- Healing Together -
Emotional Labor in Modern Indoor Sex Work
Alexis Bartlow 10861327 Dr. Marie-Louise Jansen
Dr. Don Weenink July 2015
Master’s Thesis in Sociology Gender, Sexuality, and Society
- Table of Contents -
Abstract 3
Chapter 1- Introduction 4
Setting 8
Methodology 9
Chapter 2- Theoretical Framework 13
Discursive Formation 13
The Pure Relationship and Modern Identity 14
Emotional Labor 15
Money and Intimacy 18
Past Research on Sex Work 20
Chapter 3- Their Experiences 25
Demographics of and relationship between subjects pseudonym 25
The Clients 25
Bruce 28
The Providers 30
Lola 35
Complex Reality 37
Chapter 4- Their Transactional Relationships 42
Money and Emotions 42
But Is It Romance? 44
Healing Connection 45
Chapter 5- Discussion 48
Society, Relationships, and the Self 48
Intimacy for Sale 49
New Discourses 50
Chapter 6- Conclusion 53
Bibliography 55
Interview guides 57
- Abstract -
Little research has paid attention to the emotional components of modern indoor sex work; previous research on the topic, with few exceptions, has typically denied sex workers opportunities to speak. To meet both needs, I conducted in-depth interviews with sex workers and clients in the San Francisco Bay Area, including pairs with ongoing relationships, exploring the emotional intimacy they share. The research and resulting analysis use a qualitative perspective to update Hochschild’s
“emotional labor” and Bernstein’s “bounded authenticity” into modern versions. The results complicate the typical dichotomous stereotypes of sex workers as desperate victims or hypersexual escorts. These sex workers, or skilled emotional labor providers, are self employed, engaging with their clients as their authentic selves. Their clients are typically older men who seek out providers due to sexless marriages, atypical sexual tastes, or the unfortunate social outcomes of ongoing disease. Their connection is not the prototypical “Girlfriend Experience” or imitation of romantic intimacy. Rather, it is a genuine emotional connection that creates healing experiences for both clients and sex workers. In these relationships the transaction of money for companionship does not degrade the personal fulfillment of either participant but rather clarifies expectations, roles, and responsibilities, creating sessions of intentional emotional labor that are neither coercive nor damaging. This healing connection created by two consenting adults is a previously undocumented form of modern intimacy in sex work, avoiding traditional expectations of romantic love and sex work while providing rewarding experiences for both individuals.
- Introduction -
Two sex workers sat in front of a room of sex educators, therapists, and activists, answering questions about their careers and clients. They were members of SWOP, Sex Workers Outreach Project, offering their personal experiences and trying to dispel myths. One of the speakers fielded a question about her typical clients and what they usually wanted to do with her. Her answer was so unexpected that it became the first moment of inspiration for this project. To paraphrase, she said “many of my clients come to me, and we finish the physical part in the first fifteen minutes. Then they want to lie in bed and talk for the other 45 minutes. That’s what they really come to me for, is that time. Once they cum, then they can really open up and talk to me. Sometimes they don’t get that anywhere else.”
Clearly far more than just sex is being purchased. This fact directly contradicts common academic and public discourses about sex work, which posit the sex worker’s body (or dignity) is being sold out of desperation. This sex worker was being paid for her time, companionship, and perhaps even intimacy. Hearing her frank statement, I couldn’t help but wonder, what was going on in those 45 minutes? Is this the actual trade of some sex workers? How does that relationship work? Is it emotional? How could the sex worker provide this emotional connection everyday and still have emotional energy for herself? And, if this time for talking is the main activity purchased, why is it not empirically studied and complexly theorized?
This research project strives to challenge typical stereotypes of sex workers and their clients utilized by both academia and the public at large by examining a uniquely emotional form of sex work currently being offered in the San Francisco Bay Area. Often, narrow stereotypes of clients and sex workers define how these actors and their choices are seen. Clients are seen as predators or unwilling accomplices in human trafficking (Kulick, 2005). Sex workers are often stereotyped as either victims or whores, while their work is often reduced to either exploitation or vice (Majic, 2014). However, these stereotypes are not representative of all lived experiences. Thus the central aim of this thesis is to complicate how sex workers and their clients are viewed by extending the list of potential discourses. Emotional connection is assumed to be absent in the case of the victim sex worker and performed artificially in the case of the high-end escort. To discover different realities, this project explores what role emotional connection plays for both client and sex worker. Is it imitated, forced, absent, or somehow authentic and significant?
At this moment legislature and public opinion about sex work is changing throughout the world; therefore it is necessary to understand all facets of the real sex work being done. Academia and society at large deserve a nuanced understanding of what is being bought and sold in order to make informed decisions. Specifically in California, the legal standing of sex work has been a popular topic on recent ballots. In 2008, Proposition K, which would have decriminalized prostitution in San Francisco, failed to
pass (Burns, 2015). Then, in 2012, Proposition 35 passed with a resounding majority. This proposition was designed to curb human trafficking, but it was opposed by sex workers because it included broad and vague language which could be used against innocent parties (Janes, 2012). Now, sex workers activists have filed a lawsuit against the state Attorney General claiming that California prostitution laws deny their constitutional rights. Analysts predict that if the sex workers win the case it could pave the way for decriminalization of sex work in California, leading to possible legal changes at the federal level (Burns, 2015). With so much on the line legally and socially at this moment, it is crucial to understand who is doing the work, who is buying it, and why.
By presenting a new image of sex work that is not inherently negative, as the victim and whore stereotypes are, I am not suggesting that this is the normal or typical experience. Contradicting popular discourse is not intended to negate the fact that many sex workers across the world are coerced, trafficked, and abused. However, these abhorrent situations and more positive experiences exist
simultaneously. To point out the existence of skilled autonomous sex workers in one part of the world is not to ignore much more negative realities that exist elsewhere. Rather, this project aims to shed light on new realities as part of a critical theory that works through affirmation, rather than opposition. In this I follow Rosi Braidotti, a philosopher (and professor currently teaching in Utrecht, Netherlands). Braidotti argues for and articulates a version of a postsecular feminist political stance that embraces a process of abandoning critical oppositional (sometimes radical) feminism:
Beneficial or positive aspects balance the negative aspects of the process. The benefits are epistemological but extend beyond; they include a more adequate cartography of our real-life conditions and hence less pathos-ridden accounts. . . It also reiterates the point made before: that the emphasis commonly placed on the force of the negative is out of balance and needs to be reconsidered. (18, 2008)
Following this, and to avoid theory based solely on the negative, this project is based in an affirmative liberal feminist perspective. Pathos-ridden perspectives, focused solely on the negative, highlight a crucially important experience of many sex workers. However, other sex workers having positive experiences should not be silenced in service of those in need. Thus, optimistically, I present an affirmative discourse for consideration.
