Sex work is "the exchange of sexual services, performances, or products for material compensation. It includes activities of direct physical contact between buyers and sellers as well as indirect sexual stimulation". Sex work only refers to voluntary sexual transactions; thus, the term does not refer to human trafficking and other coerced or nonconsensual sexual transactions such as child prostitution. The transaction must take place between consenting adults of the legal age and mental capacity to consent and must take place without any methods of coercion, other than payment. The term emphasizes the labor and economic implications of this type of work. Furthermore, some prefer the use of the term because it grants more agency to the sellers of these services.
The term racial hygiene was used to describe an approach to eugenics in the early 20th century, which found its most extensive implementation in Nazi Germany. It was marked by efforts to avoid miscegenation, analogous to an animal breeder seeking purebred animals. This was often motivated by the belief in the existence of a racial hierarchy and the related fear that "lower races" would "contaminate" a "higher" one. As with most eugenicists at the time, racial hygienists believed that the lack of eugenics would lead to rapid social degeneration, the decline of civilization by the spread of inferior characteristics.
Baltimore's The Block is a stretch on the 400 block of East Baltimore Street in Baltimore, Maryland, containing several strip clubs, sex shops, and other adult entertainment merchants. During the 19th century, Baltimore was filled with brothels, and in the first half of the 20th century, it was famous for its burlesque houses. It was a noted starting point and stop-over for many noted burlesque dancers, including the likes of Blaze Starr.
COYOTE is an American sex workers' rights organization. Its name is a backronym for Call Off Your Old Tired Ethics, a reflection of the fact that sex work tends to be stigmatized primarily because of society-imposed standards of ethics. COYOTE's goals include the decriminalization of prostitution, pimping and pandering, as well as the elimination of social stigma concerning sex work as an occupation. Its work is considered part of the larger sex worker movement for legal and human rights.
In the history of the United States, a clean living movement is a period of time when a surge of health-reform crusades erupts into the popular consciousness. This results in individual, or group reformers such as the anti-tobacco or alcohol coalitions of the late twentieth century, to campaign to eliminate the health problem or to "clean up" society. The term "Clean Living Movement" was coined by Ruth C. Engs, a professor of Applied Health Sciences at Indiana University in 1990.
The American Sexual Health Association (ASHA), formally known as the American Social Hygiene Association and the American Social Health Association, is an American nonprofit organization established in 1914, that cites a mission to improve the health of individuals, families, and communities, with an emphasis on sexual health, as well as a focus on preventing sexually transmitted infections and their harmful consequences. ASHA uses tools such as education, communication, advocacy and policy analysis activities with the intent to heighten public, patient, provider, policymaker and media awareness of STI prevention, screening, diagnosis and treatment strategies.
Prince Albert Morrow was an American dermatologist, venereologist, social hygienist, and early campaigner for sex education.
Katharine Bement Davis was an American progressive era social reformer and criminologist who became the first woman to head a major New York City agency when she was appointed Correction Commissioner on January 1, 1914. Davis was a former school teacher from upstate New York, who later became one of the nation's first female doctorates when she received her Ph.D. in economics from the University of Chicago in 1901. Davis was also known for her work as an American penologist and a writer who had a long-lasting effect on American penal reform in the late 19th and early 20th centuries.
An outgrowth of the school hygiene movement, the American School Hygiene Association (ASCHA) was a professional organization of physicians, dentists, administrators, nurses, and other stakeholders in the health and well-being of school children. Formed in 1906, it involved reformers and politicians of the Progressive movement era, and was active in school health and advocacy issues until its last congress in 1921.
The practice of prostitution in colonial India was influenced by the policies of British rule in India. During the 19th and 20th centuries the colonial government facilitated, regulated and allowed the existence of prostitution. Not only was prostitution in India affected by the policy of the Governor General of India, it was also influenced by the moral and political beliefs of the British authorities, and conflicts and tensions between the British authorities and the Indian populace at large. The colonial government had a profound effect on prostitution in India, both legislatively and socially.
The outbreaks of sexually transmitted infections in World War II brought interest in sex education to the public and the government. During the late 1930s and early 1940s, military maneuvers increased worldwide and sexual hygiene and conduct became major problems for the troops. Soldiers and sailors on assignment overseas were often lonely, had time to spare, got homesick, or were just looking for female companionship. This resulted in many men having multiple sex partners, and as a result, became a major health concern. During the Great War, venereal diseases (V.D.) had caused the United States Army to lose 18,000 servicemen per day. Although by 1944, this number had been reduced 30-fold, there were still around 606 servicemen incapacitated daily. This drop in numbers was partly because of the Army's effort to raise awareness about the dangers faced by servicemen through poor sexual hygiene, and also because of the important developments in medicine. In late 1943, a case of gonorrhea required a hospital treatment of 30 days, and curing syphilis remained a 6-month ordeal. By mid-1944, the average case of gonorrhea was reduced to 5 days, and in many cases the patient remained on duty while being treated.
