Male Hookers

Continuing the theme of the previous couple of posts, and trying to get back up on the post count, I decided to go with male prostitutes. I think, to approach this one properly, we have to look at male prostitutes for women, not for men. I think this is a good paradigm because it is a bit more open to interpretation than the men on men paradigm. 

Male hookers are just as common as female hookers: Male hookers, while maybe not as easy to see, are just as everywhere as women hookers are. Men will routinely have sex with women for monetary gain, if not directly money. Men will sleep with women who have money and reward them in other gifts, in cash, and in other benefits. 

The easy example is the stereotype (or is it archetype) of the pool boy / lawn boy. The "boy" is young, poor, and has sex with an older woman, often married, and she rewards him with a larger paycheck. When you compare this transaction to a man / woman prostitution transaction, it is nearly identical. The fact that women don't often go out cruising the streets looking for a trick doesn't mean that it doesn't happen - it just happens in different ways. 

Women also have been known to go on trips to places like Jamaica where they will engage in illicit transactions. They may not actually pay men there in cash, but they will give them things; there is an entire industry built around this type of transaction. And there are direct male escorts - admittedly harder to find than female ones, but they do exist. And a quick look at Craigs list or kijiji will show you many men who will have sex with women for money, and many women who will pay. 

Male prostitutes are a myth: There really aren't any women paying for sex. If they are giving people gifts, then they are in a relationship. Prostitution is defined as receiving money for sex - so gifts or other benefits don't count. That aside, prostitution is primarily about power, and since women don't have much power, there aren't male prostitutes. 

The pool boy myth is exactly that -  a myth. If they existed, they wouldn't be complaining about it; but really they don't exist. They make a good episode of Desperate Housewives, but they don't actually happen. It's just an adolescent male fantasy that somehow got wings and is still around. And you can't compare Stella getting her groove back to a real prostitution thing. THe male prostitute is a hollywood creation - or as Samantha said in Sex and the City - "Male prostitutes...are for first novels".

Just because something is advertised on Kijiji or Craigslist doesn't mean that it actually happens. There are a lot of things advertised there that never happen. just because it's on the internet doesn't mean it's true. If you were to check those ads, a lot of them would be fake, and a lot of those women looking for a discreet hookup are actually hookers. 

What I think: I think that male hookers are definitely around, and are a lot more prevalent than people think. I do think that they payment is less overt, and more likely to come in forms of women buying really nice things for their boy toys. Prostitution is a power thing - and any woman who has economic power is just as likely to use it for personal sexual gain as men are. I also think that women who pay men for sex probably justify it in the same way that men do; and that male who are in these situations can end up being just as damaged as women can - any they don't have any way to deal with it. 

How I relate: Well, I've never been paid for sex. But I do know a few male friends who had sugar mamas; and they benefitted financially from it. I don't know how it affected them, but I think that their future relationships with women weren't very healthy. I've seen a few documentaries about male escorts and the resort types as well. 

With all that stuff in mind, I started thinking about sex and Mrs. Robinson thing. It's curious that we still use a reference to a 1967 movie to define that particular relationship, because there are far better examples of it out there. And most people I know probably haven't even seen "The Graduate" anyways. But it would make a good topic - i mean, is there a difference between a 27 year old woman who sleeps with a 14 year old boy and 27 years old man who sleeps with a 14 year old girl? And the language in that sentence would probably annoy some people - because it so black and when when presented in those terms (woman/boy; man/girl). And from that as well, I think a good topic could be men raped by women.  And I bet I have a really hard time finding pictures for this post.