The sex trade: (WORMS?) Women on Submarines
Gaye D
"Not to open another can of worms, or even open a new one, I agree with
you-there are abuse victims in the sex trade. But I don't know that all of
them are, or, that those who are not are not enjoying themselves."
The short answer is that selling sex is one of those generically horrible
experiences like cleaning out a septic tank, "voluntry" and "enjoying" are
irrelevant words. But once trapped in it, then I'd say there would be a
contingent that volunteers to get a decent living out of it, especially
considering all the other things it costs them.
The long answer can be found here http://mechanima.cjb.net/hooker.html for
anyone who is interested. The conclusions of 6 years of very involuntary
personal experience.
Gaye D
--
My Homepage:
http://mechanima.cjb.net/
Harry Cameron Andruschak
>"Not to open another can of worms, or even open a new one, I agree with
>you-there are abuse victims in the sex trade. But I don't know that all of
>them are, or, that those who are not are not enjoying themselves."
That has certainly been my impression of the business women (as they like to
call themselves) who work in the Nevada cathouses. However, this is only the
impressions of a customer, not a socialogist or therapist.
This AOL account is used for sending messages ONLY. All e-mail to this address
is blocked to thwart spammers. Use nothingunderkilt@aol,com or write to PO Box
5309, Torrance, CA 90510-5309 or phone 310-835-9202. (But not often at home.)
The Trinker
[snippage]
>Of course, these are just the impressions of a former hooker
over 6 years.
First of all, Welcome!
Not to take away from the truth of your experience, but
I would say that "the sex trade" isn't just about
being a hooker, right? Actually, I'm also curious as
to whether you're defining "hooker" as all women who
engage in sex acts for money, or only those who are also
known as "streetwalkers". Are you including call girls
and "escorts" ?
I know of some "exotic dancers" who did it while
putting themselves in school, etc., who did it for
the money, and quit, and don't have too many regrets
about that period. Likewise women who did peepshows.
Male escorts who seem to enjoy their work, as well.
What about phone sex? I know of phone sex workers
who feel that it's just another job, and do quite
well at it. Not abused, or lacking family support,
or feeling PTSD...
What about porn? (photos, videos, webcams...)
I can believe that a streetwalker/hooker would
experience PTSD after a while, and it's my impression
that it's the hardest of the sex work. I just am not
sure that can be applied to the entire industry.
The Trinker
The proper de-spammed address is
(kat at vincent dash tanaka dot com).
Got questions? Get answers over the phone at Keen.com.
Up to 100 minutes free!
http://www.keen.com
haele
<mech...@hotmail.com> wrote:
> Marc Lechowitz wrote:
> "Not to open another can of worms, or even open a new one, I agree
> with
> you-there are abuse victims in the sex trade. But I don't know
> that all of
> them are, or, that those who are not are not enjoying themselves."
> horrible
> experiences like cleaning out a septic tank, "voluntry" and
> "enjoying" are
> irrelevant words. But once trapped in it, then I'd say there would
> be a
> contingent that volunteers to get a decent living out of it,
> especially
> considering all the other things it costs them.
> The long answer can be found here
> http://mechanima.cjb.net/hooker.html for
> anyone who is interested. The conclusions of 6 years of very
> involuntary
> personal experience.
> Gaye D
> --
> My Homepage:
> http://mechanima.cjb.net/
Very well put...and the articles were right on target and needed to be
written.
To clarify before I go on - I am not in any of the entertainment
trades, I am not in social work - I am in the techie side of
electronics, former military, a supervisor, and there have been a lot
of people from a lot of backgrounds that I have come across, including
some folks with "less than acceptable" jobs when they were younger.
Including two of several hard-working temporary roommates who were
trying to turn their lives around.
My personal experiance with the people who sell or have sold thier
bodies from necessity has only been second hand, and each of them came
from similar backgrounds as your articles have recounted. The
impression they gave was that it was a "just a hated but necessary
quick temporary job for the unskilled" at best, clawing for some form
of personal survival at worse. But whatever their outlook, it was
obvious they hated it. And the experiances still affect their ability
to trust co-workers and anyone who wasn't "family" or handle personal
confrontations.
The few people, male or female, who claimed they would "love to be a
hooker" - if they were willing to quit their day jobs, BTW - didn't
seem to have a clue as to what that "profession" would actually entail.
They seemed only to see the goodtime party boys and girls, the "Pretty
Women" who always seemed to be taken care of.
I would caution people not to mistake the good-time wanna-be's or
meat-market items at the bars with the real thing. And not to be
over-judgmental to the real prostitutes who are trying to turn their
lives around the best way they can figure out.
Haele
Sorry for the lecture, but this issue is close to home.
Constantly wishing good luck in overcoming obsticles and the past to
Peter and Lisha, where ever you are now...I'm proud to have been a
friend, even temporary, to you guys!
* Sent from RemarQ http://www.remarq.com The Internet's Discussion Network *
The fastest and easiest way to search and participate in Usenet - Free!
Gaye D
Harry Cameron Andruschak <andysne...@aol.comnospam> wrote in message
news:20000616194050...@ng-fj1.aol.com...
> >Marc Lechowitz wrote:
> >"Not to open another can of worms, or even open a new one, I agree with
> >you-there are abuse victims in the sex trade. But I don't know that all
of
> >them are, or, that those who are not are not enjoying themselves."
>
to
> call themselves) who work in the Nevada cathouses. However, this is only
the
> impressions of a customer, not a socialogist or therapist.
> This AOL account is used for sending messages ONLY. All e-mail to this
address
> is blocked to thwart spammers. Use nothingunderkilt@aol,com or write to
PO Box
> 5309, Torrance, CA 90510-5309 or phone 310-835-9202. (But not often at
home.)
Ah Harry,
And there is the rub......
If you have no option on being a hooker then you also have no option on
making money at it....
So you have to dissociate from all of your emotions and identity, and
program yourself to be positive about it.
Fine, you get to survive, but you don't get anything resembling a life that
way, over the years that takes an immense toll....
There is research showing that 2/3 of women in prostitution show every
symptom of combat fatigue/PTSD.
A far higher ratio than is ever found in veterans.
http://www.prostitutionresearch.com/
Makes sense.
Because in order to work as a prostitute you have to adopt very similar
coping skills psychologically and emotionally to a soldier under fire.
Prostitution is just as traumatic, though not as physically dangerous. An
unnatural situation...no one is instrinsically equipped to cope with.
For a prostitute that traumatic situation happens 24/7, for the forseeable
future.
Abuse is not a great causal factor in it's own right, so much as the crisis
it plays a part in precipitating some people into.
For example, adult victims of sexual abuse are far less likely to have a
supportive family they can turn to in a crisis.
Of course, these are just the impressions of a former hooker over 6 years.
Gaye Dalton
M Blaze Miskulin
> The short answer is that selling sex is one of those generically horrible
> experiences like cleaning out a septic tank, "voluntry" and "enjoying" are
> irrelevant words. But once trapped in it, then I'd say there would be a
> contingent that volunteers to get a decent living out of it, especially
> considering all the other things it costs them.
> The long answer can be found here http://mechanima.cjb.net/hooker.html for
> anyone who is interested. The conclusions of 6 years of very involuntary
> personal experience.
I haven't had a chance to read through the articles yet, but straight
from the top, I find that I must disagree with you.
While, yes, there is a trauma associated with some aspects of
prostitution, that is not the whole of it. Not all prostirutes are
forced into it (either by persons or by circumstances). Not all
prostitutes must dissociate themselves mentally and emotionally.
There *are* people (men and women) who actually enjoy it. There are
those who see it as a job like any other job. The stifflingly
puritanical atmosphere of the United States paints prostitution as a
terrible, sinful, and degrading act; thus those who will participate
tend to be those who are willing to fit themselves into this role.
In other cultures prostitution is not seen in that light. In many
cultures (more historically than currently, admittedly) prositution was
seen as an honorable and sought-after profession. When a prostitute is
treated as a skilled worker with an honest profession, then skilled and
honest people will seek out the profession.
Even here in the U.S. there are a lot of people who dismiss the notion
that a prostitute is a 'lesser person'. There are those who take pride
in their work, do a good and honest job of it and, yes, even enjoy it.
I met a woman in college who had worked as a prostitute for a while. In
talking with her, I heard stories not of abuse and degredation, but of
lonely men who wanted someone to pay attention to them. Mostly these
were mild, middle-aged, married men whose wives were unwilling or unable
to treat them kindly. According to this woman, the time she spent with
these men was a form of therapy. She convinced them that they were
decent people who deserved kindly attention. There wasn't any abuse.
There wasn't any degredation. She didn't suffer any PTSD. She talked
of her friends in the business, and they, for the most part, were of the
same mind as her. The last I heard, this woman was happily married and
raising a family.
While your experience may have been bad, it does not mean that the same
is true for every person (women *and* men) who has worked or does work
in the business.
--
M Blaze Miskulin
Winterborne Scenic Studios
http://www.winterborne-ss.com
Gaye D
Everything you said is terrific validation....
Especially second hand....sometimes I feel as if I live in a world that is
blind to the obvious.
Gaye
<many snips>
Gaye D
Thanks for the welcome.
The Trinker <katNO...@strigil.com.invalid> wrote in message
news:0009f8b2...@usw-ex0103-024.remarq.com...
> "Gaye D" <mech...@hotmail.com> wrote:
<many snips>
>
> Not to take away from the truth of your experience, but
> I would say that "the sex trade" isn't just about
> being a hooker, right? Actually, I'm also curious as
> to whether you're defining "hooker" as all women who
> engage in sex acts for money, or only those who are also
> known as "streetwalkers". Are you including call girls
> and "escorts" ?
I'm going to go further and say ESPECIALLY call girls and escorts.....
I have a LOT about the ins and outs of this in 3 pieces "How Streetwalkers
are Made" on http://mechanima.cjb.net/hooker.html
But basically, the trauma is not so much caused by the peripheral risks
(although, if severe, they can increase it) it is caused by the act of
having unwanted sex for much needed money.
Sex without desire (and don't anybody kid themselves, that is ALL a
prostitute is offering EVER, though some give great theatre as a bonus) is
repulsive sex. Repulsive sex is a very deep trauma.
I am defining hooker as ANY person who provides facilities for the sexual
release of others in return for money.
Having tried all the other options I eventually preferred to be a
streetwalker because it is less degrading and traumatic, overall, than
escort/massage parlours/brothels etc. Apart from being the only way to avoid
handing over money to any kind of pimp under any name.
But it's a complex issue....
If it interests you check out the pieces.
Gaye
Gaye D
M Blaze Miskulin <brb...@winterborne-ss.com> wrote in message
news:394AD0A4...@winterborne-ss.com...
> Gaye D wrote:
Hi Blaze,
Again <many snips>
"I haven't had a chance to read through the articles yet, but straight
from the top, I find that I must disagree with you.
While, yes, there is a trauma associated with some aspects of
prostitution, that is not the whole of it. Not all prostirutes are
forced into it (either by persons or by circumstances). Not all
prostitutes must dissociate themselves mentally and emotionally."
Really?
And how long did you sell sex for? ;o)))
No, seriously, if there are such people I have never met a single one of
them in three countries.
I have met a few who would CLAIM those things almost all the time...
Until you really got to know them....then the mask would slip and you would
see the truth.
For many women prostitution is about having the raw courage to go on making
the very best they can of a hand dealt by the devil himself.
