by Furry Girl
04.13.10
Some people assume nothing but the worst about "the kind of men" who look at porn or go to strip clubs or see escorts. (As though it's just a rare and dangerous "type", and not actually almost every breathing guy on earth.) There's a caricature of a seedy, unwashed man* in a trenchcoat who is so pathetic and ugly and fucked up that no "real woman" would want him. A profound loser, and a serious misogynist who acts out his hatred of women by paying them for sex or watching them get naked for his amusement. He's probably a rapist and a child molester, or on the brink of becoming one. He is all that is wrong with the world. As much as I could say that sex workers are historically the most reviled people in the world, I think that title really has to go to our customers.
In my 7+ years of being naked online, I've interacted with a whole lot of men. Tens of thousands? I don't know the number. The men who subscribe to my web sites and buy cam show time with me are almost invariably polite. (And, if not polite in the most traditional sense, they are blessedly blunt and to the point - typing "finger pussy" in my chat window, or emailing simply "more butt pics".) I am usually treated as they would treat any other person they seek to have positive interactions with, rather than unleashing the spew of anti-woman vitriol that prudery activists assume. Sure, I do get some assholes here and there - almost all of them angry at me for not providing them a service I never said I'd provide, like lots of facial videos and anal sex on my softcore porn site, or cam customers who didn't bother to read my description and get all grossed out that I'm not shaved.
When someone is overtly a douchebag to me, I can either berate them back, or most commonly, ignore them, content in knowing at least they're paying for the privilege of being rude to me, which is better than I get from, say, people who step on my feet or spill their drinks on me in bars.
You know who does unload on me and embody woman-hating stereotypes, though? The dudes who refuse to pay for what I'm selling. Nope, it's not those horrible misogynist men who pay cash for sexual entertainment, it's the upstanding wholesome men who think they're too good to do so.
Web cam networks are a hotbed of this. A guy pops into my chat room, says he has a 10 inch dick, tries to butter me up with cliche "flattery", and demands a free show on account of his own sexiness. When I politely refuse, he immediately types a barrage of insults about how I'm a fat ugly stupid whore, and lets me know he wouldn't even touch my diseased cunt if I paid him. I adore these flowcharts - as soon as I reject him, his fragile ego gets bruised, and he makes a stink about how he's actually the one rejecting me. (This is why I tell anyone considering web cam work to never, ever do free chat in hopes of getting a customer. Free chat is pretty much entirely a bunch of semi-literate dudes trying to talk a free show out of you, and then insulting you for not giving them what they want.) It's the men who refuse to buy my time that are most likely to act like they own me.
It's amazing how many emails I get from dudes who have the nerve to plainly state that they would never pay for porn, and wear it like a badge of honor, like a pick-up line, like it's something I'll praise them for. These men seem totally unaware that I might find it insulting that they've virtually walked into my business and told me they're too good to buy my crummy wares, but want to know where the restroom is so they can do their laundry in my sink. Or perhaps, these clueless men are assuming that I'll reply, "Oh cool, you're better than those icky guys who want to pay me to take my clothes off. You want to get to know The Real Me without this money thing getting in our way. Why don't you come over and let me suck your dick this weekend, seeing as how I now know you're not one of those creeps who buy porn."
Anti-sex work activists argue that it's malice against women that motivates a man to patronize sex workers or watch porn. Why is paying for a service or product proof that someone pathologically hates the person they're buying it from? Do the moralizers think that about any other occupations? Do all paying customers intrinsically revile the workers who prepare their meals, teach their children, paint their houses, fly their airplanes, pick up their recycling bins, or fill their prescriptions?
The men who get my blood boiling are the ones who demand that it's their "right" to have women sexually entertain them for free, not the customers who appreciate my time and energy by compensating me for it. Funny how the anti-sex feminists are so busy demonizing sexual commerce that they end up tacitly on the side of the real misogynists.
* My customers are almost invariably men. And, since feminists/anti-sex activists exclusively take issue with heterosexual men who pay for women sexual entertainment, I write about men-as-consumers in this post. No disrespect meant to the wonderful ladies and transfolk who buy porn and patronize sex workers!
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Furry Girl: a good time not yet had by all.
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"When I politely refuse, he immediately types a barrage of insults about how I'm a fat ugly stupid whore, and lets me know he wouldn't even touch my diseased cunt if I paid him. I adore these flowcharts - as soon as I reject him, his fragile ego gets bruised, and he makes a stink about how he's actually the one rejecting me."
I, for one, would be terribly entertained if there were a real flowchart illustrating this. Just sayin'. It'd make an entertaining cousin to the Unicorn Hunting Flowchart: http://tacit.livejournal.com/295369.html
Comment by yb — April 14, 2010 @ 5:51 am
Also, I'm curious: you talk a lot about misconceptions regarding sex workers or their customers--are there any such misconceptions that you yourself held at one point and, for some reason or another, grew out of?
Comment by yb — April 14, 2010 @ 4:23 pm
I made this discovery myself recently when I became a client of an escort. My God, to have this insanely beautiful impossibly intelligent young woman come to my room, spend an hour or two committing every obscenity we can think of, and then lying back for pillow talk about our lives....and then she pecks me on the cheek and goes, expecting nothing more and tells not a soul....this is heaven. I find myself thinking that what she has given me is so much more than I've given her (in cash) that I want to tip her, buy gifts she wants and needs...
It wasn't until I started paying for what I wanted, really wanted, that I gained the confidence of a man who "knows what he wants and how to get it". It wasn't until then that I realised how, deep in my psyche I had a hidden kernel of entitlement complex. I can't dream of chasing a woman now, pursuing, seducing. I will ask...and she may want to, or decline. That is all. To pursue, I now feel, is a ludicrous attempt convince a woman of my sexual worth...an arrogant and hilarious overestimation of the sexual value of my middle aged male body.
No...I only started to really value women's sex when I began to pay for it. I agree with you so much.
Comment by ivan appleton — May 5, 2010 @ 3:54 am
Ivan: Thank you for sharing your experiences. I appreciate getting comments from folk on the "other side" of the equation.
Comment by Furry Girl — May 5, 2010 @ 6:30 pm
I'm one of those breathing men on earth, and I appreciate you for writing about this. I haven't hired escorts, but I've been to a few strip clubs and enjoyed a lot of pornography. You're right, our type isn't rare. I've started to write about what I like just a little publicly and will expand on it in time. Perhaps I won't change that caricature alone, but I hope to defy it for a while.
I've sought out porn that I think embodies my love the feminine, or at least, my idealized image of femininity (which I know that no one woman is ever going to fit). I'm thinking now about The Unbearable Lightness of Being and the dichotomy of men who are seeking the idealized woman vs those who appreciate each individual's unique traits and seek to know the differences. I appreciate both quests, even if there's no real point to either.
I also want to end wage slavery. If you're an artist or other free spirit who deliberately chooses and enjoys this type of work, I wholeheartedly support you (and that seems clear enough to me). For those who do sex work out of addiction or desperation, I do believe we've failed as a society at some level. That's why I continue to embrace the label of sex-positive feminist (and am also very happy that you reject it and understand why). It's all about consent for me and criminalization of sex work is the primary problem. Are you familiar with the work of Peter McWilliams?
Comment by Oroboros — May 5, 2010 @ 11:48 pm
My pleasure. I may yet become your customer (ahh...your glorious bush!) Right now just passing through, directed via a link by Belle de Jour.
Comment by Ivan Appleton — May 6, 2010 @ 3:41 am
Oroboros: I've heard of McWilliam's book, but I've never read it. I added it to my Amazon wishlist.
Comment by Furry Girl — May 6, 2010 @ 4:14 pm
Great point of view. Will come again. Thanks
Comment by Beltre — January 1, 2011 @ 5:13 pm
Comment by Trackbacks — February 5, 2012 @ 3:28 am