Ruhama - What's the alternative?

Recently I was talking to a friend of mine about trafficking and other negative issues in the sex industry in Ireland.

He said to me "Pat, you are always saying you'd love to be able to do more towards combating trafficking, helping escorts etc, and you say your business is doing ok... I hear there is an organisation called Ruhama that helps trafficked women in Ireland... Why don't you make a serious donation to this organisation?"

As I explained to my friend, I do already make regular donations to charities working against trafficking across Europe, though not Ruhama, but yes I could do more I think, and I would love to do more.

This suggestion coincided with a recent experience I had grabbing a coffee at London Heathrow airport. I saw the company selling the coffee - Costa - was planning a "Costa Foundation Day" where all the profits they made that day were to be invested in programmes to improve the lives of people living in the poorer coffee growing regions.

I saw this and thought... What a great idea... And here is E-I - a successful business in an industry which, like coffee, has its issues in places - wouldn't it be great if E-I could do something like this? And maybe it is not just me who feels this way, maybe there are escorts in Ireland or Irish escort clients who would also like to give something if we had a fundraising drive to raise money for a really good cause?

My problem is though, who would you donate the money to?

To date I have donated to several organisations across Europe working against trafficking and to support sex workers in various ways, which I have read about and been impressed by. None of these organisations are Irish, but I have figured there is point in donating to organisations in other parts of Europe, especially the parts of Europe where women are often trafficked from, as if women are being trafficked to Ireland, these are the sorts of places they are likely coming from.

However, I think it would be great if we could donate to organisations who are clearly working in Ireland. After all, that is what is most appropriate really.

Ruhama, I have a problem with to be honest.

Back when I was working as an escort myself, several ladies I knew got involved with Ruhama at different stages in their lives and all the feedback I got from these ladies was very negative.

I was told Ruhama were totally anti prostitution, phone sex, lap dancing and all other forms of sex work and would only help ladies who agreed (a) to never work in the sex industry again, (b) to never associate with any women they knew who still worked in the sex industry and (c) to agree with them that prostitution etc can only be a terrible sin. A few ladies told me Ruhama actually went as far as to set nuns on them! Essentially, all the ladies I knew who decided to give Ruhama a try, got nothing positive from it.

Then, a couple of years ago, Ruhama was in all the papers, publicising these new trafficking helpline numbers they had, and I thought to myself... Ok I've never heard great things about Ruhama, but maybe something is better than nothing, maybe although many women aren't going to find Ruhama helpful, there are still some women out there who would find Ruhama’s service helpful? So I requested permission from Ruhama to publish their helpline numbers on this website. Needless to say, the numbers were never published as permission wasn't granted. Ruhama don’t want their helpline numbers published here, even though this is probably one of the most likely places women in prostitution visit.

After that I was talking to a sex shop owner and he was telling me Ruhama is run by nuns and it is not even a registered charity, they're a limited company.

Finally there was Ruhama’s much reported public pledge that they will help any victim of trafficking in Ireland. That actually pissed me off, because it was like Ruhama telling Joe Bloggs on the street not to worry about trafficking as an organisation exists in Ireland that will help any woman trafficked. This is not true, there clearly isn’t proper support for trafficking victims in Ireland at all, and Ruhama making it look like there is may drum up more donations for them, but is actually totally unhelpful to the overall situation... It discourages proper efforts against trafficking being made, because if Joe Bloggs doesn’t think further efforts are needed, he does nothing.

Of course, Ruhama and us see things very differently and want very different things also. They are totally against prostitution, lap dancing etc and would like to see laws passed to make men who avail of escort services made criminals. We are not against prostitution and certainly don’t want to see prostitution criminalised. We would like to see more support, advice and care for sex workers in Ireland, proper resources for the adult women who choose to work in this industry and of course help for women who would like to get out of the industry for whatever reason or are underage or have been trafficked.

Many organisations around the world working against trafficking are anti prostitution and would therefore not be a good choice for us to support, not to mention such organisations might consider money from E-I, escorts or escort clients "bad money" and therefore not want our donation anyway. They’d probably look upon this idea as like a tobacco company donating to a cancer charity.

I of course also wouldn’t want to work my butt off to raise money for an organisation that would probably spend it promoting their opinions which are not at all in-line with our way of thinking, instead of spending it helping women.

