Does society fear "the whore" and especially the working class whore?

[MrsWinnibago]

I use the term whore as a quote not as a word I use personally.

I'm thinking a lot at the moment about prostitution, about women who sleep with multiple partners and especially about working class women who fit into this mold.

Society loves to deride and scorn a woman with "loose morals" doesn't it?

Why?

Is it out of some kind of fear?

Or is it because it simply makes people feel better to deride and scorn those who they see as weaker or less than themselves?

Shows like Belle De Jour make prostitutes into something society is comfortable with because she's middle class and attractive so they can relate.

What would that show have been like with a woman who was obviously working class? Different? The same?

Please share your thoughts if you don't mind.

Is it out of some kind of fear?

Why would it be out of fear?

This is a genuine question. Who is scared of prostitutes?

Well...I suppose that I'm wondering if the derision comes from fear. Most hatred does.

I'm wondering if the derision comes from fear. Most hatred does.

Does it though? People say this all the time and I don't really get it. I never saw any evidence that white South Africans were actually scared witless of black South Africans, for instance. Because there was nothing to be afraid of. They were just racist fucks.

Fear of the unknown and fear of change can cause people to deride and to oppress. As of course can greed and simple hatred...but I am interested in working out why society hates working class women in particular when they are promiscuous or making money from sex.

It's not a fear of the prostitute herself--just as, in South Africa, most people's fear really isn't of black people.

One of the fears they're trying to avoid looking in the eye is the fear that they could BECOME part of this underclass. People, often women, feel the need to differentiate themselves from prostitutes, or revel in the idea that hey, at least middle/upper-middle class prostitutes have very nice lives. If they didn't feel that way, it would mean that something could happen in their life that would leave them with no other options than prostitution. By believing either "I'm different from those women" or "some of those women are choosing their choice and are really very happy with it," they avoid having to think about how terrible their lives might really be if they were forced into prostitution to keep themselves or their families fed.

The other reason people avoid discussing prostitution, or focus exclusively on the issues of the most privileged prostitutes, is that I think most women are genuinely afraid to think about the way society really treats women's versus men's needs. Men's desire to have an orgasm with a female partner is viewed as being so important that even though we know 80-90% of prostitutes want to exit (according to surveys), prostitution legalization efforts are still huge. People speak of these male desires as "needs," without giving much thought to the "needs" of the prostitutes who may need food, clothing, and shelter they cannot obtain through any other means but sexual intercourse.

By distancing ourselves from prostitutes, we assure ourselves that we do not need to fear their fate befalling us. Moreover, we avoid an uncomfortable and even terrifying look at a society that tells men their sexuality is so sacrosanct that an entire class of women (whose consent is automatic and assumed even when coerced) must be created for their pleasure, while women are told their sexuality is only important insofar as it pleases men.

What do you think of those women who say they want to continue in sex work? Do you think some of them mean it? Or do you think they're conditioned? Or something else?

I'm really interested in this subject. I wonder if even in a completely equal society there would still be prostitutes? I know that in an ideal world...an equal one..that ALL women would have a good education and the chance to work and earn well through a good career but would ALL women want that?

I don't think so somehow. I think that even if the world were not as sexist and imbalanced as it is, there would still be sex workers willing to trade their bodies for money. And men who were willing to pay.

If the whole Belle de Jour/Secret Diary of a Call Girl thing had been about a working class woman then it would have been more unequivocal that she was doing it because she needed the money, rather than as an alternative lifestyle choice, and that would have made people face uncomfortable truths about men.

As I have never seen Secret Diary...can you tell me, was that the premise? That she wanted to live an "unusual life"? Did she never celebrate or need the money?

I don't think hatred comes from fear. I think that's one of those tropes that make people feel better about horrible things happening to other people.

It seems only in the last 100 years or so that prostitution has become such a huge taboo. 18th and certainly 19th century social commentary shows that it was widespread and common knowledge especially amongst working class women. I am not saying that it was right that these women were forced by economic hardship into prostitution btw.

The whole concept of a whore has always fascinated me. How many men makes a whore? What are 'loose morals'? Is it just a rouse for allowing the rape and torture of women?

