I'm getting so tired of all those articles that are so filled with complete bullshit about Amsterdam's Red Light District. So often they state completely false facts, and they're being written by people who already have a negative idea about prostitution before they started writing about it.
It's interesting to see how often those articles are British. Apparently British people love to talk very negative about prostitution and especially Amsterdam's Red Light District, I guess this is also one of the main reasons why so many British people always come to Amsterdam's Red Light District to party. After all, nothing's more sexier then a taboo.

This article is another one of those examples, written by Lily Rae, a 'writer and musician', because obviously writers and musicians have an intimate understanding of Amsterdam's Red Light District, prostitution and human trafficking. But beyond that Lily Rae isn't exactly an expert on this subject, her article shows that Lily Rae already had a negative view on prostitution and Amsterdam's Red Light District before ever getting in touch with it. Her description of how uncomfortable she felt, and how women are being displayed as pieces of meat, shows this woman has difficulties to understand the world of prostitution, and has already condemned prostitution on itself before ever getting informed about it.
But besides the prejudice of the writer, there's something else wrong with this article. The article is filled with absolutely false facts. Some things just aren't true at all, some things are a bit different from how she describes it (as a result of not informing herself about the actual facts), and some things are just pure assumptions.

Interestingly enough her title is one of the few things that she is correct about. "Why Amsterdam's prostitution laws laws are still failing to protect or empower women". The reasons she used to support this conclusion however are so filled with misinformation, that stating this based upon her arguments, is very far from the truth.

The first mistake the article makes is already in the very first line of the article:


Prostitution hasn't already been a crime since 1809 in The Netherlands, but prostitution wasn't (locally) regulated until the 1st of October of 2000. Wherever Lily came up with that it was legislated in 1988 I don't know, but fact is that this is NOT TRUE.

The second line of her article isn't much better:






Yes, indeed, how surprising that a woman that feels disgusted with prostitution, claims that 'the system hasn't worked'. But I wonder what real facts the has to support this claim.

The first thing she claims is:


Indeed Amsterdam can be an expensive place, but would that have been any different if prostitution was not legalized? I don't think so. In fact, since prostitution has such a big stigma, prices of houses around areas of prostitution are usually lower, because nobody wants to live next to a prostitute. And because nobody wants to live next to a prostitute, the houses close by are usually not very wanted, causing the prices to go down. So you could even argue that without legalizing it, Amsterdam may have been even more expensive without it's window prostitution.
But I don't recall Amsterdam being more expensive then any other Western capital city, and this still doesn't say anything about the prices of the window rent. The price that she mentions 'up to one hundred euro a night' is another example of how poorly misinformed the author is about Amsterdam's Red Light District. Prices are closer to 150 euro then 100 euro for a night, and above all, it wasn't the legalization that caused these prices to be so high.

She continues with more bullshit:


Apparently the author is assuming we need a pimp. Well my dear Lily, I'm sorry to break your bubble here, but most girls don't have a pimp, simply because we don't need it. After all, there are basically two things a pimp can offer. The first one is to get you clients, but since we're all grouped together in an area that is famous for it's prostitution, we don't need any pimps to get clients. All the negotiations with the client happen directly with us, not through a pimp. If you would've looked up, and not starred so much with your head down at those cobble stones, you might have actually also seen this. But because you choose not to look, you also weren't able to check if the image you have about Amsterdam's Red Light District corresponds with the realities.
The second reason a girl would need a pimp for is for protection. But let this be one of the reasons why they legalized prostitution in the first place. In countries where prostitution is illegal, often a girl will have a pimp that protects the girl in exchange for a part of her income. But in Amsterdam we already have protection from the police, since it's a legal profession, and we don't have the need for any protection from pimps. After all, you said it yourself, we have a freakin' alarm button!

She also claims we pay tax 'if she registers', as if it's an option to register yourself or not. In her article she links to this article, which makes the same claim. Also there they claim that only 5 percent are registered for tax. I have no idea where these people get this bullshit, but that's absolutely not true. In fact, you can't even work without being registered, you won't even get a window from the brothel owner without showing your registration papers every single day that you rent the room (and yes, I seriously mean every single fucking day).
So it's not a choice to register yourself. All window prostitutes have to be registered at the Chambers of Commerce, without it they won't even get a window, and being registered at the Chambers of Commerce automatically means you have to pay tax. So that only 5 percent would be registered is complete and utter bullshit and completely false, and this also get's regularly checked by police, prostitution inspectors, the Dutch IRS and the brothel owner itself.

Then she says something interesting about the social stigma of prostitution. An interesting thing, since she's actually the one who helps to create exactly that stigma that she's talking about. Fortunately the government allows prostitutes to register themselves under different definitions besides the definition of just prostitute. A while ago the government tried to change that, to get more insight in to who is a prostitute or not, but since that violated our privacy, and could even endanger us (the Chambers of Commerce register is open to the public) for example by stalkers, they scrapped this idea, and allowed prostitutes to be registered under different definitions.
In short, prostitutes aren't scared to register themselves for tax, since they can register themselves under different definitions, and don't have to 'publicly announce' that they work as a prostitute. Another example of simply being poorly informed.

She continues with another example which shows her ignorance about the subject, when she writes:


I don't know if this woman simply is misinformed about the prices we charge, or didn't finish her school. But if she claims that the price of a window rent is 100 euro, and the standard price we charge is 50, then we would only need 3 clients to make 50 euro for ourselves. Based on her own 'facts', 10 clients a day would come down to 500 euro (50 euro X 10 clients), and according to her the window rent would be 100 euro, so that would leave us with 400 euro a day! Based on 15 clients a day, this would even come down to 650 euro profit for us a day! If these were the amount of clients I had a day, I'd be very happy. Honestly though, I'm happy if I get 10 clients a day on a regular day.
Another assumption she makes, one that people often make, is that we have to have sex with clients. First of all, saying it like this makes it sound like it's something bad. 'We have to have sex'. But let's be honest, if you have a problem to have sex with other people, then prostitution clearly isn't your type of job. The ones that do, don't have a problem with having sex with other people for money. So stating it like this, is like stating that the toilet lady has to clean the toilet 20 times a day. Yeah, obviously, that's the whole point of the job, isn't it?!
But more importantly, it isn't even true. Like I've explained already many times, we don't have sex with all of our customers. In fact, we have sex with less then half our customers, because most are too drunk or too stoned or too nervous to even get a hard one. Also, the prostitutes don't 'have to have sex', it's their business, they decide if they have sex with customers or not, and they decide which customers they let it or not. I've written extensively on this subject before, as you can read here.
The author also links to an article that is supposed to be the 'proof' of these claims. But when you read the article, it simply becomes laughable. It claims for instance that "approximately 9000 people had been trafficked into the sex industry in Amsterdam", which is really funny, because that's even more then the total estimated prostitutes in the sex industry in Amsterdam itself, which ranges from 4000 to 7000 prostitutes. In short, the number of trafficked victims for prostitution in Amsterdam would be bigger then the total amount of prostitutes themselves. I could go on more about this article, but I think this is already enough to show you that this bullshit is a complete lie.

