How many of the men in your life have used prostitutes, compared with how many who haven't? I'd like to ask for help or perspectives on this?

[aliasforthis2]

I'm a semi-regular poster but obviously have name-changed for this.

I feel sad and like I've seen things I cannot un-see.

So if you can be reasonably sure that your husband or partner or ex or other male in your life has NOT used prostitutes post please post here.

Likewise if any males in your life HAVE used prostitutes please post here too.

And also if they gave reasons for either doing it or not doing it or given their views on the sex industry please post them.

Hopefully it will give me a more balanced perspective than my current "all men are johns who did these things" and help my recovery.

I worked as a prostitute for 4 years and stopped/exited nearly 18 months ago. The reason I started working as a prostitute was because it was sold to me as a glamourous and easy way to make money. At the time I had many debts and was working minimum wage and living totally hand-to-mouth with no room for manouvere,if an unexpected financial burden hit like a bank charge, we would be screwed having to choose between food and electric. A friend worked for an agency and I'd seen Belle du Jour and naively thought it would be like that.

Anyway, I am now out as I just couldn't handle it anymore. A very small percentage of the men were ok but the vast majority did things like -
-try to take the condoms off
-have poor hygiene and refuse to shower first worried it would take up their 'time'
-try to get service for less money or even steal back the money
-try to force services i did not offer like anal
-be unashamed about the fact they were partnered or had a wife at home
-speak to me disrespectfully and patronising, saying things like "I want to get the most for my money" etc
-scrutinize my body and give me advice on how to look better or compare me either positively or negatively to other ladies
-try to take up mush more time than paid for deliberately
-sometimes maybe once a month i was assaulted leaving bruises or spat on or held in a house
-a lot of phone or text harrassment
-most wanted young women the younger the better ie 18-20. i'm serious when i say that this is what most men wanted - young and naive. I answered the phone for the agency sometimes and i'd say three quarters of the men specifically requested 'young' ie 18-21 , 25 at a push.Which I think is disgusting given most are in their 40s wanting as close to 18 as they can.

Obviously not every man did ALL of the above but I'd be hard pressed to find a man who did not try at least one of those things. I don't know any other way to describe it.

I have been single for a while, I had a relationship with a genuinely lovely man I met at my new work for a while (no red flags) but it ended as he became a complete workaholic when starting a company and we drifted apart and split 6 months ago.

Anyway the point of this thread is for me to get a more balanced perspective on men. I had counselling on the NHS for 12 weeks which was helping but they wouldn't fund any more. I have been told by sympathetic friends who are also ex prostitutes (not told anyone in 'real life') to remind myself that it's only a v.small percentage of men who use prostitutes/escorts. But I just cannot see it like that. Every man I see walking down the street I view as a potential customer of prostitutes and treated a person how the customers treated me. I feel like punching them sometimes for no reason. Every married man I know I wonder if they have went to a prostitute with their wedding ring happily on moaning about their wife. I find myself wondering if I will ever have a relationship with trust again. I don't live in a particularly big place or a travelling business place but the sheer hoardes of men calling the agency every day and booking was unbelievable. And more than half would have unsuspecting wives or gfs.

I feel sad and like I've seen things I cannot un-see.

So if you can be reasonably sure that your husband or partner or ex or other male in your life has NOT used prostitutes post please post here.

Likewise if any males in your life HAVE used prostitutes please post here too.

And also if they gave reasons for either doing it or not doing it or given their views on the sex industry please post them.

Hopefully it will give me a more balanced perspective than my current "all men are johns who did these things" and help my recovery.

Thanks x

You may recall my mentioning that I'd look at certain people and think 'are you one?'

Although I benefit from regular debriefing sessions, memories and visual images linger and it wasn't until I adopted alternative techniques that I was able to segregate the abnormal and the abhorrent and prevent it tainting and upsetting my equilibrium and usual demeanour.

I now meditate at least once a day; 10 minutes goes a long way to clearing my mind. Sustained stress is physically and mentally draining and I take power naps to replenish my energy levels when I feel I'm flagging. I also use EFT as a 'centreing' and rebalancing exercise.

Of course, we can't erase the past or 'un-see' or 'un-hear' but, using these techniques, I am able to minimise the effect my experiences have on my sense of wellbeing and I hope you will consider using some of them to complement and advance your own healing process.

Understandably, you have a residue of anger that needs to be resolved before you can properly move forward but, while you are continuing to engage in the sex trade (albeit, thankfully, in physical safety), it is inevitable that you will continue reinforce your negative opinions of men.

This is Brad Yates on clearing anger: www.google.co.uk/url?sa=t&source=web&cd=1&sqi=2&ved=0CB4QtwIwAA&url=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.youtube.com%2Fwatch%3Fv%3DvBvVAxoxrFE&rct=j&q=brad%20yates%20anger%20youtube&ei=2AqJToP_DPGZ0QWdztjoDw&usg=AFQjCNHJb13eArjPIHSR-Dy_2BdBiccywg&cad=rja - all you need to do is watch the video and repeat his words and his actions. As I've told you, Brad Yates has made numerous EFT videos that are available on youtube and I hope you will try some of the others.

