Our friends over at Sex in the Public Square are hosting a discussion on sex work, trafficking, and human rights this week. It’s a fascinating discussion, full of lots of complex issues, and it’s inspired me to say something I’ve been thinking about for a while:
Sex work is just a job.
As a culture, we’re able to understand that your mom cooks you dinner because she loves you and a restaurant cooks you dinner because it wants your money. But for some reason, we can’t seem to cope with the fact that a partner has sex with you because he or she loves you, while a sex worker has sex with you because he or she wants your money.
It’s the same thing, people. Sex work is just a job.
There is nothing inherently sacred or debased about sex work. It’s not a fundamentally magical, inspiring experience; nor is it a fundamentally degrading, psychologically damaging experience.
Sometimes sex work is incredibly gratifying and wonderful: a chance to help someone access
their sexual self, a chance to create a work of art, a chance to inspire. Sometimes, sex work sucks: customers disrespect you, bosses treat you like shit, you get stiffed on pay. Like any job, a sex worker’s experience in the field is highly shaped by the environment the sex work occurs in.
Yes, sex work can be a painful, damaging experience — but so can any job. And for some people, the conditions of sex work are far preferable to working in retail, or as a bartender, or as a factory worker. Because that’s what it comes down to — people choose to become sex workers because they need a job. And at the end of the day, sex work is just a job.
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Comments
And sometimes, your mom cooks you dinner because she feels like she has to, and she’s resentful about it! The metaphor still works…
February 27th, 2008 at 7:06 pmAnd! And!
At a restaurant, you can often get food you can’t get at home.
I’m stopping now…
February 27th, 2008 at 7:08 pmI disagree.
Stadistically, worldwide and in most cases most sex workers start working out of sheer and utter desperation.
That being the case, it is ( statistically, worldwide and in most cases) a fundamentally degrading and psychologically damaging experience. Albeit poverty and the rest of the conditions that lead to it are degrading and damaging enough which pretty much makes it a cloudy and fuzzy topic i still believe (and i can be completely wrong, as usual) that most sex workers dont really have a choise. And thats quite horrid.
Maybe USA or european sex workers have more freedom of choise, but for what ive seen around here, its nowhere near your “i ve thought about it, weighted my options and realized i prefer being a sex worker than a bartender” scenario.
February 27th, 2008 at 8:27 pmIsil:
I did not mean to be that flip. Obviously, some women and men make the choice out of desperation, or are pressured into it, or are trafficked. However, that does not change the fact that it is a job, like any other: people have been forced into farm work or housework, for example (see: slavery in the American South), but that doesn’t mean that being a farmer is somehow a job unlike any other.
February 27th, 2008 at 8:38 pmOr, to be more brief: being forced or trafficked or manipulated into any form of work is horrible. But being forced or trafficked or manipulated is an issue completely separate from the issue of selling sex.
February 27th, 2008 at 8:41 pmI don’t think that’s what Lux was suggesting at all.
Look, you said it yourself: the *problem* here is economic and social conditions that put women (and men) in situations where their options are less than stellar. We can rail about sex work all we want, but the bad side of it is a symptom of a greater problem.
February 27th, 2008 at 9:23 pmAlso, Isil, if you are curious, at Sex in the Public Square and the Pro-Porn Activism Blog, there is discussion surrounding actual statistics that show the perception of how many people are trafficked into sex work vs. the realty is very different.
I’m reminded of the “white slavery” scare of 100 years ago…
February 27th, 2008 at 9:25 pmSorry but I cant get my mind frame out of the mostly forced sex work force im familiar with.
Theres no issue of selling sex free of the other, far worse, involved variables. So i cant really argue “logically”.
Always glad and thankful for real open thinking space.
February 28th, 2008 at 12:41 amIsil:
Totally understandable. Forced sex work, or sex work chosen solely out of desperation, is a horrible thing, we all agree with that. I just see a distinction between the forcing, or the desperation, and the sex work.
February 28th, 2008 at 8:33 amExactly… that’s why the forum at SitPS (and others like it, hopefully!) is so important, because often it’s difficult to have these conversions *without* people conflating trafficking and voluntary sex work. Yet if we really want to do anything to solve the problem of trafficking, we *must* be very clear in what we are talking about.
February 28th, 2008 at 9:40 amLux,
Yup, i agree, its just that when almost all sex workers are forced into it, like it happens where i live, the distinction you mention is basically a theoretical/ethical consideration, not a real aspect of sex working.
Sure, voluntary sex work is just another job. Its just not the usual case, by a long long shot.
So saying sex work isnt fundamentally degrading or damaging, while being completely true given certain conditions weve already stablished, is kinda misleading compared to the big picture.
February 28th, 2008 at 11:07 am“Sure, voluntary sex work is just another job. Its just not the usual case, by a long long shot.”
Actually, there’s some dispute over that (specifically, the often-bandied-about “90%” line from Farley). KerywnK at SitPS has statistics and a long post about the research methods behind determining that “most” sex workers are forced into it.
It’s difficult to have this conversation without people taking a statement like mine to mean I’m dismissing the existence or horror of the experiences of women who *are* forced into sex work. So I hope that will not happen now… I feel like I should not have to say this, but obviously, that is *not* my intent.
February 28th, 2008 at 12:11 pmLux,
Great post. Simple, true, well-said. Should be required reading for anyone who wants to discuss sex work.
Isil,
I feel the term sex work implies the worker’s consent. Otherwise it is sexual exploitation and a different thing altogether.
I don’t know what part of the world you’re from, but even in Third World Countries, there are plenty of sex workers who consenually enter the job because of the money. It pays better than other work they could possibly get. In Western countries, I think the percentage of consenual sex workers outweighs the percentage of women exploited into the work.
XX
February 28th, 2008 at 1:29 pmLux, thanks so much for blogging about our forum on Sex in the Public Square. I loved your parallels with other kinds of work that are done for free out of love or obligation and for pay out of need for income — or obligation.
And Amber, Amanda and Isil, I’m glad to read your comments. I do think that the researchers on our forum — and certain Amanda has access to similar data — demonstrate that most sex workers are not forced in the way we typically understand that word, though that does not take away any of the outrage we have about those who are. And as has been pointed out, the horror of coercion is not lessened if the coercion is other than sexual. Coercion is wrong, and also systematic generally when we’re talking about the poor, regardless of the industry. What we need to address is the tremendous economic inequality that creates the constraints on people’s choices, and not the sexual nature of some work over others.
Elizabeth
February 28th, 2008 at 10:15 pmSex in the Public Square (dot org)
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