The article continues by stating:


I did an actual headcount of the number of prostitutes that have been murdered in the Amsterdam Red Light District since 1990, and the facts come down to only 5, and not 12 like the author states here. Apparently the author is still under the assumption that prostitution was legalized already in 1988, thus beginning to count the number of murder from 1990 to prove her point that the situation has gotten worse, and safety has gotten worse.
Fun fact is, that legalization of course didn't start until 2000, and that since that period the numbers of prostitutes that have been murdered in this country (the author focuses only on Amsterdam, but it's not just Amsterdam where prostitution is legal, but the entire country) has decreased with 35%, as you can read in my article about prostitution murders in Holland here.
So again a case of being misinformed.

The article continues with more misinformed information:


Of course 20 years should have been 8 years. Because of course in reality prostitution didn't get legalized until 2000 rather then 1988, and the city council decided already 8 years later to cut down the number of brothels back in 2008.
Besides that also the numbers of windows are wrong, there are in total 283 and not 243 windows in the Red Light District, and more importantly, there never where 482 windows in the Red Light District, this was the total amount of windows in Amsterdam as a whole and not just the Red Light District itself. Besides the famous Red Light District known as De Wallen, Amsterdam has two other areas with window prostitution, De Pijp (Ruysdealkade) with about 45 windows and the Singel area with about 66 windows.
And indeed the city council did claim to close down windows due to criminal activities, but in reality (and this is also publicly known), the city council lost that accusation in court because they had no proof of this, and afterwards simply bought out the owner, like I already explained here above.

The article continues with another statement that never gets proven anywhere:



And then continues by blaming the government from profiting off the 'sex trade' itself:


Of course her added 'we are supposed to feel better in the knowledge that this profession is sanctioned by the government', is again an example of how the author tries to suggest negative things, without actually stating it. The only thing she does get right here, is the fact that the government itself profits from prostitution itself, which is also why we always call the government itself our biggest pimp.

She then continues with the most famous bullshit of all:


Unlike most articles, this article doesn't dare itself to calling out numbers or percentages of numbers of women being forced into prostitution. In stead it chooses to simply suggest things, by adding in "I'm told there are many women who do enjoy prostitution; I've yet to hear of one, though(...)". Again more 'telling', 'thinking' and assuming things, without any actual facts.
The fact that she hasn't heard of one prostitute who enjoys prostitution isn't such a surprising thing, if you're only looking online for stories about forced prostitutes, that's what you'll find. Truth is, you can find plenty of prostitutes talking about how they enjoy prostitution. However, I'm not one of them. I don't 'enjoy' prostitution. And why should I? Is it necessary for prostitutes to enjoy their job in order not to have a problem with it? How many people 'enjoy' their work really? 
The point if you enjoy your work or not is irrelevant, the point of it being a choice of your own however is much more important. And fact is that many women, even many victims of human trafficking itself, choose for prostitution by themselves. It's a common misunderstanding that victims of human trafficking didn't choose to do prostitution. That's primarily only the case with forced prostitutes, but fact is that most human trafficking cases are about exploitation and not so much forced prostitution. 
But this is an old trick, first claiming that you doubt someone's choice for prostitution, to subsequently link it to 'enjoying' the profession. How many of you had a free choice to do the job you're doing now, versus how many of you 'enjoy' your profession? Fact is that almost nobody 'enjoys' his or her profession, but that doesn't mean it wasn't a free choice they made for themselves.

The second part of this piece is another bullshit statistic, claiming that the average age for entering the sex trade is 14. The article links to an article of NOMAS, a 'national organisation for men against sexism' and tags 'pro-feminists' as one of their target groups. The sources for these statements however all come down to researches being done in the U.S., and not in Holland, but more importantly this was a studied that surveyed only minors. So obviously a survey about minors is going to show you a very young age, since it's about MINORS! Someone else wrote an entire article about this, which you can find here.
Truth however is, yet again, like I stated above, that there's simply no way a minor could work behind the windows in Amsterdam. And from personal experience I can tell that the average age for entering prostitution, regarding women in the Red Light District, is closer to 23 then to 13. So again completely false information.

Then the article continues with another statement that's been bugging me lately:


Does legalizing something create a higher demand? Let's examine that claim for a moment. If prostitution would be illegal, would there be less men wanting to visit a prostitute? No, since they still do it, but it just happens unprotected, thus unsafe. Do more men visit prostitutes because it's legal? Well, maybe, there are no statistics about this as far as I know, so this perhaps could be true, but stating it without any proof is just assuming it.
But let's look at it the other way around. Does legalizing prostitution create a bigger stream of women willing to do sex work? Yes, because that's exactly what's going on here. Fact is that in most parts of the world prostitution is illegal, though there are plenty of women willing to do sex work as a job, to simply make a lot of money, or just purely as a survival option.
Fact is that because Holland made prostitution legal as the first country in the world, this has had an attraction to women wanting to enter prostitution, or already working in prostitution in their own country where prostitution was illegal, and therefore also unsafe. By legalizing prostitution, Holland created a beacon of hope and safety for these women, thus creating the effect that many women moved to Holland, because here they could perform this job in a safe way, unlike their home country.
Besides that, I've also explained before, that because Holland legalized prostitution, it was also able to monitor better human trafficking, since it now surfaced from the underworld. Because it surfaced, Holland was able to register better, and therefor more, human trafficking, giving them the possibilities to help more women, in stead of neglecting them and ignoring the very fact that victims exists, simply by making it illegal.
In short, bigger numbers of trafficking, simply imply that Holland has got a better idea of the realities of human trafficking, unlike countries that have trouble to register it, because it's all happening underground.

