An ongoing harm that affects both sex workers and victims of trafficking is the conflation of sex work and trafficking, including the reduction of survival sex work to exploitation. If you hope to add nuance to your practice or understanding of those in the industry by choice, circumstance or coercion, this workshop will equip you with the language to identify anti-sex work and anti-trafficking propaganda.

Together, we will unpack myths and clarify why trafficking and sex work are often reduced to the same thing. It will also help you understand the real cause of sex trafficking and therefore how to support those occupying different experiences.

Sex workers and those who have experienced exploitation deserve dignity, care and compassion. This workshop centers the voices of those in the industry to ensure that you receive, not only the academic and clinical perspective, but also the lived experience.

🎤 Presented By: Raquel Savage

📌 What to Expect:

• A comprehensive definition  of trafficking, including its underlying cause
• An in-depth discussion on anti-porn and anti-trafficking hysteria
• The inconvenient truth on how feminism and liberal politics collude with anti-rights rhetoric
• Understanding how this impacts your work and relationships with sex workers

👤 Who Is This Space For:

• Licensed clinicians and clinical interns (social workers, therapists, psychologists)
• Mental health professionals, including peer supporters, working with clients experiencing abuse
• Unlicensed practitioners of any kind committed to anti-oppressive and survivor-centered care

🧠 Learning Objectives:

• By the end of this session, participants will be able to identify examples of conflating trafficking & exploitation and sex work and how to ethically approach conversations with those in the sex industry to honor these nuances.
  
  • J. Sexual exploitation, including sexual abuse, sexual harassment, and sexual assault.
• By the end of this session, participants will be able to explain the other factors which impact the trafficking conversation, including the role of migration, racism, and patriarchy.
  • C. Socio-cultural factors (e.g. ethnicity, culture, religion, spirituality, socio-economic status, family values) in relation to sexual values and behaviors.

Accessibility: Zoom offers live captioning. If further accessibility tools are needed please let us know.

Reclaiming Joy and Intimacy in Marginalized Communities

Pleasure has often been denied, pathologized, or politicized in marginalized communities due to systemic oppression, intergenerational trauma, and cultural stigma. This workshop explores how reclaiming sexual and intimate pleasure can serve as a radical act of resistance, healing, and legacy-building. Clinicians will learn frameworks and strategies to support clients in centering joy, pleasure, and intimacy as tools for resilience and liberation.

This interactive and experiential workshop blends theory with guided reflection, somatic awareness practices, and applied clinical tools. Participants will be supported in examining their own assumptions about pleasure and exploring how cultural, spiritual, and relational contexts shape clients’ access to joy and intimacy. Clinicians will learn concrete strategies to assess pleasure-related barriers, support embodied safety and desire, and integrate pleasure-centered interventions into therapeutic and educational settings.

By the end of the workshop, participants will leave with expanded language, practical frameworks, and renewed permission to support clients in moving beyond survival toward wholeness, connection, and sustainable joy. This training is ideal for clinicians and educators seeking to deepen culturally responsive, trauma-informed approaches that honor pleasure as both a healing practice and a radical act of care.

🎤 Presented By: Victoria Moon

📌 What to Expect:

• A reflective discussion-based workshop clinical application.
• Practical tools for centering pleasure and joy in healing work.

👤 Who Is This Space For:

• Therapists, counselors, educators, and helping professionals who work with marginalized communities and want to deepen their pleasure-affirming practice.

👀 You’ll Leave With:

• Concrete strategies and shared language to support clients in moving from survival toward joy, intimacy, and liberation.

🧠 Learning Objectives:

By the end of this workshop, participants will be able to:

• Describe at least three sociocultural factors that impact access to pleasure and intimacy in marginalized communities.
  • (c): Socio-cultural factors (e.g., ethnicity, culture, religion, spirituality, socio-economic status, family values) in relation to sexual values and behaviors
  • (f): Diversities in sexual expression and lifestyles
    
• Integrate at least two pleasure-centered strategies into their clinical or educational practice that support resilience and healing in marginalized clients.
  
  • (m): Pleasure enhancement skills
  • Sexuality Education (d): Approaches to sexuality education with specific populations
    

Accessibility: Zoom offers live captioning. If further accessibility tools are needed please let us know.

Workshop Recordings

Missed one of our workshops? No problem! You can purchase the recording below and still get AASECT CEs. Please Note: The recordings of workshops by guest presenters will NOT be available for sale after the event itself.