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  • I have very mixed feelings.

    On the one hand, I don't think that there's anything inherently immoral about sex work.

    On the other hand, a large amount of sex work is not voluntary and consensual.

    There are a few sites where (legitimate) sex workers can advertise. Prices vary considerably, but you'll typically see prices starting at $400+ for "full service". They typically have specific limits laid out, what things they do and don't do, and usually require some kind of screening for their own safety. If you go to sites where clients can review sex workers, you can find listings for $50-$100 for full-service sex work with "new girls", frequently Asian. These women--most of the people exchanging sex for money are women---in those listings do not screen clients, do not have pre-stated limits, frequently do not require the use of barriers, and always work for an "agency". It is clear to me that these are not women that are doing sex work consensually. People that frequent these sex workers are complicit in their abuse. (Willing sex workers can and do work through agencies; that makes their client screening less onerous for them. But they still have clear limits, and not rock-bottom prices.)

    Given how many women, esp. at the lower end of the pricing spectrum, aren't doing sex work consensually, I would not have a good opinion of a person that chooses to use them. I could not accept someone that knew that they were trafficked and didn't care, or chose to ignore the probability that they were doing sex work involuntarily.

    I would have no opinion either way about someone that chooses to use a professional domme; that, at least, is a segment of the market that's unlikely to involved trafficked victims.

  • I don't see why it's any of my business. It's like asking what I think of men who go to the gym, or like lettuce on their sandwiches. It's just another normal thing people do in life.

    Sex is a very normal everyday thing that many people need to feel fulfilled, and the sex industry is great to fill that need. People like to bone. It's none of my business, and because I'm not a Catholic from the 1800s, I don't think it's deeply wrong or sinful.

    The only issue is that it's not regulated enough, there aren't enough protections in place for the workers or the customers.

  • Creepy

    I support sex workers but im sorry I will never step foot in a strip club. I guess in some places people go to strip clubs mostly to club and to party, but not near me, and I’ve never met anyone who frequents the strip clubs around me who wasn’t really sus.

  • Gross. How can you even enjoy sex when you essentially bought someone's consent?

    • I understand the sentiment, but "buying consent" is a difficult line of thinking when you follow it all the way through.
      ::: spoiler CW: SA There's sex workers who are sexually assaulted by clients, some brothels have panic buttons in their rooms for this reason. So if you follow the "prostitution is legalized r*pe" line of thinking, what's that then? Wasn't the sex worker in question already violated when they entered the contract with the client? Is that a case of double sexual assault? ::: I don't think that idea holds much water in all cases. It often does, but you cannot apply it universally to all sex work. That's because you can't just "buy consent", a sex worker still has very specific conditons for giving you conditional consent that only extends to a select number of specified acts, to certain time frames, certain areas of their body and so on, and they can revoke that consent when things turn south because the john starts to behave badly. And ultimately, all consensual sexual acts are in some ways conditional, even if it's the unspoken agreements in vanilla heteronormative relationships. It takes a massive level of trust and the knowledge that your partner will always intuitively accept your boundaries to allow them to do what they want with you and actually mean it. And when i look at it that way, i do not think that you can just override somebody's ability to consent by giving them money. There is already some form of consent to these acts involved when somebody agrees to pick up that line of work. It's difficult to say where that ends, moreso than in sexual realtions outside of sex work, i'd fully agree to that, and that's highly problematic, but it's not as clearcut as "all sex work is a form of SA because you bought consent the sex worker normally wouldn't have given to you".

      (rest of the post is just general musings not directed at you, comrade, i'm only putting them here because i think this works better in one post).

      That said, i'm very much not a fan of people buying sex work, and yes, that includes porn. Sorry guys, i know that most of you can't nut on your own without this stuff, for reasons i've always failed to understand, but it's how it is. The reason for my attitude isn't that i disagree with sex work per se, my support actually always lies with the workers and puts their concerns first, which is why i DO NOT support failed approaches like the "Nordic Model", which aims to only punish buying sex work, but effectively worsens risks for sex workers, increases deportations of sex workers without papers etc. My concern rather lies with the inherent coerciveness of all transactional relations under capitalism. When you listen to a typical socdem SWERF like German SPD member Leni Braimeyer (surprise, she's also a massive terf), who is pushing for the "Nordic Model" instead of the legalized prostitution we see in Germany today, there is not only a total, ultra-patronizing lack of recognizing the agency of sex workers, there's also a complete obliviousness to the economic conditions that determine how prostitution works in Germany, as yet another form of exploiting the economic imbalances in the EU and supplying German capital with a constant supply of workers who have to take increasingly awful deals out of pauiperization and desparation, as well as an increasingly precarious situation for the lower incomes among the German working class. It's these conditions that give rise to prostitution as an area of mass exploitation, and ending capitalist relations is the only way to amend the problem that a majority of sex workers are in a lopsided economic situation that is the actual threat to their agency and their ability to fully consent.

    • bought someone's consent

      Interesting, I never thought about it like that...

      I think the only excusable scenario would be independent service listings, where both parties establish limits and identify whether they're both comfortable prior to engaging in sexual activities.

    • for one thing, there's way more to sex work than intercourse.

  • Worked night shift at a hotel next to a night club that doubled as a brothel, could talk to the girls who were always taken to our hotel, heard how the dudes talked about the girls they had sex with, i say kill everyone who pays for sex.

    And this was supposed to be a "good" place btw.

    • seriously, i feel like so much of the discourse surrounding the sex industry is now dictated by a small minority of relatively well off sex workers who, probably unwittingly, produce a distorted image of what it's like to sell sex for a living. and through social media, these voices gets amplified both by libs, whose understanding of anything begins and ends with 'listen to x-voices,' and redditor-type men who have a vested interest in expanding prostitution and sanitizing its image, not because they care about sex workers, but because deep down they want to buy sex without having to feel bad about it

  • Logically, if he treats the sex worker right, with no demanding, no (non negotiated/sane) violence, and his actions don’t extend into monogamous relationships, and his views on future sexual partners are neither transactional nor cruel, it should be fine.

    Emotionally would likely be a different story for the partner, or at least for me. Partly due to the stigma attached to sex work, and partly due to feelings of inadequacy or worry about needing to perform unwanted acts, and partly due to a suspicion that that really would affect his views, because people’s thoughts and feelings are messy, sprawling things that don’t fit into the mental cabinets we stuff them into. But if the partner couldn’t get over that, then they’re not for him.

    And yes, this applies to women who pay for sex workers, too. Or at least it damn well should.

  • I believe a lot do not care whether the sex worker really does the job as a free decision. I think even more have no respect for sex workers. A few do not see sex workers as people, but rather as usable bodies. A few go to sex workers because they are misogynists. I think a few use it to be unfaithful towards their partners without their partners having the same opportunities.

  • Why not. As long as no one suffers, it's fine by me. It's a transaction like any other. Just be a decent human being (which applies in every context) and I won't think any less of you.

  • It's mutually consensual and beneficial, and they don't walk away with half your shit when things go south.

  • Guy who goes a few times a year is regular. Guy who goes multiple times a week sleeze.

290 comments