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Men who buy sex, who they buy and what they know

208 replies

allthequeensmen · 18/02/2012 17:36

Threads relating to strip clubs and the sex industry always seem to attract a lot of attention on here so I thought some of you might be interested in this study:

www.eaves4women.co.uk/Documents/Recent_Reports/Men%20Who%20Buy%20Sex.pdf

OP posts:
SigmundaFraudina · 20/02/2012 21:51

I posted a link on the Amsterdam think which suggested that in Sweden at least, the sex laws have simply pushed prostitution underground and the sex workers are complaining that it's made them more vulnerable than ever. I can find the link if you want.

mathanxiety · 20/02/2012 21:51

Legalisation has done absolutely nothing to protect prostitutes from pimps and violent clients in the Netherlands and it won't do it elsewhere. One thing that is clear from the OP's link is that many of the clients see women who are prostitutes as 'less than', 'other' and in many ways utterly degraded and useful only as receptacles for wanking into. In other words, they are sociopaths who lack empathy. Legalisation to allow people like this to continue to hold their attitudes because it will involve approval of misogyny. It will not only not help women who are prostitutes, but it will help objectify all women just as prostitutes are objectified now.

The only way to stop women from being victimised by the male appetite they serve is to criminalise the customers and the transaction. This is clear from the OP's link.

SigmundaFraudina · 20/02/2012 21:51

*thread, not think

mathanxiety · 20/02/2012 21:52
  • 'legalisation will allow' not 'legalisation to allow'
SigmundaFraudina · 20/02/2012 21:56

No, I'm sorry, I don't agree. I think that 'this is all the mens fault' is far too simplistic. Which is essentially what you're saying.

mathanxiety · 20/02/2012 22:03

It is all the men's fault. How is this not all about men and what they want?

SigmundaFraudina · 20/02/2012 22:10

What about the sex workers who are happy to be sex workers? If someone offers a service, someone is going to take it. You forget that these sex workers are offering sex for money, how can anyone be surprised when someone decides to pay.

I'm not saying that it's right, and I'm not saying that trafficking is right, but you seem to believe that the men who have sex with sex workers have the same detailed knowledge of the sex industry's dark side that you do.

SigmundaFraudina · 20/02/2012 22:11

And maybe some do, but certainly not all.

BasilRathbone · 20/02/2012 22:35

You seem to imagine that men are moronic little victims of marketing SF.

Someone offers them a service so they have to buy it?

Really?

I've had about 8 phone calls in the last 2 days from people offering me home insurance.

I've managed to resist buying the service from them.

It must be the double X chromosome I suppose.

Lucky I'm not a man, I'd be well over-insured by now.

They just can't say no, poor darlings.

It's amazing they've managed to run the world for so long.

Biscuit
mathanxiety · 20/02/2012 22:52

How is prostitution not all about what men want?

Answer: 'Women are happy to provide sex for money because it is a way of making money' - ??

If you read the link you will see the incredible cognitive dissonance involved in buying sex. Men are very aware on one level of what they are doing and the impact on women. They absolutely do have the same knowledge of the dark side of prostitution that the rest of society does. The difference is that on the important level of whether to do it or not, that knowledge doesn't translate into caring.

mathanxiety · 20/02/2012 22:53

(And there is no side of prostitution that is not dark)

Charbon · 20/02/2012 23:08

The 'legalisation' argument has been proven as flawed, partly via the Amsterdam experiment and what happened in New Zealand, as a poster downthread vividly explained. What happened in Amsterdam was a failure of prescience and post-legalisation monitoring and controls. It wasn't foreseen that legalisation would herald the arrival of sex workers fleeing their own abusive regimes or war-torn countries, that illegal immigrants would by necessity dodge the tax payments the Dutch government cynically thought they'd rake in, that those same vulnerable migrant workers would fly under the radar of health promotion schemes and lastly, that the window brothels were always a cover for organised crime that actually flourished post legalisation. The NZ poster alludes to the same experience there.

