Prostitutes - Are Women in Denial About Who Uses Them?

[CKDexterHaven]

I've seen some threads on Mumsnet where a woman is concerned about her husband or partner going on an all-male trip to Thailand or Las Vegas or Prague or Amsterdam. As soon as someone raises the issue of prostitution they are shouted down and told they are jumping to conclusions. Is the issue of nice, middle-class husbands using prostitutes something to which women are willingly blind?

There are millions of prostituted women and girls in the world, and, of course, men and boys too. The slow advancements in women's lives in the developed world mean that women in their thousands are trafficked from East to Western Europe, from South to North America, from Africa to Southern Europe and from Asia to Australia and the rest of the world just to meet demand. It stands to reason that there must be a lot more clients than prostitutes. The ratio must be akin to hairdressers and their clients. So where are the men? And who are they?

I've read interviews with exited prostitutes who say most of their clients were 'normal', often married, middle-class men. I've heard prostitutes say the best time to work is not a Friday or Saturday night but first thing on a Monday morning when mid-life crisis guys who hate their jobs treat themselves before going back to work. But in my lifetime I've only ever met two men who've admitted to using prostitutes. One was very drunk and bragged to his friends, the other one was an 'edgy' mature student who thought it wasn't exploitative because the prostitute was older than him and, therefore, somehow in control of the situation. That's it, two men.

When I was growing up in the 80s and early 90s porn was sold in dodgy shops, stripping happened in sleazy men's clubs and prostitution was virtually invisible to anyone who didn't live in a red-light area. Even the most handmaideny of handmaidens I knew felt these things were degrading to men and women. Now that porn is a click away and lap-dancing clubs are in every town centre most women seem to have redefined these things as 'empowering' rather than confront the fact that men they know enjoy dehumanising women who need money. Prostitution is also a lot more visible and, although this has been redefined as an empowering career choice for women, women still seem sensitive to the idea of men they know using prostitutes. Why is this? Is it just the question of tangible cheating or are women not as ok with 'sex work' for women as they say they are?

Ask - today you were reading about Rotherham, not Rochdale, and no it isn't 'bang up to date', so detail is important here.

I'd think it's quite easy to cherry pick anecdotes to support a position, we all do it, but I was being critical of the swathing judgements being offered. Though of course the ingrained mentality of police forces isn't in question - I'd suggest thought that those positions/views are shifting significantly, at least in the larger metropolitan forces.

Not many men seem to be convicted for seeking sex with a prostitute in this country. Do you think the adoption of the Swedish Model would change this and the threat of naming and shaming would drive down demand, or would we just readjust our values in the way we have with porn and lap-dancing clubs?

It would just change the way the sex industry works. I can't see many men being arrested for paying for sex with an independent escort or at sex parties. I could see it totally shutting down the street and parlour scene.

If freedom doesn't include the right to engage in sex work if you choose to do so, then it isn't freedom. No one should be forced into sex work. No one should be forced into any kind of work that we find distasteful, scary or dangerous. But just because some people find some other people's jobs distasteful or scary is no reason to prohibit people from choosing to do those jobs - or to prohibit people from choosing to pay others to do those jobs.
It's not helpful to people who want to stop doing sex work, or people who don't want to stop yet, or people who don't want to stop at all because they are in that minority of sex workers who find the job suits them or their circumstances - or because they are in that category of sex workers who see themselves as therapists and healers - to keep on screaming about how exchanging money for sex, or sex for money, is always a terrible thing which only happens between helpless victims and evil men.

Is there someone from the pimp lobby on these threads? Telling the fun-spoiling ugly, bitter feminists that they are the ones limiting women's freedom and not the men who conspire on a world-wide scale to prevent women from attaining financial independence and, thereby, ensuring that there will always be an underclass of women too poor to say 'no'?

If you are one of the very few women who chooses to make money from an industry founded on the misery of women and children then you are collaborating with rape culture and the abuse of women and children. If you truly have the agency you claim to have then I won't infantilise you by painting you as a victim but rather as a someone who benefits from misogyny and seeks to perpetuate it.

I'm not collaborating with anyone about the abuse of women and children. Why do you think that I would be ok with that?! Just because I have sex for money doesn't mean I'm ok with violence of any sort.

I wouldn't for a minute blame you migsymoo, it is the punters and pimps who are to blame.

CK, you are out of order. If you truly were a feminist you wouldn't attack another woman like you just have done. I don't think you like women very much at all, do you ?

screaming about how exchanging money for sex, or sex for money, is always a terrible thing which only happens between helpless victims and evil men.

