Book contents
- Frontmatter
- Contents
- List of figures and tables
- Acknowledgements
- Foreword
- Introduction
- 1 “You can’t make a living doing porn”: Laith
- 2 “I am the same me in bookings as I am out”: Sage
- 3 “I was an escort on a bike”: Kora
- 4 “Maybe it will be good for British girls because less Europeans coming into the industry”: Darcy
- 5 “I was outed in one of the tabloid newspapers”: Anonymous
- 6 “They are both shitty jobs … because I’m not free”: Sierra
- 7 “Don’t judge us as different from you”: Wyatt
- Postscript
- Notes
- References
- Index
6 - “They are both shitty jobs … because I’m not free”: Sierra
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 05 January 2022
- Frontmatter
- Contents
- List of figures and tables
- Acknowledgements
- Foreword
- Introduction
- 1 “You can’t make a living doing porn”: Laith
- 2 “I am the same me in bookings as I am out”: Sage
- 3 “I was an escort on a bike”: Kora
- 4 “Maybe it will be good for British girls because less Europeans coming into the industry”: Darcy
- 5 “I was outed in one of the tabloid newspapers”: Anonymous
- 6 “They are both shitty jobs … because I’m not free”: Sierra
- 7 “Don’t judge us as different from you”: Wyatt
- Postscript
- Notes
- References
- Index
Summary
In this chapter we take a deeper dive into the challenges, frustrations and fears that contributors have with duality in our current labour market. Sex as a side hustle is frowned upon yet the process of precarisation threatens all work, even for these most highly skilled and educated workers, who spent more time in libraries than they did in pubs. Duality funds ‘flexicurity’ for them, where there is little safety net; however, they lack protections in both of their jobs because sex work is not fully accepted as work, and they can lose square jobs if their past or active sex work becomes known. Some held jobs in the public trust and examples are used to highlight their challenges here.
Although contributors may betray the trust of loved ones and associates by lying about sex working, they feel deceived by the entire system. In their minds they have done everything expected of them in terms of getting an education and working in mainstream jobs. They stayed out of trouble hoping that they could earn a good living, only to experience a ‘dream deferred’ (Hughes, 2001). An anonymous contributor shares her thoughts and frustrations:
‘I don't think that I’m so special and that there's anything special about me … faced with the reality that you’ve got no fucking money and there's literally the panic and my parents, they’re middle class but they don't have any money for various reasons and so I can't really rely on them. I’ve done a PhD; I’ve got lots of educational capital and lots of cultural capital but about 1.5 years of finishing up really ruined me financially. I was always living off the edge of my maximum overdraft and part of that time I was living at home again because there was no way that I could pay rent. I borrowed a little bit off of my parents and then it came to graduation and I literally had like no money.’
This contributor entered the sex industry the day after finishing a PhD. This is the reality for many and makes duality necessary and rational but alienating.
- Type
- Chapter
- Information
- Work, Money and DualityTrading Sex as a Side Hustle, pp. 131 - 144Publisher: Bristol University PressPrint publication year: 2021