quote:

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Just a question: why is it that mostly men do this, and not women?

---

I can speculate that men (or women) might hire a prostitute because they are:

- lonely and/or horny, but shy
- in a relationship that doesn't work for whatever reason
- desirous of a non-emotional sexual act
- caught up in the twisted gender relations of our society where sex is a commodity (some want it, others have it, some will sell it)

[ 24 September 2007: Message edited by: CMOT Dibbler ]

Un-real reasons:
a) the so-called "nexus of horniness" - in fact, most johns are married or have a regular partner, more often so than non-clients in fact,
b) "in order to have a more sensual sexual experience with a sexual partner who is skilled in many sexual techniques" NOT - we are usually talking about a hand job, blow job, or quickie with a generally strung-out half-dressed stranger who is trying to get out of the car or room ASAP
c)_______________________________________

(Feel free to cut-and-paste this, adding your own answers)

[ 29 September 2007: Message edited by: martin dufresne ]

Sociologist Said Bouamama and journalist Claudine Legardinier interviewed prostituted women and men and asked them to answer this very question, i.e. to describe their clients' motivations.

Here is an excerpt from their book Les clients de la prostitution - l'enquête (Presses de la renaissance, Paris, 2006:

"Nos interlocutrices - et interlocuteurs - qui, face à la dureté du quotidien, montrent une force et des ressources stupéfiantes, décrivent froidement les hommes qui les paient. À les entendre, il y a "de tout". Pour reprendre et rassembler leurs termes : "Des jeunes et beaux qui ont tout pour plaire, des orduriers qui laissent les filles en larmes, des types avec une odeur de sueur, des gentils, des odieux qui jettent les billets par terre pour vous forcer à les ramasser, des pathétiques dans une grande misère humaine, des hommes qui en veulent pour leur argent, des pervers qui demandent qu’on les piétine ou qu’on les fouette, des types prêts à allonger des fortunes pour faire de vous une esclave, des hommes malheureux qui voudraient un sentiment de la part de la prostituée, d’autres pour qui les femmes n’existent pas. Énormément d’hommes qui aiment les gamines. Des RMistes qui se tapent un délire. Des gars qui pensent qu’ils ont tous les droits parce qu’ils ont payé. Des obsédés, mais pas tant que ça. Des maris qui enlèvent leur alliance et la remettent à la fin. Des malades qui vous disent : "Tu pourrais être ma fille." Des violents qui essaient de vous étrangler avec une ceinture."

More at http://sisyphe.org/article.php3?id_article=2334

[ 24 September 2007: Message edited by: martin dufresne ]

quote:

---

Originally posted by martin dufresne:
Un-real reasons:
a) the so-called "nexus of horniness" - in fact, most johns are married or have a regular partner
b) "in order to have a more sensual sexual experience with a sexual partner who is skilled in many sexual techniques" NOT - we are usually talking about a hand job, blow job, or quickie with a generally strung-out half-dressed stranger who is trying to get out of the car or room ASAP
c) To conduct a police investigation of a massage parlour (See: Reasons for Judgment released on June 22, 2007)

[ 24 September 2007: Message edited by: martin dufresne ]

---

And I qoute from that Judgement:

quote:

---

The officer then asked the attendant what services were available and she responded that she would not do full sex or oral sex. She did say that for an extra twenty dollars she would go topless. The officer said okay and the female then removed her top. The attendant also advised the officer that he could touch them a little if he wanted. The female continued to massage the officer’s legs, back, buttocks and shoulders for about twenty minutes. She then asked if he would roll over. She then began to massage Constable Cole’s chest area and asked if he wanted her to massage him anywhere else. The officer said “yes”. The female asked that Constable Cole show her. He then directed her hands to his groin area. She placed her hand on Constable Cole’s penis, and said “here”. The officer said “yes”. The officer then testified that she asked him if he wanted more oil. Constable Cole said “yes”. Then “she put more oil on her hands and then brought her hot hand back onto my penis and it was at this point that ____________________________________________

---

Feel free to cut and paste and fill in whatever "happy ending" you prefer.

[ 24 September 2007: Message edited by: Cueball ]

quote:

---

Originally posted by CMOT Dibbler:
What I am certain of, is that no good can come of making sex work illigal.

---

I don't have an opinion about this one way or another. I haven't read up on the issue.

What if a person was possessed of a physical state whereby traditional dating, might not be an option available to them but they wished to also to experience the kinds of things most people have a reasonable expectation of experiencing in their lives, and so enjoy their life to the fullest, say by the commissioning of a hand job? In those circumstances would you consider hiring a professional person to accomodate your desires and needs an expression of the powerful over the powerless, or an act of empowerment?

Or is sex only a privilege of the able bodied?

[ 24 September 2007: Message edited by: Cueball ]

quote:

---

Originally posted by martin dufresne:
A pleasant alibi but not the case.

---

So you are saying that some people who are disabled should simply go without sex for there entire lives? And were they to hire someone for this purpose the real reason would to excericing their dominant economic position in society for the sake of feeling their own male power and for "no-strings-attached sex" and to ""get it" on demand, without the price associated with an actual relationship"?

Sounds kind of ablest to me. I didn't realize that physically disabled people were part of the dominant economic elite. You're saying no consideration should be made for such persons?

[ 24 September 2007: Message edited by: Cueball ]

Disabled people seeking sex from prostitutes would be merely be expressing their latent "dirty whore" fantasies and the like?

In anycase have you read any scholastic material covering this subject area, pertaining to prostitution and disabled people, or only the stuff that supports the case that suits your prejudices?

Perhaps you could start here:

quote:

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Exposed: the last taboo

Sex and disability are rarely discussed in the same sentence. Even less is said about prostitutes and surrogates. But these sexual services exist and, for better or worse, some disabled people use them. Sarah Hobson investigates

---

Disability Now

[ 24 September 2007: Message edited by: Cueball ]

quote:

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TLC is a group of disabled and non-disabled people who work together in a voluntary capacity, to provide information and contact opportunities so that disabled people have access to the best possible commercial sexual services. We also provide background support for our sex workers.

