I want to first say that I absolutely support sex workers. I have several friends that are sex workers. This is nothing against them. Many of them have chosen that line of work because it's what they love doing. So this is nothing against sex workers. Heck, I think a lot of them will be in agreement with me on this.
Also, before people get into blaming sex workers for perpetuating sex trafficking, in countries where full service sex work is legal, victims of trafficking are more comfortable coming forward. Why? Because they have the safety of not being punished for doing sex work. Trafficking people is illegal, but fully consensual sex work is legal. I also want to point out that when I searched "Sex Work vs. Sex Trafficking," the first things to pop up were articles pointing out the difference on anti-trafficking sites.
Next, people might make all sorts of judgments about customers of sex workers, but humans were built with strong sexual needs. It's part of how we are biologically. When people are having difficulty finding a lover and going through various problems in their life, being able to hire a service that provides a needed intimacy can be extremely valuable. There are married couples that go to night clubs and onto dating sites to find a third person to bring into their bedroom, as a way to spice things up. There was someone who pointed out that it's more ethical for these sort of couples to hire a fully consenting sex worker than to try picking people up at the bars or on dating sites.
Having said all of that, here is my critique of the sex work industry.
Like many industries in our society, it is almost strictly catered to heterosexual men. When looking at websites for brothels in Nevada, they have the workers listed. All of the workers I found on all of the sites are women. Although gay and bisexual women might have the chance to enjoy the services too, there still seems to be an assumption that most of the customers are going to be cisgender men.
Strip clubs are referred to as "gentlemen's clubs," implying that these clubs are for men to attend. Yes, there are women and gender non-conforming people who go there as well, but when they're referred to as "gentlemen's clubs," you know who the assumed customers are.
There's a genre of porn called POV. POV stands for point of view. The film is from the visual perspective of the man in the video, made so that a man watching the video can imagine himself being in it. There's a minor subgenre called FPOV, which stands for female point of view. When I went onto PornHub, searching for FPOV videos, nearly all of them still focused more on showing off the woman's body. A woman viewing it would have a bit of difficulty seeing herself as the woman in the video. However, men viewing the many (and I mean many) POV videos (which maybe should actually be called MPOV?) that exist can easily see themselves in it. Heck, some of the titles have the word, "you," in there.
There is one minor exception I've seen to the sex work industry being primarily catered to heterosexual men. There are bits that are catered to gay men. There was a pornographic search engine that had videos categorized as "straight," "gay," and "trans." Straight meant that there were women in the videos. Gay meant that it was only men. Trans meant that it included transgender woman. So if a woman is in it, it's for straight people. If it's only men, it's for gay people. Why aren't videos of only women also referred to as gay? Shouldn't that be classified as gay? The assumption here is that all the viewers are male, and that woman-on-woman action is for the viewing pleasure of males. In addition to that, when I first went onto a search engine, and looked up "male strip clubs," the first thing I found was a guide to finding gay strip clubs.
So when it's not heterosexual men being catered to, it's still almost exclusively men that are being catered to. There are heterosexual women who have sexual needs too, and many of them may possibly be having difficulty getting their sexual needs fulfilled. It's true that most women have sex forced on them in some way or another. However, a lot of women have commented that safe and consensual sexual activity has been something that has helped them overcome their abuse. A service where their safety is guaranteed could be of great value for them.
I had a discussion with a couple of courtesans who work at a brothel in Nevada, along a friend of theirs. We discussed the idea of men doing full service sex work, possibly for women clients. The laws in Nevada primarily seem to keep men from being able to do it legally. I commented that there are potential dangers of having full service male sex workers in our current social climate. I pointed out that an erotic website that had women post naked selfies tried doing one of men. Disaster occurred when that happened. Even worse disaster could potentially occur from full service sex work provided by men. That friend of theirs commented, however, that such a service would probably be safer than the alternatives. She also commented that it isn't just heterosexual women who could benefit from having that sort of service. She mentioned that she's extremely queer, and that she'd be glad for such a service. Dating is difficult for her, but she still has sexual needs. She commented that there might also be lesbians who'd benefit from it too.
I will say that there are some changes happening, but at a very slow pace.
In regards to FPOV porn videos, which I mentioned above, I eventually found one FPOV video where a woman viewing it could easily see herself as the woman in the video. It was done by an amateur couple. When looking at the comments section, several women expressed major gratitude. They were excited to see one focusing on the man, but not only that, on the pleasure he was feeling. A few years later, I looked for another that might have been made since, but I found nothing. Why is there so little?
There are also a few things I've been doing. One of the reasons I became a male burlesque performer was in response to how women are sexualized almost exclusively for male pleasure. I also put together an OnlyFans page. On that page, I've made self pleasure encouragement films where I assume the viewer to be a woman. I've addressed the viewer as "my queen," "mommy," "my little princess," and other female specific terms. I once sent a mass message to my subscribers, opening with the sentence "Hello to all of you queens, empresses, and goddesses that have subscribed to my page."
Small steps have been made, but there's a lot of work that needs to be done. I'm also going to acknowledge that, like all societal changes, this can't happen overnight. It will take a lot of time. Many of it is also intertwined with other societal beliefs about gender and sexuality. However, there need to be more places where women can get a satisfying service from men, the way that men are able to get from women. Sex shouldn't just be something that is done by women for men. Women have sexual desires and needs too.
