Gloria Lockett describes how the charges were assigned in her 1983 case. All the white people in our group were granted immunity in an effort to make them testify. The economic situation in this country is the main reason for most of the prostitution of women in general and for African American women. Where white women make 60 or 70 cents to the dollar of white men, women of color earn even less. The Black Coalition Fighting Back Serial Murders reports a study in San Francisco showed that welfare cuts resulted in a higher number of AFDC mothers being arrested for prostitution.
Racism is at the center of the discriminatory conditions within the business.
For example, white women may have the choice to work at a sauna, at a bar or hotel, or for an escort agency. Street work may be their only option. On the street, police often reserve tourist and commercial districts for white women, harassing women of color to an even greater extent and advising them to ply their trade on the other side of the tracks. Racism is part of many communities, but the effects are multiplied for those marginalized as women of color and as prostitutes. As prostitutes, women of color, particularly African American women, are isolated from the mainstream of society and taught to view themselves and their communities with shame.