“Human Trafficking Is Modern Day Slavery”: Rev. Margaret Fowler, Sex Work and Trafficking

Abstract

The late Rev. Margaret Fowler, United Church Minister, was a key supporter of LGBTQ rights and a vocal advocate against human trafficking in Jamaica. As the founder of the Theodora Project, Rev. Fowler served many persons coerced into sex work or subject to sexual exploitation. She argued that human trafficking is a complex connection of economy, gender, social dynamics, law, and foreign relations. She called for the Church to be involved in anti-trafficking work as to do nothing risks “the very real possibility of Jamaica becoming another major area of sex tourism”. As we celebrate her life and ministry, we are given the opportunity to carefully excavate her perspective on the nexus among trafficking, slavery, and sex work. It does appear that her discourse follows the traditional Church line, which conflates slavery, trafficking and sex work in a fashion that views sex work as wholly coerced. In exploring the arguments that validated her important ministry in Negril, this chapter centres sex positive approaches to sex work and questions the slavery and exploitation framing that is normal in Christian discourse.