An elementary school teacher from the Bronx, New York, has been reassigned for publically revealing her past as a stripper and prostitute, the New York Post reported yesterday. The question this story has thrown up is whether this demotion, as well as the coverage the story has received in the press, confirms that society is afraid of sex workers.
Melissa Petro has been teaching art at the PS 70 elementary school in the Bronx for three years, and has been open about her profession prior to becoming a teacher. In an essay for The Rumpus, published in the June of 2010, Petro wrote about her experiences and explained her need to speak out about sex work, despite what her colleagues might think. And in a Huffington Post article earlier this month, Petro revealed that she had used Craigslist to facilitate a brief career as a prostitute. It was this revelation that apparently caused PS 70 to remove Petro from her classroom.
Parents of pupils at PS 70 are predictably outraged – and have …