Zee St. James

Parker

Welcome to a sex workers Guide to the Galaxy where the answer to life the universe, and everything is sex workers. I'm your host, Parker Westwood. And today's a very special show, I get to bring on one of my dear friends and activist colleagues, Zee St. James. Zee and I are both co-founding members of a network of sex workers to excite revolution or ANSWER Detroit nd Zee also does a lot of other activist work with urban survivors union, and has just been actively involved in the sex workers rights community in Michigan for as long as I've known them. So, this is just a really exciting episode we get into it, like emotionally, but also legislatively, we talk about so many things in this episode, which is why I need to put a trigger warning on this episode, we talk about intimate partner violence, sexual violence, suicide, violence against sex workers, nothing too graphic, but just in case that's triggering to anyone I wanted to make sure I mentioned that. I also wanted to plug for a moment because Zee St. James has the last name St. James, which as we talk about in the show is an homage to Margo St. James, who we lost In January of this year, Margo St. James was an incredible force for sex workers rights, and founded the organization Call Off Your Old Tired Ethics or COYOTE, and later on ended up founding St. James Infirmary. So this is a loss for the sex worker community, but we continue the fight in her honor. She also had a fantastic haircut, if I may add, and there is a celebration of life on May 1, which I will post details for in the show notes. I encourage you all to attend to celebrate the life of this magnanimous fantastic human being who stopped at nothing to fight for the rights of her community for sex workers and speaking of someone who doesn't stop at anything to fight for the rights of their community, being sex workers, let's jump into this interview with Zee St. James. All right. Hey, everybody, I am here with the one and the only Zee St. James. Zee Thank you for being here with me today.

Zee St. James

Yeah, Parker, thank you so much for having me.

Parker

Yeah, I'm so glad that you could make it we we've been working together with ANSWER a network of sex workers to excite revolution for a couple years now and I'm excited to I, I, realized as I was sending you these questions, I actually don't know a lot of the story. So, I'm excited to hear more from you and get to know you a little bit better. Why don't you take a little time to introduce yourself name pronouns and the kinds of sex work you do?

Zee St. James

Yeah, um, so my name is Zee St. James. I use they them pronouns. I've been in the sex industry going on. I was calculating, it's going on 10 years now. For most of my adult life, a little bit of my adolescence, and since I was 21, I've been doing like escorting work mostly more that it was online work and sugaring. I actually got into sugaring first because I was trying to search scholarships the summer before college and I was like 17, almost 18, and I was I took out all these college loans and got really nervous about it so,

Parker

Yeah.

Zee St. James

intimate scholarships seeking arrangements popped up suggested like oh,

Parker

no way.

Zee St. James

Yeah, yeah. This was my introduction

Parker

that checks out.

Zee St. James

Good old Fannie Mae trafficking me into the sex industry No, no. So

Parker

I mean, if we're gonna target anyone, let's target Fannie Mae.

Zee St. James

Yeah, the, government. But um, yeah, that's how I first dipped my feet into the industry and then it wasn't until like years later that I started doing like, escorting.

Parker

Awesome, cool, and we'll get more into your, your, storyline with sex work. But I did want to like you reminded me of this actually and I thank you for that, that I wanted to ask you the question about your last name and where where it came from? Does it stem from the one in the only Margo St. James and tell us a little bit about it?

Zee St. James

Yeah. So, um, yeah, the name that I use for doing sex work or organizing work and also, um, you know, my preferred name in my personal life is Zee. And that's not the name that I advertised or work under. Um, and I, so I was trying to come up with like, okay, I know, I want to be called Zee. Like, what should I use as kind of this persona for my last name for doing political work? I decided to start calling myself Zee St. James, after the late, Margot St. James, who has recently passed uh she was a sex worker and organizer who founded St. James Infirmary in San Francisco, which was a I think they did like social services and like medical care. That was like zero barrier and accessible for sex workers, rooted in harm reduction. So that was the name that I decided to take on almost as like how people take on names of houses or whatever.

Parker

Yes, that's wonderful. I think she too, had a huge hand in starting COYOTE. Call off your old tired ethics.

Zee St. James

Yep COYOTE! There's a hooker’s ball in there that Shel Silverstein ,

Parker

Oh,

Zee St. James

attended and wrote a song about so this,

Parker

Amazing.

Zee St. James

this goes back farther than we even realized.

Parker

Absolutely. It is, after all the oldest profession. Well, I love that and rest in power Margo St. James. So, tell us a little bit more about your story. You were panicking about these student loans totally relatable and seeking arrangements popped up. What, what, happened after that? How did how did you evolve in the sex work industry?

Zee St. James

Um, well, yeah, I had like a sugar relationship. Um, when I starting when I was under age, like, isn't the best. Definitely, you know, bring, brings up some, some questions of consent and everything, but um, we do what we got to do and so that lasted for a couple of years. Um, I like moved out west with that person, uh actually found the sex to be quite boring and so much so that when I left that relationship, I like, you know, experimented so much I got mono, within months within a few months of,

Parker

Oh my god,

Zee St. James

yeah. I was, got really sick, went back home, lived with my parents, and eventually, you know, I was working retail and started doing webcamming out of my childhood bedroom at night and they kind of started figuring out what I was doing and not liking it. And by then I had enough money saved up that I was able to move out and it's when, yeah, when I finally moved out on my own, that I knew, like, I wanted to do full service, sex work and escorting so, I jumped right in to that arena. I think I was around. Let's see. Yeah well, I was like, 21.

Parker

And what year? Because that was before SESTA FOSTA hit correct?

Zee St. James

o I want to say that was like: 2015

Parker

Okay. And then you ended up working in Canada. Do you want to talk about that a little bit?

Zee St. James

Um, yeah. Before we talk about that I'll talk about like the beginning of some of my agency work. Maybe.

Parker

Okay, that started here. Okay.

Zee St. James

Yeah, so that did start here. Um, I know quite a bit. I'll clarify a little about what you know about me. So.

Parker

Yeah, I'm so excited.

Zee St. James

Yeah, yeah. It's disjointed. I have like a little bit of experience in a lot of different things. What I don't have experience in is strip clubs so, I've never I've never been a dancer. I've tried to audition, but did it, they didn't want me anyway.

Parker

The whole thing.

