Grand Theft Aftermath

A few of the responses to yesterday's post, "Grand Theft Are You Fucking Kidding Me?" via email and Boing Boing comments.

I am not amused. This blasé contrarian response just looks like yet another shallow "cooler than thou" post-feminist attitude. -- Madprime

First, he seems to assume that the feelings of johns represent the feelings of men in general. Maybe they do, but I'm gonna need a hell of a lot of evidence before I believe it. -- Raya

Are you referring to Susannah Breslin as a guy? She might not take too kindly to that. -- Antinous

Susannah Breslin sounds like an ass. -- Jccalhoun

Reverse Cowgirl has been staring into the abyss too long. -- Noen

Grand Theft Auto IV doesn't bother me, but Susannah Breslin moronic perspective is offensive. -- Silas

I've liked Susannah Breslin in the past, but the sneers at "polysyllabic" language are just fucking stupid. -- Patrick Nielsen Hayden

I think it is worth noting that I am 29, and have played all versions of this game, starting at age 18. I do not kill people. I do not rape, mug, shoot, stab, discriminate, abuse, use, or any other negative toward my fellow humans. Oh, and I've also looked at porn. So, it would seem that the argument that this game makes you develop an antisocial personality is mistaken. Anyone with a cursory knowledge of mental illness could have told you that. -- Rangzen

As a 25 year old educated male feminist working for the police I find the amount of hysteria that these games raise amongst people absolutely ridiculous... It isn't that the game is about killing prostitutes or visiting stripclubs that makes it appealing, it's that those things are possible along with a plethora of other things including: becoming a vigilante, putting out fires, driving ambulance, driving taxi, repossessing vehicles, watching tv, surfing Rockstars own parody of the internet, flying a helicopter, jumping 2 buses on a motorcylce while tossing molotov cocktails at a hummer, play darts, play pool, go bowling, get drunk, rough up criminals, eat a hamburger, buy a nice suit, take a girlfriend out on the boardwalk, watch a really really lame cabaret and comedy club... the list goes on and on. Killing is an integeral game mechanic and sleeping with prostitutes is just window dressing, don't construe the IGN video as some sort of overarching example of the game.-- Grimmway

Dear Susannah,

There's nothing more dull than an ill-thought out, anti-feminist rant from someone whose professional life is devoted to satisfying their need for affirmation and exhibitionism/portraying themselves as licentious, fucked up, beautiful, porn obsessed, fragile, depressive and yet, somehow, deeply intelligent.

Maybe, if you got over your aching need to be liked by men, you could start liking women more. Hell, maybe you could even start liking yourself.

Yours hopefully,
A.

Grand Theft Are You Fucking Kidding Me?

