A conversation on comedy, spirituality, the sex life of dolphins, and the deep historical roots of sex workers

The podcast ‘The oldest profession’ created by sex worker rights advocate, comedian, and writer Kaitlyn Bailey is all about showing us that, although the term sex work is relatively new, sex workers have existed and contributed to our societies since the dawn of civilization: From the priestess prostitutes of ancient Mesopotamia, to the great courtesans of Europe, the madams of the Wild West, to pop-cultural icons such as Dee Dee Ramone, Cardi B and Marilyn Monroe. The podcast covers both real people and their legacy as well as mythology and biblical history. For example, the episode on the stigmatization – or ‘slut shaming’ with modern terminology – of Mary Magdalene by the church fathers is recommended for anyone looking to understand how the whore stigma (still) works. By dividing woman in two parts: The whore and the Madonna.

In the stand-up show with the name ‘Whores eye view’ Bailey uses the huge material from the podcast and offers a ‘mad dash through 10 000 years of history from a sex workers perspective’. In the show she also draws on her personal experience as a stigmatized sex worker, and she compares this experience with her father’s experience as a soldier. In this way she shows us how absurd the claim that sex workers ‘sell their bodies’ really is. Even though it is a serious subject, Bailey effectively uses comedy to make her points. And in this show the joke is not on the sex worker, as is so often the case in our culture. Instead, the joke is on the patriarchy: “Doesn’t Donald Trump look like the kind of guy that, if he accidentally made a woman wet, he would be like, ‘ew, slimy!’?”. Bailey shows how the sex worker – in the form of rebel, witch, or outsider – has always been at the forefront of the rebellion against this system of oppression, Stormy Daniels as the latest manifestation of this tradition. Thus, Bailey effectively gives any sex workers in the audience a sense of pride for belonging to this lineage of warriors.

When Bailey took the show to Oslo for the Fringe festival, we had a chance to talk with her:

Is prostitution really the oldest profession? I thought this was just ‘a way of speaking’?

Its older than money. Exchanging sex for something of value predates us as a species. But the idea of profession is of course wrapped up in our concept of money. So, exchanging sex for something of value, is older than professions. And I would put it in the same category as hunting. It’s one of many survival strategies that we and other species use. Many animals exchange sex for nesting material. Sex for shelter. And absolutely sex for food. So, I believe that the first exchange is sex for meat, that’s what I believe.

I think I read something about penguins, they do it for pretty rocks?

No, it’s like specific rocks that they need for nesting. So, they are kind of hard to acquire, especially since they only have the flippers. Penguins are not like crows, its not about shiny stuff, it’s about nesting material.

But crows don’t exchange sex for shiny stuff?

No, they don’t exchange sex, but they will steal your jewelry cause they like shiny stuff.

What about fish?

I really do not know anything about mating, and the sexual practices of fish, so I would be speaking way out of my experience on that. I don’t know what fish do. Although, I imagine that maybe octopuses, or other incredibly social animals do this. And so, I don’t know what the deal is with dolphins or whales. Dolphins engage in a wide variety of recreational sex for example, but I don’t think they have any method of exchange.

They don’t have hands.

Right, they don t have any pockets, so I don’t know how that would work

My favorite parts of your podcast are the episodes that go back to the mythical and the biblical stuff, like the episode on the ancient goddess Ishtar, or Inanna, and the episodes about Lilith.

You know, it’s the foundational stories of western civilization. And we have been very wrong about so many of them.

In my own work I have seen this connection: Many sex workers, of course not all, but many, are kind of spiritual, like they are doing the Tarot, some define themselves as witches, and so on. I am wondering how this could have survived for so long. Because I don’t think all sex workers necessarily are aware of this history. But still, they carry it with them somehow.