---

quote:

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Meanwhile Rebecca, 27, says: "As a disabled woman, the only thing I can't do that my able-bodied friends can is have sex. I am severely disabled, although I can go to night-clubs and pubs and lead a full life. I would like to have a surrogate boyfriend if he treated me as an equal - I would hate to be patronised. But I live in a residential home so I need to know that the men are police checked otherwise the manager won't let me see them."

---

[ 24 September 2007: Message edited by: Cueball ]

quote:

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John, a wheelchair user in his 30s, has no sexual experience at all. He has a job and lives with his parents in a rural part of Northern Ireland, but sex has never been discussed. He cannot use dating agencies, he says, because he is physically unable to open mail and does not want to bother his personal assistants (PAs).

---

It's interesting, that whole appropriation of voice thing, huh?

[ 25 September 2007: Message edited by: Michelle ]

quote:

---

Originally posted by jas:
Out of respect for Cueball, we could perhaps change the thread title to: why do able-bodied men use prostitutes?

---

yes, and I would answer: men have greater power, freedom and means to pursue their desires, and notoriously can separate sex and love to a greater extent than women, while being at far less risk of its consequences

hence the popularity of prostitution throughout history

.

[ 25 September 2007: Message edited by: Geneva ]

quote:

---

Originally posted by Geneva:

yes, and I would answer: men have greater power, freedom and means to pursue their desires, and notoriously can separate sex and love to a greater extent than women, while being at far less risk of its consequences

---

Yes, except I would change a few words. "Power" to "control". Men don't have "power" over other people, they have control. "Freedom" is not a word that applies here, but "means", yes, perhaps.

However women now have means, unprecedented in modern history, to pursue their desires, and yet we don't see a sharp spike in prostitution that serves women, unless these women are using female prostitutes.

but in some niche markets, women are emerging as far more active:
for example, there was a recent film here in France, Vers le Sud (Heading South) starring Charlotte Rampling, about French women and sex tourism -- in this case to Haiti and the Caribbean islands generally:
http://tinyurl.com/38t7pm

http://tinyurl.com/29oq3u

unimaginable in previous eras, now many Western professional women have the social freedom and means to go to an island and rent some young and muscular guy for a night/week or two, and they do

.

[ 25 September 2007: Message edited by: Geneva ]

quote:

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This is probably a fact that goes against the popular notion of the client as being “lonely” and “sexually needy.

---

Martin - saying people with many sexual partners using prostitutes goes against that notion... isn't it like saying fat people shouldn't go to restaurants ? It seems to me that people with a large appetite for such things would be more likely to be a consumer.

quote:

---

Originally posted by jas:
PS: having worked with disabled people before, I know that some of them DO in fact date and do have sex lives, sometimes with the help of their personal attendants.

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by jas:
Out of respect for Cueball, we could perhaps change the thread title to: why do able-bodied men use prostitutes?

---

I can't help but agree with substantive parts of the analysis of power relationships, sex and prostitution, as laid out by Mr. Dufresne above. There is no doubt in my mind that the relative economic factors have impacts both in terms of the ability of men to aquire sex "on demand" and women's decision to provide them, even over their moral misgivings.

I don't think there is any need to argue that here, nor do I think anyone has.

I would say in relationship to the theoretical arguments put forward here by Mr. Dufresne that there are two useful areas of discussion here, one the theoretical framework in which we analyze prostitution in an ideal sense, and the other, how analyse it in its real day to day context of social relations in the light of that theoretical framework so as to have positive impacts the lives of women as a whole.

In the first aspect, those of abstracted theory, I would say that Mr Dufresne's agruements fail to address the issue of women's relationship to capitalism, and makes the mistake of reducing the issue simply to one of sexism, as expressed in patriarchal relations. This is not to say that patriarchal relations are not a major factor in determining how capitalist relations are manifested (for instance in the case of prostitution) but to say that the commodification of sex persists as an aspect of capitalist relations, and also patriarchal ones. Race also seems to play a factor here too, as women who are economically marginalized because of their sex and because of their race are more likely to turn to this means of making a living.

In the real world this means, that simply outlawing prostitution, closing down bawdy houses and the like is going to do no good whatsoever, as long as women continue to find themselves in a situation were it is difficult to economically sustain themselves through other means.

In fact, I believe that arguing for the continued criminalization of it, without critiquing the present social relations as embodied in capitalist relations as we know them and can reasonably effect them at this point in time is to further marginalize prostitutes and make them more vulnerable overall by squeezing them into a social category which can be preyed upon both by the police, and by criminal elements, and also by stygamtizing them and destroying their self-esteem, and thus also making them that much more vulnerable to the forces that prey upon them, and suceptible to drug addiction and the like.

For example, I can not imagine many prostitutes are very comfortable with the idea of calling up their parents and saying: "I just had a really bad date can I come home now," though something along these lines does happen, many end up turning to their pimps in such situations.

Recently a group of protitutes in Vancouver were accosted by a man wielding a gun, who was set upon by a group of pimps, who then took his gun away and shot him.

So, in the real world, aside from the idealized theory, I think Mr. Dufresne's stand contributes too and excibate the opression of women in the sex trade, by stygamtizing them not only in the eyes of society at large but also within the feminist movement itself. This can only compound the problem, IMO.

As to your main point, about "why do able-bodied men use prostitutes," all I can say is that the very debate which has been exposed here about disabled people seeing prostitutes, wether or not that is morally right or wrong, and the consequent proposal to ammend the thread title, leaves me in doubt as to whether or not the community might consider the act of masturbation in all situations to be sexual, and might not consider them to be a humanitarian act of some kind.

[ 25 September 2007: Message edited by: Cueball ]

One would think that someone with such a keen interest in this subject would have links to these sources on hand, but no, you don't.