Zee St. James

Yeah. So, I tried doing like independent escorting for a little bit, and I had trouble getting starting, started. I mean, like, figuring out advertising and everything's a learning curve, especially when you're not connected to community. Um, and yeah, it was like, I I'd moved out on my own. I was young. I'd gotten into a new relationship. The person knew that I was a sex worker going in and but would kind of later hold that over my head, so it was through like kind of trying to work independently and being in this relationship that I was like, started like experiencing him lashing out against me or kind of like, manipulating me out of my money and using you know, guilt that I was in the sex industry in order to get that just started kind of be like a downward spiral like I was dealing. I didn't know anyone else in the sex industry at the time so I was dealing with the stigma from my partner, kind of this tenuous relationship with my family who suspected maybe what I was doing, but um, didn't really know I was doing it for money. They just knew I was like, having cybersex with people.

Parker

Gotcha.

Zee St. James

I'm a pastor's kid. So, I come from this like pretty religious background and that certainly has like a lot to do with it. Like I had a purity ring growing up. That I asked for myself.

Parker

Wow.

Zee St. James

Pledging your virginity for marriage. My best friend growing up that I, uh, who had the purity ring that I'm like, oh, I want one just like you she actually is getting married this Friday.

Parker

Wow,

Zee St. James

I don't know if she still has hers or what? That's her business. Back in the day the idea was that so she might be losing her ring and I've discarded mine a while ago. Oh,

Parker

I forget that. I forget that. You're a pastor's kid. That's, that's wild.

Zee St. James

Yeah, sometimes the kind of like Christian camp counselor a bit you can see it in me if you look really close, especially in some of my awkward fashion.

Parker

I'm never gonna not see that now.

Zee St. James

Yeah. Very,

Parker

Amazing.

Zee St. James

Um, but yeah, definitely having those experiences. I think when you do experience stigma, and you know, like violence, or like you're in the sex industry, um, it makes it a lot harder to deal with, especially if you're going through it alone and like, I was already reading things online, like about sex education, and sex positivity and I think I even read Tits and SASS at that part. So, I knew this term [garbled].

Parker

Yes,

Zee St. James

I knew some of these ideas and I would try to repeat them. I don't know how much I really had internalized it, myself, um, and the relationship that I was in kind of escalated, and I tried to leave it several times and when I finally did leave it, um, my partner outed me to my parents as a sex worker. And that kind of it was at like, the worst possible time because, first of all, like, they had most of my stuff, so I already kind of had to rebuild, my lease was ending, and I needed to, like find another place to stay. Sex work wasn't my primary income. I also worked in a restaurant, and I had gotten uh my partner job at that restaurant so I quit that job because I didn't want to, you know, be around them anymore I was like, worried for my safety. And, you know, the people usually would lean back on your family didn't want to, like support me, even, like, emotionally support me. For this, they didn't really understand it, or know what to do. Um, so I was felt very alone. I think that was probably it was probably like, the most suicidal I'd ever been, but like, the only time that I didn't seek help, um, I was ended up moving to like, a completely different part of town and yeah, quitting my job and so I now had to rely on sex work income, which I wasn't doing very frequently, I hadn't really figured out how to advertise and make like a decent income off of that and so I decided to start working for an escort agency. And mostly was like out of motels and stuff, their, the way they did things was like, very dated, like I talked to someone who's much older than me and worked for them back in the day and like they still had not changed their prices. The prices were very low and then they of course, took a chunk of whatever you made.

Parker

Right, and do you remember how large the chunk was like what the percentage was?

Zee St. James

Um, let me see.

Parker

I mean, if you don't, that's fine. I was just curious.

Zee St. James

They took like 40% I would say of yeah, what you made. I found out later that they like, wouldn't really screen the clients I found, like, a lot, a lot of, you know, like pushy people stealthing. Just experiences of like, I don't, I don't necessarily call it like outright assault but just I mean, it technically is like sexual assault. If someone's trying to get you to do something you don't really want to do. Um just like, not the best experience but I stuck with it because they had the client base. And I like didn't have another way to be connected to clients and I needed the income, like my mental capacity and functioning were not very good. I'd like dropped out of school. So, it was really hard for me to do any other work.

Parker

That's the way that you felt about the agency being kind of your access to clients is how I felt about the strip club when I was working in Detroit for like,

Zee St. James

Yeah.

Parker

that blip in time. Yeah, especially after, after, SESTA FOSTA. I was like, how do you find clients? But I imagine like, yeah, it's just, it's just easier when you have the agency that people are turning to but anyway,

Zee St. James

but yeah, and then I did eventually figure out how to work BackPage with Bitcoin, because backpage was still around for a little bit and that is when I ended up experiencing more stability. Even though I wasn't connected to enough other workers to really know how to screen, and you might screen a little bit differently. It was just like more income coming in. So, I was taking the agency clients, I was like, learning how to take my own clients, um, and slowly just kind of like, building up like saving money, getting financially, more stable and around that time, is when I started to meet some other sex workers, um, through SWAT, Michigan, who I'd like sent an email to when I lived at home with my parents and was working online, like, probably like a year and a half before that. But, yeah, it was when I was working on BackPage, I connected with some other workers and, um, through working on, like sex worker rights issues, which like I seemingly had familiarity with, I seemingly like really wanted to, like, end the stigma and I would like say those things. But I think I didn't. Not that I didn't believe it, but I didn't fully internalize like, what that meant for me.

Parker

Yeah,

Zee St. James

um, because I think I would, when you when people are telling you like, oh, like, why are you doing this, you're exploiting yourself. This is dangerous, like, this is bad. You are, and we hear, you know, anti-trafficking advocates and, you know, religious people like, talking about us that way. We really want to push back with like, no, I choose to do this. I'm empowered. Like, that's like your automatic, you get into this defensive place.

Parker

Yes.

Zee St. James

Like, kind of from like this, this is sex positive. Like I bring joy to people, I bring this and that, which isn't necessarily bad or wrong but it also does it hold place for by like, the violence, or like trauma you might experience or I mean, I think I think it's more difficult.

Parker

It doesn't allow space for reality, because we contain multitudes and issues are so much more complex than one side or the other.

Zee St. James

There you go. Yeah.

Parker

I got you.

Zee St. James

[garbled] let you know. No, absolutely. No one is. No one has to display their trauma out for everyone, whether that's sexual violence, you've experienced outside the sex industry or ,

Parker

yes,

Zee St. James

inside the sex industry, like, we shouldn't demand that of people. For sure, but like, I'll sit in these human trafficking trainings, and they're telling me like, oh, yeah, survivor, the brain of a traumatized survivor's the same, like frontal lobe as the brain of a four year old and like all these really infantilizing things about people who've worked in the sex industry and experienced trauma, which is like not all of us, obviously, but even for those of us who have like, we have a lot more agency than that our experiences are more nuanced and so like when people will kind of criticize the sex worker rights movement for being like to sex positive. Or, they'll say, they're glorifying the sex industry, things like that I understand sometimes where they're coming from, but also, you've got to like, what are you looking at? Are you looking at someone's client facing account that they're trying to make money? Of course, they're not going to like, talk more about nuance, because that is like one very specific side of us.

