Amnesty International has come under a barrage of negative publicity – which included a letter signed by Hollywood stars such as Lena Dunham and Meryl Streep – for the outrageous act of speaking to people who sell sex, listening to what we say and then shaping its draft policy on sex work to reflect the evidence. It’s hard to believe that those celebrities actually read the policy in question before trying to bully Amnesty into abandoning it, not least because discussion of the policy has failed to touch on any of the human rights abuses that Amnesty sets out.

Amnesty’s draft policy opposes the Swedish model, a legal framework that has been adopted in several countries and has been described by some as progressive, and even feminist. However, the reality of criminalising those who pay for our services is that sex workers are left with fewer clients, including men who we might otherwise have felt able to turn away - those who seem drunk, aggressive or who have a reputation for violence.

Furthermore, by prioritising the supposed “eradication” of the sex industry, these laws empower police officers to harass, evict and deport migrant sex workers. This is exactly what Amnesty found when it looked at the Swedish model. In Norway the police had a virulent attitude towards women selling sex, and sex workers felt that reporting violence to the police was in itself dangerous because it attracted police attention. As one sex worker told Amnesty: “If you call the police, you lose everything.”

It is essential to listen to sex workers all over the world in order to draft laws to help keep us safe

Amnesty found that sex workers in Norway were routinely evicted by the police. The organisation’s report states that “a number of migrant sex workers were violently attacked and raped … They reported the incident to the police … they returned to their apartment to find the police have removed all their money and electronic equipment. Four days after the attack they were forcibly evicted.”

It’s hard to believe that those Hollywood signatories read this and thought: “Brilliant, the police evicting migrant women when they report rape sounds like the feminist solution to prostitution; we should support the legal model where this occurs.” But that is what appears to have happened – unless they signed up to attack Amnesty over a document they had not read.

The draft policy specifically notes that the voices of sex workers are often “obscured or silenced” during such debates. It is ironic that the vilification heaped upon Amnesty demonstrates just how true that is.

A representative from an organisation campaigning for “feminist criminalisation” (there’s no difference to sex workers between “feminist” and “traditional” criminalisation when the police are at our doors) incredulously told a journalist: “Amnesty is not listening … if Amnesty isn’t listening to them [celebrities], then who are they listening to?”

The idea that Amnesty might prioritise the voices of sex workers in a conversation about sex work was apparently incomprehensible. Even the Guardian found nothing amiss in running a story about this and not quoting anyone who currently sells sex. If this criminalisation is so beneficial for us, it’s hard to imagine why the organisations campaigning for it are unable to find and quote even one sex worker in the world in support of it.

It is essential to listen to sex workers all over the world in order to draft laws to help keep us safe. This is both a simple and yet radical act. From Zimbabwe to Paris, Bangkok to Guatemala, sex workers are hoping that Amnesty will not be bullied out of voting for the truth of its own research when its members meet this week. We are hopeful that the quieter voices of sex workers remain audible next to those of Hollywood’s stars.