Sex work

[Sunat45degrees]

I have a very "liberal" BIL. The kind who prides himself on his liberal credentials, "life and let live" etc.

I won't lie, he's also the classic white middle aged man who thinks he has all the answers and is completely oblivious to his own privilege. So the type who thinks if something is theoretically true, then of course it is ACTUALLY true eg the gender pay gap isn't really a thing because women make choices to work in less well paid jobs and it just is that way, and obviously, because women would get paid equally for equal work, how could any of us have any issues? or "of course women can get promoted at the same level as men, if they're doing the work". Basically, I feel like he's not moved into any deeper understanding than I had when I was 18.

He's definitely the type who takes the liberal approach based on what I think of the "Hollywood" version - so in a movie, the transwoman 100% passes, would 100% be completely safe for other women, has 100% gone through a huge issue to get where she is so of course, we should consider her a woman. Or the woman who's struggling at work with the wanker boss always finds a way to overcome..... blah blahh blah.

Anyway, his latest, is about how selling your body is, of course, completely fine as long as there's no exploitation.

I have not particularly done a lot of reading or research on prostitution. What I've picked up is a general understanding that we can tell ourselves its "empowering" for women all we like but the reality is that for every women who sells her body and genuinely is in control there are hundreds or thousands who don't. So again, the hollywood version - feisty, independent sex worker making decisions about HER body that work for her is what he thinks it is MOST of the time.

I'm actively looking for resources as I clearly need to educate myself on this issue. But am here to shamelessly ask if anyone who is more knowledgeable can direct me - I just instinctively don't believe that most women are prostitutes by choice. I think even if it SEEMS like a choice, it quite often starts as something else?

I haven't heard of this research. I suspect that it doesn't exist. It sounds like the sort of 'research' that Melissa Farley would do but I don't think it's hers.

The women who work in the windows in Amsterdam are not drug addicts. Drug addicts often suffer from PTSD, whether they are male or female, prostitutes or not.

There are people who have researched drug addicted street based prostitutes. Ann Marie O'Connor for example interviewed a number of women in Dublin in the 1990s. She outlined their problems but made it quite clear that they were not representative of prostitutes in Ireland.

That didn't stop Ruhama from claiming that 38% of prostitutes in Ireland have attempted suicide. Often the prohibitionists will use research into drug addicts and pretend that it applies to all prostitutes.

Obviously they use their bodies for sex. People use their bodies in their work. That doesn't mean they sell their bodies or sell themselves.

Most sex workers go into it for the same reasons that most people go into their chosen way of making money. People weigh up how much money they will earn, how long they will have to work to get that money and how much they dislike what they have to do.

Most sex workers are not drug addicts. They are not coerced. In countries like China tens of thousands of women know that they can earn large amounts of money by travelling to countries like Britain. They can invest that money in their future by paying for college or starting a business.

There is a type of woman in Britain and other countries who grew up in deprivation. They follow the example of their peers by taking crack cocaine and heroin. They resort to street prostitution and shoplifting to fund their habit. They are vulnerable to rape and murder.

They are a small minority of sex workers. There are ways to help them. That doesn't include ASBOs or other repressive measures. They need rehab and help with housing among other things.

Sex workers in the walk ups of Soho and in brothels rarely offer anal sex. Oral sex is with a condom, although some will offer OWO for more money. I suspect it is different for escorts.

China has some very poor people and no welfare net. Women go into prostitution to make money to feed themselves. That's not a choice.

You seem to live in la la land and keep talking about Soho. Prostitution exists everywhere, not just one part of London and your views on condoms/anal are laughable.

I've seen you on threads before on sex work chanting the happy hooker myth. I can only assume you're a John.

Men who wholeheartedly support sex work are men who simply are on with exploitation. Kind of like being supportive of the war industry but only when it kills bad guys.

Correlation isn’t causation. Nordic countries have a decline in condom use across the board.

Why don’t you just admit you like having sex with women who wouldn’t have sex with you if you weren’t paying? It’s liberating. Just own in instead of constantly trying to convince feminists that sex work is great, and not harmful. We ALL know it is.

Something random I heard in a debate today… connected to that Netflix series “adolescence”. I think we all know what InCels are (involuntary celibates). In Germany InCels are, in policy, considered to be one of largest terrorist risks - lone, disenfranchised men. The government pays sec workers to sleep with men at risk of being in inCel. I’m not articulating this well but… sec workers have a function and role in society - always will/ always have. Surely (surely?) the best thing to do is protect them, recognize their work is work, to stop it from being in the shadows and respect their work.

States have always institutionalised misogyny and exploitation of women. Does that mean we should recognise it as okay?

No, the answer is that the German state should address the root causes of male misogyny, not play into it by affirming to those men that they are entitled to use women as if they are just sex objects, support animals and service providers for men’s orgasms.