Parker

Right.

Zee St. James

You're not in like the community of other sex workers and it's when I started to connect with other workers through SWAT, Michigan, and then eventually through ANSWER and some of these other advocacy groups that there started, I started to be able to like process some of the trauma and violence that happened to me alongside other people who had experienced that too.

Parker

Yeah.

Zee St. James

And that was really powerful.

Parker

For sure, I think it's really important that people, I mean, that's one of the reasons why I started the podcast is so that people can see us as human beings and not on either side of the spectrum as like, people who need decisions made for us and like, don't deserve rights. And on the other side, like these liberated goddesses, so we're like, whatever gender-neutral term we're using for divine being. Because we are, we're human beings. We make mistakes, we're also badasses, we have all the complexity and I love that. I remember when you were like, oh, yeah, I use a different name for my activism work than I do for my work, my sex work, and I was just like, oh, that's so fucking smart. Too bad. It's too late for me now.

Zee St. James

It's partly a gender thing because I'm she her when I work, but I'm they them like, with everyone else I want to be authentic with. I was also talking today about

Parker

I love that.

Zee St. James

um, someone was asking me like, oh, what is gender mean to you? And I was like, felt a little put on the spot. But I was reflecting, like, with sex work of how like, yes, I do present a lot more femme for working and it almost is like, sometimes it can be hard being in that space and being sexual, because I do have trauma. But I see it almost as like my femme warrior, like body armor in a way that it puts space between me and the client, like this idea and the fantasy of what they want to see and who I really am in my experiences that I might not really want to share with them that's like not for them to take and, yeah, it just makes me feel a lot more confident. When I have to get all dolled up and put on a wig and go to work and see a trick and they're seeing me as something that I'm not, but you know what, like, it's okay. It's like for this certain amount of time, it's for this purpose and it can kind of protect the real me in the moment.

Parker

Yeah.

Zee St. James

Emotionally.

Parker

Yeah, I was just talking to a friend of mine the other day, it's so interesting that we're talking about this because we didn't, we didn't plan, on this part of the conversation and I love that. Um, but I was just talking to a friend yesterday about the fact that I've been cultivating a relationship with my body.

Zee St. James

Yeah,

Parker

and often like writing to my body, and, and it's, I've kind of realized the same thing that like, my body is the she her pronouns and like, the soul within is the they them pronouns. And like in in that I can kind of find this serenity or I don't know what other words but this like peace with, with, gender. So, I love, I love that that's how you also like utilize and view gender and it's a constant. I mean, ask us in six months, we may have a different answer about gender. That's the magic of it.

Zee St. James

Gender is a performance it's you're performing for a lot of people cis heteronormativity or whatever. Because,

Parker

yes

Zee St. James

That’s just something they want to see not all of us sometimes they really like the bisexuals the queer-does but um,

Parker

Give me androgyny.

Zee St. James

Yes.

Parker

I've been watching too much TikTok.

Zee St. James

Oh Yeah,

Parker

where were we in your journey? Here you,

Zee St. James

So we were talking about, you know, that I experienced, like, I've worked for an agency I've worked with, like for myself, I've had some partners that I guess, you know, some people might hear about my experience giving money to an incident partner and be like, that was your pimp. And I would say no. But again, like, what are the role of third parties? Like are they a good or a bad thing?

Parker

Yeah, let's, let's take a minute here and maybe I feel like it would make sense to talk about intimate partner violence and maybe like that dynamic. And then also explain what third parties are when, when, you say that term like what we're talking about. And, and the political place, or like the legal place that that holds. That's a weird way to ask this question, but I know you know what I mean so I'm gonna leave it there.

Zee St. James

I'm going to try it and then you can follow up and get whatever I don't get.

Parker

Deal.

Zee St. James

We know how to tag team. But yeah, okay so intimate partner violence is just, um, I think maybe more of a like less gendered or stigmatized term for like domestic violence, or experiencing violence with someone you're sleeping with. I guess that's what like intimate partner actually means. So maybe they're your boyfriend. Maybe they're your husband. Maybe they're a trick. I don't know. For me, when I use that, yeah, I usually mean, like, a partner, like a dating partner that I had and so it could be, you know, that encompasses physical violence, sexual violence, um, this more nebulous, kind of like emotional or manipulation, when there's substances involved that also kind of like throws things for a loop, as well and we'll get into that a little bit later when I talk about some of the advocacy work. But yeah, sex workers, um, I don't want to say like, we're at risk, we're at high risk for that, like we are, and it is not our fault and it's not because it's the nature of the industry. It's because it's a criminalized industry. So, people really target us. And they look for people who are younger sex workers, they look for street-based sex workers. They look for drug using sex workers. When I say they, I'm talking about predators. So, like whether it's a predator, or this is a relationship you get into and there's like, some unhealthy, abusive, even dynamics going on. That's what I mean. And it's again, it's something that people like assume, oh, you're a sex worker, you're a P word prostitute, like, of course, you have a pimp, of course you experience violence from clients, of course you experience, like, really, it's from the police. That's not necessarily true. I know, those are stereotypes and so they're stereotypes, I think that we sometimes want to, like, separate ourselves from and say, h, that's not me out of respectability, that goes back to the whole, like, I'm empowered, I choose to do this. But it is true that like, a lot of us have those experiences. Um, and it does play into our work. I mean, like, I started doing sex work, like manage sex work more, so I could get out of that relationship. Um, so it is a very nuanced issue when you're talking about sex work and domestic violence, and then eventually, what we might call trafficking.

Parker

Right? There's a quote here, I'm hoping this trans-, transitions us nicely into your time in Canada, but maybe if it doesn't just be like, we're just launching into Canada. There's a thread on Twitter that you, you discuss some of your experience in, in Canada and working with third parties and the, you, write. Despite working for a variety of what could be considered, quote, third parties unquote, I don't consider myself a victim of trafficking, although the law certainly would. Would you want to elaborate on that statement a little bit and maybe talk about your work with, with, third parties and what the law might consider trafficking?

Zee St. James

Yes. So, third parties legally would be like anyone who like manages a sex worker. I know we have like pimping laws. So, it could be in an exploitative way but not always, you know, people who are escorts will have booking assistants that they hire on, that's considered a third party. If you hire a driver to drive you around, and I know in that thread I mentioned you know, having kind friends drive me around to appointments technically, that's a third party. Under the law, they are physically transporting you so that is constituted trafficking. Our partners, anyone who profits off the earnings of a sex worker, could potentially be considered a third party, as well as like, you know, booking agents, managers, strip club managers, even all of those would be included when I say third party so that not necessarily bad. Um, however, it's because it's a criminalized industry, it definitely gives the opportunity for exploitation if just like, I mean, all capitalism would give opportunity for exploitation of like, that managers, or someone who is like controlling your work environment could dole out against you, but essentially it's through criminalized industries.