If you've spent five minutes on the internet in the last 24 hours, you've probably come across the controversy over the sex and violence, as in sex-and-violence, featured in the just released Grand Theft Auto IV. After a video of the Ladies of Liberty City began circulating around, in which men drive around, pick up sex workers and/or drive over them, shoot prostitutes standing on street corners, and get some freaky-ass, legs-in-the-air, booty-shaking lap dances, everyone got all up in arms over it. The girls at Feministing weren't having it: "It is no question that GTA is merely reflective of the bigger misogyny embedded in capitalist patriarchy, but the question is why is a game that depicts such violence towards women so popular?" (Jesus Christ, if this is what degrees in gender studies hath wrought, polysyllabic bloggers still carping about the patriarchy, please fucking stop handing them out.) Jack Thompson nearly had a heart attack over it. (To wit: "Grand Theft Auto IV is the gravest assault upon children in this country since polio. We now have vaccines for that virus... The 'vaccine' that must be administered by the United States government to deal with this virtual virus of violence and sexual depravity is criminal prosecutions of those who have conspired to do this.") And Rockstar got a helluva lot richer. (See: "Record Sales Expected For Grand Theft Auto IV.") I have a writer friend known online as the Harpoonist, and if you say something totally idiotic to her, or if she is recounting a story to you in which someone says something totally idiotic, she says: "I mean, really?" I think this is her way of saying: "Are you fucking kidding me?" But without all the swear words. And that, in sum total, is my reaction to this ridiculous, overblown, cockamamie controversy over the Ladies of Liberty City and the sex-and-violence in Grand Theft Auto IV. I mean, really? I mean, are you fucking kidding me? What is this, the fucking 80s? Did politically correctness not die, like, last century? Did we not hunt down all the feminists and shut them up already? Are we not a culture so completely overrun with politically incorrectness that the only appropriate response to the latest incident of it is to laugh? Because while the feminists were out burning copies of GTA IV and building sex positive spaces in the sky, while Mr. Thompson was off getting his knickers in a major, anal crevice wedging twist over this, while Rockstar was in the corner counting its money and laughing hysterically at the grand spectacle of it, I was watching the video you can see for yourself here, and when the guy in the car with the commendable soul pole got what he wanted and then ran over the woman who gave it to him, you know what I did? I laughed. Because I thought it was funny. Because this whole moronic outcry against what is nothing but an unabashed and unashamed articulation of Man's basest impulses run amok is nothing but hypocrisy. Here's a newsflash for you. This is the way people think. This is how things are. This is the way it is. Every week, I get more Letters from Johns, and this is the conclusion that I have come to. That men seek out prostitutes because prostitutes let men express themselves ruthlessly. With utter impunity. Because if you pay her, you don't have to feel guilty. And if you think men pay women for sex because we live in a misogynist society, you should come down out of your ivory tower and live amongst the rest of us for a little while. Do you know what Mr. Soul Pole in GTA IV says before he runs down the woman who just serviced him? Were you not listening, Feministing? He says: "I'm a hired killer and I pay for sex. My mother would be ashamed." Then he takes out the girl. Feel free to take a little time to think that one over, ladies. Or here's a line from a letter I got from John 15: "My mom was nuts, and aside from the mental illness, loved her wine and valium... Sundays was a real carnival, and me being the eldest bore the brunt of her wrath." Oh, yeah--and, by the way, he's a state investigator. Or here's a line from a letter I got from John 30: "I would possibly seek companionship in this manner again, but honestly it was a frightening act of depravity fueled by a complete loss of morals related to my murder for hire status in the military." The fact of the matter is that you cannot police the sexual fantasies of men. It isn't going to happen. You can't distill one man's desires into some reductionist understanding of 21st century America that posits women as the victims of men once again. You can't continue to stick your head into the sand and refuse to believe that this isn't a part of how men really think and feel and fuck and want and love and hate and live. You just can't. To do so is insanity. To be totally honest, that's what really blew my mind about Spitzergate. That America was just so shocked, so outraged, so aghast. What do you think cocktails of power, money, and sex begat? What do you really think is going on behind closed doors, on street corners, in parked cars in America? I mean, really?

Sleepless

New today. Two letters. A letter from a john. That is, a jane. "I Was A Girl Who Had Gone To A Prostitute." A letter from a working girl. "I Feel More Alive." As for me? I can't sleep. In other news, I hear some chick who used to write for Jane is doing a story on male prostitutes, the kind who have sex with women, I believe, for New York. I'm probably not supposed to repeat that, but it's not like I give a fuck.

Stressed out of my brain about the heavily parental role we play when we look after our charges, many of whom are very sick and die, bullying from registrars you can't fight, the sexual tensions rife amongst lonely doctors stuck temporarily hours from home, I found myself sleeping with a teddy bear every night for the first time since I was eight. -- "I Was A Girl Who Had Gone To A Prostitute"

At the end of the day, my cunt belongs to me and I'm the one who gets to enjoy it. After I'm done, I lie in bed naked and count the cash. It's crazy and surreal and beautiful. -- "I Feel More Alive"

A night terror, also known as pavor nocturnus, is a parasomnia sleep disorder characterized by extreme terror and a temporary inability to regain full consciousness. The subject wakes abruptly from slow-wave sleep, with waking usually accompanied by gasping, moaning, or screaming. It is often impossible to fully awaken the person, and after the episode the subject normally settles back to sleep without waking. -- Wikipedia

Dear Jane

I've gotten quite a few new letters from johns since my Newsweek piece ran. This past weekend, I got my first letter from a jane, a woman who paid for sex: "I Got What I Wanted." According to the Wall Street Journal's "How the New Rich Are Changing the Oldest Profession, "According to a survey by Russ Alan Prince, president of Connecticut-based wealth-research firm Prince & Associates, in his book The Sky’s The Limit, a sizable percentage of the super wealthy use escorts. He surveyed 661 people who owned private jets. It found that 34% of males and 20% of females had paid for sex." She writes:

It wasn't romantic, but I wasn't looking for romance. It turned out to be the best $2,000 I ever spent--that includes a $500 tip.