Is this because you have not read these sources yourself, or because you know that they do not actually match your account and so are limiting access by not providing links, so that people will be more likely just to accept what you say on face value, or are you just a spoilt boy who assumes that other people (mostly women) will do the work for you?

[ 25 September 2007: Message edited by: Cueball ]

Men use prostitutes because they get off on being naughty.

Our society makes prostitution look dirty and like the forbidden fruit. Most men in North America are brought up by Christian households where they are taught that sex is naughty and you shouldn't enjoy it etc.

quote:

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Men use prostitutes because they get off on being naughty.

---

Maybe that's why they want to keep it illegal

[ 25 September 2007: Message edited by: Saber ]

For instance lets at first recognize the historical facts of the laws that have been put into place to criminalize prostitution. Prostitution was not made illegal at the behest of the feminist movement. It is not as if Parliment rolled over one day, discovered Andrea Dworkin, and suddenly realized that it should make prostitution illegal as a necessary means to safeguard women from exploitation.

In fact, it is an age old set of laws, which come directly much older patriarchal forms bound up in Christian morality. That is the fact of its origin.

Interestingly Angela Carter in her work on sex, sadism, sexual agency, pornography, prostitution, and the Marquee De Sade called the "Sadian Woman" suggests a completely different relationship between prostitution and male power.

She suggests that banning prostitution was in fact a means through which patriarchal power structures ensured female fealty to patriarchal marriage relations, since from the middle ages onward one of the only possible means through which women could even hope to secure economic independence, or financial security outside of the patriarchal family was through the avails of selling her body, and that the prohibition against prostitution served to bind her even more to that servitude. She further goes on to suggest that in that context marital relations were really not much more that sanctioned prostitution, bound by social norms, enforced by the church. So in effect banning prostitution served really to enforce the principle that women were fundamentally the property of their husband.

Interstingly, this furthering of restrictions upon prostitution comes at precisely the same time as the general clamping down on womens rights to own property in the middle ages, and the period of witch burning. Few people know it but women had much more independence prior to the Victorian period, and that part of the Christian purge of social undesirables and heretics, of the 16th century (including women who chose to remain independent of mainstream christian culture,) was the revoking of traditional inheritance rights that made wives the first inheritors of family properties, and not the eldest male.

In these circumstances, women had very few options other than marriage, as a means of ensuring their own economic security which were not bound to Patirachal family relations. Carter suggests that prostitution was stygamtized and banned specifically to further restrict women's ability to accumulate independent wealth, and thus bind them to Christian marital relationships, which, given that marriage in most cases was directly an economic/sexual relationship was basicly prostitution anyway, without any liberty whatsoever.

[ 25 September 2007: Message edited by: Cueball ]

Hi Michelle,
Yes, I agree that appropriation of voice is a huge problem, including in debates about prostitution and gender relations in general. I also agree that it is easy to do it – or to give the impression that one is doing it – whenever a man endorses women’s speech about men’s oppression of women, or discusses it from his own experience. I try very hard to avoid doing so – for instance never speaking out without a feminist having at least equal time - but I always listen to women to find out if I am failing.
So despite your jocular tone, I want you to know I am taking this challenge very seriously, which is why I thought a bit before responding - always a good idea!;-)

Would you point out where you feel I have "claimed feminism as my own movement"? I have quoted and referred to women in prostitution, feminists and feminist organizations critical of men's prostituting of women – including men's anti-woman laws and policies –, and I have offered my own analyses of how the law and the courts protect pimps and johns’ treatment of dispossessed women. How is this claiming feminism as my own movement in your eyes?

Also, I wonder how does quoting arguments that seem true to me in a very real – and very painful - struggle between women who disagree about whether or not to legalize pimping/brothels/johns make me responsible for their words « used as a weapon » against advocates of said legalization. This struggle existed long before I piped up, I didn't invent it... Indeed, I stayed on the sidelines for years – in the face of a controversy I feared appearing to attempt arbitrating – before women convinced me that men’s role in prostitution and the immense harm we wrought made it imperative for EVERYONE to take a stand. In terms of my choices, I live in Quebec and it was Quebec feminists (at the Quebec Federation of Women) who made the choice four years ago, as did the Canadian Association of Sexual Assault Centres throughout Canada, to draw a distinction between decriminalizing the actions of prostituted people and maintaining social pressure on the actions of the people who prostitute them. I am accountable to those feminist coalitions and have referred you all to their position papers, without pretending to speak in their name or instead of them. So I don’t see how I am appropriating or instrumentalizing their voices as my own in any way when I quote them and document the problem with my work.

Finally, you characterize and implictly dismiss my opposition as « moral ». It is a fact that there is always a moral dimension to Left-wing politics (acknowledging harm and responsibility, siding with the oppressed), but I really believe that it is oppression and not some defective morality I am opposing, especially the "immorality" alleged of prostituted women when men are always absolved sight unseen on a purported basis of "need".

Personally, I have no illusion of moralizing men away from privilege and power (although I know many liberals do), even if I remain optimistic that men will, someday, break ranks and oppose patriarchy in sufficient numbers to make a difference. Yet, I am even more hopeful that the widening rift between ultra-liberal and ultra-conservative strategies will tear down the moral cover that men exploit – both in the Right and in the Left – to use and hurt women, in both paying and non-paying « relationships ».

I am very open to your answers and advice on how to avoid giving the impression you felt. (And I must say right off that I will ignore "Cueball"'s predictable attempt to spin the above words whichever way...)

In solidarity,

Martin

"The pain of destroying male rule won't be worse than the pain of living with it." (Andrea Dworkin)

[ 26 September 2007: Message edited by: martin dufresne ]

Our society is both overly and underly (okay I made that word up) obsessed with sex and sexuality.

Overly in the ways that sexist behaviours and actions towards women (and "the feminine") are simply everywhere. Naked images of women sell jeans, perfume, body lotion, cars, etc. Under patriarchy, men are taught that they are entitled to sex, when and with whom they wish. The purchase of sex, reading in Cueball's context above, works hand in hand with patriarchal dominance.