It’s collusion with misogyny to reinforce the nastiness of incel “logic” by giving these men what they want. Disgusting, actually. If another group was identified as potential terrorists would this ever happen? Can you imagine a state providing religious terrorists with people from another religion to abuse just to stop them setting off bombs?

If Islamic terrorists want to bomb non-Muslims should the German state provide free Christians or Jews for them to set fireworks off on as a service? A few Muslims for Hindu nationalist terrorists to rough up just to keep down violent urges? No, the very thought would be utterly abhorrent. Only when it’s men claiming they can’t control their urges and hate women is the answer to this to let them indulge in some state-paid-for rape.

I sometimes wonder whether the posters trotting out the age-old “safety valve” argument — the old “prostitutes provide a useful service to society by letting violent men rape and abuse some women with impunity” line — really have any idea what they sound like. An idea so patriarchal that it’s been around for millennia, but somehow you think we’re going to think that if you pretend it’s faux employment rights we’ll find it fresh and appealing?

Sounds like absolute bullshit to me. If you respect the work so much and want to help, why don't you have sex with incels? Help calm them down.

You set our good points! I’m conflicted as for those that are sex workers, what should society and we do for them? To eradicate sex work - if that is the proposal, ultimately - will take, should it be possible, a very long time - and maybe it’s not even possible. So I guess my question to you is what do we do and how do treat people who are sex workers now and in the future?

Just ignore him - he is not worth wasting breath on.

I am a late 40s woman… in my 20s I lived in hackney east London and many pals did stripper / escort / sex work. Men (gay) and straight/ bi women. This doesn’t seem the forum to discuss sex workers rights but I am not a man okay… I just am interested in how we square the reality that sex work exists and the sex workers working lives themselves vs the issues with sex work incl abuse of sex work itself.

Assaults and sex offending increase around strip clubs. You’d think men being able to indulge their desires would reduce their offending but it doesn’t. It increases their feeling that women are commodities and have no right to consent, boundaries and free choice. I’d lay serious money that incels using prostituted women (with government approval) become more dangerous, not less. Doubt anyone has bothered to look into the data though. Just throw marginalised women at the dangerous men and keep your fingers crossed. Ignoring that prostituted women are most at risk from dangerous men in the first place.

What incels actually need is emotionally honest and well-socialised friends. In RL, not online. But men are told to rely on their female partner for emotional support, not their friends. Which is why single women are happier than single men. Men want a partner who is their; mother, friend, therapist, sexual partner, cleaner, confessor and nanny. When they don’t get a partner, they are missing all those roles. Women aren’t when they are single. A prostituted woman doesn’t fill all those roles and therefore incels stay dangerous.

Encouraging men to be friends and parents and emotionally available to each other in RL would solve most of these issues.

Don't argue with idiots. They will simply drag you down to their level and beat you with experience.

You are burning far too many mental calories on this buffoon of a man. It also seems clear, from the insight you've given us of him, that even if you presented him with facts or logic that made him question his views he is never going to admit that to you.

If you are going to invest energy in debating an issue, or furthering a cause, focus on people who may be open to persuasion. This man isn't one of those.

There is no starvation in China now. There are jobs in factories but not everyone wants to work in a factory. A minority of factory workers try sex work instead. You can't say they have been forced into it by circumstances, because only a few women in those circumstances will want to try it. Some may stop because they don't like it, some will continue until they have earned enough to start a business or buy a car or whatever, a few will want to keep going. That's their choice, one that you want to take away from them.

I know about different types of prostitution in different countries. Soho is different from many places because women don't work alone. That makes a big difference. You say my views on condoms/anal are laughable. You don't believe me when I say that anal sex is rare and most oral sex is usually with a condom. Well, you don't have to believe what I say, you can read what Rachel Moran has written in her book Paid For. She used to be a prostitute and many people recommend her book. They say it shows the reality of prostitution. Catharine A MacKinnon, the feminist author, said it is 'the best work by anyone on prostitution ever'.

page 173
"I avoided vaginal intercourse for the first two years of my prostitution life and anal intercourse for all of it. That was very unusual. I met many women who would never perform anal sex; that was not at all unusual. One particular young woman I met in my first months on the streets would not perform oral sex, ever. She just could not stand to do it and she could not understand how I was of the opposite mindset. I clearly remember her wrinkling her nose up in disgust and shuddering when I told her that all my jobs were either hand-relief or oral."

page 48
"I don't know what's happening on the streets now, but in 1991, almost all the girls used condoms for fellatio. The reality was that selling oral sex was a disgusting practice, condoms or not, but I continued to do both [oral sex and hand-relief] on a near-daily basis. That situation continued for two years: it was that long before I had sexual intercourse for money."