With this affirmative perspective in mind, and while attempting to give a nuanced representation of a type of sex work currently occurring, this thesis attempts to answer the following questions: What do clients and sex workers report as emotional, intimate, or non-erotic components of the indoor sex work relationship, and how does emotional labor affect both parties? What specific emotional and social needs
are met for the client in this transaction? How do sex workers understand and personally negotiate the emotional labor they offer? How is the relationship between the emotional and commercial components of a sex work relationship negotiated by both participants? These questions direct the research because they explore the nuanced meaning of emotional connection as a service or product in a commercial transaction. As the emotional component of sex work is absent or denied in almost all common
stereotypes, exploring it will produce a new angle from which to see the profession. Again, the aim of this is to reconceptualize the sex work relationship in order to improve research, theory, and legislation.
There has been one trend within sex work that lightly includes the role of emotions in the sex work relationship. Plenty of attention has been paid in recent popular media, culture, and academic research to the “Girlfriend Experience” (GFE), a type of sex work that imitates a romantic date (Milrod, 2012, Bernstein, 2007). Dinner, conversation, and perhaps even kissing accompany the physical sex being purchased. Sex workers are expected to be romantic, affectionate, and sweet (Milrod, 2012); what is appealing to the client is the suggestion of emotional connection, or rather the acts and gestures typically performed to indicate an emotional connection. However, it is typically assumed that the sex worker is faking these acts to offer the GFE; her emotional reactions are put on for the client’s enjoyment. I aim to discover if some sex workers genuinely feel for their clients. It is an act for her, done in service of her paying customer? Or does she feel real emotions in return?
Having touched on the aim, relevance, and perspective of this research, I would like to quickly explain my use of certain terminology and how I approach large concepts that underpin this research. First, throughout this thesis I will use the terms “sex worker” or “provider” for the interview participants who were paid for their time, and “clients” for those who were paying. I choose to use these words because they are the terms used by my interview respondents. As this is an attempt to provide an honest portrayal of these individuals’ experiences, it is important to mirror their language (Hennink, et al., 2011). “Prostitute” is a term laden with long history of judgment, and both client and sex worker respondents did not use this term during our interviews. While one of the sex workers I interviewed is attempting to proudly reclaim the term prostitute in much the same way “faggot” has been by gay male communities, I decided not use this term as it may have irrevocably negative connotations for many readers.
However, I must also be clear about what I mean by “sex work”. For the purpose of this project, I define sex work very broadly. I engage the word as a non-judgmental umbrella term that encompasses full body erotic massage, cuddling sessions, BDSM services, full service appointments that include manual, oral, or penetrative sex, erotic performance, and combinations of the above. While this may seem broad, it aims to include as many people as possible that utilize erotic or sexual behaviors in their professional careers. A sex worker can provide many different kinds of services; undoubtedly some offer different kinds of appointments. Despite its ambiguity, the term sex work is useful because it does not carry the
negative connotations that prostitute does while highlighting that these jobs are “work,” requiring skill and labor.
A concept that seems more easily understandable than sex work, yet proves to be even more complicated upon exploration, is “emotion”. Defining what emotions are and how they function is much beyond the scope of this thesis. Sociologists have only begun to grapple with emotions in the past few decades, and there is little agreement among them regarding a stable definition. However, Peggy Thoits, a Sociologist at Indiana University, identified the following components in the majority of definitions of emotion: “(a) appraisals of a situational stimulus or context, (b) changes in physiological or bodily sensations, (c) the free or uninhibited display of expressive gesture, and (d) a cultural label applied to specific constellations of one or more of the first three components” (318, 1989). While this definition can seem oddly vague, it points out a crucial fact about emotions: they are influenced by both biology and society. The mind appraises a situation, the body responds physiologically, and culture names
combinations as specific emotions meaning specific things. This complex and relation definition of emotion underpins how I approach the concept throughout this thesis.
A problematic term used throughout this paper is “intimacy”, and I consciously avoid providing a central and unifying definition of the word. The purpose and meaning of emotional intimacy will be explored below, however it is important to recognize the fluid and intangible quality of the word. It means very different things at very different moments. In fact, the remainder of this project is attempting to provide a detailed account of a form of intimacy experienced by the individuals I interviewed. However, for those who simply must have a definition or two, the following thoughts are provided by the
Sociologist Viviana Zelizer (see Theoretical Framework for an exploration of this text):
What about intimacy? Like most value-laden terms, intimacy scintillates with multiple meanings, ranging from cool, close observation to hot involvement. The Oxford English
Dictionary offers these main definitions: ‘1. (a) the state of being personally intimate;
intimate friendship or acquaintance; familiar intercourse; close familiarity. (b)
euphemism for sexual intercourse. (c) closeness of observation, knowledge, or the like. 2. Intimate or close connection or union.’ (19, 2005, italics in original)
Even the dictionary seems unable to locate the root or even outcome of intimacy. Intimacy is not an emotional state, but rather the state of sharing a relationship with another. While it is slightly sexual, it also suggests connection or union that is not inherently sexual. The fact that it is so important, so “value-laden” is part of why it is so indefinable. The significance of intimacy in all our lives weighs heavy, and attaching a simple definition to this significance nearly always seems inaccurate.
Next, there is an essential irony built into the focus of this project, one that is hinted at by the ambivalence of Zelizer’s quote above. By exploring emotional, intimate, or non-erotic components of the indoor sex work relationship, I necessarily reduce the complexity of how the erotic and emotional are played out physically. In reality, the line between physical and non-physical labor is not clear, as
emotional closeness is often enhanced by or even based on a physical connection. To be sure, the physical aspect can be necessary for the emotional labor to come after, and thus even emotional intimacy is not purely non-physical. But, the focus of this project is what occurs mentally and emotionally before, during, after, or even because of sexual gratification. This focus does not negate the fact that physical
gratification is an important component of the session and the actors’ abilities to connect emotionally. For example, cuddling may be a physical action used to promote emotional closeness; the term “non-erotic” attempts to capture this liminal zone of behavior that is physical but not explicitly sexual.
From this blurring of the physical and emotional, I turn to another source of confusion: the influence of money. As will become clear, the commercial component of the sex work relationship can be one of the few factors differentiating it from non-paid relationships. Therefore, setting taboo aside, to understand how emotional labor operates in sex work the relationship between money and emotions will be explored theoretically and empirically.
The Setting
The context of this study is crucial to both its design and outcome. I chose to conduct my research in the San Francisco/ Bay Area for practical and theoretical reasons. The practical reasons will be
discussed in the Methodology section below. Here, the theoretical and cultural reasons for picking San Francisco as the site of study will be offered. San Francisco is a unique place, and the results found there reflect this non-normative environment.
First, it is important to note that sex work is illegal in California; sex workers and clients must constantly negotiate both legal risk and social stigma. As said previously, there have been both lawsuits and ballot measures to decriminalize sex work, but at the time of this writing it is still illegal. That said, sex workers are not all the equally scrutinized by the law. Indoor sex work is rarely prosecuted by law enforcement (see Methodology for an exploration of indoor versus outdoor sex work). Streetwalkers, often associated with pimps and drug use, are the main focus of law enforcement. Unless a direct
complaint is made, cops will not target or harass self-employed workers that are off the streets (Bernstein, 2007).
