Work doesn’t need to be skilled for it to be work or for it to be difficult. People deserve to be able to afford to live no matter whether they work or not, let alone based on how skilled or hard their labour is. For people who believe that people should be valued and paid based on the skill required for their job, especially when they think those in unskilled jobs don’t deserve enough payment to live comfortably, discussing sex work and poverty becomes awkward.
If you believe only skilled people deserve to be paid fairly but you also have some reason to be invested in sex worker rights (perhaps you are a sex worker or know one), then it becomes necessary to argue that sex work is skilled labour.
For some sex workers, there is certainly skill involved in the work. For practically all of us, there are skills we develop over our time selling sex. Some of those skills are in threat assessment, some are interpersonal, and some are in things like filing taxes or placing online ads. While skills can be developed by doing the job and more skilled people might be able to charge higher prices for specialized things like domination, skill isn’t a requirement.
Part of the appeal of sex work is the fact you can get into it without any training or specific education. The only thing in the way is the stigma around the industry, and even then… stigma ceases to be quite as important when your other options are extreme poverty, as is the case for many people who get involved in sex work.
When I started selling sex in a more typical manner, actually putting up escorting ads and meeting clients just for sex, there was no skill needed. I replied to some texts and arranged a time, met the client, then mostly just laid there are let the client do what they wanted within reason. Sometimes I did things that were more or less difficult, various sex positions or acts that I needed to be more active for, but ultimately none of it required training or talent.
For me, sex work has never required me to train at anything or practice. I make more money when I act out certain personas or have ads with better phrasing, but none of those things are necessities to do the work and make enough to survive.
People aren’t paid proportionately to their skill, but even if I could snap my fingers to make it so, why would I? Why would we concede that people should have a quality of life purely based on how much training or practice their job takes? Not only does the amount of training required not necessarily correlate to the ultimate difficulty of the work, but I don’t think we should be suggesting that only people in certian jobs require a good quality of life when plenty of the jobs that are “easier” are also necessary and plenty of the ones that are harder aren’t. Instead of this constant back and forth, is it not better to just say that we should all be able to live comfortably regardless of whether we work or not, or what work we do?
So many people start selling sex because they cannot function in traditional work. The suggestion that sex work is just as difficult in all the same ways means we can’t talk about that effectively. If it takes so much expertise to sell sex, how are so many people who are completely inexperienced doing it and making enough money to get by?
New escorts are frequently taken advantage of by clients, but there’s also a higher demand for people who are new and seen as innocent and naive. Pay is offered inversely to skill there, where the less experience someone has the more desirable they’re viewed as. Higher volume means more money, though when we’re looking at hourly rates it’s the people who brand themselves as newer to the industry or as selling sex as a side-gig or low volume who are able to charge higher rates and still get bookings. I can’t think of another industry where a lack of experience is viewed as a reason to pay more.
When it comes to sexual skill, regarding just the physical act, the average client in my experience mostly expects me to follow instructions and stay in one position while they thrust or go down on me. The most intensive thing I’m expected to do is give a blowjob. I’ve gotten better at making clients climax quickly by saying the right things or clenching at the right time or managing to deepthroat briefly, as time goes on, though ultimately I wouldn’t say I’m particularly “good” at sex. I’m sure there are plenty of promiscious people who are much more skilled than I am, even with a much smaller number of total partners. I’m bad at deepthroating and have a strong gag reflex still, I struggle to relax and often use poppers if I’m bottoming… someone talking about sex work as something needing expertise doesn’t resonate with me.
The things that make sex work difficult are the risks associated with it. There’s a risk of sexual assault and violent battery or of being arrested. Sex workers can be outed for selling sex and lose future jobs or the support of our families. Those things are difficult to cope with on an emotional level and are consistent concerned. If someone wants to talk about how sex work isn’t as easy as some people make it out to be, those are the things to focus on. Arguing that it’s difficult to do on a physical level isn’t believable when the entire reason people get into it when in poverty is because the barrier to entry is so low and it’s something that practically anyone can do.
While I appreciate that I’m seeing more people speak up for sex workers, I want them to do it using the right arguments. Sex work doesn’t have to be skilled for sex workers to deserve rights.
If I practice deepthroating every day until I can do it perfectly and become a world-famous rentboy one day for that skill… I’m not going to suddenly be more deserving of support or rights than I was at 17 when I was just laying there making barely-believable fake moans with clients thrusting away.
Jack Talks About Sex Work 