For a snapshot of the gay psyche, you couldn’t do better than the online, all-gay forum DataLounge.
A 26-year-old was wondering what to expect if he hired an escort. “There’s 2 in Las Vegas I’m considering — both around my age. I’d be grateful for some serious advice!”
Instead of advice, he was sideswiped with moral judgments: “Why would a 26 y/o need to hire an escort? Just how ugly are you? “; “Sounds like something Kelly Clarkson would do”; “Bring your crack pipe.”
The prize bit of nonsense was this ode of self-congratulation:
“I’m so glad that I’m 37 and never had to even think about hiring an escort. I want guys to like me for me, and that means more to me than some whore who has fucked the whole city… I’m not necessarily into younger guys, but I take amazing care of myself and look really great. Maybe you should do the same and stop living some crazy vapid existence.”
Lovely.
And not at all relevant.
The 26-year-old poster had simply requested some “serious advice,” based in experience. Was that so much to ask?
For many of the gay men who responded, yes. The real problem here was not actually escorts, but sex without love. And in a rather unexpected way, the various writers echoed an opinion more common on Abstinence billboards: Love waits.
Love may wait, but sex, to be completely candid about it, does not — as the history of the world, with its illegitimate heirs and blowjobs in oval offices, amply demonstrates.
Uncoupled from love, sex remains a taboo even for gay men, who, one presumes, should know better. Instead, the official line is embraced: sex can never be a complete pleasure in itself but must always serve some “useful” purpose.
For heterosexuals, the love requirement — for which marriage is the formal ritual — ensures Dad will stick around to raise the kids (a rather optimistic insurance policy, it turns out). Yet gay men, among others, buy into the romance of it, however little it applies to their situation.
At Nightcharm we are always amazed by the turn in a conversation when we casually mention that we’re pornographers, or as we put it for the faint of heart, “run an adult website for gay men.” The chill that ensues, the smug attempts at humor, the prissy Marian the Librarian prudery — finding this in a bunch of otherwise grown men never fails to floor us.
Sex, it seems, remains a chaotic, dangerous force, best relegated to darkness, to be handled, if at all, with caution and (too often) outright shame.
And so the escorts are “whores,” “hustlers,” “rent boys,” rather than the dispassionate and more accurate “sex worker” — a term pioneered by doctors working with sexually transmitted diseases as a way to remove an obstacle in reaching one of their target demographics.
Yet, despite all the moral posturing, the facts of life are plain: Of course, young men hire escorts! And why not? You’re on a business trip, you’re holed up in a plastic Ramada Inn with Jenna Jamison on 400 porn channels, you have to get up early in the morning for a meeting and can’t fritter away the night in some glum, local bar — why wouldn’t you hire a professional for a little canoodling and, maybe, a good athletic fuck?
Meanwhile, back at DataLounge, our 26-year-old was finally getting what we judge to be an honest response:
I hired an escort in the prime of my life, during my 20s. It doesn’t have anything to do with being old or ugly. I did it because I thought it would be fun and I got turned on by the situation of having complete control over someone — the whole novelty aspect of it. I paid to have him for the whole weekend. We had sex about 5 times over a 3 day span. The rest was very interesting — conversation and going out to dinners and such. I felt like Richard Gere in Pretty Woman (haha).
The thing that a lot of people don’t know is that most escorts are very intelligent and make great company and conversationalists if you ever engage them in that avenue
And although this admission, that power is sexy, elicited a whole new wave of slams, other veterans of reality soon piped up:
“If you want HIM to take control, my experience is that you have to spell it out before you hire him. But what’s this Tip generously shit? … At $200 an hour, they’re making plenty of cash.”
An argument soon broke out over the intelligence of escorts and their relative value as conversationalists. “It’s an urban myth,” huffed one of the posters, dismissing the contention that many escorts were, in fact, grad students funding their education with flexible work hours and the best return of pay for time. “No one, and I mean no one, who has a hope in hell of ever making it in a ‘legitimate’ field would take the risk of escorting.”
