From the Guardian Newspaper UK
During the 1990s, the number of men paying for sex acts in the UK is estimated to have doubled. It has never been difficult to find an escort, but men who have used prostitutes recently describe how technology has made things dramatically easier. In just the same way that the internet has simplified the way we buy flights and books, finding someone to pay for sex has become a headache-free process online.
The new availability of free internet porn can also have the effect of stoking an appetite, he adds. "The analogy might be, I suppose, that it's like watching Match of the Day, and then being inspired to go out and play football, and try out something you've seen."
Websites where men can post reviews of named, and often pictured, prostitutes are easily accessed through Google. Speaking openly about using prostitutes remains unusual but the anonymity of the web means users can be as frank as they like in their discussions. (A typical exchange on a site yesterday runs: "Natasha can be particularly recommended for her figure and her oral technique." "Natasha isn't particularly busty. Only a C cup." "True true, but I'm willing to overlook a shortcoming if the remainder is exceptional.")
The lap-dancing industry is at pains to make a distinction between what they provide and the illegal sale of sex in massage parlours, but for men who go to their clubs, the line is often more blurred. For a generation of men in their 20s and early 30s, strip clubs have become an unremarkable, fairly uncontroversial nightclub option – forcing them to reassess their own attitudes towards the exchange of money for titillation.
Harry, 26, an advertising executive, visited a brothel twice on a recent holiday in Greece. "Most guys have gone to a strip club and have probably had their fair share of dating and casual sex or whatever," he says. "There's not a great divide between strip clubs and brothels. And I think that's why people like us would consider it, because it doesn't feel like a massive departure."
His attitude was also shaped by his frequent use of online dating organisations. "I've been using internet dating sites quite a lot recently and the mindset is very similar. You meet up with people with no real anticipation of anything happening, and you end up having casual sex because it's easy. So there's a sort of laziness to it. It doesn't really mean anything, it's ready and accessible – and that's exactly how it felt in this place in Greece," he says.
Dan, 28, an online marketing executive, visited strip clubs while he was abroad and came away unsettled by the experience. "I was on holiday, it was fun. It wasn't that big a deal. I didn't feel I was part of that exploitation," he says. "It wasn't sexy. It was just so transactional. Everything that that kind of intimacy shouldn't be. And obviously you know what it is, it's just business, business, business – but it was almost like a vending machine …"
Women's groups are split on how to respond to the growing indifference towards the idea of women selling their bodies – for sex and pornography.
Niki Adams, of the English Collective of Prostitutes, says she welcomes what she sees as a widening acceptance of women working in prostitution because she believes it will "reduce the stigma discrimination that many sex workers face", and because it means that the public are now viewing this as a "reasonable" employment choice.
But other feminist organisations warn that an emerging readiness to portray women who sell their bodies as making empowered choices is very misleading, while anti-pornography campaigners are uneasy about the long-term consequences of this increasing acceptance of pornography and lap dancing.
"It has never been easier or more acceptable to buy or sell women's bodies for sex acts," says Kat Banyard, author of the Equality Illusion, a portrait of modern feminism. "The scale of prostitution, pornography and lap-dancing industries is unprecedented. Much of this is driven by the development of technology. Now porn can be acquired cheaply, immediately and anonymously in your bedroom.
"Meanwhile, the porn industry has cleverly marketed itself though men's magazines as a world where women are sexually liberated and empowered. The reality is very different. The effect of being in that industry is devastating, with 68% of women suffering from post-traumatic stress disorder."
Matt McCormack Evans, an activist who will launch the Anti Porn Men Project on Monday, is concerned that the growing consumption of online porn among adolescents is fostering a new, more open attitude towards paying for sex. McCormack Evans is 22 and dismayed by the speed with which his generation has been presented with enormous, unprecedented access to cheap porn.
"A decade ago, pornography might be something borrowed from cousins, hidden under your mattress; it was difficult to get hold of. There was a feeling that it was something that needed to be kept secret. It is not like that now. There is a sense that you don't need to pretend that you don't consume this," he says.
Now his club gives clients the chance to look at girls "far prettier than they would ever be able to marry, in front of them with their legs wide open," he says. "It's amazing."
A bleaker snapshot of the modern face of Soho's sex industry comes from David Miles, 45, a former drugs project worker, now unemployed, who says he has been buying sex for the past 10 years.
Prices here have stayed down over the decade and the going rate remains between £20 to £100. "You can have quick sex with a beautiful woman for £20, with £2 for the maid. That's very quick – it's called a walk-up; £100 is for half an hour.
"I sometimes feel guilty about it. You are having sex with a young woman for that. Some of these girls are not making much money. That's the sad thing. The arrival of girls from eastern Europe meant that the prices have stayed down."
