Dear Santa,

Please can I have a time machine for Christmas? I’ve been a very good girl this year.

Love Katie, age 21¼

Last night, I joined women from Feminist Fightback, x:talk and the International Union of Sex Workers at Reclaim the Night.

We marched alongside and at the front of the main march, with red umbrellas and placards promoting sex workers rights, opposing the current attempt in the UK to outlaw sex work.

The Reclaim the Night message should include safe streets for sex workers. This is particularly important at the moment with legislation being proposed to further criminalise sex workers, giving increased powers to police to raid brothels.

During the march, we slowly made our way to the front, chanting alongside the rest of the march (“sex is work, sex is play, let’s make sex work safe today!”; “wherever we work, wherever we go, yes means yes and no means no”; “2, 4, 6, 8, end the violence, smash the state!” and as we reached Spearmint Rhino towards the end of the march, we stopped - a mass of red umbrellas and placards, shouting “sex workers rights, sex workers rights, we want sex workers rights!” to the tune of Glory, Glory, Hallelujah! over and over as the rest of the march passed by us. It was a little negative at first, with some of the London Feminist Network at the front of the march shouting at us (what happened to “women unite, reclaim the night!”?) but quickly became positive, with women walking past thanking us, cheering us on and telling us to shout louder (which we dutifully did, of course) and even changing their chant to ours. It was very encouraging for me to see so many people in support - I was expecting a lot more abuse than we received.

Sex work is not a bad institution. Of course, we should be helping to get the trafficked, pimped women out, the women who don’t want to be there - but at the same time, we should be helping the women who want to sell sex to stay there. It’s a job: a woman consents to sex, and gets paid for it. The only reason it’s different to an office job, or working in a supermarkets, or whatever else these “feminists” slamming prostitution do for a living is because it involves sex.

These people who call themselves pro-choice and yet want to take away a woman’s right to choose her job and what she does with her body are not pro-choice, and if feminism truly is, like I believe, about equality for everyone, it’s hardly feminism either.

A woman’s body is not for sale by other people against her will, it’s true: but if she wants to sell her own body, that should be her prerogative.

Continuing my Things I Learnt In… series, Paris!

• Supposedly, approximately 600 people go to hospital each year with dog related injuries, not including that old getting bitten excuse. This is why I’m a cat person.
• If you don’t understand something, think about it some more. If you still don’t get it, don’t worry - it’s just French.
• There is one skyscraper in Paris. It boasts both the fastest elevator in Europe, and the best view in Paris - the latter because you can see all of Paris from the top… but not the skyscraper! This skyscraper is also the reason there is only one skyscraper in Paris: they learnt from their mistake.
• There is a coffeeshop in Paris famous for once being the haunt of some famous socialists. Because it’s famous, an espresso there costs €6. I’m not quite sure that that’s what Marx had in mind…
• People in Paris are sociable! Having spent so much time on UK public transport, it was mildly un-nerving to have someone look me in the eye and smile at me on the Metro.
• Everytime I go somewhere new or somewhere I’ve not been for a long time, the travelling bug infects me a little more - next stop, Bruges!