Australia @aussie.zone maniacalmanicmania @aussie.zone 6h ago

NDIS participants can no longer access sex worker services through funding. Advocates say it's a 'deep betrayal'

www.abc.net.au NDIS participants can no longer access sex worker services through funding. Advocates say it's a 'deep betrayal'

For over a month now, people with a disability have been unable to use NDIS funding for seeking sex worker services. Lived-experience advocates say it's a step backward.

11 comments

I feel like they should have access to sex work services. Give them funding!
- I agree also
Thanks Bill! Really saving the taxpayer there.
Edit: sorry, I think I glanced through the article too quickly- it is referring to prostitutes. I'm not in Australia, and I'm not really sure if I have a stance on this, but wanted to correct my comment so I wasn't misleading people

~~It sounded like this meant prostitutes, but it seems like this actually just means things that help you physically make sex work if you have a disability, which seems much more normal and appropriate~~
- How is disabled people safely and consensually experiencing a sexual existence not "normal and appropriate"?
  
  I don't actually know that I think it's abnormal or inappropriate, I'm not really sure. But I thought it was saying they'd no longer be supported with sexual funtioning kinda issues related to their disability, like equipment or medication that makes improves sexual functioning. Those kinds of things are definitley reasonable, beyond a shadow of a doubt.
  
  I don't live in Australia, so what I think is honestly irrelevant; your government doesn't need to advocate for my interests. But I'm not really sure how I'd feel about policies making disability aid money available for the paying of prostitutes in my country (though prostitution isn't legal here, and the puritanical US would never accept that changing). I don't think prostitution is wrong, or that disabled people don't need support in the ability to life healthy full lives.
  
  I guess I feel like I don't know enough about the variety of disabilities to have any sort of informed stance. My first thought is just that people with disabilities are generally still perfectly capable of forming meaningful relationships where intimacy could happen, sans government provided prostitution. But like, that's informed by a fairly limited perspective, there are a lot of disabilities and I can definitely see there being unforseen implications to familiar disabilities or disabilities I'm not aware of.
  
  I have a disability, and it does kinda impact my ability to build relationships in the same way that other people do (a circadian rhythm disorder, my sleep schedule is extremely isolating) and I would never expect the government to give me money to pay for prostitutes. But I'm also from the US, where there's a very different relationship with the government than there is in most "developed" western countries (the culture being that the government should do as little as possible and everything people can do for themselves, they should. Though in practice it's just pro corporation and anti-human) and where sex has historically be demonized FAR more than in other western "developed" countries.
  
  I could have communicated much more effectively in my first comment, but I did think the context and what I was responding to was an entirely different thing
- It is prostitution, but so what? What is inappropriate about two adults undertaking an agreed transaction for sexual needs that would otherwise go unfulfilled? A disabled person already has so many limitations in life, any opportunity to expand those limits should be supported in my view. As a taxpayer, I support my money being used for these services for disabled community members.
  
  Thank you for correcting me! I skimmed the article out of curiosity a bit too quickly I guess
I see no evidence backed by actual science that allowing NDIS funded access to sex services improves outcomes for the community.

And I don’t just mean the disabled community but broader society, which is paying for the NDIS.

If this is about funding making a subset of people feel good and not about actual outcomes then I might as well ask for taxpayers to fund my holidays.
- Biological imperatives are a thing.
Government funded hookers hey? I fail to see how u can justify that?

11 comments