So why don't you want to believe what former prostitutes are saying? Why do you think that you know better? It seems to be you who is living in a fantasy world, not me. You think you know what type of person I am. I know what type of person you are. You can only believe one extreme position or its opposite. Either the 'happy hooker' idea or the idea that women are kidnapped from the streets of Shanghai, bundled into a car, taken to a room with bars on the window and raped twenty times a day. The reality is neither of these two extremes. Sex workers have more control over what they do than you want to believe. If they don't want to do anal sex they don't do it. If they don't want to do oral sex without a condom, or at all, they don't do it.

Women who campaign for the Nordic model like Rachel Moran are saintly figures whose only motivation is compassion for the downtrodden whereas people who oppose them must be traffickers, pimps or johns. That is what people like you believe.

"Assaults and sex offending increase around strip clubs. You’d think men being able to indulge their desires would reduce their offending but it doesn’t."

Are you referring to the now debunked theory that rape and indecent assault increased in Camden in London after the opening of lap dancing clubs? This web page is interesting on this subject. It deals with different myths about the lap dancing industry. Myth 6 is "Lap dancing clubs create no go areas for women and increase sex crimes".

House of Commons - Culture, Media and Sport Committee - Minutes of Evidence

I know about different types of prostitution in different countries.

Ah - a prostitution hobbyist!

Are you seriously arguing that one woman’s subjective account from 1991 reflects the reality of prostitution in 2025?

And that women in sex work in China have choice and autonomy about their work and are prostitutes because they just want to buy a car?

The more stuff you post, the worse your arguments get. You also seem to be arguing both for and against Rachel Moran in the same post.

Just think what good things for the world you could be doing instead with the time you take to read up avidly on prostitution anecdotes.

I don't know what's happening on the streets now, but in 1991

Quite. Her experiences are really, really old.

Just like many young women have very different experiences of sex than my generation, with unwanted strangulation, slapping and spitting, as well as anal sex being common, so have experiences of the sex than men now expect from prostitutes.

Mainstream violent pornography has changed men's expectations of sex and accounts from modern day prostitutes that I have heard say how men come and tell them the violent scenes they want them to act out from the pornography they have seen.

This is absolutely disgusting.

Incels are disturbed young men, disproportionately likely to be autstic, and need proper support in how to relate to other humans and to women as humans.

That you think women's bodies should literally be offered up like this is grotesque. You are feeding the incel narrative that women exist for men's gratification, not countering it.

@pleasedonotfeedme

Great Post!

I don’t support this. I am sharing this. My comment is what better support can society give to sex workers as it doesn’t seem sex work is disappearing.

No.

The heart of the matter, that cannot be resolved, is that men who want to stick their cocks in women who don't want to do it, and only do because of money, are bad people. They just are. No amount of fuckwittery changes that.

There are many undesirable behaviours that are not disappearing, child sex abuse, rape, murder, theft, assault, slavery. We don't seek ways to try to make these ' better' because they are not going away ( people did that with slavery for millenia, from the Hebrew bible saying that slaves deserve a day of rest too, to Pariiament voting on better conditions on slave ships in the 18th century, but ultimately, we realised some things are just plain wrong and cannot be made better, and made it illegal. We still have modern slavery of course, but I think we would all agree that its better to outlaw slavery than accept it as a fact of life and try to make it as good as possible for the slaves).

Its for society to decide what it finds acceptable and to outlaw what it deems is not. We don't expect laws to eliminate many things we make illegal. But we make the laws anyway as a statement of the type of society we want to be.

My view is that I do not want a society in which men are taught that they can purchase intimate access to a woman's body. I don't believe in this uber right wing free market idea, that pro-'sex work' people promote, that if there is a buyer and a seller then anything goes. I believe some things should not be sold and intimate access to women's bodies is one of those things. I think that this teaches men the wrong attitude to women, and the wrong attitude to sex and the wrong attitude to consent. I don't believe men can ever view women as equals when they can buy access to women's bodies.

And then of course, there are all the other harms that so often go along with it, that often women's poverty is exploited, its inherently dangerous in many ways, often inherently harmful, often part of crime and criminality, such as trafficking, exploitation and violence.

So no, I don't think we should shrug and accept prostitution just because its going to happen anyway, just as we don't shrug and accept many other things just because they will always exist.

The starting point for me is how do we want society to view and treat women. I want a society where women and men are truly seen as equal and fully human in worth and dignity. I do not believe that prostitution is compatible with that.

You are entirely correct about this.
There are so many opinions on this thread from people who do not know any prostitutes or any thing about them, who blindly follow what seems to be popular feminist opinion. I know 100s of prostitutes, all who choose to do it as it pays better that most jobs.
I wouldn't want to clean someones house or serve someones dinner for free either, the money makes it acceptable.
For any one who's interested, have a look at the 1000s of profiles on adult work, listing the services of women. Very few do everything, and would not be expected to.

As usual, this debate is focussing on women, not on men. Do we really want to live in, and bring our children up in a society which tells men that buying consent is OK? It’s as simple as that, really.

THIS