'You're consenting to being raped for money'

[CGowen]

A second series of the television drama The Secret Diary of a Call Girl - about a prostitute who loves her work - has been commissioned. Appalled at the sanitised picture it portrays, a woman who charges for sex tells Emine Saner what her life is like

Tuesday December 11, 2007
The Guardian

A flat in a block in a suburb of London: Karen (not her real name) thinks her neighbours probably realise she sells sex for a living. Of all the myths and stereotypes surrounding prostitution, the reality is more likely to be found in banal places like this. It is as far away from a cliched sleazy Soho walk-up as it is from a room in a luxury hotel. The bed is made, the bathroom clean. There is a pair of black plastic strappy shoes with a transparent high heel on one side of her computer desk; tucked down the other side is a pair of fluffy, white slippers.

The ITV drama The Secret Diary of a Call Girl, which has been commissioned for a second series despite terrible reviews, brought prostitution into the mainstream - and with it a lot of controversy. The makers of the programme, which was adapted from the book and blog by "Belle de Jour", the pseudonym of a supposedly high-charging escort, were accused of glamorising prostitution and portraying an unrealistic image of the sex industry. "It is highlighting in a big way a very tiny segment of the industry," says Karen, who wanted to talk to the Guardian about her experiences in light of the hype surrounding the programme. "The majority of what this industry is about is a lot of pain, misery and distress. It annoys me that the media like to highlight only the prostitutes who say how empowering this is. There might be a few out there who think that at this moment in time, but that is not true for the vast majority. What pisses me off about is that you're very rarely going to have a client that you like having sex with. You have to learn to disassociate your body from your mind which is dangerous for your psyche. For the vast majority of prostitutes, it isn't glamorous - it is damaging and dangerous - yet it seems to be promoted as some kind of career option."

It is hard to understand why a woman who isn't a drug addict would become a prostitute, but then there are a huge number of reasons why someone finds themselves in this situation, says Karen. In her 20s, she was the victim of a horrific attack and sexual assault, which left her with an anxiety about men. She thinks she has tried to counteract it by putting herself in what she sees as a position of power over them. "I'm the one in control, they're paying me. I'm not stupid - (the assault) probably does have something to do with proving to myself that I can be the one in control, that I can have something at the end of it. I can say when he walks out the door."


....

http://lifeandhealth.guardian.co.uk/women/story/0,,2225542,00.html

[Triana]

1. For more real-world insider truth about the sex industry see this thread:

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=show_mesg&forum=229&topic_id=8340&mesg_id=8340

It is NOT pretty or pleasant, or glamorous.

[provis99]

2. Raped for money? Oh please..

She chose to be a prostitute because she didn't like being a secretary. She CHOOSE prostitution. And she chooses her clients! Where does rape (involuntary sex) come into play? Sounds like a lot of rationalization from someone who looks down on her own chosen profession (for prudish reasons, I would guess), and is fishing for sympathy.

[lumberjack_jeff]

3. This logic makes us all slaves in exchange for pay, does it not? n/t

[noamnety]

4. you guess she looks down on the profession because she's a prude?

really?

An estimated two thirds of prostitutes have experienced violence from clients. Has she? "Nearly. When I first started, I got trapped on a building site with a client. He locked me in a Portakabin with him. He made it clear that all the security guards had gone home because it was a Sunday evening. I hadn't realised that he was very drunk. He started talking about wanting a threesome and I said I'd ring my friend and ask her to come over. I rang this made-up number on my phone and pretended to speak to her, then I told him I had to go out and meet her. He let me out." Once she was out of sight, she ran and ended up having to climb over two 8ft fences. "Another time, I had one guy who kept insisting that I have anal sex but I wouldn't. He became extremely violent - he kept grabbing my hair and pulling it back. And you have to act like you're enjoying it. How that cannot damage somebody is ... you don't know what they're going to do if you say stop."

[Warpy]

5. Most hookers don't choose their clients

because most are desperate for the few bucks that blow job will bring them. It means they won't get drug sick, that they'll be able to pay for the cheap motel one more night, that they'll have cereal and milk for the kid in the morning. They take anyone who comes up with the money, even though that might be the one freak who beats the hell out of her and leaves her for dead, stealing every cent she's made during the rest of her long night on the street. Prostitution is dirty and dangerous work, even for the top of the call girl trade.

The higher up on the food chain a sex worker is, the better the pay and generally the better the clientele. She also has a little more choice in whether or not she wants to work and is more likely to have "regulars," men she knows and can trust not to put her into the hospital or worse.

The only thing to do about sex work is legalize it and regulate it, pull it up from the underground and make it easier to go after the freaks. As long as there are customers, there will be hookers. Why women sell sex instead of working for nothing in an office is their business, and my own feeling is that a good sex worker who keeps herself and her clients safe is worth every dime she gets.

Most of the problems and misery of the profession are caused by its illegality. When are moralists going to realize they can't outlaw something as popular as vice?

The first duty of any society that wants to consider itself free should be to eliminate all oxymoronic "victimless crime" off their books.

[noamnety]

6. Legalizing it doesn't eliminate violence

and as has been pointed out in other threads, where it's been legalized, there's been an increase in illegal human trafficking.

When it comes to buying and selling women's bodies as a commodity for entitled misogynistic men, waving a wand and calling it legal doesn't solve the underlying problems.

[Katherine Brengle]

7. Exactly, it just legitimizes the commodification of women's bodies.

It solves very little and causes more harm than it eradicates.

[Lydia Leftcoast]

8. Maybe a lot of men have trouble understanding this viscerally

They may think on a superficial level: "Ooh, make my living by having sex with lots of people."

I look at the life of a prostitute and think, "Eww, giving blowjobs to or being fucked by strangers who may not have the greatest hygiene and who may or may not be kinky or dangerous and who, at best, think of you as the equivalent of a blow-up doll," and it's not appealing in the least.