The real test of a society is not whom it judges, but whose dignity it is willing to defend.
By Anjum J Parveen, Novelist | NLP Practitioner
Society has an extraordinary ability to identify the woman it considers immoral, but a remarkable reluctance to question the circumstances, customers and systems that keep exploitation alive.
A sex worker is reduced to a label before anyone asks about her life. Was she forced into this work? Is she an adult choosing it? Does she control her earnings? Is someone threatening her? Does she want to leave, or does she want safer conditions? These are not interchangeable stories. Treating every sex worker as helpless erases agency. Treating every situation as freely chosen erases coercion.
That distinction matters because protection without listening can become another form of control.
We speak endlessly about morality, but rarely about the conditions that make people vulnerable. We condemn the person whose circumstances make us uncomfortable, while ignoring the demand, inequality and power imbalances that sustain exploitation. We question her character, but rarely ask who profits from her vulnerability. We scrutinise the woman in the room and leave the people who seek her services outside the frame.
Why is her identity so often exposed to public shame while the buyers remain private? Why does society investigate her respectability more eagerly than it investigates violence against her? These questions are not an attempt to excuse exploitation. They are an attempt to locate responsibility where it belongs.
For many sex workers, stigma does not end at the workplace. It follows them into hospitals, neighbourhoods, rental agreements, police stations and ordinary conversations. A woman may hesitate to report violence because she expects humiliation or disbelief. She may avoid medical care because she anticipates judgement. She may be denied housing or ordinary services because her occupation becomes an excuse to treat her as less deserving.
When asking for help carries the risk of being shamed, silence can become a survival strategy. That silence then allows abuse to remain hidden.
There is also a dangerous confusion between trafficking and consensual adult sex work. Trafficking involves exploitation and coercion. Adults who choose sex work should not automatically be treated as trafficking victims. Equally, calling every situation a choice can conceal threats, debt bondage, force or control. A serious response must listen to the person, understand the circumstances and protect against harm without stripping anyone of agency.
Some people want to leave and need safe housing, education, financial support and genuine opportunities to rebuild their lives. Others want safer working conditions, healthcare and protection from violence. Their needs cannot be decided by outsiders who have never asked what they want. A rescue that ignores a person’s wishes may simply replace one controlling authority with another.
And what of their children?
A child should never inherit society’s prejudice. Yet children of sex workers can face bullying, exclusion, intrusive questions and the burden of hiding a parent’s occupation. They may be judged for a life they did not choose, carrying a label they did not earn. Imagine learning that classmates consider your family shameful before you have even understood what that word means.
What kind of society makes a child pay for an adult’s circumstances?
Children need education, safety, privacy and the freedom to build identities of their own. Schools must prevent bullying and protect confidentiality. Communities must stop treating a parent’s occupation as a child’s identity. No child should have to conceal their background to deserve friendship, opportunity or respect.
Institutional responsibility must be more than a paragraph in a policy document. Police must receive complaints without prejudice and investigate violence seriously. Hospitals must provide respectful, confidential healthcare. Schools must protect children from discrimination. Welfare departments must make housing, education and support accessible. Rehabilitation programmes must offer real choices, not impose a single idea of what a person’s future should look like. Sex workers must be included in decisions that affect their lives. Awareness campaigns mean little if the people most affected are never invited to shape them.
This is not about asking society to approve every choice. It is about refusing to confuse moral judgement with justice. We cannot claim to oppose exploitation while abandoning people to those who profit from their vulnerability. We cannot speak about women’s safety and then decide that some women deserve less protection.
Perhaps the uncomfortable question is not why sex workers exist. It is why society finds it easier to condemn them than to confront the demand, inequality and hypocrisy surrounding their lives.
If dignity belongs only to people we approve of, it is not dignity. It is a privilege. A society that protects its reputation more carefully than its people must ask what, exactly, it is trying to preserve.
About Anjum J Parveen: Anjum J Parveen is a novelist and NLP practitioner whose writing interrogates human behaviour, social attitudes and contemporary realities. Her articles address mental health, parenting, gender equality, childhood and institutional accountability, questioning entrenched assumptions and bringing overlooked concerns into public debate. Her work combines psychological insight with a critical examination of society and its responsibilities.
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