Elsewhere on mediabistro.com: MSNBC Looking for “Whores”

Thanks to FishbowlNY for spotting a post by sex-worker-turned-author Audacia Ray, who was approached to be a “talking head” expert on the Spitzer scandal for Dan Abrams’s show on MSNBC, until an unnamed producer bungled the pre-interview:

“They were casting for someone who had been a sex worker to talk about the mechanics of hiring a prostitute, and the producer I talked to point blank asked me ["have you been a whore?"], though then he quickly backtracked and said, ‘I’m sorry if I’m not using the right terminology,’ and I told him that no indeed he was not.”

Her background as a fetish worker and sensual masseuse? Not good enough. In addition, she adds, “they told me flat out that they weren’t interested in discussing the political interests of sex workers or the issues around sex trafficking as it is today.” So she turned them down—and then her publisher, Seal Press, got on the phone and chewed the producer out for the whore thing.

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