Well I am a glutton for punishment.

Yabby
It is the men who are taking this article personally. It seems it is completely wrong to ever raise an issue which might show some men in a poor light and OLO is bombarded with anti-female rhetoric. Reverse the situation and it is the women who take it 'personally' because unlike the issues in these articles posters like you make sweeping statements about women as though it is the norm.

Look at FS's comments on the other thread remarking that "all women go bad". Now we know he is not representative of most men but that is the attitude that many women have to endure in the workplace despite the fact that according to some men there is no such thing as sexual harrassment or rape because the women has in some way invited the attack. I do take that sort of rot personally because it reflects an attitude that one hoped went the way of the dinosaur but not so.

I have always said these gender debates are superfluous most of the hostile and vilest of comments reflecting past hurts and accusations against their ex-partners.

I have acknowledged where I think men have had been adversely affected such as in Family Law/child custody.

Fact is we have to stop thinking in terms of men vs women and ensure that any laws or decisions are humanitarian and egalitarian even if it means protecting vulnerable people like prostitutes as a first priority over the rights of Johns. And that is really all I can say on the matter.

Hello pelican,

I admire your tolerance and resilience in continuing to state your well-balance and empathetic position in the face of virulent and often bizarre commentary.

And as a man I honestly can't understand how anyone would want to have sex with someone who is clearly in a vulnerable or exploited position - and part of being a sensible, mature, responsible member of society is to find out where disadvantage and exploitation exist, and, if not to work towards preventing it, then at least to be sensitive to it and to make sure your actions don't end up making it worse. Unfortunately I have reached the end of my youthful, idealistic phase in which I imagined that social change chould be achieved to the extent that this sort of exploitation could be prevented, and instead I suppose I have accepted that there will always be people who are unreachable - and that being the case, I do think that barriers need to be set up to prevent such people from doing the harm they are capable of.

As such, I have a kind of sympathy for the author's position. Clearly many sex workers are doing what they do unwillingly - and it's not just about choice, because as Ammeline says it is often related to being trapped in an exploitative situation from early childhood. (and Ammeline, for what it's worth, I am very sorry for what you have been through, I want you to know that we are all responsible for letting it happen, and if there was justice in the world then we should all be behind you in helping you to do what you need to do to manage the aftermath). I do think the sex "industry" needs to be carefully regulated to prevent this sort of damage from happening, and I don't think we in Australia are doing a particularly good job of it at the moment.

(cont)

The reason I commented on this article in such a negative way however is that it fails to demarcate the qualitative divide between men who do harm (whether deliberately or unconsciously), and men who think about their choices and seek out paid sex in a responsible way (and in that sense we *are* talking about "high price escorts here who work in hygienic conditions and usually keep the majority of their income", in the same breath as we are talking about those who are enslaved and forced into prostitution).

Patriarchy, for want of a better word, is real. There are clearly situations that both women and men have to face every day, which can be explained in terms of having to negotiate through positions of disadvantage associated with gender-based normatives. However it is by no means the only explanation for the difficulties that exist between men and women. Scholars like Helen Pringle need to understand this if they want to advance the interests of vulnerable women, because the experience of being continually accused of being capable of violence or exploitation simply as a result of one's gender can easily lead men to regard feminism as nothing more than a ruse and a power grab perpetuated by women who don't allow us the same level of consideration that we give freely to them, only to have it misinterpreted and thrown back in our faces. I'd suggest this is the origin of much of the bitterness you hear from men in on this forum.

'This is not an academic discussion, it involves people, emotions and lives. '

I think it is a difference between men and women. Men seem to be able to separate emotions from the discussion and talk about it in a theoretical academic way, and this seems to be really offensive to the female posters. Doesn't mean the men don't care, and regardless of what rational-debate says it's perfectly valid way to debate. Peter Hume's clinical analysis, and the popularity of thought exercises illicit cries of where's the empathy! One can talk about an emotive issue in a non-emotive way while still having empathy.

I get the feeling men here are talking more about high class hookers who have made the choice to earn big bucks rather than do office work. I reckon feminist discourse either denies the existence of these women, or decides FOR women that ANY woman who is a prostitute is a victim. Most men reject this. Most men see a transaction. A simple one of dollars for sex. I don't think any of the male posters deny there are exploitative employers, just that it's a separate issue to the academic equation of dollars for sex.

Let's remember, we live in a country with a pretty adequate social security system. People DO have choices. The constant theme from feminists is all prostitutes are being exploited, or their choice is somehow not a valid choice. It's basically an argument that women aren't responsible for their actions and choices. Notice in feminist analysis, men ALWAYS are. Regardless of their upbringing, their drug habits, mental illness and 'societal expectations', it never lessens their responsibility.

The idea that personal responsibility is lessened by life adversity is foreign to most men I know. R0berts empathy for intimacy-poor men is a very rare. There was a quote on here that nobody forces men to pay for prostitutes, but the prostitutes have no choice. It's a double standard.

Let's remember Men who are down and out, with drug problems, mental illness and homeless survive without the option to earn $200 an hour as a prostitute.

With regards to this section specifically

"I sincerely doubt you could find one person who has not been negatively impacted by their experiences of prostitution (whether the prostitute or the client). Certainly you will not find one whose life has been enhanced because of it."

The most negativity I have ever got is from people not involved, who know nothing - it is them negatively impacting me.
That aside, my experiences as a sex worker have greatly enhanced my life, I am open minded, I am more confident, I have much higher self esteem, I feel more valued than I ever did a corporate job, my job is to make people happy. Even with all the whorephobic and stigmatised crap these people fling that does put a damper on thins I am still overwhelmingly a better and happier person for being a sex worker.

You say you can't find one - I am one and I cant tell you now there are plenty others.

Saying you cant find someone who has not had a negative experience of anything at some point is true of everything. You want to reduce negativity stop attacking us, stop telling us what we can think, choose and feel.

Further on the stigma not attaching to clients, I feel there is a far greater stigma attached to clients. People seem to always refer to clients as deviants and perverts, or violent killers if you go all over this article. This like for any sector of society is a small minority.

Seeking intimacy is a normal human urge, for some people it is easier to find than other. For some people the services of sex workers feels like their only opportunity to have this experience, and agreed and consenting experience.

You don't have to agree with what they want. You don't have to agree to what work I do. But you don't need to pump out such hateful diatribe a perpetuate stigma, insight discriminate, and largely ignore or discount the views of sex workers.

Tristan I greatly appreciated your comments of Monday, 2 May 2011 7:22:12 PM. Whilst I generally seem to disagree with your politics the comments there were very good. The message in your post put quite clearly one a number of us have been making on OLO for some time albiet with an acknowledgment of our own interest.

Stereotypes and "class" definitions are useful tools but when they start becoming legislation or are used to determine the guilt or worth of individuals they fail completly.

We all walk our own road.

There is no way of telling at a class level that a specific "John" is priviliged and a specific prostitute victimised. It's dangerous if the law starts trying to make those distinctions or even if it starts trying to make individuals involved in a transaction responsible for the decisions of the other party (assuming no duress).

melanieofsydney, thanks for your input. Discussions about sex work carry with them the difficulties of differentiating between those who make informed decisions to partake and those who are their our of desperation. Both exist and it's difficult to help one without hurting the other. Please keep up your input to the discussion.

R0bert