Parker

Yeah, in this case, it's criminalized. And the third-party laws are intended to target people with malintent. Right. But if they're so broad that they could include sex workers, loved ones, and friends. And, and, it's, yeah, the intent of the law is not how it's actually carried out.

Zee St. James

Exactly. or,

Parker

Go figure.

Zee St. James

two people that are trying to work together equitably do a duo or maybe you're the friend who's watching out for your other friend who's doing car dates on the street, but under the law, like people who've been charged with trafficking each other with trafficking themselves, because the law just sees like anyone who's facilitating prostitution as a trafficker.

Parker

Yeah. And here, when we're saying the law, we're talking about the US criminalization, like full criminalization of sex work,

Zee St. James

Right, in this, which, in that little thread, and I know, we want to like kind of move on to talking about Nordic model stuff, like I do have some experience working in Canada, and experiencing abusive third parties under the Nordic model working in Canada.

Parker

Yeah, before we go into your experiences, will you explain to us what the Nordic model is, and then kind of tell us about your experience with it.

Zee St. James

So, sex work, or prostitution is fully criminalized in the United States. It's not fully criminalized. In all countries. You know, in New Zealand, it's decriminalized, which means it's just not illegal, but you know, trafficking and exploitation is still criminalized. There's this model, called, people like to call either Nordic model because it's used in lots of like, I think it's used in Sweden, or even partial criminalization. They also call it the equality model, which I'm not too fond of, I think that's like a sugarcoating of it, and that basically means where that on the side of the seller. So, the sex worker it is decriminalized so you won't get arrested for selling sex on the buyer end, that is still criminalized, that is illegal. And then a lot of activities around the sex industry are also illegal. So that's the model that Canada has, technically, that it's legal for people to sell sex, but not to buy it and third parties, so like pimping kind of stuff is also still illegal.

Parker

Yeah, I mean, I think that's like a great 101 of like Nordic model versus decrim. Or criminalization not decrim-. I keep doing that.

Zee St. James

Yeah. Yeah and so a lot of times, people who will hear like anti-trafficking advocates, people who are behind like end demand will really be pushing this model of like Nordic model, because they'll say, oh, we don't want to criminalize the sex workers, we recognize that arresting you in order to rescue you isn't the best thing but we still want to end the demand for this. So, we're going to criminalize john's we're going to criminalize buyers because what they're doing is bad in order to end the demand. And like, first of all, if you're going to make it so less people want to buy sex, like that's just going to force the people who are trying to sell it into some like much more precarious situations, because the people who are interested in seeing us will either want to target us or you know, be exploitative. It also puts more police presence out there because you're trying to arrest people actively who are quote unquote john's, um, and any you know, any increased policing of sex workers has the potential to be deadly, even in a model of, under full decriminalization if we did do that, we know there are things that existing sex workers, especially the most visible ones, who are outdoor street based sex workers, would still be profiled and targeted for and so even if the police can't arrest them for prostitution, you know, that they're surveilled and we'll charge them with something we'll charge them with loitering, or public intoxication, or a drug crime or just you know, anything that has to do with survival and poverty.

Parker

Yeah, well, cause the stigma still remains and yeah, the, the cops are not immune to stigma, as you know, like not immune to the whole holding whorephobia in their hearts, um, among many other things. But also, I think, to this, this idea, whenever I think of people who are saying, like, we want to end demand that you were saying a bunch, when I think about when I think about the people who are saying we want to end demand, I'm like, you have a god complex, because you can't, you can't end demand, you can criminalize demand, which is what they're doing with the Nordic model, but you're not going to end the demand. You're just making it more dangerous for everyone involved.

Zee St. James

Yeah.

Parker

So it doesn't matter what you criminalize around in the industry, you're still making it dangerous for everyone involved. And then of course, clients and I'm sure you might have an experience with this or maybe not, but like clients have an aversion to screening or giving you any information when they're the ones that are on the the end of being criminalized. They they're just really wary that you might be a cop.

Zee St. James

Yeah, I definitely saw that working in Canada too at first, so went over there hopped on BackPage. Um, I had originally like, gone over there because I thought like, oh, yeah, it's like, less criminalized, right? Like, I don't like working for my agency here. Trying to live this, like, leave this domestic violence situation. I don't really like I'm like having to spend lots of time in motels. Anyway. Um, so I like traveled a lot like I was kind of running from stuff because I was. And,

Parker

Yeah.

Zee St. James

yeah, go across the border and yeah, clients were like, screaming, what's that? Why would I give you a reference? No. That was like, not the norm in Canada.

Parker

Wow.

Zee St. James

Which I think other people who you'll talk to, will say that as well. Um, and so I like tried to navigate working in Canada, by myself, eventually, kind of, oh, it was my bus ticket back. I missed my bus back and there weren't any more tickets for the weekend back. So, I was stuck in Toronto, and I didn't have like a place to stay and I just had my suitcase. So yeah, I didn't have a place to stay. And all the buses were booked for the weekend. Um, and I ran out of money. So, at first, I was able to make a deal with a couple guys to like, shoot a porn scene, and they paid for my hotel and then like, the next day, I connected with another provider and we've kind of started sharing a workspace and then she invited me to meet this guy who drives her around.

Parker

And there were quotation marks there everyone just so you know.

Zee

guy who drives you around, but this this guy was a pimp, I guess, more of a pimp. He would like place the ads, and we would give him like, a, you know, a certain amount of our money and he was fine, to me. Um, I mean, like, he wasn't violent to me, but I, one of the black sex workers who was in our little group, um, eventually told me later that he did put hands on her and had that capacity. So being like, having a US passport, especially like in Canada, if you tried to, like pulled some shit with me, it would be very easy like, at first I tried to find a different manage working environment that was more equitable, which was this kind of like workers collective, but the person who ran it talked to their lawyer and they said since like you are from the US, technically it would be considered trafficking because you don't have like a legal visa to work here. You wouldn't be able to get one in order to work in the sex industry. So, I wasn't able to and like those kinds that kind of workers collective thing, you know, not everyone can work independently. If you can, that's great but like, sometimes we need to share workspaces, it's great for safety, it's great for cost saving and if you're new to the industry, you might want someone who would charge a fee to handle some of your advertising like, that's just because you're not familiar with it. That isn't unheard of, or inherently bad.