Another friend I talked to about this suggested, if there is no suitable charity out there, why don’t I set up an E-I Foundation like Costa Coffee have? This is an interesting idea, but frankly, I don’t think it is a feasible one as I’m already worked off my socks running E-I, not to mention I don’t have the experience required. I don’t completely disregard this idea though, as although I think setting up a foundation would be going too far, I have often thought maybe we could help by paying for independent parties to create good quality info, e.g. get a top solicitors firm to write a guide to escorting and the law for escorts or get a medical professional to write quality content about safe sex practices in this business.

One organisation I’ve seen that I really like is http://www.sw5.info/. They are in London and working mainly in the male prostitution field, but I like their stuff... If there was an organisation like this in Ireland I think I’d want to support it.

So, over to you folks...

Has anybody got any thoughts or ideas regards this issue? What do you guys think of Ruhama and other organisations working in prostitution? Is it possible I've heard wrong about Ruhama, have any women got positive stories about them?

Thanks

Pat

Two extremes.On one side we have a bunch of holy celebel nuns who might as well be selling ice creams out of the back of their van as dictating to st girls and on the other hand we have a money mad former escort who wipes her arse with gold toilet paper and wont push to legislate the buisness.

HP.

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Originally Posted by halfpounder

Two extremes.On one side we have a bunch of holy celebel nuns who might as well be selling ice creams out of the back of their van as dictating to st girls and on the other hand we have a money mad former escort who wipes her arse with gold toilet paper and wont push to legislate the buisness.

HP.

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How are you Westie? :p

Give him a Gold Membership badge Pat and he might hang around for a bit!!! :D

Paws

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Originally Posted by bigpaws

Give him a Gold Membership badge Pat and he might hang around for a bit!!! :D

Paws

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Ah you can't give that gold stuff away.... Karen Coleman still hasn't collected the lovely gold rosette I got her on Tuesday ;)

just donate the money to me ,cause i contribute more than anyone to the escort business in ireland.


nbt:D:D:D

Look this maybe a stupid idea but what about asking the Garda if they have any idea's or contact the Uk group and tell them your ideas and see if they could start something here that could be headed up by E-I that way you/we know the industry and between the girls and the clients who we know could be a positive help towards this also adding to the credibility of this site and the positive work that companies like this could contribute into the industry and cleaning it up.

I would contribute to that. Maybe if any of the guys come accross some girl that is being trafficked they could contact the board and find out if they are with the help of the garda and if they are make it look like and arrest and deportation as most of these girls are in fear for their famillies back home. And not let them know that they're being helped until they are taken to the airport and perhaps give a help package of some money, and the contact details of someone from another agency that will meet them on the other side when they get off because I would guess charities on that side the are better equiped to keep tabs on them and continued support of them and there famillies.

Just a thought.

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Originally Posted by Honey/Alexi D

Look this maybe a stupid idea but what about asking the Garda if they have any idea's or contact the Uk group and tell them your ideas and see if they could start something here that could be headed up by E-I that way you/we know the industry and between the girls and the clients who we know could be a positive help towards this also adding to the credibility of this site and the positive work that companies like this could contribute into the industry and cleaning it up.

I would contribute to that. Maybe if any of the guys come accross some girl that is being trafficked they could contact the board and find out if they are with the help of the garda and if they are make it look like and arrest and deportation as most of these girls are in fear for their famillies back home. And not let them know that they're being helped until they are taken to the airport and perhaps give a help package of some money, and the contact details of someone from another agency that will meet them on the other side when they get off because I would guess charities on that side the are better equiped to keep tabs on them and continued support of them and there famillies.

Just a thought.

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Thanks for all your ideas Honey / Alexi D.

We are never sure whether we could have an improved relationship with the Garda or not. It is hard, because, on one hand of course we would want to cooperate with the Garda regards issues like human trafficking etc, but at the same time we would never want to help them persecute independent escorts etc. The way we hear it from ladies, some guards are great, others are shite, so we never know if we should be generally considering them friends of the industry or not! In any event, I doubt we would get the level of cooperation from them you are suggesting, but it is interesting food for thought anyway. It would be great if we could do what you are suggesting, I'm just not sure we could.

