‘I don’t regret selling sex. It’s allowed me to meet many good men.’
I was in my early 20s, teaching undergrads in the morning, taking graduate classes in the afternoon, and selling nighttime webcam sex shows on a site that regularly featured professional porn stars like Jenna Jameson. The man watching me that night bought 90 minutes, which would have cost him nearly $600. I’d landed a big fish, and I didn’t want to lose it. But when he told me his request, I froze.
“Why don’t you take a nap?” he wrote.
It was the most unusual request I’d ever received. And, as you probably know, people feel free to get very unusual when they’re anonymous online.
“You look like you could use some sleep,” he continued.
“Don’t you want to tell me your real name?” I asked, smiling, shaking the ends of my wig around my face. I doubted my sleeping would actually keep him interested.
“We can get to that later,” he replied. “Just nap a little for now. And put some clothes on, or you’ll get cold.”
I arranged my body in a flattering position and laid my head on a pillow. What is with this guy? I thought.
I wouldn’t figure it out until much later.
♦◊♦
Disclaimer: coercion is wrong, kidnapping is wrong, and hiring someone underage is wrong. There are men (and women) in the world who want to inflict suffering on others, and hiring a sex worker gives them an easy way to do it.
But I’m tired of seeing men and women buy into the lie that male sexuality is inherently violent and sadistic. My experience as sex worker has taught me the opposite.
When I first began working in the sex industry, I believed the cultural script about the men who made it profitable. Male sexual desire consisted of seeing thin young women naked and suffering, handled roughly, used callously. I read and trusted every word by Andrea Dworkin and Catherine MacKinnon. There was so much evidence to support their theories of how male hatred of women was expressed through abusive sex.
Frankly, men terrified me. I suspected they were incapable of compassion. To get them off, I thought, they all needed cruelty.
♦◊♦
I started working online during the peak years of anal-sex mania, and requests of ass-to-mouth (ATM) and double penetration (DP) with toys were common—not that I (always) honored them. One of the pleasant things about webcam was that it was possible to fake almost anything, especially penetration.
On the webcam site, non-paying visitors could type anything they wanted into the un-moderated chat windows: “Your family must hate you.” “I bet you have AIDS.” “You’re a fat whore.”
But not every man treated me this way, even with the luxury of complete anonymity. My first regular client was a man who talked with me for up to an hour before asking me to bring myself to orgasm. He wanted to see an orgasm, and he didn’t make demands about how I achieved it. Then came another regular who had only days earlier attempted suicide after a breakup with his fiancée. A year after we first met, he told me that our friendship—which many people would dismiss as illusory and degrading—was sometimes all that kept him from making a second attempt.
One young man in particular left a deep impression. He was younger than I was, working a blue-collar job in New Jersey, and he couldn’t afford much private time. But he would stay at his computer for as much of my shift as he could, cracking inside jokes and distracting me from other users’ insults while I was in free chat waiting for someone to pay for a show. We talked about music, his puppy, and the girls he was dating.
In this strange cyber world, he became a dear friend. And years after I retired from webcam, we still occasionally reached out to each other through email. Once he wrote, “It’s funny, you used to be this sexual icon that I would never have. Now it’s just like you’re an old friend I haven’t talked to in a long time and all I wanna do is catch up.”
I began to attract more and more men who wanted conversation, who bought me gifts and sent postcards and told me about their lives. They wanted to see me play with myself; they didn’t want to see me hurt. I became more vocal about what I did and didn’t like—in part because, for the first time, I was figuring out what I did and didn’t like. When someone told me to do something I didn’t want to do, I would refuse. I started countering requests for anal with “I will if you will.” It was possible to engage with them. It was astounding to me how many men would listen and suggest something else if I told them what I was doing hurt. They were free to leave and spend their money elsewhere, but few did.
It occurred to me that many men had trouble expressing empathy because no one had ever taught them how. Most were clueless, not brutal—although some were both. Lots of these guys had grown up so confused and undereducated about the female anatomy that they hardly even had a sense of what sensations might feel best or what activities were most satisfying.