Parker

It's the same way an independent sex worker would hire someone to manage their booking or manage their social media. So, it's something along those lines.

Zee St. James

Yeah, it was a similar thing. I think, like when I talked to that particular group, like collective of people, they're like, yeah, here's the fee if you just want to, like rent our room for your client and here's the fee, if you want us to handle your advertising. So, it was like very equitable, but again, because like, I was technically a migrant, in Canada,

Parker

Right.

Zee St. James

um, I, they turned me away, they were like, no way. And who knows, you know, if I was a migrant, from another country, it might have been a different story, it might have just been, because the US is so criminalized, they didn't want to take the chance on someone with a US passport.

Parker

Right.

Zee St. James

So, in some ways that barred me from accessing collective working spaces, in other ways it protected me from violence, especially like probably just as a white person in Canada, you know, that third party manager guy who I gave my money didn't lash out against me. But he would do that to other people, I would learn, um, there was another there's another like pimp kind of guy I ran into in Canada, too. It was more like a boyfriend pimp kind of situation, only lasted a couple days, my trips were very sporadic, kind of flying by the seat of your pants, like a little bit of like survival and excitement that I don't want in my life anymore. You can do that when you're younger, a little bit when you're young and dumb, I guess. But now that I say, oh, my, oh, my god, what could have happened? I look back and like, yeah, that that wasn't the best for me but I did in my short period of time working in Canada, which was probably only totaled a couple of weeks, I experienced a lot more third party managers and why because it was still really hard to work because it was the Nordic model, because clients, you know, don't want to screen so it makes people more reliant on those third parties and I think that's really important. You know, if we're looking at a different models of sex work, the Nordic model, especially for certain populations, really has the potential to increase the violence.

Parker

Which is so important to recognize, and I thank you for bringing that up because it is really important because the people pushing the Nordic model are the people who are anti sex trafficking, or that's their platform, right? And so, to recognize that the Nordic model creates a space in which sex workers who are consensually doing this work, for whatever reason, like if it's just economic necessity, or it's because they like some, I mean, it's always nece-, it's for money, we're doing this for money, like, let's be clear about that. Um, but for whatever reason we're doing it it actually like pushes people towards these third third party managers that could be that has the potential to be exploitative or violent.

Zee St. James

Yeah. And discouraging us from being able to work together because, again, one of us could be prosecuted as a trafficker or a pimp, or for keeping a brothel. When really,

Parker

Yes.

Zee St. James

you know that we are the ones to keep each other safe.

Parker

Yes, say that one more time for me because I love that.

Zee St. James

we are the ones who keep each other safe. We keep each other safe sex workers keep each other safe.

Parker

Yes. Okay. So, I'm going to move into more of your current experience with sex work and your what your sex work you currently do working as an independent sex worker under criminalization in the United States. How, how have things changed for you, or how are things different? Now that like you've since, since, you've been working in the States, I know that in Canada, that was like a short stint. Let me rephrase this. This is clumsy. Clumsy questions are always fun, but sometimes I'm like, wow, my brain is so scattered. Um, so I know that your time your time in Canada was short, and that you've been working in the United States for some years as a sex worker now, and are currently independent. So, tell us a little bit about how your work differs now and some of the things you face.

Zee St. James

Um, yeah, so definitely working more independently, I mean, I eventually kind of wised up to like, these guys don't know shit. These agency people don't know shit. Like, if I don't need to rely on them which isn't always a process, it's kind of like a transition process just like transitioning out of the sex industry would be a process. You know, you might keep seeing a couple clients who pay you at your, your, older rate, who you didn't screen as much. Um, while you start to increase your screening and safety measures, while you start increasing your prices. If you can, um, that, that,

Parker

Let me just say here for a moment, because I was just like, yeah, managers don't know shit. I just like felt it well, up in my being. In at the strip clubs, they, they tried to get every girl in fact, they would mandate that you had a manager, some of them.

Zee St. James

Like a specific manager?

Parker

So usually, it was a specific manager, and they would, yeah, they would help you quote unquote, help you get your dance card and like help, help, you stay on time for your schedule, like send you reminders of like, when you were going to be so basic. And what I knew, because I was seasoned at that time, was that you that I didn't need a manager and that he was doing all of this easy work and getting a cut of the money and that the strip clubs, were mandating that these girls had a manager. So, they were like, enforcing this third party. Anyway, so when you were like, I realized these guys didn't know shit, I was just like, preach, because,

Zee St. James

They don't!

Parker

Oftentimes we don't need that manager, we just feel like we do.

Zee St. James

Yeah, because they tell us we do. Because they tell us oh, you're going to age out of this, like, which is up for a lot of us kind of like the opposite of what is true. Um, but especially like, at least in a strip club, even if you're not encouraged and it's like a competitive environment, like you do have those other workers there. Like when I was working, you know, in Canada, like there's at least like some other workers there for the agency that I worked with in Detroit. Um, we were not encouraged to talk to the other workers, like I met one going on a duo but like we weren't, they didn't even talk to us about like sexual services. So, I didn't know until I went on a duo with someone that most of the girls were probably up charging for full service and I was, like, all of these things that and again, everyone can like choose their own prices. Like I've sold sex for $40 and I've sold sex for like a few thousand you know, depending on the situation, that I was in? I would, I would do it again for that amount if I had to. Um, but the more we can share information with each other, the better. Even just like, being able to get tips on different business model things or like, oh, no, you know, you can charge extra for that. Right? If you want to, like, things like that is like so, so important. Um, did I get off topic. What was the question? Where are we going next?

Parker

No, you're so good. You're so good. I was just like, yes, community is so important. And red flags when they're trying to isolate us big time.

Zee

Um, we were talking about more about like independent work.

Parker

Yeah, we're talking about your like your current experience in sex work and like, where basically where you've arrived now, and what your experience is now?

Zee St. James

Yeah, so now like, with the pandemic, I've been turning to like probably half online work doing some like phone sex work with night flirt. Um, sometimes I do camming I have like content that I've made in the past that still sells so there's that and then yeah, I do still do independent escorting types of gigs. So that's probably about like half and half. Half online, half in person right now and definitely having more control over it is a good thing. Um, although even in doing more independent work like I don't know I had a lot of like guilt for a while about falling into these manipulative relationships these like, quote unquote, abusive relationships, like, even as recently as a few years ago, um, that kind of like will, and a lot of times they come around out of necessity. Like, even though I didn't need someone to manage my sex work after FOSTA and SESTA, I needed someone to drive me around still. So, it would either be a bat, there's a relationship, I stayed in once because I needed someone to help me move and I was not physically able to do so by myself. Things like that. So, they're, you know, experiences that I continue to have, like, I have supportive people around me who I think, are better at helping me identify when I might be getting into a relationship like that, um, because it can be really hard. But again, like, I had someone who I consider, like a mentor, tell me when I was coming to them about this relationship that was occurring, like, you know, that's not your fault, right? Like, I don't know, if you have like a history of abuse, or experiencing intimate partner violence, but like, people kind of sniff that out, and, like, target us for that and that's not okay and that's just something that we have to deal with sometimes, but this is like, a really common experience that people have, um, and so, like, that really helped me to see things in a different light. And to come to terms with some of that stuff and to realize, like, you know, it's not my fault.

