Censorship as a Mirror of Power Dynamics: Writing, Silence, and the Gatekeepers
As I worked on my memoir, a project meant to pull back the curtain on the hidden power dynamics in relationships and society at large, I found myself caught in the very systems I was critiquing. Attempting to write about my experiences as a sex worker—specifically with men whose wealth and privilege enabled their unchecked entitlement—I encountered something unexpected: censorship.
This wasn’t overt rejection or critique. Instead, it was a quiet, systemic refusal. Words and phrases central to my narrative were flagged or removed. Scenes showing the raw violence, manipulation, and emotional labor demanded of me—the very elements that define the heart of my story—were deemed too sensitive for inclusion. The platform where I sought to shape my narrative didn’t outright tell me I couldn’t tell my truth. It simply rendered certain truths unfit for its space. I had set out to write about power, control, and invisibility. Yet, in this act of censorship, I found these themes playing out in real time. My story, too, became subject to the erasures that keep the status quo intact.
The Cost of Silence
What I am writing about is not obscene. It is not gratuitous. It is necessary. My experiences—with men like Simon, the wealthy shipping magnate who brought me to Mykonos under the guise of romance, only to reveal his violent entitlement, or with Henry, who hid behind wealth to justify his disdain for transactional honesty—reflect larger societal patterns. These stories show how power operates in the shadows, depending on invisibility and silence to sustain itself. Yet the systems I critique seem determined to erase the details that reveal how power truly functions. Violence becomes too explicit to describe. Emotional labor becomes too messy to unpack. The transactional nature of relationships between the wealthy and the vulnerable becomes something to avoid naming altogether. But to erase these details is to erase the mechanisms of control. To strip these narratives of specificity is to strip them of their meaning.