The Parlor Problem

[Freeky]

As for the rest of this conversation...the whole point of my OP was that in this scenario the worker IS in control. As Placid Dingo's link clearly showed these women ARE in control and do get to reject men they don't want to work with.

And I support that, for sure.  It seems like it would be a good business model, and due to the AMERICAN DREAM, you could charge extra for it.

[Salty]

Phone's ringing Anna. It's your motherfucking limbic system.

Your brain, the one that is actively refusing reality in this "conversation" is only here, right now, in that body of yours because some tiny little mammal a long fucking time ago was able to successfully fuck. You are the product of successful fucking. Your brain, at it's core, wants two thing:

1. Avoid getting killed.
2. Fuck so your DNA carries on.

That's it. Everything else is just a fancy fever dream. True, we build societies, among other things, with those fever dreams. Hell, your fancy frontal lobes are even capable of ignoring the very real demand for sex. But then it releases actual REAL unhappy chemicals that prompt you to look for more.

Needs? We don't need very much. We only NEED to protect out bodies from death. Shelter, food, water. If that's all we need then why the fuck are people so unhappy?

In fact...humm..maybe the reality that America has some of the highest rates of anxiety, depression, and other bad chemical reactions correlates with the intense sexual repression that is just a part of the American Way. Maybe all those people who get sex shoved in their face daily with ads should just STFU and stop whining they're not getting any and be happy they survive at all.

Oh yeah, they CANNOT because their brains are HARDWIRED to fuck, to spread DNA. YOU are the product of this hardwiring.

As for the rest of this conversation...the whole point of my OP was that in this scenario the worker IS in control. As Placid Dingo's link clearly showed these women ARE in control and do get to reject men they don't want to work with. So long as "We reserve the right to refuse anyone" is in place WHAT THE FUCK ARE YOU TALKING ABOUT?

I paid my debt to the species. It's on my kids to pass DNA on at this point. And my limbic system is fine. I feel great.
Have you been to Seguin? I'll be JUST FINE until I can get away for the weekend. Even if it takes months. Hell, if it took YEARS, I still wouldn't fuck any of these people.

And these women still have to make a living. Turning people down until you get one you ACTUALLY LIKE ENOUGH TO PULL HIS DICK has got to be bad for business. 

ALSO, I care less about justifying sex work (getting or giving) than I care about how to structure sex work so as not to be harmful to either party. PD's example is excellent.

Is the work compassion? Are the guys indulging a need? I don't really care. That shouldn't justify it one way or another. What people willingly do with their bodies in detail does not matter when compared with their right to do so. Kind of like, oh um, dare I say...DRUGS.

You don't need another person participating to get high, and I never heard of anybody hiring somebody else (who wouldn't have bothered if they weren't getting paid) to get high with them.

Also, don't get me wrong, sex work should be absolutely legal everywhere. The social and economic factors need to be addressd, though. I wonder how many people would be in the sex industry if they could get decent money doing some other work, under good conditions, and/or if there was actually a decent safety net?

I'm not saying your limbic system is not fine. I'm saying you have one, just like everyone else and its very real chemical impulses create a very real need for sex.

Your brain doesn't care if your kids are passing off DNA. Your brain cares about their survival, but it cares more about spreading your own genetic code. The point I'm making isn't about you personally. It's about how we don't have a choice in our desire for sex.

As to the second bolded part: THANK YOU. That is precisely what i've been trying to say since the OP.

[Mesozoic Mister Nigel]

Sex is an evolutionary biological urge.  Sex, and by association physical contact, triggers an enormous biochemical edocrine cascade of hormones that affect the body and brain, and ultimately, the way we feel, behave, and function.

I am really puzzled why you would think that something which has been wired so deeply in our bodies and minds for billions of years is somehow not a "need".

This.

The ramifications of being deprived of sexual contact, specifically compassionate sexual contact (note that this does not include and has nothing to do with rape; people do not rape because they are desperate, but because they want to control, punish, or subjugate, none of which are related to sexual needs), in most adults, are comparable to the ramifications of being deprived of compassionate touch or companionship. Depression, pessimism, and increased rates of illness.

[Mesozoic Mister Nigel]

Which brings me to the next point; how many of these "creeps who can't get laid" have become creepy and weird as a result of inadequate sexual contact?

In my experience, the real creeps... the date rapists, fondlers, molesters, etc... are not men who can't get laid. Most of them are charming, appealing, and can carry on a conversation. These are not typical representatives of the guys who resort to prostitutes.

Some men go to prostitutes recreationally. I can't say that I approve or will ever approve of that. But I am saying that typifying the average john as a horrible person is... well, it's wrong. They may be damaged people, but the majority aren't rapists or batterers.

[The Good Reverend Roger]

Which brings me to the next point; how many of these "creeps who can't get laid" have become creepy and weird as a result of inadequate sexual contact?

Perhaps some.

Oddly enough, the least dangerous ones, I think.

[Bebek Sincap Ratatosk]

I talked with someone who was a highly paid 'escort'. In their line of work the customers are successful businessmen that simply don't have time for relationships. Geerally involved buying lots of presents, having nice meals at nice hotels and some kind of sexual contact, but not generally 'just sex'. She seemed perfectly happy with the business.

Not typical, or even comparable to some poor girl on the street getting pimped out to anyone with enough cash to cover an hour... but still a form of the sex industry where this person (and according to her everyone she knew at her agency) were very happy and liked what they did.