And then the next part of the article brings us to the infamous Saban B.:


This is the case of Saban B., the notorious pimp which caused a shock reaction through Holland, and eventually was the reason why the city government started with their project 1012, to close down windows in the Red Light District. Now besides the fact that Saban B. began already back in the end of the 1990's, before prostitution was legalized, and was already repeatedly reported to the police by both brothel owners and prostitutes pressing charges, it was the police who did nothing for almost 10(!) years, until eventually they dusted off the files and began to look into the case, leading to his arrest.
But here's my question. Was it despite of Holland legalizing prostitution that they caught Saban B. and his gang of brutal pimps? Or was it due to Holland legalizing prostitution that they were able to catch him? After all, if prostitution would have been illegal, none of the victims or the brothel owners would ever have gone to the police with their stories, leading to his arrest. But it was due to the fact that prostitution was legal, that prostitutes and brothel owners weren't afraid to go to the police to report this man, leading to his arrest, even though this still took way too long
This is the very essence of why legalized prostitution is better. Because prostitution is legal, Holland is able to get a better insight in the world of prostitution, thus gaining more information about who the victims and the pimps are, in order to do something about it. While in countries where prostitution is still illegal, the very reason why they don't have such high numbers of trafficking and arrest of pimps, is because of the very simple reason that prostitutes and brothel owners are scared to go to the police, since they're doing something that's illegal and things will never get registered.
Make it legal, and indeed you'll get higher numbers of trafficking, and indeed you'll get more pimps arrested, but isn't that the whole point to get more pimps arrested? Would you rather have lower statistics, because you can't catch the bad guys, or higher statistics leading to more arrests and making the world a safer place?

Then the article continues with another report:


Yes, the infamous Stop The Traffik campaign, which according to Esta Steyn, director of Stop The Traffik Holland, wasn't their campaign, but they were nearly asked by the makers of the campaign if they could use their organisation their name (can you believe it?).
Just because a video says so, doesn't make it true, and fact is that the few women that Esta Steyn has talked to working in the Red Light District in Amsterdam, were not forced. In fact, she hasn't spoken to one single girl from the Amsterdam Red Light District which had been a victim of human trafficking. Which makes one wonder, how can you claim things if you've never actually even met one?
Another fun fact is that indeed the video states 'sadly the end up here', but funny enough those 'thousands' of women they're talking about don't even have enough room, since, like I wrote down here before, Amsterdam only has about 400 windows, and the Red Light District itself has only 283 windows. So how do 'thousands' of women fit into only 283 windows?
I could write much more about this, but I've already done that before in this post here, so I'll let you people re-read that one again.

Then the article continues with more bullshit:


Of course this is complete nonsense. In fact, Amsterdam is the safest place on earth for prostitutes, due to the fact that it's legal, thus protected both in it's legal status and by government authorities, and beyond that has a cameras at every corner of the Red Light District. In fact, the Red light District has more camera's and police surveillance then the royal palace on the Dam in Amsterdam, and is one of the best protected areas in Holland.
Stating that this profession is one of the most dangerous professions is the world is again a display of ignorance. Prostitution is indeed not a job without any risks, but is comparable with let's say for instance a bar tender at a local pub. Besides the fact that the author is overestimating the dangers of this profession, she's ignoring the fact that there are far more dangerous jobs out there, and that danger is no reason to make a profession illegal, can be argued with the fact that the most dangerous jobs are often jobs the government themselves offer, such as soldiers in the army, police officers, etc.

But then the article all of the sudden becomes a rampage of purely false facts:

Like you can read here above, the attempts haven't failed, it is due to the legalization that pimps are actively avoiding Holland as a place for forced prostitution in favor of countries that have not legalized it yet. It's also due to the legalization that Holland was able to arrest pimps and thereby reducing human trafficking, and the safety for sex workers themselves are far superior to those who work in countries where it's illegal.
The statements that legalizing prostitution has resulted in "the acceptance of selling under-age (...) women as a tourist attraction" is purely false, and is purely based on her own assumptions. Facts however shows that no minors were found behind the windows in Amsterdam's Red Light District, as also the city government can tell you, the police and all other authorities that deal with minors, prostitution or human trafficking will all be able to spit out for you.
Beyond that Amsterdam hasn't accepted the trafficking of women as a touristic attraction. In fact, quite the opposite, hence the closing down of prostitution windows, and hence the fact that Amsterdam does no promotion whatsoever regarding it's Red Light District, but heavily promotes the Rijksmuseum as 'the main touristic attraction' in Amsterdam, even though in reality it's still the Red Light District.

The article states further that:


The article states that:


This article is just accusing clients of prostitutes as rapist, assuming every prostitute is a victim and is forced. Of course this is another one of those dumb assumptions the author made, influenced by a negative emotion regarding sexwork and misinformed by articles that are produced by people that have a personal issue with prostitution itself.
The plan of prosecuting buyers of sex as rapists is exactly what they have done in Sweden, and is called the Swedish model, of which I explained here already why this is an extremely bad idea for both voluntarily working prostitutes as well as victims in need of saving.

And then the article finish on a typical radical feministic note:

This is the second part about the Amsterdam city center council meeting, you can read part 1 here. In this part I will talk about the co-creators of this prostitution policy, the prostitutes themselves, and how much we were really involved in the making of these policies. I will also discuss here the part about improving the position of sex workers and empowering them, and what the city government in reality does about that, and about prevention.

For those of you that wish to look back the entire meeting, you can watch it back online on this link. I'll also put a time frame at my mentions, so you can keep track of what part of the meeting I'm talking about exactly.

