Courtesy Stigma: Showing Up for the Sex Worker You Love

Honey Haven, MSW, MEd is a PhD Social Work student at Rutgers University; a graduate assistant at the Center for Research on Ending Violence (REV); and Director of Research & Care at New Jersey Red Umbrella Alliance (NJRUA). She uses community-engaged, qualitative, arts-based, and embodied methods such as CBPR, PAR, and cuerpo-territorio to investigate how people are governed as sexual citizens, and how these governing forces shape their relationship with the self, their sense of belonging, and their interactions at different system levels. Honey focuses particularly on how sex workers navigate and resist social exclusion under stigma and criminalization, with an emphasis on identifying and enhancing protective factors to create more robust ecosystems of care for sex workers. Her work also engages broader issues related to reproductive health and justice. She is currently collaborating with scholars and sex worker organizations across the U.S. on a research project titled Hustle & Health, examining the impacts of abortion, health, substance use, and criminal justice policies on sex workers’ health and well-being. At REV, she collaborates on a mixed-methods longitudinal study focusing on youth self-directed violence, peer support, and protective factors in community contexts. Honey’s professional background is in offering services and education to sex workers and survivors of IPV, DV, and sexual assault, as well as their care networks. At NJRUA, she collaborates in sex work-affirming research, program and educational curricula development, grant writing, and the facilitation of support groups, mutual aid efforts, and harm reduction strolls.

The New Jersey Red Umbrella Alliance (NJRUA) is a working alliance of activists and allies who are dedicated to promoting, defending, and advocating for the human rights of sex workers in the state of New Jersey and the world.

N’jaila Rhee, is the Executive Director of New Jersey Red Umbrella Alliance. She received her B.A in Journalism and Communication Media from Rutgers University, and went on to work in print, broadcast, and public/ media relations. She is also a journalist, a BBW adult web model, and PSO, formerly an exotic dancer. Ms. Rhee hosts the Cuntcast Podcast, part of the Unreasonable Fridays Network. She has organized and hosted several webinars and events for the New Jersey Umbrella Alliance, including panels for the 2018 Commission on the Status of Women in NYC. Rhee has been a speaker at Banana 2, the Asian American media conference, speaking on niche blogging and online community building. She has given seminars at Exxxotica Expo on Sex Positive Body Acceptance and niche blogging. She has spoken on panels at the Woodhull Sexual Freedom Summit & Catalyst Con. She has advocated for the human and labor rights of sex workers since 2005.  She strives to make a sex-positive space where people of all races, gender identities, and sexual preferences can have their voices heard.