Surviving the Witch-Hunt: Battle Notes from Portland’s 82nd Avenue, 2007-2010

By Emi Koyama
Confluere Publications

Surviving the Witch-Hunt is collection of artifacts and commentary from 2007 to the present and catalogues the community forces that emerged after the City of Portland removed its controversial Prostitution Free Zones (PFZ). These zones had allowed the police to issue exclusion orders for those who had been arrested for sex work, even if they had never been charged. For ninety days, anyone arrested for prostitution in the designated area was not allowed to return without submitting an appeal, segregating public space and criminalizing behavior without actual legal indictment.

The uproar from community figures after the removal of the PFZs demonstrated the discriminatory sentiments of many of those living in the 82nd Avenue neighborhood. Those who opposed the end of the PFZs claimed that there was an increase in crime and a correlating decrease in their property value, and they united to fight the “problem” of sex work in their communities. Emi Koyama collected documents that demonstrate their anger toward sex workers and bolsters these artifacts with some social justice commentary, raising arguments that protect the rights of all women and advance a more holistic view of community development. This booklet uses the 82nd Avenue case study as an example of how multifaceted problems cannot be solved via law enforcement but through broader advances in social and economic justice.

Countering the arguments of outraged neighbors near 82nd Avenue, Koyama’s documents describe the harm PFZs do to women who work in the sex industry. The fliers in the collection address the underlying causes of sex work, and explain that improved access to housing, employment, and treatment services are a better response than criminalization. The documents also catalogue the efforts of anti-prostitution advocates who focus on educating men about the social dangers of purchasing sex. This was the most interesting part of the compilation to me, since many anti-prostitution feminists are pushing educational programs as a way to end sex work. Koyama’s work shows that decreasing the demand for sex work, while a seemingly laudable goal, actually harms women. Decreasing demand also reduces the price for services, so sex workers have to do more acts for less money, and it pushes sex work to more remote areas, causing potential dangers for workers. Also, johns who are rational regarding risk taking will be taken out of the pool, leaving a group of riskier men purchasing the services of sex workers. These men are more likely to act violently towards sex workers and are less likely to take safe precautions during sex.

As someone who recognizes that the problems associated with sex work have no simple solutions, I am thankful that Koyama lays out these rebuttals to anti-prostitution groups. Criminalizing and even reducing the amount of sex work will do little to address the more serious problems in our communities. Sadly, the deeply rooted social, racial, and gendered inequities that necessitate sex work too often go unnoticed by policymakers, concerned citizens, and others trying to improve their communities.

As a human rights lawyer, I am personally outraged at the discriminatory attitudes of too many in the 82nd Avenue community regarding the end of PFZs, and I am somewhat embarrassed that I had not known about these events before reading this collection. Many local stories of civil rights conflict, of discrimination, and of survival often don’t reach further than the affected community. By effectively curating a compilation of documents from the 82nd Avenue community, Koyama demonstrates the importance of capturing a historical moment in the trajectory towards justice. The fliers, newspaper articles, notices about community meetings, and email messages Koyama collected were probably designed to be temporary, but in this small archive they combine to tell a powerful story of the strength of community activism.

Review by Andrea Gittleman

Lost Girls: Sex and Death in Renaissance Florence

By Nicholas Terpstra
Johns Hopkins University Press

Founded in 1554 by a group of charitable women who called themselves the Compagnia della Pietà, the Casa della Pietà, or Compassion House, was built in Florentine to shelter girls who had been orphaned or abandoned by their parents. The goal of the home was to keep children and adolescent girls from turning to (or being forced into) prostitution in the absence of familial support, and to provide them with the possibility of a dowry and marriage. Despite these good intentions, only 202 of the 526 girls and women who resided in the home survived their stay. As Nicholas Terpstra repeatedly asks in Lost Girls: Sex and Death in Renaissance Florence, “What was killing the girls of the Casa della Pietà?”

