prostitute
from Old English hore
This word carries heavy historical baggage about gender and power!
Originally meant 'adulterer' (any gender); by medieval period, systematically applied to women as sexual dehumanization. Male sexual behavior was normalized; female behavior was criminalized and verbally erasured through this slur.
This is a slur. Reclaimed by some sex workers as empowering self-reference, but use externally only with individual consent and community context. Use 'sex worker' in neutral/professional contexts.
["sex worker","worker"]
Sex workers and feminist scholars (including Jill Nagle, Melissa Gira) have reclaimed this term to assert dignity and agency, inverting its historical function as dehumanization into identity assertion.
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