I think it might be possible to have an ethical form of the sex industry... but not on a street corner.

[Salty]

In a lot ways this issue is similar to abortion in that it's going to happen either way. Men are going to do it, and other people are going to offer it. When you make it illegal you force people to carry it out in unsafe ways.

[Mesozoic Mister Nigel]

Which brings me to the next point; how many of these "creeps who can't get laid" have become creepy and weird as a result of inadequate sexual contact?

Perhaps some.

Oddly enough, the least dangerous ones, I think.

Statistically speaking, the non-dangerous ones are the majority.

[Mesozoic Mister Nigel]

In a lot ways this issue is similar to abortion in that it's going to happen either way. Men are going to do it, and other people are going to offer it. When you make it illegal you force people to carry it out in unsafe ways.

Yes; criminalization is a reflection of the culture of sexual subjugation of women and of sex.

WE MUST CONTROL THEM.

[Mesozoic Mister Nigel]

I talked with someone who was a highly paid 'escort'. In their line of work the customers are successful businessmen that simply don't have time for relationships. Geerally involved buying lots of presents, having nice meals at nice hotels and some kind of sexual contact, but not generally 'just sex'. She seemed perfectly happy with the business.

Not typical, or even comparable to some poor girl on the street getting pimped out to anyone with enough cash to cover an hour... but still a form of the sex industry where this person (and according to her everyone she knew at her agency) were very happy and liked what they did.

I think it might be possible to have an ethical form of the sex industry... but not on a street corner.

Speaking as a social scientist, this anecdote is largely meaningless. I may agree with your conclusion, but your anecdote disincludes those who have left the job, those who have had negative experiences, and those who are unhappy but don't express discontent because of worry about losing their job. As an instrument of measure it is without value.

[BabylonHoruv]

So far we have really only talked about happy endings for men. I am curious about how people here feel about the increasingly common practice of happy endings for women? Same? Different? Why?

http://www.herprivatepleasures.com/

Different in that it is far less likely that the man giving her a happy ending has been trafficked into the country, and if she goes into a place expecting a happy ending and doesn't get one she is far less likely to rape him.

The differences are less than the similarities though.

[Placid Dingo]

I talked with someone who was a highly paid 'escort'. In their line of work the customers are successful businessmen that simply don't have time for relationships. Geerally involved buying lots of presents, having nice meals at nice hotels and some kind of sexual contact, but not generally 'just sex'. She seemed perfectly happy with the business.

Not typical, or even comparable to some poor girl on the street getting pimped out to anyone with enough cash to cover an hour... but still a form of the sex industry where this person (and according to her everyone she knew at her agency) were very happy and liked what they did.

I think it might be possible to have an ethical form of the sex industry... but not on a street corner.

Speaking as a social scientist, this anecdote is largely meaningless. I may agree with your conclusion, but your anecdote disincludes those who have left the job, those who have had negative experiences, and those who are unhappy but don't express discontent because of worry about losing their job. As an instrument of measure it is without value.

Well I guess theres also the consideration of why Rat posted that story. I think he was trying to point out that an ethical and desirable sex industry is possible not that it's typical. Same as why I posted those quotes; to show attempts at doing the right thing.

[Salty]

As far as anecdotes go I think it was pretty useful. Most people think "prostitute" and hold a very firm image in their minds, it's good to break those images apart.

[Placid Dingo]

So far we have really only talked about happy endings for men. I am curious about how people here feel about the increasingly common practice of happy endings for women? Same? Different? Why?

http://www.herprivatepleasures.com/

Different in that it is far less likely that the man giving her a happy ending has been trafficked into the country, and if she goes into a place expecting a happy ending and doesn't get one she is far less likely to rape him.

The differences are less than the similarities though.

Id certainly suggest otherwise.

Also on what Nigel's saying I dont think shes wrong. Im just saying that the reason Rat told that story was to make a point about what is possible not to prove anything.

[Mesozoic Mister Nigel]

I talked with someone who was a highly paid 'escort'. In their line of work the customers are successful businessmen that simply don't have time for relationships. Geerally involved buying lots of presents, having nice meals at nice hotels and some kind of sexual contact, but not generally 'just sex'. She seemed perfectly happy with the business.

Not typical, or even comparable to some poor girl on the street getting pimped out to anyone with enough cash to cover an hour... but still a form of the sex industry where this person (and according to her everyone she knew at her agency) were very happy and liked what they did.

I think it might be possible to have an ethical form of the sex industry... but not on a street corner.

Speaking as a social scientist, this anecdote is largely meaningless. I may agree with your conclusion, but your anecdote disincludes those who have left the job, those who have had negative experiences, and those who are unhappy but don't express discontent because of worry about losing their job. As an instrument of measure it is without value.

Well I guess theres also the consideration of why Rat posted that story. I think he was trying to point out that an ethical and desirable sex industry is possible not that it's typical. Same as why I posted those quotes; to show attempts at doing the right thing.

Hm, I didn't pick that up. I mostly just picked up on the "happy hooker" trope, which is definitely out there. You know, the jolly madam in her house full of happy hookers with a heart of gold. I tend to view with great suspicion stories where "all the girls are happy with their job" and "I knew a perfectly happy well-adjusted girl who prostituted herself because she liked it".