Sex work would probably be less stigmatized in a currencyless society

Submitted ⁨⁨2⁩ ⁨days⁩ ago⁩ by ⁨Ibaudia@lemmy.world⁩ to ⁨showerthoughts@lemmy.world⁩

Thinking about this because of a greentext I saw earlier complaining about OF models.

It feels like a lot of the stigma surrounding sex work in the modern day (that doesn’t just boil down to misogyny/gender norms/religion) is based on the fact that selling intimate aspects of one’s self places a set value on something that many see as sacred; something that shouldn’t have monetary value.

Not to say anything about the economic validity of a society without currency, but I think that, hypothetically, if that were to exist, sex work would be less stigmatized since this would no longer be a factor. Those engaged in sex work would be more likely to be seen as doing it because it’s something they are good at/enjoy, and less because it’s an “easy” way to make money, as some think. It would also eliminate the fear of placing set value on social, non sex-work related intimacy (not that those fears were well-founded to begin with).

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Chainweasel@lemmy.world ⁨1⁩ ⁨day⁩ ago
It wouldn’t really be “sex work” if they weren’t doing an exchange for something would it?
Yes, we have currency as a placeholder for trading goods directly but people who perform sex acts for other goods like drugs are just as stigmatized and no currency was involved.
And the people are just having sex with a fun of it then it’s not sex work either, it’s just sex, which is less stigmatized now then it was 30 years ago but it still has a stigma attached to it, otherwise slurs like “skank” and “slut” wouldn’t exist.

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- Ibaudia@lemmy.world ⁨1⁩ ⁨day⁩ ago
  True, but there are more aspects to sex work than just exchanging sex for something else. Creating pornography, for instance, is something some people already choose do just for fun, even without economic incentive.
  
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  - ColeSloth@discuss.tchncs.de ⁨1⁩ ⁨day⁩ ago
    And making porn is stigmatized. That’s why 99% of the porn made “just for fun” is intended to never see the light of day by anyone but the people making it.
    
    Really, I’m not directly sure what your argument/belief/whatever is here in this post.
    
    If there’s no exchange or barter, then there’s no sex work. The stigma behind sex work is that you’re selling your body to someone for a price tag, and if you weren’t getting paid you otherwise wouldn’t be doing it with that particular person. In other words, if you aren’t getting compensation out of it, you’re just like anyone else with a tinder account.
    
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DarkMetatron@feddit.org ⁨1⁩ ⁨day⁩ ago
If you get paid for it you are a whore, if you do it as a hobby you are a slut.

The stigma is there, regardless of the money aspect. They will just use a different word.

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Squirrel@thelemmy.club ⁨1⁩ ⁨day⁩ ago
There will always be exhibitionists and people who just like to fuck, but sex work is, by definition, transactional. You’re not going to see a society with free communal whores who aren’t being compensated in any way.

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- JasonDJ@lemmy.zip ⁨1⁩ ⁨day⁩ ago
  
  transactional
  
  I prefer “tit for tat”.
  
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- Ibaudia@lemmy.world ⁨1⁩ ⁨day⁩ ago
  I was more thinking any and all forms if sex work, however you want to transpose their equivalents in a post-scarcity society.
  
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  - Aux@lemmy.world ⁨1⁩ ⁨day⁩ ago
    You’re just delusional.
    
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stonerboner@lemmynsfw.com ⁨1⁩ ⁨day⁩ ago
We are talking about the world’s oldest profession here. Prostitution far predates the invention of currency, as transactional sex goes farther back than recorded history.

Currency is not needed for prostitution. All that is required is payment, in any form. This occurs during transaction, which constitutes trade.

I don’t think making prostitution more difficult by requiring barter solves anything at all.

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- lolcatnip@reddthat.com ⁨1⁩ ⁨day⁩ ago
  I assumed OP was talking about a post-scarcity economy, not one based on barter. I didn’t think anyone wants to go back to a barter system considering the overwhelming popularity of currency everywhere it has been used.
  
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  - stonerboner@lemmynsfw.com ⁨1⁩ ⁨day⁩ ago
    Even in post scarcity, bartering would resume and the stigma would persist. Either way, how the transaction unfolds in not where wrist-wringers get caught up
    
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- arin@lemmy.world ⁨1⁩ ⁨day⁩ ago
  Even fucking male spiders give a gift to the females so she doesn’t fucking eat him literally.
  
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  - stonerboner@lemmynsfw.com ⁨1⁩ ⁨day⁩ ago
    That’s not prostitution because the gift was not for the sex, but instead not to be cannibalized. It’s very clearly a case of “extortion under the threat of cannibalization!” 🤓
    
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Carrolade@lemmy.world ⁨2⁩ ⁨days⁩ ago
I wanted to disagree with this, but I actually think you make a rather compelling argument.