Here goes:

Yolanda van Doeveren also mentioned that they've talked with many prostitutes (1.17.41). Of course I don't know what she calls 'many', but I've never even heard of her or her entire 'prostitution program' before the start of this meeting, and I'm almost 100% sure the other girls that work with me didn't talk with them either, so I wonder who the hell she did talk with.
She mentions that it's very 'unique' in Holland that prostitutes 'in large numbers' have been actively involved with the creation of the policies regarding prostitution in Amsterdam, a co-creation she calls it. I think she means the monthly meeting at the P&G 292, a meeting most prostitutes don't even know exists, and monthly gets visited by around 5 to 20 prostitutes. Thinking about the roughly 7000 to 4000 estimated prostitutes in Amsterdam, and the 900 prostitutes working behind the windows, around 20 girls is hardly something I would call 'large number of prostitutes. Yolanda van Doeveren makes it sound like the prostitutes have been involved on a large scale with the creation of these policies, but I can assure you that's very far from the truth.
I often see people claim things about their contact with prostitutes. Some people complain that it's hard to get in touch with prostitutes. Partially that's true, not many girls give a damn about what other people have to say about us, all they care about is making money. But then again, if you never go out in the nights (when most of the women work) to come to us, then the chance to get in touch with us is pretty small. After all, most of the girls behind the windows don't speak Dutch, they don't follow the Dutch news and they're not interested to look up things about their job in their spare time. It's a typical example of how most of the girls like to keep their work and private life separated, and one of the major reasons I don't target my blog to my colleagues, since I'll know that 99% of them will never even start to look for it.
Other people always claim they have good contacts with many prostitutes, they know them intimately and often also personally. A good example of someone like this is Frits Rouvoet for example. These people always think they know everything that's going on with us, because they talk to a few girls. In reality however the number of girls they talk to are often exaggerated in order to give their claims more value. Fact is, that especially Romanian and Bulgarian women, really don't give a fuck about what other people say. They're not interested in what you have to say, and often will refuse to talk with you, because they just don't give a fuck. They're unfortunately not really like me, even though I wish they would be a bit more like me and would care a little bit more about how people treat us.
As for the case of Frits Rouvoet, I still haven't seen him, I guess his invisibility cloak is doing a really good job to avoid him from being seen by me. I did talk to some other girls though that did speak with him. Most girls mentioned that 'this idiot', as they called him, sometimes comes to them with roses or other small presents. Most of them simply ignore him, or pretend to be on the phone when he comes. Most of the girls really 'weren't interested in his bullshit', as they put it.
I guess the ones that are interested to talk with him, are the ones that are looking for help, which could explain why in his vision most girls are forced, since they're looking for someone to help them, and those are mainly the only ones he talks to. The other girls simply don't give a fuck about him or 'his bullshit'. Just so you guys know what's going on.

Yolanda van Doeveren also spoke about improving the position of sex workers and 'empowerment' (1.16.50). In reality however this mostly comes down to helping out victims, which is something that has nothing to do with 90% of the sex workers. After all, in what way is a prostitute who is not a victim 'empowered' or gets her position 'improved' by victim support? We are not victims. Why would I need victim support? That's not empowering me, that's just aiding help to victims, and falls under fighting trafficking, not under empowerment and improving my position.
Yolanda talks about how prostitutes have a bad position when it comes to negotiating the prices for our workplaces. But then again, who gave the window owners this monopoly position in the first place? The window owners have virtually no competition, meaning they can ask any price they want, since the city government keeps closing down windows. They know we're desperate for a workplace, and will pay almost any price they ask, since these are some of the few remaining legal workplaces for prostitutes. Also the closing down of windows in the past has only caused the prices for workplaces to rise at those times, so if there's one person responsible for those 'insanely' high window prices, it's the city government itself.
Though, in the past 4 and a half year that I've been working here, the prices have gone up with only 10 euro, something that I wouldn't call exactly a shocking amount. Let's face it, all prices constantly go up, and considering 10 euro in 4 years time, based upon 150 euro, isn't very much.

Yolanda van Doeveren also talked about prevention (1.19.27), and with that obviously she's talking about preventing women from becoming victims of human trafficking. In reality however things come down more to preventing women from entering prostitution in the first place, which is also the reason why they call it the barrier model, which I still think is a weird idea for something that's considered a legal job. Their idea is that if they do an intake interview with a girl, that this will prevent human trafficking. Unfortunately she's sadly mistaking.
If a girl comes to you and would be a victim, she already is a victim, so you're not preventing anything, you're just stopping it from happening on your doorstep. Those girls that are forced will just be pushed by their pimp to go somewhere else, to another country perhaps, or to another city, or work in illegal prostitution. You're not preventing human trafficking in this way, you're just pushing them somewhere else, to make it someone else his problem.
But more importantly, the intake interview itself is laughable. I did the intake interview with my office, and if they can figure out if I'm forced or not based on those questions, I'll give them all a brand new Ferrari. Fact is, it's virtually impossible to find out through an intake interview if a girl is being forced or not, especially with these stupid questions. And let's be honest, even if a girl would be forced, she would never say this in an interview.
Preventing girls from becoming victims of human trafficking (which for the largest part exists out of women being exploited and not so much really forced), doesn't start with making it more difficult for them to come to work here. It starts by providing good, legal and safe alternatives to the services the human traffickers now offer. Like I explained in this blog before, most girls that are victims of human trafficking, are girls that need these traffickers to help them out to get started over here. If the government would provide these girls with help to get started over here, most of these girls wouldn't need the help of these traffickers, and would've prevented most of the trafficking simply by providing a service.

Another interesting thing Yolanda van Doeveren mentioned quickly, was that according to her there are more human trafficking cases in court then before (1.15.40), and also the number of investigations has gone up incredibly much. This is however completely the opposite of what her own report shows, as I've explained in detail already in this post here. The number of girls pressing charges from 2012 to 2013 (which is the period she is talking about), has dropped from 124 to only 32 (74% less). The number of suspects has dropped from 35 to 21 (40% less). Also the number of investigations has dropped from 195 to 72 (63% less).
So I don't know if Yolanda read her own report, but what she states is completely the opposite of reality, and completely the opposite of what her own report says about it. In fact, every number in her report regarding human trafficking show's an incredible decrease, which is quite the opposite of what she's saying here.

Read here part 1 about our working contracts and conditions.
Read here part 3 with the answers to some of the most important questions the politicians had.

