ABSTRACT
The media's fascination for the figure of the sex worker has been well documented, and interest in her shows no signs of abating; in fact, numerous scholars have noted a recent increase in that fascination. The term sex-work saviour complex is used to identify those media narratives that seek to save the sex worker by constructing her as a social victim in need of rescue. The causal effects of media narratives are of central concern to sex worker-rights activists precisely because of their power to shape public opinion. Once the public understand the sex worker as disposable this discourse then permeates policy and practice. Significantly, much debate around sex work focuses on street sex workers, despite their constituting a minority of the sex industry. Sex-worker voices are noticeably absent in much of this journalism, but when they are heard they frequently offer a very different perspective.