I mean its archetypal: Even though there’s been so many efforts throughout history to erase and denigrate the sacred whore, she finds a way. I remember the first time I walked into a strip club, and I saw with my own eyes these beautiful, shiny, charismatic women dancing. And there was a worshipful element to this place. And you know the mythos surrounding Ishtar: She looked after the sex workers in the temple, the sacred prostitutes. But she also looked after the more mundane sex workers, people that had lost the religious element, like tavern sex workers. And I believe that no matter what type of sex work you are doing: The sacred whore lives inside all of us. It is a sacred un-mutable energy that simply exists! So, I think that we recognize her across time. Even if we don’t know her name anymore.

Do you believe in her?

I certainly call her in before every show. But I also call in my ancestors. And I count myself as a part of a lineage of sacred whores and storytellers and freedom fighters.

Do you consider yourself spiritual?

More and more so. I build an altar in every city I go to. I have a manifesting journal, and I would be lying if I didn’t say that I believe that there is something bigger than me that I feel like I am a humble messenger of. I don’t have a label for it, but I believe in something big and profound that exists on a spiritual realm.

Do you identify with the ‘old pros’ in your podcast, and if so, who do you identify the most with?

The first old pro I identified with was Veronica Franco. She was a venetian sex worker who was born into a noble family. She escaped a violent and abusive marriage by working first at a brothel owned by the catholic church and then she became a courtesan. And she became a famous writer, editor and advocate for women during a time when the respectable wives of Venice were not allowed to read or even enter the library. There was this idea that promiscuity of the mind leads to promiscuity of the body. They were really trying to keep the rich girls dumb, so that they didn’t lose control of them. The reason that I identify with her so much is because her male peers, sort of the other courtiers that were also seeking patronage among the same class of men that she was, felt that she had an unfair advantage because of her intimate relationship with those patrons – which is hilarious because she is operating in this world with no legal rights! But sure, she has an unfair advantage because she has tits or whatever. So, they conspired to destroy her reputation and career, and they had her tried for witchcraft. She had become a very famous and effective ambassador, and she made a lot of things happen for Venice. The city was grateful for having her right up until the very moment when she was systematically and effectively demonized by her male peers. And I felt like something similar had happened to me in comedy. And it is one of the reasons for why I do the work that I do today, and why I identify so much with her story.

What about Lycoris the Mime? Listening to the episode about her I get the feeling that being a mime in ancient Rome is much like being a stand-up comedian today?

Stand-up and sex work have gone together almost as far back as sex workers and soldiers. In the American lineage you have Gypsy Rose Lee that came out of the vaudeville period, and she contributes to creating the artform that would become burlesque, but also stand up comedy. Many sexy performers were also funny performers. And I feel like courtesans and jesters occupy similar positions in court: You know, we are both ‘singing for our supper’, we are both playing for the pleasure of the king, and we are both allowed to do things that regular courtiers are not allowed to do. Lycoris, she is a mime. But when I say mime, I am not talking about the French silent artform that we associate with miming. Mimes in ancient Rome were street performers that utilized a wide variety of skills. Some acrobatic stuff, but also funny, insightful, social commentary that I recognize as part of the stand-up lineage. Of course, nobody is calling themselves a stand-up comic in ancient Rome, that’s not a job that exist yet. But what mimes are doing are similar to what stand-ups do today. And she was a sex worker. And not for nothing: Sex work has subsidized every imaginable artform for all human history. And stand-up is no exception to that.

Yeah, can you talk more about this connection between the world of art and sex work?

So, it’s unfortunate because of the deep sexism in the artworld, that we know more men’s names than women’s names. But sex workers are all over every museum in the world. We have been muses and models. Brothels have incubated all kinds of art for all human history. We did an episode about Henri de Toulouse-Lautrec, that captures a lot of this. And Anaïs Nin talks about her experience as an art model. People of all genders have subsidized their art with sex work. The patronage model looks a lot like the sugaring model of today. There is a lot of parallels there. And another important example: In European courts the king’s favorite courtesan was often a very important patron of the arts in her own right. That role is often filled by sex workers with taste.

Would you say that sex work is an artform in and of itself?

