So, I love to spend my free time on debate forums, debating various issues. Often sex worker's rights. I noticed awhile back that when I say "sex workers" or "sex work" people seem to think that means just prostitution. So when I say "I'm a sex worker", they often assume I am a prostitute. So a few days ago I decided to do an experiment and just let people assume I was a prostitute.
And Holy Moley, the amount of absolute hate and atrocious verbal abuse that came my way....not just to me, the supposed prostitute. But family as well, "anyone who could love you is garbage," extending the criticism to my supposed children even, etc (I didn't say I had children. They assumed it for some reason). Asking me if I'd been the victim of rape and other violent assaults, in a way that was assuming I had, and mocking me for it.
Now, one would expect that from the typical internet troll. But what surprised me is that even intelligent, well educated, articulate people who normally maintained a lot of integrity in debate were suddenly willing to abandon all their integrity and credibility that they normally worked so hard to maintain in the face of the most ridiculous commenters, just to scream at and demonize a whore. People who always spoke out against people being "reduced to name calling" were really quick to fill several pages with primarily that.
What is it about prostitution, between consenting adults, that does this to typically rational people who are usually very concerned with maintaining a calm demeanor? Why does this suddenly reduce them to the very behavior they are usually so concerned with appearing above? Even while they were attempting to persuade me to choose another path, they still said horribly abusive things (which seems obviously counterproductive). Even people who often speak about prostitutes with compassion, as if they should just be regarded as victims, seemed to change their tune pretty immediately. It seems that when presented with a prostitute, what they most want to do is abuse her, even when they have only expressed sympathy for prostitutes in the past.
In short...why is this the one thing that seems to drive people so damn crazy? Do people really just want prostitutes to suffer, in the worst way imaginable? Are they scapegoats for all the world's ills?
What do you think?




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