The "Dissociation" involved is a long term aspect, not just a topical
application to be switched on and off at will.
Gaye
larisa
provide sexual experiences to those with severe disabilities - I
think they call themselves sexual surrogates or something silly
like that. I have read some personal accounts by some of these
people, and they definitely don't describe the experiences as
traumatic - rather, they talk about the good they do for their
clients and the increased confidence and self-esteem that results
from such experiences.
Larisa
larisa
professions. I had the occasion to visit an automobile factory
recently, and saw the workers who work on the assembly line
there. Basically, for 8 hours, you stand there as cars move past
you on the assembly line, and bolt something on - over and over
again at a rate of one per minute. There is no time to look
around, to rest, or to say a word to a co-worker - and even if
there were, it's so noisy that you'd have to shout. You are not
a person; you are just a part of a machine, and are treated as
such. And, needless to mention, if you make the slightest
mistake, you get seriously injured.
While I do not doubt that there are women who are extremely
unhappy being prostitutes, I doubt that prostitution is the only
profession to produce such unhappiness. I know that if I were to
work in a factory like the one I described, I'd go nuts within a
week. I am sure that any of you can name several professions
that you'd rather starve than perform - and prostitution is not
likely to be the only one on that list.
LM
David G. Bell
mech...@hotmail.com "Gaye D" wrote:
So do you see any useful distinction between selling physical sexual
contact, and and other areas of the sex industry. From what you're
saying, making porno movies isn't significantly different (hard core, at
least), but would the lack of physical contact in phone sex make a
difference.
I suspect not...
--
David G. Bell -- Farmer, SF Fan, Filker, and Punslinger.
Copyright 2000 David G. Bell
Gaye D
First, I was raised in a "Motor City", you won't get any argument from me on
factory work!!
No question that it is damaging to those who do it....
The difference with Prostitution is that it affects you on a deeper level,
and damages you 24 hours a day, not just while you are working.
You have absolutely no option on access to a normal emotional life, it isn't
possible.
This is interesting though:
" I might also mention that there are people whose profession is to
provide sexual experiences to those with severe disabilities - I
think they call themselves sexual surrogates or something silly
like that. I have read some personal accounts by some of these
people, and they definitely don't describe the experiences as
traumatic - rather, they talk about the good they do for their
clients and the increased confidence and self-esteem that results
from such experiences."
This one is worth a whole article (watch dis space >
http://mechanima.cjb.net )
For now, let me say it is not that the individual clients are necessarily
traumatic.....
I met some wonderful people I would never usually have met, and got to talk
with them of a far less superficial level than is usual.
But how healthy IS this "surrogate" business, in real terms?
Isn't it really still about divorcing sex from emotion too? That isn't
healthy whichever way you look at it.
Under the surface it is condemning the severely disabled as incapable of
normal relationships.
My cousin was a high functioning Down's Syndrome person, she married. A
friend of mine in Dublin is a wheelchair user (or perhaps "abuser" ;o)))
from birth, and an epileptic. Since he was 16 he has rejoiced in one of the
most enviably healthy and voracious sexual and emotional lives I have ever
seen.
For the "surrogate" (bless 'em, I really LOVE euphemisms ;o)) this is no
more natural than any other form of prostitution.
There is an element of satisfaction...but underlying it is the denial of
access all normal human emotion....
That IS the deepest trauma, and the true damage of prostitution. Access to
normal emotionaloptions is something we take very much for granted right up
to the moment you realise you no longer have it. That moment is devastating.
Most of the damage is already done by then.
To throw in a curiosity. This may be just my experience, but disabled
clients seem to be either the VERY BEST (people it would be a joy and a
priviledge to deal with under ANY circumstances) or the VERY WORST
(OBNOXIOUS!! In spades!!). Never any shade of grey in between.
Maybe that is a whole other topic in itself?
Gaye
The Polymath (Jerry Hollombe)
>
> I might also mention that there are people whose profession is to
> provide sexual experiences to those with severe disabilities - I
> think they call themselves sexual surrogates or something silly
> like that. I have read some personal accounts by some of these
> people, and they definitely don't describe the experiences as
> traumatic - rather, they talk about the good they do for their
> clients and the increased confidence and self-esteem that results
> from such experiences.
Sexual surrogates contract their services to psychotherapists, not
patients. Their task is to be a sexual partner for a patient in
situations where their usual partner is inappropriate or nonexistant.
They are trained and certified to work with pshrinks for the good of the
patient. Calling what they do prostitution is the equivalent of calling
what a surgeon does assault with a deadly weapon.
--
The Polymath (aka: Jerry Hollombe)
http://www.babcom.com/polymath/
http://www.babcom.com/gla-mensa/
Query pgpkeys.mit.edu for PGP public key.
The Trinker
>Hi Larisa,
>First, I was raised in a "Motor City", you won't get any
argument from me on
>factory work!!
>No question that it is damaging to those who do it....
>The difference with Prostitution is that it affects you on a
deeper level,
>and damages you 24 hours a day, not just while you are working.
>You have absolutely no option on access to a normal emotional
life, it isn't
>possible.
>This is interesting though:
is to
>provide sexual experiences to those with severe disabilities - I
>think they call themselves sexual surrogates or something silly
>like that. I have read some personal accounts by some of these
>people, and they definitely don't describe the experiences as
>traumatic - rather, they talk about the good they do for their
>clients and the increased confidence and self-esteem that
results
>from such experiences."
IYDMMA, what's your opinion of people who say that
traditional U.S./European marriage is just a genteel
form of prostitution?
>To throw in a curiosity. This may be just my experience, but
disabled
>clients seem to be either the VERY BEST (people it would be a
joy and a
>priviledge to deal with under ANY circumstances) or the VERY
WORST
>(OBNOXIOUS!! In spades!!). Never any shade of grey in between.
>Maybe that is a whole other topic in itself?
..I don't think that's actually true, really. I think
that people are inclined to view members of any group
they don't normally encounter in those two categories,
especially when they have limited contact and their
original opinions of that group are similarly limited.
People tend to create the dichotomy of "hooker with a
heart of gold" or "soul-dead whore", but surely as with
other groups, most are in between, people trying to get
by in life despite their circumstances.
I've gotten to know all sorts of disabled people, and
believe me, there really are all sorts.
The Trinker
The proper de-spammed address is
(kat at vincent dash tanaka dot com).
larisa
involve the emotions to such an extent that one is incapable of
divorcing one's emotional life from one's work - acting is just
one example, and any art, if seriously practiced, is going to be
all-consuming. Do you think that a serious composer is capable
of divorcing his/her mind from music for even a moment? I'm a
very un-serious composer, and even I have music in my head all
the time, every time (kind of like background music, but all
mine). Now, if I hated music and wanted no part of it, this
would be very traumatic; but since I love it, this is wonderful.
As for emotions - does an actor feel traumatized or empty because
he/she is always acting out emotions that he/she really doesn't
feel? Does a master chef feel traumatized because he/she gets
to cook delicacies that other people eat? Admittedly, some
people, due to abuse issues or other problems, should not get
into prostitution - just as people with eating disorders should
not become chefs. But I think that sex can be as much of an art
as cooking or acting or music. The problem is that most
Americans are extremely traumatized when it comes to sex; our
perceptions of sex are warped and twisted, and we are quite
incapable of enjoying sex the way we enjoy a piece of music or a
good meal (and now that I think about it, our perceptions of food
are almost as twisted). This does not, however, mean that sex
for pay is inevitably a degrading experience.
Hm. Not sure if the above means anything. But, for what it's
worth, here it is.
LM
Lee S. Billings
>
>Hi Larisa,
>First, I was raised in a "Motor City", you won't get any argument from me on
>factory work!!
Hey, another Detroit girl? Where'd you go to high school?
[Larisa said:]
>" I might also mention that there are people whose profession is to
>provide sexual experiences to those with severe disabilities - I
>think they call themselves sexual surrogates or something silly
>like that. I have read some personal accounts by some of these
>people, and they definitely don't describe the experiences as
>traumatic - rather, they talk about the good they do for their
>clients and the increased confidence and self-esteem that results
>from such experiences."
>
>WHEW!!
>This one is worth a whole article (watch dis space >
>http://mechanima.cjb.net )
>For now, let me say it is not that the individual clients are necessarily
>traumatic.....
>I met some wonderful people I would never usually have met, and got to talk
>with them of a far less superficial level than is usual.
>But how healthy IS this "surrogate" business, in real terms?
>Isn't it really still about divorcing sex from emotion too? That isn't
>healthy whichever way you look at it.
This strikes me as similar to the comments Rivka hears from people who think of
regular therapists as "people you pay to care about you." Her recent post on
this topic (the title of which has slipped my mind) answers it far more
eloquently than I could. and I believe much the same argument would apply in
this case.
>Under the surface it is condemning the severely disabled as incapable of
>normal relationships.
This, however, is definitely a valid point. I'd be interested in hearing from
anyone with better than hearsay knowledge of the subject, because I sure as
hell don't know enough to comment!
Celine
--
"Only the powers of evil claim that doing good is boring."
-- Diane Duane, _Nightfall at Algemron_
Gaye D
"So do you see any useful distinction between selling physical sexual
contact, and and other areas of the sex industry. From what you're
saying, making porno movies isn't significantly different (hard core, at
least), but would the lack of physical contact in phone sex make a
difference.
I suspect not..."
Again, I'll go one further, I wouldn't make an objective distinction at all,
subjectively, let me assure you all of those things would be an additional
trauma. There was never a day in my life when I could have done any one of
them with a gun held to my head!!
I suspect that goes for the majority of Hooker and ex Hookers too (as if to
say nuns and traffic wardens would be multilaterally cool with 'em ;o))). I
couldn't strip in public either ;o)))
http://www.themestream.com/articles/49872.html is a piece that makes a lot
of the relevant points on this one.
I don't think though, that striptease ever hurt anybody who COULD do it, it
isn't selling sex, it's performance art (just can I have the option of a
firing squad in the name of humanity?).
Phone sex?
I don't know.
Privately, or commercially, I have simply never had anything that resembles
it, or met anyone who admitted to it!! (I have my innocences too ;o)))
Subjectively, I have a complete horror of erotic talk (not a moral
judgement, a value judgement). I honestly don't have a clue how that would
affect anyone with a normal range attitude to it!!
I'd be interested in others' opinions.
Gaye
Gaye D
"IYDMMA, what's your opinion of people who say that
traditional U.S./European marriage is just a genteel
form of prostitution?"
It can be, I think, it certainly was (unbeknownst to me) at my last attempt
that halted just short of the altar!!
Trouble is, I have to say, this is gonna sound REALLY weird, but my weird,
reclusive life has isolated me from these things to such an extent that I
don't actually KNOW how the traditional marriage WORKS in real terms, I
haven't got a clue.
I just know it SHOULDN'T be like that, but that it could be.
Less so since the big cultural upheaval since WWII which changed the role of
women in society and relationship out of all recognition though.
My feeling is that it depends on the people involved, and the healthier the
relationship is the less likely it is to devolve into a "genteel form of
prostitution".
I know my recent experience (far from normal for many reasons) actually FELT
like "doing the business" 24/7 for six months.
But it was a sick and destructive situation that should never have happened.
All I can say is I would expect and demand far more from a relationship than
that to even consider a permanent commitment to it.