Importantly, the liberal social climate of San Francisco influences the social standing of sex workers. Usually, sex work is not heavily stigmatized. This is partially due to a general attitude of sexual permissiveness of San Francisco culture. The city has been considered unusually progressive, even before
War World II, but after the war it flourished as a liberal city filling with immigrants and veterans. Following the summer of love in 1967, “hippie” culture made self-determination and individual freedom cornerstones of San Francisco society (Palmer, 2012). Today, this area supports and nourishes many alternative forms of sexuality. Most famously, the Castro neighborhood is known to be a mecca of gay male culture, with rainbows painted on the crosswalks and a long list of famous queer bars and clubs. Meanwhile, the dungeon and BDSM culture is also unusually normative and widespread. Not
surprisingly, sex workers have also been accepted culturally, giving the industry more freedom to grow and diversify. With more social space to operate within, without being hunted by the cops, indoor sex workers have the freedom to explore themselves and their professions, creating new niche forms of sex work that may have been socially or legally stamped out in other areas of the country.
Turning from the legal and social standing of sex work in San Francisco, the size of the sex work market is another important element of the setting of this study. Unfortunately, determining the scope of sex work in any urban setting, but especially in the United States, proves nearly impossible. Estimates are often produced by activists with political aims on either side of the issue, so accurate figures simply don’t exist. Generally, it is agreed that at least 1% of American women have engaged in sex work, although that is undoubtedly low (Prostitution Education Network, 2015). It is unknown what percentage of those are indoor, self-employed sex workers. The conservative French organization Fondation Scelles estimated in 2012 that between 500,000 and 1 million sex workers were active in the United States, despite the fact that sex work is legal in only one out of 50 states.
It is nearly impossible to say how many sex workers are active in the San Francisco Bay Area, much less what portion of those are self-employed, and what portion within those are practicing the type of sex work described in this thesis. Statistics are simply unavailable, but one provider shared with me that he believed, based on his experience and anecdotal accounts, that two to three percent of sex workers offer a more connective or emotional service. Thus, this phenomenon is a minority, a rarity, albeit one growing in size and popularity. Lola and Grace, both providers profiled below, regularly speak to and work with younger providers to teach them how best to manage this type of work. If there is a growing supply of this emotion focused kind of sex work, there must be a growing demand as well.
Methodology
This thesis is qualitative in nature as it is aims to understand motivations, emotions, and meanings (Hennink, et al., 2011). Following the postmodern and feminist schools of thought, this type of data is best collected through qualitative analysis of situated knowledges. This theoretical perspective is offered by Donna Haraway, a feminist theorist, as a potential way to achieve an embodied feminist objectivity (1988). For Haraway, truth claims are invalid if the positionalities of the researcher and subject are not
incorporated. A single objective truth simply does not exist. Therefore, I aim to find the very subjective truth of a group of people at a certain moment. I aim to be transparent about my position in relation to the community in which the clients and providers belong. Thus any truth claims I make are not to be taken as “unlocatable, and so irresponsible” (Haraway, 583, 1988), but rather as an honest portrayal of the truth lived by my interview subjects.
I found my interview subjects by snowball sampling through my social and professional circles in San Francisco. Having worked and volunteered in the sex education and counseling communities in San Francisco, I had access to a wide and well-connected network of sex positive activists, educators, and therapists. Via email, I asked these contacts to spread my call for interview subjects through their various communities. I was able to access two clients for interviews through a sex education non-profit I had volunteered with, San Francisco Sex information. I confirmed two clients through this organization. I had previously met members of SWOP, the activist organization mentioned above, through the same
organization, and these contacts posted my call in their message boards. From this, I confirmed a few sex workers to interview. A few personally asked their clients to speak with me. Then, my call was posted by a provider on www.providingsupport.com, on which I contacted my remaining providers and clients. Because my snowball sampling was so community oriented, and so many of my interview respondents were personally asked to contact me, my interview pool is skewed heavily towards a certain kind of client and sex worker (the demographics and motivations of which will be detailed in Chapter 3). This sampling method is in no way random, but rather led to a highly connected group of subjects. As my interview pool was so small, and my sampling methods so targeted, my results are not generalizable to other markets or a larger population. However, they do provide a snapshot of a certain time and place and the community that inhabited it.
My call for interview subjects asked for people of any gender, sexuality, age, etc who hire a sex worker of any kind. I tried to be as broad as possible to get a range of respondents. As I was sampling within a small connected pool, I attempted to find variation by confirming subjects who offered and purchased very different kinds of sex work (massage, full body, BDSM, etc). As is discussed in the findings chapter below, I interviewed male, female, transgender, and gender free providers. I tried, in vain, to confirm female clients to be interviewed. However, I was only contacted by male clients. Despite my efforts, I wasn’t able to find a female client to interview, and this does leave a large methodological gap in my findings. The subjects I did not confirm were left out for logistical issues or communication problems. No potential subjects were denied for personal or demographic reasons.
In order to understand the emotional components of sex work, I conducted in-depth interviews with clients and sex workers in the San Francisco/ Bay Area. I interviewed six clients and six providers, although many of those providers had been at some time or are currently clients. Within my pool of
interview subject were four ongoing client partner relationships (for a complete demographic list of clients, providers, and the relationships between them, see Chapter 3). It was crucial to the validity of the data that both clients and providers be interviewed. Past research on this topic typically only interviewed clients, assuming the intentions or emotional outcomes for the providers. This methodological failing has created a massive hole in the existing data. By interviewing both sex workers and clients, I was able to check their answers against each other, seeing if they had similar or different experiences. In this way the voices of all those involved, including typically marginalized sex workers, were included. Interviews were semi-structured but largely conversational (see appendix for interview guides).
All providers interviewed are self-employed, indoor sex workers. “Indoor” has come to be used as an umbrella term for a sex worker who owns or rents a space to conduct their business. It is defined against “outdoor” sex workers, most often associated with “streetwalkers.” Often using the Internet for marketing and communication with clientele, indoor sex workers enjoy relative autonomy and safety (Cunningham and Kendall, 2011). Recent research has shown that indoor sex workers have less risk of physical violence, theft, and drug use than outdoor sex workers. Often, indoor sex workers operate within complex protection strategies, which ensure safety and payment. While it clearly requires more capital to start working, indoor sex work is considerably safer (Sanders and Campbell, 2007). This is why indoor sex work was chosen as the field of research for this project. Within this safety infrastructure, indoor sex workers have more agency to operate as they please, and thus would be the most likely to have ongoing relationships with clients that involve emotional labor (Zelizer, 2005, Sanders and Campbell, 2007, Cunningham and Kendall, 2011).
