On Sexual Deprivation, Sex Workers, "Incels," and Violence

[YimminiYoudar]

Just been checking to see if there's already a thread about this article On Sexual Deprivation, Sex Workers, "Incels," and Violence - my initial reaction on reading it is:
But if it is work then it isn't sex. A money transaction may be a lot less nasty than more violent kinds of coercion but it is still coercion. I want to teach my sons that their minimum level of consent for engaging in any kind of sexual activity is that both parties must be wholeheartedly and enthusiastically consenting without the aid of any kind of coercion or any reduction in conscious decision-making due to drugs, alcohol or anything else, including monetary exchange. I can't square the circle of having an exception for consenting commercial sex transactions. Oppression is still oppression even when the oppressed is so acclimatised to their oppression that they would choose it over the unfamiliarity of liberation.

However I understand that there are feminists who would take a different view and I would appreciate it if you could take the time to explain?

But if it is work then it isn't sex.
That is a sound argument, but the counter argument from mens rights activists is that women treat all sex as a transaction, insisting on marriage or gifts before permitting sexual access

I would argue that there is rape, just sex and, intimacy. Rape is forced sex and us wrong. Just sex is sex with an absence of desire for the sex itself so prostitution and otherwise coerced but not forced sex would come under this bracket. while not wrong in itself is gross-what kind of loser would have sex with someone who doesn't want to have sex with them. If a woman wants to sell sex that way it is her business but no self respecting nan would buy it. And there is intimacy which is sex that both parties want.

Sex meaning any sexual acts as opposed to consensual piv etc.

What about gay men who are incels?
Would anyone argue that they have a right to access sex with attractive gay men?
Do they get any sympathy for their lack of sexual fulfillment?

Or is it just the terrorists style incels who are seen as a problem to be placated because they make themselves seem like a threat to social harmony....the problem of violent maladjusted young men whom no one wants to interact with

So the MRA argument referred to by UpstartCrow is what is put across in the linked article and is not something I can agree with, but I know there are women who consider themselves feminists and don't think a commercial transaction for sex counts as coercion. Do they have a different viewpoint from the MRA version?

DairyIsClosed that's an internally consistent position but the linked article is claiming that the gross-what kind of loser attitude is a problem that should be tackled as making unattractive men feel ashamed that no one would want to have sex with them unless paid for it is contributing to anger and alienation. If commercial sexual transactions are fine then no one need think twice about popping out for a quick blow job when they want one. Are there any genuine feminists who believe this or is it just an MRA fantasy?

mens rights activists is that women treat all sex as a transaction

That's interesting - I was shocked when Stephen Fry came out with that statement, but didn't realise it was a MRA view.

I think the "all sex is transactional" view of some MRAs is driven by a refusal to understand that women are fully rounded human beings, who come with wants and desires (including sexual desires) of their own. MRAs are so wedded to the idea of women as either scheming Medusas or mere domestic appliances that this doesn't occur to them. They also tend to have a strong Madonna/Whore complex going on in their mind, where as soon as a woman indicates she's interested in sex, she's a whore (and presumably any madonna who deigns to have marital, flannel-nightie-round-waist sex shifts herself from the madonna to the grasping Medusa category). It's a pretty horrible world view, but comes down to one basic idea: they don't think women are people.

I guess that's the bottom line - it's not about sex at all, it's about denying humanity to half the human race.

I think that womens economic and sexual liberation is very problematic for many men, when women are free to have sex with whoever they feel attracted to this ends up in a situation where a large number of men don't get any sex.
Previously when women couldn't earn enough to support themselves they had an incentive to partner up with and provide sex to men who they wouldn't otherwise find attractive but if women earn their own money they don't have to do that.

The presence of incels has some benefit for men who are sexually successful, since their status is raised by the presence of a large underclass of unwanted men ie they look better by comparison.

I do agree that all sex is a transaction I prefer to trade sex for sex, if I give sexual pleasure I want sexual pleasure in return.

Yes fortuna I was going to say something similar. We exchange pleasure and should be getting pleasure in giving it too.

So sex is an exchange as a conversation is. We are involved.

The idea that sex is something that women hold and that men want access to is inherently problematic.

The idea of women having power over men because they get to decide when sex happens (as well as assuming heterosexuality which is another issue), is the notion that men are angry at women for women owning not 'sex' but the right to consent what to do with their bodies. Many 'nice men' hold this belief. Along with the belief that they are nice men.

Incels are an extreme example of a worryingly typical male attitude and behaviour.

It depends I suppose on what you mean by "transaction". As I understand it, transactional analysis is a school of psychology that posits that all human interactions are "transactional" in some sense - i.e. they involve exchanging something for something else. Even a "Cold out today...Yes, wonder when spring will finally arrive" conversation in the supermarket becomes a transaction on this understanding, because it's a sort of exchange of recognition of shared humanity.

But that's not (AFAIK) the only psychological theory of human interactions, nor does it seem to me to be the sense in which MRAs mean the word in any case. They are thinking specifically of financial exchange within a capitalist society. So a married woman barters sex for her husband's earning power and capacity to buy her a nice semi in the suburbs, in their view.

I suppose I see lots of different models of sexual behaviour going on here:
The financial transaction view (MRA)

The competitive sports view (there's an imaginary panel of judges going to hold up marks for artistic impression and technical merit at the end, you must tick off a certain number of positions from the karma sutra of a certain level of technical difficulty to even be in the game).

The transactional analysis view (you give me pleasure, I give you pleasure view - I've been in relationships which have ended up like this and they always seem pretty unsatisfactory)

What I've heard called the "jam session" view - sex is like playing music, something you do with another person you like and have chemistry with (or shared musical tastes). IME this is the sort of sex I like best.

So I guess I don't buy into the world view that says all interaction is transactional, so I think that arguing that even sex centred round mutual pleasure is transactional is stretching the meaning of "transaction" to breaking point.

I dont agree that all sex is a transaction. You might as well say that when two friends hug each other its a transaction.

It depends I suppose on what you mean by "transaction
of course it depends on what criteria you are using

everything we do has costs and benefits, we weigh them up consciously or unconsciously, I suppose what people dont like is the idea that we are consciously weighing the costs and benefits of every interaction.

I am not saying that we coldly calculate the benefits of mutually pleasurable sex but we ultimately are drawn to do it because we find it good/beneficial/enjoyable/desirable

in my view any exchange/interaction is a transaction because it has costs and benefits for all parties, things we want, things we dont want.

Humans have a deeply rooted sense/instinct for fairness and will tend to rebel or reject situations in which they feel they are getting a bad deal