[HN Gopher] India's sex workers turn to WhatsApp, Instagram to f...
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India's sex workers turn to WhatsApp, Instagram to find clients
safely
Author : vinnyglennon
Score : 48 points
Date : 2023-07-19 19:21 UTC (3 hours ago)
(HTM) web link (restofworld.org)
(TXT) w3m dump (restofworld.org)
| pratik661 wrote:
| As opposed to sex workers in other countries?
|
| This article has a "every 60 seconds in Africa, a minute passes"
|
| or "In Japanese culture, killing someone is frowned upon" vibe to
| it.
| mise_en_place wrote:
| > She could not meet her clients outside due to movement
| restrictions in her city Sangli, nor bring them home as she
| didn't want her daughter to know she was a sex worker.
|
| It must be wild to have a sex worker as a parent. Maybe I'm
| getting older but there's no way that's a good environment to be
| raising a kid in.
|
| Like that adam22 guy, no way his daughter will turn out normal.
| Especially when they were using her for content like his wife
| breastfeeding her.
| chimeracoder wrote:
| > It must be wild to have a sex worker as a parent. Maybe I'm
| getting older but there's no way that's a good environment to
| be raising a kid in.
|
| Plenty of people are raised by parents who did sex work.
| There's no inherent reason it has any effect on parenting.
| rngname22 wrote:
| Do you find it strange to think we wouldn't consider it weird
| to have a parent who was a soldier or a boxer or a cop who had
| demolished someone's face on camera or killed another human
| during a non-defensive war or put someone in a cage for selling
| a plant, but the idea that a parent would give another human
| one of life's greatest pleasures for money is disturbing?
| bittercynic wrote:
| I'm not the one you asked, but I think those are all various
| degrees of disturbing. Don't you?
| postmortembees wrote:
| Why, why would you say that? Parent leaves for work, parent
| comes home from work with income.
|
| Is it because sex work is dangerous? So is fishing, and pizza
| delivery, and construction.
|
| Is it because sex work wears down your body? Plenty of general
| contractors, nurses, and landscapers have jobs that are more
| physically demanding.
|
| I genuinely do not see how, if someone has a reasonable
| separation of work/home, it would present any more negativity
| on a kid's upbringing than any other physical labor.
| ilyt wrote:
| Well, one day kid will want to know where you work and what
| you do and you can't lie forever. Especially if somehow they
| learn early or other kids will.
|
| But yeah there is plenty of worse things that can happen.
| blamarvt wrote:
| What's wrong with the truth?
| candiodari wrote:
| I hate that people have a purely punitive approach to this.
| They get to feel puritan with a semi-reasonable argument:
| sex work damages others! It damages children! And, for that
| they get to do anything, because now they want to "help
| children", and not what they're really doing, using
| violence against children to attempt to impose their own
| moral values on the world. What they're _really_ doing ...
| that sounds a bit bad. But it sounds bad because it _is_
| bad. And let 's ignore that organisations like the police
| or Child Services definitely have their share of people who
| merely want to use violence against children, for whatever
| reason, because those _definitely_ exist.
|
| Look at what these people DO! Are they improving child
| services for the children in there? No, of course not.
| These moral crusaders are, effectively, looking to punish
| children so they can look good and moral. Damaging real
| people, real children with real violence so society can
| _look_ just a little closer to their moral ideal.
|
| You see ... what determines if this is better or worse is
| the alternative. If you're really after the welfare of the
| child, what determines your position is the alternative ...
| What damages the child more? That's what matters for the
| moral position. Taking the child away, in India, leads to
| this:
|
| https://borgenproject.org/orphans-in-india/
|
| So no, a parent who's a sex worker is a LOT better.
|
| That _should_ be the basis for your moral position. It 's
| all well and good to define an ideal and then blame people
| for not attaining perfection ... but of course we'd all be
| in jail if that's how we actually work. Is leaving children
| with sex workers ideal? No, but WE DON'T CARE ABOUT IDEAL.
| We care about the best possible situation for the child!
| And that, sorry, is definitely, without any doubt, letting
| sex workers raise children.