Finally, it was paramount ethically that I do not endanger my respondents’ identities, as purchasing sex work is illegal in the state and country where my data will be collected. Therefore, I ensured anonymity and confidentiality for my subjects by never collecting their last names, using pseudonyms in this paper, and deleting specific details, names, or dates which could be used to identify interview subjects (Hennink, Hutter, and Bailey, 2011).
In the coming chapters I will present theoretical exploration and empirical research to answer my research questions. In this chapter, I have introduced the general concepts interrogated by my research questions, the setting of my research and the reasons for its choice, and the methodology that I employed and why. Chapter 2 will explore my theoretical framework by presenting past research on the central topics of my thesis. This exploration will begin with the function of discourse before turning to emotional labor and eventually past research on the role of emotional labor in sex work. Chapter 3 will begin to present my empirical findings, describing the clients and providers interviewed and offering the holistic narratives of two individuals. Chapter 4 will explore the outcomes of their relationships and the interplay between finances and emotions. Finally, Chapter 5 will explore these findings in light of the theories
presented in Chapter 2. By presenting a theoretical exploration of empirical findings, I aim to present a reconceptualization of how sex work, and its inherent emotional labor, can be integrated into society.
- Chapter 2 - Theoretical Framework -
The empirical findings and theoretical claims of other researchers will be presented in this chapter. First, overarching concepts such as discourse, emotional labor, and intimacy will be explored. Then, research focused specifically on how these concepts play out in the sex work relationship will be presented. As such, this chapter will cover a large amount of topics spanning many different disciplines and foci. By doing so, I lay the theoretical framework I will use to make sense of my data; here I offer the reader the building blocks necessary to follow the Chapters 5 and 6.
Discursive Formation
Michel Foucault, a French Sociologist and Philosopher, significantly redefined how academics understand the relationship between power and language. Most relevant to the aim of this project is his concept of discursive formation. As stated before, my goal is to complicate stereotypes and extend the list of discourses. I turn to Foucault to explain why this is not only possible but also desirable.
In his now famous History of Sexuality (1978) Foucault argues against the repressive hypothesis, or against the idea that sex has been systematically repressed by various powers of church and state. Rather, he argues, history shows a discursive explosion, wherein sex acts, and those who perform them, were carefully studied, codified, and recorded. This creation of sexual identities and categories, or discursive formation, was an exercise of power. Who can rename whom is ultimately a function of who has power in society, and the outcome is powerful and significant. New language is created to define the actor, and this language influences the actor and society. Thus the identity of the individual and the group is constantly redefined and reinforced by the nearly invisible power of daily language, or the power of discourse.
However, Foucault also argues that power can be found not only at the top of societal structures, but also wherever language is used in new ways. Thus, not only the church and state can create new discourses; rather, we all have the power to create language that silently shapes the individual and society: “power is produced from one moment to the next, at every point, or rather in every relation from one point to another. Power is everywhere; not because it embraces everything, but because it comes from everywhere” (93, 1978). Thus, by offering a new discourse I am engaging my own power as academic and a citizen. Likewise, the words of the clients and providers I interviewed lend these new
conceptualizations of sex work power and validity.
However, there are those that would argue that naming new stereotypes is not helpful; it is engaging in the type of essentialism that oversimplifies reality. In response to this concern, I present the concept of strategic essentialism. Hannah Macpherson, a cultural geographer working at the School of
Environment and Technology in Brighton, recognizes that theorists are torn between wanting to represent the complexity of real lives and the need to present coherent findings. In her words, “tensions arise between the intellectual imperative to illustrate the complexity of the social-material and de-construct identity categories and the need to communicate research findings to broader audiences in accessible formats” (545, 2011). Theorists have used strategic essentialism to ease these tensions. Essentialism effectively reduces an individual down to identifying roles or characteristics; this reduction is easily criticized as overly simplistic. However, the same reduction of complex realities can be helpful when fighting for the rights of the underrepresented or stigmatized. Thus I engage strategic essentialism in my attempt to create new stereotypes; while they do not encompass the complex lives of my interview respondents, the simplification is worth the potential value of new ways to talk about sex work.
The Pure Relationship and Modern Identity
A fundamental text analyzing intimacy in modern times is Anthony Giddens’ The Transformation of Intimacy: Sexuality, Love, and Eroticism in Modern Societies, published in 1992. I present Giddens here for two main concepts that will be useful points of comparison in discussion below: “the reflexive project of the self” and the “pure relationship.” Both aim to describe recent creations that are results of macro shifts in Western societal structure and gender relations, creating novel types of relationships and intimacy needs.
Giddens begins by discussing cultural changes that have transformed the nature of sexuality and marriage. Emotional intimacy is understood today in terms of romantic love, which is actually a recent social construction, made possible only by large cultural shifts in gender relations. Previously, marriage was largely a function of economic necessity and structural familial relations. Then, “during the
nineteenth century, the formation of marriage ties, for most groups in the population, became based on considerations other than judgments of economic value” (Giddens, 24, 1992). New discourses about romantic marriage spread quickly, and emotional intimacy became a desirable aspect of a relationship. The rise of effective contraception and financial opportunity for women offered them more autonomy. These changes, among many others, fundamentally altered how marriages operate. Over time, marriage became an all encompassing partnership, one which Giddens coins the “pure relationship”:
The term ‘relationship’, meaning a close and continuing emotional tie to another, has only come into general usage relatively recently. To be clear what is at stake here, we can introduce the term pure relationship to refer to this phenomenon. […] It refers to a situation where a social relation is entered into for its own sake, for what can be derived by each person from a sustained association with another; and which is continued only in
so far as it is thought by both parties to deliver enough satisfactions for each individual to stay within it. […] The pure relationship, to repeat, is part of a generic restructuring of intimacy. (54-55, 1992)
Partners in the pure relationship are expected to be equal, emotionally intimate, mutually financially dependent, and deeply satisfied. Self-disclosure of emotion is normative and expected. Each person, rather than society itself, now carries the obligation to define the terms of relationships: “‘The
involvement of individuals in determining the conditions of their association’- this statement exemplifies the ideals of the pure relationship. It expresses a prime difference between traditional and present-day marriage” (Giddens, 170, 1992). No longer is society, church, or family able to define how a relationship functions; rather each individual is expected to do so. However, this freedom to define the relationship also results in a cluster of rights and obligations. Partners are expected to be affectionate and emotionally intimate, but they are also expected to handle the practical matters of daily living together. Often male partners in heterosexual relationships are expected to spontaneous and romantic. The pure relationship puts an incredible amount of responsibility on each partner to fill nearly every need of the other, even as each partner is expected to define the terms of the relationship.
Related to the pure relationship is Giddens’ concept of the reflexive project of the self. Whereas one’s identity used to be defined by one’s position in a family, church, or trade, today each individual has the freedom to redefine themselves through their education, career, and most importantly our
interpersonal relationships. Today, as Giddens argues, “personal life has become an open project, creating new demands and anxieties. Our interpersonal existence is being thoroughly transfigured, involving us all in what I shall call everyday social experiments, with which wider social changes more or less oblige us to engage” (Giddens, 8, 1992, italics in original). As the modern man’s identity is now a self-guided project to be constructed through action, behavior, and relationships, the intimate pure relationship has taken on unprecedented significance in the formation of the self. Modern individuals redefine themselves through daily actions, often most significantly through the intimate relations we hold.
Emotional Labor
Analyzing emotional components of a relationship can be tricky for a Sociologist, as social mechanisms or practices, rather than internal states, are often the object of study. But recent decades have seen an “emotional turn” in Sociology, producing research and theory about the role of emotions in social relations. From the onset, how to define emotions or emotional states, such as intimacy, was a crucial issue, and the validity of the study of emotions, lacking a central definition, was often called into question (Thoits, 1989). However, Sociologists now frequently incorporate emotions into analysis. Thus a choice
such as hiring a sex worker to meet an emotional need must be analyzed with emotion’s strong influence in mind. Risks, stigma, and rewards are weighed and balanced by the client as they make the choice to engage in criminal behavior. Emotions affect every step of this process, and thus must be considered as well (Thoits, 1989).
Sociologists are willing to incorporate emotions into their analysis to different degrees. However, large camps within the literature can be identified. For one camp, “this focus on emotions from a
sociological perspective recognizes that human beings not only are rational economic actors but also act on the basis of emotional attachments or affective commitments” (Steinberg and Figart, 14, 1999). However, another group argue that rationality itself is processed through and built around emotions. As emotional social actors, our constant calculations and choices are inherently wrought with emotional baggage (Collins, R. 1993). While knowing the exact role of emotions in decision making and risk
management could be impossible, it is crucial to consider their significant role in the daily management of personal relationships and money. The height of interaction between the two may occur when emotions themselves are up for sale.
A crucial theoretical tool for this thesis is “emotional labor.” This term was invented in 1983 by Arlie Russell Hochschild, an American Sociologist whose research looked at the role of emotions in professional spheres. Since that time, her theoretical tool has taken on a life of its own, being used by many theorists in different ways. This thesis updates the idea by analyzing how it functions in a new iteration of sex work.
In The Managed Heart, Hochschild explores the role of emotions, and specifically of emotional management, in the growing sector of service jobs. In 1983, when she wrote the book, Hochschild estimated that “roughly one-third of American workers today have jobs that subject them to substantial demands for emotional labor. Moreover, of all women working, roughly one-half have jobs that call for emotional labor” (11, italics in original). While she looked closely at airplane stewardesses, Hochschild was aware that this sort of emotion management, to produce a certain emotional state in others, was present in many different lines of work. She wondered how the daily performance of emotional labor affected the many workers who were expected to perform it.
Before analyzing how the actor was related to the act, and whether this relationship was detrimental to the worker or not, Hochschild defined emotional labor as the following:
I use the term emotional labor to mean the management of feeling to create a publicly observable facial and bodily display; emotional labor is sold for a wage and therefore has
exchange value. I use the synonymous terms emotion work or emotion management to
requires one to induce or suppress feeling in order to sustain the outward countenance that produces the proper state of mind in others- in this case, the sense of being cared for in a convivial and safe place. This kind of labor calls for a coordination of mind and feeling, and it sometimes draws on a source of self that we honor as deep and integral to our individuality. (7, 1983, italics in original)
This definition assumes a separation between the emotions the employee feels and displays. Regardless of whether there is a major difference between these two states, the employee must strive to present an authentic emotional reaction. This creates surface displays that are given value, whether or not they align with internal realities: “The more I listened, the more I came to appreciate how workers try to preserve a sense of self by circumventing the feeling rules of work, how they limit their emotional offerings to surface displays of the ‘right’ feeling but suffer anyway from a sense of being ‘false’ or ‘mechanical’” (x, Hochschild, 1983). It drains the actor to feel how false the performance is, argues Hochschild, even as they must strive to appear authentic.
It is important to note that Hochschild immediately saw a downside or cost to emotional labor. Would the employees’ emotional states really be their own? Or would they simply become another commodity to regulate and control, along with labor supply and cost of materials. What would be the human cost of this work? Hochschild was clearly interested not only in the affects on professional outcomes but also in the private cost of the expansion of emotional labor: “But there is a personal point, too. There is a cost to emotion work: it affects the degree to which we listen to feeling and sometimes our very capacity to feel” (21, 1983). The cost, in her eyes, occurs because of the separation mentioned earlier. Within each actor, the mechanism causing the deterioration is the split between the self and the performance, the front and back stages:
A principle of emotive dissonance, analogous to the principle of cognitive dissonance, is at work. Maintaining a difference between feeling and feigning over the long run leads to strain. We try to reduce this strain by pulling the two closer together either by changing what we feel or by changing what we feign. When display is required by the job, it is usually feeling that has to change; and when conditions estrange us from our face, they sometimes estranges us from feeling as well. (Hochschild, 90, 1983)
This dissonance can be increased or decreased by typically large market factors that influence business practices more than the needs of the individual worker. Should supervision and company rhetoric demand performances of emotion further and further removed from the reality of the employee’s real emotional
state, the dissonance is wider and the strain greater on the individual’s connection to his or her self. Quickly, it is clear that the less control the individual has over his or her working conditions, the greater the strain emotional labor can cause.
These two halves of the self, the feeling and the feigning, are echoed in a famous piece of Sociological theory, one which Hochschild relied on. Erving Goffman was a founding father of modern Sociology, and some of his most important contributions were his concepts of frontstage and backstage acting. This theory was presented in “On Face-work” in 1967. Goffman used these concepts to describe how social actors save face, or avoid stigma, by having a self which is outward facing and one that is entirely internal. He invoked theater terms purposefully: Goffman highlighted how performative our everyday identities and emotional states can be. Hochschild relied on Goffman’s model, but used it to describe purely emotive performances as well. While she only gives a passing nod to Goffman in The Managed Heart, the parallels between their theories have been noted by Sociologists for decades.
Money and Intimacy
The commercialization of feeling can also be concerning from a different perspective: if intimacy or close emotional attachment is purchased, isn’t the emotion diminished by the exchange of money? You can’t put a price on love, or so the argument goes. However, if emotions, authentic or otherwise, are commodities which can be purchased, then how can we understand theoretically the relationship between these emotions and their price?
Viviana A. Zelizer tried to answer these questions and others in her 2005 text The Purchase of Intimacy, in which she argues that intimacy is not corroded or denigrated when commodified. Rather, she suggests that nearly all intimate personal care, whether in the context of a family, private, professional, or public setting has an integral economic component. Zelizer takes an enormous scope, looking into the multiple and complex relationships between money, emotions, the law, and societal expectations. She claims that her findings are applicable wherever money and intimacy cross paths: “Its broadest arguments apply across the world, wherever and whenever intimacy and economic transactions intersect. There has never been the sort of time that separate spheres enthusiasts dream about, where intimacy’s purity thrived uncontaminated by economic concerns” (283, 2005). Despite common understanding that care in the home is private and apart from the public world of finance, Zelizer argues that finances are always involved in intimate emotional relationships and that how we as a society name and regulate those financial relationships is highly contextual.
Money and emotions, as ideas, realms, and fields of study, are enormously fundamental to who we are as relational people. As such, the type of relationship that exists between the two has been heavily hypothesized about. Zelizer identifies three main camps within which nearly all theories can be lumped.
The winning camp, with the most social critics and scholars subscribing to it, is what Zelizer coins the “separate spheres and hostile worlds” camp. This group argues that money and intimacy do not and should not have anything to do with each other, desiring “distinct arenas for economic activity and intimate relations, with inevitable contamination and disorder resulting when the two sphere come into contact with each other” (27, 2005). In this view, any mixing of the two leads to moral contamination of both; these ideas have the oldest standing theoretically and with the most groups. A smaller camp, the “nothing-but” group, believe that the mingling is “another version of normal market activity, nothing but a form of cultural expression, or nothing but an exercise of power” (27, 2005). The third camp, which both Zelizer and I belong to, sees the intermingling of finances and emotions as a site for the individual to construct their relations as they see fit, “actively engaging in constructing and negotiating ‘Connected Lives’” (28, 2005). By actively engaging with these significant parts of adult life, an actor is constructing his identity in relation to others, or in other words working on the reflexive project of the self. Thus in Zelizer’s theory of how money and intimacy mutual influence each other, Giddens theory is mirrored.
While the majority of Zelizer’s argument is focused on care services and complex family and marriage situations, she does touch on sex work, or as she says prostitution (I will follow her language while discussing her text). Her perspective is from a legal and economic standpoint, but she makes a few theoretical points that are applicable here. First, she applies her hostile worlds theory to prostitution, showing that it is an often used argument against the validity or moral standing of prostitution:
… the relation between prostitute and patron looms as the ultimate triumph of commercialism over sentiment. Hostile worlds theorists continue to warn that the introduction of economic transactions into sexual life pushes it toward the corrupt calculating world of the market. Yet the realm of prostitution and other sex work shows us a differentiated social landscape, with its own well-marked boundaries and its own distinctive matching of relation, transactions, and media. (145, 2005)
By the end of the above quote, Zelizer is already rebutting the application of hostile worlds argumentation to all types of prostitutes. As she does have an eye for structural forces, she recognizes the complexity of realities in modern day sex work. Thus, as the realm is differentiated and self-negotiated, using arguments such as hostile worlds for all prostitution relationships would be inappropriately simplistic. In the
following (long) quote, Zelizer clearly articulates how both the emotional labor and logistical realities of prostitutes vary widely:
Let us look more closely at differences among streetwalkers, call girls, and brothel prostitutes. It would be easy to reduce those differences to degrees of economic
complexity: streetwalkers are nothing but the equivalent of street vendors, while call girls are boutique experts, and brothel prostitutes, supermarket salesgirls. It would be equally easy to assume that lurking behind such structural differences, hides a homogenous moral world of commercial degradation. For all prostitutes in this view, the ever-present price for sex eliminates any possibility of intimacy. . . Nevertheless, all three variants of prostitution exhibit a complex economic organization, and in all three the providers establish a set of contingently negotiated relations, some fleeting but other quite durable, with their clients. (147, 2005)
While Zelizer recognizes that economy does not inherently reduce the value of intimacy, she is
realistically aware that it operates differently in different settings, and that actors from individuals up to entire states are constantly working to redefine what these different arrangements mean personally, financially, and legally. However, what is evident universally is that money brings significance to an intimate relationship: “Our first question- how, when, and with what consequences people mingle intimacy and economic activity- therefore receives a double answer: economic activity is integral and essential to a wide range of intimate relations, but the presence of intimacy endows the economic activity with special significance” (Zelizer, 279, 2005). Thus in complex and constantly changing ways, intimacy is endowed with special importance when finances are involved, and vise versa. They are not diminished by each other, but rather are constantly weighed and negotiated against each other in everyday situations. This is true whether or not sex is involved.
Past Research on Sex Work
Having summarized some theory regarding the concepts of discourse, modern identity, and the relationship between money and intimacy, I will now review past research that has been conducted to explore the meaning of emotional components in sex work relationships. The four research projects below share in common the indicators of emotional intimacy reported by clients in their relationships with sex workers. What differed were the location, context, and discipline of the research. It is crucial to note that in two out of four studies below, the voice of the sex worker is completely absent. This large
methodological gap results in theoretically unsound conclusions. Without knowledge of all parties of involved, the complete picture or relevance of the work is extremely limited.
The first piece of research comes from a surprising place: a psychology department in New Zealand in the mid-1990’s. Elizabeth Plumridge and her team of cohorts were public health lecturers and
anthropologists; a sex worker activist joined the team to interview men who visit massage parlors. They wanted to know how male clients justify purchasing sex. The interview respondents told the researchers that they enjoyed purchasing sex work for a list of reasons: authentic connection, emotional warmth, mutual satisfaction, and the avoidance of normative relationship obligations. As Plumridge notes, “this confidence of freedom from relationship obligations was a necessary but not complete basis for pleasure. Paradoxically, these men also endowed commercial sex with notions of sexual reciprocity and mutuality” (Plumridge, 173, 1997). The ability to provide mutual satisfaction was prided by the client. The
researcher thought this directly at odds with avoiding other obligations. But they clearly found that emotionality plays a role in all of these relationships:
By some it was depicted as a primary emotional relationship. Several men asserted their paid sexual contacts were of greater emotional importance than the relationships with their wives…The men are positioned in an almost wholly favourable light: free agents and participants in a wholly mutual and emotional and sexual pleasure, they are provided with an ideal reading of their behaviour to facilitate the experience of pleasure in
commercial sex. This interpretation of the purchase of sex, which is a commercial exchange, as one of sexual reciprocity or mutuality, is highly problematic. It is undoubtedly a self-serving interpretative schema leaving men who pay for sex free to enjoy it on their own terms and insulating them from evidence which contradicts the premise of that pleasure. (Plumridge, 177-178, 1997)
The authors’ analysis of the data, as shown above, is to suggest that the clients’ answers were self-constructed myths out of touch with the reality of the transaction. There were a few instances of sex workers saying to their clients that they did not feel mutually satisfied, and they were included to demonstrate how the men rationalized ignoring these statements. The incredible theoretical trick that these researchers perform is to say that these men are ignoring the reality of the sex workers lives without making any attempt to empirically ground the statement. The working assumption beneath this analysis is that the sex worker is not authentic, not emotionally connected, with no mutual satisfaction.
A seminal text on this topic is Elizabeth Bernstein’s Temporarily Yours: Intimacy, Authenticity, and the Commerce of Sex, which pays particular attention to the relationship between global forces and local sex work. Bernstein performed ethnographic research and conducted interviews with clients and sex workers in the San Francisco/ Bay Area and Amsterdam. Her book, published in 2007, highlights
fundamental shifts in the nature of sex work over the past decades and points out radical changes in the realm of sexuality and emotional intimacy. Bernstein argues that as women are socialized to expect
intimacy, romance, and a relationship, forming an overwhelming constellation of responsibilities and obligations, sex work can provide an outlet for men. While their emotional needs would preferably be met at home, they are chased out to find intimacy without Giddens’ outside obligations. They are able to access the emotional intimacy they desire without feeling pressured to enter a relationship or be given extra obligations (Bernstein, 2007).
This is no doubt reminiscent of the type of service offered by the GFE. Bernstein’s analysis often mentions the GFE, but she notes nuanced differences in her findings. She found that the impression of an authentic experience is paramount for the enjoyment of her clients. Should they suspect that the provider is imitating emotional intimacy, their enjoyment would be greatly lessoned. This unique circumstance creates an opportunity for what Bernstein coined “bounded authenticity.” Sex workers are increasingly offering clients authentic intimate experiences with clear boundaries and agreements. Bernstein explores the macro influences creating these needs and the professional developments that influence both actors. Because of this, she does not closely interrogate whether these emotional connections are genuine for both actors. However, she does note the importance of boundaries on sex work relationships’ authentic qualities.
Teela Sanders, a British Sociologist and Feminist, interviewed clients of sex workers to explore emotionality. Sanders spoke to clients of massage parlors but she also looked at clients of escort services too. Specifically, she wanted to analyze the relationships and sexual scripts of “regular” clients who have ongoing relationships with sex workers. Once again, the indicators of emotional connection were present in both scripts and actions: “Wanting to experience some level of emotional connection that is
reminiscent of the intimacy and emotions that are usually desirable in the conventional heterosexual union are an important driver for male clients to visit the same sex worker repeatedly” (Sanders, 408, 2008). Also, authenticity was an important motivator for the clients. For some clients, this emotional exchange blurred the lines of their transactional relationship with the sex worker, while for others they were able to manage their own emotional connection in light of the complexity of the situation. What is evident in both cases is that the client makes subjective meaning in their transactional relationships, finding personal value in them.
Sanders argues that similarities in structure and motivation of non-commercial sexual relationships and sex work relationships are extremely widespread. Therefore, false dichotomies are assumed when talking about sex work and non-commercial relationships:
There are differences in the sexual scripts that men adopt, therefore this article does not argue that all men who buy sex adopt commercial sexual relationships characterized
similarly to that of conventional sexual relationships, but that for men who are ‘regulars’ there is a strong evidence to support this pattern of behavior. (Sanders, 404, 2008)
This comparison between the two avoids any sort of moralistic judgment of either sex worker or client, and does not ascribe a certain subjectivity to the sex worker. It works to promote a less stigmatized view of the transaction, which certainly wasn’t present in the past research.
Finally, returning to New Zealand, Gillian Abel researched the emotional health of sex workers for the Department Public Health and General Practice. Published in 2011, this research looked only at sex workers, engaging Goffman’s idea of front and back stage emotions. Abel conducted her research in areas of New Zealand where sex work is now decriminalized in order to understand what effect sex workers’ professions have on their emotional well being. Abel found that sex workers regularly engage in a separation of their real emotions and the presentation of emotions, or front and back stage acting in Goffman’s terminology. These workers were very active in creating public and private personas in order to separate their work time from their personal lives. Often they would have routines to “become” their work selves, and then after a session a different routine to return to their normal selves. So large was the distance between the two halves of the workers that they would actively work to not connect their authentic selves to their clients.
Abel argues that this separation is a healthy mechanism employed by the sex workers to ensure mental health and longevity in the career. She claims, “Yet this paper has provided some evidence that separation of self from role (distancing), rather than damaging, is in fact an effective strategy to manage emotions” (1183, 2011). Noting that this functions in sex work in much the same way as other
professions, citing specifically Hochschild, Abel notes institutionalized steps that sex workers are taking to maintain this distance. She sees this as a natural result of the ongoing proliferation and
professionalization of sex work, specifically in places where it has been decriminalized. However, legal standing aside, social stigma is often still an issue for these sex workers, and the separation of work from private self is a tool to manage not only emotional damage but also social stigma.
Having explored these theoretical concepts and empirical findings, this paper will now turn to original research. The theories presented above, specifically emotional labor and the reflexive project of the self, were unknowingly engaged by the vast majority of my interview respondents. Likewise, the results of the four studies on sex work mirror closely the data I collected. However, new insights into the motivations and outcomes of both the clients and providers can be found below. Chapter 3 will answer my first two subquestions: what specific emotional and social needs are met for the client in this transaction? How do sex workers understand and personally negotiate the emotional labor they offer? These questions will be answered by looking first at the client group and then the provider group, finally
analyzing the complexity of their experiences as compared to common stereotypes. Chapter 4 will explore my final subquestion: how is the relationship between the emotional and commercial components of a sex work relationship negotiated by both actors? After answering each of the subquestions, I will answer my main research question in Chapter 5, by analyzing my data in light of the theories presented. Bringing together my theoretical framework and my findings, I will attempt to summarize what clients and sex workers report as emotional, intimate, or non-erotic components of the indoor sex work relationship, and what role emotional labor plays for both actors. In the process, I will offer new discourses for academic and public consideration. The relationship these clients and providers share is unique in academic literature, and therefore merit new conceptual titles.
- Chapter 3 - Their Experiences -
In this chapter, I will present my data to answer my first two research subquestions. First, for both the client and provider groups, general demographics will be presented before identifying trends. Looking first to the clients, their interviews will be presented to answer the following: what specific emotional and social needs are met for the client in the sex work transaction? Next, the providers’ responses will be described to analyze the effects of emotional labor on their experience. After each group, the story of one individual will be described in detail; this is done to humanize the data. Looking at patterns and trends can be effective for data analysis, but it fails to recognize the uniquely human nature of what is being
discussed. I asked my interview respondents to tackle enormous issues: sex, intimacy, money, all in the context of their own illegal activities. Their responses were deeply personal and vulnerable, and it is paramount that this crucial component of the data is not ignored. Unfortunately I don’t have the space or time to offer every person’s story. First, from an analytic perspective, the chart below is offered to quickly summarize the client and provider interview groups.
Demographics of and relationship between subjects:
Age Gender Sexuality In relationship with:
Both provider
and client? Clients
Leo 62 Male Heterosexual Kathryn
Dror 68 Male Heterosexual Lola
Bruce 51 Male Heterosexual Lola
Hugh 45 Male Heterosexual Lola
Grant 55 Male Heterosexual
James 35 Male Heterosexual
Providers
Jay 55 Transgender Transsexual Yes
Kathryn 45 Female Bisexual Leo Yes
Malcolm 34 Male Bisexual
Lola 29 Gender Free Queer Dror, Bruce, Hugh
Grace 47 Female Bisexual
Lili 41 Female Queer
The Clients
The clients I interviewed all identified as male, heterosexual, and white. All were between 35 and 68 years of age, with the vast majority over 45. Three were married, one divorced, and two were dating others but not married. They all had full-time jobs, mostly in offices, and were not generally “out” or
public about their relationships with sex workers. Many had started visiting sex workers decades ago, often having a first experience abroad that was less than satisfactory. Thus they had lots of experiences with different types of sex workers, eventually settling on their current arrangements. This profile of client is typical for the sex workers that I interviewed; thus I am confident they are a rather representative sample of clients engaging in this type of sex work. According to providers, this type of client is desirable as they have the economic resources to pay for more expensive sex work, and the experience to know what kind of sex work they want. Lastly, they have scheduling flexibility to disappear from work or home for a few hours without anyone noticing or asking questions.
All clients had a life circumstance (or two) that made sex work an ideal space of sexual and emotional gratification. For the three who are married, their marriages were sexless or at least not sexually satisfying. However, because of their relationships with sex workers, these clients were able to maintain their marriages despite this shortcoming. Grant shared, “I’m in a long-term marriage and we stopped having sex when she got pregnant. For a number of years, I tried begging but at some point, I said, this is absurd. And although I don’t tell her I see these other women, she’s got an idea. She’s pretty open. And she’s not concerned, which is great because that’s how we could stay together for a long time.” Just this kind of story was echoed by the other two who were married. Hugh has an unusual sexual fetish that he does not seek to satisfy with his wife. It is much more preferable for him to negotiate details with a provider, meet his sexual desire with her, and then return home to his wife to raise their daughter and run their home. For all three who were married, their sexual relationship with a provider was instrumental to the ongoing success of their marriage; Dror described his relationship with Lola as releasing pressure that would otherwise affect his home life.
For the clients who were unmarried, reasons for hiring providers varied. Bruce, who is profiled in detail below, is cautious to begin dating due to recurring disease. His relationship with a provider allows him to have sexual and emotional gratification without implicating another person in the difficulties of his disease and treatment. James, who identifies as polyamorous, dates women regularly and has one ongoing partner. He seeks out sex work for relaxation and fulfillment; it is essentially supplemental to him. Leo does not date regularly, and is attracted to the regularity and ease of his sex work relationship. Thus a wide variety of reasons and life circumstances brought these clients to seek out a sex work relationship.
That said, very certain emotional needs were being met for the clients in these relationships. The first, and most ubiquitous, outcome of the relationship was “connection”. While this term may seem unclear, it was the one word used by all clients. Leo quickly shared, “I feel a personal connection with her.” For five out of six clients, their relationship with their provider was personally important. Grant shared that the most significant part of what he was looking for was connection, which in his view meant comfort in sharing time and conversation together. Many described feeling close to their providers. While
they knew they were not “in love,” many felt a desire to give back to their providers, or create a reciprocal connection. I closed nearly every interview asking why the respondent wanted to talk with me. Half of the clients did so because their provider asked them to. More than once, I heard “I would do anything for her.”
For other clients their connection was more physical. James seeks out physical relaxation with his regular full body sensual massages and compares the level of intimacy to that shared with a barber. They catch up, become comfortable, and then take care of the task at hand. Leo is very attached to Kathryn and adores the physical attention she gives him, but even that blurs into emotional desires: “She’s beautiful and I like her a lot and we connect in conversation and in kinda spiritual outlook so it’s more than the sex…she really, she knows how to really drive me wild! God I love it! But there’s more to it than that, I really like her as a person.” As is evident in this quote, even for those who described the physical component of their relationship as important, the personal or emotional connection was nearly always mentioned as well.
Beyond connection, sex work relationships offered clients an opportunity to feel affection and permission for exploration. For many, this was especially possible because of the ongoing nature of their relationships: expectations and boundaries were established over time, creating ease and comfort. James is still nervous every time he visits a sex worker, but he is able to gain more relaxation and pleasure the longer he sees a provider. Dror, Bruce, and Leo were able to explore new areas of their sexuality with providers, and felt encouraged by the affectionate response they received. Hugh, in particular, depends on the freedom he finds in his sex work relationship. Asking a woman in a non-paid relationship to perform his fetish (which he asked not be named) would be difficult and awkward. With providers, he is able to explore his sexuality safely, receiving the pleasure he desires without being judged. This permission to explore sexuality was paramount for all clients interviewed.
While each client has his own experience of sex work, I would like to quickly present how sex workers described the motivations of their clients. I do this because providers have seen many clients and thus have a wealth of experience. In the following quotes both connection and permission for exploration are evident:
“I’ve held men while they’ve cried about their wife had a hysterectomy last year and he thought he was gonna lose her. Or they have three kids under the age of seven and of course he understands that she has no time or energy for him. There’s an aging parent living in the house now that they have to care for and deal with all that death and grieving process. It’s really rare to have a client come in and bitch about his wife. What I hear is a great deal of respect and a great deal of value being place on those relationships, that they don’t want to split up, they don’t want to change that. They just have this need that’s not being
met.” (Grace)
“We do these long sessions, we do like three hour sessions normally, and for normally like an hour or hour and a half he just like admires my body and likes to look at it and pet and caress me. He’s an architect and so he’s really into visual aesthetics and he just loves the architecture of my body.” (Malcolm)
“You know a lot of guys come to me feeling uncomfortable and ashamed about a particular sexual interest that they have and so not only do I welcome it, but that like it’s normal! Let’s do it!” (Kathryn)
These quotes demonstrate that clients come to providers for a variety of reasons, but that they often are looking for connection or permission. Often these are needs that are not being met elsewhere in their lives, for various reasons. Whatever the circumstance, their relationship with their provider offers them emotional connection or sexual freedom they are not finding elsewhere. For a more holistic understanding of the client’s experience, I will now share Bruce’s story in full.
Bruce
Shortly after Bruce divorced in 2012, he was diagnosed with a rare and serious form of skin cancer. He spent months in the hospital receiving treatments. He started 2014 cancer free but completely unsure of how to form a new relationship. Bruce knew that his cancer could return at any time, and he was afraid to make a new relationship and then have to reenter the hospital. He shared, “so I didn’t really know how to approach life. I was really lost. So I was searching for friends, other relationships to be supportive.” A friend told Bruce that after his divorce he had visited a sex worker and that “he found it beneficial on more than just a sexual level. He found it emotionally kind of gave him some confidence. It affected his life. He really got something out of it.” As this sounded like something that Bruce wanted, he took a referral from his friend, and visited a sex worker for the first time.
Bruce’s first experience with a provider was positive, but due to geographical issues he looked for another. At first he found women who were clearly “making the choice strictly on financial reasons” or women much younger than Bruce, which he found “really sad.” Then, Bruce found Lola. She was tough to meet at first, not responding to him until she heard a verbal referral from the first provider Bruce saw. But when they finally met, Bruce had an incredible experience:
Well it was exciting, it was nerve wracking, it was all sorts of things. The most
