On joy: Reflections on finding happiness even when life does its best to get in your way

I had the opportunity to write this reflection on joy for Victoria's YAM Magazine's November-December issue. It was one of the most moving stories I've worked on, taking in people's stories of strength in the face of significant adversity.

My only regret is that I over-interviewed, ending up with so many stories that everyone here literally gets a few paragraphs and no more. You'll just have to take my word for it that each and every one of them was worth an entire article on their own.

Find the link to the piece in YAM here, or scroll on down to read about these extraordinary Victorians.

Clockwise from top left: Pippa Blake, Debra Bell, Jacqueline McAdam, Sam Jones,
Mary Katharine Ross, Michael Cameron, Jeneece Edroff (centre). Photo: Jeffery Bosdet

It’s the season of comfort and joy, but what does joy really mean? As YAM discovers, some of the most inspiring wisdom comes from people who have seemingly had the greatest burdens to carry.

By Jody Paterson

“And they all lived happily ever after.” Wouldn’t it be something if that were true — if we all could wake up feeling joyous every single day, in a life without suffering?

But any person grown beyond childhood — and even some still in it — know from their own experiences that joy is not a given, not a permanent state. It’s fleeting and mercurial, notoriously hard to hold onto as life’s ups and downs take their toll. Joy is elusive, even for those who appear to “have it all.”

Yet somebody with a lifetime of struggle and barely a buck in their pocket can still be the most joyous person in the room. Someone who’s known nothing but setbacks can be relentlessly optimistic. How do people dealing with adversity find joy even while people with every reason to be happy bog down in their search for it?

Victoria academic and entrepreneur Jacqueline McAdam asked herself the same question after extensive travel in Africa, where she met cheerful children and young people carrying on with their lives despite growing up in dire poverty and seeming hopelessness. She wrote her doctoral thesis, “More Than Luck,” a decade ago on what she found out.

We spoke with McAdam for this piece and also did a little crowdsourcing to ask Greater Victorians who came to mind when they thought of someone they knew who sought joy despite dealing with adversity. People responded with dozens of names.

The moving stories of the small selection featured here echo many of McAdam’s findings in her studies of African children. Their stories underline the points made by Archbishop Desmond Tutu and the Dalai Lama in their Book of Joy: Lasting Happiness in a Changing World — that joy comes most readily to those who feel connected to a larger world; that it’s rooted in spirituality and the way we frame our experiences; that we are most joyous when helping others.

“People who experience joy give more than they get,” says McAdam, a university instructor and owner of the social enterprise Resilient Generations. “Joyful people know that it’s through other people that we grow, and so they take the risk. Joyful people look for new experiences. They overemphasize the positive while underplaying the negative.”

That last finding in particular describes each of the people sharing their stories here.

A life transformed forever at age 12 by a massive head injury. A single mom who finds herself in a wheelchair with multiple sclerosis. A woman beset by childhood bullies, depression, sexual assault and now a fatal cancer. A recovering drug user who went through chemotherapy while living homeless on Victoria’s streets. A young person who’s been fighting her way through a life-threatening illness from the time she was born.

All seemed surprised to hear that someone had named them as a person notable for their joy. All framed their adversities as something that ultimately bettered them.

“I’m an ordinary person who has had some things that the average person hasn’t had to deal with, but maybe that’s what makes me able to juggle stress,” says Sam Jones, owner of 2% Jazz Coffee.

His painful memories of being teased about a speech impediment and his appearance — he has a still-undiagnosed genetic condition that causes tumour-like growths on the left side of his face and neck — tainted his school experience so much that he opted to home-school his three children when the time came.

“It occurs to me that my adversity as a child strengthens me, has made me who I am. Part of what I do is survive, and I think that comes from working hard enough throughout my life to get through the bad times.”

Pippa Blake, diagnosed with multiple sclerosis as a young mother and in a wheelchair for the last 26 years, says she likely wouldn’t have spent the years since then sky-diving, sailing, horseback riding and making her way to Mount Everest base camp in 2007 were it not for developing MS.

“All these things I do, I wouldn’t be doing if I weren’t in a wheelchair,” says Blake. “You get to a stage where you say, ‘Why not?’ Getting MS has opened so many doors for me. It has made me a nicer person. I have time for people.”