Thanks

Pat x

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Originally Posted by ninebythree

just donate the money to me ,cause i contribute more than anyone to the escort business in ireland.


nbt:D:D:D

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How will you contribute? Are you an alternative sex therapist or something? ;)

I have to admit that I didn’t click on this thread as I thought Ruhama
must be some sort of Viagra alternative remedy or something, lol

But seriously, I can see why E-I would not wish to donate to an Org. That may be preaching to people as they help them, but I suppose in the possible absence of any Org. That helps people that were caught up in trafficking, at least there hearts are in the right place even if they are kind of using that position to moralize as well,

I saw a fantastic program a few month ago of an NGO program to fully train very (Materially) poor Woman in India to completely make,assemble and Install solar panels in the remoter parts of India that have no power, this simple program makes a huge difference to there entire Family’s and community’s, and there are held as vital cogs in the local infrastructure and hailed as heroes almost when they arrive in a village to install panels, now it was not strictly an anti-Pros program or anything, but from the severe poverty they came from, Its not a stretch to suppose some have avoided the worse aspects of this Industry as a result of being educated in light engineering and Electrical training.

See

Barefoot Solar Engineers


http://www.worldchanging.com/archives/000954.html

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Originally Posted by Quarterpoundher

I have to admit that I didn’t click on this thread as I thought Ruhama must be some sort of Viagra alternative remedy or something

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LOL, you've cheered me up this morning.

There are lots of very good causes in this world. If I can't think of a way to do something really positive for women in this industry in Ireland, I think I will try to do something for a great cause helping women out there somewhere instead.

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Originally Posted by Quarterpoundher

I have to admit that I didn’t click on this thread as I thought Ruhama
must be some sort of Viagra alternative remedy or something, lol

But seriously, I can see why E-I would not wish to donate to an Org. That may be preaching to people as they help them, but I suppose in the possible absence of any Org. That helps people that were caught up in trafficking, at least there hearts are in the right place even if they are kind of using that position to moralize as well,

I saw a fantastic program a few month ago of an NGO program to fully train very (Materially) poor Woman in India to completely make,assemble and Install solar panels in the remoter parts of India that have no power, this simple program makes a huge difference to there entire Family’s and community’s, and there are held as vital cogs in the local infrastructure and hailed as heroes almost when they arrive in a village to install panels, now it was not strictly an anti-Pros program or anything, but from the severe poverty they came from, Its not a stretch to suppose some have avoided the worse aspects of this Industry as a result of being educated in light engineering and Electrical training.

See

Barefoot Solar Engineers


http://www.worldchanging.com/archives/000954.html

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Sounds like a breed of fish or rubarb.

Im half the words too,
QP

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Originally Posted by Patricia

LOL, you've cheered me up this morning.

There are lots of very good causes in this world. If I can't think of a way to do something really positive for women in this industry in Ireland, I think I will try to do something for a great cause helping women out there somewhere instead.

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Wouldnt that be a good cause and solve a fair ammount of probs?The prob with Ruhama is they are led by religous ppl and i think that thgis country is pretty much done with listening to religous ppl for now.All they did was mislead innocent ppl and then destroyed their own names.

I have said it before and i say it again, i have never seen a poor nun ,brother, priest etc.They all live in comfort.If they are serious (and they arent ,only taking the piss) then they would give most of their comfort to good causes.Do we ever hear of them giving shelter to a homeless person for the night?No we dont.We do however see them drive brand new cars all the time,live in top accomodation.Even the pope as an example, driving around like a fuckin goldfish in that bullet proof glass, like a fuckin idiot waving ,like an incontinent geriatric.Give me a fuckin break please.

Im glad i never liked these ppl, these religous shower of cunts, hypocrits that go around praying for us.Like if i i got a tumour in the morning they would pray for me.Its a fuckin op i need not a rosary.

I believe in god and thats it,i dont need religous cunts running around like flies telling me how to live my life when many of those same rammed it up a young boys ass.

Im glad i never liked these clowns.If these are gods reps on earth then i will do my own thing when i die.They contradict the shit out of themselves and are so fuckin stupid and brainwashed they cant even see it.

Conmtradiction of the century???Apparently God loves everyone unconditionally yet according to these same pricks he will punish you for eternity if you dont follow his rules,rules based on the life of a carpenter thousands of years ago.We are told to give up stuff for length?I always take something up for length.Why?Because jesus went ona fuckinholiday for 40 days thats why?He went off on his own into the sands.A fuckin holiday withour RyanAir.