|
| You want to change sex work? Offer these people some better
| options. And if you can't do that, for whatever reason,
| throwing the child into child services IS NOT a good second
| option.
|
| And I would argue this applies to pretty much every country
| in the world, including the US. The situation of orphans
| may not be quite as bad as in India, it's certainly not
| better than living with (very) suboptimal parents, whether
| that means this or ...
|
| And, frankly, that should be the only concern.
| paulddraper wrote:
| > how it would present any more negativity than any other
| physical labor
|
| The mistake is characterizing sex work as "physical labor."
|
| There is a well documented link between sex work and
| trauma/psychological disorders.
| flangola7 wrote:
| A frightening large amount of people have terrible and
| judgemental attitudes towards sex work of any kind even
| though there they are objectively irrational. Rather than
| introspect, they try to debate and argue they are somehow
| correct. This is one of my favorite most unapologetic videos
| on the entire internet: https://files.catbox.moe/fzmvu0.mp4
| _a_a_a_ wrote:
| It seems like a judgemental attitude induced by religion.
| Those most against prostitution seem to be in religious
| groups.
| chimeracoder wrote:
| > It seems like a judgemental attitude induced by religion.
| Those most against prostitution seem to be in religious
| groups.
|
| That's a common misconception, but it's simply not true. If
| you talk to actual sex workers, they'll consistently tell
| you that they face judgemental attitudes and discrimination
| across the board, not just from religious people.
| _a_a_a_ wrote:
| Fair enough, that was just my impression. But it is my
| impression also that most *organised groups against
| prostitution often seem to have religion behind them. I
| may well be wrong though.
| dijit wrote:
| I would go further and say that _some_ people who are
| against sex work are against the propensity for other crime
| to occur (including trafficking, drug use etc) or for
| violence to be perpetrated against sex workers.
|
| Ironically, if we didn't have puritan attitudes, the
| majority of those issues would be mitigated quite
| drastically.
| pixl97 wrote:
| In a strange twist, I wonder if the puritan attitudes
| increase the retail 'price' of sex work? Said
| attitude/laws increase risk, which lowers the number of
| workers in the market, which increases potential earnings
| of those willing to participate in the market.
| _a_a_a_ wrote:
| The earnings for a streetwalker, who is at the bottom of
| the heap pretty much, is low. Some years ago I was
| offered sex for PS15. I still feel sorry for that lonely
| lady who was just trying to get by best she could. I hope
| she's well.
| akomtu wrote:
| Well, sex work corrupts the workers psychologically and aids
| the addiction of customers. Sex work is a lot closer to
| selling mild drugs than to mowing lawns. It's hardly the
| worst thing in our society, for there are far worse white
| collar jobs that are officially respected, but it's not a
| reason to whitewash it. Another way to think about it is to
| imagine it's a virtual reality that customers pay for to get
| a dopamine rush. The VR allows to create any experience for
| the customers, but is it a good thing to do?
| badrabbit wrote:
| The idea that the person who gave birth to you is being used
| to pleasure random men for money is psychologically
| traumatizing because every child treasures and looks up to
| their parents (or wants to). Their life and identitiy is
| intertwined with yours and their decision or vicitimization
| is also by extension affecting you.
|
| You want your parents to be valued and respected. You would
| think sex for money is valuing but it is or at least feels
| like devaluing. It is one thing for your parent to have sex
| because they want to and for the sake of it, it is another
| thing to do it because they have to which means they are
| unable or unwilling to provide anything else of value to
| pursue partners they are interested in, instead of the
| general public.
|
| The idea that anyone, even neighbors and hobos could be
| paying to penetrate the person you treasure the most and is
| supposed to be role model and teach you how to live right is
| at the very least disturbing. Even porn stars work with other
| porn stars but prostitutes at best filter by appearances
| aside from money.
|
| Children are protective of their parents and vice versa.
| Whether a child or parent, seeing them become a prostitute
| feels like something sacred to you is being desecrated.
|
| If that doesn't make sense to you, I suggest taking off the
| ideological glasses.
| willcipriano wrote:
| I'm fairly certain what you describe in the last sentence there
| is a crime. A very serious crime.