That said, I'm one of the "pro-decriminalizing prostitution" babblers here. I think of it like a union drive for a nuclear power plant. Ultimately we'll be better without the company altogether, but until that day, this is a better solution than the status quo. And there is a huge difference between legalization and decriminalization, which I'll leave for the wonderful babbler lawyers to explain.

Underly in the ways in which we will not talk about sex frankly and openly. Starting with children, teens and then us alleged grown-ups. It's a subject to whisper to your girlfriends about or brag to your friends, "Gettin' any?" that kind of thing. We can't talk about sex drives, how it can be higher and lower in different people, or in the same person over our lifetime, hell, over a month, week day!

Talk about condoms in the schools and watch people freak out. Talk about teaching young people, young women and young men, about STIs, pregnancy, getting to know your own body and what's pleasurable, and watch people across the political spectrum lose their minds.

Xtra magazine did a feature on people who identify as asexual, something almost unheard of.

Then if we get into sexual attraction, sexual orientation, we're really into the murk of the vast unknown and it's just "better not to talk about it" or "I don't care what two consenting adults...."

Lastly, a perspective that we have no representation from is the perspective of women (and men) who do sex work, and who hear directly from the clients/johns/customers themselves why they use prostitutes.

My Theories:
1) Prostitution occurs simply because many men (John's and especially pimps) just don't respect women and see them as a commodity rather than a human being.

2) The reason it's men selling and purchasing prostitutes and not women is probably simply because men still are far and away the dominant gender in society.

3) The very fact prostitution still occurs is because we as a society have yet to view women as equals to men.

4) I don't think it has all that much to do directly with horniness/shyness.

[ 26 September 2007: Message edited by: West Coast Greeny ]

Considering that sex-trade work has been a part of pretty much every society on earth throughout all of recorded history, any explanation of the phenomenon should include more than just a look at western society.

I don't see that being in the sex-trade is necessarily more dangerous or demeaning than any other line of work. It is mainly the illegality of sex-work which makes it dangerous.

quote:

---

Originally posted by Dana Larsen:

By the way, if you think you've never paid anyone to have sex, think again. Anyone who has ever rented porn has helped pay someone to have sex. If we truly made paying for sex illegal, all pornography would be illegal as the performers are being paid to have sex.

---

The Dworkin argument essentially comes to the same conclusion, so yes, banning porngraphy is part of the equation here as well.

[ 26 September 2007: Message edited by: Cueball ]

[ 26 September 2007: Message edited by: martin dufresne ]

That should be around on net somewhere, or equivalent.

[ 26 September 2007: Message edited by: Cueball ]

quote:

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Although we recognize that the equality test adopted by Butler is an improvement on Canada's criminal obscenity law, we still do not advocate criminal obscenity approaches to pornography. They empower the state rather than the victims, with the result that little is done against the pornography industry.

We are encouraged, however, that the Butler decision under Canada's new Charter makes it likely that our civil rights law against pornography would be found constitutional if passed there. And we are continuing our work to empower victims to fight back against harm committed by pornographers.

---

In other words, not illegal because it was obscene, but because it is offends the "civil rights" of those who are exploited by pornography.

Now find me the part were she suggest she might be in doubt as to whether or not the community might consider that pornography is in all situations a violation of civil rights, perforce, based on her analysis of the functioning of pornography in society?

[ 26 September 2007: Message edited by: Cueball ]

quote:

---

Tessa: Portrait of a Working Girl
by Peter Berton

Tessa (not her real name) is an escort. In plain English, she has sex for money.

Now Tessa is not stupid, nor pathetic, nor under coercion. She is a smart, self-directed woman who has chosen this life because she likes the hours and the very good pay. “I can spend my day with my son, then go out and make an excellent living,” she tells YNOT.

Tessa didn’t plan to be an escort. Instead, things progressed in her life until she came to this point. “I was going to school and needed a job, so I started as a shooter girl,” she says. “But then I saw how much money the dancers were making and I wanted to earn as much.”

Once she became a dancer, Tessa soon became aware that other girls were boosting their income by selling sex. “I used to swear up and down that I would never become an escort, and I used to look with total disgust at those girls who were,” she recalls. “But two years later, the money I was making as a dancer wasn’t enough, so I decided to take a customer up on his offer of $500 to meet him at a hotel. After that first time, I didn’t think twice about it.”

Today, Tessa splits her time between dancing and escorting. “I do both my jobs at the club. I don’t post ads; that would be too dangerous,” she explains. “About 60 - 70-percent of the people who come to the club are looking for more than a dance. So I arrange to meet them somewhere; usually a hotel. I also go to upscale bars and meet my clients that way.”

As with any job, the quality of clients varies. “Some expect you to be their therapist and to listen to them whine and complain about how rotten their lives are,” she says. “Others fall in love with you after the first time and mistake the sex for something more than it is. But there are also those who are just nice guys, who understand that you a professional providing a service, and treat you as such. I’ve got one regular who I see every week who is like this. He is bright and personable and fun to be with.”

So which job is better; being a stripper, or a call girl? “It’s better being an escort than a dancer,” Tessa replies. “When you’re a dancer, you have to wait until you can convince a customer in the bar to go to the back room with you. That can take up to an hour. But being an escort, you have people calling and asking to meet you, without the small talk that you have to go through in the club.”

---

quote:

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Today, Tessa is committed to being a dancer, escort, and a mother. She knows that someday she’ll have to find other work – “guys always want younger girls; that’s part of the fantasy” – but for now she’s content to do what she does.

“This life isn’t for you if you’re not really comfortable with yourself and your body,” Tessa tells YNOT. “You have to be strong, keep off the drugs, and never lose sight of who you are and what you care about. But hey, the money is really, really good.”

---

quote:

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Originally posted by martin dufresne:
Well, that's our answer to the original question, n'est-ce pas?
To provide women comfortable with their bodies a wonderful and very lucrative experience.
Ain't we sweet?...

---

Why is prostitution bad?