Whoregate

While the Spitzergate shit continues to hit the proverbial fan, my personal feelings are probably best summed up with an exchange I had with Siege earlier today, in which I said something to the effect of: Men fuck whores. Who cares. The thing I suppose I find mildly fascinating is how everyone knows this, but everyone uses morality debates to disguise the reality of America's relationship to the story, which is: We are curious. And that is human. Fascinatingly, one of the most insightful and moving pieces of writing on Whoregate came from none other than Alex Balk. (Although, one cannot help but wonder what My Cock would have to say on the matter. My Cock?) Oh. I forgot something. Thanks to all the Newsweek readers who have sex with prostitutes for sending me their letters from johns.

I guess what I’m saying—or not saying—is who the hell knows why we do what we do? One of the five people whom I consider vastly more intelligent than myself once told me his theory that human beings “nearly always end up working out traumas and rejections and fears in their sexual desires,” and I don’t doubt the essential truth of that. Why did Eliot Spitzer screw whores? Maybe it had to do with all those Monopoly games. I don’t know and I don’t care; the only thing this story proves to me, once again, is how badly we fuck ourselves up when it comes to sex. At the end of the day it’s probably just easier to say “My cock made me do it.” You don’t have to look at any of the deeper causes that way. Which just seems like a tragedy for everyone.

The Spitzer Affair

If you're interested in learning more about the Spitzer affair, the indictment is here, the New York Times coverage is here, and the soliciting sartorialist's guide to what to wear is here. If you're interested in how sex workers see this breaking story, Bound, Not Gagged has the mother of all sex worker blog coverage feeds here. To learn from Client-9, read this. If you're interested in reading about why men pay for sex from the mouths of johns, my online project Letters from Johns is here. If you're interested in my take, stay tuned.

The Men Who Sleep with Prostitutes

The conviction of Steve Wright for the murder of five prostitutes in Suffolk has again thrown the light on prostitution. The debate about its legal and social status is as current as ever, but what do the men who visit prostitutes think about what they do?

Patrick, Pete and Mark have some things in common.

They are all successful, professional men, who work long hours and have to travel away from home. But what really unites them is that they all use prostitutes and are utterly unashamed about it.

The Men Who Sleep with Prostitutes --> Related --> Via

A Melancholy Monday

Over the last few days, I got more letters from johns. I posted a new one today. I also got an email from someone who said my sexual politics are warped. I responded. He responded. The gap was bridged, I suppose. As I said to him, the one thing about being a writer and journalist is that if you wear your politics on your sleeve, no one will tell you anything. And everyone knows writers are parasites that thrive on the stories of others. Since I launched Letters from Johns, I've been wondering if I would hear from working girls. If I should do another blog that's Letters from Hookers. I'll have to see how it goes.