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- ColeSloth@discuss.tchncs.de ⁨1⁩ ⁨day⁩ ago
  The stigma with sex work is that you’re having sex with someone because you want paid, and otherwise wouldn’t be having sex with that person.
  
  If there was no need for money or an exchange for goods and you wanted to have sex with a bunch of different people, we already have that in today’s society. It’s a tinder user.
  
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  - Carrolade@lemmy.world ⁨1⁩ ⁨day⁩ ago
    It’s also related to sex being a “special” or “sacred” act. If it was just something that could be potentially dangerous by resulting in STDs or unwanted pregnancy, like say, driving your car can be potentially dangerous by resulting in accidents and death, then no stigma would exist. But people give it this special character beyond any other human activities, and put it on a pedestal essentially.
    
    Without that pedestal, a delivery driver delivering to someone they don’t like, for the money, is just … their job. Sex being a job is just … a job a person can have. Why make it special?
    
    People basically want to put the pussy on a pedestal, and you don’t really need to be doing that. It doesn’t actually make any sense, it’s just tradition for some folks. Who then want other people to follow their tradition too.
    
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ValiantDust@feddit.de ⁨1⁩ ⁨day⁩ ago

a lot of the stigma surrounding sex work in the modern day (that doesn’t just boil down to misogyny/gender norms/religion) is based on the fact that selling intimate aspects of one’s self places a set value on something that many see as sacred

The fact that most of the times the stigma only clings to the person selling and not the person buying makes me think that this is actually a negligible part of the stigma.

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- Ibaudia@lemmy.world ⁨1⁩ ⁨day⁩ ago
  There are absolutely individuals who shame those who buy these things (think those who make fun of OF subscribers), but overall I would say you’re right.
  
  I think a lot of that is the fact that sex workers are more public-facing than their clients, making them targets for stigma.
  
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Red_October@lemmy.world ⁨1⁩ ⁨day⁩ ago
People who have sex with people just because they enjoy it already exist. It’s not new and it won’t meaningfully increase just because a society becomes currencyless.

Without an economic incentive, sex workers will stop existing entirely. It won’t be work, and they won’t have any need to do it. They won’t be compelled to have sex with you just because you have money now. There will still be people at a bar, club, or whatever who will have sex with someone they like for little or no reason, but again, that’s not new.

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- Ibaudia@lemmy.world ⁨1⁩ ⁨day⁩ ago
  Maybe you’re right, but I also think that depends on the idea that other aspects of sex work beyond just sex for money wouldn’t be fulfilling to anyone without incentive. Creating pornography, for instance. Maybe that’s true in an “all work is degrading” type of way. Maybe it’s just semantics around the word “work”.
  
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DharkStare@lemmy.world ⁨1⁩ ⁨day⁩ ago
I don’t think you’d have prostitution in a currencyless society. They wouldn’t be prostitutes at that point.

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- Plopp@lemmy.world ⁨1⁩ ⁨day⁩ ago
  You don’t need currency for it to be prostitution. Prostitution is exchanging sex for goods, services or currency.
  
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- ryathal@sh.itjust.works ⁨1⁩ ⁨day⁩ ago
  So if I paid in chickens then it’s not prostitution?
  
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  - pearsaltchocolatebar@discuss.online ⁨1⁩ ⁨day⁩ ago
    Chickens would be the currency in this scenario.
    
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- Ibaudia@lemmy.world ⁨1⁩ ⁨day⁩ ago
  There are more forms of sex work than just prostitution, though. Porn, sex surrogacy, etc. People can find those rewarding outside monetary incentive.
  
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givesomefucks@lemmy.world ⁨2⁩ ⁨days⁩ ago
What?

A prostitute that isn’t paid…

Isn’t really a prostitute are they?

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- Ibaudia@lemmy.world ⁨2⁩ ⁨days⁩ ago
  There can be other forms of compensation in currencyless societies, so not necessarily. There’s also just the personal fulfillment aspect, which is supposed to be the main thing motivating people to work in this hypothetical.
  
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  - givesomefucks@lemmy.world ⁨2⁩ ⁨days⁩ ago
    
    There’s also just the personal fulfillment aspect,
    
    Yeah, that’s the reason lots of people have sex for no money…
    
    Like, if there’s no money changing hands, it’s not a free prostitute, it’s just someone willing to have sex with you
    
    It doesn’t make any sense to still call them a prostitute.
    
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  - thejoker954@lemmy.world ⁨1⁩ ⁨day⁩ ago
    So instead of being a ‘whore’ for money, Jane can be a ‘whore’ for a meal? Or a whore for a new dining set?
    