If it were legal and prostitutes had the protection of the police it would not be as exploitative and frightening an industry as it is today.

The criminalization of prostitution is highly exploitative of women. Prostitutes are denied the basic rights of protection that the rest of society have. Why? Is what they do so bad?

I understand that martin dufresne is arguing for decriminalization. I support that. I think however that a truly modern and rational society would legalize prostitution completely.

There are so many stereotypes of both sides of the transaction, and little understanding, beyond the superficial exchange of money for sex, of what really motivates. It isn't the obvious capitalistic exchange of service for money that we don't understand, it's the motivation for stepping outside what is deemed "acceptible" by the standards of the day.

quote:

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Originally posted by martin dufresne:
Saber asks: "Why shouldn't men pay?"

Why indeed? And why should they get sucked off when they do?

---

I'll tell you what bothers me about this statement. It's sexist.

Men do not have the right to tell women what is and is not degrading for them. Back when women were chattel, bought and sold in a male dominate marketplace, in which the most common business transaction was marriage, women protected their value by protecting their virginity. Well, not any more. We're not cars.

People who enjoy seeing women as inferior will often talk about women's victim hood or degradation. It's more politically correct to talk about their degradation than their inferiority. But what is degradation? The devaluing of. So, if a man gets to say what degrades a woman, he gets to say what lowers her value. However, this language is often heard as "feminist". As though looking down on a woman but pitying her at the same time is somehow more feminist. Then, there is the inverted form of this "victim- feminism" which is to blame women for their victimization.

I find it interesting that women are often blamed for their victim hood when they do something that brings the scorn of patriarchal society upon them. When they break men's rules, it lowers their value in a male dominated society. They are therefore stigmatized. The stigma limits their agency. Having had their agency limited, they are oppressed by society. However, people rarely see that it is not the act itself that has lead to this diminished agency and victim hood but rather society's punishment of the act; the punishment for disobeying patriarchal rules. In this case, market rules.

Your comment supports the very sexist hegemony that you are telling women to protect themselves from by obeying.

What is to be stigmatized about a blow-job?
1) It cannot get a woman pregnant
2) In terms of STD infection it is several times
safer for a woman than vaginal sex.
3) It gets a man ready for vaginal sex, if that
is what the woman wants

quote:

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Originally posted by Bacchus:
About a friend of mine:

Portrait of an escort

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Gee, I've never heard any empowerment stories of real-life escorts before This makes me feel so much better about paying someone to sexually service me. Yay.

And a site that features naked-breasted women and links to "porn access" is obviously a great basis for discussions in the feminism forum.

But the history of labour is one of fighting coercion. The reason why we don't have Guaranteed Livable Income is directly linked to the importance of coercion to accommodate capitalist and male pressures, despite the traditional discourse about workers' "consent" and "free choice", so often imposed by liberals and conservatives alike in labour issues. (Didn't they use to say the same about other forms of exploitation, e.g. slavery and, more recently, child-buying?)

My point is that we have a collective responsibility to stand up to these pressures, validate voices of resistance - and a long history in the Left of doing so.

Workers have given themselves - through back-breaking activism - legislation to limit employers and clients' choices. Sweatshops are illegal, so is harassment, minimum salaries have been struggled for and obtained - even if many categories of women remain deprived of these basic rights.

I feel that the current neo-liberal reform project of decriminalizing pimping and brothel-keeping - in order to better accommodate tax-paying businesses freedom to further exploit women's current lack of real options in a racist, sexist workplace - is something that should similarly be identified and resisted - as most women in prostitution resist them - even when this project is touted by some as women's choice.

[ 28 September 2007: Message edited by: martin dufresne ]

I supported Saber’s point that men should pay. Men/we have a grossly unfair proportion of the money. Indeed, we - like pimps - make most of it off women’s backs. Income redistribution is a matter of justice (and it is a crime that neo-liberal/conservative policies collaborate in gutting it). My point was that men shouldn’t be entitled to « sexual servicing » for ceding piddling amounts of this money. It is their choice of acts, not women "committing" this or that that I am challenging (as a fellow man).

Saber says that men have no right to tell women what is and is not degrading to them. I agree. But are men entitled to support women with first-hand experience who testify that men knowingly degrade and exploit them in prostitution and who resist the prospect of the State normalizing this state of things? Are men entitled to take at face value these women’s words about their lives – as I have been doing here – and to act on these women’s calls for support? Must men's contributions be limited to anonymous claims that anonymous female friends think it's great? I think – and I am convinced that Saber will agree – that this is for women to decide.

Saber suggests that it is fellatio I am attacking. It would be fascinating to someday address men’s symbolic investment in this specific ritual, but my argument was limited to prostitution i.e. whether sexual servicing (of any form) should be a male-ordained condition of income redistribution.

Is it to « look down » on women to state – as many prostituted and non-prostituted women do – that pimps, brothel-owners and johns look down on (and indeed oppress) women in prostitution? Again, I feel that this is for women to assess, but if the field of domestic violence is an indication, front-line workers have overcome the liberal pretense that to acknowledge and oppose coercive conditions was always equivalent to "victimizing" women.

Finally, is prostitution really "disobeying patriarchal rules"? I know that Penthouse and the sex-liberal canon in general say so, but I doubt it. The argument that it has been around since the beginning of patriarchy suggests the contrary, and validates the feminist analyses of men's choices and decisions around marriage AND prostitution as strategies of appropriation.

Thank you for addressing the crux of the matter.

[ 28 September 2007: Message edited by: martin dufresne ]

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Originally posted by martin dufresne:
Saber says that men have no right to tell women what is and is not degrading to them. I agree. But are men entitled to support women with first-hand experience who testify that men knowingly degrade and exploit them in prostitution and who resist the prospect of the State normalizing this state of things? Are men entitled to take at face value these women’s words about their lives – as I have been doing here – and to act on these women’s calls for support? Must men's contributions be limited to anonymous claims that anonymous female friends think it's great? I think – and I am convinced that Saber will agree – that this is for women to decide.

