Taking the AIDS industry to task

[Natasha]

Taking the AIDS industry to task

http://www.xtra.ca/public/viewstory.aspx?AFF_TYPE=1&STORY_ID=5190&PUB_TEMPLATE_ID=3
Greg Beneteau
7/31/2008

We meet Nancy, who is at ease talking about her work as the headmistress of an Indonesian network of MTF transsexual sex workers known as waria. She complains that her young charges have no respect for their elders, brazenly showing off their designer vaginas — bought at sex-change clinics in neighbouring Thailand — to potential clients. Nancy also works for Jakarta's Department of Social Affairs teaching waria the practical skills they need for career options outside of sex work. But even in the face of high HIV- prevalence rates and a conservative Muslim theology that vilifies sex work and condom use, most waria remain sex workers either because the pay is too good or it's the only job they've ever known. They choose.