Why are we meant to respect sex workers?

[FlamedToACrisp]

OK, I appreciate I came to the feminism party late. You lot are all on your fourth drinks and the buffet table is half-empty, but I'm still trying to edge my way into the conversation and make sense of it all. So please don't do the sneering 'educate yourself' thing - if you don't want to talk to me about this subject, I'll just go and sit in the kitchen and talk to the dog.

Anyway:

Over recent years (at my age, anything after 1990 feels recent), the term 'prostitute' has become 'sex worker.' And with it, the attitude to prostitutes has changed. I was brought up to regard them as either mercenary law-breakers or nympho sinner sluts encouraging married men to be unfaithful, but now I'm supposed to feel they're just women (or men) choosing this way to make their living and we shouldn't be judgemental.

I haven't looked into this issue; lucky me, it has not impinged much on my life, although obviously I'm aware there are sex trafficking considerations. Have I got it right or misunderstood? What's the cause of this change?

So, is prostitution now socially ok? And if so, why is 'prostitute' an unacceptable term?

I was only saying that I didn’t like being called this

Yes, we get that, but WHY didn’t you like it? That’s the thing we are asking you to unpack.

I didn’t like being called a prostitute either, but that’s because despite all the huge wishes of cash (and perhaps in part because of the huge wishes of cash) I knew prostitution was a terrible thing to be engaged in, for me, for other women, for society as a whole.

‘Wishes’ should read ‘wodges’ - clearly Apple doesn’t get British slang

@FlamedToACrisp

My parents are both dead. But generally speaking, everyone I knew thought that way about them in the 1960s or 70s.

They also looked down on unmarried mothers and hated non- white people so that makes it OK in your book I suppose.

@Pixxie7

They are providing a service that arguably prevents a lot of sexually induced crimes. I couldn’t do it so yes they have my admiration the same as everyone else who provides a service.

Sorry Pixxie7 but that is just a one of the sex industry related excuses they use to justify what they do

@TorgosPizza

I don't respect prostitution or the people who engage in either end of it, and I don't see sense in dressing it up by giving it a nicer-sounding name, but I do recognize that most prostitutes are in very difficult situations (often addicted to drugs), and the people buying sex deserve much more disgust than the ones selling it.

It is given a nicer name to appeal to the men who are buying it my friend :)

@DidoLamenting

oh absolutely Pankhurst - that trite hackneyed expression is not my view.

Ha! Do not worry I know it isnt your view . It just made it spring into my mind. That particular phrase pisses me off too.

Just on this subject I found this article about Germany interesting and even more interesting that they DO NOT mention the legalisation of prostitution there. As if that couldn't possibly be connected at all. I think people on this board are probably familiar with similar reports from women living in the Holbeck area.

It affects ALL women whether they are directly involved or not.

I think that everyone deserves a degree of respect (obviously not child murderers ,rapists, muggers and the like)! However being called a "sex worker" makes prostitution seem legal and above board ,rather than a prostitute which has a different sort of meaning altogether .For the ladies who have been paid handsomely ,all well and good ,your choices your lives .The reality for most sex workers is grim and unrelenting and often exploits girls /women and sometimes boys as well ,often going hand in hand with drugs and trafficking .Young women from Eastern Europe or Asia coming over, and being promised work as a hairdresser or waitress .Some doing nail bar work by day ,and prostitution by night .A long way from home there is no where to go for help as they are under the watch of their pimps and often dont speak English well .Years ago women were often viewed as either Harlots or Housewives and "decent" women would never touch this sort of thing! Hopefully attitudes today should be more enlightened .

Sorry Pixxie7 but that is just a one of the sex industry related excuses they use to justify what they do

It's also an excuse for society to turn a blind eye to the abuse and atrocities that happens to girls and women.
Drug addicts,runaways,homeless , prostitutes etc are all fair game . By looking down on them ,dehumanising them society can sleep at night under a veneer of civility and also pretend that the men are "good" and not abusive,violent and predatory.Those women and girls deserve what they get and they're not good for much else.

It's absolute bullshit.

Why is inappropriatefemale getting such a hard time? I see exactly where you are coming from, fwiw, @Inappropriatefemale

Let's talk about "respect" as a word:

kottke.org/18/05/the-respect-of-personhood-vs-the-respect-of-authority

tldr: the word "respect" can be used in at least two ways and they are often (sneakily and semi deliberately, in my opinion) confused.

1 - Basic respect from human to human. This should be universal. It isn't, but it should be.