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But anonymous heresay claims by people who agree with your predetermined ideological fixations are just AOK.

Such as:

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In 1984, a Montreal woman was pressured by her UIC agent into accepting a nude dancing job. She had to raise a big stink in the media to avoid losing her benefits.

I was told last year by Quebec City welfare rights advocates that female beneficiaries are pressured all the time by investigators into turning tricks instead of going on collecting welfare.

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The fact is that the number of named real-life prostitutes who argue against your position is large. You selectively ignore these voice, and supplant it with yours, simply by ignoring them,

The "good" proselytizing psychologist, kindly telling women what is really wrong with their lives , instead of accepting at "face value these women’s words about their lives."

PEN

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Legislators of this century have continued to fail to realise that prostitutes are not a special breed of women with compulsions to indulge in criminal behaviour... socially, culturally and psychologically prostitute women pursue lifestyles little different to the millions of other single working women, wives and mothers in the... community. Popular mythology keeps prostitute women separated from other women in people's minds, while the law, founded as it is in 19th century puritanism, keeps them separated in the social order -- Roberta Perkins

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Working girls : prostitutes, their life and social control

Instead you insist on telling women in the sex trade what they want, as opposed to hearing what they say want. In other words you tell them what you want them to want.

[ 28 September 2007: Message edited by: Cueball ]

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Gee, I've never heard any empowerment stories of real-life escorts before This makes me feel so much better about paying someone to sexually service me. Yay.

And a site that features naked-breasted women and links to "porn access" is obviously a great basis for discussions in the feminism forum.

wtf ?

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Originally posted by CMOT Dibbler:
My god, but your a prat.

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Originally posted by Michelle:
You mean like this?

I meant to mention this earlier - let's not fall into namecalling.

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And a site that features naked-breasted women and links to "porn access" is obviously a great basis for discussions in the feminism forum.

wtf ?

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Originally posted by jas:

Gee, I've never heard any empowerment stories of real-life escorts before This makes me feel so much better about paying someone to sexually service me. Yay.

And a site that features naked-breasted women and links to "porn access" is obviously a great basis for discussions in the feminism forum.

wtf ?

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Originally posted by EriKtheHalfaRed:
I saw an ad with real live women saying how the latest skin-care product made them look and feel years younger. Therefore it must be true.

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Originally posted by martin dufresne:
Whatever we say, focussing on women evades the thread question : "Why do men use prostitutes?" - and protects men's choices.
Prostitution and Male supremacy

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Then one might ask, what is a thread about men doing in the Feminism forum?

Your attempts to eliminate any female discourse outside of what you deem pertinent is patently see through. Here persons introduce real live women talking about being real live prostitutes, and you now want to exclude their testimony. On the other hand the theories of Andrea Dworkin are apparently fair game.

You have chosen Andrea Dworkin as the woman you can use to assert you paridigm, and now want to make hers the only feminist voice, which can be heard from.

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Originally posted by EriKtheHalfaRed:
Is there any indication that Penthouse Forum isn't based on real life experiences? Sorry, but it's onething to argue for less punitive laws re prostitution and porn, it's something else again to insist that many women 'choose' this profession. A few perhaps, but very few.

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Why not read the links that I provided including an comprehensive study, based on scientific surveys of prostitutes in Australia, and also the link to PEN a US base prositutes advocacy group. I didn't bother to look for any T&A so, I can't vouch for the advertising on the PEN site.

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Whatever we say, focussing on women evades the thread question : "Why do men use prostitutes?" - and protects men's choices.

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What is your comment on sex trade workers who oppose your views, where do they fit in with the your feminist movement?

Try this on:

Trafficking

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In her paper of 1999, Jo Doezema has pointed out that the current panic over the trafficking of women and children has a historical precedent in the panic over the white slave trade in Victorian times. This moral panic was used to provide hysteria against brothels, and convince the public that prostitutes were not "loose women" but "innocent victims of men". Newspapers sell on stories of asexual vulnerable people being shipped around the world and imprisoned in sex slave camps.

Jo goes on to say, "To the myth of the white slave's innocent has been added the third world difference of supposed ignorance, faithfulness to tradition and sexual backwardness. The myth of white slavery / trafficking in women is ostensibly about protecting women, yet the underlying moral concerns are with controlling them."

Jo suggests that women who migrate for the sex industry can only be freed from violations of their human rights if they are first freed of their mythical constraints.

[SNIP]

A number of today's campaigns have become a platform for reactionary and paternalistic voices, advocating a rigid sexual morality under the guise of protecting women, and incorporating racist and classist perceptions in their analysis of the sex industry in developed countries. Often, "trafficking" is used by states to initiate and justify restrictive policies.

The police and other authorities have reasons to exaggerate reports of 'slavery' in which sex workers are unable to select their clients or decide what services they will give. Scare-mongering creates jobs.

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Originally posted by jas:
Cueball, I think you missed the point of his comment, which I thought was very incisive:

Nor is anyone trying to exclude "female discourse" here, that I can tell. It appears there are very few women participating in this discussion, possibly because the question in the thread title is being asked primarily of men, not women.

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Dufrensen most certainly is. People introduce testimonies from some of the women who do this work, and Dufresne then decides we should go back to the "thread topic:" Men "using" prostitutes. How does he do this? He does this by refering us to a theoretical document by Andrea Dworkin.

Ergo, the theories of Dworkin are allowed, testimonies from women in the sex trade that contradict Dworkin are not.

To the point: Dworkin's thesis is that tricking is essentially exploitative -- ergo we conclude that the prima facie reason that "men "use" prostitutes" is for the exact purpose of exploiting them. However, this equation completely falls apart if you introduce testimony that indicates that prostitution is not in all cases exploitative from the women who are presumably being exploited in the first place.

[ 28 September 2007: Message edited by: Cueball ]

eta: I mean to say the men on the demand side of this equation.

