Pseudo science and the commerical sex industry

This is a break from my usual blog because I read this story on the BBC news web-site and it got my back up. The story was about the growth in the sex industry and the impact on the rise in prevalence of STIs. Excerpts are as follows:-

"The number of men paying women for sex has nearly doubled in a decade, UK research suggests.

Surveys of 11,000 British adults in 1990 and 2000 found the rate increased from one in 20 to nearly one in 10 men."

...or perhaps men are now slightly more likely to admit having paid.


"Rising divorce rates, sex tourism and increasing availability of commercial sex are blamed by the Sexually Transmitted Infections journal."

In the 1940 sex tourism was called WWII. So what? In the 1930s Britain had its worst ever outbreak of STIs - but people didn't like to divorce in those days - they were promiscuous but stayed married, so there is no reason to believe there is a connection. People have an inherent tendency to be promiscuous - its a requirement for spreading human genes as widely as possible - so there is no reason to believe that men have suddenly become more promiscuous in the last 10 years. Has there been an increase in the availability of commercial sex? More girls on the net sure, but are there more on the streets? On the whole I would guess it hasn't changed that much. The real cause of the rise in STIs is the existence of so many - 25 years ago you couldn't catch Herpes or HIV and chlamydia was not a concern. Suddenly these diseases are very much a fact of life and continue to become more prevalent.


"It warns men's lifestyles put them at risk of catching sex diseases, yet few are getting checked in clinics."

Well getting checked from time to time would be a good idea. I caught a verruca once - got to be careful with those shared baths.


"There are more men with money and more women looking for this type of work"

Sorry, are we talking about the difference between 1990 and 2000 or between 1890 and 2000? I hadn't realised that I had suddenly become much ricer in the last 10 years and had blown the lot on commercial sex...



"The findings come as experts call for a radical rethink of sexual health services to tackle rising rates of sex diseases."

They could make a good start by actually asking people a bit about their sex lives, since they obviously know precious little about it themselves.


"In the UK there has been a resurgence of sexually transmitted infections (STIs) such as chlamydia, gonorrhoea and HIV."

Almost entirely amongst youngsters that have just left school and are exploring sex for the first time often in not the best of circumstances. It might occur to scientists that the reasons that lead to so many teenage girls having babies might actually be the same as the reasons why there has been a rise in STIs amongst young people.


"More than 58,000 are now living with HIV in the UK and 104,155 new cases of chlamydia were reported in 2004, latest figures show."

And by far the greater number of them are gay. Only a tiny proportion are heterosexual and the vast majority of those are recent immigrants, particularly from Africa (sorry if that doesn't sound PC but it happens to be a statistical fact).


"The study authors, from Imperial and University College London, the London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine and the National Centre for Social Research, do not believe the rise in paying for sex is the prime cause for this, but warned it could be a contributing factor."

Or not a factor at all. In Thailand the incidence of HIV in sex workers is actually significantly LOWER than it is in the general population. All the studies I have ever seen in more liberal countries have suggested that sex workers have a low incidence of STIs since they are well aware of the dangers and practice safe sex as a result.


"While women who sell sex in the UK have been targeted by campaigns to promote safer sex and uptake of sexual health checks, on the whole men who pay for sex have not, they said."

Well it takes two to tango. If you ensure that one side of the equation knows it needs to play safe you have largely done the best possible. Good to see the Dept of Health is spending our tax in a focussed way.


"And their work shows these men often have other risk factors for STIs including higher numbers of partners in general."

So what does this have to do with the commercial sex industry? Sounds like an attempt to use psuedo science to reinforce existing prejudices against the industry once again. Surely its better to have promiscuous sex in a planned safe way with a professional than a passionate unsafe encounter with a girl in the toilets of the local pub.


"More than a third of the men in the study had 10 or more sexual partners during the previous five years. Meeting new sexual partners while abroad, including in countries with higher rates of STIs than the UK also increased risk."

Randy buggers. Increased risk perhaps - but where is the evidence that proves it increases the incidence of disease? Depends on how careful you are.


"The men most likely to pay for sex were single, living in London and aged between 25 and 34."

So not in the age group with the highest incidence of STIs, that is the 18 - 25 year group.



"Lead author Dr Helen Ward said there were many reasons why more men were paying for sex."

Probably the high incidence of women like Dr Helen Ward with closed minds could be the biggest factor.


"There has been a more liberal attitude towards commercial sex and increasing commercialisation of sex. Lads magazines are bombarded with images."

Yeah right. The increase in sales of lads magazines like Nuts has been in direct proportion to the decline of magazines like Playboy and Penthouse. The old fashioned sex comedy movie that was so popular in the 70's has died a death. There was a time when the rise in such magazines was blamed on not being able to have real sex because it was too dangerous. How times have changed...


"She said many men were meeting new partners abroad, on stag nights for example, and the internet and cheaper international travel meant people had more opportunities to buy and sell sex."

Yeah blame those dirty foreigners. As if.


"It does not seem to be exceptional for groups of men to go away with each other for the weekend and have commercial sex.

Sure. And Amsterdam, Hamburg, Bangkok only became destinations for sex tourists in the last ten years. Wake up lady.


"My concern is that if people are going abroad where there might be less safe sex, they really ought to be thinking about the possible risks."

Yeah - you might go to Ibiza and catch a nasty does of the clap off a party girl from Solihull. Whats that got to do with the sex industry? Working girls in Holland don't practice safe sex? The goverment of Thailand hasn't heard of AIDs?


"Men who pay for sex should be the target of health promotion campaigns and screening initiatives,"

Well I'm all for a good screening.


"She said such programmes could be targeted at young male travellers and groups of men going on holiday or stag party trips, but that it might be better to target men in general, starting with school based sex education and mass media campaigns."

What, along the lines of "Don't pay for sex its bad for you!". Actually the statistics strongly suggest that if young men want to experiment with sex then the best way is with a professional that knows what she is doing and practices safe sex, rather than some teenage slapper thats shagged everyone in town. Not only that but countries with a more liberal attitude to commercial sex have far lower incidence of teenage pregnancy, less alcohol and drug related crime, less violence and fewer broken relationships (gives us guys something more positive to look forward to you see so we don't use our testosterone in more negative ways...)


"Peter Baker, of the Men's Health Forum, agreed it was important to target all young men because those most at risk were the least likely to use health services.

He added: 'Many people will be surprised by the relatively large numbers of men who are willing to pay for sex.

'But it's not so surprising in the context of social trends - women are increasingly sexualised in the media, sex phone lines are routinely advertised in the back of magazines and phone boxes...and divorce and separations are on the rise.'"


Right. So women have only become objects of male sexual desire in the last ten years and the "oldest profession" started just before that. How Britain came to have 60million people living here when there was no interest in sex before 1990 must be a mystery to us all. Anybody that knows anything about British history will know we have been randy buggers since year dot. The only thing that changes from generation to generation is whether its socially acceptable to talk about it or not.


And you thought the religious right had closed minds?!

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