| qingcharles wrote:
| What dystopian country are you in that makes a video of
| breastfeeding an actual crime?
| [deleted]
| [deleted]
| willcipriano wrote:
| Is that what it was? Or was it "content".
| rightbyte wrote:
| I mean, monetizing your child with breast feeding videos
| might be considered tasteless even though it is legal and
| certainly not CSAM.
| _a_a_a_ wrote:
| Perhaps you should look into it, try and find out a bit more
| from other people's experience whose parents were sex workers,
| before you decide. Otherwise you come across as bigoted.
|
| The saddest problem from sex work that I'm aware of is people
| get forced into it from lack of money. It may not be the sex
| work so much as the poverty that does the damage to the
| children. In terms of growing up with the constant fear of lack
| of money, that deeply affects your parents, and that in turn
| damages you. Yes I am speaking from experience.
|
| edit: "A woman in Zambia stated that five blowjobs would allow
| her to purchase a bag of cornmeal for her children."
| https://www.socialconnectedness.org/the-stigmatization-behin...
| Fucking hell.
| s5300 wrote:
| [dead]
| tohnjitor wrote:
| It's not just you. That's an abominable environment to raise a
| child in.
| throwawayadvsec wrote:
| It's just a job.
|
| If you're independent, mentally sane, and not blowing your
| money on drugs, you could actually give a better to life to
| your kids that 99% of people.
|
| I knew someone who invested enough of the money she made that
| way so that her daughter would never have to work a single day
| of her life, and she was like 40yo.
| skilled wrote:
| It's a job, sure... but it certainly isn't straightforward or
| without its problems. And above all, sex isn't exactly "I
| tried these gloves and I didn't like them so I will get the
| other ones" type of deal.
|
| Love is great because it's innocent and exploratory, I find
| it hard to believe these sex workers deal only with clients
| who are in it for romantic aspects, which means a lot of the
| time these women will be taking on whatever nasty bullshit
| their client is dealing with in their own life...
|
| And that isn't something you can suppress for the rest of
| your life. It will eventually seep out and begin to distort
| your view of reality. And no amount of money can fix that.
|
| Not trying to be too cynical but it's a major point to
| consider if you want to weigh the topic as a whole.
| rurp wrote:
| > isn't something you can suppress for the rest of your
| life. It will eventually seep out and begin to distort your
| view of reality. And no amount of money can fix that.
|
| Anyone working a job that deals with a lot of drunk people,
| or criminals, or mentally unwell will experience a fair
| amount of nasty behavior. It sucks, but people do the work
| because it's their best option and others rarely judge them
| for it. Except sex workers, they get judged by practically
| everyone.
| JohnFen wrote:
| I think that how harmful it is depends on the society in
| which it takes place.
|
| I mean, everyone who works is a prostitute in the more
| abstract sense. We are all renting the use of our bodies for
| money. The only difference between me and a sex worker is
| that I'm renting my body to someone to be used toward a
| different purpose.
| [deleted]
| maxilevi wrote:
| And how many people are like that? You are basically discard
| most of the population
| DennisP wrote:
| Independent, sane, and drug-free doesn't seem like that
| high of a bar to me.
| _a_a_a_ wrote:
| Most sex workers I've come across are not drug addled nor
| mentally unwell. Obviously that's a tiny proportion and not
| enough to draw solid statistical conclusions from, but at
| least it's more data than you have.
| renewiltord wrote:
| I think working from home is probably a much worse environment
| to raise your kids than going to work and coming back and they
| don't know that you sold your body for the day. The latter case
| is indistinguishable between jobs.
| andsoitis wrote:
| > When Dhokne's friend lent her a smartphone to find work online,
| she didn't know how to use it. "I had always used a black-and-
| white [feature phone]," the 35-year-old told Rest of World.
|
| Incredible to read so vividly about the digital divide. Glad
| there are organizations geared towards connecting people with
| more digital tools, lest them and their children get left behind.
| mighmi wrote:
| In India, voice-based UIs are extremely important in the local
| app ecosystem, because of wide illiteracy in rural areas.
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(page generated 2023-07-19 23:02 UTC)