As for disabled people, that curious black/white split ONLY applied to my
experiences as a prostitute (an was not subjective, others confirmed it).
That is what makes it so curious.
Was it pure coincidence? Or are there other reasons? The difference was
really pronounced, and, to me, completely unexpected.
My other experiences of disabled people are in many shades of grey, like
anyone else.
;o))
Gaye
My Homepage:
http://mechanima.cjb.net/
Gaye D
Not Detroit, but the UK equvalent too unspeakable to name ;o))) ACK!!
The ultimate doom was to wind up in the "Rover" factory....
I see your therapist analogy right way.
I have to say this, I am NOT convinced therapy is all that healthy in itself
either.
But with a caveat, if you saw ANY of my convoluted bio you would recognise
I'm screwed up in some very peculiar ways that do NOT respond well to
therapy.
So I do consider myself biased, for having no way to identify with people
benefiting from therapy.
Apart from which, therapy is SUPPOSED to be a means to an end, healing.
Sex, or sexuality is not, it's a healthy part of life.
I'm trying to put myself, as a woman, in the position of a consumer of
surrogate sex now....and it won't go there, the idea freaks me completely on
a subjective level.
I have really had to put some serious work into untangling my emotions and
sexuality into some kind of shape over the past 6 years, and at the end of
it, I can honestly say any kind of "surrogate" experience would have done
untold damage.
I relate it to my experience of the state care system.
In terms of "paid caring".
This is worth an open discussion I think....it 6am here (Ireland). Tomorrow
(today) when my eyes are full open I'd like to chuck that out and find out
how other people feel.
Gaye
Gaye D
To answer some of your questions.
It IS different.....
Prostitution is horrible, nobody chooses it. It's not a vocation or a drive
like acting or music. While it can be incredibly demanding it isn't an
artform or a means of self expression, it releases nothing. It is just a
means of obtaining a survival essential called "money". Your emotions are
not involved in what you do, you have to shut them down, full time, to be
able to cope with doing it. Perhaps even more significantly, you also have
to shut down a great many conditioned psychological and emotional reflexes
(like the one that makes you draw away from being touched by a man you have
neither affection nor desire for, that is actually quite unconscious, to be
a hooker you have to find a way to switch it off), a lot of more basic
instincts, and many inner responses to cultural imperatives. The sheer
stress of doing so is phenomenal.
Sex for pay is not so much degrading as quite naturally and healthily
repellant. I never felt degraded by it, just denied an essential privacy and
autonomy,on a very deep level.
The damage is not in what you feel about doing it, but in how much of your
self and identity you have to shut down to cope with it.
You are in a state of constant tension and hyper vigilance. Quite
instinctively you shut off your capacity to respond to the physical
stimulation.It's unconcious, like shield your head with your hands, or
curling into a foetal position under threat.
Ever notice almost all hookers (ever very thin ones) have at least a slight
"pot belly"?
It comes from so much topical exercise with the belly distended,
unconsciously, to relax the muscles under the bed of the womb and physically
"transcend" all risk of physical arousal.
Schtupping an entire regiment of Marines is fine, as long as you are doing
it out of DESIRE to schtupp Marines. But to provide sex for even one man out
of nothing but a need for money, without desire, is traumatic.
It is a violation of self, in invasion we are not designed to cope with.
As for composers.
I have sat and watched the most incredible music composed on theory alone,
in cold blood, to formula, as clinically as an end of year account....
Thankfully there are other forms of composer too ;o))) (I have collaborated
some too, by MY method, of following the melody to hear in my head where it
wants to go next ;o)))
I write serious fiction too, it can be heavy going, but it is catharitic in
all the same senses that prostitution demands a total paralysis of self.
Paralysis and denial of self, ego, or soul is perhaps the deepest, least
transient damage there is.
Gaye
Gaye D
patients. Their task is to be a sexual partner for a patient in
situations where their usual partner is inappropriate or nonexistant.
They are trained and certified to work with pshrinks for the good of the
patient. Calling what they do prostitution is the equivalent of calling
what a surgeon does assault with a deadly weapon."
Hi Jerry,
Ah sure, we won't get into that war maybe?
If we were going to I would be inclined to say that you would be amazed how
much prostitutes come to understand about human sexuality, in practice, not
theory, in the school of the lowest common denominator:
Their own best interests
Most common sexual dysfunctions consume time for no extra money for a
prostitute. Therefore they have far more of a vested interest in overcoming
then that a therapist has.
I am NOT a fan of therapy as it stands. There is too much "guinea pigging"
of clients towards personal or academic issues of therapists. Too many
therapists are too hung up on theories that have no relation to reality. The
motivation for many therapists to be therapists in the first place appears
to be too caught up in dysfunctional needs to control......
BUT WE AREN'T GOING TO HAVE THAT WAR 'k?
Call my ongoing expose (only just warming up) "The Abuse Industry"
http://mechanima.cjb.net/abuse.htm my contribution to that debate.
And if I can get my pile of jigsaw pieces to fit together into a clear
picture on that, there is a lot of dirt in that laundry, with some
potentially far reaching effects.
Plus the pragmatic, and informed statement that hookers are just as capable
of intelligence, empathy and integrity as anyone else, and more so than at
least some.
The less ethical are filtered out of prostitution by the simple fact that if
you lack ethics, theft or fraud are far softer options than prostitution in
every other sense.
My other point is to again stress I am only concerned with the identical,
underlying, detrimental effect that surrogate sex has on those who
participate in it.
To say a surrogate is hired by a therapist, not the client, is to split a
hair that points towards a hooker being hired by a pimp to service a john.
It means very little in the overview.
Gaye
The Trinker
Gaye,
It sounds to me like your experiences and the experiences
of your (former, right?) colleagues definitely would lead
one to feel that all sex-for-money is abhorrent and
repellent and...
Your words raise a few questions in me. One of them is
whether you feel that you were raised with standard
Christian expectations/attitudes about sex. Another is
how you would feel about people who feel that "sport
fucking" is okay, or sex between friends (rather than
lovers)...sex just for the sake of the fun and camaraderie
rather than as an expression of love? What about
play parties and sex parties?
I wonder as well about your stated aversion to phone/
verbal sex. Does it extend to written forms?
In this particular group, I also wonder about whether
you've read Spider Robinson's thoughts on sex work.
Spider's wrong about many things (and right about
others), so I wouldn't put him forward as any authority,
but I find his thinking interesting.
What are your thoughts on the old trade of the courtesan?
Where's the line between a courtesan and the bouncy
trophy wife?
The Trinker
finding this discussion fascinating.
The proper de-spammed address is
(kat at vincent dash tanaka dot com).
David G. Bell
mech...@hotmail.com "Gaye D" wrote:
> Not Detroit, but the UK equvalent too unspeakable to name ;o))) ACK!!
I hadn't realised the UK connection -- we have a few other social screw-
ups which come into the situation, don't we. At least there are parts
of the USA which can _have_ a hard-core porn industry, whether or not it
is a good thing.
No experience of phone sex, some of the Internet equivalent with one-
handed-typing. There, at least, the keyboard may give a distancing
effect. And I suspect that a lot of people who do it on the 'net have
less RL experience than I.
ARCmage
web site. It was very interesting reading.
He can see your point concerning the idea that having sex with people you
don't want to have it with would be damaging.
Something he found himself wondering about though. Couldn't it be said that
*any* job you are forced to do, and do not enjoy, is damaging? You have
likened prostitution to cleaning septic tanks, pointing out that it is
unpleasant, dirty work. Is it not the case that someone forced into the
septic tank cleaning trade because it's the only way they know how to make
money is similarly injured?
A large percentage of the world is forced to do things they do *not* want to
do, in order to earn the money they need to survive.
Another thing that occurs to the ARCmage is that there are people out there
who find cleaing septic tanks a not-unpleasant way to earn a living. It
follows that there must be prostitutes who are not damaged by what they do,
or at least no more damaged than someone forced to work in the fast food
industry.
--
Sin(The ARCmage)
------------------------------
1
Noah Singman
> It IS different.....
> Prostitution is horrible, nobody chooses it. It's not a vocation or a
drive
> like acting or music. While it can be incredibly demanding it isn't an
> artform or a means of self expression, it releases nothing. It is just a
> means of obtaining a survival essential called "money".
[respectful snippage]
"I'm sorry your experience was so terrible, Gaye. And your experience with
hookers (and as one) is surely broader or deeper than mine, since I've
neither employed one nor been one."
"But I have spoken with young and middle-aged women, over a span of almost
20 years (since my college days), who did perform various sexual or
sex-related acts for money, sometimes for a few years. And none of them
described the experience as negatively as you did. Were all of them lying
to themselves and others? With all due respect, I think your
generalizations are too sweeping."
"There is certainly sex slavery in the world. And there are women who,
through various forms of real coercion, are forced to perform sexual acts.
But barring such coercion, prostitutes do choose their profession - and I
don't consider it a dishonorable one. The fact that millennia of sexual
prudery and other hang-ups have combined to make prostitution illegal in
most places doesn't mean that the job is immoral."
"Prostitution can be degrading. There are many other degrading jobs, most
having nothing to do with sex. Prostitution can be dangerous. So can any
other job in which the work is performed in an intimate setting, with
strangers, while alone - say, being a cabbie in New York. Prostitutes often
give most of the money they earn to pimps, who sometimes seem to do almost
nothing for them. Any non-freelance consultant can tell you about the
significant difference between their billing rate, and their pay rate.
Prostitutes often find their not-for-profit sex lives unpleasant. I know
few people, even those who enjoy their jobs as much as I do, who want to
spend their free time doing the same kind of work. There aren't many jobs
that combine so much unpleasantness so frequently as prostitution (though
I'm quite convinced that legalization would ameliorate some of this). But
that doesn't mean, ipso facto, that prostitution must be an unalloyed
horror."
"There are only two ways to have sex with another. One is by force, which
is always wrong, period. The (only) other is by mutual consent. This
consent may be influenced by preening, which may be facilitated (among other
things) by our looks, charm, wit, or wealth. And when it's the last of
these, in certain more honest and explicit forms, we sometimes call it
prostitution. A pretty arbitrary distinction, I think."
Noah
Elusis
> Sex without desire (and don't anybody kid themselves, that is ALL a
> prostitute is offering EVER, though some give great theatre as a bonus)
Gaye, while I don't wish to discount your experience and knowledge,
having spoken directly to Annie Sprinkle at length about her work in
various permutations of the sex industry, and conducted an in-depth
research project about her career, I have to differ that this is "ALL a
prostitute is offering EVER."
From Annie, and from dozens of other sex workers' written and
performance accounts of their lives, I have heard testimony that
directly contradicts your blanket statement. This is not to say that
sex work is fun and games, that every sex worker loves it, or even that
some sex workers love it all the time. I'm only making this response
because it bothers me to see a generalization without qualifiers like
the one you've made, when I have direct knowledge of evidence to the
contrary.
Elusis
(wishing her web page, which includes her Annie thesis, wasn't offline)
--
http://www.dreamscape.com/elusis ~*~ wear your butterflies proudly -TA
~*~ I am the rightful heir to the flaming global throne of evil. I WILL
TAKE THIS WORLD AS MINE so if you people could just cooperate it would
be very nice. -JV ~*~ Buttless chaps make good business sense! -Dances
Elusis
> from the top, I find that I must disagree with you.