I sincerely hope that ohme can find the courage to source the help she needs to make those first tentative steps to exit prostitution, and I wish you and your dc well for the future.

I especially want to thank you for your honesty, alias. As I'm sure you know, your experience of prostitution is, sadly, not uncommon but you have given me valuable insight into the feelings and fears of a woman engaged in the trade which, in turn, I hope will be of benefit to others

the points about porn are very valid.
And many people don't realise, you don't even need to google 'hardcore porn' to see these images. Just googling 'porn' will do it, because what was once hardcore is now mainstream.

I would have said with total confidence that my DH of 12 years would never pay for sex , until a month ago when I was using his iPhone and a massage parlour address came up on the search history as I typed into google. I went hot and cold all over but didn't say anything. I've been thinking about it a lot since.

I googled the name of the parlour and stumbled upon punternet and read some of the reviews and discussions by men there. It's clear that men who use whores see them as little more than objects. It's pretty repellent but if you're renting out your body you are also objectifying and commodifying it - you cannot expect men to act by a different set of values than you yourself do. When you are selling something as powerful and as hungered for as sex in a pretty much unregulated moral environment you are going to see some very nasty behaviour. You see this in relation to the buying and selling of narcotics too. It brings out the very worst in people

As for my situation - I don't know what I'll do. Maybe I'll confront DH maybe not. I don't know if he's done more than just think about buying sex.

I think it's unrealistic to expect that men buying sex as a commodity will treat the seller with any more respect than someone selling anything else. Whatever you are selling people ask for more, ask for a discount, etc., sex is not going to be any different.

Users of prostitutes as I understand it are not allowed to develop any emotional bond with them, not allowed to kiss, so it's no surprise really that there is no humanity in the transaction.

alias just to say thanks, you responded to all my posts, amazing and kind of you to take the time. I think both of us have to take 'the long view', I often find myself thinking, oh in two or five years life will be different and better. Imagine where you will be Also, re. our shared low regard for men, I think it would be useful to think, all it takes is one man to show us something different...I mean, if nothing else then statistically at least (!) there is bound to be one man out there who would love/respect us and all women. As long as he's out there, raising sons...

Wow, what an amazing thread. Much respect for the courage of the OP and others who have weighed in with similar stories.

I think the problem with trying to assess how many men have gone or would go to prostitutes, is that it varies massively by cultural subgroup, country, age etc. My dad was a sales exec who went on business trips to Asia and it was pretty obvious from talking to him and his friends that this kind of thing was involved. In some countries in Asia and Africa, it seems like it's pretty much just was men take for granted as weekend entertainment. There may be certain demographics like that among young men in the west, I'm not sure.

Certainly in the circles I move in, which is kind of middle class arty / media, it would be very rare for anyone to suggest that going to prostitutes is OK or to try and deny the huge amount of coercion, exploitation and unhappiness engendered by the profession. Of course that doesn't mean that no individual man I know has done it, but I'd be surprised if many had.

Marriage has been described by some feminists as a form of prostitution. While that's an extreme stance, it's certainly true that in reality sex often involves one partner doing it not because they happen to want sex at that moment but as part of a larger picture from which they get something else - whether money, emotional manipulation or just wanting their partner to be happy. For that reason I have difficulty with the idea of absolute opposition to prostitution as a concept. However it's hard to imagine how anyone could ever go to someone selling sex commercially without feeling, in the back of their mind, that the kind of misery described in this thread (or worse) is somewhere behind it and that they are perpetuating that misery. I know I couldn't.

I know a couple of men who have

I have been thinking about this thread since I read it - I know a couple of men who have used prostitutes, both have been very open about it, so I don't think it's true that men always conceal that side of them. Other than that, I know completely that my DP would never, his friends wouldn't either - and my friends, mainly from uni, I went to brighton - all hippies and very right on feminists even the men! They would be appalled. I think the point above is important - you don't need all men to treat women well in order to find happiness - you need one man, the man you are with.

There are many bad men and many good men - your personal journey is to learn boundaries so you feel safe when embarking on a relationship that you can recognise when a man is not trustworthy and can confidently walk away at once.

I had trust issues with men - not relating to prostitutes, but to cheating/ dishonesty/ unreliablity. I thought all men were unreliable and were likely to cheat. This completely poisoned my life - I had a year of therapy and I overcame it, partly by learning that my own boundaries would protect me. ie. I accepted that some men are unreliable, but I will not put up with that. To believe that, I had to also believe that some men are good and reliable, and that I will find one.

I did find a good, pure of heart man and after the first few agonising painful months of not being able to trust him, I learnt to fall backwards, the scariest feeling - to really trust. But I learnt that trust is earnt.

You should not simply assume all men can be trusted - you should assume there are good men out there and you will learn to recognise them and protect yourself from the other type.

I really believe if your heart is in this journey, you will get support from the universe ....sorry, really hippy thing to say...but good luck..x

Violence, abuse and putting the sellers health at risk by trying to remove a condom is disgusting and criminal behaviour.