Dutch version

So a couple of weeks ago the city center council of Amsterdam had a meeting regarding the progress on project 1012. The project that was designed to reduce 'criminogene' activities and upgrade the city's center by removing 'low economic valued' companies and replacing them with high class businesses, had for long been a discussion in Amsterdam.
The city council has always proclaimed the project was about gaining back control in the Amsterdam Red Light District, taking back control from the criminals, from the mob, from the human traffickers and pimps. In reality the project has always been a project to reduce the Red Light District area with it's window prostitution and coffeeshops with 40%, in hopes of attracting a different type of tourist.
Prostitution windows have been closed under the pretenses of 'fighting human trafficking', but in reality is nothing more then an attempt to reduce the Red Light District area itself and the tourists that visit it.

Thusfar 109 prostitution windows have been closed down (or actually bought for 31 million euro), under the claim of fighting human trafficking. In reality many women lost one of the few still legal workplaces for prostitutes in this country, and were left unattended for by the city government. Where these women are now nobody knows, but with the recent closing of 150 windows in Utrecht, and more windows threatened to close in Amsterdam (read here), it's not hard to guess where these women went to. Many left the country in favor of other countries that offer a safe haven for prostitution, like Germany. Many others continued their work in illegal prostitution, something that only recently have come to the attention of the authorities.

During the meeting, that was open to the public, director of the Amsterdam prostitution program Yolanda van Doeveren was there to explain the city center council what she's been doing with her program and what the results were. I listened closely to what she had to say, with the help of my boyfriend, and was shocked. Some of the things she says are completely true, other things however seemed to have been pure propaganda from the mayor, to ensure his project 1012 wasn't at risk.
Another thing that shocked me, was the complete lack of information and knowledge the politicians had regarding prostitution. They seem to have no idea even how things work, let alone that they could spot the (many) false pieces of information that was given out to them in order to deceive them.

For those of you that wish to look back the entire meeting, you can watch it back online on this link. I'll also put a time frame at my mentions, so you can keep track of what part of the meeting I'm talking about exactly. I've also split the entire meeting into three parts, since the meeting was over 3 hours long, and I wanted to make sure I made everything very clear to everyone. This part will focus on the working contracts, check at the bottom of this posts for the second part about the involvement of the prostitutes itself with the policy and the third part in where I answer some of the questions the politicians had directly.
Here comes the first part:

One of the biggest pieces of misinformation was about working contracts (1.39:10). Yolanda van Doeveren explained women working behind the windows rent their rooms day by day, and this is absolutely true. But then she claimed something that is completely false. She claimed that window owners make contracts with prostitutes that are for a longer period then just one day, mostly one week.
I think Yolanda van Doeveren has been talking and listening too much to Ilonka Stakelborough, because I recognize this from a newspaper article from a while back, which I also wrote about on my blog here. But since some things have changed a bit, let me make it one more time really clear.
There are NO contracts. All women in the Red Light District rent their windows on a day by day base. Prostitutes can get a fixed room for themselves, in which case the window owner will reserve that particular window just for that girl, but under no circumstances are contracts being signed or made.

Getting a fixed room for yourself means basically nothing more that the window owner won't rent out the window to another girl. And of course, if you don't show up (for whatever reason), and the window owner was counting on you, and the next day you show up again, then indeed you have to pay for that room if you want the same room again. If you don't show up anymore, you don't have to pay.
Actually it's a very simple deal. If you have a fixed room, the rooms is yours as long as you pay for it. If you don't pay for the room anymore (because you didn't show up for example), you loose the room. Of course you can still get another room, but in no way are girls held back to quit this job, or otherwise take a day off without paying for it.
But even if you want to take a day off without risking to loose you own room afterwards, the window owner provides plenty of services. Let's say you have your own room, and you don't want to work 7 days. The window owner allows you to take two free days a week without paying for it, and without loosing the room. If you want to get a break from work for a longer period, for example to go on vacation, the window owner allows you besides those two free days a week, the opportunity to take up to maximum two months(!) of free days.

In reality this basically comes down to the fact that most girls who have a fixed room, take one or two free days a week. When they go on vacation they just tell this to their office, and they can take two months free. If they wish to take more then two months free, and still want to come back to their own room, they can do that if they pay for the room during the period that extends the two months. Of course they can also choose not to, no problem at all, but then there's a chance that another girl will have the room when they get back, and the girl will have to rent a different room.
But let me make things very clear to everyone, that under no circumstances are girls held back by contracts to quit this job, because they have their own room. If they want, they can quit any minute of the day. And even if you rent your room, that still doesn't mean you actually have to work, just as long as you pay for the room, the window owner doesn't care if you're working or not.
Yolanda van Doeveren her claim that in reality many women work 7 days a week, because they have to pay for their room seven days a week, is completely false, it isn't even allowed anymore to work 7 days a week. These women can take two free days a week, and if they get sick, they can just take a week off without having to pay for it, without loosing the room.

This is it for the first part. The meeting was over 3 hours long, and I wanted to make sure that the things I wrote down here are absolutely clear to everyone, so there can be no mistakes regarding the answers. I've split the entire meeting into three parts.

Read here part 2 about the our involvement in the policies.
Read here part 3 with the answers to the most important questions from politicians.

Dutch version

The windows aren't closing just yet, but the threat is real. My fear is that the city government will yet again create more victims by repeating their mistakes of closing windows down. If you think about it it's really funny. It's the city government that does the most forcing in prostitution, in this case forcing women into illegal prostitution, where there's less protection, and more chance of becoming a victim of human trafficking. After all, how many pimps did the city government catch by closing down prostitution windows thus far?

Dutch version

Human trafficking is decreasing immensely in Amsterdam. This is the conclusion of a report made by the city government of Amsterdam itself about the developments of prostitution in 2013 (report here).
The report itself shows that from the 124 victims who pressed charges for human trafficking in 2012 numbers have now decreased to only 32 victims in 2013, a decrease of 74%! Also the number of human trafficking suspects that were prosecuted has decreased from 35 suspects in 2012 to only 21 suspects in 2013, a decrease of 40%.

The report shows quite a different image from what people have been getting about prostitution in Amsterdam, and specifically about the Red Light District. With percentages of 50%, 80% and 90% politicians have tried in the last couple of years to give the image to people that prostitution in Amsterdam, and specifically in the Red Light District, was a crime filled environment. But yet again cold hard facts point in a different direction. Just like with the anti-human trafficking campaign results as I talked about here, and all the police raids they've done in the past years in different cities with window prostitution, but also with illegal prostitution, it turns out the real numbers of human trafficking are far lower then that.