The more men I talked to, the more sympathetic I felt. I was approaching the biggest epiphany of my life: men had as much anxiety and shame around sex as women did. We were all in this together, and any ideology that couldn’t admit as much was doomed to fail.
♦◊♦
It was this newfound comfort that facilitated my switch to in-person sex work. The vile cesspool that is the Internet made transitioning easy. Refreshingly, I never had a man call me fat, ugly, or diseased while we were standing face to face. And the men I met in person were shockingly tame when it came to sexual quirks.
On webcam, I was asked to play the part of a murderous dominatrix who poisoned her submissive and stood laughing over his grave. One customer wanted to see me tie myself with boat rope in impossibly bizarre configurations. I even had a regular who got off on me fake-sneezing and blowing my nose.
But with escorting, the ATM and DP requests were long gone. In the flesh, men were downright vanilla. Some in-person clients did want to incorporate violence, but only when they were the recipients. (Even the most casual research will bear out the fact while dominatrices can make a good living kicking the shit out of men, female submissives are so rarely in demand that most have to work as a switch in order to stay afloat.)
People who deeply distrust the sex industry—who’ve been personally harmed by it or find it threatening or who associate it only with exploitation—often get very angry when escorts (or academics who study sex workers, like Sudhir Venkatesh) claim some clients don’t want sexual interaction.
But it’s true: some don’t. I’ve been hired by men who never asked me to get naked, never requested that I touch their genitals. There’s always conversation, regardless of the other activities during a date: clients talk to me about their parents (especially their fathers) and about failing marriages or life after divorce. They often show me pictures of their children and, sometimes, spouses.
The longer I’ve worked, the more it seems that the sex is often a front. It’s an entry point that allows men to make their real request (for affection, understanding, and connection) while still satisfying stereotypical ideas of masculinity. What most men want is a great romance or, at the very least, a great friendship. They want to feel like they’re falling in love. They want to feel loved in return.
The clients who do want to have sex—and of course, there are many—don’t want that sex to be uncomfortable or unpleasant for me. They want to me to take pleasure in the act as well. They want to feel attractive and competent and gentle and attentive. Many of them are all of those things. If they express guilt about paying for sex, I don’t try to talk them into feeling otherwise. When one man said he should stop seeing me because the money he spent on our appointments should be going toward his kids’ college funds, I replied, “Well, if it makes you feel any better, it’s going toward mine.” (I never saw him again.)
Yes, I’ve met men who didn’t respect my boundaries and who harmed me, inadvertently or purposefully. But such men were few and far between, and I refused to see them again.
Not every man who visits a strip club, watches a clip of porn, or pays for sexual companionship wants to commit an act of violence against a woman. Rapists and murderers are the ones who want to rape and strangle people; some of them hire escorts, some don’t.
When Melissa Farley tells The Economist that men who hire prostitutes “are not nice guys looking for a normal date. They regularly attempt to rape and strangle women,” she’s not talking about my experience. Farley’s cloudy thinking rests on the belief that a man’s sexual interest in a woman is fundamentally disrespectful, fundamentally abusive, and fundamentally wrong.
But what’s wrong is the stigma surrounding sex work. In the professional world, there is no other service arrangement in which clients are accused of hating those whom they hire. Not janitorial work, furniture moving, notoriously dangerous meat-factory work, or any other job that requires use of the service provider’s body in grueling, unhealthy ways.
♦◊♦
In the seven years I’ve known “Napman,” the gentle soul whose strange request opened this piece, he’s yet to let on that he secretly desires to strangle me. He periodically sends me gifts. We email and punctuate our updates with pictures. He knows the names of all of my pets—he even knows where I live. I told him about this article. I came to know him as a man who only wanted what most men want: to do something nice for someone else.
There are many important conversations to be had about the sex industry, but I don’t believe those conversations will be beneficial unless they move beyond cartoonish depictions of villainous, lustful men victimizing innocent and vulnerable women.