>
> While, yes, there is a trauma associated with some aspects of
> prostitution, that is not the whole of it. Not all prostirutes are
> forced into it (either by persons or by circumstances). Not all
> prostitutes must dissociate themselves mentally and emotionally."
>
> Really?
> And how long did you sell sex for? ;o)))
Although first-hand knowledge of this topic is extremely valuable and
deserving of respect, it doesn't comprise the only valid view.
> No, seriously, if there are such people I have never met a single one of
> them in three countries.
Without knowledge of under what kinds of circumstances you have met
other (former?) sex workers, I have no way to know how self-selecting
(or not) your contacts might have been... :-/
> I have met a few who would CLAIM those things almost all the time...
> Until you really got to know them....then the mask would slip and you would
> see the truth.
I have personally talked to one of the best-known long-time sex workers
in America and did extensive searching out of personal narratives from
other sex workers, and I appreciate that there are many people whose
experiences are negative or mixed. However, I also found a great deal
of commentary from women and men who were favorable towards, and even
proud of, their professions, and I find it problematic to assume that
they were all either 1) lying or 2) self-deluded.
In fact, that characterization of "positive" sex workers is a favorite
one of anti-sex "feminists" like Catharine MacKinnon and her ilk, and
IMHO, it's rather patronizing.
This is not to say that you would find yourself in agreement with
MacKinnon et al; only that my reaction to what I perceive you to be
saying above is affected by the connections I draw between your
statements and theirs.
Elusis
Gaye D
Gonna have to rap one on one here so PLENTY quotes ;o)))
> It sounds to me like your experiences and the experiences
> of your (former, right?) colleagues definitely would lead
> one to feel that all sex-for-money is abhorrent and
> repellent and...
VERY former, I have 50 ambien I treasure, as an absolute guarantee that the
question of selling sex again will NEVER arise whatever else happens. The
final week of March 1993 was the last I ever worked as a hooker, or ever
will.
>
> Your words raise a few questions in me. One of them is
> whether you feel that you were raised with standard
> Christian expectations/attitudes about sex.
<near helpless laughter> Think we'd better get ourselves coffee and a plate
of bicuits for this one!!
First off ARE there such things as standards Christian
Expectations/attitudes? And if so what de EFF are they?
I've been a committed agnostic since my teens an am now a committed atheist
(when I say "committed" I mean it is actually what I believe and have faith
in, not a default condition cos I don't believe in anything else), so all
"Christian" means to me is someone else's religion....
I'm not saying that to be defensive, it is relevant. I was born in the UK.
My Upbringing ended when I left home age 13, way back in the early 70s (for
the most basic account of this:
http://www.themestream.com/articles/27373.html "The Hell to Pay" ) both of
those things being equally significant.
Had to live somewhere so I went to London's equivalent of Haight Ashbury and
"Dances with Hippies" (came away convinced hippy was a shortened form of
Hypocrite too I might add ;o)) Don't even get me STARTED on THAT subculture,
especially it's sexual and emotional aspects!)
Even the most conventional elements of the UK in the 70s were on another
planet to the "Family Values" fundamentalism of the US today.
In a more personal level, I have spent the past 15 years in deeply Catholic
Ireland.
Where, in all of that, IS there a Christian Standard option anyone could be
raised with?
To point you to 'nother two pieces:
Madam Whiplash? NEVER? http://www.themestream.com/articles/59192.html
Abuse by Demon http://www.themestream.com/articles/66324.html
Wanna play "spot the normal aspect" there ? ;o)))
Most of the women I worked with were raised as devout Catholics, many
remained so. They regarded the wellbeing of their children as having a
higher priority than sex in Christian terms. They were right.
Where I stand on religion is:
There is no such thing as hell, but there ought to be, specifically for
anyone who tries to impose their own preferred beliefs on others!!
On the other hand I respect the sincere faith of others (whatever form it
takes) and regard that faith as a benefit to them and to humanity.
Another is
> how you would feel about people who feel that "sport
> fucking" is okay, or sex between friends (rather than
> lovers)...sex just for the sake of the fun and camaraderie
> rather than as an expression of love? What about
> play parties and sex parties?
I would feel that was their own business ;o))) and ABSOLUTELY none of mine.
Personally.....I've done all those things in my own (private and voluntary)
life (except the parties, I'm not comfortable drinking coffee with more than
one other person let alone that!! ;o))). They were part of my personal
sexual and emotional formation. Good, bad or otherwise. Everyone else is
just as entitled to those experiences for whatever they are worth to them at
any time of their life as I was.
I regard "fun and cameraderie" as a valid healthy reason for sex, as long as
it doesn't pretend to be anything else, just not one that I would ever be
available for these days. It isn't part of anything I want as an individual.
I think it is probably a healthy part of growing up, but I am 42 and WAY
beyond that!!
The other things probably aren't too healthy, but on the other hand
unhealthy things can often be an essential part of the process of growing
towards personal emotional health.
Morally, I don't disapprove of anything that is done honestly and
consensually, on all sides.
Iwouldn't consent to them, or promote them though. But that is a value
judgement, and a very different thing ;o))
>
> I wonder as well about your stated aversion to phone/
> verbal sex. Does it extend to written forms?
>
Now, here's an interesting question that has bog all to do with sex work,
and a lot to do with me as a writer and a human being.
My largest barrier as a (potential) writer of fiction (something that is
VERY serious and sacred to me since for ever). Was a tendency to sexualise
everything. Not as porn (HATE THAT, can't even think that way) but as heavy
erotica. Erotica is never IMHO explicit but rather implied and symbolised
Examples:
Almost anything by Yukio Mishima
Emile Zola's "Le Faut de l'Abbe Mouret"
"The Vampires of Alfama" (can't remember author, but Amazon list it as outa
print)
Except I took it all a LOT further, in the same vein....
I had to find my way past that somehow (along with a lot of other things) to
be able to write anywhere near my potential and aspirations.
So, go analyse Gaye (I think I may be rather obvious ;o))
http://mechanima.cbj.net/hooker.html "This Hooker and Sex" parts I-III.
I still love VERY WELL written erotica as an artform.
However as a writer it stands between me and what I really seek to achieve
('nother plug ;o)) my piece de resistance in progress, and absolute labour
of love, http://mechanima.cjb.net/aboutren.html "The Renegade")
Explicit, hardcore, titillatory porn has ALWAYS been impossible to me, and
repellant.
I don't think there is ANY harm in porn, I just cannot for the life of me
get into why anyone would ever enjoy it.
> In this particular group, I also wonder about whether
> you've read Spider Robinson's thoughts on sex work.
> Spider's wrong about many things (and right about
> others), so I wouldn't put him forward as any authority,
> but I find his thinking interesting.
I would LOVE to (must check 'em out on usenet).
>
> What are your thoughts on the old trade of the courtesan?
> Where's the line between a courtesan and the bouncy
> trophy wife?
I doubt if there IS a line between the two, did anyone ever suggest that a
"trophy wife" was a healthy aspiration for healthy people?
Going back to "old trades"...
Let's get it in perspective.
You either became a wife (and property of your husband) or a Nun, or some
kind of a hooker.
The world has, mercifully moved on.
Gaye (who REALLY enjoying rappin' here ;o)))
Gaye D
"No experience of phone sex, some of the Internet equivalent with one-
handed-typing. There, at least, the keyboard may give a distancing
effect. And I suspect that a lot of people who do it on the 'net have
less RL experience than I."
Ok, if you are prepared to be honest about that so am I. I tried it exactly
twice, with the same person (who is still a very valued friend).
For me it was just incredibly emotion and intimacy frustrating.....
It really hurt.
I'd never do it again.
It's not for me.
I think that is part of where I am now in myself, with no interest in sex
beyond the intimacy which so many people (for a variety of reasons) seek to
hide from.
A (pre hooking) need to depersonalise sex was a big part of the damage in
myself I had to heal.
Strangely, that pathology made prostitution more repellant to me, if
anything. It was a seperate issue.
Gaye
Gaye D
"But I have spoken with young and middle-aged women, over a span of almost
20 years (since my college days), who did perform various sexual or
sex-related acts for money, sometimes for a few years. And none of them
described the experience as negatively as you did. Were all of them lying
to themselves and others? With all due respect, I think your
generalizations are too sweeping."
No, they aren't...
I'll tell you why.
There is a layer of denial that is essential to preserving some illusion of
personal autonomy, even in the past tense.
It is part of the PTSD factor, a way our subconscious protects us from
intolerable pain.
Without healing it leaves us an emptier person that we would ideally be.
If the experience was occaisional, it does little harm, being much the same
as the denial of the real pain of childbirth that ensures the world isn't
full of "only children".
Gaye D
"Something he found himself wondering about though. Couldn't it be said
that
*any* job you are forced to do, and do not enjoy, is damaging? You have
likened prostitution to cleaning septic tanks, pointing out that it is
unpleasant, dirty work. Is it not the case that someone forced into the
septic tank cleaning trade because it's the only way they know how to make
money is similarly injured?"
Yep, of COURSE you are right there. No question.
But Prostitution damages on a far more invasive and deeper level.
Let me try and get this concept as simply and straight as I can. (Not least
for my own sake!!)
Sex is an intimate aspect of who we are, a very private freedom.
Private, in the sense of being at our autonomous disposal.
The similarity with cleaning septic tanks relates to the cultural
misconception of "choice", not to the damage it does. They are seperate
issues.
To be raped, with not further physical injury, does deeper, different, and
more lasting damage that to be severely beaten.
Prostitution involves a repeat pattern of the inner injury and violation of
rape as a way of life, that must be constantly repressed to allow
functionality.
Prostitution IS sex under indirect duress, in every psychological and
emotional sense.
Jacob Sommer
<sigh>
Gaye, I'm sorry, but your generalizations *are* too sweeping. I do not
have the experience of long talks with Annie Sprinkle, though I have seen
a good deal of her work; I have not had any friends that I know of who
were sex workers; I have had little to no real experience with sex
workers; and I am not any kind of a psychologist or psychiatrist.
That being said, saying that *everyone* who goes through a given
experience must *always* have some mental damage seems quite wrong.
Saying that each and every person who went through something of the sort
has damage and that if they don't acknowledge it they are lying to
themselves doesn't seem credible. To me, it seems like an attempt to
validate your own pain as something which all others who have gone thru
your type of experiences *must* have. If another person doesn't have it
then maybe they have a different mind than you - maybe stronger or weaker
but different and not affected the same way.
I am not saying your own pain isn't valid as it most emphatically is. I
am saying that perhaps you should not say that you automatically know how
someone you have never met or talked with feels about part of their past.
Would you want someone to use such a broad brush to describe you, in spite
of how little they know about you?
Jacob
Gaye D
Just a quick line here to say that the next phase of articles (AND my book)
will set out to explore and explain the inevitability of damage resulting
from prostitution.
I cannot thank everybody here enough for the feedback and perspectives that
have focussed me on this.
All I can tell you, for now, is that I never met a single hooker (in any
sense) who did not sustain considerable ongoing damage from the mental
gymnastics involved.
Though I personally know a couple who have actually written books claiming
they didn't to an extent.
Yet, in real terms, away from the public eye, the actual damage was a lot
more apparent than a subjective impression.
But the key is this:
If it were possible to sell sex in answer to a financial imperative and not
be damaged or distressed by it.
Then
How is it not possible to be raped without being damaged or distressed by
it?
The same emotional and psychological basics apply to both.
