Employment with increasingly precarious conditions. Violence against prostitutes has increased in 2024, associations warned on Tuesday, on the occasion of the international day to end violence against sex workers.
“We saw a 6% increase in violence against sex workers (TDS) between 2023 and 2024, and an increase in the severity of the violence perpetrated: more rapes, many more attempted murders and injuries with weapons” , indicates Paola Gioia Macioti, coordinator at Médecins du Monde of the Jasmine platform, which lists the violence committed against TDS, on the sidelines of a demonstration in tribute to prostitutes killed or assaulted in 2024 in France.
“Seven sex workers were murdered and the Jasmine platform recorded no less than 3,110 reports of violence this year, including 203 rapes or attempts and 82 cases of assault with a weapon,” specifies Médecins du Monde.
“Repressive laws” that increase precariousness
Around thirty people gathered on Tuesday noon near the National Assembly to pay tribute to these victims and demand better protection for these workers. “This increase in violence is directly linked to repressive laws which have increased the precariousness of sex workers, without changing the material conditions which push people to do this work to meet their needs,” says Paola Gioia Macioti.
At issue, according to her, is the 2016 law which provides for the penalization of clients of prostitutes as well as third parties who help sex workers: “we cannot take the risk of screaming if we are attacked because if someone discovers If you are at home and doing sex work, your landlord will evict you, otherwise he could be guilty of pimping,” she explains.
For Mistress Catin, a sex worker present at the gathering and who prefers to remain anonymous, “what we are asking is that the deputies and senators commit to taking stock of the obstacles to fundamental rights that we suffer.”
“We came to denounce all the violence suffered by our community, and also to commemorate our dead,” indicates for her part Berthe de Laon, also a sex worker and coordinator of the Parapluie Rouge federation, a group of community health associations and collectives and defense of the rights of TDS.
“We are here so that the public authorities, the State, the parliamentarians can listen to us, can hear us (…) and can finally put an end to the policies that bury us,” she adds.
