The difference between sex and. prostitution isn't just that money gets exchanged. A prostitute accepts money in lieu of having his/her own desires met in the sex. If your hooker is any good, you're not just paying for consent, you're paying for sex that's all about you. You don't have to go down on a prostitute unless you happen to love going down.
I don't think this is inherently wrong--you don't pay a massage therapist to trade backrubs, after all--but it's an important thing to keep in mind when discussing prostitution. Prostitution isn't some women doing for pay what other women do for free, despite what the Freakonomics guys seem to think when they say things like:
Who poses the greatest competition to a prostitute? Simple: any woman who is willing to have sex with a man for free.
I don't know about you, but I've never had sex with a man for free. I've had sex in exchange for getting my sexual desires--partner choice, specific kinks, sometimes emotional closeness--met. Prostitutes, especially high-class ones, do have some say in which acts and which men they'll do, but not to nearly the degree a woman fucking for "free" does. I'm fairly sure that any prostitute who only slept with men she found panty-soakingly attractive and insisted that they fulfill her fantasies would go broke.
I'm also not a sucker for giving it away for "free" because prostitution in our current society involves a lot of risks unrelated to the sex. I like my day job, but I might do a couple paid fucks on the weekend now and then for extra cash, the way I work on festival event crews now and then--except that if I ever got caught at the fucking I'd lose my day job and a whole lot of possibilities in life. The money may be worth the sex (i.e, the dude-centric sex with ugly dudes), but unless I want to commit myself to the lifestyle it's not worth the sex and the risk.
And I don't want to commit myself to the lifestyle because odds are I can't be a $500 whore. (Also because I don't want to choose between lying to my dad and horrifying him.) I like sex well enough and I've got a decent work ethic, but I'm not conventionally gorgeous, I'm not great at mustering up enthusiasm for sex acts and partners I'm not into, and I'm downright terrible at the whole charming-sexy-manner thing that separates the "courtesans" from the Pac Hiway hookers. (I don't think I'm Pac Hiway material either, by the way, but somewhere on the Craigslist midlist. I could probably get somewhat more than my current salary, but not enough to compensate for the risks and sacrifices.) Just because a woman can get $500 an hour for sex doesn't mean any woman would get that if she played enough pricing games.
Certainly, prostitution isn’t for every woman. You have to like sex enough, and be willing to make some sacrifices, like not having a husband (unless he is very understanding, or very greedy).
Most hookers do have husbands or boyfriends; there are plenty of "very understanding" men out there. But me, I like sex enough to not be a hooker. Because it's sex that I like, not hooking, and no disrespect to hooking but those are two very different things.
I didn't read your link to the Freakonomics guys, but they may have a point.
ReplyDeleteFirst, if the man involved *perceives* sex with Mary Jane next door as "free," then the result to an economist is the same as if it were free--the hooker has to compete with the customer's perception, not reality.
Second, if the man involved understands the difference you're talking about (reference Charlie Sheen's famous observation that he didn't have to pay hookers to get laid, he had to pay hookers to get laid without stalking or strings attached) he still has a choice to make between paying money and going the barter route. The women willing to barter sexual pleasure only in exchange for reciprocal sexual pleasure are still in competition with her, and they don't have cash flow or overhead issues (her willingness to make a deal is tied to her ability to eat and keep the lights on, while if they don't find a "deal" they think is good enough, they can forego sex indefinitely, and many do. That might not be ideal, but they won't starve or freeze.)
Besides, gun nuts all know someone who thought he'd be great at selling guns because he loves guns. My dad did it for a few years . . . it was his dream . . . now he's over it. We have a saying that goes something like, "If you love something, think twice before you make it your job." See Tamara por ejemplo.
Don - Man, I know that guy too. He got fired from the gun shop for being snotty to the people who didn't come in as flawlessly educated as he was. Idiots are one thing, but when you start making fun of well-intentioned people who are just new to shooting, it's time for you to get a job where you can have a little more humility.
ReplyDeleteHookers and sluts may be the same to some guys, but the Freakonomics dudes aren't just talking about women who do random dudes off Craigslist (an activity which burned even me out rather fast as it can make you feel like an unpaid whore too)--they're talking about women who have "friends with benefits" or even women who have premarital sex with their boyfriends!
More than 70% of the men in his generation have sex before they marry, compared with just 33% in the earlier generation.
So premarital sex emerged as a viable substitute for prostitution. And as the demand for paid sex decreased, so too did the wage of the people who provide it.
Maybe Mary Jane next door is like a free hooker, but it's pretty offensive to say that Mary Jane your live-in girlfriend of three years is like a free hooker.
And yet . . . I'm no expert, but I've read that there IS statistical evidence that it was a lot more common and a lot more expected that young men would visit "houses of ill repute" in the days when premarital sex with marriageable women without the exchange of money was a lot less acceptable.
ReplyDeleteIt's only a correlation, but it does suggest that there's an effect.
Maybe Mary Jane next door is like a free hooker, but it's pretty offensive to say that Mary Jane your live-in girlfriend of three years is like a free hooker.
ReplyDeleteExcept in that non-zero sense, she is like a hooker. She's a source for sex. Which means if Bobby Lane is getting some there, some statistical percentage of Bobby Lanes will forgo seeking sex with prostitutes.
Monkey hooker!
ReplyDeleteI'm an escort (in Canada, where it's legal). The fact is, the men I see are paying for me to be there but they are also paying for me to leave. Women who "give it away for free" are doing something so very different from what I'm doing.
ReplyDeleteAnd I kinda miss the "giving it away for free" part.
Sarah, do you not do the amateur version because you choose not to anymore, or is there something about your job that prevents it? I find this fascinating. A lot of grumpy libertarians like me think prostitution should be legal in the U.S., but I don't really have any experience with how things actually work.
ReplyDeleteProstitution in Canada is legal in name only. The activities surrounding prostitution such as solicitation in public (which includes talking about your services on your cell phone)and working in a fixed location, a hotel or your own apartment, is illegal.
ReplyDeleteYou also have to work by yourself, because paying someone for protection or the work space is considered living off the avails and criminalizes them.
So in reality it is actually very difficult to work legally as a sex worker. Granted, most sex workers bend the rules, to reduce isolation and cost and because our safety is at state if we work solo.
Currently a Charter Challenge is being presented by three former/current sex workers to decriminalize the activities surrounding prostitution. This is an effort make work safer for the men and women involved and uphold Canada's human rights laws.
Decriminalizing sex work is largely a labour issue. Sex workers have the right to work in a safe environment without fear of arrest or violence on the job.
-lush
Don, I don't really do the amateur version for a few reasons: 1) sex is very physically demanding and doing it for free impedes my ability to do it at work; 2) The last thing I want to do after hours of having sex is to have more sex; and 3) I don't think it's fair for me to be with someone while I do this. These are all personal reasons!!
ReplyDeleteLush, you are absolutely right. When I said prostitution is legal in Canada, I should have mentioned all the confusing rules and regs associated. I work for an agency and do not do in-calls, making what I do specifically within the confines of the law. It's unfortunate the laws that do exist and although I won't go into a long rant on what I wish was legal, I can say that in-calls are MUCH safer than out-calls or street solicitation.
Re: Craigslist
ReplyDeleteI'm pretty sure there are auto-responders that certain people use to spam every w4m or casual encounters ad. They seem to count on a success of 1 out of 1000 replies.