The only healthy non destructive sex is sex that is motivated by free
individual sexual and/or emotional choices (of whatever kind).
Sex driven by nothing but material need is not, and cannot, be in that
category by definition.
That exists outside of my subjective perspective.....
But I have to get it together to untangle the two and make that objective
case clear.
I have 'em tangled, and unless I untangle 'em in a hurry I am going to
commit (my personal) cardinal sin of invalidating an objective argument by
invalid and subjective premise.
There is a subjective case here.
(I guess everybody has figured that is based on <shudders> "ACK!!" "Hand me
the barf bag"?. I have no problem admitting I am a person who has never been
too comfortable with a lot of touching).
But there is also another, seperate, objective case.
My central argument in the articles, and the book, is that the majority of
women do not want to be prostitutes, and until society recognises that and
offers them real options (something western societies are remarkably
reluctant to do in real, practical terms) it has no moral right to persecute
and condemn them. That is cruel and inhuman because most of them are
suffering enough without it.
However there are a LOT of other important issues that need covering, and I
think all of this is one of them.
My aim in this is to see a situation where no one is ever trapped in
prostitution (directly or indirectly) again. Where the situations that trap
them there are recognised at last and addressed. That is MY agenda.
But I have to take it beyond that I think, into wider issues.
Issues I cannot personally identify with.
But, already put to the pin of my collar to think about this, I have no
sense of identification with any (for me, hypothetical) person choosing
prostitution over other realistic options.
Nor do I have any identification, or subjective sympathy with anyone who
seeks a right to, object driven, dehumanised sex....
BUT
As a general principle, this is my body, I do not feel the state has the
right to dictate how I may use it or hire it out unless I seek to
deliberately harm another person....
Which, I guess means I think that should apply to everybody else's body too.
;o)))
But I gotta untangle de subjectivity from de objective issues <blushing as
one caught out should> or I won't make the REAL case.
Gaye ;o)))
jhetley
<snipped>
>A large percentage of the world is forced to do things they do
*not* want to
>do, in order to earn the money they need to survive.
>
>Another thing that occurs to the ARCmage is that there are
people out there
>who find cleaing septic tanks a not-unpleasant way to earn a
living.
Mucking out stalls in a dairy barn, feeding the back end of a
garbage truck in the middle of summer, digging out sewer lines
by hand....
Even if you ignore the army, I've done a lot of shitty jobs in
order to feed myself and my family. I'm not sure I'd compare
any of them to prostitution, but ugly, dirty, and dangerous is a
job description for a hell of a lot of the workers in this world.
Jim
Gaye D
You get a RIGHT ON from me for this:
"Mucking out stalls in a dairy barn, feeding the back end of a
garbage truck in the middle of summer, digging out sewer lines
by hand....
Even if you ignore the army, I've done a lot of shitty jobs in
order to feed myself and my family. I'm not sure I'd compare
any of them to prostitution, but ugly, dirty, and dangerous is a
job description for a hell of a lot of the workers in this world."
Can I add one in that comes close to a "different equivalent"?
Underground mining.
My father was a mining engineer.....
He sat down and told the "inside story" an odd time....
Many of the tunnels are not high enough to stand up in...
And as he eloquently put it:
"when you are five miles underground and need the toilet, do you honestly
think 'popping up to the pithead' is an option?"
Apparently the smell was something you couldn't imagine unless you
experienced it.
Without even mentioning the various health risks in coal mining.....
There is no more a "one true universal occupational victim" than there is
"one true way"....
I know that ;o)))
In another role, as a person from a long UK Trade Union Tradition I have to
say there ARE some jobs no human being should be expected to do without
MASSIVE compensation for the sheer trauma of them.
Gaye ;o)))
jhetley
>
>Can I add one in that comes close to a "different equivalent"?
>Underground mining.
Ugh. I went down in a mine exactly _once._ Hard-rock mining,
IIRC they were hauling out copper and nickel with some silver
mixed in. It's the sort of job that makes catching mortar
rounds look attractive.
Still, if that was the only way to earn a living, I'd probably
do it. Which suggests that all men are fools.
The Polymath (Jerry Hollombe)
>
> "Sexual surrogates contract their services to psychotherapists, not
> patients. Their task is to be a sexual partner for a patient in
> situations where their usual partner is inappropriate or nonexistant.
> They are trained and certified to work with pshrinks for the good of the
> patient. Calling what they do prostitution is the equivalent of calling
> what a surgeon does assault with a deadly weapon."
>
> Hi Jerry,
> Ah sure, we won't get into that war maybe?
> If we were going to I would be inclined to say that you would be amazed how
> much prostitutes come to understand about human sexuality, in practice, not
> theory, in the school of the lowest common denominator:
> Their own best interests
Irrelevant. That has nothing to do with sexual surrogates, who are not
prostitutes.
> I am NOT a fan of therapy as it stands. There is too much "guinea pigging"
> of clients towards personal or academic issues of therapists. Too many
> therapists are too hung up on theories that have no relation to reality. The
> motivation for many therapists to be therapists in the first place appears
> to be too caught up in dysfunctional needs to control......
Again, an entirely different matter from sexual surrogacy.
> Call my ongoing expose (only just warming up) "The Abuse Industry"
> http://mechanima.cjb.net/abuse.htm my contribution to that debate.
If you've already done it there, why drag it in here? Just point us to
the site and those who care will go read it.
> ... Plus the pragmatic, and informed statement that hookers are just as capable
> of intelligence, empathy and integrity as anyone else, and more so than at
> least some.
Again, irrelevant to the subject of sexual surrogates.
> My other point is to again stress I am only concerned with the identical,
> underlying, detrimental effect that surrogate sex has on those who
> participate in it.
Do you have any proof such an effect exists? So far, I've seen only
your opinion asserted here.
> To say a surrogate is hired by a therapist, not the client, is to split a
> hair that points towards a hooker being hired by a pimp to service a john.
> It means very little in the overview.
You appear to be very ignorant of the subject and are grinding your own
ax for reasons I have no interest in (unless you want to pay my
counselling fees). Believe what you like. The facts don't care.
Jonathan Hatch
I want to make it clear that none of the statements I make below are
in any way intended to imply that your experiences, emotions, and
opinions are invalid. I just don't happen to agree with some of your
statements.
On Sun, 18 Jun 2000 22:26:44 +0100, "Gaye D" <mech...@hotmail.com>
wrote:
<snip>
>All I can tell you, for now, is that I never met a single hooker (in any
>sense) who did not sustain considerable ongoing damage from the mental
>gymnastics involved.
>Though I personally know a couple who have actually written books claiming
>they didn't to an extent.
>Yet, in real terms, away from the public eye, the actual damage was a lot
>more apparent than a subjective impression.
>But the key is this:
>If it were possible to sell sex in answer to a financial imperative and not
>be damaged or distressed by it.
>Then
>How is it not possible to be raped without being damaged or distressed by
>it?
>The same emotional and psychological basics apply to both.
"How so? Rape, it seems to have been shown, is less about sex and more
about power, is it not? Perhaps I have been misinformed, but that
seems to be what I've heard. If someone is raped, their consent has
been made moot, as opposed to having been bought. I see a fundamental
difference there.
>The only healthy non destructive sex is sex that is motivated by free
>individual sexual and/or emotional choices (of whatever kind).
>Sex driven by nothing but material need is not, and cannot, be in that
>category by definition.
"Which definition? What's an emotional choice? What is a 'free
individual sexual ... choice?"' Without these definitions, your first
sentence is meaningless; even after you define the terms, how will we
know that such a sweeping generalization is true?
>That exists outside of my subjective perspective.....
"Unfortunately, I doubt that.
<Snip subjective case: Accepted as it stands>
>But there is also another, seperate, objective case.
>My central argument in the articles, and the book, is that the majority of
>women do not want to be prostitutes, and until society recognises that and
>offers them real options (something western societies are remarkably
>reluctant to do in real, practical terms) it has no moral right to persecute
>and condemn them. That is cruel and inhuman because most of them are
>suffering enough without it.
"But this central argument has nothing to do with the statement you
made above: that 'the only healthy nondestructive sex is... choices.'
The argument that a majority of women don't want something is far from
saying that anyone who might want it is hopelessly doomed forever to
destructive sex.
<snip>
>But, already put to the pin of my collar to think about this, I have no
>sense of identification with any (for me, hypothetical) person choosing
>prostitution over other realistic options.
"Hypothetical no longer. In an earlier post, you classed porn
actresses/actors as similar if not equivalent to prostitutes in the
damage. I know of a porn actress who chose her career over an
extremely successful college career, because she liked it more.
"In another earlier post you wrote
>Prostitution is horrible, nobody chooses it. It's not a vocation or a drive
>like acting or music. While it can be incredibly demanding it isn't an
>artform or a means of self expression, it releases nothing.
"Yet above, you do restrict yourself to the probably correct case: the
majority of women do not want it. I think everyone can agree that a
woman who does not want to have sex for money but needs the money and
has no other options is being traumatized and suffering quite beyond
anything I can personally imagine. This doesn't mean others have the
same feelings. How do you know it's not an art? Who are you to decide
that for everyone else?
>It is just a
>means of obtaining a survival essential called "money". Your emotions are
>not involved in what you do, you have to shut them down, full time, to be
>able to cope with doing it.
"This presumes that everyone in the world does (and *should*) link sex
and emotion as inseparable. Personally, for me, they are linked.
However, I know several people (both men and women) for whom the only
emotion necessary is lust, and sometimes not even that, just a sense
of adventure. If neither person is looking for any kind of emotional
attachment, why is that so damaging?
"Personally, while I think sex is wonderful, *for me* sex without
emotional entanglements is less pleasant than self-stimulation, so I
don't see where it's worth the money to go to a prostitute. Notice
however, that these claims are about *me*, and I do not judge as
emotionally unhealthy the `other side.'
>Perhaps even more significantly, you also have
>to shut down a great many conditioned psychological and emotional reflexes
>(like the one that makes you draw away from being touched by a man you have
>neither affection nor desire for, that is actually quite unconscious, to be
>a hooker you have to find a way to switch it off), a lot of more basic
>instincts, and many inner responses to cultural imperatives. The sheer
>stress of doing so is phenomenal.
"What if you don't have that reflex of drawing away? Or is it your
contention that everyone does and whoever says they don't is lying to
themselves?
"Again, I intend no disrespect, but I do believe that you are pulling
what some of my friends call a `Paglia.' The belief that one's own
experiences are seminal; that they must automatically belong to
everyone as well, is not the best belief to use when judging others'
actions.
"On the other hand, I most wholeheartedly agree that anyone who hates
being a prostitute as much as you obviously did should be forced to be
one. (I was going to say `doesn't want to be a prostitute,' but then I
realized that I know plenty of people who don't actually actively like
their jobs, but do them anyway. Assuming that a person with such an
attitude towards prostitution exists, he or she should have the right
to practice it (so long as it's as safely as possible).
Yog
Gaye D
> "How so? Rape, it seems to have been shown, is less about sex and more
> about power, is it not? Perhaps I have been misinformed, but that
> seems to be what I've heard. If someone is raped, their consent has
> been made moot, as opposed to having been bought. I see a fundamental
> difference there.
I must be leaving the point out on the fly here ;o))) (Wouldn't surprise
me!!)
Rape is about power from the PERP'S point of you, I am afraid I don't give a
tinker's cuss about any negative effect that has on him!!