2 - additional or particular respect. This is something extra and implies looking up to. I look up to skilled people, knowledgable people, good people, brave people, resilient people, persistent people: experts and heroes. Like everyone, I have my own particular value system about who those people are.

So, for example, I respect Teresa May as a person - in the first sense - in the sense that I would not push in front of her in a queue and if she fell over I would help her up; I do not respect her as a politician - look up to her, in the second sense - because I think as Home Secretary and Prime Minister she did a lot of harm. Many people will disagree with me - they are entitled to do so on the second point but I would take issue with them on the first.

In theory, everyone, including feminists and Christians, should always have respected sex workers in the first sense. (of course they did not - people are flawed - misogyny is all pervasive)

I think the OP is implying that we are now being expected to respect them in the second sense, that is, we should have professional respect for them on the basis of their work; and I think the OP is questioning this.

the thing is though - however problematic sex work is (and though I have no personal knowledge it is very problematic to me) - I can't help but respect a woman who supports herself and her family through her work - especially if it isn't work that she particularly enjoys.

That doesn't stop me wishing that everyone could have work which isn't dangerous, which they believe in and even enjoy some or a lot of the time.

I've had some shit jobs. If people were to bark aggressively at me to justify why I did it then the answer would be "because it's better than living on the street and while of course I would rather be running a richly remunerated script writing team on a wildly successful TV show, I'm not choosing between that and this; I'm choosing between this and, apparently, for now at least, nothing".

I'm comfortable with having zero respect for men who pay for sex

And wondering why these conversations always focus on the women in this rather than the men.

Of course the women should be the focus when it comes to harm reduction and etc.

@SenselessUbiquity the way the OP was worded it sounded more like she was baffled how they went from nothing (slurs,mistrust,abuse) to the first sense.

And I guess that's why most people reacted the way they did.

was brought up to regard them as either mercenary law-breakers or nympho sinner sluts encouraging married men to be unfaithful, but now I'm supposed to feel they're just women (or men) choosing this way to make their living and we shouldn't be judgemental.

While the addition of "choosing" might make it seem like the seconds choice, the way the statement starts "they're just women(or men)" is pretty telling in my eyes.

@SenselessUbiquity thanks, I’m glad someone does.

@SenselessUbiquity very eloquently put, I agree wholeheartedly.

@NiceGerbil “ And wondering why these conversations always focus on the women in this rather than the men.”

This a million times over, I am so disheartened how the focus in this debate is so often on the morality of what the women are doing, and hardly ever on the men doing it. This is replicated across the entire conversation when it comes to sex between men and women. Men can be promiscuous, and even lauded for it. Women are judged and criticised for it.

I know it’s probably unwise to bring religious/spiritual thinking into it, but I am adherent of the concept of Ahimsa (which is very basically the principle of the minimising of harm/suffering). I don’t deny that there may be women who engage in prostitution who come out of it fine with bags full of gold, but I think we have to prioritise the women who are suffering/harmed. I was heartbroken to read everything @Inappropriatefemale wrote, but don’t worry I don’t pity you, as I have no idea what I would have done in your situation. I do however think you have been mistreated, and made to endure things no one should have to no matter what choices they make. I wish you the absolute best in terms of your own healing, and should or when you decide you to pursue love and intimacy again I hope you find someone who will treat you well.

There is this particular dimension of the choice position I think needs unpacking. I don’t care what choice anyone makes they don’t deserve to be beaten, murdered or abused. There is a tendency with prostitution that when people make that choice that those are the risks they are taking, as if that that somehow absolves the rest of us of responsibility should the worst happen. I disagree with that in the strongest possible terms, the reason prostitution is so dangerous is primarily because of men, but also because the rest of us want to turn a blind eye. There is a reason prostitutes are so frequently targeted, it’s because abusers know that few people care enough so they are safe targets. Forget about about respecting prostitutes I don’t know how we can really respect ourselves if we allow it to continue.

@Inappropriatefemale
if you look at the link I sent then you will see that a percentage of men would rape a woman if they could get away with it and if sex workers weren’t available so I think there is truth to it, plus the woman from the polices serious crimes squad thought so too.. I don’t think you understood my post. What I meant was that sleeping with a prostitute is a sexually motivated crime. I think your policewoman was wrongly suggesting that it was a lesser crime because the victim was a prostitute.

Really interesting discussion with many facets. It’s good to read everyone’s perspectives and thank you to those sharing their personal experiences with people engaged in the sex for money world.

I’m fascinated by how emotional it makes some of us (myself included) to read about someone doing something sexual with their body that we ourselves would never do.