Terpstra sets out to solve this 456-year-old mystery using the limited documentation still available about the home, as well as other documents that discuss contemporaneous Florence. Throughout the text, Terpstra explores and elaborates upon various theories about what was killing the residents of Casa della Pietà, weaving these theories within the story of the home and the conditions of Florence of the era. In telling this story, Terpstra touches on topics such as the work available for adolescent girls, birth control and abortifacients (and the abortion debate), prostitution, and religious fundamentalism. Although the book is structured as somewhat of a mystery, Terpstra’s question about the fate of the residents is only one part of what is ultimately a social history of the Casa della Pietà and Renaissance Florence.

In terms of women’s history, the book is interesting in two ways. First, it discusses the challenges and options an orphaned or abandoned girl could anticipate facing at the time, even when external support was provided. Second, as was previously mentioned, a group of women established the Casa della Pietà. This was not the norm at the time. Although Terpstra warns against overly romanticizing these women, it is somewhat difficult not to, particularly when the author outlines the differences between the way the Casa della Pietà admitted girls and the way that contemporaneous shelters did, and when he compares Casa della Pietà under the guidance of Compagnia della Pietà to the way it operated once the founding members ceased their involved. As Terpstra notes, “these women challenged more than just the sexual politics of Renaissance Florence—they challenged its political and ecclesiastical establishment.”

The book contains fascinating, and sometimes shocking, information about Terpstra’s topic. I appreciated that Terpstra does not exclusively limit himself to the subject of Casa della Pietà, but uses the mystery of what happened to the home’s residents as a way to examine related issues. Admittedly, some of these discussions were less interesting to me than others. For example, although the section that discusses the textile work done by the home’s residents and the wool and silk industry in general is necessary to have as complete an understanding of the home as possible, I did find it difficult to get through because it is a topic in which I have little interest. This is my bias, however, and I appreciated the level of detail Terpstra demonstrated in this section when he turned this focus to topics that were more in line with my interests.

Overall, despite containing a few sections that were less interesting to me, the text puts forth considerable fascinating information. Perhaps most importantly, the text both taught me about a shelter I had never before heard of, and made me want to learn more about the topic and the social climate of Renaissance Florence and its impact on women and girls.

Review by Erin Schowalter

Women Without Men

Directed by Shirin Neshat
Indiepix



The story of director Shirin Neshat is almost as compelling as her first feature. Born in religiously conservative Qazvin, Iran, Neshat has been using visual art to explore gender relations under Islam for nearly two decades, traveling back and forth between the States and Iran to enrich her perspective. But because her work has been so politically outspoken, Neshat has been exiled from her native country since 1996.

A visionary as courageous as she is condemned, Neshat is perhaps the most likely candidate to direct Women Without Men, an adaptation of Shahrnush Parsipur's sweeping novel. The scope of Parsipur's story is both epic and intimate, juxtaposing the Western imperialist invasion of Tehran with the intertwining lives of four Iranian women during the tumultuous summer of 1953. To call such a project ambitious would be an understatement.

The connection between this political upheaval and the four characters in question is unmistakable; just as the people of Tehran have decided to come together and fight to maintain democracy, these four women have reached an impasse in their own lives. Nearing thirty and still unwedded, Munis (Shabnam Toloui) seeks to escape the oppressive hand of her older brother; Faezeh (Pegah Ferydoni), a rape victim, must flee to avoid condemnation; long-time prostitute Zarin (Orsolya Tóth) is finally ready to leave the life behind; and middle-aged Fakhri (Arita Shahrzad) has grown weary of her stifling, loveless marriage. The greater struggle of the revolution provides a moving counterpoint to the individual struggles of these characters to achieve solace.

Both the book and the film use elements of magic realism to tell their story. In order to be free of her brother and reinvent herself as a revolutionary, Munis either fakes her own suicide or actually commits suicide and comes back to life; it's unclear which. While roaming the woods, Faezeh sees a surreal reenactment of her rape. Though the device isn't consistent, it still manages to be effective when used.

It helps that the film is beautifully shot, with careful compositions and a palpable tone and style. Neshat uses a metallic palette throughout, giving the film an appropriately imprisoning feel. The film is also remarkable for its avoidance of graphic imagery, with the exception of a disturbing scene in which Zarin scrubs herself raw in a public bath, but this is more to emphasize her diseased, nearly skeletal body, and needless to say, this lone image has a lingering impact.

