4 ms·

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

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 5y ago
What’s the alternative? Give government more power to tell people what they can an can’t do?
- emptysongglass 5y 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 5y 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 5y 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.
      - scarface74 5y ago
        Well, seeing that the US is the only industrialized or even 2nd world country that doesn’t offer free healthcare. ..
  - robertlagrant 5y 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. Nor an economist?
  - scarface74 5y ago
    I’m all for offering free education and health care. But if everyone got an education, how would that reduce inequality? Besides, not everyone has the desire of ability to go to school.
s5300 5y ago
Go listen to what old construction or steel mill workers will tell young kids about how their bodies are physically shredded to nothing. Entire joints literally ground down & deteriorated to dust. There is zero recovery from this, not to say that there also aren’t cases where there’s zero recover from mental damages. Are you anti-any of these professions? They for the most part definitely knew what they were getting into as well. I did a short stint of continuous improvement engineering at a steel mill in Pittsburgh… it was an arguably decent place, but so many those labor workers gave zero fucks about the money they were making & would’ve left so long ago if they didn’t have family completely reliant on them.
- emptysongglass 5y ago
  I specifically called out the psychological harm that is a frequent companion of sex work. I have no doubt that manual labor, day in and day out, breaks down the body: I have my fair share of stories doing such tasks when I was younger. The mistake is in making like for like comparisons as you just did. Sex is not a simple commodity. We would do better to listen to the stories of the sex workers who have left the industry or who are offered therapy through orgs specifically created to help sex workers like Pineapple Support as part of workers' contracts with Streamate et al.
- Spooky23 5y ago
  The shittyness of jobs are not mutually exclusive. I would not advise anyone to be a stripper or to stick with some building trades for a long time.
- robertlagrant 5y ago
  There's no need for whataboutism. The issue raised is that this work is seen as empowering and liberating, and the message that it can take an enormous mental toll is not similarly publicised, or is dismissed as right wing moralising. No one's doing that to stories about steel mill workers.
- belorn 5y ago
  I suspect if one did look at the statistics, construction workers who are victim of human trafficking do not generally end up with wife's/husbands that write on HN. A social study about what happen to those people would likely be a quite depressing read.

scarface74 5y ago

What’s the alternative? Give government more power to tell people what they can an can’t do?

emptysongglass 5y 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 5y 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 5y 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.
    - scarface74 5y ago
      Well, seeing that the US is the only industrialized or even 2nd world country that doesn’t offer free healthcare. ..
- robertlagrant 5y 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. Nor an economist?
- scarface74 5y ago
  I’m all for offering free education and health care. But if everyone got an education, how would that reduce inequality? Besides, not everyone has the desire of ability to go to school.

s5300 5y ago

Go listen to what old construction or steel mill workers will tell young kids about how their bodies are physically shredded to nothing. Entire joints literally ground down & deteriorated to dust. There is zero recovery from this, not to say that there also aren’t cases where there’s zero recover from mental damages. Are you anti-any of these professions? They for the most part definitely knew what they were getting into as well. I did a short stint of continuous improvement engineering at a steel mill in Pittsburgh… it was an arguably decent place, but so many those labor workers gave zero fucks about the money they were making & would’ve left so long ago if they didn’t have family completely reliant on them.

emptysongglass 5y ago
I specifically called out the psychological harm that is a frequent companion of sex work. I have no doubt that manual labor, day in and day out, breaks down the body: I have my fair share of stories doing such tasks when I was younger. The mistake is in making like for like comparisons as you just did. Sex is not a simple commodity. We would do better to listen to the stories of the sex workers who have left the industry or who are offered therapy through orgs specifically created to help sex workers like Pineapple Support as part of workers' contracts with Streamate et al.
Spooky23 5y ago
The shittyness of jobs are not mutually exclusive. I would not advise anyone to be a stripper or to stick with some building trades for a long time.
robertlagrant 5y ago
There's no need for whataboutism. The issue raised is that this work is seen as empowering and liberating, and the message that it can take an enormous mental toll is not similarly publicised, or is dismissed as right wing moralising. No one's doing that to stories about steel mill workers.
belorn 5y ago
I suspect if one did look at the statistics, construction workers who are victim of human trafficking do not generally end up with wife's/husbands that write on HN. A social study about what happen to those people would likely be a quite depressing read.