From the victim's point of view it is about invasion, violation of an
intimate and sexual nature. The most invasive form of rape is anal
(sometimes anal sex has a tendency to symbolise a questionable degree of
dominance in healthy relationships). A man can be raped that way. Under
duress I don't think gender orientation is relevant.
I mention this to make it easier for men to identify.
A prostitute is having sex under indirect material duress. There are
differences of degree and proportion, but far more similarities.
Internally, the consent is a sumission to a tangental material need, not a
sexual consent of any kind.
The power exchanges are interesting too. In commercial sex, you are selling
submission to the needs of another person, to the negation your own ("not
sex" is also a need y'know ;o))). The contract is about sex and money, but
the trauma is, in a degree, about power and an ongoing state of sexual
disempowerment.
> "Which definition? What's an emotional choice? What is a 'free
> individual sexual ... choice?"' Without these definitions, your first
> sentence is meaningless; even after you define the terms, how will we
> know that such a sweeping generalization is true?
I think I was being clumsy here in trying to cover a lot of ground.
The only healthy reason to have sex with a person is that the objective is
to have sex with the person (for whatever reason, lust, friendship,
emotion).
To use an analogy, the only healthy reason to eat is for the sake of eating,
whether out of hunger or pleasure in savouring the food.
To eat in order to fill an emotional void, for instance is unhealthy.
(Unless it involves me and a kilo of Swiss dessert chocolate, in which case
it is THE ONLY WAY ;o))) As an occaisional, or once off, behaviour it ain't
the end of the world, as a way of life it, is a big bad deal.
That's a valid analogy too. Sex, like eating is a fundamental drive in it's
own right, not as coin for barter.
No one could possibly fail to be damaged by sacrificing their individual
autonomy over their emotions and sexuality to a material need.
HOWEVER, I will say IF there exists a person who finds selling sex arousing,
for real, not as a denial system, EVEN as an expression of existing damage.
(I have never met such a person, I haven't met the whole world yet though) I
would be inclined to believe that the act of selling sex would not IN ITSELF
cause further trauma, though it would be an obstacle to healing.
But just as a caution, there are plenty, a majority of women who are
terribly distressed by being trapped in prostitution, let not their need for
escape, and options, be invalidated. Let's not get anywhere near the
sickening line thrown up by too many clients "But you SHOULD enjoy it"
either.
>
> >But there is also another, seperate, objective case.
> >My central argument in the articles, and the book, is that the majority
of
> >women do not want to be prostitutes, and until society recognises that
and
> >offers them real options (something western societies are remarkably
> >reluctant to do in real, practical terms) it has no moral right to
persecute
> >and condemn them. That is cruel and inhuman because most of them are
> >suffering enough without it.
>
> "But this central argument has nothing to do with the statement you
> made above: that 'the only healthy nondestructive sex is... choices.'
> The argument that a majority of women don't want something is far from
> saying that anyone who might want it is hopelessly doomed forever to
> destructive sex.
Ah but Yog, I am not saying that. As in all this type of consent issue I say
simply: it is none of my business, if they want (or even just BELIEVE they
want) that, it isn't for me to dictate otherwise.
However the academic community, as a whole, now acknowledges dehumanised sex
as symptomatic of pathology.
I am going to state categorically here that as soon as a woman has other,
long term, realistic survival options to prostitution what she decides
beyond that, good, bad or indifferent, is her own business. I am concerned
only with ensuring that women ALWAYS have a realistic alternative which is
simply NOT the case, especially for those already in prostitution.
If there is ever such a thing as a sincere wish to be a prostitute, then
like pornography, I can't see three things:
a) What harm it does.
b) How anyone could possibly be interested in it.
c) What concern it is of mine if it isn't forced on anyone.
>
>
> <snip>
> >But, already put to the pin of my collar to think about this, I have no
> >sense of identification with any (for me, hypothetical) person choosing
> >prostitution over other realistic options.
>
> "Hypothetical no longer. In an earlier post, you classed porn
> actresses/actors as similar if not equivalent to prostitutes in the
> damage. I know of a porn actress who chose her career over an
> extremely successful college career, because she liked it more.
No just what does that tell anyone of what drive made her choose that way
and how it affected her?
Absolutely nothing really.
>
> "In another earlier post you wrote
>
> >Prostitution is horrible, nobody chooses it. It's not a vocation or a
drive
> >like acting or music. While it can be incredibly demanding it isn't an
> >artform or a means of self expression, it releases nothing.
>
> "Yet above, you do restrict yourself to the probably correct case: the
> majority of women do not want it. I think everyone can agree that a
> woman who does not want to have sex for money but needs the money and
> has no other options is being traumatized and suffering quite beyond
> anything I can personally imagine. This doesn't mean others have the
> same feelings. How do you know it's not an art? Who are you to decide
> that for everyone else?
OI!! ;o)))
I am NOT deciding it for everybody else...I am trying to find a way to
relate to any of the alternative hypotheses......
So far I can't relate them to the shop floor reality I have known and
experienced.
My argument relates to the damage done by having sex under material duress
(see above).
As in rape, disempowerment IS the issue.
Beyond that....I haven't got a clue how anyone can enjoy soccer either....if
they show no symptoms of denial and say they do then I just believe 'em.
Can't help wondering why the same women who claim to enjoy commercial sex
seem to ALSO get a lot of "healthy enjoyment" out of spending the money on
substance abuse though?
> "This presumes that everyone in the world does (and *should*) link sex
> and emotion as inseparable. Personally, for me, they are linked.
> However, I know several people (both men and women) for whom the only
> emotion necessary is lust, and sometimes not even that, just a sense
> of adventure. If neither person is looking for any kind of emotional
> attachment, why is that so damaging?
I've known a lot of people like that too (HELL I did it myself for years,
BEFORE I was a hooker, couldn't even orgasm unless it was totally
dehumanised!!), without any exception I can think of offhand ,they were
pretty screwed up people.They tended to lack empathy for others too (I may
have done myself).
BUT, be very clear, I am one of those people who is prepared to "defend with
my life" the right of any other to be as screwed up as they wish....as long
as they don't hurt anyone else.
>
> "Personally, while I think sex is wonderful, *for me* sex without
> emotional entanglements is less pleasant than self-stimulation, so I
> don't see where it's worth the money to go to a prostitute. Notice
> however, that these claims are about *me*, and I do not judge as
> emotionally unhealthy the `other side.'
I've been on both sides ;o)))
Let me state categorically, that as long as that behaviour is not the result
of duress, direct, indirect, material or otherwise, I don't judge it, I just
keep it away from my life (THE BEHAVIOUR, not the people ;o)))
>Perhaps even more significantly, you also have
>to shut down a great many conditioned psychological and emotional reflexes
>(like the one that makes you draw away from being touched by a man you have
>neither affection nor desire for, that is actually quite unconscious, to be
>a hooker you have to find a way to switch it off), a lot of more basic
>instincts, and many inner responses to cultural imperatives. The sheer
>stress of doing so is phenomenal.
> "What if you don't have that reflex of drawing away? Or is it your
> contention that everyone does and whoever says they don't is lying to
> themselves?
That relflex of drawing away is universal regardless of your criteria of
inner consent to the sex, or the touch, in itself.
>
> "Again, I intend no disrespect, but I do believe that you are pulling
> what some of my friends call a `Paglia.' The belief that one's own
> experiences are seminal; that they must automatically belong to
> everyone as well, is not the best belief to use when judging others'
> actions.
Nope, I am definitively trying NOT to do that. Just to raise awareness the
very severe issues and problems that were a self evident part of my life for
6 years.
If anyone is happy in prostitution, then there is no problem or issue to
highlight in those instances, and those instances alone.
However, society as a whole has proved (at least in Europe) WAY too fond of
working on the assumption that women are happy in prostitution and that to
"permit" them to continue in it is a huge favour and the only solution
required.
>
> "On the other hand, I most wholeheartedly agree that anyone who hates
> being a prostitute as much as you obviously did should be forced to be
> one. (I was going to say `doesn't want to be a prostitute,' but then I
> realized that I know plenty of people who don't actually actively like
> their jobs, but do them anyway. Assuming that a person with such an
> attitude towards prostitution exists, he or she should have the right
> to practice it (so long as it's as safely as possible).
No arguement there Yog <big grins>
Gaye
Tina Shrader
Gaye D wrote in message <8ijvbm$uvj$1...@fraggle.esatclear.ie>...
>Hi Yog.,
>
>> "How so? Rape, it seems to have been shown, is less about sex and more
>> about power, is it not? Perhaps I have been misinformed, but that
>> seems to be what I've heard. If someone is raped, their consent has
>> been made moot, as opposed to having been bought. I see a fundamental
>> difference there.
>
>I must be leaving the point out on the fly here ;o))) (Wouldn't surprise
>me!!)
>Rape is about power from the PERP'S point of you, I am afraid I don't give
a
>tinker's cuss about any negative effect that has on him!!
>From the victim's point of view it is about invasion, violation of an
>intimate and sexual nature. The most invasive form of rape is anal
>(sometimes anal sex has a tendency to symbolise a questionable degree of
>dominance in healthy relationships). A man can be raped that way. Under
>duress I don't think gender orientation is relevant.
>I mention this to make it easier for men to identify.
>A prostitute is having sex under indirect material duress. There are
>differences of degree and proportion, but far more similarities.
>Internally, the consent is a sumission to a tangental material need, not a
>sexual consent of any kind.
The redhead at the end of the bar looks up, sighing a little and trying to
decide whether she really wants to get too far into this conversation, given
the state of her home ISP's news server, and the lack of time to post from
work. She shrugs a little and decides to out herself a bit, "Gaye, as
someone who's 'been there, done that' in a lot of ways when it comes to sex
(the abusive kind, the 'for money' kind, and the 'out of love' kind), I have
to say that I agree with some of the others here who have said that your
generalizations are too sweeping in some respects. Yes, rape is an
incredible invasion for the victim. Yes, I believe that prostitution CAN be
a kind of rape, but I don't believe it HAS to be.
>The power exchanges are interesting too. In commercial sex, you are selling
>submission to the needs of another person, to the negation your own ("not
>sex" is also a need y'know ;o))). The contract is about sex and money, but
>the trauma is, in a degree, about power and an ongoing state of sexual
>disempowerment.
"If you're going to make that sweeping a generalization, you might as well
say that anytime a person sells a service, they're being disempowered by the
exchange. Do you believe that a nurse is disempowered because s/he's
placing the needs of his or her patients first? Do you believe that a
personal care assistant for a disabled person is being disempowered because
the needs of the client come first? Certainly there's a potential for abuse
and disempowerment in the above situations, but I don't believe it's a
necessary part of providing those services, nor do I believe it's a
necessary part of being a sex worker.
>I think I was being clumsy here in trying to cover a lot of ground.
>The only healthy reason to have sex with a person is that the objective is
>to have sex with the person (for whatever reason, lust, friendship,
>emotion).
>To use an analogy, the only healthy reason to eat is for the sake of
eating,
>whether out of hunger or pleasure in savouring the food.
>To eat in order to fill an emotional void, for instance is unhealthy.
