Can you be a good person if you pay for sex? [Content warning: descriptions of sexual abuse]

[Lave]

Do you think there's a grey area or are all men who pay for sex abusive?

@tomorrowalready Am going to respond anon via direct message as I don't want to derail the OP's thread

[quote CoraPearl]@tomorrowalready Am going to respond anon via direct message as I don't want to derail the OP's thread[/quote]
No need on my account Coral, your input is very welcome here

Hard to say if anyone is all bad but men doing this a part of a bad system, i.e a form of extreme exploitative capitalism which pushes that this exploitation is essential, which is how these rapists soothe their guilt. Read Alexandra Kollontai's On Prostitution, it clarifies a lot.

Agree with previous posters that the world isn't divided into good people and bad people.

But I think paying a woman for sex is bad, and causes harm to the woman and society.

Yes of course you can be a good person if you pay for sex.

Not in my eyes. Decent men know it's not right.

@Thisisworsethananticpated

What about women paying for sex ? Are they as awful

Mate come on. This is so few people it's barely worth mentioning!!!!!

@0DETTE

And I don’t think that any of the men actually believe that the women are into it. Because otherwise why would they pay?

They complain bitterly if the woman isn’t good enough at pretending she enjoys it or if she looks ill or injured. They know it’s abuse, they are paying her to pretend it’s not.

It’s just the story that they tell themselves / their mates so that they can go on justifying it.

It’s the same as men who sexually abuse children. They say it’s not abuse, it’s loving and consensual. It’s just Pearl clutchers and bigots who don’t understand .

And that it’s better that a lovely man who loves and cares about the child does this than a nasty rough teenaged boy. And that what they and the child have is special and different and the usual rules don’t apply to them.

Johns say all the same things but they know it’s a pack of lies.

I think you are assuming a higher level of self-knowledge in the majority of johns than they actually possess. I think the majority of men who pay for sex sincerely believe that sex with other punters might be a chore, but they are the exception and the woman enjoys sex with them. Male egos astonish me.

Not RTFT

No.

Seeing a female body as a commodity that you can pay to access sexually is not the action of a man who really sees women as whole people.

The impact on societal attitudes of that transaction being aok and even positive is damaging.

And trusts before you even get to the massive amount of harm caused here and everywhere. In order to keep the shelves stocked, as it were. The fact that accepting it as normal for plenty of men to do this, also has an impact on the way various crimes related to it, are considered.

Ive seen estimations of up to 20% of users being women in some areas. I dont think the same systematic and cultural imbalances are there in that form but its still exploitation

Will read thread now. These usually have the same variety of views. Let's see how this one has gone.

@BlatantlyNameChanged

I would say they are rapists as consent can't be bought.

Same. Lack of choice is not the same as active choice and certainly isn't the same as freely given consent. It's sick and seedy, no one has a right to fuck another person simply because they've handed over a bundle of tenners.

If you want to see what sort of men use prostitutes then take a look at www.punternet.com/index.php/reviews It's vile.

Oh god why did I click this link.

Horrific.

@Lave

Not one of my clients ever bothered their arse to ascertain whether I was doing it of my own accord, even when I'd turn up to bookings with bruises nobody said a thing.

I become so poorly with stress and PTSD after a year of doing it I was visibly emaciated and none of them sought to find out if I was ok.

Two of the fuckers knew with absolute certainty that somebody was behind the scenes pulling my strings because I told them as much. It didn't stop them wanting to book me.

This sounds so so hard. I hope you're taking care of yourself. Sending hugs x

Certainly when I think of some of my clients I'd say they were good people.

The young guy with autism who was so bloody respectful. Brought me chocolates and perfume and checked all throughout that I was comfortable with what he was doing etc. He just didn't feel capable of "pulling" a woman naturally.

Or the guy whose wife had MS and had made it clear she was never going t I have sex with him again and if he wanted it then he should pay, then go home to her and their kids. I couldn't fault those guys.

However... their actions are feeding in to a wider problem so I'm that point. I don't know.

I have reviews of my service on punternet that would make you sick

Yes.

@heathermaleather

I have reviews of my service on punternet that would make you sick

I'm so sorry, I can imagine how hard it must have been to read them

I don't think I was ever 'reviewed' on there but I don't think I can bring myself to check now. It would trigger me for sure. The men who write those reviews are vile.

I had field reports on adultwork though and they made for ridiculous reading, like badly written erotic novels. Just thinking about it is enough to make me cringe.

I think this comment is worth highlighting.

'Not all sex workers are feeble women who can't say no to pimps.'

This is on a thread where the OP was being violently controlled from age 18.

Additionally having a man or men setting a woman to work as a prostitute includes

Sex trafficking
The woman being effectively imprisoned
The grooming / pimping of the very vulnerable. Those who have left care, are seriously addicted to various substances.
That sort of thing.

Why don't they just say no? I mean if you're to weak to do that then I suppose you get what's coming to you. That's the implication.

Of course age is no barrier to all that, especially with the fact that loads of men like young. Grooming of girls, girls being targeted who have terrible home lives, those with low self esteem being manipulated by 'boyfriends' etc etc.

I suppose if you want to argue that being paid for sex is fine. All those being grossly exploited are inconvenient. How to get around that? They're weak! Could just say no. So they can be ignored.

I've read a fair few threads on this topic on here and the comments can get pretty grim, but that is even by usual standards, really awful.

More posts than usual saying 'women do it too!'.

And expect people to buy that yep loads of women are paying for sex.

@Lave I always found the adultwork reviews to be ridiculously complimentary. Bit he punternet ones pull no punches. Suppose because they're anonymous

*Could you imagine having casual sex with somebody then going online afterwards and writing an in-depth review of their anatomy and rating their performance for the world to see, for the purpose of influencing others to go and pay them for sex too? It's grim.

I don't know one woman that would behave that way about a ONS, FWB or whatever.*

This.

It's so dehumanising.

I used to think that the fact it was “the world’s oldest profession” meant that it probably had an important status we needed to acknowledge as always going to be there, even if it was uncomfortable to some. Now that seems unbelievably naive - the world’s second oldest profession is probably “slave-owner”/“slave”, and we’re not falling over ourselves to justify it as part of society’s natural order.

Civilisations (hopefully) move on and make progress, and things that were seen as the norm become unacceptable thanks to public discourse, campaigning, legal changes, and social pressures. Paying to rape women will, again hopefully, one day be unacceptable too.

I've read a few attitudes of men who pay for sex pieces/ studies etc. And of course puntern*t is eye opening.

The theme was the majority of men had no empathy for the woman. One I remember in a study said he didn't want them to enjoy it because if she does then he's not getting what he paid for. The point for him was she didn't want it or enjoy it. In general i think a fair few men in general life enjoy unsettling, scaring, upsetting, exerting dominance over, harming women and girls. I mean that's what so many 'trivial' but very common sex offences are about. And most women know from experience that a large minority of men have that attitude.

Naturally the idea of paying a woman for sex would appeal to a fair number of men like that.

No, I don't think you can be. I would divorce a partner who did that, or bin a friendship. It's almost certainly a form of rape really, isn't it? V few women would enjoy it - I would guess most are desperate, have been coerced, or (worst case scenario) trafficked.

I thought that too. Feeble women. Shocking.

Anyone I've met who uses sex workers considers them lesser beings.

Those punternet reviews expect the women to be grateful yuck

Nobody decent treats others this way