Friday, October 9, 2009

more Vice Squad in Soho

After two weeks Vice Squad was back on Five last night. There was more about Soho walk ups. As with last week there was something about kerb crawlers in east London (probably Whitechapel) but I had no particular interest in that. Although this blog started and continues with the issue of street girls, I have no experience of the world of kerb crawling. I don't have a car.

A Soho bobby on the beat told us that men are often mugged on the stairs of Soho walk ups. I have never had this experience but then I don't go to Soho at night. He explained that there are about 100 women in walk up flats in Soho. There are about 50 flats. Each doorway usually leads to two flats on upper floors.

Two of the prostitutes and their maids were interviewed. Both of the prostitutes were from Albania. I did not recognize either of them. Gina said she came to London with the assistance of her friend who was a prostitute. She did different jobs to begin with, but decided to become a prostitute because London is such an expensive city to live in.

She said that she has about 25 customers per day and makes between £200 and £300 a day. I assume this is after she has paid rent on the flat and other overheads. Each customer pays a minimum of £20. Her maid Rita explained her role, which includes protecting the girl from any possible violence.

The other prostitute, Samantha, said that for her it's just work, she has a family to support and bills to pay. Her maid Janet said that women in walk ups work for themselves, there are no pimps. They look after themselves and there are no drugs. They are doing it to make their lives better.

The narrator explained that the days of Soho walk ups could be numbered. There is new legislation that could ban them. One of the women said that this would put them on the streets where they would be less safe. In the walk ups they are protected.

I agree that it would be a tragedy if the Soho walk ups were all closed. I am not saying this because I like to go to them. Many women will be harmed if the new legislation goes ahead.

I have started a Yahoo group for readers of this blog if they wish to discuss issues and share information. People can still leave comments on each post if they wish, but I will reply to comments on the group. The blog is about the less expensive forms of prostitution, which could be Soho walk ups or could be street girls. I have called the group Punternot because I want people to be free to discuss issues that would not be allowed on the Punternet forum, such as street girls, but also things like your favourite internet porn site. The Punternet site abhor the desire of Harriet Harman to censor it, but they do censor many people's views. I will not censor sincerely-held views but I will moderate out any snarking.

This is the URL of the group. You will need to create a Yahoo identity if you don't already have one.
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/punternot/

Monday, September 28, 2009

Vice Squad in Soho

You may have seen the documentary on Five about the work of the Metropolitan Police Vice Unit in Soho. It was on Thursday (24 September 2009) at 9 pm. They started with something about a clip joint and ended with something about two under-age girls out drinking. Neither of these items was to do with prostitution. It was in the middle part of the programme that they showed some Soho walk-ups and this was what interested me and may interest readers of this blog.

I learned that technically these Soho walk-ups are not brothels. A walk-up is legal if only one woman works from the premises. The walk-ups shown in the programme were in Lisle Street and Greek Street. The one in Greek Street is the one that I have mentioned previously in this blog.

They interviewed a young woman from Romania called Amy. I saw Amy once this year and twice last year. This was before I decided to see the two older women who work at the same place. Amy said that she had come to Britain and began working in prostitution. She did not say if she had been trafficked into the country. Romania is now part of the EU and Romanians here are not illegal immigrants. She did not say if she had been deceived by anyone organizing her movement to Britain. It has been said that traffickers tell women that they will work in a normal job, and it is only after they get here that they are expected to work in prostitution.

Amy said that she was working as a prostitute somewhere where she was not happy. She was not making enough money for herself there, and so after a couple of months she found 8 Greek Street and was told by a woman she could start work there. She did not say that she had a problem leaving the place were she was before. It has been said that traffickers tell the women that they have to repay debts of thousands of pounds. One of the police officers said that one of the women working at 8 Greek Street had said that she earns a thousand pounds a day. The officer said that because sex costs just £20 they must be getting a lot of customers. However, £20 is a minimum and many customers will be spending more than that.

I do believe, though, that there are places – in Soho and elsewhere – where women are suffering. I have mentioned in a previous post that there is somewhere else in Greek Street that was called the Slaughter House. I think I may have been there once but left before paying because I did not like the look of the place. There are only three walk-ups in Greek Street.

A couple of months ago I went to 11 Brewer Street. I went up the stairs, but when I saw that the women's names were not displayed I turned to leave. A woman came out of one of the flats onto the landing and tried to entice me in. This has never happened to me before. She was small and thin and looked like a refugee. When I said I wasn't interested she shouted a couple of swear words at me at the top of her voice, walked back into the flat and slammed the door loudly. I could tell that there were men further up the stairs.

I went onto the Crimestoppers website and I reported the place as a potential place of trafficked women. It's still open.

The reason why I don't go somewhere where the women's names are not displayed is that I can find the best ones using the PunterNet website. I can use PunterNet reports and the Soho thread in the PunterNet forum. I can take into account what they look like (I don't go for big-breasted blonde types), attitude, price and the services they provide. I would not want to be with a woman who is unhappy.

