When most people speak about sex workers, what comes to mind are prostitutes, hookers, illiterates, dirty, disease-infested whores, and slay queens. Society often stigmatises Female sex workers while men patronising them are spared the same treatment.

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The public view sex work from a one-sided perspective without caring about the personalities of these women, their stories, background, interests, aspirations, talents, wit, intellect, and possible contributions to their communities. This imbalanced view of sex work isolates and degrades women, forcing them to hide their profession to avoid discrimination and isolation from communities, friends and family.

Negative stereotypes are learned from childhood

I was very little when I noticed the discrimination against some women called “ashawo," a Nigerian slang referring to a prostitute. So I associated the word with “rejects of society," which I never wanted to be called when I grew up. The first time I noticed a brothel on my way to church, I remember the desolate look of rejection written all over the building. I'm unsure what the tipping point was; I knew it was a brothel.

At the time, we lived in the Apapa area of Lagos state, Nigeria. My mother always referred to one of our neighbours as an "ashawo" and spoke about her with disgust, calling her unspeakable names. So, whenever I walked by the brothel, I would stare at the women with sadness, knowing that they, too, like my neighbour, had been rejected by society. 

One Sunday evening, as I returned from church, one of the sex workers caught me staring and shouted at me in Nigerian pidgin English. "Wetin you dey look?" she said to me. “You wan fuck? Abi, you want make I drag you enter here?" I walked as fast as I could till I was nowhere near the brothel, and I never took that route alone to church again. I was terrified because I didn't know if I could stop staring or what would happen if I was caught again.

My unlearning journey about sex work began many years after reading “Eleven Minutes” by Paulo Coelho, which highlights the experiences of Maria, a young Brazilian prostitute, and her journey to self-realisation through sexual experience. As a sexually liberated woman, I believe sex workers are more and should not be undervalued or reduced to just their vaginas. 

Sex work is not a crime

Sex work is one of the oldest known professions, and it's estimated that around 40 million people worldwide work in the sex industry. Sex workers can live healthier lives and contribute to society with legal rights, labour rights, and adequate health care. 

But despite this, sex workers are stigmatised and more likely to experience homelessness, poverty, and drug abuse. Now that I think about that Sunday evening on my way back from church, the sex worker probably tried to beat me to it as a survival strategy by ensuring that I didn't have the opportunity to judge and discriminate against her. 

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I understand that some women sell sex to make money but don't call themselves or think of themselves as sex workers. For example, a single mother struggling to make ends meet, a struggling student trying to pay her bills or a runaway teenager. 

To change the narrative in mainstream reporting, I set out to hear from these women, who have been underreported daily. While some refused to speak with me for fear of being portrayed negatively in the media, two sex workers agreed to speak with me.

Candy, the first sex worker, is a sex writer who aspires to be a sex therapist. She is also a talented chef who enjoys making crochet on the side while also attempting to launch a blog in which she will talk about the value of accepting and appreciating one another's unique perspectives and ways of life.   

Candy, who has been a sex worker for three years, revealed that it was difficult to fend for herself with an unsupportive family and that sex work was the only thing that made sense to combine with the school. She also stated that she earns between 30 and 40 thousand naira if she spends the night with a client and 20,000 naira for a short time. 

When asked what the smallest and largest penises she had seen and if she was intimidated by their enormity, Candy said the smallest was about the size of her pinkie when fully erect. The largest was about 9 inches when fully erect. "I was terrified and in pain for days because he was so rough," she said. 

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Should sex work be made legal?

Decriminalising sex work would bring sex workers out of the shadows, benefiting many. Criminalisation, however, harms more than it helps. It increases stigma, discrimination, and the risk of violence. It impairs working conditions, health care, and self-advocacy and makes leaving sex work more difficult. 

Physical and sexual violence against sex workers is perpetrated not only by customers but also by police officers. In 2019, policemen in Abuja who wore "pure water sachets" as condoms reportedly raped some sex workers. These women have not gotten justice for the inhumane treatment they suffered.

Another sex worker I spoke to is Barbara, who works in a Lagos brothel in the heart of Bariga and has been a sex worker for a while but can't remember how long. She is a struggling nurse from Benin and a mother of two who became a sex worker after a series of heartbreaks to make ends meet. 

She said that some of her clients sneakily take off condoms while they are having sex, and others don't pay the agreed-upon fee after having sex. “It can be difficult to understand some of the men too, particularly the virgins who come for us to dis-virgin them and the men who treat sex workers as animals,” she said. When asked if she had ever been in a position where she was harmed, abused, or raped by a client or a judgy person, she revealed that her ex-boyfriend abused and molested her when he saw her with clients and assaulted her one day, leaving her seriously ill.  

Barbara also mentioned that she services between nine to three clients daily and earns between N15,000 and N5,000 per client. "I won't advise any woman to go through what I go through most nights as a poor sex worker in Nigeria," she said when asked what advice she would give aspiring sex workers.

Imagine a world where women voluntarily become sex workers in a safe environment. They can file a complaint if they are raped by a police officer or a client and be confident that it will be investigated without hiding their true profession for fear of being judged or abused or having their child(ren) or family mocked. That is the world I aspire to live in.