MADRID — Spain’s Socialist Party (PSOE) suffered a sound defeat on Tuesday in its attempt to re-criminalize legal sex work in Spain, as a controversial law it attempted to pass failed to gain parliamentary support among its allies in its ruling coalition.
The supposedly “feminist” law had been loudly opposed by sex workers, sex worker rights groups and the local adult industry. The traditionally left-leaning PSOE was counting on the ultra-Catholic elements within the opposition right-leaning PP to provide some support for the law, but a critical mass of PP’s parliamentarians withdrew their support from the reviled “Abolition of Prostitution” law promoted by the government led by Prime Minister Pedro Sánchez.
The vote ended with 122 in favor (PSOE, Ábalos and CC), 184 against (PP, Sumar, ERC, Junts o PNV) y 36 abstentions (mainly from the “new right,” MAGA-like Vox party).
Among criticisms of the law by parliamentarians were misgivings about the law not offering an exit path for sex workers, and an emphasis on punishing facilitators and clients, described by the government as “pimps and johns,” following the Nordic Model propaganda playbook.
The spokesperson for the PSOE’s Equality Commission, Laura Berja, unequivocally stated last year, “We must abolish prostitution because it is incompatible with human rights.”
According to the El Mundo newspaper, Tuesday’s defeat holds “symbolic weight” and it sends the abolition law “right to the trash bin.”
It is the first time, the newspaper noted, that the PSOE has failed to rally its coalition allies in support of an important piece of legislation, which may show “a crack” in the coalition that may further endanger its chances to remain in power.
As XBIZ reported, Spanish sex workers have been organizing for months to fight Sánchez’s campaign, which stem from SWERF-inspired policies marginalizing and criminalizing them.
Sex workers have pointed out that the original goal of the Only Yes Means Yes law — which was an earlier law which some feminists in the PSOE mutated into a sex-work abolition bill — was to enshrine the idea of consent in Spanish law, but that its backers ended up not criminalizing nonconsensual deep fakes and deplatforming consensual sex workers instead.
“They ignore the voice of sex workers,” the activists told the Spanish press in December. “They ruin us, they make us lose autonomy and they send us into a clandestine world. How the hell is this helping reduce crime activity in our work life?”
The sex workers also accused the PSOE government of “institutional violence” against them, and are demanding an end to “harassment and criminalization” of their work.
Sex Workers Tap Libertarians, Liberals to Stop Socialist ‘Feminists’
Sex workers have been meeting with the conservative PP, hoping to convince libertarians and the economically liberal faction within it to break rank with social conservatives and ultra-Catholics in the party to preserve the legal status of sex work on personal freedom grounds.
Inés Olaizola, a penal law academic at the Universidad Pública de Navarra, has described the PSOE’s approach to sex work as “taking agency out of the consent of the women who work as prostitutes.”
By classifying all prostitution as “exploitation” — and thus erasing sex workers’ ability to consent — the proposed legislation essentially treats women “like minors,” Olaizola explained.
Barcelona-based director and producer Erika Lust warned in 2022 that the PSOE’s call for “the abolition of all forms of making a profit from the prostitution of others” directly threatened porn production.
“It would not matter whether the practice is carried out under exploitation — banned under current law — or if it is independent labor, with consent from all parties involved, following ethical production standards,” Lust said.
“What is presented as an effort to stop exploitation and violence in defense of human rights, in particular women’s rights, ends up being the main source of violence, precariousness and lack of protection for all sex workers — who are already vulnerable as it is,” the filmmaker added.
“The Only Yes Means Yes law was promoted as a revolutionary feminist law,” Spain-based performer and sex worker activist Maria Riot told XBIZ on Monday. “But it’s not just targeting full-service sex work.
European director, performer and sex work activist Paulita Pappel, who is originally from Spain, told XBIZ that the country is currently seeing a rise in conservative influence.
“This is leading to the suppression of voices and erosion of fundamental human rights,” Pappel noted. “The pretext of protecting children online is being used to target sex workers, restricting their tools and subjecting them to discrimination. Laws requiring age verification and banning online advertising for sexual services are pushing sex workers into precarious situations. We need to oppose these measures and advocate for decriminalization. We must fight back.”