But the other things you mention OP - men complaining about their wives, asking for services they haven't paid for, commenting on the quality of the goods/service - in the context of the transaction that's taking place, well I can't see this sort of behaviour as particularly morally reprehensible.

It's like comparing people's behaviour at a private dinner with that at a restaurant buffet - at the latter it wouldn't be unreasonable to behave in a piggy way, taking too much food and complaining to the staff if you felt the quality wasn't great. Do that at a private dinner party and you'd never be asked back.

ohmetoo - meant to add, I was very promiscuous as a young woman and over the space of about 5 years ended up having some pretty horrible sexual experiences which left me feeling worthless for a while and with a poor self image. But I'm more than just my sexuality, as you are, and in time the other aspects of my life became the bedrock of my self image. I don't hold any sort of grudge against the men who treated me casually and with disdain. We're all capable of stupid, selfish and unkind behaviour but these things don't form the sum total of who we are.

why am I seeing some posters on this thread excusing the fact that some men feel justified in treating women as less than human just because she is a prostitute ??

what is wrong with you people ?

confidence wrote: sex often involves one partner doing it not because they happen to want sex at that moment but as part of a larger picture from which they get something else - whether money, emotional manipulation or just wanting their partner to be happy. For that reason I have difficulty with the idea of absolute opposition to prostitution as a concept.

That goes some way to explaining why I'd rather see legislation in favour of safe & well-paid prostitution than wholesale legislation against it. It's impossible to remove all elements of bargaining from sex - it's a relational transaction - so, to me, it seems wiser to set clear and strong boundaries that protect both/all parties. Making sure the seller's bargaining position is secure, so to speak: exploitation means a transaction in which one party has insufficient power.

The fact that much exploitation (ie, transactions where one party is robbed of their bargaining position) is enacted against women is the reason for feminism.

I should have said that, when I talk about sex trades, I include porn and stripping. I'd like to see boundaries re-introduced and re-applied. While I campaign for continued freedom of expression on the internet, I support ISP-level porn filtering and would be fine about legal enforcement for it. There shouldn't actually be any hard porn imo - it's a Victorian invention and, as Alias said, humans are quite sufficiently turned on by writings and images of non-abusive sex. But that's a hard battle to win under present circumstances.

Shagmund - It's like comparing people's behaviour at a private dinner with that at a restaurant buffet - do you honestly not see what you're doing there, comparing abuse of another human being's body with a lukewarm shepherd's pie?

or a soggy bit of quiche ?

disgusting attitude

I found out that my dh had been seeing sex workers for a decade. Started with the calling cards in phone booths and then using the internet. No-one would ever have guessed - family man; high achiever; morally sound upbringing; attentive wife - decent sex life. He also had an affair with a close colleague. So the words of a poster above rang very true for me - a wife for the home and family life; a mistress for extra marital fun and prostitutes to scratch an itch.

As you can imagine, I have killed myself trying to understand why this happened - why he came to the point where he thought it was OK.

All I have arrived at is: massive overiding ego and sense of utter entitlement, coupled with insecurities and a pathetic feeling of not being number one whilst I was pregnant and absorbed with small children. A belief that he wasn't really hurting anyone as long as no-one knew. Just the easiness and anonymity of finding someone and making the arrangements - when you go on these escort sites I can imagine that for someone like him, it all seems somehow normalised - naughty but fun and anyway -everyone is doing it. A mile away from the reality that you are actually buying another human being - paying her to use her body and disguise her disgust.

I feel sad and ashamed on his behalf and appalled that he has used people this way - leading to the damage to people like the OP and other brave posters have described above.

And Shagmund -I would give the world to be able to go back in time and maybe have the chance to nip this in the bud rather than waiting and waiting for evidence.

Quite agree AF. Even if one sees prostitution in purley commercial terms, what the Op and metoo have experienced is illegal and vile and well beyond what would be deemed acceptable in any normal 'transaction'. They have been hit, raped, spat at, rupped off etc.... THis is all illegal, apart from immoral.

A woman who is selling her body for sex isn't expecting to be treated like a girlfriend. The man is paying to pleasure himself on and in her body. Criminal and dangerous behaviour is unacceptable in any context but sexually selfish and inconsiderate behaviour? Doesn't it go with the territory? It's not a mutual exchange of love and pleasure. It's one person paying to use another person. If you are selling sex you are stepping outside of the conventions which dictate the mores of normal sexual exchange.

shag, does it excuse some vile disrespect of another human ?

really ?

did you mean to sound like you are saying that prostitutes deserve such inhuman attitudes towards tthem

such not some

MissL I am really sorry your husband turned out to be such a man

That must have been absolutely devastating to you

Meant to post and run, but...prostitutes are people - not things to be used.

Whether or not money has been exchanged is irrelevant. If someone said - if you give me a tenner, you can punch me in the face; you still wouldn't do it, would you? Because you would know it was wrong.

It has been devastating and I can't begin to describe the pain.

What constitutes 'vile disrespect'? The act of paying for sex?

shag ...haven't you read all the thread ?