The most popular girl in Soho as I have said is Paris. She is from Essex, so there is no question of trafficking there. There are other British girls, like Ritzy. Lily, one of my two current favourites, is from the south of France. Ivy, my other current favourite is from the Philippines. I don't know if there is any trafficking from the Philippines but I do know that Ivy went on holiday to the Philippines for a few weeks recently. If she had been trafficked into Britain then she would not have been able to leave the country in the normal way. She would have to have been trafficked out of the country and trafficked back in again, which I don't think is very likely.

Vice Squad didn't find any trafficked women in their inspections, or any women who wanted to be rescued. I would have thought that if they had found illegal immigrants then they would have told us about them. They didn't find any pimps there either. It has been said that pimps take a lot of the money from Soho prostitutes. The only men who are probably making the money out of prostitution in Soho are the property owners, probably the Duke of somewhere-or-other like so much of inner London. Each prostitute has to hand over a couple of hundred pounds a day in rent.

I hope that some of the women save up some of their earnings and buy the property themselves. Then they don't have to pay rent to anyone. But I don't know if the Duke of somewhere-or-other would want to sell; maybe he knows what a good thing he's onto. I hope that older women who have made a career out of prostitution can help younger women who may not want to pursue it as a career but need to get money sometimes. I hope that Paris makes her fortune, the dirty little minx.

I'v got a couple of photos of Paris that you might like to see. I don't have any photos of any of the other girls in Soho, I got these from the internet.



The Vice Squad did find a girl who looked under-age but wasn't. They checked. So now every punter in London knows that if they want a girl who looks under-age but isn't, all they have to do is to go to Lisle Street. If you go on Google street level you can see the doorways shown on the programme. There are only 2 or 3 places in Lisle Street, and I don't think it is number 2.

Friday, September 11, 2009

replies to comments 2

If have never said in my blog that prostitutes that I have met have taken Crystal Meth. I have said that escorts have told of their drug use on various forums and that one escort said how she liked to take Crystal Meth.

This was last year on the PunterNet forum in the thread "Re: Drug addiction among WGs". Her username is "SabrinaYork". I thought you might be interested to read her comments, my reply to them, and the comments of another escort on the subject.

15 July 2008
The only parlor I worked in Crystal Meth was rife, I would only use it every now and then (once a month or so) if I was pulling a double shift, a toot would keep me awake, you would never tell as I never took enough to get that 'wired' look have the chat and the jaw going 90 miles per hour! I suspect few of the girlie's here use them, or if they do it is recreational once in a while with a few mates on a night out, I reckon no matter how much you earn if you have a habit it would never be enough. I have bought Charlie twice in this country and both times said never again, too expensive and too cut.

19 July 2008
Doubt it is over here, I can't get it for love nor money, funny how you find drug dealers with a conscience, can't understand the hype myself, a point between 4 mates once a month is not exactly a problem, all it is stronger speed! Sit down with a couple of beers, speak shite, put the world to rights, go out at 2am and play some pool, then onto a club to dance your ass off! Its those that take it to excess that have problems as ususal.

20 July 2008
No as I say I can't get hold of the stuff for love nor money, I have not taken anything stronger than co-codamol this year, but if I could then I would, like I say it is ok if you don't go stupid with the stuff, I don't smoke now (4 weeks yesterday, thanks Champix), I hardly ever drink, you see girls out on the streets off their face on alcohol every night of the week, IMO the legal stuff is far worse at times.

This is my reply to her comments

23 July 2008
If someone takes Crystal Meth in a low dose, the effect can be similar to amphetamine. Pilots in the war and lorry drivers used to take it. In larger doses it is similar in effect to cocaine, and in larger doses still it is like crack cocaine. In large enough doses it surpasses even crack cocaine in its stimulant and euphoric effects. That is why it can be so addictive.

It is easy to say that 'Its those that take it to excess that have problems as ususal'. Everyone thinks that they can control it but it can easily end up controlling you.
It may not be much of a problem in this county yet what happens in America happens in this country 10 years later.

Alcohol is the most readily available drug and so in one sense it is the most problematic. It is so easy to overdose on heroin so that is why heroin kills the most people. But Crystal Meth is the most addictive in anything but the smallest doses.

I think that this is an example of what a reply should be. I did not make any snide remarks, I did not try to belittle her, or suggest that she was mad or bad. I don't dislike escorts or people who take drugs. As long as people know what they are getting into, that's fine by me.

Another escort whose username is "shadylady" also commented on the subject, and her views are very interesting.

31 July 2008
Well maybe but to look at it from a different angle. The sorts of girls who become escorts tend to be the sorts of girls who are risk takers and more experimental than your average Jane on the street;-in fact the exact same personality type who would be attracted by experimenting with drugs.

