4 ms·

Moral judgement aside, what makes this "dirty work" in your estimation?

Spooky23 4y ago
It’s a soul crushing job over time. Feeding the lizard brain of guys jerking off to whatever instructions you get gets old, and the money is usually just good enough to keep people around.
- glogla 4y ago
  > It’s a soul crushing job over time. As opposed to waiting tables, selling finance products, working to deny people insurance coverage programming on surveillance on websites, working in retail, nursing, or any other activity where you're working hard barely scraping so some rich guy can buy 37th private jet? Most jobs are soul crushing. Why single out camgirls?
  - mistrial9 4y ago
    because -- for many humans, actual sex is intimate and touches the "soul" much more than those other activities. Repeated defense of ugly and abusive sex comes from a vocal minority on the Internet
    - glogla 4y ago
      Yes, that is what I was expecting. The anti-sex people claim they are interesting in stopping exploitation or whatever, but in the end it is about regulating other people's sex lives and pushing their morality on them.
      - emptysongglass 4y ago
        Read my other comment but this is honestly a weird take conflating a broader puritan anti-sex pattern with pushback on sex work. It is not a wholly positive thing. There are advantages (remote work from anywhere, etc.) but it doesn't do any favors to the actual people doing this to place sex work on a pedestal.
    - bccdee 4y ago
      How is taking nude photos of yourself "ugly and abusive sex"? I feel like you're regurgitating stale anti-porn talking points rather than actually engaging with the topic at hand. A cam girl is her own boss, picks her own hours, works from home, sets her own boundaries as to what she's comfortable doing, and does not have to be involved in any office politics. All of the things which normally put the "soul-crushing" in "soul-crushing job" are absent. It's a great deal for a lot of people. I find your appeal to spirituality shallow and unconvincing, especially given that lots of people engage in casual sex and don't end up with their souls crushed.
  - emptysongglass 4y ago
    Because it really is a psychological mindfuck in a way those other professions aren't. My wife is a former camgirl. After six years of it, she was a mess. I was very pro sex-work before I met her, even during our first year or two together then she started needing therapy and then I just offered to support her because watching your wife's mental health deteroriate every day was pretty rough. I know the kind of people who frequent HN are very pro sex work but there is another side of it that is hushed or pushed aside and that is former sex workers speaking out. It is psychologically punishing to turn yourself into a sex object, repeatedly in front of the unslaking thirst of thousands. It changes how you view men, it changes how you view your own body, it changes how you value this "thing" out from which you peer.
    - scarface74 4y ago
      What’s the alternative? Give government more power to tell people what they can an can’t do?
      - emptysongglass 4y ago
        Probably reducing wealth inequality, offering free education and health care would be a good start but I am neither a sociologist or political theorist.
        sacrosancty 4y ago
        People in poor countries working for people in rich countries is how wealth is equalized. That's how developing countries develop and how developed countries stagnate. So the existence of an international market for this is probably already part of the solution. After they have enough wealth, they can give themselves free healthcare and education without being a basket case forever depending on foreign charity.
        emptysongglass 4y ago
        Your argument is orthogonal to free healthcare and education being offered by the state. You don't need to be an immigrant to be poor in your country of birth, such as the US.
  - Spooky23 4y ago
    Leave the straw man alone. I was responding to a specific question, “what makes this dirty work” and specifically made no moral judgement or assertions. Obviously, there’s a chip on your shoulder about the topic. Camgirls have a shitty job and aren’t nurses. That doesn’t mean that camming is uniquely shitty or that it’s some sort of act of personal liberation.
wheelerof4te 4y ago
The obvious danger of injury or infection. Plus, sex is just a dirty thing. You have to keep clean and shower a lot. Monitor your health more. That kind of stuff.
- lupire 4y ago
  What, like a virus? Or a Trojan?
- bccdee 4y ago
  How exactly is a person going to injure themselves by getting naked on camera? Oh, maybe they'll get hypothermia from the chilly air in their bedroom! I genuinely have no idea what you're talking about. Wouldn't be especially dirty either — nothing a few tissues couldn't wipe away, frankly, not as a solo performer. You get dirtier than that just by using the bathroom. So, again — how is it "dirty work"?