Equally the 'it will be pushed underground' argument seems to have no evidential support. It hasn't happened in Iceland as far as the evidence tells us and I've personally never seen anything to suggest that in 13 years, there is a massive underbelly of underground activity in Sweden. I'm also never sure what people mean by the term 'underground'. There's no evidence of increased street prostitution in Sweden, because the visible punters have disappeared for fear of apprehension. It's possible there has been an increase in prostitutes working alone, but again I've seen no evidence of that.

What has changed in Sweden are public attitudes towards paying for sex. A national survey showed an astonishing shift in culture since the pre-1999 days, with the conclusion that paying for sex was now seen as a societal wrong.

The analogies are all there in the UK. Our societal attitudes to all sorts of things have changed following legislation. Drink/Drive laws, Rape in Marriage, public smoking, wearing seatbelts, car-seats for children, owning dogs bred for fighting. There was a public outcry against all of these measures from some quarters, never more so than the drink/drive laws in 1967 when Barbara Castle was subjected to a vicious and misogynist campaign.

But they all changed attitudes, that current and future generations would find baffling now.

runningforthebusinheels · 20/02/2012 23:15

Sigmund, 4.13 on the study linked in the op: quotes from the men studied who had used prostitutes:

'The very fact that they're prepared to do that job where others won't even if skint, there's some capability inside them that permits them to do it, to not be disgusted by it, a normal woman would be if she was asked to do it.'

'It's a dirty job in my humble opinion, having sex for money isn't a decent thing for a human being.'

Read on after point 4.13 - it gets a lot more disturbing than that. Men using prostitutes are aware of what's going on - for example abuse, trafficking, but they still go ahead and have sex. Because it's their right to pay for it.

How you can come on one thread after another on this subject and bang on about 'the women who want to sell sex' and that 'not all are trafficked' - I just don't know.

Have a Biscuit from me too.

carmenelectra · 20/02/2012 23:47

Why are some of you on a mission to save these women?I don't get it? Surely the amount of trafficked, abused and pimped prostitutes is miniscule compared to those who do it of free will.

Do none of you read the posts where we are mocked? Where these poor womenboast of shagging our men?

Not that its anything to boast about because if we are not shagging thEm ourselves there is a good reason.:)

runningforthebusinheels · 21/02/2012 00:00

What are you talking about carmen?

Quote from 4.14 of the study:

"they describe beatings and forced addiction. 'Pimps get their money and abuse them. They treat them like dogs.'

'some of them are really made to -or forced- like raped. There is no other hope for them. Some are being held hostage in a brothel'

Can I just re-emphasize that these quotes are from the men who have used prostitutes. How bad is that?

None of those women are boasting, and yes, I would save them.

mathanxiety · 21/02/2012 01:37

The most disturbing rationalisation for it as reported in the study is that it prevents rape.

i.e. men are entitled to sex and they are entitled to get it whatever way they can.

mathanxiety · 21/02/2012 01:39

Carmen are you really trying to say that there are women prostituting themselves because they like the job?

Did you read the study at all?

carmenelectra · 21/02/2012 07:38

Yes I read the study and found it very interestin and disturbing. However, I think the findings don't tally up with comments I have read from prostitutes who have posted on here.

I don't buy into the fact these particular women are beaten raped or pimped. They are loving what they do. And openly take the piss out of those on here who take a moral or political stance on here.

Also, going completely off topic hee. Why do these prostitutes take great delight in saying they are shagging our husbands/partners?it does nothing to fight their corner. And is very childish in suggesting all partnered men are liars and cheats. I guess its all they know. Whilst I feel sick at the thought of drugged or trafficked girls, I feel most of them are not. Mostly these women know exactly what they are doing and can fight thEir own battles.

BillyBollyBandy · 21/02/2012 08:21

Again, I don't think that the experience sex workers have of men is likely to persuade them of anything except men are liars, cheats and abusers. They will, generally, have experienced this both through sex work and also in their private life.

It is unlikely they will have come across many men who show care and kindness towards them.

MadAboutHotChoc · 21/02/2012 08:39

However, I think the findings don't tally up with comments I have read from prostitutes who have posted on here.