[ 28 September 2007: Message edited by: jas ]

At no point in time has Dufrensne responded to any of that counter argument, and when it appears he ignores it, or in this case attempts to get the subject back on topic, which is according to him "mens desire to exploit women," as expressed through "using" prostitutes. From one, the other is deduced: the relationship is exploitative, so therefore the men must be seeking to exploit women, when they seek out prostitutes -- simple.

The problem is that if one can show that not all sex-trade workers are coerced, then they are not being abnormally exploited, at least beyond normal standards of exploitation common in most work places. If they are not exploited then the proof that men seek out prostitutes as an expression of their desire to exploit women, is severly compromised.

As for your question, I am the only person who as answered it, actually.

[ 28 September 2007: Message edited by: Cueball ]

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Originally posted by Cueball:

As for your question, I am the only person who as answered it, actually.

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Originally posted by Cueball:
Well the only time I ever went to a prostitute it was because I wanted to know what going to a prostitute would be like. What is it like to pay for sex?

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This may make up the majority of sex-trade work, but it is hardly the only kind. I mentioned above that women and couples also hire sex-workers, if to a lesser extent. Do women and couples hire sex-trade workers for different reasons than men do?

Another aspect to the question, is what about men (or women) who see dominatrixes?

Consider a man who pays a sex-trade worker to dominate him and sexually humiliate him, but with no actual sexual contact. Does this count as a "man who uses prostitutes"? Do you think the reasons this person would hire a prostitute are the same or different as a man who hires a sex-trade worker for a different kind of experience?

What about a man who hires a prostitute to dominate him and use a strap-on to penetrate him and give him sexual pleasure that way. Is he also "using a prostitute" in the same sense as a man who hires a prostitute for a more conventional sexual experience?

I think a broader perspective would reveal that people hire sex-trade workers for a wide variety of reasons. I agree that some people who hire prostitutes are people who hate women and seek to degrade and harm them. But I don't agree that all, or even a majority of people who hire sex-trade workers are necessarily abusive, disrespectful or even distasteful. There's a wide spectrum of human behavior.

A good public policy would be to use regulations and controls to make adult sex-trade work as safe as healthy as possible, like we do with every other profession.

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martin dufresne:

Well, that's our answer to the original question,
n'est-ce pas?
To provide women comfortable with their bodies a
wonderful and very lucrative experience.
Ain't we sweet?...

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EriKtheHalfaRed:

I saw an ad with real live women saying how the latest
skin-care product made them look and feel years
younger. Therefore it must be true.

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How dare you use words spoken by a woman working in her capacity as an actress to discredit the words of a woman who is delivering a personal testimony. Is your inability to discriminate between fact and fiction limited to your perceptions of women?

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Jas:
How about you stop "protecting" the sex-workers for a
few seconds (it's OK, they can take care of themselves
for a little while), and focussing on the men in this
equation?
eta: I mean to say the men on the demand side of this
equation.

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Well, protecting women is one of the mandates of
Feminism. If you don’t like it. Get off the thread.

I understand that the official argument being put forward by some of these individuals is that prostitution should be decriminalized and that Johns should be punished.

The rhetoric that these individuals are using to support these arguments however is misogynous. The top quote by martin dufresne is a prime example of this.

Let us consider for a moment a form of labour other than sexual labour. Let us consider sweat shops. Would you argue for the rights of factory workers internationally by ridiculing the people who work in them? Would you discredit statements issued by their unions? Would factory work be so bad if it were properly regulated? The argument against sweat shops is that they operate illicitly, in countries where there is little or no labour legislation. Well that is the same argument that I am making about prostitution. And if we want proper regulation of the industry it is going to have to be regulated by the workers.

Envisioning a better life for women should be the focus on this thread. It is my hope that sex-trade workers will continue to organize and form unions that enable them to operate independently and with full protection under the human rights code. Why would we want an industry populated by individuals marginalized by the economy and by society not to be shaped by the people who are immediately depending on it. Women working in prostitution are immediately dependent on that trade for their livelihood. Why should they not determine their working conditions? Can you think of any reason?

[ 29 September 2007: Message edited by: Saber ]

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As for your question, I am the only person who as answered it, actually.

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Can you blame men for not answering? Babble is many things, but it is NOT a councilor's office. The atmosphere in this thread is highly judgemental, and no John is going to admit to having sexual relations with a sex worker when the risk of being condemned as a mysoginist pervert exists.

[ 29 September 2007: Message edited by: CMOT Dibbler ]

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Originally posted by CMOT Dibbler:
[QB]

Can you blame men for not answering? Babble is many things, but it is NOT a councilor's office. The atmosphere in this thread is highly judgemental, and no John is going to admit to having sexual relations with a sex worker when the risk of being condemned as a mysoginist pervert exists.

[QB]

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[ 29 September 2007: Message edited by: martin dufresne ]

Lets talk about how your moralistic censure, adds to the low self-esteem of the "victims" you are so righteously, trying to lift up from their debased ways.

And above all lets not talk about the fact that the great majority of women in the sex trade would prefer, not only not to be in it, but also not to be persecuted by people like you because they are in it. Denigrated and marginalized so that they are even more vulnerable to the process you say you are opposed to.

You say you only want to prosecute the johns, and not the prostitutes themselves. And this is supposed to make them less vulnerable to being victimized. How so? This is just having your cake and eating it too. It is still illegal activity, which must perforce, go on in secret, away from the eyes of society and the police, and so still create the conditions under which gross exploitation can take place, because the prostitute must protect her client, or give sufficient assurance that he will be protected, in order for her to be able to ply her trade.

Even if you were to squash the industry by throwing all the Johns in jail, you propose nothing to alliviate the basic economic stresses that make many women take up prositution, and at the very best you may make it impossible for them to make any living whatsoever, the very condition they are trying to escape by becoming prostitutes.

You have merely replicated the conditions you say you are trying ameliorate.

[ 29 September 2007: Message edited by: Cueball ]

I am fascinated by his, CMOT's and Saber's apparent inability to justify - or indeed address in any fashion - the reason(s) for men's use of women in prostitution.