I believe in treating women in this position with respect. I try to treat everyone with respect unless they are types that purposely harm others. I can separate the person from the actions. Interesting that OP mentions her father believing in God and being wrong. My beliefs are the reason I respect others.

I 100% do not believe any completely healthy person would choose this path if they had other options.

I don't know if the law has changed but back when I was working for the police the charge was "Known common prostitute" so one day a group of right on women from the local uni decided this was insulting and they wanted it dropped. They asked our sergeant if they could come in and meet some of the local prostitutes to start a campaign so that women would just get charged with soliciting (this was street prostitution or working from windows.) They nearly got murdered.

As I say I don't know if it has changed but back then you got two cautions before you could be charged with soliciting. The clock reset every year so after two cautions the bright ones would get a train to another city, use a false name and work there till they got two cautions and then on elsewhere. When the 12 months were up they started working locally again. They definitely didn't want the charge changed even those these well meaning women thought being called a "known common prostitute" would unite the women in a campaign.

They were very confused.

@winerack19

holy moly! Pormer prostitute/sex worker here. Story time.

I was living in Australia at the time. I had been there almost 2 years with my visa expiring and no option to stay other than to go on a student visa. I'd seriously been considering doing my masters anyway back in the UK but after 2 years in Aus, I'd really made a life and home-away-from-home for myself. The thought of leaving was awful, and I really didn't have much back in the UK that made going back an appealing option.

But as an international student I was looking a t $80,000 or roughly £44,000 for a 2 years masters degree. 27 year old me was a pretty good saver, but I was still about £20,000 off. Plus I didn't really want to have to use up all my savings soooo...

I end up chatting to a friend of a friend at a party about it all. She jokingly said "well there's always escorting." My response was "honestly at this stage I'd consider it" and that's when the convo got serious. She'd been an escort for 4 years in Sydney. I quickly learnt how incredibly well escorts are paid here in Australia.

For a standard "girlfriend experience" I charged $350 for half an our, $650 for an hour. For the experience up, $500 half an hour, $900 an hour.

I'd book 3 nights a week in a hotel room and usually see around 8 clients -10 clients. After taxes, cost of hotels, personal grooming etc, I was still making damn good money and I'm sure you can roughly work out that it didn't take me long at all to have my $80,000

I don't have a single regret. It gave me incredible financial security. Afforded me to do a masters in a degree that lead to a career I absolutely love. Very luckily only had a handful of shitty clients in the time I was doing it. I had my head on straight the entire time. And made damn good money doing it.
If you want to judge me that's one thing, but to not respect me as a human being because I was able to get $900 an hour doing something women do for free anyway, I mean that's on you but it's a bit sad.

Good for you. You did what you had to do and had a long term plan. It’s funny how some over look that you achieved a career at the end of it.

When you use the term prostitution OP I think there’s all different types from standing on a street corner you are obviously vulnerable.
Other things such as escorting and more professional things I don’t really view they are being been exploited. The internet (fans only for example) they are not even having sex. It is a big thing these days a lot of young women earn a lot of money doing this for a living in a short amount of time I can see how it’s appealing.

@Bananabread8 a young woman died online while "not even having sex". The man watching her left her to die rather than raising the alarm so he wouldn't get in trouble.

I know several cam girls, you're deluded if you don't think this type of work has an effect, at least mentally on some of them.

The only sex workers I'd have any issues with respecting (other than individuals being dickheads) is the increasingly common middle class cam girl, who found that cam work could be quite profitable when uni/job didn't work out and seems unable to differentiate between her own situation (often well paid, comfortable, no risk of pregnancy/assault/sti and acting of her own volition) and a prostitute who has been trafficked, abused or exploited, who is at risk of rape or assault.
The amount I've heard claiming that there is nothing wrong with sex work and that "barely anyone" is forced into it from people like this is astonishing.

But, other than that, it's the people paying for sex that I have an issue with, not the ones selling it.

You know what really pisses me off? The sheer hypocrisy of it all.

Because despite the abuse,the judgement, the slurs,the shaming etc society has always been glad that 1.these women and girls exist and 2.that they can take advantage of them or benefit in various forms.

That's why it's "the oldest profession".

The whole sex worker thing is being slightly more honest about it.

It's the same shit, wrapped in a pretty(woke) wrapper.

@CaptainCorellisPangolin not all cam girls are the same. Plus you'll find "happy" prostitutes/escorts too. You have no idea how frustrating,dehumanising and even exploiting cam work can be too.