Why do men use prostitutes?

[BurtWorm]

Very interesting article from the Guardian. Made me wonder if any any DUers would be brave enough to talk about their experiences with prostitution, on either side of the transaction. (That leaves me out of the discussion as anything but an interested observer.) Have you used a prostitute? Or been a prostitute? Or known someone who used prostitutes or was one? Do the men in this article sound familiar?

http://www.guardian.co.uk/society/2010/jan/15/why-men-use-prostitutes

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The men didn't fall into obvious stereotypes. They were aged between 18 and 70 years old; they were white, black, Asian, eastern European; most were employed and many were ­educated beyond school level. In the main they were presentable, polite, with average-to-good social skills. Many were husbands and boyfriends; just over half were either married or in a relationship with a woman.

Research published in 2005 found that the numbers of men who pay for sex had doubled in a decade. The ­authors attributed this rise to "a greater acceptability of commercial sexual contact", yet many of our ­interviewees told us that they felt ­intense guilt and shame about paying for sex. "I'm not satisfied in my mind" was how one described his feelings after paying for sex. Another told me that he felt "disappointed – what a waste of money", "lonely still" and "guilty about my relationship with my wife". In fact, many of the men were a mass of contradictions. Despite finding their experiences "unfulfilling, empty, terrible", they continued to visit prostitutes.

I interviewed 12 of the men, and found it a fascinating experience. One told me about his experience of childhood cruelty and neglect and linked this to his inability to form close ­relationships with anyone, particularly women. Alex admitted sex with ­prostitutes made him feel empty, but he had no idea how to get to know women "through the usual routes". When I asked him about his feelings ­towards the women he buys he said that on the one hand, he wants ­prostitutes to get to know and like him and, on the other, he is "not under ­delusions" that the encounters are anything like a real relationship.

"I want my ideal prostitute not to behave like one," he said, "to role-play to be a pretend girlfriend, a casual date, not business-like or mechanical. To a third person it looks like we're in love."

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...Darren was young, good-looking and bright; I asked him how often he thought the women he paid enjoyed the sex. "I don't want them to get any pleasure," he told me. "I am paying for it and it is her job to give me pleasure. If she enjoys it I would feel cheated." I asked if he felt prostitutes were different to other women. "The fact that they're prepared to do that job where others won't, even when they're skint, means there's some capability inside them that permits them to do it and not be disgusted," he said. He seemed full of a festering, potentially explosive misogyny.

When asked what would end ­prostitution, one interviewee laughed and said, "Kill all the girls." Paul told me that it would take "all the men to be locked up". But most of them told the researchers that they would be ­easily deterred if the current laws were implemented. Fines, public ­exposure, employers being informed, being issued with an Asbo or the risk of a criminal record would stop most of the men from continuing to pay for sex. Discovering the women were ­trafficked, pimped or otherwise coerced would appear not to be so ­effective. Almost half said they ­believed that most women in prostitution are victims of pimps ("the pimp does the ­psychological raping of the woman," explained one). But they still continued to visit them.

An upcoming new law will make it illegal for men to pay for sex with a trafficked or pimped woman – and a punter's ignorance of a woman's ­circumstances will be no defence. Critics have suggested that this is ­unfair, that a man can't possibly know whether a woman is being exploited. Our interviews challenged this ­notion. The men knew, to some extent, about abuse and coercion in prostitution – they weren't operating under the ­convenient illusion that women enter the trade because they love sex. More than half admitted that they either knew or believed that a majority of women in prostitution were lured, tricked or trafficked.

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