Prostitution was widespread in the 18th and 19th centuries but that doesn't mean that it wasn't taboo. Known prostitutes used to be buried at the crossroads with criminals and suicides. Later on prostitutes used to have their own separate cemeteries for fallen women, eg The Cross Bones Graveyard in London.

What I mean is that other people in their neighbourhoods knew they were prostitutes, of course the church and upper classes scorned them, they had the cheek to be working class women regardless of how they made money.

I'm South African and not a racist fuck nor do I fear black South Africans either. After saying that to go to the topic in question, men dislike prostitutes cause they're jealous of the power they have and they get more nookie than they do!

The Magdalen Laundries still have a monument for Fallen Women ie women who had sex, become pregnant outside of marriage, victims of rape and incest, girls who flirted, girls and women who had rumours spread about them and other boys or men, lesbians, prostitutes and any woman deemed unacceptable to the church.

Thats very interesting about China crescentmoon.

Crescent fascinating! So it's linked to capitalism!

Is that because men have more money? Or because women want more "stuff".

I know that's simplistic but still...

I don't think the taboo comes from fear of prostitution itself, but more fear of how "loose morals" can damage society, and so needs to be curtailed in the form of it being derided.

I see my own situation years ago as a microcosm of what happens in wider culture. At uni I was in a friendship group which, although not particularly religious, had some very uptight and prudish characters in it. As part of the unspoken "rules" of being part of the mini-cult group, you had to conform to their principles, which were mainly 1) You don't hang out with other people and involve members of the group in social activities at all times and 2) You certainly don't get off with randomers unless said randomers been debated at length with members of the friendship group and prior approval has been given.

Well I got off with randomers and was severely ostracised from the group. One of them was so jealous incensed that she got drunk and tried to have a stand-up fight with me, calling me all sorts of slut-based insults

I see that fear of the lack of perceived social control in sexual promiscuity as the main reason behind the whole scorn. And perhaps there's an element of worry over the perceived decline in monogamy - these women are threatening to steal our men!

But why are women only held to account over 'loose morals'? Women cannot steal men, if a man is going to cheat he will.

It's an attitude ingrained in societies since Biblical times. Women are perceived as having more control over their base instincts, therefore are more likely to tempt men. And this is damaging to their supposed 'proper' role - that of a loyal, monogamous wife and mother.

Totally agree that the perception of men reduced to mere walking penises is damaging, just look at rape conviction stats. Actually theres another thread.

Perceived sexual promiscuity is seen as a massive threat to social order in patriarchal cultures. Consider how the MPAA (US film rating regulators) treat the depiction of sexuality - particularly female sexuality - as far more 'dangerous' than scenes of violence.

Sexually active, unmarried women are traditionally regarded as massively threatening to patriarchal cultures, legal and economic systems. How could they not be? If women are empowered to produce children without the 'ownership' of a male partner (a named, known, legally and contractually bound 'father' and husband), how can a patriarchy exist? It would become a matriarchy, no?

I think fear of prostitutes and consequent degradation of them is also related to patriarchal attitudes to male sexual and emotional urges. It's not been seen to be OK to suppress male sexuality in the same way as it has been to suppress women's sexuality (and the consequent power and creativity deriving from sexuality, in women's cases). Therefore, men have been seen as needing 'outlets'. Therefore prostitutes have been 'created' - through force, economic deprivation, acting out of cultural myths about certain 'types' women (those from 'othered' social, ethnic and economic backgrounds). But heaven forbid that these women should have been recognised as providing something that other people actually 'needed'. That would have given them power. And their offspring would have been 'unfathered' (i.e. not owned by their mothers' husbands). And then there'd have been the start of that dreaded thing: a matriarchy.

JulyKit Your points completely make sense, and I'm sure are true in a wider social context.

However it doesn't explain the attitudes of my former friends, who were in a way a matriarchal-type group, as they held all their social power over the males in the group too, and would have been strongly disgusted at any of the men being sexually promiscuous, just as they were with the women, and would have made them outcasts too "oh, he doesn't want to hang out with us anymore, he's too busy pulling" and "noone in our group was attractive enough for him, he had to go elsewhere".

The only explanation for that I've been able to come up with is that the members of the group were fearful of their social influence being lessened by any other members becoming "wild" by getting off with unknown quantities - strangers to the group, who they had no control over.