Sybil Neville-Rolfe OBE was a social hygienist and founder of the Eugenics Society, and a leading figure in the National Council for Combating Venereal Diseases. She has been described as a feminist and a eugenicist.
La Follette–Bulwinkle Act or Venereal Diseases Control and Prevention Act of 1938 sanctioned federal assistance to U.S. states establishing preventive healthcare for venereal diseases. The United States federal statute commissioned the United States Public Health Service for demonstrations, investigations, and studies as related to the control, prevention, and treatment of opportunistic infections. The public law amended the Army Appropriations Act of 1918 appending the judicial context which created the Division of Venereal Diseases within the Bureau of the Public Health Service.
The Chamberlain–Kahn Act of 1918 is a U.S. federal law passed on July 9, 1918, by the 65th United States Congress. The law implemented a public health program that came to be known as the American Plan, whose stated goal was to combat the spread of venereal disease.
Following the Mexican Revolution, the eugenics movement gained prominence in Mexico. Seeking to change the genetic make-up of the country's population, proponents of eugenics in Mexico focused primarily on rebuilding the population, creating healthy citizens, and ameliorating the effects of perceived social ills such as alcoholism, prostitution, and venereal diseases. Mexican eugenics, at its height in the 1930s, influenced the state's health, education, and welfare policies.
Sexual Education of the Young Woman is an educational book, published in 1923 and written by a psychiatrist and author David H. Keller. The book provides sexual education guidelines for the girls above the age of six years old. The guidelines concern biological knowledge about the female and male bodies, discussed in the context of prevailing moral and social norms. The book is intended to be read by the young girl herself or conveyed by her parents. As such, it is not only a source of knowledge but also a parenting tool. Sexual Education of the Young Woman contains 13 chapters, each dealing with a different topic of sexual education. It has clear views on the issues of morality and social norms- women are depicted as fundamentally different from men. The author suggests that the life purpose of a woman is giving birth and raising children as well as assuring a cozy and relaxing life for her husband. However, Dr. Keller stresses the importance of proper general and sexual education, and the influence it has on the happiness of a future mother and wife. Sexual Education of the Young Woman is a part of a 10 volume collection The Sexual Education Series released in 1928.
Alma Maria Katarina Sundquist (1872–1940) was a Swedish physician and a pioneering female specialist in the treatment of venereal diseases. A committed women's rights activist, she campaigned for better working conditions for women, addressed problems associated with unhygienic homes and prostitution, and promoted the need for sexual education for girls. She fought for women's suffrage, contributing to the inaugural meeting of the Swedish Association for Women's Suffrage (FKPR) in June 1902. Internationally, in 1919 she represented Sweden at the founding of the Medical Women's International Association in New York and attended the First International Congress of Working Women in Washington, D.C. In the early 1930s, on behalf of the League of Nations, she was one of the three contributors to a report on the slave trade in women and children in the countries of Asia.
During the beginning of the late Victorian era in Cape Town, South Africa, prostitution was considered an offense but was rarely prosecuted. The majority of prostitutes during this time were local women of color, though there was a small number of European women partaking in sex work as well. As time progressed, regulations on prostitutes increased under the Contagious Diseases Acts, and Cape Town saw a rise in both European prostitutes and prostitution itself as a result of the Mineral Revolution and the Second Boer War.
The Commission on Training Camp Activities (CTCA), also popularly known as the Fosdick Commission, was an umbrella agency within the United States Department of War during World War I that provided recreational and educational activities for soldiers as they trained for combat. Established in April 1917, the CTCA had the mandate to keep American troops "physically healthy and morally pure", while also motivating them to fight.
Fit to Fight is a silent sex hygiene film about the dangers of venereal disease written and directed by Edward H. Griffith. It was produced by the Commission on Training Camp Activities and initially shown to American World War I soldiers. After the war, a slightly edited version was commercially released to the public in 1919, under the title Fit to Win. The film proved controversial due to its graphic imagery and its limited support for prophylaxis. It was subject to censorship attempts, and contributed to the emergence of the exploitation film as a distinct niche.