SGB, you know better than to ridicule a big picture by reducing it to extremes, which haven't been voiced by any poster on either thread. What you did there is the same as people saying domestic abuse isn't a problem because women aren't timid victims and NAMALT.

The problem is a set of cultural values that lionise the penis and accept the commodification of other humans for its whims, as long as the penis owners pay the going rate. That can lead to some terrible things.

Migsy - you are part of the problem, though not the cause of it.

I was responding to SolidGoldBrass who seems to think it's ok to make money from the sexual exploitation of women.

I think Migsy seems to be in a bind and optionless and therefore not exercising agency so my post wasn't directed at her. It was directed at SolidGoldBrass who seems to be the prostitution-apologist on these threads.

Do you have a filter at all, CK ? There is a self confessed prostitute actively posting on the thread. Reading between the lines (and remembering other threads, where incidentally she was treated with kindness and respect) she is in a fucking awful situation.

And you come out with a rant like that ? Whether it was directed at her, or another poster, it was simply an opportunity for you to spew forth what you have waiting to do since you started this thread.

I don't think you are what you say you are. I don't believe you.

AnyFucker Don't you think that the tiny minority of prostitutes who have options and have made a choice and have exercised agency have looked at misogyny and the abuse of women and thought 'I'll exploit that for money'? That is a pretty despicable thing to do to other women and helps perpetuate a life of misery for the 99% of optionless prostitutes. If these women have exercised the agency they claim to have then they don't get a free pass to behave like shit to other women just because they are women themselves.

Or put it another way, I think people like SolidGoldBrass are perpetuating Migsy's situation.

I really, really hate going to bed on a lost temper. It pisses me right off.

The basic premise of this thread is that the men who use prostitutes are 'normal' guys and probably we all know men who use prostitutes, but if a woman suggests this she gets vilified and shouted down. I think this thread has proved how badly women react to other women who say this. We're willing to see 'other' men as bad guys but if a woman suggests men we know might be the bad guys then other women round on her. This is partly how men get away all this kind of stuff.

And so we've arrived. OP, you have made some good points on this thread, but it is clear from your OP and from your most recent points, that you are blaming women here. And you don't see sex workers as Real Women.

CKD: Why are you blaming women (the 1% in your post) for exploiting patriarchy, as they see it? All of us women do it one way and another - if you are a woman (sorry, I don't know,) don't you ever 'perform femininity' to get a result?

How is it the women who're "behaving like shit to other women", rather than the punters with wives, and the men who run the industries that lead men to expect whatever sex they desire?

No, I am not blaming women for prostitution and I don't see prostitutes as lesser women. I do believe if we take the tiny minority of prostitutes who claim they have agency and are not victims at their word then they are accountable for collaborating with and perpetuating misogyny for their own financial benefit. If you truly have made that choice (and I think it is a rare, rare minority of prostitutes that have) then you have sold out other women, especially poorer women, for your own gain and that is pretty despicable.

No CK, you see sex workers as victims or villains. You don't see them as Real Women. And you are blaming women. You have been from the start of this thread.

I am not blaming women for prostitution

If you have made that choice then you have sold out other women, especially poorer women, for your own gain

The second statement says you hold "happy hookers" to account for the exploitation of not-so-happy hookers. This means you blame them for prostitution.

(I hadn't even asked you that.)

As I say I have very limited experience ( and all in London) but the met have been very supportive of street workers whose pimps or customers have turned on them ime and absolutely filled with hatred for in their word "the bastards who did it"

I'm just going to throw something in about "happy hookers." I knew two women who voluntarily chose prostitution and didn't work for pimps. Both of them spoke very convincingly and energetically about how it was a great job, how much they enjoyed it, how good the money was etc. They both tried to persuade me to try it. One of them regularly tried to talk my friends into trying it.

They were both sexually abused in early childhood by close male relatives. They both had very serious alcohol problems. One of them had been a heroin user. One of them had a long history of eating disorders.

In my opinion, for both of them, prostitution was self harm and it was inextricably related to the CSA they were subjected to. I think that truly "happy hookers" are a lot rarer than they seem to be.

That's harsh CK as I said upthread "from a limited set of options" and for most sex worker the options very limited. I will freely admit I can't possibly judge anyone until I understand their personal circumstances. Another example is gang membership (which in some ways is the male equivalent of prostitution) yes it is horrific and for the vast majority it is exploitative, however it can be the only sense of identity and family ( not to mention money) these lads have.