As the report states, last year in 2013, there were 21 people prosecuted for human trafficking. In total 7 cases (33%) resulted in a complete clear of all human trafficking charges. In all of the cases where charges were cleared regarding human trafficking, the prostitute herself claimed not to be a victim of human trafficking, but was branded by the district attorney as victim. In other words, she wasn't a victim, but because the district attorney and the police were convinced she was a victim, it had to come to a court case to prove that the girl wasn't a victim after all. This also leaves only 14 people who were convicted of human trafficking from all the 21 people who were prosecuted in 2013, an extremely low number if you compare if to the 4000 to 6000 prostitutes that are reportedly working in Amsterdam.
But also the number of victims who pressed charges, 32 in 2013 compared to the 124 in 2012 has decreased immensely with 74%. Based on the 4000 to 6000 prostitutes that are working in Amsterdam, this comes down between 0,8% and 0,5% of the total amount of legal working prostitutes working in Amsterdam. This number is very low considering the earlier made statements by both politicians and police that the numbers of human trafficking in prostitution would be around 50 to 90%. Especially if you realize that more victims are coming from illegal prostitution.

According to the district attorney of Amsterdam for human trafficking cases herself, Jolanda de Boer, this is just the tip of the ice berg, or so she wants to make us believe in an article that was posted in July of this year in a local newspaper.
Her words are: 'We still don't know if it's about ten or eighty percentage of the prostitutes that are being abused in Amsterdam. But even with ten percent we're still talking about 400 cases a day.'
Her words look remarkably close to the exact words of mayor Eberhard van der Laan, which were later copied word for word by party member of the PVDA, Marjolein Moorman. In fact, these are the exact same words he and Moorman used, the only difference is that Jolanda de Boer, district attorney, doesn't dare to use the words rape in this case.
I think it's remarkable that a district attorney copies the exact words of a politician, especially since the words are twisted to give people the wrong impression, like I explained here. In fact, district attorney Jolanda de Boer seems to become political with these words, and clearly choose a political side, something I don't think is a good thing for the independence of the justice system in this country. I think it's highly undesirable that a district attorney becomes political in her function, especially when it comes to manipulating the public's opinion about things, with phrases like these.

Jolanda de Boer claims in the article that these 'twenty to thirty cases a year' however are just the tip of the ice berg. But whoever looks deeper into the report comes to a different conclusion. In 2013 window prostitutes were checked 1968 times by the city governments own controllers, on top of the 567 checks from the police. That's in total 2535 checks for around 900 women who are working behind the window in Amsterdam in total, meaning each prostitute gets checked around three times a year. From those 2535 window checks 11 times police and/or controllers from the city government picked up signs of human trafficking (read here more about those).
Jolanda de Boer claims the reason why we don't see more of the tip of this particular ice berg, is because of a lack in man power. However with 2535 checks a year on 900 women and only 11 reported possible victims I sincerely doubt that. They have man power enough to check each woman 3 times a year, and still they where only able to find 11 possible victims.
It's also pretty sure to say those 11 'possible victims' that were reported by them included the 7 cases in were women objected being a victim. After all, it wouldn't make sense if she would have pressed charges herself if she didn't consider herself to be a victim. So we can say pretty sure that the at least 7 women (because every case involves at least one women, but could also involve more women) come from that group of 11 women that were reported by the police and controllers themselves.
This would conclude that in at least 63% of the cases (7 from all 11 even reported women) police and controllers reported a girl as victim, although she denies, and it's also proven later in court that this was not the case. A typical example of how often police and controllers have a wrong image about people in prostitution.

That police and controllers often get the wrong image about things in prostitution is not something new. Many prostitutes, in fact I think even most prostitutes, report that police often sees them as victims, and often sees their partners (either boyfriends or husbands) as pimps. These statistics confirm that image as in at least  63% of the cases police and controllers got the wrong image, and the suspect was set free after trial.
I myself have experience with this when the police told me during an interrogation a couple of years ago that they though also I was a victim of trafficking. In their opinion it was 'very suspicious' that I was always alone (I hadn't met my boyfriend at the time), yet other women are often being seen as possible victims when they're with their boyfriend or husband. So apparently to the police it doesn't matter if you're single or not, either way you're suspicious, and they see you as a victim, something these numbers prove.

Another interesting number the report mentions is the number of illegal prostitution. In 2012 there were still 41 reports of illegal prostitution, in 2013 this was 58 reports. This means the number of reported illegal prostitution has gone up with 41%.
That illegal prostitution is getting growing is not something that only this report shows. In fact, almost every report about prostitution shows this, and also many journalists have reported about this as well, like for instance Dit was de Dag from the EO did a while ago.
So there seems to be a trend of illegal prostitution growing, which does sound logical, since every year the number of legal workplaces for prostitutes are decreasing. Since 2008 in total 109 windows have been closed (23%) in Amsterdam, and only 401 remain today, with an additional 100 windows still scheduled for closure. Also on a national level we see the numbers of legal workplaces for prostitutes decreasing, with for example the closure of more then 100 windows in Utrecht last year. In fact, from the estimated 2000 windows since the regulation of prostitution, 665 windows have been closed until now, that's 33% of all legal prostitution windows. And still they wonder why illegal prostitution is growing?
What we've learned from illegal prostitution from the numbers of the previous campaign against human trafficking, is that illegal prostitution is for 61% responsible (read here) for human trafficking. Not weird, after all, illegal prostitution happens uncontrolled, without any protection, thus the chance for human trafficking is naturally higher then in a controlled and protected situation like legal prostitution.
So 'cleaning up' the Red Light District from crime didn't actually happen, in fact, there was never as much crime there as people claimed. And in stead of helping women, they've pushed many women out of legal prostitution, leaving them no other choice but to do it illegal, with as a consequence that now women can become easier victim of human trafficking then before.

On top of that the obligated registration at Chambers of Commerce, to register yourself as prostitute in stead of professional services, as was allowed before, also had a huge impact. The report mentions a decrease in legal registered prostitutes, which is a logical consequence, since registering yourself in a public record as a prostitute is violating a prostitute their privacy rights, and as the report also concludes, had an unwanted effect that put women more in danger then it helped them. This was also the reason the city government later reversed this decision, allowing prostitutes again to be registered under different definitions, so they didn't have to put themselves at risk.

