Samaritans and sex calls

[ahumanfemale]

Not a TAAT but I saw elsewhere multiple mentions of the abundance of sex calls that The Samaritans receives.

I used to volunteer for a similar helpline. It was abroad and for English-speaking people. We too had regular sex callers. All - ALL - would only talk to female volunteers. I thought it was because we were a small-scale charity and it was cheaper to call us than any 0800 equivalent. It wasn't until just now that I realised our helpline wasn't unique in this. And the majority of ours were either wearing women's clothes - or fantasising about it. The underwear of underage teens was also a feature. Some clearly got off on trying to make us uncomfortable. They didn't realise we weren't uncomfortable, just bored.

And honestly, I'm fucking angry. This needs to be publicised. There are LITERALLY men out think their wank is more important than people in severe distress getting help. They LITERALLY put having a wank above someone not committing suicide. There are enough of them that The Samaritans includes their calls in its training, as our training did too.

And people - women - think these men won't go into mixed sex changing rooms and won't get thrills from making women uncomfortable and won't use their conversations to wank to either in situ or later?

The policy at my helpline changed and we were able to put the phone down on them after confirming they weren't in distress (as in they kept wanking and talking out their fantasy or whatever, rather than respond to us). This was done because someone pointed out it was abusive to expect female volunteers to be wank-fodder. I've no idea what their policy is now or what The Samaritans' policy is.

I'm disgusted that this is so common. And fwiw, we never had female sex callers.

Ex-Sam volunteer here. Obviously can’t talk about the content of any specific calls. But yes, sex fantasy calls/masturbators are incredibly common, it would be unusual to do a shift (3-5hrs) without taking several. Policy is just to end the call, you get very used to it. Some were incredibly prolific - thousands of calls a month - numbers would get blocked etc.

There are occasional female sex callers, it does happen. They were memorable though because they were unusual (and often took volunteers a lot longer to recognise because they weren’t expecting it in the same way as you are with a male voice).

Omg men can be so disgusting. I think we a society wide case of cognitive dissonance going on with men's sexually predatory and abusive behaviour. We are not allowed to mention it, and if we do we are gaslighted and told we are 'fear mongering'. And that we are 'bigoted' and 'exclusionary'

A friend of mine used to volunteer for Childline and they got these kinds of calls too

Utterly grim. It’s horrible that it’s so prolific. I can’t even begin to understand why it’s so common, just more evidence that there are an awful lot of men who get off on pushing women’s boundaries.

Tbf we have a lot of similar on Mumsnet. The toilet troll, popular kid troll and so on - almost certainly a bloke getting his rocks off.

Yeah, people (mostly men) can be grim 🤷🏻‍♀️ but at least for me, it didn’t take away from being able to help people in crisis. You are well trained for it and you just free the line up and move on. They’re very easy to spot/manage once you have a bit of experience. They’re never as clever as they think they are exactly like sex/poo trolls on here tbf!

blimey. this was a thing I didn't know about

every day's a school day

Thanks for shining a light on this - I didn't know, though sadly not surprised given what we've seen on here AGP posts.

And this is why I don't want these pervs in changing rooms and other single sex spaces with women and girls.

I was a sex chat line operator in the mid 90s. One year I worked the Christmas nigh shift and weirdly, it was mostly very depressed callers talking about their problems.

I don’t mean to be flippant about the seriousness of men wanking at non-consenting charity volunteers and blocking up lines meant for people in distress, but it seems a bit like the other side of a metaphorical coin.

Yes I used to work for the Samaritans about 20 years ago and on some shifts there were more sex calls than genuine calls.

Omg men can be so disgusting. I think we a society wide case of cognitive dissonance going on with men's sexually predatory and abusive behaviour. We are not allowed to mention it, and if we do we are gaslighted and told we are 'fear mongering'. And that we are 'bigoted' and 'exclusionary'

I concur. I don't know what men would have to do, how low they would have to sink, before society says that we have a massive problem with men and male abuse of women and girls. Will it take a crime like the savages on the bus in India? I think somehow, people will always find a way to excuse it and dismiss it. Women don't want to believe it and men don't want to confront it about themselves.

I can't tell you how happy I was to see this thread! (Although happy might be the wrong word) ex sam volunteer an I would get disgusting sexcalls every shift. Also calls from men in prison pretending they were suicidal as an excuse to talk about the child they'd raped to a young sounding woman. They would never talk to men.

