MALE SEX WORK AND SOCIETY
Edited by
Victor Minichiello, PhD
John Scott, PhD
Approx 512 pages, including glossary and index
33 full color illustrations
4 black & white illustrations
24 figures & graphs
Cloth, $120 ISBN: 978-1-939594-00-6
Paperback, $50 ISBN: 978-1-939594-01-3
Juline A. Koken
David S. Bimbi
DOI: dx.doi.org/10.17312/harringtonparkpress/2014.09.msws.009
We are not surprised that some male sex workers and their clients use alcohol and drugs—people do drink and people do use drugs, often to alter their perceptions of their everyday worlds. What surprises us is that people are surprised when that change occurs. Perhaps the association between male sex work and substance abuse supports deeply held prejudice against the idea that a male would freely choose to engage in sex work as an occupation. Rather than seeing using drugs and violence as forms of exploitation, researchers perhaps need to understand what purpose drugs and alcohol play in recreational sexual encounters and what such things say about masculine behavior and power relationships between men. Some of these behaviors may in fact be interpreted as a reaction to the social stigma associated with male sex work. Recent research has found that, with the increasing acceptance of male sex work as an occupation, drug and alcohol use has been decreasing among some escort groups, such as those that offer a “boyfriend experience.”