“Except for those who do,” came the instant reply. “Sorry, Charlie, just go and wrap yourself up in your blanket statements and take a nap.”
And then — because, after all, this was DataLounge — came the inevitable hilarious over-reach: “In Bush’s America,” the poster clucked, “some young men have to whore themselves just to get a decent education!”
“Look, you get what you pay for.” a new voice or reality broke in. “The real professionals will take care of you any way you like. Just go to Hooboy.com and check out the reviews of escorts in your city. Then you can make an informed purchase. You wouldn’t buy a car without researching it first? So why not research it when buying a human being?”
“Buying a human being,” we admit, is a bit too much reality even for us — though not inaccurate. (Still, are you not then also buying a human being when you hire a housekeeper or a gardener or a lawyer?) This tip, like the earnest ones that preceded it, was at least practical and not a bad bit of advice — for anyone.
All photos are of professional male models,
not escorts.
We make no claims as to their sexual orientation
or after-hours sidelines.
Interesting.
Like you posited, a service is a service, right? I don’t have to pay for sex, but I’ve entertained the idea of doing it with certain individuals. I don’t see the big deal these silly queens went on and on about. It shows the lack of introspective depth and the ability to reason why somebody might want to buy a couple of hours of fun. You pay to ride a roller coaster, get into a theme park, or even your state beach. Sometimes, just the thrill, the fun, the enjoyment, or sheer beauty of a situation is what we crave and I see nothing wrong with carving out a few hours with an escort. These guys can throw their hands up to their faces like they are shocked all they want, but who wants to have sex with *them*? I can guarantee more than half of them are so out of touch with what they enjoy and like sexually that a few miserable, fumbling moments with the likes of them would make any sane man wish he put his cash in the hands of a seasoned professional.
Thanks John and Drub for clarity amidst the chaos. I’m finding many tangents here for future (or past?!) essays. And much amusement in such “thoughts” from those who suppose vs. those who’ve hired, or been hired! Experience is still the best teacher, me says.
I almost feel ashamed to admit here that I don’t pay for sex that much. There is so much available for free that I just don’t have the time to look for the escort version, even at my current age (over 50).
But my rare experiences with payed sex are all exellent. Both the giving and taking version (money that is).
Let me just limit this entry to my first experience, in the seventies: I still was a student, working for the city of Rotterdam’s architecture and planning department, and had to attend housing devellopment meetings with both old and new residents of the city renovaition quarters. These meetings went on for ever and ever and often were sleep inducing, and were the main reason I never graduated but decided to find a future in theater, where the options to follow your fantasies were so much richer. After these boring sessions I rushed to the railwaystation, where I could be sure to just see my train departing as I reached the platform breathless and sweating to my toes. Yep, I did not have a motorbike yet in those days, I had not realised the gay bikers had an extremely erotic culture of their own, yet.
Nor did we have “randstadrail”, the service that connects the cities in the most densely populated area here now. But I’m drifting off.
Waiting another 45 minutes on a deserted station, where all kiosks had closed hours earlier, I soon found there was just one area were trade was to be found at that hour: the small parking lot at the west side. (don’t go looking guys, it’s all gone these days, Rotterdam is a clean (?) city). I positioned myself between the lampposts and the guys loitering around there, and soon found a nice way to top off my student allowance tax free, by getting into the cars that were casually coming around the corner to see what whas on offer. I never missed a train with it; it all went amazingly fast: Somehow I was extra hot because I was a student and not a junky, but probably all junks also posed as students, and who could blame them.
The only bad vibes sometimes came from other guys, that tried to scare me off because I was occupying their (?) patch. When one guy there had the good sense to find out if I was trade or punter, I bluffeded I was both. Good! he said, can I escort you home? I explained I did not live in Rotterdam, and waiting to take the train. No problem he said. OK, then, but do you realise you will not make the last train back? No problem, was the answer again. So yep, I was cornered and accepted: we went to my place for a whole nights session.