I left in the end as it made me feel violated. And it wasn't even that, the organisation had a very light hearted attitude to it e.g. just laugh it off, tell you don't be silly it's not violating, claim that the men had issues and needed to have a sex call other wise they'd go and do something worse

It was all a complete denial of the fact that it was a form of violence against women. Also, I don't know if you know, the Sam's used to have a 'brenda line' -explicitly for men who wanted a sex call because they 'have a problem and just can't help themselves'

When I left I gave them an earful about it and said they needed to get some proper training on gender based abuse and violence

(And exhale...)

(Apologies for sp and grammar, I was het up and typing at the speed of light!) Also, google Brenda line

And another thing...! Most of them would talk about wearing women's clothes

In the beginning of Samaritans it was called the Brenda line, sex calls were regular. They still are but no volunteer has to listen to them now and the ethos changed within the organisation towards them a long time ago. The are not acceptable however some genuine calls can come out of a call that starts in this way. I found them difficult but always knew I could end the call and as volunteers we had support to deal with them

Ex Samaritan. I left because the sex calls were beginning to outweigh calls from those that needed help. Also started to feel used by those men who phoned early morning to discuss which lipstick or foundation to wear.

I used to work in a Rape Crisis Centre, so I knew these calls happened, but I’m shocked by the scale of it. It’s crap that it’s caused some of you to leave rather than being able to do the role you signed up for.

blimey

www.theguardian.com/uk/2000/jan/02/sarahryle.theobserver

Reverend Varah, the founder wanted call handlers to 'befriend' the sex callers. what's unwritten in that article is that if the vast, vast majority of them only want to speak to women, then yet again he's asking women to service men's sexual demands. plus ca change eh?

of course the Guardian reports this uncritically, with an aside that Varah also supported sex education, so he must be right about expecting female volunteers to assist men in cracking one off.

Ex-Sam here - my experience was similar to @Cwenthryth's. And I found some of the sex callers to be incredibly manipulative and clever - they knew exactly what to say to keep us on the line (we could only end the call when certain criteria have been met). The early morning shifts were the worst.

I've never heard of the Brenda line though . . . ?

This thread is properly depressing. I used to man a national helpline 20 years ago. No sex pest calls in my year of volunteering.

Was about to post about the Brenda line. Think that was in the 70s?

I’m not sure I agree that the organisation has a light hearted attitude about them though - perhaps that was your local leaders/branch culture? (For those who don’t know, Samaritans has quite a decentralised branch structure, like the RSPCA, although it has got more streamlined in recent years) I was involved with regional ‘caller support’ (basically managing high frequency callers) and it was taken very seriously, and my branch took support of our volunteers very seriously as well, no one was ever made to feel they had to indulge a sex caller etc.

Male volunteers get more ‘snap’ calls (where the caller hangs up immediately without saying anything - really common) I think because masturbators are looking for a female voice. Although of course a lot of genuine callers will hang up as well - I think there was a statistic that the average caller will have hung up 5-6 times before feeling able to start to talk to a volunteer. And many genuine callers want a female volunteer as well (and some want a male).

I do think Samaritan training is excellent, I never felt violated by the wankers - pitied them really, but it was water off a ducks back. Other types of manipulative callers were a lot more frustrating. But on the whole being able to make a difference for people at their lowest was an immense privelige.

Shouldn't it be possible to charge at least the worst repeat callers with something? I would think it qualifies as sexual harassment of the volunteers or something, anybody know?

I couldn't complete the Sam's training I was so livid about the sex calls. I tried my best and spoke about my concerns but I just felt violated. There were more women than men volunteering in my group and we are targeted, we were told the sex calls just hang up when a male voice answers the call. I just couldn't do it to myself.

I’m a current Samaritan and I can confirm that yes, we do get regular sex calls. They don’t use the internet etc because they like to try and trick the listeners into there wanking scenario for as long as possible until the penny drops... it’s a controlling game where lack of consent is at the root for the wanker.
They’re very disappointed in me as I can spit them a mile if nowadays and spoil all their fun.
Must Sams are just generally pissed off at genuine callers maybe not getting through because of people abusing the service.

sorry about the typos