https://sfpc.study/sessions/spring-26/whore-singularity
The Whore Singularity asks: if everyone is naked on the internet, is no one naked on the internet? Made for students new to sex worker history and theory as well as those with prior knowledge, this class traces the history of online sex work, censorship, and surveillance. Together, students will collectively imagine cybersex utopias grounded in liberation, and share them with their communities during a hybrid showcase at the end of class. From JenniCam to Rule 34, online culture has always been synonymous with the human erotic imagination. Not all digitally-mediated erotic expression is labor, but it is all under constant surveillance. Because of this, we all have a stake in the fight against sex work criminalization, anti-porn stigma, and whorephobia.
The Whore Singularity traces key moments in online sex work history alongside contemporary policy regimes such as FOSTA-SESTA and Project 2025, examining how pornography has become contested terrain for free expression, labor rights, and bodily autonomy. Students will learn to see their everyday internet use as built by sex worker necessity, creativity, and organized resistance against injustice, and to recognize the benefits of solidarity with those who are naked on the internet—whether or not they themselves are currently naked online. Whether you use platforms to market your services, to get off, or to connect with others, your privacy is on the line. Digital sex represents the control that fascists want to win, and the power that everyday people stand to lose. What can we all do to fight slut and pervert shaming in the interest of solidarity and liberation for all? What could a cybersex utopia look like, and who do we get there together? Students will use literary tools of utopian imagining to envision and illustrate whoretopias.
The class will conclude with a hybrid showcase based in Los Angeles, where students are invited to share their cybersex utopias.
Teachers: Tina Horn, Jaye Elizabeth Elijah
Section 1: March 31, 2026 to June 2, 2026
Section 2: April 5, 2026 to June 7, 2026
(10 classes)
Section 1: Tuesdays, 1:00–4:00pm ET Section 2: Sundays, Sundays, 4:00–7:00pm ET
Online (Zoom)
$1200 Or pay $600, $300, or $0 with scholarship
Deadline
Applications open until February 9, 2026