The first International Day to End Violence Against Sex Workers was organized by the Sex Workers Outreach Project USA. It directly memorialized the victims of Gary Ridgway, the Green River Killer, who confessed to murdering 49 women, many of them prostitutes, between 1982 and 1998. Ridgway stated he chose victims he believed society would not miss. The day’s founders highlighted this calculus of indifference, which extended to violence perpetrated by clients, pimps, and law enforcement.
The observance served a dual purpose: to honor the dead and to politicize the conditions that made their deaths seem inconsequential. Vigils listed names. Activists distributed harm-reduction kits and know-your-rights cards. The framing deliberately expanded the definition of violence beyond individual acts to include policing tactics, discriminatory laws, and social stigma that increased vulnerability.
A common misunderstanding is that the day solely protests serial killers. Its broader target is state-sanctioned violence. Arrests, confiscation of condoms as evidence, and police harassment are cited as systemic forms of abuse that prevent sex workers from reporting crimes or accessing protection.
The annual event built transnational solidarity among advocacy groups from Kolkata to San Francisco. It provided a shared platform to campaign for decriminalization, oppose harmful rescue industry narratives, and push for the inclusion of sex workers in policy discussions about their own safety. D17 turned private grief into public, organized demand for fundamental human rights.