So i dont listen to these idiots.Now Mothe Thersa and the like.I would listen to her, i would listen to this small few saints but ppl going around in ice cream vans at night making a full time job out of something?I dont think so.


I need a bit of fresh air,
QP

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Originally Posted by Patricia

LOL, you've cheered me up this morning.

There are lots of very good causes in this world. If I can't think of a way to do something really positive for women in this industry in Ireland, I think I will try to do something for a great cause helping women out there somewhere instead.

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Patricia,

I strongly feel your already doing an incredible amount in this arena already, far more then a brigade of bible bashers, E-I has completely changed my mindset, as I was always naively on the side of clamping down when now I see that the best possible thing is for the conditions to exist to promote Independents and the benefits that would accrue for them and Society at large.

As for cheering you up, your Avatar lifts this fair nation a little above the waterline everytime I see it, for one.

I wanted to ask you about your employment criteria, you seem to be an all Female Org. Is that by accident or design ? as if by design I might have to take you to task on matters of equal Opps. As I for one would like to hand in my CV for any and all Positions that may arise (I make a mean cuppa) lol


Ps I really did think Ruhama was a Viagara type product. Now I know what it is, they must have fallin over their rosary beads at the association.

See also if interested a ten minute clip

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8oS2iUFvdTE


Half or Westie

I couldn’t agree with you more on your sentiments regarding the zealously religious, it could have been written by me apart from I’m an Atheist (again through long thought on the subject, surprise, surprise) I have time though for those orders working at home or abroad, who if there was a God, there are doing “HER” work,

Also,
I am making an effort on the length front, but its like trying to come of crack cocaine for me, (I got the shakes real bad Doc....)

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Originally Posted by Quarterpoundher

I wanted to ask you about your employment criteria, you seem to be an all Female Org. Is that by accident or design ? as if by design I might have to take you to task on matters of equal Opps. As I for one would like to hand in my CV for any and all Positions that may arise (I make a mean cuppa) lol

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Thanks Quarterpounder.

E-I is 100% female owned and managed plus all our sales staff are female. In our web development team though, there are 2 guys, but we never see them... They are just our nerds working out of another office. To be honest, I like E-I being a female only team and I think our customers prefer dealing with ladies also. I wouldn't be totally against hiring a male though if one came to my attention who was brill. It is the person I care about not their gender I guess. However, all our staff have to be UK based by law... It would be illegal for us to hire any staff in Ireland due to Irish law on advertising escort services. Maybe we could take you on as a contractor though, if you are prepared to take this risk of the police busting you? ;)

Thanks Patricia,

I was just curious, I understand why its best all round, I was taken aback by learning its Illegal to have Staff reg. In Ireland, never knew that, I’m puzzled as I had thought from your end your just facilitating the Escorts to advertise that there being paid for there time and anything after.....etc.

Not disputing with you in the slightest, my God you know your stuff, but found that legal sit. a bit Irish to say the least, a bit like abortion and other things in Ireland, go to the UK and avail of their laws but God forbid suggesting we follow suit.

When are we going to grow up ??? are we in the EU are not.

I was wondering about your IT side, in fairness this site runs smoother then Michael Flatleys Jock Strap lol

As for Police busting me, I was born in the UK and technically I’m reg. there also, plus I’d only be in charge of the Tea. (I do do a mean cuppa cha,, keep me in mind)

How can you call men nerds just because they work with pc's

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They are just our nerds

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I work on pc's and servers most days although it is not my fulltime job but if you seen me, nerd would be the last thing that would come to your mind, not saying I'm god's gift to woman but I def don't look like a nerd, maybe nerd is your term for endearment lol.

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Originally Posted by anon163

How can you call men nerds just because they work with pc's

I work on pc's and servers most days although it is not my fulltime job but if you seen me, nerd would be the last thing that would come to your mind, not saying I'm god's gift to woman but I def don't look like a nerd, maybe nerd is your term for endearment lol.

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I defo did not mean 'nerd' in a derogatory way. I call anyone who is a whizz on the computers a nerd. I'd love to be a nerd myself! I know most 'nerds' don't have big thick glasses etc but if they did I'd find that sexy anyway! I think the net is amazing and some of the funniest, smartest people on it are the real techie people.