    Unless we are in a post scarcity world there will be ‘currency’ even if it’s not ‘money’.
    
    Anything that made sex transactional would just be more of the same old shit we see today.
    
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  - Skua@kbin.earth ⁨1⁩ ⁨day⁩ ago
    It seems like you mean a post-scarcity society rather than a currencyless one. Sex work done to earn a living is still done to earn a living if it's in a society that distributes goods and services in another way. I'd hope that the sex worker in question is getting personal fulfilment from it, but unless their basic needs are covered regardless then it seems foolishly optimistic to assume that it's the case
    
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essell@lemmy.world ⁨2⁩ ⁨days⁩ ago
There’s evidence for this.

Trans priestesses attended temples in Mesopotamia and were very highly regarded.

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El_guapazo@lemmy.world ⁨1⁩ ⁨day⁩ ago
You’re looking at this as an economics issue. But I think it’s a fundamentally a biological or evolutionary artifact. Evolutionary biology has intraspecific competition for access to mates to mating opportunities as a driver for change.

Organisms work to prevent the resource from being exploited just like water, habitats, space, etc. It’s other women that would lose if access to mating opportunities are tied with monetary transactions, and a few would benefit. Minimizing prostitution helps the female of the species be more selective about their mates, and increases the “value” of their interactions.

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stonerboner@lemmynsfw.com ⁨1⁩ ⁨day⁩ ago
Big doubt. Sex work was stigmatized back when there was only bartering. The stigma isn’t about the money at all. It’s about the nerve of someone to use their body to get by. Until people stop caring what other people do with their body, this issue will remain.

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- Ibaudia@lemmy.world ⁨1⁩ ⁨day⁩ ago
  This is absolutely true, I just think that it would be less stigmatized. I don’t think it’s possible to completely eradicate the stigma, it’s just too difficult to compartmentalize these things for some.
  
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  - stonerboner@lemmynsfw.com ⁨1⁩ ⁨day⁩ ago
    I don’t think changing the mode of payment would curb any stigma. The stigma isn’t about the transaction, it’s about autonomy and the only path to removing stigma is normalizing that autonomy. And protecting it.
    
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kerrigan778@lemmy.world ⁨1⁩ ⁨day⁩ ago
Well, this is the weirdest shit I’ve ever read.

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Nougat@fedia.io ⁨1⁩ ⁨day⁩ ago
I don't think it matters whether the exchange of value involves currency or not.

There are things that most people find to be unethical to "sell" (exchange for value in a transaction). Those include actual human beings (slavery), military or political influence (bribery), and murder.

I believe that sex work in often included in that list because of a lengthy deep history of protection of "bloodlines." Of course, there has always been sex work, but those who offered such services - especially women - were by definition unconcerned about their own "bloodline," which must then mean that their "bloodline" was not worth protecting. That meant that providers of sex work were necessarily "lower" people.

Today, and especially in the global West, the notion of "bloodlines" is more associated with bigotry than high status. That's why we're calling it "sex work" now instead of "prostitution," for example - and sex work is more socially acceptable now, even if it's not super high on that scale. Because that cultural thing about "bloodlines" is well-entrenched and runs very deep.

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Cobrachicken@lemmy.world ⁨2⁩ ⁨days⁩ ago
Interesting thought. I think most issues stem from bigot assholes who consume the produce but are not allowed to due to their background/upbringing/social “norms”. And those within their normative set not willing to provide, because of the same background/upbringing/social context.

Also, w/o currency there will be other forms of compensation, like a certain amount of work time, or… (p.e.) a handful of apples… due for a certain set of services.

Additionally there is always a percentage of plain idiots who would socially not be able to ascertain this kind of services w/o paying, and these seem to need to demonize the servicer to feel better about themselves.

Sry if I busted this comment, brain is fried after work.

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StaySquared@lemmy.world ⁨1⁩ ⁨day⁩ ago
So like… cut her lawn for sexors?

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FrostKing@lemmy.world ⁨1⁩ ⁨day⁩ ago
It really depends on the culture of the area, but yeah overall it’d probably be less stigmatized on average. It would certainly be stigmatized though—some people forget that many people consider sexual acts in general (that others can see, like posting pictures on the Internet, porn work, etc.) wrong in the first place. A lot of people online don’t interact with these people a lot—not necessarily because they ‘don’t touch grass’ but because these are often the people who chose not to be active in social media. When you consider that they see a woman posting a steamy picture of herself online as wrong, it makes sense why.

Many people have grown up with a very conservative (sexuality wise, at least) mindset, and that’s just the way they were taught to see things.

I think that because of that, it’s not unlikely that a large portion of people would still see person doing these things, even if not for monetary gain, as “sluts” or something similar.

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