In fact, it is Zarin's story that ends up being the most effective, while some of the others seem a bit heavy-handed at times. Fakhri's husband chides, "A woman hitting menopause shouldn't be flirting anymore," while Munis' brother declares, "A woman's body is like a flower. Once it blossoms, it quickly withers away." It's not that these sentiments aren't believable, but pairing them with a sheer lack of sympathetic male characters makes it all seem intentionally exaggerated.

From the film's final disclaimer, it seems that Neshat's primary objective was to focus on the revolution, but the way Women Without Men unfolds makes the political aspect of the story more of a backdrop than a feature. It is quite poignant, however, to realize that, in the end, our four main characters have been afforded a rebirth of some kind, even if it's through death, while the Iranian people have failed to achieve the one for which they've so bravely fought.

Review by Caitlin Graham

Chloe

Directed by Atom Egoyan
Sony Picture Classics



A retread of Anne Fontaine’s 2003 film, Nathalie, I walked out of the theater feeling rather disappointed with Chloe.

Julianne Moore plays Catherine Stewart, a successful gynecologist who is married to a college professor named David (Liam Neeson). After David misses a flight home, Catherine looks through his phone and finds a rather questionable photo. Catherine then becomes consumed with the suspicion that David is cheating on her. After a chance meeting with Chloe (Amanda Seyfried), a young escort, Catherine decides to hire her to seduce her husband, ostensibly to determine what makes him tick and turns him on. Chloe accepts the assignment with alacrity, sharing with Catherine the explicit details of her rendezvous with David.

It is at this point that I began scratching my head. If Catherine thought she had proof of David’s extramarital dalliances, why didn’t she just confront him outright? Or hire a private detective to look into his activities? Or go through his things and check credit card statements, emails, and call records to uncover more evidence? Isn’t that what usually happens in real life when women think their husbands are double dipping? Unfortunately, this isn’t the only poor—or poorly explained—choice Catherine makes.

To up the confusion factor, Catherine’s behavior toward Chloe is often inexplicably maternal. She advises her to get checked for STI’s, expresses concern over Chloe’s health simply because Chloe sneezes, and all but kisses her boo-boo when Chloe takes a spill on her bike and skins her knee.

Chloe enjoys being nurtured and obviously views Catherine as a mother figure. This is impressed as she repeatedly tries to give Catherine a hairpin that belonged to her real mother. Telling viewers about Chloe’s mother could have provided this limp story with some interesting wrinkles; however, Chloe’s back-story is never properly explored. How she ended up becoming a call-girl and exactly what drives her obsession with Catherine is left unexplained.

None of the characters are suitably fleshed out, for that matter. We know David is a flirt, but Liam Neeson’s anemic performance would have you believe that his behavior is merely reflexive. The fact that Catherine seems halfway willing to accept that meager explanation makes it even harder to understand her choices. The couple have obviously had problems in their marriage in the past but we never find out exactly what they were or how (or even if) they got resolved.

And what’s up with their son? Michael (Max Theiriot) feels an obvious hostility toward his mother and his trips to a therapist’s couch are alluded to several times, but this character never comfortably inhabits the world of this story. Throwing all of Michael’s footage on the floor and making a few changes to the story would have helped this film immensely.

To make matters worse, the filmmaker’s decision to violate the show-don’t-tell rule further undermined this enterprise. Newsflash! Stories told by unreliable narrators pack more of a punch when the audience initially believes what it’s been told. Moviegoers should never be able to anticipate plot twists.

Properly executed, Chloe could have been an erotic thriller par excellence. Instead, the filmmakers never actually decide what they want this film to be. Is this movie simply a portrait of marriage where the thrill is gone or a glimpse into a career woman’s mid-life crisis? Is it an indictment of prostitution—a trade where workers are purchased, used, and ultimately discarded—or a metaphor for how some mothers collude with father-daughter incest? Maybe this movie is treatise on how sexual passion and jealousy are almost always inextricably linked.

Chloe, manages to be all of these things and none of these things. It is undone by its slack pacing, under-developed characters, depressive tone, and somewhat implausible story. If you are a fan of any of the featured actors, I would suggest that you wait until this film becomes available on DVD. Chloe just isn’t worth the price of full admission.

Review by Ebony Edwards-Ellis