It’s a soul crushing job over time. Feeding the lizard brain of guys jerking off to whatever instructions you get gets old, and the money is usually just good enough to keep people around.

glogla 4y ago
> It’s a soul crushing job over time. As opposed to waiting tables, selling finance products, working to deny people insurance coverage programming on surveillance on websites, working in retail, nursing, or any other activity where you're working hard barely scraping so some rich guy can buy 37th private jet? Most jobs are soul crushing. Why single out camgirls?
- mistrial9 4y ago
  because -- for many humans, actual sex is intimate and touches the "soul" much more than those other activities. Repeated defense of ugly and abusive sex comes from a vocal minority on the Internet
  - glogla 4y ago
    Yes, that is what I was expecting. The anti-sex people claim they are interesting in stopping exploitation or whatever, but in the end it is about regulating other people's sex lives and pushing their morality on them.
    - emptysongglass 4y ago
      Read my other comment but this is honestly a weird take conflating a broader puritan anti-sex pattern with pushback on sex work. It is not a wholly positive thing. There are advantages (remote work from anywhere, etc.) but it doesn't do any favors to the actual people doing this to place sex work on a pedestal.
  - bccdee 4y ago
    How is taking nude photos of yourself "ugly and abusive sex"? I feel like you're regurgitating stale anti-porn talking points rather than actually engaging with the topic at hand. A cam girl is her own boss, picks her own hours, works from home, sets her own boundaries as to what she's comfortable doing, and does not have to be involved in any office politics. All of the things which normally put the "soul-crushing" in "soul-crushing job" are absent. It's a great deal for a lot of people. I find your appeal to spirituality shallow and unconvincing, especially given that lots of people engage in casual sex and don't end up with their souls crushed.
- emptysongglass 4y ago
  Because it really is a psychological mindfuck in a way those other professions aren't. My wife is a former camgirl. After six years of it, she was a mess. I was very pro sex-work before I met her, even during our first year or two together then she started needing therapy and then I just offered to support her because watching your wife's mental health deteroriate every day was pretty rough. I know the kind of people who frequent HN are very pro sex work but there is another side of it that is hushed or pushed aside and that is former sex workers speaking out. It is psychologically punishing to turn yourself into a sex object, repeatedly in front of the unslaking thirst of thousands. It changes how you view men, it changes how you view your own body, it changes how you value this "thing" out from which you peer.
  - scarface74 4y ago
    What’s the alternative? Give government more power to tell people what they can an can’t do?
    - emptysongglass 4y ago
      Probably reducing wealth inequality, offering free education and health care would be a good start but I am neither a sociologist or political theorist.
      - sacrosancty 4y ago
        People in poor countries working for people in rich countries is how wealth is equalized. That's how developing countries develop and how developed countries stagnate. So the existence of an international market for this is probably already part of the solution. After they have enough wealth, they can give themselves free healthcare and education without being a basket case forever depending on foreign charity.
        emptysongglass 4y ago
        Your argument is orthogonal to free healthcare and education being offered by the state. You don't need to be an immigrant to be poor in your country of birth, such as the US.
- Spooky23 4y ago
  Leave the straw man alone. I was responding to a specific question, “what makes this dirty work” and specifically made no moral judgement or assertions. Obviously, there’s a chip on your shoulder about the topic. Camgirls have a shitty job and aren’t nurses. That doesn’t mean that camming is uniquely shitty or that it’s some sort of act of personal liberation.

wheelerof4te 4y ago

The obvious danger of injury or infection. Plus, sex is just a dirty thing. You have to keep clean and shower a lot. Monitor your health more. That kind of stuff.

lupire 4y ago
What, like a virus? Or a Trojan?
bccdee 4y ago
How exactly is a person going to injure themselves by getting naked on camera? Oh, maybe they'll get hypothermia from the chilly air in their bedroom! I genuinely have no idea what you're talking about. Wouldn't be especially dirty either — nothing a few tissues couldn't wipe away, frankly, not as a solo performer. You get dirtier than that just by using the bathroom. So, again — how is it "dirty work"?