{"id":200,"date":"2026-02-14T23:16:17","date_gmt":"2026-02-14T23:16:17","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.bbcsexnews.com\/news\/?p=200"},"modified":"2026-02-14T23:23:58","modified_gmt":"2026-02-14T23:23:58","slug":"las-vegas-hooker-and-vegas-sex-works-want-to-form-a-new-union","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.bbcsexnews.com\/news\/las-vegas-hooker-and-vegas-sex-works-want-to-form-a-new-union\/","title":{"rendered":"Las Vegas Hooker And Vegas Sex Works Want To Form A New Union."},"content":{"rendered":"\n

PAHRUMP, Nev. (AP) \u2014 Nevada is the only state where people can legally purchase sex, and now sex workers at one of the state\u2019s oldest brothels are fighting to become the nation\u2019s first to be unionized.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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Nevada is the only state where people can legally purchase sex, and now sex workers at one of the state\u2019s oldest brothels are fighting to become the nation\u2019s first to be unionized.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cWe want the same things that any other worker wants. We want a safe and respectful workplace,\u201d said a worker at Sheri\u2019s Ranch in Pahrump, Nevada, who goes by the stage name Jupiter Jetson and asked that her legal name not be used for fear of harassment.Prostitution is legal at licensed brothels in 10 of Nevada\u2019s rural counties. That doesn\u2019t include Clark County, home to Las Vegas, though Sheri\u2019s Ranch is about an hour\u2019s drive away. The majority of the brothel\u2019s 74 sex workers submitted a petition to unionize with the National Labor Relations Board last week under the name United Brothel Workers, represented by the Communications Workers of America.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Sex work, and the employment rights of the those who do it, remains a largely taboo topic worldwide. Prostitution is only legal in a handful of countries, including Germany, and organizing efforts vary. In Spain, where prostitution is unregulated, the government approved a union for sex workers in 2018 but a court quickly outlawed it<\/a>, saying it made the exploitation of prostitutes legal.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cAll workers are guaranteed certain human decencies and dignities, and the right to organize is one of those,\u201d said Marc Ellis, state president of the Nevada Communications Workers of America.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Sheri\u2019s Ranch respects the right of workers to \u201cexpress their views on workplace structure,\u201d Jeremy Lemur, the brothel\u2019s marketing and communications director, said in an email. The business\u2019s focus is on providing a \u201csafe, lawful and professionally managed environment.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The process could go back and forth for weeks, but the brothel could choose to recognize the Communications Workers of America as the sex workers\u2019 representatives and begin negotiating a new contract immediately, according to union attorneys.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Concerns over contract terms<\/h2>\n\n\n\n

The workers at Sheri\u2019s Ranch, who call themselves courtesans, were given a new contract in December that would give the brothel control over their intellectual property and power of attorney. The contract, viewed by The Associated Press, said the brothel will have the \u201cirrevocable, worldwide, perpetual, royalty-free, non-exclusive license\u201d to distribute the women\u2019s material.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Another worker, who goes by the stage name Molly Wylder, said the terms would make it harder for courtesans to leave the industry and pursue other opportunities. For Wylder, sex work is a temporary job to help pay for her student loans. Like Jetson, she asked that her legal name not be used.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cIt was never my plan to stay forever,\u201d Wylder said.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

When the women brought their concerns to management, they were told to sign or leave, they said. The women requested more time to decide, while some signed under duress, Jetson said. The dispute remains ongoing. Lemur did not respond to questions about the women\u2019s concerns.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Jetson said she and two others were fired after the brothel learned about the unionization effort. The Communications Workers of America is fighting for them to be rehired. Lemur did not respond to questions about Jetson\u2019s employment.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Independent contractor vs. employee<\/h2>\n\n\n\n

Sex workers are typically classified as independent contractors, said Barb Brents, an expert in Nevada\u2019s sex industry and retired professor at the University of Nevada in Las Vegas. Independent contractors do not get as many legal protections as employees, but they usually get more freedoms. The success of their unionization could come down to a debate between whether they are considered independent contractors or employees.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The independent contractor status is fundamental to the workers\u2019 autonomy, said Lemur.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

But the women argue they are treated as employees. They have set schedules, they can\u2019t work from home and they are required to charge a minimum of $1,000 per hour to their clients, Ellis said. Sheri\u2019s Ranch gets 50% of what they earn.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cIn our dream scenario, we would like to be recognized as employees because we would like the full rights and bargaining power that employees have,\u201d Jetson said.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

With many of the women making their own online content, they want their intellectual property protected. They also said they want to negotiate over their dress code \u2014 they were recently told they can only wear denim shorts, not pants \u2014 and they\u2019d like to see a fairer wage contract.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Wylder said she\u2019d also like to negotiate for health insurance, which they are not provided.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Other workers in the sex industry have seen success. In Los Angeles, dancers at the topless bar Star Garden became the only unionized group of strippers<\/a> in the U.S. The Lusty Lady, a San Francisco strip club, was pioneering when its workers unionized in 1997, though it\u2019s now closed.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Brents said the Sheri Ranch courtesans\u2019 effort is significant in a stigmatized industry in which its workers historically lay low and stay quiet.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cIt\u2019s pretty amazing and heartening to see so many sex workers standing up for their rights,\u201d she said. ___<\/p>\n\n\n\n

This story has been corrected to show that the worker\u2019s stage name is Molly Wylder, not Wilder.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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PAHRUMP, Nev. (AP) \u2014 Nevada is the only state where people can legally purchase sex, and now sex workers at one of the state\u2019s oldest brothels are fighting to become the nation\u2019s first to be unionized. Nevada is the only state where people can legally purchase sex, and now sex workers at one of the state\u2019s oldest brothels are fighting…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":202,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[136,4,13,207,208],"tags":[211,209,210],"class_list":["post-200","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-american-dating","category-big-black-cocks","category-big-booty","category-las-vegas-sex","category-sex-industry","tag-las-vegas-dancers","tag-las-vegas-hookers","tag-vegas-sex"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.bbcsexnews.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/200","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.bbcsexnews.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.bbcsexnews.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.bbcsexnews.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.bbcsexnews.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=200"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/www.bbcsexnews.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/200\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":208,"href":"https:\/\/www.bbcsexnews.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/200\/revisions\/208"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.bbcsexnews.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/202"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.bbcsexnews.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=200"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.bbcsexnews.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=200"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.bbcsexnews.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=200"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}