I have seen those comments Hmm and in fact I don't think these were made by real life sex workers, and are probably punters. The fact that they relish in saying that they're shagging our husbands is a real giveaway Hmm

PlentyOfPubeGardens · 21/02/2012 08:46

I feel most of them are not.

Oh that's OK then, let's just all ignore the actual evidence in favour of a couple of dubious anecdotes and what you 'feel' to be the case Hmm

AnyFucker · 21/02/2012 08:50

Carmen,you and I have been on some of those threads together. You are being very naive about what they were actually saying.

The posters you are referring to came over from Punt er net which is populated by men who use prostituted women and the women that have to pretend they like what they are doing

You remember these women get "ratings" on that site? How many "brownie points" do you think they might have got for coming over to MN and saying the things they did? Do you think maybe some of them were actually punt ers? There is proof time and time again from individual testimonies that while still working within the sex industry there is massive pressure to convince yourself you are not being harmed and of course there is mileage in "spreading tthat word" if it helps your own cognitive dissonance in the process. Much more telling though, is the stories from women who managed to get away Sad

This is about the men that use prostituted women, carmen, I find it difficult to believe you are that naive to believe that these women that "love" the job are anything more than a tiny minority.

smallwhitecat · 21/02/2012 08:56

This reply has been deleted

Message withdrawn

Nyac · 21/02/2012 13:12

Most women in prostitution don't want to be there, which is the reason why trafficking and grooming very young girls into the life is so common. It takes a lot of sexual trauma, violence and threats to make most women in prostitution do their jobs. That's because it is a violation of somebody's body, sexual desires and sense of self, to be penetrated by any man who comes along with money in his pocket. Across the world it is the youngest, poorest, most vulnerable women who are prostituted. This is not a coincidence and this is also what the men who use prostituted women want.

This article by a woman who was prostituted in Ireland demonstrates the reality:

www.irishexaminer.com/news/the-harsh-realities-of-being-raped-for-a-living-183894.html

"The nation is finally beginning to take a look at the intrinsic harm of prostitution. I welcome this because it is a harm I have understood since I was a 15-year-old prostitute, being used by up to 10 men a day. The one thing that linked those men together, besides their urges to pay to abuse my young body, was that they all knew just how young I was. They all knew because I told them, and I told them because it had the near-universal effect of causing them to become very aroused.

"When a man is very aroused in street prostitution that is a good thing, because it means he?ll climax quickly and the whole ordeal will be over fairly fast. I learned that on my very first day while sitting in the car of an elderly man who repeated over and over the thing that was causing him such sexual joy: ?Oh, you?re very young ? aren?t you? Aren?t you??

"That is the true, sleazy and debased face of prostitution ? the face that pro-prostitution lobby groups hysterically deny and attempt to conceal. Well, they cannot conceal it from me. I spent too long looking at it, too long being abused by it, and too long trying to recover from the soul-level injury it left behind.

"Many of the girls I worked alongside were not much older than I was, and one was only 13-years-old ? and there was no shortage of grown men paying to abuse her. Most of the older women had been working since they were our age or younger, and many of them had histories of sexual abuse that predated their prostitution lives. When a person looks at a 30- or 40-something prostitute what they forget is that they are looking, in most cases, at a woman who has been inured to bodily invasion since she was a prepubescent child.

As always a thread about men who pay to prostitute women has degenerated into "women choose it" arguments. Well let's look at the choices of men who pay for sex and the hell on earth they have created for so many women and children because of them.

yellowraincoat · 21/02/2012 13:49

Before I say anything I'd just like to point out that I'm in no way pro-prostitution and realise that the majority of women doing it would rather not be.

However. Lots of people fucking hate their job, feel it diminishes them, feel physically fucked over by it every day. My dad, for example, is a mechanic and at 60 should really not still be crawling about on a cold wet floor for a living and comes home every day and slumps in front of the telly.

Why is it that we are so pissed off at prostitution but not at other jobs? What is it about prostitution that is so bad compared to other jobs?

I am in no way saying that I think it is just another job, would just like to know why others think it is not.