Yes! I think that sex workers are performers. Always. But not all performers love their job. And you don’t have to consider yourself an artist, you don’t have to consider yourself a healer, you don’t have to be channeling those things. It’s also a part of the service industry. But I think that waiters are performers as well. I know that there are a lot of sex workers that don’t like the idea of describing their work in those terms …

… that you should point this out reminds me of something: In the influential book ‘Revolting Prostitutes’ this is the case that is being made, that we should frame sex work as work, period. What do you think of this argument?

I think it’s a brilliant book, I have so much respect for the authors. I like the work that they do, I think it’s very effective. And at the same time, we disagree on some foundational analysis. Their focus is that sex work is work – first and foremost. And I believe that sex work is work – but I believe that it is also sex. And I think we do the movement a disservice by excluding other paradigms. Because you might end up primrose path walking yourself into a regulatory structure that ends up doing more harm than good. When you focus on labor protections you end up focusing on licensing, regulatory capture, and that type of control that leads to mandatory STI-testing, and so on. That might be my Americanness showing through, because we don’t have a good history of having an effective labor rights movement. But I am excited to see what is happening in Belgium right now: Belgium decriminalized sex work and then immediately went towards strong labor protections for sex workers. And I am dying to see how that plays out: Because I have seen ‘labor-protections’ used by prohibitionists to try and create conditions that make it harder for people to do this work without outing themselves or stigmatizing themselves. I agree with the principle that everyone should have labor protection, and nobody should do work that is bad for them because of poverty. But coming from an American context: I just don’t think it’s the most effective framing for the goal that we are trying to achieve. I think the most effective framework for thinking of sex workers rights is through the LGBTQ- rights lens: As thinking of it as sex between consenting adults first – and work second.

I have met many sex workers that see themselves as artists, healers, and the like. But at the same time, I have also talked with some that only wants to frame sex work as work – maybe to be able to point at the fact that it can be hard work. Can we resolve this?

I think it’s important to remember that there have been artists sculptures, acrobatics, dancers who hated their job, who were doing it only to make money. These categories are not exclusive to one another. Just because it’s an artform doesn’t mean it’s not work. And just because its labor, and there are examples of exploitation, and you have bad days, and your boss sucks, doesn’t mean it’s not an artform. Both of those things can be true at the same time.

Would you like to talk about your own experience with sex work?

I have been an hourly escort, that was in 2005, and I have also done sugaring back in 2015. The longer I talk about this, the farther away from the actual sex work I get. I never did sex work past FOSTA-SESTA [1]. So, I have no experience navigating the dangers of the new surveillance-based internet. But that was my experience. I had both a very privileged and a positive experience as a sex worker. I have experienced sexual violence, but not when doing sex work. And one of the things that I touch on in the show is something I heard from sex workers over and over, and that is that sex work, like the context of being a professional and existing within a community, gave me a lot more tools to articulate and enforce my boundaries than I ever experienced in the hook-up culture or like ‘vibing with dudes’ in a bar.

That resonates deeply: I have also heard this over and over.

You learn to set boundaries, or you quit. Or this isn’t for you. And I also felt like I had more negotiating power as a sex worker than I ever felt I had as a waiter or a barista, or any of the other service gigs that I did.

Did it come in handy to be a funny person when you did sex work?

Absolutely. We all bring different tools to the table when we do anything. And I think that being funny is a transferable skill that has served me a in all my jobs. If I was waiting tables, or whatever. When I was doing political advocacy, or fundraising. Or sex work.

Is comedy a form of seduction?

On a foundational level, sex work is about arousing. So, we are inspiring what should be an involuntary physiological response from our clients. With our energy, our body, the words that come out our mouth. Stand-up comedy, or comedy in general, is about evoking an involuntary physiological response from a group of strangers. We are trying to make people laugh with the words that come out of our mouth. There is a lot of parallels there.

[1] FOSTA-SESTA (The Fight Online Sex Trafficking Act and the Stop Enabling Sex Traffickers Act) is a set of laws passed under the Trump administration that were supposed to thwart human trafficking, but have ended up hurting the very people they were supposed to help: Pushing sex workers as well as trafficking victims into more exploitative and dangerous situations by taking away the digital platforms they depended on for safety.