Sex Worker Joy
Commissioned by Brass Monkey Magazine.
A lot of awful shit is happening to the SW industry at the moment, which is having devastating impacts on the health and overall livelihood of Sex Workers. Speaking from a UK perspective, over the past decade we’ve seen hundreds of clubs close around the country and it’s rapidly getting worse coming out of lockdown. At this point, we don’t know what it is we’re likely to be returning to and it’s terrifying. In the issue before last I wrote an article about the dangers we face, so I covered a lot of the negatives surrounding sex work there. Society is so focused on promoting sex work trauma porn and negative stories surrounding our work, that it’s easy for people to believe it’s all bad. As a result, I want to do something different this issue and focus on sex worker joy.
Sex work is freedom for so many reasons. Firstly, there is a journey that you go on as a baby sex worker to discover the power of your sexuality and how it can arouse others, you can really learn to be your best and sexiest self on the job with the help of others in the industry and months and years of trial and error with customers, eventually you can master the power of your own sexuality and how to market it. Another good thing about sex work is that It gives undocumented people the ability to earn an income, it gives people with complex mental health needs a flexible work schedule, it allows people not earning enough money the ability to take on a second job and it gives people who need quick access to money the ability to earn cash in hand on the day. Now I’m not saying that the parameters surrounding people’s need to earn money fast and under these circumstances haven’t been oppressive, I’m just saying that the freedom it allows is like no other workforce and that there is joy in that.
For a lot of people, the erotic labour industry is where people find their chosen family and their friends for life. Securing the bag together is a dopamine release like no other and there is an intimacy between sex workers that could not be achieved through working any other job. There is a soft vulnerability to the profession that gives you the ability to form deep, meaningful bonds.
Additionally, it can enhance your psychological and social skills because you have to learn to read people to sell to them, you learn a lot about human behaviour in your interactions and you have to learn how to switch on the charm and charisma when you need something – a skill most people will go their whole lives without mastering. On top of this, sex work can be a place where you learn your own power and self-worth because you see the ability to make someone desire you and you are able to play with that, to place financial value on it and make a profit. Overall, this can be a huge confidence boost, even for those who don’t feel they need it, because it can enhance your perception of yourself and confidence in your abilities.
Furthermore, sex work teaches you how to move through the world as a sensual being, aware of your own sexual power and skill. Awareness of one’s own sexual power and skill is a niche life changing skill that very few possess as few people are in touch with the sexual parts of themselves, especially considering the ways sexual physicality connects with mental sexuality.
When I started working and made friends who I looked forward to seeing every shift I had the best time, this experience coupled with occasionally going home with stacks of cash together and laughing at all the wild things that happened every evening gave me a high I haven’t had in any other job since. There truly is fun to be had and meaningful friendships to be made in sex work. When you wonder why people continue to work in a job so stigmatised it’s good to remember that there is joy, passion and freedom in sex work and that’s why a lot of us who have a choice choose to stay.