The report also mentions so called 'agencies' which help girls setting up their companies and other registration papers, as well as finding a place to life for these girls. The report calls it an 'unwanted effect', yet does not suggest any solution to this problem. Point of course is, that neither the city government nor the national government supports prostitutes in any way of getting started over here, leaving it all up for themselves in a country where bureaucracy seems to have been invented.
Like I talked about before in this post here, the reason why many girls need help is because it's incredibly difficult to arrange everything (permits, place to life, setting up your own company, registration, finances) by yourself. These so called 'agencies' they talk about in this report are the very people that are trying to help us do things the government refuses to do. Of course the chance that some of these 'agencies' take advantage of you is very well present, since they're not legal, but in absence of a legal alternative many women often don't have much choice. Fortunately for most women this goes well, but in some cases it does not, and agencies exploit these women, to which they become victims of trafficking.
Like I talked about in this post before here, if the government wants to prevent/stop trafficking, they need to offer the girls a legal alternative to something that happens now by 'illegal' agencies. In stead they only choose to see these agencies as an unwanted thing, and don't offer any solution to a problem that is clearly present.

But there are more things this report recognizes as problems, yet offers no solution to in the conclusion. The report mentions the fact that many of us are living in apartments which charge high prices for rent, something they've also recognized to be rather common. They've also recognized the fact that often these apartments are occupied by more prostitutes then just one girl.
The reason this problem exists of course is because our vulnerable position. The city government, which has done nothing more then send out negative information to the general public about our profession, has turned us into unwanted people. People are afraid to rent us apartments (as I've written about here recently), because we have a bad name, largely due to false allegations by the city government that prostitution is a crime filled industry (or criminogeen as they called it).
On top of that prostitutes still can't get a business bank account, in fact we even have trouble getting a regular bank account. We can't get any loans from banks (as a start up for our own business for instance, or as an advance to our rent), nor can we get a mortgage.
All these things create the effect that we are extremely limited in our choices for housing, leaving only rental apartments for a high price as an option, if we can find one at all. Those who can't find an apartment (not an uncommon thing) often seeks refuge at the apartment of one of their colleagues, thus creating the effect that often girls live in over-priced houses together.

When it comes to 'normalizing' prostitution and 'empowerment' for prostitutes however, all measures seem to be aimed at only rescuing victims or helping girls exiting the industry. No empowerment is given to prostitutes who don't want to exit the industry or are not victims. This shows yet again that the city government only sees us as victims who'd rather quit this job, then independent entrepreneurs.
In stead of offering us options to safely enter our job, by setting up a legal agency for prostitutes who helps you with all the paperwork, finding a place to life, finances etc. they come with more rules and regulations, and top of top of that try to find ways to fight the people helping us.
In stead of giving us more rights so we can rent normal apartments, get bank accounts, loans and mortgages, so we don't have to depend on over-priced private sector apartments and 'illegal agencies', we get new rules on top of recently introduced rules like for instance the raise of the minimum age of 18 to 21 (even though no minor was found during any of the 2500 checks in window prostitution). New rules include for instance an obligated intake interview with our office, obligation to follow hygiene guidelines etc. All rules aimed at finding victims or making our jobs more complex, but none aimed at really empowering us.
Also empowerment seems only to imply that you quit this job or get shelter as a victim of trafficking, apparently empowering yourself as a prostitute can only mean for the city government that you quit as a prostitute. Yet, real empowerment, like forbidding agencies to refuse prostitutes as residents of an apartment, or forbidding banks to refuse prostitutes as customers, is not on the list.
Also preventing women enter prostitution seems to be rather the target, then actually helping them in achieving what they want, to become independent sex workers. No, the city government rather helps you to avoid prostitution all together, leaving us only one option, getting help from 'illegal agencies', with as a possibility that we become victims of human trafficking.

The report shows us a glimpse of things that are really happening at the moment. A city government claiming huge amounts of victims, while the report shows us the problem is by far not as large as they claim, and is even decreasing. On top of that it shows us how wrong their image is about the world of prostitution, since most of their reported victims end up not being a victim at all in 63% of the cases.
It also shows that closing down the windows to stop human trafficking hasn't worked, in fact, problems only seem to have moved into illegal prostitution, where it's much more difficult to detect, control and help. Further more it shows that the city government still doesn't recognize prostitutes as independent business owners, since empowering prostitutes only seems to revolve around aiding victims and helping prostitutes quit this job. On top of that we, yet again, get to deal with more rules and regulation, while the real problems the report mentions aren't tackled, by giving prostitutes more rights.

Dutch version

FACT: NETHERLANDS, prostitution is legal: 127 murders. SWEDEN, where pimping, buying, brothel-keeping are banned: 1

That's what a tweet says that's going around on the internet. The information is based on a message of a cold case team from the Dutch police (source here), who are investigating cold case murders. In the message, it states that 127 prostitutes have been murdered in the past 30 years. And this is exactly where the so called 'fact' in this tweet goes wrong.

After a couple of years of living in our wonderful apartment we're forced now to look for a new place. Not because we didn't pay the rent, not because our landlord found out about my job and didn't accept it, not because our neighbors had trouble with my job. No, simply because he's coming back from abroad and therefore we can't stay there anymore.

Last time it took us about 6 months before we found an apartment where the landlord accepted my job. It was a long and hard search, and we got refused multiple times because of my job. They didn't always say it directly to us, but sometimes we just got turned down with the excuse that the apartment wasn't available anymore when they heard about my job, but when a couple of days later my boyfriend called them up again from a different number it turned out that was not the case at all.
Another apartment was also supposedly 'already taken', that apartment stayed empty for more then 6 months after our offer. Other agencies sometimes where just honest about it, and told us nobody would accept us with my job.