I’m not claiming that my experience is representative of all sex workers, or even all sex-working women, but I know my experience is not entirely anomalous. I don’t regret selling sex for a variety of reasons—one of which is that it’s allowed me to meet many good men. And in doing so, it’s forever changed me for the better.
—Photo Alejandra Mavroski/via Flickr
… and I just asked an overwrought question on a post that’s over 2-1/2 years old…
@john hall: 😉 I’ve been there. “Shane”‘s blog at Nightmare Brunette appears to be gone but she has a lot of work scattered about the internet. Try Twitter @CharlotteXShane
Thanks for the article and your observations. I’ve never been a female sex worker, so I wouldn’t suppose to question your perceptions. I am interested, though — do you trust men? Trust them enough to have a committed, long-lasting relationship? Are you or have you ever been married? The reason for the personal questions — I produced a limited series some years ago about high-end escorts. It was pitched as the opposite of the seedy underbelly of the business. We were to cast high-flying, successful, bright, independent, happy escorts with none of the stereotypical baggage — no Uncle Nasty in… Read more »
There will always be an inherent inequality in prostitution. That this poor woman has convinced herself that these men really care about her is truly sad. “Dear friends” don’t use you as an object to be bought for sexual purposes. That she is trying to paint those clients as good men who talk to her about their wives/girlfriends is absurd – I wonder how they would feel if they knew. These are not the actions of good men and I’m disappointed in The Good Men Project for promoting them as such.
Great article. I knew there was more to sex work than the horror stories. Thank you.
Brilliant! Yes, I’ve never paid for sex (penetration) but going to strip bars kept my spirits high throughout a difficult divorce and dishonorable custody fights. I’ll always believe in nice girls that aren’t jaded even if I have to fight the feminist-haters everyday for the rest of my life- or at least until my second son is 18. Now I am happily remarried with a one year old son. I still wonder how some of those girls are doing. I have a lot of respect for their faith/courage on top of their beauty. I never liked going to Vegas or… Read more »
Yes!!!!! What a brilliant article. Thank you SO MUCH for writing this. I get so fed up by all of the people who confuse human trafficking with sex work….ITS NOT THE SAME THING! You are fabulous and inspiring. I am a sex worker advocate in CT, check out my blog http://legalizetoprotect.blogspot.com/ and facebook group, Sex Workers Outreach Project CT
xoxo
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Great article, I couldn’t agree more. I was petrified to transition from stripping (with 300 Ib bouncers, cameras and metal detectors on hand) to escorting, cause all I could think of was the pop culture cliche, I assumed every client was some kind of Patrick Bateman, on a violent cocaine high, eager to murder and torture call girls. Like you said, almost all have been very vanilla, and when there’s rough stuff, it’s cause I ask for it!
‘But what’s wrong is the stigma surrounding sex work. In the professional world, there is no other service arrangement in which clients are accused of hating those whom they hire. Not janitorial work, furniture moving, notoriously dangerous meat-factory work, or any other job that requires use of the service provider’s body in grueling, unhealthy ways.’
This is true. I don’t think anyone’s ever yelled ‘I bet you have AIDS’ or ‘Your family must hate you’ to a sanitation worker.
Hi, As a former sex worker I share this experience with you. I had many men who would visit my club (I was a stripper) and would talk to me for hours about their life, job, family, etc in exchange for pay. At first I was surprised at the amount of men that just longed for companionship. I still exchange emails with a few of them, which is surprising because I haven’t stripped for at least five years. Thank you for sharing this, I think that many people don’t understand the dynamic of the client relationship that is built in… Read more »
Just wanted to say this was an excellent read, and I applaud you for writing it so well and putting it out there. This is precisely the sort of anecdotal truth that needs to be more mainstream – I hope that more and more of us are simply tired of the same ol’ “trust us, this is true” rhetoric based around fear tactics.
A well written and interesting read. Thank you for sharing!
Thanks for writing this!