Parker

Yeah. As, as a survivor of sexual violence, I resonate with all of that. Really embodying the, it's not my fault piece, takes it, it's a journey. It is a journey. And I feel like I'm still embodying like that, where I confront a situation, and I recognize how much ownership I'm taking over things that are outside of my control. So, I really resonate with that and I think intimate relationships are where a lot of that is brought up. And I get to face it all over again, usually in from a different angle, you know but it's, it's a wound that that goes deep, because it's a story we tell about ourselves. So, I'm really glad to hear that you're finding some healing around that, and that you have that support.

Zee St. James

Yeah, and definitely, I hope, like through some of this, it's funny, like I didn't, some of this, while it was happening, I was doing like trying to do like sex worker organizing, and I was trying to, like preach against stigma, and all of these things. And sometimes like, yeah, you got to change the thoughts before you change the internal beliefs here. So, it's like work that we all do but I think maybe we also make assumptions about people who, who speak those things. Like, you know, they're all they got it all figured out and sometimes the reason is we don't we're saying that because we don't have it all figured out because we're trying to, like, counteract this other narrative that's inside us. Um, and so you just you never know, where someone is at. It wasn't until recently, when we're having, we're having these like, local political conversations where people are trying to nudge us into the Nordic model, then I'm like, wait a second. Actually, I worked under the Nordic model and yeah, it was not great. I do have like some personal experiences here that I can talk about and say like, yeah, no, I guess the law might have at some point, identified me as like a victim of trafficking or something, because of how third-party laws go. But like, this is not, this is not what I would have needed, I would not have needed further criminalization, or, you know, I the Nordic model in the United States would not have prevented some of the violence that happened to me here. Um, what did help was, you know, finding other workers, learning more about harm reduction through that and ways to work more safely and even just being in a space where we can carry the stigma that we all face together.

Parker

Yeah. Community and showing up for others has been a huge help in the healing process, because it allows us to see we're not alone and it also provides a support structure of which we are a part, right? We're not the only one being supported. We are also supporting other people. Which brings us gently and ever so smoothly into this topic that you had chosen, and I'm so elated about it. It was this healing through action piece. And I want I wanted to ask you like, I have an idea of what you meant by that but I'd love to hear it in your words like what did you mean by healing through action, and then feel free to just like dive into some of the action you've taken that has helped your healing process?

Zee St. James

Yeah, um, so it's a little bit of a newer realization for me. But I want to talk a little bit about the work that I've been doing with urban survivor’s union, which is the National Drug User union. I've been involved with for I think maybe going on two years now and so at first I, they have a sex worker working group that meets it's for sex workers who use drugs, sex workers who work in the harm reduction fields, or sex workers who are interested in learning more about harm reduction. And I knew a little bit about the drug piece of harm reduction, but I mostly knew about like the sex word sex work side of harm reduction. Going in, so I first joined that group call to try and like further my own knowledge. Um, and through that we worked on a project that was trying to address this law that was being pushed out of Ohio that would criminalize furnishing a sex worker with a drug as though it would make it a trafficking. So, it brought in the definition of force fraud, coercion, which is trafficking to include giving someone a drug in coercion, like to constitute coercion. Now, of course, this was put about because of like the increasing like overdose crisis and try to try to combat this issue of substance use space coercion, being used to traffic people into sex industry, which does happen. Um, you know, that's something that happened in our communities. However, what we know is that trafficking laws have been used to police sex workers who are doing this, you know, more consensually. They've been used to police trafficking survivors and criminalized trafficking survivors. They're not good for either of those groups, or whoever kind of lay in the intersections of both and like, some of the issues that we could get a with that particular law would be, you know, like encouraging people to use drugs alone, which again, in an overdose crisis is like very, very dangerous. Um, you know, like, it also it didn't say whether the drug had to be illicit or licit. So, like, is this Narcan? Is this birth control? Is this me giving my friend an Advil before we go see a client? Um, right, you know, it could erode Good Samaritan laws that protect people trying to resurrect someone, revive them, resurrect, revive an overdose and Narcan, like for example a client? Would the client just leave you there because they don't want to be charged with a trafficking charge. It just opens up this really nebulous area. So, the sex worker working group of the urban survivor’s union took this issue and we started by interviewing people within our communities, and our circles who were sex workers who use drugs or trafficking survivors who use drugs, some of them had themselves experienced substance based coercion. Some of them just had, you know, substances within a domestic violence or trafficking situation. So, we interviewed them about their experiences about what they tried to seek for help, what helped them in that situation, what didn't, what would have helped them in that situation, and we start started to see certain themes come to light. The biggest one being, that the services that are meant to help people leave domestic violence or trafficking situations really are not good for people who use drugs. They really most of them mandate abstinence in order to access housing. A lot of them in order to get domestic violence services, you have to go and make a police report and so you can just imagine, you know, that's traumatic enough having to actually go and report your, your, violence, that whats happening there, you can just make it so you get caught up in the criminal legal system. Um, obviously, we saw lots of faith-based services that you know had stigma against sex workers, and especially, you know, trans people gender non-conforming people, they like either just wouldn't serve them or because they did such a bad job people don't want services from them. So, we started to see that theme we also talked to, um, we've talked a lot about anti -rafficking advocates. A lot of times like, you know, people in our circles, say the anti-s and we'll vilify them, you know, not all anti trafficking advocates believe in Nordic model or end demand criminalization. Surprisingly, there's this group called the Freedom Network, which trains service providers, like domestic violence and trafficking service providers. And they are Pro decrim. They're having their conference this week, I think. So, they have a whole network of people who think more like we do and that was really heartening. But we were able to see from like the service provider side, okay, like, what are the issues, and one of the things was that there's this law, that, in the TVPA, which I'm going to get into, I know, we're getting into the weeds of some of this advocacy stuff but I think it's really fascinating.

