Guardian article on sex workers and disabled people

Flora, you will get people arguing that sex is actually exactly the same as providing a service like a manicure, or a haircut

Moncup: That kind of defines the problem, people with disabilities who use mainstream sites feel they need to identify that they have an impairment for many reasons. It should make no difference but I assure you that if it is not said upfront the chance is better than even that on meeting someone the other person is likely to say something like "Oh your a disabled person". Not great for self confidence.

You did remind me though that their are specialised dating sites for people with impairments I have no knowledge about them so I dunno who uses it, or how people negotiate meeting up. My main point is, if you have a hidden disability you can go most places when you want. Start chatting and maybe pull. Then back to someone's where at some point if a conditions sever enough, inhalers, tablets, injections. Panic attacks, tourets, the issue of the impairment will be broached and negotiated. Sometimes it wont matter some times it's the door.

For those with a very obvious disability, or learning disability, they cannot even start the process with out a huge logistical hoopla, which for some is just to much hassle or dispiriting when no contacts are made. These are the practicals

SGB:

I consider a pedicurist, tarot card reader, counsellor or any other service provider who turned someone away because of their ethnicity/sexuality etc. to be a disgusting bigot, regardless of whether they are allowed in law to do so.

I consider applying the same standards to the provision of sex - that a person should have sex with person A because she (or he) has had sex for money with person B, to be repugnant.

Because sex is different.

the alternative and correct and solution, of course, is obvious to people who do not rationalise and excuse sexual assaults

NT, as you say, referred to in that disgusting story was that one of the excuses the care staff gave for calling in sex workers was because they were fed up of being groped, mauled and otherwise sexually assaulted by the residents

you can see the thought processes "hey, let's get some women in to substitute for the staff as sex objects and blow up dolls, cooool"

it's akin to the idea that the presence of sex work establishments reduce sex crimes in the area

perhaps they do...but what sort of fucked up thinking is that ?

it simply kow tows to the idea that some people cannot control their sexual urges and really, they can in most cases

Prom: I know this is a very long thread and it would take a long time to trawl through it, but no where have I or Spero said that disabled people should be using sexworkers AT ALL. This is the result of the moral certantity that the only paid for provision of intimate hands on services must mean prostitution. Spero and I have argued that a "surrogacy" model would be the way to go. We were then advised that since this is still going to lead to the trafficking of women and children that we should have a situation that those disabled people unable to make use of sexworkers in the standard way, they would then be forced in to celibacy not as a result of choosing it, but as a result of the inability to get someone to facilitate it.

On the financial issue, 3 thoughts.

1. Those who are the most severly disabled will have both DLA, and some will have the new PIP. This is specificly awarded to impaired people to use as and when they like for what ever they like. However as the new benefit is harder to get it would leave more people unable to afford it.
2. If we were to as you say have a diffrent type of service which is more along the therapeutic model, that might be aforded either by state funding, or charity funding.
3. Since the system would need to be regulated and those surrogates who choose to do so will need specific training in handling, lifting, understanding advanced techniques in communication and emotional issues. It could be that these surrogates may be able to charge different less expensive rates, but since they are more regulated and better trained they would be more likely to have regular work. Plus it might be that those attracted to this type of work would not be motivated by money alone.

It seems Spain, Germany, and Italy may have far diffrent and possibly better attitudes to young people (i.e. not raping or abusing them.

Id rather not go into details on this thread but i have had about three close shaves with Italian males at the ages of ten , 16 and 17.

I remember there was an article (last year?) about where staff in a care home were calling prostitutes in to the residents. The care home were quick to point out that they carried out risk assessments on behalf of the residents they were calling women in for, as they were vulnerable. But at no point was the possibility that the women going in might be vulnerable even raised. As long as the residents were fine then that was the end of the story.

That kind of encompassed the problem for me.

SGB difficulty is that there are people (many? majority? I don't know) who do not have the luxury of picking and choosing their clients.

The article I linked upthread just the other day shows that quite starkly.

Yes, something like 'I should just mention I'm a wheelchair user'. They certainly didn't say explicitly they were looking for sex... people rarely do on dating profiles. (Well, not on Guardian Soulmates anyway.)

You just said that "the majority of disabled people they cannot act on their impulses as the able bodied do. No masterbation, no chchatting up a potential sex partner, no opportunity to use any of the online dating/shag sites."

