seven years, I was bought and sold. On the streets, that could be 10 times in a night. It’s hard to describe the full effect of the psychological coercion, and how deeply it eroded my confidence. By my late teens, I was using cocaine to dull the pain.
I cringe when I hear the words ‘sex work.’ Selling my body wasn’t a livelihood. There was no resemblance to ordinary employment in the ritual degradation of strangers’ using my body to satiate their urges. I was doubly exploited — by those who pimped me and those who bought me.
I know there are some advocates who argue that women in prostitution sell sex as consenting adults. But those who do are a relatively privileged minority — primarily white, middle-class, Western women in escort agencies — not remotely representative of the global majority. Their right to sell doesn’t trump my right and others’ not to be sold in a trade that preys on women already marginalized by class and race.”
“Buying Sex Should Not Be Legal,” New York Times, Aug. 28, 2015
- Involvement and Affiliations:
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- Co-founder and European Coordinator, SPACE International, 2012-present
- Works with Coalition Against Trafficking in Women
- Works with European Women’s Lobby
- Works with Equality Now
- Former prostitute in Dublin, Ireland
- Education:
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- BA, Journalism, Dublin City University
- Other:
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- Twitter: @RachelRMoran
- Quoted in: