When I was a sex worker in Istanbul, a client lured me to a park. He punched me in the face, broke my nose, and threw me into a cold lake. It was the middle of the night in March. I walked three and a half miles home—soaking wet, bloodied, and freezing to death.

I told the police what had happened. They laughed at me. My friends laughed too—at my naïve belief that the police would even lift a finger to find the man who did it.

But I knew his name. I knew where he lived. I gave them everything. The police did nothing.

That man went on to kill three sex workers across the country. The police were accessories to murder. All preventable deaths.

This is one of many violent experiences I’ve had with men.

Let me make this abundantly clear: the police do not care about sex workers. Serial killers target us because they know no one will come looking. And too often, they’re right. That’s why, for millennia, killers have gotten away with it.

We are the practice ground for men’s violence. Disposable. Forgettable. Killed, then blamed for our own deaths.

The truth is simple: they know that they are likely to be able to get away with killing a sex worker.

Until the world starts treating violence against sex workers as real violence, the bodies will keep piling up.

Not because we are easy to kill—but because no one cares enough to stop it.