All we are treated to are attempts to convince us that any feminist critique of johns, pimps, brothel-owners and complicit politicians are "really" assaults on the women being used.

Not only used by johns, but by prostitution apologists, apparently, a ploy with a long-standing tradition in the Left.

"CHICKS UP FRONT!"
Lynda Obst, producer of a TV show called The Sixties, says in an interview: "...the women's movement grew out of such '60s contradictions as men dominating the activist meetings where women, instead of creating policy, were being used as a blunting force. "Chicks up front!" was a familiar rallying call at the protests because no one thought the troops would fire on women."

It's hard not to see this is still happening when Bacchus' way of addressing the thread question is to proffer an alleged testimony (written by another man) about one more anonymous happy hooker, posted on "YNOT.com: the Ultimate Adult Webmaster Resource Site"

Well-deserved sarcasm about this pathetic copout - where I simply pointed out the logic behind Bacchus' post: justifying men's use of prostitutes by a prostituted woman's fulfillment - is presented as if I rather than prostitution apologists were pushing women in the line of fire... A simple quote of "Tessa"'s words in a straight summary of this text is huffily labeled "misogyny", as if it was her I was challenging rather than "Bacchus" for using her in this manner.

Tokenism?
One of the more pleasant moments of this thread has been "Saber" rattling: "How dare you use words spoken by a woman working in her capacity as an actress to discredit the words of a woman who is delivering a personal testimony?"

Regardless of the veracity of Tessa's (not her real name) story - something none of us can ascertain - I am surprised that Saber seems oblivious to tokenism, i.e. the extent women in prostitution must act, feign fulfilment, tell sex industry journalists - like johns - what they want to hear, indeed the only stuff their media will publish.

"How could you have believed me?"
Trust women who have escaped prostitution who reveal this rigmarole. Ulla, the most visible of Lyon's "sex workers" during the seventies, recently challenged the liberal feminists who had bought and applauded her apparent empowerment at the time: "Comment avez-vous pu me croire?" (How could you have believed me?) (1) She even revealed that it was her pimp who had been writing her speeches...

I know I shouldn't even honour with a response the gross insults used here to evade men's choices, silence skeptics of the Official Story and misrepresent/caricature/vilify feminist critiques of commercial sexual exploitation and detailed proposals to end it.(2)

The simple fact that so much of this thread has been spent doing this, i.e. actively sidestepping men's choices and responsibility, speaks volumes. Still, it's a sign of progress: it wasn't that long ago that men didn't even have to bother with denial and excuses or to hide behind "real women" to protect their gender interests.

__________________________________
(1) From the CYBERSOLIDAIRES webiste:
C'est un métier qui peut être librement choisi, disent plusieurs. Florence Montreynaud connaît très bien l'argument. "Mais je suis assez vieille maintenant pour avoir vu les premières travailleuses du sexe, celles de la révolte des prostituées en France en 1975. Elles disaient : "Nous sommes libres, indépendantes..." Des années après, quand elles ont arrêté, elles nous ont dit : "Comment avez-vous pu me croire?" Je n'ai jamais oublié cette phrase." Elle l'a souvent réentendue depuis. Et il n'y pas là de paradoxe selon elle : "Rien de plus normal qu'une femme dont le corps est transformé en marchandise cherche, par les mots, à garder une certaine estime d'elle-même." Elle ne peut pas croire qu'on puisse "consentir à son propre abaissement".
En 1975, Ulla, la pasionaria de la révolte de Lyon, se clamait libre de tout proxénète et défendait haut et fort le droit à un travail non criminalisé. Aujourd'hui, elle reconnaît qu'elle était "maquée, comme 98% des filles". Ce n'est pas pour protéger son souteneur qu'elle a menti. "Mais pour sauver ma peau. C'était trop dangereux de dire la vérité..." FRANCE: Comment avez-vous pu me croire?

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Originally posted by Cueball:
I don't think that is a very useful comment Fidel.

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What was its intent?

This is a dangerous area where some will lie in wait. Think minefield, IEDs, ambush.

Of course it is and he does. The buyer of "sexual services" gets to define scenarios and uses the person he prostitutes whichever way he has money to pay for.
Carol Pateman, author of The Sexual Contract and an advocate of Guaranteed Income, points out the significant proportion of clients who ask women to masturbate them, something almost all of them could do themselves. She concludes that it is not "sexual services" that clients seek but "the sexual use of a woman for a given period. If not, why would they enter the market and pay for hand relief?"

There may be mental issues involved for some buyers of S-M scenarios, but in fact, a number of formerly prostituted women have described most buyers of these arrangements as men of power (e.g. cops, politicians) whose thrill was to vicariously experience of how (their) power impacts others. These women often said they felt dragged down to these men’s levels of cynicism by being thus manipulated into a position of pseudo-power.

Dana also writes: "I think a broader perspective would reveal that people hire sex-trade workers for a wide variety of reasons. I agree that some people who hire prostitutes are people who hate women and seek to degrade and harm them."

One can look at the feelings and intentions of the people who use women in prostitution (which include no only johns, but also pimps, parlour/agency owners, traffickers, indirect profiteers – hotel owners, advertisers, credit card empires -, politicians and industry lackeys in general) – a necessarily self-centered perspective.

But personal psychology, biases and intentionality aren’t the only keys to the reasons involved, nor even the main ones IMO. Johns need not explictly have "Cueball"'s caricatural "desire to exploit women" to do so and be understood as doing so.

It seems to me that, as "jas" pointed out, to really answer the thread question, we have to foreground the dynamic and net effect of a system, where most buyers aren’t "perverts" but common well-adjusted participants in an overarching commercial/political machinery (that almost always ensures their impunity).

Is this system misogynist for using women (and feminized men and youths) in this manner? I think we can agree it is.

[ 30 September 2007: Message edited by: martin dufresne ]

Men who consume pornography and use prostitutes: normal lusty guys with a healthy sex-drive.

[ 30 September 2007: Message edited by: Cueball ]