Sex work still remains a topic of intense debate and controversy. On one extreme end of the discussion, you will find those who consider sex work unethical, filthy, perverse, and also degrading for sex workers (and hence something that needs to be fought against and abolished), and on the other end you will find those who think it’s indeed “just a normal job as any other,” which should be decriminalized, legalized, and/or regulated.
Whatever way the discussions bend to, we cannot close our eyes for the fact that many sex workers are simply trafficked, coerced, or otherwise pressured to doing sex work (for instance, in a criminal, social, or economic way or to finance a debt or addiction) or have little other means to making enough money to sustain a decent living.
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Yet, apart from the abovementioned, there’s also a significant group of sex workers who do their job entirely voluntary, for instance, because they think of it as sexual empowerment, an interesting profession, being able to choose their own types of clients, or perhaps because it makes for good money in a work setting in which one can often determine the frequency of activities and/or decide one’s own working hours.
All by all, we need to recognize that not all sex work is carried out with full agency and free choice of the sex worker and that it’s sometimes hard to discern where free choice ends and subtle or less subtle forms of coercion and pressure begins.
Another issue surrounding sex work is the level of legality and more specifically the legality of the types and performance frameworks of sex work activities, which all depend on individual countries, or even on states or provinces in countries. For instance, it means that in some countries brothels are simply companies with employees, both paying their due taxes, but in other countries brothels are illegal, persecuted, and pushed into the underground and criminal sphere.
Now, in an ideal world, a sex worker is an individual who provides voluntary and consensual paid sex work (i.e. sexual services or commercial sex) to another individual or individuals. Payment can consist of money or goods. The sexual services provided are carried out on either a regular or occasional basis, and either performed in an employer-employee relationship or as an independent worker for a company, brothel, or done alone on one’s own account.
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Mind that the phrases sex worker and prostitute are sometimes used synonymously, but in contemporary discourse it’s rather that prostitution is seen as a type of sex work that involves physical contact with a client in the form of sexual intercourse, non-penetrative sex, manual sex, or oral sex, and so on.
Overall, the designation sex worker is the preferred term for prostitute because it’s thought to avoid the negative connotations and stigma attached to the latter. Moreover, the use of the term sex worker instead of prostitute aims at the recognition of prostitutes having (or should have) agency, being a form of labor, that is, a job or profession among many other types of professions, with certain rights and duties attached to it.
At any rate, sex workers can be of any gender, but the majority are female. There are many types of paid sex work, which can include providing sexual intercourse, erotic and sexual massage services, stripping, pornography performances (live online, in-person, or prerecorded), sexual escort services, girlfriend experience services, lap dancing, BDSM, kink, and fetish play services, or phone or internet sex (virtual sex), to give some of the more common activities.
It’s important to note that not all sex workers engage in sexual intercourse. In fact, only those who also (or only) provide sexual intercourse are called full-service sex workers.
Another interesting phenomenon is the rise of somatic sex coaching and counseling, which is an embodied, physical practice that could be considered an extension or continuum of sex work. Think here of therapeutic treatment modalities like Sexological Bodywork, Somatic Sex Therapy, Somatic Sex Education, or Tantric Sex Services, etc.
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Yet, we need to add here that not all somatic sex coaches and counselors agree with the definition above and rather think of these modalities as being a form of Body-Oriented Psychotherapy, especially because an important part of these professionals have also had training as sex therapists, psychotherapists, midwives, or social workers, among other officially acknowledged professions.
Anyway, it goes perhaps without saying that the existence of sex workers is because of the demand for them. Yet, the reasons why people (mostly men, by the way) seek out commercial sexual services vary widely. For instance, it may be for entertainment and fun, out of social or cultural habits, for relaxation and stress-relief, gender affirmation, curiosity, need of affection, lust, for sexual addiction, perversion, or pleasure, fantasy and roleplay realization, a need to experience a feeling of power or control, and/or the need for emotional and/or physical intimacy or bonding.
All things considered, we can say that the world of sex work — both from the viewpoint of the supplier and consumer — is a grey domain, rather than one with black-and-white characteristics, and actually boasting a field of human activity that defies extreme standpoints, simply because of human beings’ manifold and intermixed motivations and needs.