"Umm... once again, I think you're being too restrictive, Gaye. Let me take
your analogy a little further... The only healthy reason to eat is for the
sake of eating. Okay, fine. Does that mean it's *unhealthy* to pay someone
to cook for you? Or to cook for someone else for money? Just because
there's money involved doesn't make the exchange unhealthy. You seem to
believe that no one can enjoy the act of sex as a physical experience
('performance art', if you will) without being somehow damaged by it. I'm
not sure I buy that. I'd say the *potential* for damage may be higher, but
I don't believe it's inevitable.
>No one could possibly fail to be damaged by sacrificing their individual
>autonomy over their emotions and sexuality to a material need.
>HOWEVER, I will say IF there exists a person who finds selling sex
arousing,
>for real, not as a denial system, EVEN as an expression of existing damage.
>(I have never met such a person, I haven't met the whole world yet though)
I
>would be inclined to believe that the act of selling sex would not IN
ITSELF
>cause further trauma, though it would be an obstacle to healing.
>
"If that's true, Gaye, then you're implying that any situation in which a
person provides personal (emotionally involving) services to another for
money is inherently damaging. Do you honestly believe that all counselors
and psychologists and psychiatrists are damaged by providing emotional
support to their clients for money?
>But just as a caution, there are plenty, a majority of women who are
>terribly distressed by being trapped in prostitution, let not their need
for
>escape, and options, be invalidated. Let's not get anywhere near the
>sickening line thrown up by too many clients "But you SHOULD enjoy it"
>either.
>
"Of course there are. People are abused and trapped in horrible situations
every day. That doesn't mean that prosititution by itself is the culprit.
I'd say that society's insistence that sex is somehow 'dirty' and that
'decent' people 'don't do that' is far more to blame for the abuse than the
simple act of selling sex.
<snip of the rest of an interesting post because I simply don't have time to
respond to the rest right now>
Tina
Jonathan Punchy Hatch
> "On the other hand, I most wholeheartedly agree that anyone who hates
> being a prostitute as much as you obviously did should be forced to be
> one. (I was going to say `doesn't want to be a prostitute,' but then I
> realized that I know plenty of people who don't actually actively like
> their jobs, but do them anyway. Assuming that a person with such an
> attitude towards prostitution exists, he or she should have the right
> to practice it (so long as it's as safely as possible).
"Please insert a `not' between should and be in the second line of that
paragraph.
Yog
--
Jonathan Hatch a.k.a. Yog Shoggoth a.k.a. "Punchy" a.k.a. etc.
jha...@umr.edu http://www.umr.edu/~jhatch
"Positive thinking doesn't sound like a very good idea to me. I'm sure it
doesn't work. And if it does, it's probably real hard to do." - G. Carlin
M Blaze Miskulin
> Sex without desire (and don't anybody kid themselves, that is ALL a
> prostitute is offering EVER, though some give great theatre as a bonus) is
> repulsive sex. Repulsive sex is a very deep trauma.
Well, according to the woman I talked to, she was offering more comfort
and companionship than sex. She commented that a lot of the guys just
wanted to talk. She offered a kind and sympathetic ear (and a few other
body parts).
I cannot believe that every single person involved in the sex industry
is repulsed and traumatized by it. Especially when you factor in
hard-core porn stars. Women like Annie Sprinkle, Nina Hartley, et al
are not, to any appearances, repulsed or traumatized. Especially when
you consider that Ms. Hartley is an RN, and could be working in that
field easily.
Blanket statements like yours--especially as emphatic as yours--tend to
put me off.
--
M Blaze Miskulin
Winterborne Scenic Studios
http://www.winterborne-ss.com
Janet D. Miles
<394AD0A4...@winterborne-ss.com>, M Blaze Miskulin wrote:
> Gaye D wrote:
>
> > The short answer is that selling sex is one of those generically horrible
> > experiences like cleaning out a septic tank, "voluntry" and "enjoying" are
> > irrelevant words.
> I met a woman in college who had worked as a prostitute for a while. In
> talking with her, I heard stories not of abuse and degredation, but of
> lonely men who wanted someone to pay attention to them.
Yup. 's about what I've heard, too. A friend of mine worked for a while as
a pro-domme (no sexual contact was allowed, although explicit conversation
was permitted and the client could be allowed to masturbate).
I got the impression that most of her clients were men who were either
afraid to discuss their kinks with their partners, or men who, for one
reason or another, were sure they could never *get* partners (one man was
afraid that cooking was so un-masculine that no woman would ever want him;
another was sure that his fantasy of wanting to be tied up and tickled was
unique and utterly degenerate), and she frequently spent a good portion of
the session offering reassurance and encouragement, not just domination.
Occasionally, she would get someone who knew exactly what he wanted, and
was hiring a pro as a special treat (kind of like getting a professional
massage can be a nice treat even when your partner is perfectly willing
and happy to rub your back); those were some of her favorites.
She quite enjoyed the work, and suffered no trauma that I'm aware of.
Follow-up information: I ran a draft of this post past her, to check for
confidentiality and accuracy, and she added the following points:
> 1) I enjoyed the work while doing it, and if I hadn't enjoyed it, I would have
> done something else instead.
>
> 2) I still engage in similar activities, to wit BDSM play, with nonpaying
> partners simply for mutual entertainment.
>
> 3) I would consider that kind of work again, should future circumstances prove
> conducive.
>
> 4) I still *write* in the field of human sexuality, in a variety of ways, which
> I enjoy greatly and intend to continue. Again, if I didn't like it, I wouldn't
> do it, as my career is thriving in other fields.
>
> 5) Far from being traumatic, I found BDSM activity often had quite beneficial
> therapeutic uses both for myself and for my clients. They often learned new
> things about themselves. I got to cultivate my self-control and indeed it was
> this extensive experience that gave me the depth of patience and restraint I
> have today.
>
> 6) Both I and my clients sometimes experienced the activities as profoundly
> spiritual.
>
> 7) My primary partner and I negotiated what activities were comfortable,
> allowable, and out-of-bounds with regards to my professional activities. I am
> still in the same relationship today, we are happy together, and we still apply
> some of the same groundrules to current playpartners and other subsidiary
> arrangements.
JanetM
--
Posted by Janet Miles <jmi...@usit.net> <http://www.public.usit.net/jmiles>
"This is Callahan's Place, and it's Callahan's Place because of everyone
who comes in and ensures it stays that way." -- Robert Farquhar, July 15, 1998
Loyal Webcrafter: PenUltimate Productions <http://www.worthlink.net/~ysabet>
Jonathan Punchy Hatch
<mech...@hotmail.com> wrote:
<snip>
> Rape is about power from the PERP'S point of you, I am afraid I don't give a
> tinker's cuss about any negative effect that has on him!!
> From the victim's point of view it is about invasion, violation of an
> intimate and sexual nature. The most invasive form of rape is anal
> (sometimes anal sex has a tendency to symbolise a questionable degree of
> dominance in healthy relationships). A man can be raped that way. Under
> duress I don't think gender orientation is relevant.
> I mention this to make it easier for men to identify.
> A prostitute is having sex under indirect material duress. There are
> differences of degree and proportion, but far more similarities.
> Internally, the consent is a sumission to a tangental material need, not a
> sexual consent of any kind.
"This, I think, is where we differ. I don't believe payment is always
necessarily duress. Now, if the prostitute has no other source of money and
needs money to survive (or believes that these things are true, regardless
of whether they are), then duress it may be. But there are known cases of
people becoming prostitutes under no more duress than `if I do this, I can
buy more clothes.' There are prostitutes with other sources of income
available. I guess you're not including them when you say `prostitute,'
except that in an earlier post you seemed to be willing to include a
broader range than I thought.
> The power exchanges are interesting too. In commercial sex, you are selling
> submission to the needs of another person, to the negation your own ("not
> sex" is also a need y'know ;o))). The contract is about sex and money, but
> the trauma is, in a degree, about power and an ongoing state of sexual
> disempowerment.
"How about women who are paid to dominate?
> > "Which definition? What's an emotional choice? What is a 'free
> > individual sexual ... choice?"' Without these definitions, your first
> > sentence is meaningless; even after you define the terms, how will we
> > know that such a sweeping generalization is true?
>
> I think I was being clumsy here in trying to cover a lot of ground.
> The only healthy reason to have sex with a person is that the objective is
> to have sex with the person (for whatever reason, lust, friendship,
> emotion).
"Why? Do you have evidence of this?
> To use an analogy, the only healthy reason to eat is for the sake of eating,
> whether out of hunger or pleasure in savouring the food.
> To eat in order to fill an emotional void, for instance is unhealthy.
> (Unless it involves me and a kilo of Swiss dessert chocolate, in which case
> it is THE ONLY WAY ;o))) As an occaisional, or once off, behaviour it ain't
> the end of the world, as a way of life it, is a big bad deal.
> That's a valid analogy too. Sex, like eating is a fundamental drive in it's
> own right, not as coin for barter.
"So, by your argument and analogy, a food-taster for a medieval king is
living an unhealthy `big bad deal?' That would be the equivalent of the
prostitute, by the way, not eating to fill an emotional void. The eating to
fill an emotional void would be equivalent to a kind of sexual encounter
you seem not to worry about too much in this argument: sexual addiction.
> No one could possibly fail to be damaged by sacrificing their individual
> autonomy over their emotions and sexuality to a material need.
"Are you addicted to the categorical assertion? I would agree with this
entirely if you added `It seems' somewhere, or `I can't imagine anyone
not,' or even just put an `almost' before no one.
"Besides, unless you are *forced* to become a prostitute and then *forced*
to pick a specific john, you aren't `sacrificing [your] individual
autonomy.' Just because I offer a prostitute money, she doesn't have to
have sex with me unless she's on a quota or something. If a john offers a
prostitute less than what she considers she should earn, does she have to
sleep with him anyway? No. She's got autonomy.
"Now, as I said, people who are forced into that by poverty and lack of
other choices are obviously in a bad situation, but you need to realize
that there are different groups. Just because some prostitutes are forced
and abused into it does not imply that everyone who is a prostitute was
forced into it. You included porn actors/actresses with prostitutes before,
and many of them aren't forced.
<snip>
> But just as a caution, there are plenty, a majority of women who are
> terribly distressed by being trapped in prostitution, let not their need for
> escape, and options, be invalidated. Let's not get anywhere near the
> sickening line thrown up by too many clients "But you SHOULD enjoy it"
> either.
"I don't think anyone here is even coming close to that.
<snip
> > "But this central argument has nothing to do with the statement you
> > made above: that 'the only healthy nondestructive sex is... choices.'
> > The argument that a majority of women don't want something is far from
> > saying that anyone who might want it is hopelessly doomed forever to
> > destructive sex.
> Ah but Yog, I am not saying that. As in all this type of consent issue I say
> simply: it is none of my business, if they want (or even just BELIEVE they
> want) that, it isn't for me to dictate otherwise.
"Yes you are saying that. You have declared that the only nondestructive
sex does not include prostitution. Period. Above you say that no one could
fail to be damaged. Doesn't sound like it's something you're considering
none of your business.
> However the academic community, as a whole, now acknowledges dehumanised sex
> as symptomatic of pathology.
> I am going to state categorically here that as soon as a woman has other,
> long term, realistic survival options to prostitution what she decides
> beyond that, good, bad or indifferent, is her own business. I am concerned
> only with ensuring that women ALWAYS have a realistic alternative which is
> simply NOT the case, especially for those already in prostitution.
> If there is ever such a thing as a sincere wish to be a prostitute, then
> like pornography, I can't see three things:
> a) What harm it does.