A simple denial that all men are not dangerous would’ve been sufficient. When you start giving examples of the nice people, I believe you’re creating an over optimistic point of view. One way or another I’ve been around this scene, if not totally in it. My opinion is that these men, as most people do, know what they can get away with and they’ll go that far. When you say that these men are kind, I suggest that these are the men who have figured out that you won’t take any thing less, or that maybe you are annoyed by… Read more »
My original comment was based on attempting to be logical and present a different, well-said point of view. But, reading the original article itself just gives me an impression of fried baloney.
I love everything about this website. Men have to band together and do our own “movement” if we are ever going to get equal rights in society, too. Funny how the scales tipped, isn’t it? Men are seen as atrocious, to the point they can’t be left alone in a room with a child of any age. That kind of stuff makes me sick.
Interesting article. Could I ask how being a prostitute has affected your personal sex life? Has selling the intimacy had any effects on how you view your own, genuine intimacy?
Thanks
Since I also work as a prostitute, I’ll give you my answer. I can separate “love sex” and the one without it very well, so I don’t feel it affects the intimacy with my partner negatively. On the contrary, I have realized how satisfied I am with the sex in my relationship, so it’s even better. Sexual variety also makes it even more interesting to have sex with a long-term partner.
However that’s just me. I can imagine that one could also get jaded if one has a high frequency of clients.
I have two thoughts: ONE) What nobody is bringing up: *An escort’s clientele is NOT a random sample of men.* While this may not have anything to do with the excellent article’s thrust (pun intended), who uses escorts? It would not surprise me if we discovered that the men who use escorts are statistically MUCH more likely to be the shy, nice guys who don’t generally compete well in the more typical manner in which men meet (“hunt”) women which rewards/requires agressiveness and self-confidence. It would also not surprise me if they were also more intelligent — able to afford… Read more »
I’m not sure about you, but if someone un-ironically said “men are pigs” in my vicinity I’d take them the to task about it.
Good for you. Kudos. 🙂 I hope it happens, and that you are not then immediately told to “lighten up, It’s just a saying.”
(A saying you can hear in sitcoms on a regular basis, I might add.)
The Professional — The Good Men Project Magazine…
‘I don’t regret selling sex. It’s allowed me to meet many good men.’And read comment by Johnny Soporno….
Great post, in a world where men are portrayed as violent monsters, or stupid buffoons. I’m happy to hear we’re not all deviants.
Thank you for this. as a woman who is distrustful of men this has opened my eyes a bit more.
Men want to make women scream, but they also want to make them smile. Mostly it isn’t that rare for a man to not enjoy a fake connection, just rare for him to not get male approval through dominating someone. Every man who pays for company or stimulation hopes to be ‘the one’ who the woman might have even considered servicing for free. Unfortunately women aren’t going to start pursuing cowardly men any sooner than men are going to start pursuing ugly women. And so: Men, women, you and me, we need to start spitting on the men who lie… Read more »
This article, as well as all the many and varied comments, is quite fascinating. We are all sexual animals on some level, and there isn’t a society anywhere on earth that has not dealt with sex/barter/pay scenarios within their culture. It’s ancient and pervasive. Where we get tangled up is in our cultural programming that dictates our attitudes about natural urges and acts. We impose a model of morality that, upon closer inspection, usually reveals itself to be nothing more than information planted in us from others during our vulnerable and formative years, rather than ideas we gain from our… Read more »
Thank you Brooke. I agree with you 100% and I must respectfully confess that I’m very surprised that this comment may have been written by a woman (if you’re a woman). I’m a male in my mid 20s and people are always shocked that I go to strip clubs, and watch porn and pay for sex. The response is always ‘why don’t you get a girlfriend? You’re so normal. Blah blah blah. What they don’t understand is that getting a girlfriend (or worse yet a wife) just for sex is the single worse thing a man can do. The dating… Read more »
why did that comment have to be the first one, can’t we just delete it from the internets 🙁
Hey girlfriend, thank you for putting yourself out there and breaking the silence. The more of us speak up, the better ALL of our lives are. THANK YOU.
You’re the only thing that gives me hope anymore. My misogyny is critical, but whenever I read something of yours my crumbling faith becomes restored. Thank you for being as real as you are, you’ve inspired things in me that no drug, no man and no scene has ever before.