People who find joy appear to reframe the negative events of their lives in positive ways, says McAdam. Mary Katharine Ross, communications officer with the Community Social Planning Council, exemplifies that, having embarked on a “year of forgiveness” as an adult to be able to forgive, among other things, the two men who raped her at 15.

“We are responsible for how we feel,” says Ross. “I am not responsible for being raped, but I am responsible for how I view it, how I incorporate that experience into my life.”

If joy comes from giving to others, Jeneece Edroff deserves to be among the most joyous in town. Beset with lifelong severe health challenges from neurofibromatosis, the 23-year-old has a legendary drive to give back to her community that started when she was only seven. She has raised $1.25 million to date for local health charities.

“To find joy, look at things with a different perspective,” advises Edroff. “Be around people. Smile and say hi. It’s the little things that can change a person’s attitude. Find a hobby that makes you happy.”

Joyous people know when to call on friends and family for help, notes McAdam.

Michael James Cameron, who went through 20 hard years of substance use and suicidal thoughts from Grade 8 on after a ski accident at age 12 left him with a severe head injury, remembers his family as his “biggest fans” through it all.

Now in recovery and a volunteer with the Victoria Brain Injury Society, Cameron can still recite every word of the Robert Service poem “The Quitter,” which “really resonated with me” when he came across it after his Grade 8 teacher assigned everyone to memorize a poem. By then, he was already heading into drug and alcohol issues, out of step in a small Alberta town where few knew anything about brain injuries.

“My advice: don’t give up,” says Cameron. “I remember this guy in high school telling me, ‘Don’t let the assholes beat you down.’”

Sara McKerracher also recalls her family as “amazing” through the period in 2015 when she was living homeless and addicted on the streets of Victoria, going through chemotherapy for Stage 4 lymphoma (now vanquished). The 28-year-old survived that hard experience determined to change her life.

“Joy for me is something that happens from the moment I wake up now,” says McKerracher. “I’m in a warm bed, waking up in good health. I don’t ever want to forget the things I went through, but I also don’t want to dwell on them.”

Joyous people embrace new experiences, says McAdam. They know how to live in the moment. Sue Morgan, 67, is facing down end-stage kidney failure by packing her bag for six more months in her beloved Guanajuato, Mexico, having rejected dialysis and organ transplant as “not for me.”

She says given her many health issues, she wouldn’t feel right about lining up for a new kidney at this point when so many other younger, healthier people need one.

“I still make plans, just not long-term ones,” says Morgan. “My advice? Don’t be afraid. We’re all going to die. Figure out what matters and live every moment.”

A number of those interviewed cited spiritual practice as vital in their lives: faith, meditation, yoga, mindfulness. McAdam saw that among those she studied as well: “Most people who are highly resilient have a fundamental spirituality.”

Debra Bell has suffered one major life challenge after another, including the death of her son Robbie from a heart condition at age 10 and the diagnosis of her other son, Riel, with schizophrenia at age 17. But connecting to her Bahá’i community and faith never fails to bring her joy, says Bell.

Ross says "Illuminata," based on A Course in Miracles — a spiritual thought system developed in 1975 by the Foundation for Inner Peace — is “my prayer book.” The Findhorn Foundation’s Game of Transformation is an integral part of her life.

But just in case anyone is thinking that those who know how to seek joy never suffer again, best to let that one go. Bad things happen to good people, including everyone interviewed for this piece.

That Jones never leaves his workplace without saying to his employees, “Be nice” didn’t protect him from being “totally and completely hosed,” as he puts it, in a business relationship a few years ago, costing him his business, his home and very nearly his marriage.

Ross’s year of forgiveness didn’t spare her a diagnosis 18 months ago of multiple myeloma, an incurable cancer. Blake’s amazing adventures still haven’t replaced the feeling of a hike through the woods on her own strong legs. Edroff’s health challenges will never go away.

“Our adversities change, but we’ll always have them,” says Jones. “It’s part of being human — hunting for food, climbing up a tree at night to stay safe. It makes us more human … and humane. Maybe it’s actually positive that we have these adverse things happen to us.”

OK, #MeToo, and almost certainly #YouToo if you're female

My old newspaper stomping grounds lured me out of column retirement this week to write a piece launching their #MeToo series. Here it is. You can find the Times Colonist version here.

***

I admit, the first day of the #MeToo phenomenon was a pretty brutal day to be on Facebook. So many terrible stories, though I felt genuinely heartened by the heartfelt, stunned response from men who clearly had no idea.

The critics are already popping up at this point, saying things like how wrong it is for women to have to be out there in public with their painful stories. Personally, I see real power in the #MeToo thing. Sexual assault and harassment remain one of the most common shared experiences of women around the world, and this is the first time I’ve really seen women out there about it in a big way.

I mean, seriously, can most of us even count how many times we’ve had weird and creepy experiences with a sexual overtone involving men? One of my family members and I were just recounting the time when she was 13 and some Italian on a crowded Venice ferry pressed into her from behind with his erection.

And on the one hand, I think, “Good grief, a child of 13!” and shake my head. But on the other, I know that my own understanding of “the way men are” came right around that age, too.

I’ve had many more reminders since then, from the scruffy clerk in the small Kamloops store who I realized was masturbating while I browsed, to the boss who lifted up my skirt to ascertain whether I was wearing stockings.

More intimate examples as well, of course, though the #MeToo phenomenon helped me see that there are lines in the sand for me, some things I will not put out to the world to reflect on. So just suffice to say, I know how it can be when the lines between intimacy and assault get blurred.

Throughout all of these experiences, I’ve continued to love and appreciate men. Never once did I classify what happened to me as being about all men, because I had met and loved far too many good ones to think that the issue was about all of them. I really hope we can get past any pitting of women against men in the conversation that’s to come around #MeToo. The issues are sexual assault and harassment, not gender.

That said, guys, it IS rather noticeable that this stuff almost always comes back on your gender. It does seem to indicate some troubling issue at the heart of male sexuality.

Sure, we could come up with examples to the contrary. But let’s stick with the obvious for now: Being sexually assaulted and harassed is a troubling rite of passage for virtually every girl/woman, and it’s almost always a man who is the perpetrator.

What’s the problem at the heart of all of this? Kind of a sexual privilege, perhaps. The men who have these anti-social, demeaning and even criminal behaviours believe that their desire trumps your consent.

I’m not even sure if the concept of consent is a consideration for them. Sometimes, the lack of it appears to be the turn-on, as anyone knows who has ever experienced a Thetis Lake flasher staked out on the towel beside them. At times it’s also very clearly a power move, kind of like a full-of-himself monkey who mates with whoever he chooses as a show of strength to the others.

But here’s one thing I do know: It’s got to stop. The Bill Cosby stuff, Harvey Weinstein, Jian Ghomeshi, and now accusations against David Blaine – it’s so awful.

And as women everywhere know, it’s not just happening to pretty starlets. Nor is it only rich, piggish men who are guilty. Imagine the weight of all our #MeToos if every one of us was honest about what has been done to us by men we didn’t want touching us.

There are many good men who are distraught by the #MeToo wave, asking what they can do.

First and always, listen to our stories, because we, too, need to see how disturbing it is to the men who love us that we are still having these experiences. We’re worried for our daughters, granddaughters, great-granddaughters.

And then, help us understand. Why do we have these experiences with men? What can men do to change in other men whatever behaviour is going on here? Men, we need you for that part, because such questions are mysteries to women. We have our issues as a gender, but grinding our pelvises up against strangers in public spaces or groping our young nephews is not one of them.

Talk, everyone. If #MeToo is to be anything other than a really rough few days on Facebook, women need to tear back the veil on our routine experiences of sexual assault and harassment. And men have to help us set things right.

An open letter to my Facebook friends on the occasion of this morning's bit of bother

First, time to get honest about our relationship. Mostly we aren’t really friends, are we? I’m connected to 2,400 Facebook “friends,” and it might be a stretch to imagine that even five per cent of them are genuine friends of mine. So how about we think of each other as “connections” instead, all of us with our various reasons for deciding who we connect with on this odd thing we know as Facebook.

My connections have grown vast since I first opened my Facebook account a decade ago. But right from the get-go I took the approach that if you’re a real person and plan to contribute something to the public conversation beyond trying to get my vote or my money for your multi-level-marketing product, I’m up for connecting.

I happily connect to people without knowing whether we share the same opinions, values, world views. I appreciate diversity of thinking and culture, even when it’s uncomfortable. I almost never “unfriend” a connection, having decided long ago that freedom of speech is a foundational element of democracy that I want to actively support.

But that’s not to say I won’t give you a rough time now and then when you post something that irritates the hell out of me.

I sometimes wonder if it feels like a shock to a Facebook connection when I get prickly over something they wrote. If so, my apologies to any in my Facebook network who assume our being connected means that we agree on all the issues of the world, or at the very least have a tacit agreement not to acknowledge said differences publicly. I don't see things that way.

No worries that I’ll be prowling through all your Facebook posts, barking at you for this or that. I’m only reserving the right to get crabby when you come onto my Facebook page and say whatever you’re saying. Our pages are kind of like our houses, so when a person stands on my doorstep yelling their uninvited views through my door, I figure I’ve got every right to yell them right back out the door and off the property.

Here’s my promise to you: I will never be rude, or at least not until way late in a lengthy and fruitless back-and-forth that is getting tedious. I will do my best to make myself clear without malice, meanness or abusive language. But I won’t always be nice.

One thing my connections definitely need to understand is that I offer no protection from other people in my Facebook network who play much rougher than I do. Those who post on a post of mine are on their own to settle any differences between each other. I usually walk away from comment threads once they get completely out of control.

Every now and then, I do unfriend someone. If a person is relentlessly awful - racist, homophobic, idiotic or otherwise generally horrible whenever they post something on my page - they’re gone. One guy threatened violence, so he got the hook, too.

Should you feel the need to unfriend me after suffering one of my attacks, please don’t hesitate. I’m just fine with that. Whatever our reasons for connecting on Facebook, we are free to bail when the cons start to outweigh the pros. A lot of times we don't even know each other, after all. Also, many people take great umbrage at having their views challenged. Who knew?

I suspect I’ve lost some “friends” over my sex work perspective as well, so might as well get that one on the record while we’re being honest with each other: I am a committed and unequivocal supporter of sex workers’ rights to work and live free of discrimination, stigma and bad laws that routinely cause far more harm than good. I will come after you like a Cooper’s hawk on a plump robin if you come over to my page and start posting uninformed BS about sex workers.

Other than that, welcome, friend! I expect we’ll (mostly) get along just fine.

Homelessness is still a problem. Gee, go figure

Ten years ago now, I was part of a major initiative to address homelessness in Victoria. The Mayor's Task Force on Breaking the Cycle of Mental Illness, Addictions and Homelessness brought together some of the most informed, passionate people in the country to look into the issue of people living on our streets and what needed to be done about it. 

In four intense months, the task force put together a comprehensive report, packed with thoughtful, meaningful research, strategies and findings. What lands people into homelessness in these modern times turned out to be quite a complex series of things, starting with people's own personal crises, health issues and inability (for all kinds of reasons) to manage the major problems and stressors of their lives, and then deepening into shifting priorities at all levels of government, systemic failures, flawed decision-making, disconnects and deep funding cuts across the existing system of support, and a general failure by our society to grasp how much effort and investment is needed over a very long time to try to address an entrenched social problem.

The key message repeated over and over again in that report was that while we do indeed need much more housing and social supports, we will always have homelessness unless we address the root causes of it. Without that, you are simply housing those who are homeless right now, even while new people fall into homelessness behind them.

A decade on, we have built some more housing. We have added more outreach. We have shifted thinking in the judicial system to the point that judges now routinely make much more humane decisions when confronted with cases that so clearly come down to homelessness and poverty rather than criminal intent.

We have also talked and talked about the root causes of homelessness, so much so that I'd like to think that virtually everyone now understands much more that homelessness happens not because someone is too lazy to work or reluctant to "pull up their bootstraps," but because of things like mental illness, poverty, disability, catastrophic injury, substance issues, a lifetime of disadvantage, and the lack of any kind of personal support system to fall back.

But while public awareness may have improved, the strategies that might staunch the flow of people into homelessness have never come about. That explains why we are still talking about homelessness like nothing has changed, and why there were a thousand or so people living homeless in Victoria when the task force got underway in 2007 and still is. And why there still will be 10 years from now if we keep doing things in the same ineffective, reactive way.

A new report was released last week confirming that the majority of homeless youth in our country are survivors of the foster system. Children from families investigated through Canada's child-welfare system are almost 200 times more likely to end up homeless at some point in their lifetime compared to children with no involvement in the system.

Shocking. But we knew that already 10 years ago. We've heard about it repeatedly in the intervening years from former BC Children and Youth representative Mary Ellen Turpel Lafond, who penned report after report pointing out this tragic statistic. Yet here we are, still being shocked. Still doing nothing effective in response.

We also knew 10 years ago that discharging people from our provincial jails with no plan also fed into homelessness, not to mention led some of them to instantly commit another crime to get themselves out of their dire economic situation. We knew that discharging people with chronic mental illness from hospital without a solid plan did the same. As did relentlessly wearing down social supports to the point that people on the edge began to fall into the cracks.

So yeah, it's a bummer to still be talking about homelessness all these years later. But until we get serious about why we can't seem to get on top of it, it will remain a heartbreaking example of societal failure and wasted human potential.

Stop Operation Northern Spotlight. Stand up for sex workers' rights. Don't be the modern-day version of Martin Luther King's blandly dangerous 'white moderate'

I'm adding my voice to what I hope will be an ever-larger chorus of British Columbians asking that police departments in BC refuse to participate in the ill-informed Operation Northern Spotlight campaign to "stop sex trafficking," which has been conducted off and on elsewhere in Canada for a number of years and is modelled on a similar U.S. police strategy.

As you will see from the letter below from the Supporting Women's Alternatives Network (SWAN Vancouver Society), the police campaign most definitely doesn't stop trafficking. But it does do serious harm to adult sex workers just trying to make a living.

SWAN bases its letter on solid sources, and I've included all of them here. If you're not already informed on this issue, please read and learn. Uninformed opinion and myth around sex work continue to cause real harm to people, and do nothing to stop the harms of violence, exploitation and genuine trafficking. Around the issue of sex workers' rights, I'm reminded more and more of Martin Luther King's denunciation in his Letter from a Birmingham Jail of the dangerously passive position of  "the moderate," who talks a great deal of their supposed support for human rights but in fact stands up for nothing (thanks to the late Arthur Manuel for the reminder): 

First, I must confess that over the past few years I have been gravely disappointed with the white moderate. I have almost reached the regrettable conclusion that the Negro's great stumbling block in his stride toward freedom is not the White Citizen's Counciler or the Ku Klux Klanner, but the white moderate, who is more devoted to "order" than to justice; who prefers a negative peace which is the absence of tension to a positive peace which is the presence of justice; who constantly says: "I agree with you in the goal you seek, but I cannot agree with your methods of direct action"; who paternalistically believes he can set the timetable for another man's freedom; who lives by a mythical concept of time and who constantly advises the Negro to wait for a "more convenient season." Shallow understanding from people of good will is more frustrating than absolute misunderstanding from people of ill will. Lukewarm acceptance is much more bewildering than outright rejection.

None of us over here on the side of sex workers' rights supports trafficking. But what we're trying to get across to the public is that these kinds of police actions do nothing to help those who truly need the help, while harming Canadian workers who end up working in even more dangerous conditions (or deported back to poverty in the case of migrant women wrongly assumed to be trafficked) as a result of flawed and thoughtless police targeting. 

Yay for Victoria Police Department, who so far gets all of this and works hard to stay above the fray while developing better relationships with sex workers in the region. Here's the letter - please share, support, and stand up for a population whose battle for human and workers' rights is real and immediate.

July 6, 2017

RCMP ‘E’ Division
BC Association of Chiefs of Police
Municipal Police Agencies
Director of Policing Services

Dear Madam and Sirs:

Re: Call for Non-Participation in Operation Northern Spotlight in British Columbia

We, the undersigned, are individuals and organizations deeply committed to the health, safety and human rights of women, men and trans persons involved in the sex industry. As such, we are concerned about the safety and well-being of those in the sex industry who are at heightened risk of human trafficking.

We would like to express our opposition to Operation Northern Spotlight and ask that BC law enforcement refrain from any future participation in this national anti-trafficking initiative. ‘Rescue’ missions such as Operation Northern Spotlight do more harm than good. A quick-fix attempt to deal with a complex issue, Operation Northern Spotlight sweeps up everyone present for interrogation, detention and/or arrest, without adequately distinguishing between those who are underage and/or coerced, and those who are not. (See the following sources: The Use of Raids to Fight Trafficking in Persons, How to Stage a Raid: Police, Media and the Master Narrative of Trafficking, and Canada and migrant sex‐work: Challenging the ‘foreign’ in foreign policy.)

This strategy is one that is based on deception and manipulation, as evidenced by police posing as sex workers’ clients in hotel rooms and ‘shock and awe’ raids on indoor sex work venues. These actions foster distrust and adversarial relationships with law enforcement. Pulling people out of the sex industry without their consent and penalizing those who do not agree to exit the sex industry does not ‘save’ or ‘rescue’ them.

‘Rescuing’ individuals who do not wish to be rescued has multiple impacts. Sex workers report being confused and frightened and may suffer trauma and even exhibit symptoms of post-traumatic stress disorder. Sex workers lose income and experience economic hardship. This places sex workers in a precarious position where they must either accept dates or provide services they normally wouldn’t to recoup losses. Operation Northern Spotlight can also have consequences for public health, as sex workers report reluctance to keep large quantities of condoms on commercial premises for fear of raids. Operation Northern Spotlight also has a ripple effect beyond those directly impacted, by driving sex workers further underground to evade police detection and making sex workers less likely to turn to law enforcement if violence occurs.

In order to be effective and to help exploited youth and trafficked persons, anti-trafficking solutions must be developed with the knowledge and expertise of sex workers. Combating human trafficking and upholding the rights, dignity and safety of sex workers should not be mutually exclusive.

As you are aware, British Columbia has a tragic history with regards to the deaths and disappearances of sex workers. In the past decade, progress has been made between law enforcement and sex workers to right the wrongs in the aftermath of the serial killer. Forsaken, the report of the Missing Women Commission of Inquiry, provided guidance to law enforcement on how to enhance the safety of vulnerable women in the sex industry. Operation Northern Spotlight is incompatible with the recommendations of Forsaken and does not have any place in this local context. 

Targeting individuals in the sex industry through approaches that induce fear and increase mistrust of law enforcement jeopardizes any chance of cooperation between sex workers and law enforcement. This type of repressive enforcement also threatens the foundation of a collaborative, multi stakeholder, community-based approach (See Forsaken recommendation no. 3) that is growing throughout British Columbia – a foundation that so many police officers, sex workers and community organizations have painstakingly built over the last several years. In short, Operation Northern Spotlight jeopardizes our ability to keep moving forward on our shared goals of reducing violence against sex workers.

We ask British Columbia law enforcement to decline any future invitation to participate in Operation Northern Spotlight. If the forthcoming Provincial Sex Work Enforcement Guidelines are modeled upon the Vancouver Police Department’s Sex Work Enforcement Guidelines, as per Forsaken recommendation 5.8, Operation Northern Spotlight will be at odds with provincial guidelines for sex work-related policing approaches.

In closing, we call upon British Columbia law enforcement to work with sex workers to develop best practices to help and support trafficked persons while protecting the safety, dignity and human rights of all individuals in the sex industry.

Signed,

Andrew Sorfleet, President, Triple-X Workers' Association of British Columbia
Annie Temple, The Naked Truth
BC Coalition of Experiential Communities
Brenda Belak, Lawyer, Pivot Legal Society
Cheryl Giesbrecht
Dr. Lauren Casey
Dr. Sarah Hunt (Kwakwaka'wakw Nation), Assistant Professor, UBC
Dr. Becki Ross, Professor, UBC & Co-Founder West End Sex Workers' Memorial
Dr. Cecilia Benoit, University of Victoria
Dr. Victoria Bungay, Canada Research Chair: Gender, Equity & Community Engagement, UBC
Elizabeth Manning, PhD, RSW
Esther Shannon, Founder, FIRST Decriminalize Sex Work
Gender and Sexual Health Initiative, BC Centre for Excellence in HIV/AIDS
Genevieve Fuji Johnson, Associate Professor, Simon Fraser University
Hayli Millar, PhD (in Law), Associate Professor, University of the Fraser Valley
Jan Wilson, Executive Director, Prince George New Hope Society
Jody Paterson, PEERS Victoria
John Lowman, Professor, Emeritus, School of Criminology, Simon Fraser University
Joyce Arthur, FIRST Decriminalize Sex Work
Kerry Porth, former sex worker and sex work activist
Options for Sexual Health, Provincial Office
PACE Society
PEERS Victoria
Sanctuary Health
Sex Workers United Against Violence (SWUAV) Society
SWAN Vancouver Society
Tamara O'Doherty, PhD, JD, Simon Fraser University
Vancouver Status of Women
Warm Zone, Abbotsford
West Coast Co-operative of Sex Industry Professionals