> b) How anyone could possibly be interested in it.
> c) What concern it is of mine if it isn't forced on anyone.
"You say this, but you keep going back to the general case in many of your
comments.
> > <snip>
> > >But, already put to the pin of my collar to think about this, I have no
> > >sense of identification with any (for me, hypothetical) person choosing
> > >prostitution over other realistic options.
> > "Hypothetical no longer. In an earlier post, you classed porn
> > actresses/actors as similar if not equivalent to prostitutes in the
> > damage. I know of a porn actress who chose her career over an
> > extremely successful college career, because she liked it more.
> No just what does that tell anyone of what drive made her choose that way
> and how it affected her?
> Absolutely nothing really.
"And I didn't mean it to. I'm simply pointing out that it ain't
hypothetical. I don't know what drove her to do that (specifically) and I
don't know how it has affected her because I've never deeply analyzed her
psyche. That isn't my point.
> > >Prostitution is horrible, nobody chooses it. It's not a vocation or a
> drive
> > >like acting or music. While it can be incredibly demanding it isn't an
> > >artform or a means of self expression, it releases nothing.
> >
> > "Yet above, you do restrict yourself to the probably correct case: the
> > majority of women do not want it. I think everyone can agree that a
> > woman who does not want to have sex for money but needs the money and
> > has no other options is being traumatized and suffering quite beyond
> > anything I can personally imagine. This doesn't mean others have the
> > same feelings. How do you know it's not an art? Who are you to decide
> > that for everyone else?
> OI!! ;o)))
> I am NOT deciding it for everybody else...I am trying to find a way to
> relate to any of the alternative hypotheses......
"But in the above paragraph, you *do* decide for everyone else with your
categorical assertions `Prostitution is horrible,' (Maybe for you, maybe
for many, maybe not for everyone?) `nobody chooses it,' (see previous
paranthetical), and `it isn't an artform or a means of self expression.'
> So far I can't relate them to the shop floor reality I have known and
> experienced.
> My argument relates to the damage done by having sex under material duress
> (see above).
> As in rape, disempowerment IS the issue.
"In rape, your consent is stolen from you. In prostitution, again excluding
the forced-into-it case, your consent is bought. There is a huge
distinction. Do your feelings upon selling a car equal your feelings upon
having it stolen? Yes, I know, the car is material and not emotional, but
the difference stands
> Beyond that....I haven't got a clue how anyone can enjoy soccer either....if
> they show no symptoms of denial and say they do then I just believe 'em.
> Can't help wondering why the same women who claim to enjoy commercial sex
> seem to ALSO get a lot of "healthy enjoyment" out of spending the money on
> substance abuse though?
"How about just including the phrase `that I know' into that?
<snip>
> I've known a lot of people like that too (HELL I did it myself for years,
> BEFORE I was a hooker, couldn't even orgasm unless it was totally
> dehumanised!!), without any exception I can think of offhand ,they were
> pretty screwed up people.They tended to lack empathy for others too (I may
> have done myself).
> BUT, be very clear, I am one of those people who is prepared to "defend with
> my life" the right of any other to be as screwed up as they wish....as long
> as they don't hurt anyone else.
"So you don't want to force them to fix themselves, but you reserve the
right to look down on them. That's fine.
> > "Personally, while I think sex is wonderful, *for me* sex without
> > emotional entanglements is less pleasant than self-stimulation, so I
> > don't see where it's worth the money to go to a prostitute. Notice
> > however, that these claims are about *me*, and I do not judge as
> > emotionally unhealthy the `other side.'
> I've been on both sides ;o)))
> Let me state categorically, that as long as that behaviour is not the result
> of duress, direct, indirect, material or otherwise, I don't judge it, I just
> keep it away from my life (THE BEHAVIOUR, not the people ;o)))
"But you have been judging it in all your statements.
> >Perhaps even more significantly, you also have
> >to shut down a great many conditioned psychological and emotional reflexes
> >(like the one that makes you draw away from being touched by a man you have
> >neither affection nor desire for, that is actually quite unconscious, to be
> >a hooker you have to find a way to switch it off), a lot of more basic
> >instincts, and many inner responses to cultural imperatives. The sheer
> >stress of doing so is phenomenal.
> > "What if you don't have that reflex of drawing away? Or is it your
> > contention that everyone does and whoever says they don't is lying to
> > themselves?
> That relflex of drawing away is universal regardless of your criteria of
> inner consent to the sex, or the touch, in itself.
"The reflex you mentioned did not mention sex. Maybe you meant it to and I
missed it, or maybe you're just flat out wrong. I don't have a reflex that
makes me draw away from being touoched by someone unless it's a `Boo!
Scared ya!' kinda thing.
> > "Again, I intend no disrespect, but I do believe that you are pulling
> > what some of my friends call a `Paglia.' The belief that one's own
> > experiences are seminal; that they must automatically belong to
> > everyone as well, is not the best belief to use when judging others'
> > actions.
> Nope, I am definitively trying NOT to do that. Just to raise awareness the
> very severe issues and problems that were a self evident part of my life for
> 6 years.
"I support very strongly your doing that. I just would prefer it if your
statements restricted themselves to those cases and didn't generalize.
> If anyone is happy in prostitution, then there is no problem or issue to
> highlight in those instances, and those instances alone.
> However, society as a whole has proved (at least in Europe) WAY too fond of
> working on the assumption that women are happy in prostitution and that to
> "permit" them to continue in it is a huge favour and the only solution
> required.
"How about it they permit them to continue in it while giving them the
option to stop if they want. Would that not serve your purposes equally
well?
> > "On the other hand, I most wholeheartedly agree that anyone who hates
> > being a prostitute as much as you obviously did should be forced to be
> > one. (I was going to say `doesn't want to be a prostitute,' but then I
> > realized that I know plenty of people who don't actually actively like
> > their jobs, but do them anyway. Assuming that a person with such an
> > attitude towards prostitution exists, he or she should have the right
> > to practice it (so long as it's as safely as possible).
> No arguement there Yog <big grins>
"I guess you didn't notice that I accidentally left out an extremely
important `not' in that paragraph. Celine pointed it out to me. (Thanks,
Celine!)
Leonard Erickson
kal...@krypton.rain.com (Leonard Erickson) Said
M Blaze Miskulin <brb...@winterborne-ss.com> writes:
> While, yes, there is a trauma associated with some aspects of
> prostitution, that is not the whole of it. Not all prostirutes are
> forced into it (either by persons or by circumstances). Not all
> prostitutes must dissociate themselves mentally and emotionally.
>
> There *are* people (men and women) who actually enjoy it. There are
> those who see it as a job like any other job. The stifflingly
> puritanical atmosphere of the United States paints prostitution as a
> terrible, sinful, and degrading act; thus those who will participate
> tend to be those who are willing to fit themselves into this role.
Also, consider this. Due to the illegal, or barely legal (in Nevada)
status, a hooker *has* to service clients she'd want nothing to do with
otherwise. Say that slob on the bus who hasn't bathed in a week and has
breath that'd stun a horse. Or that bunch of drunken frat boys.
That's what's so soul-destroying. *Having* to allow people you really
want no part of to be that imtimate with you.
For a typical hooker, there's no choice because even if she's
independent, she can't be sure when her next trick will be. And if she
turns the slime down, he's likely to go to the cops.
In the Nevada "houses", they do get to be a bit more selective, but
still if you turn down too many customers, you'll be out on your ear.
Remember, it's the *house* that has the license, not the girls. If the
house kicks you out, you are finished as a legal hooker.
And I trust that I don't have to describe what happens to a girl who is
working for a pimp if she turns down business?
> In other cultures prostitution is not seen in that light. In many
> cultures (more historically than currently, admittedly) prositution was
> seen as an honorable and sought-after profession. When a prostitute is
> treated as a skilled worker with an honest profession, then skilled and
> honest people will seek out the profession.
And it becomes much easier to maintain standards regarding *customers*.
--
Leonard Erickson (aka Nemo) kal...@krypton.rain.com
"No, I will _not_ move your planet... What do you want to move it _for_?
It's fine right where it is!"
-- Dairine Callahan, Wizard (no relation)
Leonard Erickson
kal...@krypton.rain.com (Leonard Erickson) Said
"ARCmage" <arc...@innocent.com> writes:
> The ARCmage went ahead and read a large percentage of the articles on your
> web site. It was very interesting reading.
>
> He can see your point concerning the idea that having sex with people you
> don't want to have it with would be damaging.
>
> Something he found himself wondering about though. Couldn't it be said that
> *any* job you are forced to do, and do not enjoy, is damaging? You have
> likened prostitution to cleaning septic tanks, pointing out that it is
> unpleasant, dirty work. Is it not the case that someone forced into the
> septic tank cleaning trade because it's the only way they know how to make
> money is similarly injured?
Cleaning septic tanks is unpleasant on a phsyical level. And for some,
on a psychological level (I'm wading in *what*?!).
Having sex with someone you don't want to is an entirely different
order of "unpleasant". I still shudder at the memory of the time some
well meaning acquaintances ("friends" doesn't fit) found out that I was
a virgin and decided to "help". They were going to get me fixed up with
a hooker...
I was scared silly at the mere *thought* of getting intimate with a
person I didn't even *know*, much less *trust*. You see, I had some
*severe* trust issue due to emotional abuse. I still have them, though
not as strongly. Fortunately, I was able to get a friend to talk them
out of it.
It's the *ultimate* violation of your "personal space". And *having* to
not only let it happen, but actively seek it out and *assist* in it has
got to be a thousand times worse.
> A large percentage of the world is forced to do things they do *not* want to
> do, in order to earn the money they need to survive.
There's a huge difference between "things I don't want to do" and
"things that make me sick to *think* about". For anybody who has
undergone even "mild abuse" prostitution is going to be *worse* than an
acrophobe forced to perfom on the trapeze or a high wire (Being an
acrophobe, and a victim of "mild abuse"<shudder>, I'm qualified to say
this).
Prostitution usually not merely demeans and degrades, it *violates*
you. If you can pick and choose your clients, it may be different. But
that's a *luxury* that most pros don't have.
> Another thing that occurs to the ARCmage is that there are people out there
> who find cleaing septic tanks a not-unpleasant way to earn a living. It
> follows that there must be prostitutes who are not damaged by what they do,
> or at least no more damaged than someone forced to work in the fast food
> industry.
True. But they are a *minority*.
D.J.
Leonard Erickson wrote:
[]Having sex with someone you don't want to is an entirely different
[]order of "unpleasant". I still shudder at the memory of the time some
[]well meaning acquaintances ("friends" doesn't fit) found out that I was
[]a virgin and decided to "help". They were going to get me fixed up with
[]a hooker...
I almost had this sort of 'help' as well. The guys who wanted to
'help' me this way usually came down with one or more diseases
themselves, per cruise overseas. I managed to talk them out of it.
Sometimes other sailors on the same ship are not necessarily
shipmates...
D.J.
--
djim55 at tyhe datasync dot com. Disclaimer: Standard.
My Web pages Updated: May 30, 2000:
http://www.datasync.com/~djim55/
Stacy & Matthew Peterson
This would be Callahan's Impossible Yet Highly Heated and Personal Topic
#25.
Y'ever wonder how these threads get started?>
Maraud.
The Polymath (Jerry Hollombe)
Usually when someone's personal hobby horse is set to rocking -- whether
by them or someone else.