DC Madam Scandal Highlights the Ethics of Sex Worker Confidentiality

Jesse Leavenworth at The Hartford Courant interviewed a number of sex worker advocates and former sex workers about the case of Deborah Palfrey, the so-called DC Madam.

The women Leavenworth quoted are in agreement: it is appropriate for Palfrey to release her records.

• "It does impact the trust that is important between clients and sex workers." But revealing clients' identities is "an obvious strategy for sex workers who are criminalized." — Carol Leigh, Bay Area Sex Workers Advocacy Network
• "I think the woman is alone. This is a very lonely occupation. We deal in a very isolated business and we have very little support, and now her finances have been cut off and she is facing total ruin. ... All I have to say to Deborah Palfrey is, 'Go for it, girl,'" — Robyn Few, Sex Workers Outreach Project U.S.A.
• Secrecy is important. But the federal government has pushed Palfrey to the edge. "If somebody is out to destroy you, you have to fight back." — Veronica Monet, author of Veronica Monet's Sex Secrets of Escorts

But some people with ties to sex work think Palfrey should have remained silent. Leavenworth finds this quote on the Web:

• "I know she's probably being swallowed up alive, and a lot of people can't take that weight on their shoulders, but she's naming names and that goes against my principles — I realized I'd sunk my ship, but I wasn't taking anyone with me." — Heidi Fleiss, the "Hollywood Madam," quoted in Radar Online

Because much sex work is illegal in most US jurisdictions, there are no special legal protections for either sex workers or their clients. There are no sex worker shield laws like there are for journalists. No sex worker/client privilege, analogous to attorney/client privilege, exists. While we expect privacy in the bedroom, we don't expect the sanctity of the confessional.

Ought there be? I could argue that by the intimate nature of a sex worker's services, there is an implicit expectation of confidentiality between the sex worker and the client, on a par with the explicit expectation of confidentiality between psychotherapists and their clients. (Therapy and sex work have a lot in common, for example the issues of transference and countertransference.)

At the same time, we aren't talking about an ideal world here where sex work is professionalized and respected; we're talking about the real world, where sex work is marginalized and despised. The system is set up already with a bias in favor of the clients. Sex workers are stigmatized and punished. Their clients, if they have sufficient class status or power, are routinely ignored. (This is clearly classed: Police vice squads routinely operate sting operations against clients of streetwalkers; but have you ever heard of an expensive escort service that turned out to be a front for a vice squad sting?)

In the real world, the deck is stacked against sex workers. Is it ethical for them to resort to desperate measures in the real world that would be unethical in an ideal one?

The ethical questions around a sex worker's client list are by no means clear, neither for the sex worker or for the journalist into whose hands it might fall. I am extremely interested in what someone like Lindsay Beyerstein would have to say about the matter.

(via Melissa Gira at Sexerati [NSFW])