The last apartment we visited, before we found this apartment, was almost a closed deal already. I was just about to sign the contract, had all the money cash with me to pay everything, when the owner all of the sudden got cold feet about it, and started to worry about things. 'Yes, but what if you take your customers over here, I don't want that!' he replied. It's one of the many arguments I've heard from people about why they're scared to take in sex workers.
But even if you explain to them that the reason why you work behind the window is because you don't want your customers in your own house, they're still not convinced. After a while I had enough of arguing with him and told him I didn't want the apartment anymore. He was shocked, and all of the sudden started to say there was no problem and I could take it, but that I couldn't register my company at this adress. But I already had enough of it. Either you gladly accept your new tenants, or you don't start complaining.

Our current landowner didn't have a problem at all with it. It wasn't an issue for him as long as we kept the apartment nice and payed the rent in time. We don't have much contact with him, since we never have problems with him and he never has problems with us. He knows we always pay our rent in time, he knows we won't make a mess of his apartment, and he knows I won't bring customers to the apartment.
Yet, unfortunately not many other people think like him, as is the case now with our search for a new apartment. Getting apartment refused is not a surprise at all anymore. In fact, it's more of a surprise to us when people do accept it.

Today again was another example of getting refused purely based upon my job. We were interested in an apartment, but like always the agency first wanted to get some info about our income, our employers and our jobs. We feel no need to try and hide it, after all, if we lie about it they can always find out later and then we can get into even bigger problems. But often you don't even have to tell people what job you're doing, just saying you're from Romania and you're a self-employed business owner already tells them enough. Secondly, I'd way rather life in the apartment of someone who just accepts this job, rather then someone who only thinks about the prejudices about this job.
So my boyfriend wrote them an e-mail, stating our income, his employer details and our jobs. He also explained in the e-mail that I don't work from the apartment and keep my job and my private life strictly separate. And that's when we got the email back which stated:

"Dear Mark,

I appreciate your honesty about your girlfriend, but the owner doesn't wish to rent to people from the sex industry. It will therefore be difficult to find an apartment through the agencies, because we all use basically the same criteria that we get from the landlords.

Best regards,"

As you can see, also the agencies make no secret about it that sex workers get discriminated purely based on our job. Yet, I never understood exactly why. After all, prostitutes make enough money to pay for the rent, while other people who wish to rent an apartment in the center of Amsterdam would have to struggle to pay for the rents they ask in the city's center. Prices currently for an average apartment are around 1500 euro's a month or more. Yet, prostitutes who can make this money in one single weekend get refused, while others with less salary get accepted. I don't understand these people. Why do you wish to keep out people who you can be sure of that they can pay the rent, for people who may need to struggle each month to make that amount of money?

The main reason why people are so scared to rent to a prostitute is because they're ignorant about the job. They think we take our customers home. But if I wanted to take my customers home, then why would I still pay 150 euro a night for my working room if I'm not going to use it anyway?
Other people are scared it may attract other 'shady' type of people. But why would I want to attract 'shady' people to a place where I live? Don't they realize that I have to live there and not them? Why would I want shady people hanging around my house?
They automatically think that because you're a prostitute that you just hang out with shady people, criminals and dirty men, like that's something we enjoy in our own spare time. It's a typical example of how legally prostitution has been decriminalized, but not mentally yet. It may be a legal job, but people don't treat it any different because it's legal. We still get treated like lepers, like outcast, like vermin. The only thing that's changed is that now we're legal vermin, which means we have to pay taxes for being this, but unfortunately we haven't gotten any of the rights. Legalizing has got us all the obligations of paying taxes for instance, and having to work and live by the rules the government made up for us, but none of the rights regular people have, like opening a business bank account, getting a loan from a bank, a mortgage or even something as simple as renting an apartment.

But most of the times you don't even get to the point where you can explain these things to them. By default you're already an outcast, and not given any chance. They simply don't want to listen. After all, they can find 100 more people for you, even if they have trouble to pay the rent for it, it's still better then a prostitute. I truly don't understand this.
If things where up to me, I'd gladly accept prostitutes in my apartments. In fact, I'd even prefer it, since they always pay their rent on time, because they don't want any trouble added on the daily problems they already experience being a prostitute. And they'll try and be as quiet about it as they can, because if they don't, the neighbors might cause problems. So actually, prostitutes are very good people to accept in your apartments, since they'll avoid problems with you as much as possible, since you're one of the few people who will accept them, and it may be very difficult to find a new place for them. Plus they have more then enough money to pay for the rent, and they'll keep it quiet, because they don't want any trouble.

Sadly however, most prostitutes get refused. Even though prostitution is a completely legal job, we have all the registrations the government demands from us, we have a bookkeeper that does our administration for us, and we follow all the rules, people still won't accept us simply because of our job.
The search for an apartment is extremely difficult, especially in a city like Amsterdam, where searching for an apartment is already almost suicide. For this reason you'll often see girls living together. The few girls that do manage to get a house, often take in other girls who still haven't found one. And there are simply too few landlords accepting prostitutes, to take in each prostitute. This causes landlords who accept prostitutes to be in a monopoly position, in where they can demand everything from the prostitutes, because they know the girls can't find a place elsewhere easily. Yet, the police and politicians act surprised when they find 10 girls living together, and immediately see it as a sign of human trafficking.
When girls put everything on the name of their boyfriend, because the landlords will accept their boyfriends but not the girls themselves, people again call it human trafficking, because the girl pays for everything while it's in his name. Yes, of course it is in his name if you people will never accept prostitutes as residents!
And then some people act really surprised when some guys take advantage of these kind of situations, and use a girl who has these kind of trouble, to get a nice apartment and money for himself. Yes indeed, discriminating prostitutes like this, and not giving them the rights other people have, makes prostitutes more vulnerable for real human trafficking!

So, my dear readers, landlords, police officers and politicians. If you really want to fight human trafficking, I'd suggest you start by making sure we get the rights we deserve to have. That discrimination against prostitution stops. Only if prostitutes can move freely in this country, and are not subjected to constant discrimination, stigmatization and criminalization, you will make prostitutes less vulnerable to human trafficking. Anything that adds to the stigmatization, criminalization or discrimination of prostitutes is supporting and aiding human traffickers to gain more victims. On top of that, giving prostitutes more rights so they can move more freely does not only cause less women to become victim because they're in a vulnerable position, but also makes it easier to spot the girls that are forced into this job. After all, the more freely a prostitute can move and behave, the bigger the contrast will be with someone who cannot. So please stop the traffic, and give us the rights and not just the obligations.

Dutch version