Bye Bye Vegas Buy Buy

Originally uploaded by Melissa Gira.

Heading home –

Press Conference

Originally uploaded by Melissa Gira.

Wonder Woman

Originally uploaded by Melissa Gira.

‘In your satin tights, fighting for your rights,’ Miss Indigo Blue.

Workshop Day

Originally uploaded by Melissa Gira.

I put my new (only a little ironic) Lawrence Lessig pin from emi koyama on my badge in honor of my workshop – also, appropriately, talking on media, messaging, tensions around sex workers ‘glamorizing’ ourselves in the press.

No, that’s not the name of a new outcall agency — I’m just trying to put into a simple, keen phrase what it feels like for a (bloggging) girl here over the last few days, speaking only for myself, of course. I have windows and windows full of notes, and spend most of my time between formal sessions seeking out folks who have spoken to build more rapport with them to better represent those notes. This is more nuanced than the direct quoting of traditional journalism, for me, and an approach Dacia and I have convened and checked-in over each day: the need for consent, accountability, and also, to record not just the “correct” words of each participant, but to preserve the broader context into which she or he is speaking, to record how he or she locates her or himself in both our movement and society-at-large, and to recognize that taking this attention to our communications is something that most reporting is not designed to do.

Blogging seems so suited to my style of documentation — of our history, of our culture — because of that flexibility, because it requires me to position myself within my own documentation.

This is why, in my actually live coverage of our action last night, many of our conversations this week seemed to coalesce, encapsulated in our walk up and down the Strip…

… and this is why I’m attempting to operate here as both blog evangelist and demystifier; and why I’m taking 5 minutes before another day of it to put this down, philosophy of communications in the moment (and also, of course, so I can cite this is in my workshop in a few hours — hello, gorgeous transparency).

Report back from our direct action/performance on the Vegas Strip tonight, meeting workers and talking to tourists:

MP3 File

Street Education

Originally uploaded by Melissa Gira.

Red Light

Originally uploaded by Melissa Gira.

Cops Arrive

Originally uploaded by Melissa Gira.

Money, Baby

Originally uploaded by Melissa Gira.