Parker

I could listen to you for hours, so just go ahead

Zee St. James

So, there's this law in the Trafficking Victims Protection Act, which the TVPA um, is basically the biggest source of federal funding for anti-trafficking. That's including stings and services to people and also, domestic violence services. I think the Violence Against Women Act got lumped in with that act. So, when I'm kind of saying, I'm not trying to say domestic violence and trafficking interchangeably, but I put those two together because they are funded together, which is an important thing to know. This huge law, there's not a whole lot of other laws that come at funding this way, but trafficking, this issue of trafficking. It does.

Parker

Wow.

Zee St. James

So, yes, in that law, um, there's like a couple of stipulations. One is that it like prioritizes funding programs that are in demand higher than or that use an end demand approach, such as, like doing john sting's higher than approaches that don't. So, it's gonna like prioritize, like giving that grant funding to those organizations and it also has a stipulation that says that groups that receive federal funding cannot promote the legalization. And I say legalization, not decriminalization of sex work and so that has been interpreted broadly by a lot of these service providers. to mean that, I think they're thinking more oh, we can't promote decriminalization, thus, we can't support sex workers, or we can't like house them because if they're still going to be involved in the sex trade, that's why a lot of times you'll hear like, exit, exit, that kind of wedge because they think they are trying to like, they are like promoting prostitution, which is not true. Um,

Parker

Right.

Zee St. James

You can receive federal funding and help sex workers. Um, and that's not being pro-legalization. Like I'm not pro-legalization. I'm pro-decriminalization. So again, those

Parker

Yeah, can we, would you mind defining the difference between the two?

Zee St. James

Yes. So, um, legalization is gonna be, think of like Nevada Brothel method. Um, so it's like, putting forth laws that will regulate the sex trade, maybe make people register, or having to do STI tests, which I've heard people be like, that's good, right? We want to treat this like a public health issue. But really, it just, legalization creates two markets creates a legal market and an illegal market because not everyone's going to be able to register with the government. If you're undocumented, or you know, if you can't pass an STI test, but you still need to make your money that night. You're still going to do what you're going to do, and then you're going to be subject to criminalization. So, decriminalization would just be removing the criminal penalties for participating in the sex industry, but not requiring you to like get some sort of a license.

Parker

Thank you. I think that that's a really important distinction that not a lot of people understand. I'll hear people who um really support sex workers and claim or claim to support sex workers and want to be an ally and they they're like, I support the legalization. And it's like, I think, I think you need to read about what that actually might be. So, thank you. Thank you for that.

Zee St. James

Yeah, no problem. I know, there's like all these different issues. Um, but interesting thing about the TVPA and doing more research in it is you see all of the things that we talked about now laid in that groundwork for all of the different reauthorization. So okay, I'm gonna backtrack a little bit, because we missed talking about this law coming out of Ohio, which I'm not going to mention, because one, I don't want it to be reintroduced, but two, um, I think, is going to be reintroduced into this TVPA thing that I keep talking about. Um, so yeah, we talked to people in our community, we talked to service providers, and then we did some training and work to be able to meet with this senator who had proposed the legislation. Well, we haven't heard back from him and if you've been following some different sex work laws that have popped up in the last session of congress, like, you might be wondering what happened to EARN-IT. And okay, this isn't confirmed, but what we think might happen, the Trafficking Victims Protection Act, the big federal law that funds all of the anti-trafficking and domestic violence efforts, is going to be reauthorized in the fall of this year. So, what we think probably will happen is that, you know, some of the legal push around like substance use coercion and trafficking, or, you know, laws like EARN-IT are going to be rolled into this Trafficking Victims Protection Act reauthorization, which is a law that I think only gets reauthorized every few years or so. So, we've shifted our focus to working on that and we're able to roll in a lot of the work that we did do into this. Because we don't want laws criminalizing like the use of substances in there, and there's some other stuff that there's so many things we know we don't want. But right now, we're working on affirmative asks for that law, which is hard whenever you're trying to do affirmative ask because again, you can't say we know what we don't like we don't like these, like faith based anti-trafficking groups, requiring that we're abstinent or the access basis, basic services that we need to survive. We don't want things like that, but you can't write it into law like that. So, we're trying to preemptively kind of anticipate what are some of the issues the EARN-IT section 230 things, issues around survivors of trafficking, who do experience substance use coercion. What are those? And then what are the affirmative asks that we can ask for, like, what is our ideal world of things that would address these issues in ways that aren't carceral. And are, you know, going to like be the best outcome for the people who are the most impacted by issues of domestic violence and trafficking, which drug using sex workers, unfortunately, are at higher risk of it, because of just lack of resources. So, it is through I know we started this conver-, this part of the conversation by talking about healing through action. So, I talk about all of like, the nitty gritty stuff to say in learning like, wow, how big this system is, like, all of this language that we've, that's been hurled against us, where this originates from reading the different reauthorizations of the Trafficking Victims Protection Act, finding out how the organizations are funded and like what is prioritized and then also doing the interviews of people who had experienced violence was really healing for me in a way and I don't think people should do activism with the intention of healing like primarily like that's not why we do it, that's why you go to therapy, but I've been in like the psychiatric therapy system for a long time like going on 15 years now. Half of that was traumatizing. Half of it was helpful. I don't think I've made as much ground as I have, I don't know, I've like process things a lot quicker trauma wise through doing some of this work. Because it's cool to be able to say, okay, we know, like, we know, these are issues like we both experience on the ground, you could be in some sort of survivor support group and that is helpful. But when you can point to the institutions that are doing the harm and making the harm happen, the institutions that are arresting us, and criminalizing us, you know, even if you've never been arrested for prostitution, you've probably, you know, the fact that you're afraid of client violence, of the police has something to do with that ,the criminalization of sex work has something to do with that, knowing that you can't go and report violence that happens against you, or someone who wants to harm you can use your criminality against you. Um, that is violence that we've all experienced on, you know, micro or macro levels, unfortunately.

Parker

Yeah.

Zee St. James

So being able to like, figure out how the system works, and where we can really impact change who we need to talk to, um, has been really healing. I've talked to some of the other organizers in the project and I know they have similar thoughts in that. It can be just very affirming.

Parker

Absolutely. I think, I mean, we've talked about this in ANSWER meetings to that, that no movement will be long lasting without an element of healing. Like there's there is collective healing that needs to be done in any social justice movement, because we face and I think sex work is this unique issue that is at this like, intersection place of all these -isms like capitalism, sexism, white supremacy, borders, et. cetera, patriarchy, like all of those things and there's a lot of healing to be done around those things. And so if we're not doing that healing work, we are at risk of acting in those systems, or falling prey to those systems again, when, when, all we're trying to do is knock them down. Yeah, I think I think that's very right.