That is incorrect and, frankly, narrow-minded and ignorant.

You also stated that countries such as spain, italy and germany have much lower rates of child sex abuse which is a random guess on your part as far as I can see given that there is no accurate way of measuring this heavily under-reported crime even in our country and any stats that re available will not be comparable due to different religious, societal norms and the approach of police etc. I have no idea how you can even begin to back this up in any meaningful way and yet you state it as fact and an argument for reducing the age of consent.

For those who want the age of consent reduced this will presumably feed through into laws about who can work as a prostitute.

Got to wonder about agenda here, given the juxtaposition of those 2 points. Pro-prostitution and pro-lower age of consent = not a great picture from where I'm sitting. If that's not something you (and others presenting this argument) are comfortable with then prob best to make that clear I think.

WhenTheRed: there are various circumstances other than sex work when a professional is seen as having the right to refuse a client (or vice versa) for reasons of preference or indeed prejudice. If the service being provided involves A visiting B in B's home (whether it's sex, a pedicure or a tarot reading) then A doesn't have to give an actual, provable, demonstrable reason for cancelling the service. Nor, for that matter, does B. Counsellors can refuse individual clients on vague grounds such as 'personality clash' or 'a different counsellor might be more suitable' even when what the refusing party really means is 'I don't want to deal with you because of your ethnicity/sexuality/religious belief/ugliness/you smell'.
The professionals who have got themselves in trouble under equality laws have been the ones stupid enough to make a big fuss about it and demonstrate what bigots they are. I see no reason why the same general set of exemptions-from-the-rule wouldn't apply to sex workers, on the same grounds - that a person is entitled to feel safe in his/her home or in the workplace (when the workplace is the client's home) and with certain types of personal service, client and professional need to feel comfortable with one another.

Mooncup: I presume the ads said that the person was disabled? Did they also say they were specificly looking for sex?

Would you like to explain Tabard why those who were interviewed for the articles said what they did, or perhaps would you like to explain when scope/capability/ and Disability Now have conducted research on the subject of relationships disabled people of all kinds report that they find it harder to both find a partner and to achieve a sexual relationship.

It is your level of ignorance about the lifes of other disabled people that is sweeping.

According to Wiki the age of consent in Malawi is 14, and in DRC is 14 for girls.

I do not think that this has resulted in a low amount of child sexual abuse. What with, you know, having seen the news and all.

I've just realised I said 'dating sites aimed at dating' sites. Der. Obviously I meant 'dating sites aimed at disabled people'.

Good lord just seen another poster now convinced with no data whatsoever that child abuse is much reduced in countries with a lower age of consent.

Am surprised.

"That for the majority of disabled people they cannot act on their impulses as the able bodied do. No masterbation, no chchatting up a potential sex partner, no opportunity to use any of the online dating/shag sites. "

Erm, What?

That is a tremendously sweeping statement, and incorrect I might add. Shows a very narrow view of disability.

Is there any evidence that there is less child abuse in Germany, Spain and italy?

Given that it is a very under-reported crime generally, and in the UK we don't know the true picture, I would be very interested in learning more about how that conclusion was arrived at.

the argument that lowering the age of consent will reduce the incidence of child abuse is a new one on me TBH, but always interested to hear new ideas if they can help with this stuff.

Leith, I've just googled and there are lots of dating sites specifically aimed at dating sites! And I've seen profiles from disabled people on mainstream dating sites too.

Prom: The point is, as always it has been. That for the majority of disabled people they cannot act on their impulses as the able bodied do. No masterbation, no chchatting up a potential sex partner, no opportunity to use any of the online dating/shag sites. They need to have reasonable adjustments to use the legal term. So if the moral certaintity of some posters on this thread were to be translated in to action, it would mean that despite the ability of able bodied people to use sexworkers, and that a as yet existing sex industry exists. It would be a careworker, social worker, member of the family, a volunteer, who would have to have that chat.

and Spero, if you are so upset to see someone talking about the AOC on a thread about the rights of disabled people to buy sex...take it up with the poster who introduced it

I will counter it where I see it, even if it is a departure from the main point

personally, I believe Raunch Culture and the normalisation of the sex industry contributes to young girls and boys having sex too early