On the platform I made a last attempt to lose him: I’m just a student, cannot pay you much. Boldly he said fifty guilders will do. That was a great way of clearing the air and easing me with the situation.
At home I felt really relaxed and good about having crossed this hurdle. I realised I could just ask this guy whatever I felt like doing, and after some of his encouragement, I did indeed take a giant leap: Can I drink your piss? Sure ! WOW, that was one giant leep for mankind . . . eh me! It would certainly have taken me another decade to get me to experience and recognise my kinks within the social circles I revolved in then. That step taken, with a large portion of the night still remaining, I charged on: can I lick your asshole? (Honestly, I did not know the word rimming then). Yep, sure, he answered. As I went on my exploration tour and made sounds that couldn’t possibly be interpreted as repulsive. He sighed with relief: Wow! he said. He thought he’d chase me away for sure, because is hole was anything but clean. The relaxed atmosphere and the fact that I was in charge, while if I think it through in retrospect, he was,
made me reply: I don’t think I want it any other way; this is so much better then the smell of shampoo. And so, in one night I leaped at least 20 years in recognising my sexual preferences.
The next morning I brought him back to the station, payed him the train fare plus double what he asked previously and said the experience was worth even more. Sadly I never found him back at the station.
I agree with those who have the opinion that paid service is a value thing. This is especially true when the service is not something readily available for “free” (and by the way, emotional envolvement is rarely free). For me value cums in the form of a beautiful T-girl. I love a well sculpted female body that cums with a working cock. Im in heaven alternately sucking tit and cock and feeling her tits hard against my back while she is slaming her cock in my butt. Its a sexual treat that I allow myself much like an expensive bottle of wine
Paying for sex…at any age? big deal…
i’ve paid once, dated a former escort and hooked up with current rentboy (sans renumeration). none of the experiences were bad, none of the guys were un-intelligent, two of the guys are successful in the non-adult entertainment world and the other, well, who knows. point is, it takes all kinds. as far as risk goes, pilots, firemen and police take far greater risks each and every day — and they’re “heros.”
if it’s hot, great. if it’s all you can get, great. if you’re curious, great. the uptight people in the world need to loosen up a bit…there’s lots of fun to be had out there.
You guys just keep amazing me with your thought provoking shit. Similar to you conclusion about pro-stitute vs. housekeeper, I always compare selling (renting) your ass/cock to selling your knowledge/talents represented with your brain mainly. In both cases, you sell your body one way or another, so I don’t really see the whole moral aspect of the former.
And yeah, the guys who try to prove something to themselves on dating sites and argue with the rest of the site out of context, amuse me A LOT! Such BS.
Just fuck, ppl, and try to be safe.
only fuck safe sex
I never hire, (has good reason besides money) nor would ever hire an escort guy. Why? Well, ehr…
…crap. Ashamed to say: I’m Christian, not to any church, nor Bible, but I do take some sins very clearly; Lust is obviously at it’s heigt here. Now I admit, NC is a porn site, and I’d have to be blinded first to scroll down under the images to finally read what is left of the post in safety; I like porn. And besides that, no one lives without sin, and it is actually good at one hand to be sinful. Just don’t overdose
Besides that, escorts may be fun for a while, but like porn, it’s nothing like the real thing. And as we all know; SAFE rather than any.
I’ve wanted to *be* an escort, and I’ve wanted to hire one. I’m currently 26, and in a commited relationship, but it remains, to me, a thrilling fantasy — just to sit and talk to one. I’ve often pondered the idea of hiring one just to draw him, talk to him, and pick up a couple of new techniques.
I grew up with the Pretty Woman fantasy, I’m afraid. In my state, the hustlers that are readily available are like deep fried leather couches. The fantasy dosen’t line up very well to that. But in a bigger city, someplace else, I’d say go for it.
Just finished watching Pedro Almodovar’s Bad Education, so that might also be coloring my perspective a bit, though not strictly applicable.