Zee St. James

Like I support people being able to have like services that are low barrier that meet people where they're at, if you want to have professional help, and therapist, by all means you should be able to do that. Again, that's not without certain institutional harms that are there and when you have more resources available to you, it's better to get more, it's easier to get more out of therapy. But I will say, like, when it comes to like sexual trauma, healing, like in sex work, like we really have the power to help each other heal just by holding space for each other. Um, but personally, it's hard to find a good therapist, that's not going to stigmatize you for your work. Um, we don't always have those things accessible to us. So just in, you know, holding space with each other, like we've done through ANSWER I know, we have like a peer support group, um, you know, being mindful checking in with one another, or even doing these political projects where we start to bring some of our stories in on our own terms, you know, in ways that feel okay, to us this healing by choice, piece,

Parker

Yeah.

Zee St. James

I think that's really essential and powerful,

Parker

Agreed. It really does take a village, the healing process, and raising a child, but that's where the that's saying is from, but raising the inner child raising the inner child takes a village. Um, wonderful. Is there? Is there any work that you currently want to plug that you're doing with urban survivor’s union or with ANSWER that you can think of at the moment?

Zee St. James

I know we do have an ANSWER fundraiser up. That's how you and I know each other primarily and have gotten to know each other and I know this podcast definitely helps to support the work of I'm really grateful for that. There's no events with ANSWER I have off the top of my head. So yeah, just direct people to our social media. Our website our I said, Twitter already ,our fundraisers, and then with urban survivors union. Yeah, maybe I can give you some more links there. There is the national drug users union, they meet remotely. It's really good if you are looking to learn more about harm reduction, or even just try to find a group of folks that maybe isn't as like a pure abstinence based oriented. Um doing like some of the good work to try and de stigmatize drug use. So that is, yeah, another organization I would check out I know we do have a methadone fundraiser for some of the methadone advocacy work. So, I can also plug that, um, and on a personal level, if I do have a Twitter account, it's at Zed weirdo, z e, d weirdo that comes from I have a friend. So, Z Zed is what you would call the letter Z in Canada. And then I have a friend called nice Edward, like, Edward. That's where that,

Parker

Oh, cute. I like that. So, but, and all of that will be linked in the show notes for anyone interested in exploring all of those links. So, I have one more question before we launch into our rapid fire questions. What is something you wish the greater public would understand about sex workers or sex work as a whole?

Zee St. James

Oh, that's a good one. A lot of times, we like to pit survivors against sex workers, you know, like survivors of trafficking against sex workers. But there's people in both categories and I think all sex workers are survivors, you know, are survivors of criminalization. Some of us are survivors of different kinds of violence, whether it's the violence of stigma, institutional violence, or interpersonal violence, like so much of the population also experiences. But we also are survivors because we support each other and we're really what each other have to rely on.

Parker

Absolutely. I love that. Also, as you were, that reminds me that, as you were speaking earlier, I didn't want to interrupt you. But one of the things that came to my mind was that sex workers are against trafficking. Like, I would, I would, venture to say like, all sex workers are against trafficking. Yeah.

Zee St. James

Yeah, we're against trafficking [garbled] criticize the anti-folks. We're not for trafficking. We don't like that

Parker

No.

Zee St. James

we don't want to experience exploitation.

Parker

No, cuz so we're against trafficking, but we're also against police violence. Right. So cool. I love you so much and I'm so so proud of you. Um, let's get into our rapid-fire questions. Are you ready?

Zee St. James

Yes.

Parker

Okay, vanilla or chocolate.

Zee St. James

Vanilla.

Parker

pancakes or waffles?

Zee St. James

Waffles.

Parker

fishnet or lace?

Zee St. James

fishnet.

Parker

Excellent. What's your favorite place you've ever been?

Zee St. James

Um, the, the mountain I forget what they're called but the mountains in Albuquerque.

Parker

Ooh, in Albuquerque.

Zee St. James

Santa Fe. I think the Albuquerque's are Sandia because yeah, watermelon.

Parker

Oh, cute. I like that. Oh, a book from your mandatory reading list.

Zee St. James

Revolting Prostitutes.

Parker

Hell yeah. Uh huh. A secret talent.

Zee St. James

Baking Cookies.

Parker

Oh, delicious. I'm coming over um a song, a musical artist, or an album that you're currently obsessed with?

Zee St. James

Kate Bush.

Parker

Yeah, [garbled]

Zee St. James

gotten there? Let's see. Oh, is that one where she like dresses up like a little boy. She's acting out the story. Cloud Busting

Parker

Love that. Love that. Okay, finish the sentence for me. Good sex is?

Zee St. James

Consensual.

Parker

Yeah. I'm surprised that one hasn't come up yet. If you had one superpower, what would it be?

Zee St. James

To be invisible.

Parker

Hmm. That's such a good one.

Zee St. James

Then you can spy on people.

Parker

Yeah, it's so good. What is something simple that brings you joy?

Zee St. James

The sound of a tea kettle.

Parker

Ooh, what a good answer. That reminds me of Hannah, the comedian Hannah Gatsby. She says her favorite sound in the world is the sound of a teacup finding its place on a saucer.

Zee St. James

Oh, I can hear that.

Parker

Yeah, it's so good. Awesome well, thank you so so much. I am just every time we get to talk, I'm so like enamored with everything you have to say and I'm so proud to be your friend and to do this work with you. And it's an honor to have you on the show. So, thank you so much for coming.

Zee St. James

Yeah, thank you so much. I'm really excited.

Parker

Yeah, I'm excited to hear the edit. When I know how to talk, yeah. All right, let's say goodbye to our listeners, bye listeners.

Zee St. James

Bye.

Parker

Don't ya'll just love that human being. I'm so thrilled to be able to share this interview with you all. Yeah, there's so much information in there. I feel like I could listen to it over and over again and learn a few things. So, I hope you all do that. Again, the links to urban, Erber. The links to urban survivors’ union and ANSWER are going to be in the show notes as well as the link that I mentioned at the top of the show to Margo St. James celebration of life on May 1 and of course, the Zee’s links specifically to their Twitter. And if you want to support the show, you can become a patron on patreon.com/sexy Galaxy pod. You can also follow us on Twitter at sexy Galaxy pod. We do not have an Instagram as of yet though y'all have me thinking about it so maybe that's the thing that's coming soon. You can also share all of this with your friends. If you have friends who you think would enjoy the show, please share it with them and just keep listening. I'm so humbled to know that I have a listener base that regularly tunes in I, I, watch those analytics y'all so thank you. Yeah, and with that, I will sign off again. I didn't think of anything spacey. I've been watching a lot of Star Trek though, so I should be able to come up with something. If you find yourself in a work bubble, and you create an alternate reality, just make sure you create an alternate reality in which there are a shit ton of orgies. Nanu nanu motherfuckers.