This week my first Feature article "Boston's strange and problematic approach to curbing prostitution (and addressing violence against women" published. The piece examines what Boston is doing to "reduce demand for prostitution by 20% in two years." I wrote the story for DigBoston, Boston's Alt-weekly. I initially pitched a somewhat vague idea for a story in June and have been reading, researching and interviewing people on the topic ever since. Many, many, many thanks to my awesome editor Chris Faraone for accepting the pitch and his encouragement to keep digging.
Illustration by Scott Murry
During the time I was researching the feature story I also wrote a piece for Rolling Stone, "5 Things You Probably Don't know About Human Trafficking". I wrote the story about human trafficking as I became increasingly frustrated by the conflation of sex work and human trafficking in much of what I was reading, especially by those individuals and organizations working to "exit women" from prostitution.
Other related stories in the news this week you might want to check out:
UPDATE: Lina Nealon from Demand Abolition wrote a letter to DigBoston in response to my piece.