Sisterhood of Sex Workers

The Sisterhood of Sex Workers is an Edenian labor union dedicated to improving working conditions, safety standards, and rates of compensation for members across the world. Founded in 238 in response to decades of corruption and abuse in the Motherlandian city of Watersmeet, the SSW is now one of the most powerful organizations in Eden.

Basic Principles

The Sisterhood was founded on the following basic principles:

1. Sex work is work. As such, sex workers should be afforded the same rights and protections as workers employed in any other industry.
2. Sex work should be legal throughout Eden.
3. Laws and regulations related to the selling, buying, or organization of sex work should be determined by sex workers themselves before being codified in any way.
4. The many and varied entrances points into the field must be acknowledged. Some will choose the work because they enjoy it or find it fulfilling, but many will be drawn to it out of financial necessity, or for other reasons. As such, providing pathways out of the profession must be a core part of the organization’s mission.
5. We will not tolerate oppression, abuse, or violence against any person. In particular, we seek to protect marginalized people, both amongst our membership and in our communities—especially those who experience more than one marginalization.

Structure & Membership

The larger international organization is broken down into five national sub-groups (one for each Edenian nation), which are further broken down into local unions in each community or region of communities (depending on the size of the communit(y/ies) in question).

Membership is open to those who sell their own sexual labor and/or performance, but not to those who currently manage brothels, agencies, or production companies—or those who otherwise profit off of the sex work of others.

Despite the gendered nature of the organization’s name, membership is open to all sex workers regardless of their gender identity. Campaigns to change the name of the union have come up several times over the centuries of its existence, but none has succeeded in gathering the votes necessary to pass the measure.

Benefits of Membership

In a world as diverse as Eden, benefits may vary depending on the member’s location and the realities of life there. However, in general, the following benefits are provided to all members as part of their union dues: healthcare, childcare, financial support during recovery from illness or injury, education for both the member and their offspring, and full coverage of funereal expenses.

History

Following The Invasion of Oz in 142 and the subsequent Explusion of Halflings from the seven kingdoms of the Edenian South (later known as Wonderland), the ubiquitous and worker-friendly Quadling Cathouses were taken over by human opportunists in search of a quick buck. Conditions deteriorated rapidly, but nowhere moreso than in the Motherlandian city of Watersmeet.

For nearly a century, however, no action was taken to rectify the situation—no successful action, that is. That all changed when Maeve Murphy, a second-generation sex worker, began to work on the down-low to try and organize. Knowing that the work of labor organization could be dangerous, she began weapons- and fight-training with frequent customer and local ruffian Jacob Goose, whom she soon fell for.

But after Maeve got pregnant with Jacob’s child, tragedy struck. Maeve’s abusive madam caught wind of what Maeve had been up to, and of how Jacob had been helping her, and decided to send a message. In 237, in broad daylight—and in full view of the room where the very pregnant Maeve was convalescing—the madam’s goons beat Jacob to death.

The madam thought that would be the end of it, but she was very, very wrong.

The murder of Jacob Goose was the moment that galvanized Maeve’s nascent union into a vengeance-seeking mob. From her maternity bed, Maeve began planning with her six closest advisors on how to strike back. And then, in mid-238, after Maeve had given birth and recovered from the ordeal, she and her posse had their revenge.

They ran the madam and her cronies out of town and then, once they were in the wilderness where the public could not see, Maeve Murphy’s posse killed the woman who had so wronged them and the lackeys and who had done the dirty work.

It was a masterstroke of public relations. By letting the townsfolk believe that all they’d done was drive off the madam—that they’d spared her life—the newfound Sisterhood won overwhelming public support, support which they parlayed into political power in Watersmeet and then throughout the rest of the south.

Tragically, during the early days of the union’s expansion into the other countries of Eden, Maeve Murphy herself disappeared and was presumed dead. In 247, she left her nine-year-old daughter Frieda behind for the final time. The plan was to ride north to Nunya’s debaucherous Paradise City to help workers there get their own local off the ground. And while the women of Maeve’s posse did ultimately succeed in that endeavor, Maeve was never seen nor heard from again.