Me, Myself, and Whores

Yesterday, I mentioned something that I'm working on, a project that I referred to as The Project, a project, I suggested, that had to do with prostitutes. What is The Project? For now, the project will remain vague, as projects have a tendency to change. One thing I didn't like about the Reverse Cowgirl--the blog, that is--last year was that there were a great many things I didn't blog about. This year, I'm trying to be more upfront. So, while I'm remaining ambiguous here, I'm also trying to be more clear here. Is it working? Who knows. My virtual underwear is transparent--metaphorically, that is. In any case, I have a point. What was it? Ah, yes. I've been writing about sex for about a decade now. Actually, 2008 will be my eleventh year. Much of that time I've spent talking to and writing about and thinking about and more to the point identifying with the men I've met in the otherworld of sex that remains for the most part unseen in 21th century America. (And, no, I'm not talking about "Cathouse" or some heavily edited crap like that; I'm talking about the real world where sex workers live and breathe and the rest of America has to pay to visit.) These days, I'm looking at the women. Anybody who knows me knows this is no easy task. I made it clear in "My, My American Bukkake Too" that I'm more inclined to identify with the men in that world. I mean, wouldn't you? Would you rather be the guy with his dick in his hand or the girl on her knees with her eyes closed? That's a rhetorical question, as far as I'm concerned. I guess it's easier to look at the Other than into the Mirror, no? Either way, and apropros of nothing, I'm interested in hearing about any of my male readers' experiences with prostitutes. To be clear, I'm not interested in some jerk-off story. I'm interested in hearing from you if you're interested in sending me an email about if you've ever been with a prostitute and why? And, most significantly, what was your experience of the girl? I'm also interested in hearing from sex workers or former sex workers. What does America not understand about what you do? In both cases, your responses will be anonymous. Please let me know if I can post your email to this blog. Email me by clicking on the CONTACT ME line to your left and up.

The First Thing You Should Know About Me Is That I'm a Whore

On the (hooker) heels of Wednesday's post, in which I asserted whores are the new black, blogger Clay Hornik sent a link to the first episode of "The Secret Diary of a Call Girl," a UK TV show based on the blog-turned-book Belle de Jour: Diary of an Unlikely Call Girl. The star of the series is Billie Piper, who's better known as Rose Tyler from "Doctor Who." I watched the show and liked it. It's smart, and funny, and a little risqué. You know you're in a different kind of territory when the main character says "fuck" in the first few minutes, gives a to-camera look straight out of "The Office" while masturbating with a purple vibrator, and concludes the show by riding a guy who likes like Austin Powers in a saddle. Sometimes, the show ventures into "Red Shoe Diaries"-land, but, for the most part, it focuses on what it's like to be a modern woman for whom the line between being a whore in bed and a dominatrix at work is becoming ever blurrier. I'm curious to hear what College Callgirl, America's Belle, thinks of it.

The New Sex and the City?

A few weeks ago, I read that Darren Star, who created "Sex and the City," has a new project in the works at HBO: "Diary of a Manhattan Call Girl." The comedy series to be is based on the semi-autobiographical book of the same name by Tracy Quan. The series of confessional stories about life as a hooker in New York City started as a Salon column. Now, it may become the next "Sex and the City"--but racier. The show will "look at how power, sex and money collide through the eyes of a group of Manhattan's highest-paid escorts forced to juggle their johns, jobs and relationships." That reminded me that earlier this year, Laurenn McCubbin announced that Rent Girl, Michelle Tea's memoir of life as a sex worker, was optioned by Showtime. Apparently, whores are the new black.

Guys Gone Wild

As of late, I've come across white collar men with an interest in porn blogging. There's the Algorithm Trading Specialist who works for a "large money management firm" on Wall Street and runs The Money Shot Blog under the name Sherman McCoy in his spare time. There's the New York City corporate lawyer who specializes in copyright and trademark issues and posts on his MySpace page under the moniker Moxie. The latter's posts include his commentary on the recently settled Kira Kener v. Vivid Video lawsuit, how the adult industry can respond to today's oversaturated porn market, and a proposal for porn starlet health care that he calls Universal Whore Care. His law degree is from Columbia. He lists his income as "$250,000 and Higher." He is 38 years old. Earlier this month, Sexerati blogger Lux Nightmare, who calls herself a "post-porn starlet," wrote about "Bubble Hotties: Future Johns of America," a generation of got-rich-quick guys gone wild who patronize prostitutes--and pornblog. As "The Brothel Creeper" writes:

"I know what you are thinking. That it's all very well for people like me to idealise whores and thieves; to think that the street is somehow noble and picturesque; I have never had to live there. But so what? One day I will. Until such time, I have to pay for it. How else would someone young, rich and handsome get sex in this city? Yes, yes, I know. Prostitution is obscene, debasing and disgraceful. The point is, so am I."