On another note (i'm not replying to you here Superego). I think Maxgentles quote sums up my feelings on this thread. " people who've never "done drugs" are much more censorious and knee-jerky on the subject than those who have. A bit like the attitudes to that other great social vice, prostitution!" Classic!

The majority of WG's here are not going to admit to drug use it's bad for business-Genghis' reaction is a case in point. I've experimented with most drugs;- I can say that because I don't have a business to protect! These days I am concerned with the legal aspect of getting caught so I take my yearly indulgances in weed and psychotropic substances to countries where they are legal. However I consider my experiences to have been life enhancing and I wouldn't change them for the world.

If you want to read the thread for yourself you can go to the PunterNet website.

Someone asked me when prostitutes can be found on Tooting Bec Common. In an earlier post I said where they could be found. I have also said that you'd be lucky to see one these days. If you go there the chances are that you will come away disappointed.

Tuesday, September 8, 2009

why men see prostitutes

People want to know why men see prostitutes. There are different kinds of prostitute and each has its own attraction.

In Soho there are many young women who are tall and slender. Some are great beauties. For example, there is Andra who is dark and Mediterranean looking, and there is Meena who is Indian. I have seen both these women for just £22. 10 minutes costs £20, plus a £2 pound tip for the maid. 20 minutes costs £40, 30 minutes costs £60.

Some men may prefer blonde girls. I have seen a couple of blonde Eastern European girls. They are not much to my liking. One of them, Alena, has a look very much in demand, pretty with white teeth and an all-over tan. On the PunterNet forum men rave about her.

With her I felt that it was a soul-less experience. She had an artificial smile. Many people say that having sex with a prostitute is a soul-less experience, but it is rarely so with me. Being with her made me realize how most of my experiences with prostitutes in recent years have been good ones, and reminded me of what it was like decades ago when I experimented with prostitutes in Soho but then stopped.

Probably the most popular woman in Soho at the moment is Paris, judging from the number of PunterNet reports. Meena has many too, and Alena has many. Andra does not have many, although to me she is the most beautiful.

Paris is blonde, but she is English. She is slender but not tall. She is such a fun girl. She gets £25 per 10 minutes, as do all the girls at 4 Old Compton Street. She is so busy that it is often better to book to see her. Usually in Soho it is not necessary to book in advance. Just walk up the stairs and if the girl is free you can see her. Another popular girl there is Angie, who is European.

Another English girl at 4 Old Compton Street is Ritzy, who is a black woman. I have seen her once and found her to be a lovely friendly affectionate girl. She is neither tall nor slender, but I wouldn't mind seeing her again. However, I don't think this will happen because recently I have been going to 8 Greek Street, which has its own attractions. (This is not the place in Greek Street they call The Slaughter House.)

I first started going to 8 Greek Street when I found out that some of the women there give oral sex without using a condom. Amy is a young woman who performs this service. I have seen her twice. However, it is the two older women I will be seeing.

Ivy is a middle-aged woman from the Philippines. She is neither tall nor slender but she is lovely to look at and has a beautiful face. I have seen her twice so far and will see her again. Each time she started with the oral sex without a condom. They wash your cock in the sink before they begin if you request this service. Then she moved on to a hand job. I have found that this gives me the right amount of stimulation to bring me to orgasm.

These older women know how to please a man. You may think that you need viagra to have sex but with these women you don't. They can do things that most women do not know how to do. They can get you erect and bring you to orgasm without a problem.

The other older woman is Lily, who is from the south of France. She is middle-aged to elderly. (No, she doesn't take her teeth out.) These two women have the confidence that comes with age and experience. They are so easy to talk to and I feel no awkwardness when I am with them. I get Ivy to talk dirty to me when she is wanking me. I asked Lily to talk dirty in Marseille dialect but she just talked in normal French.

Ordinary shagging does not give me enough of the right kind of stimulation to bring me to orgasm. I like to see prostitutes even if I know I'm not going to come, although I intend to see Ivy and Lily for the foreseeable future. I pay the minimum amount, £22, and spend 10 minutes having fun. It's worth £22 just to see a beautiful naked woman, to touch her and touch her pussy (although you can't usually put your finger inside). I have never been to a lap-dancing club. I think what I have been doing is better.

I like to lie on my back on the bed and get the girl to sit on my tummy astride me. Well worth £22. There are brothels much closer to where I live but they are more expensive. I did go to a local brothel recently when I found out about one that seems to have just opened. It was a bit shabby. The woman was Cuban and called Alba (or maybe Alva; in Spanish the 'v' is pronounced as a 'b'). I paid £40 for 15 minutes. She started by sucking my cock without a condom. She let me put my finger inside her pussy. She does kissing too, but she said I should give her £100 if I want a good snog. It was a pleasant experience but I don't think I will be repeating it.

My other local brothel is not shabby at all. I have been there a few times over the years but it lacks something. I went to see a girl in Soho recently. As I was going up the stairs the maid from the first floor flat was putting up a notice on the door. She was short and plump but had a beautiful face and I started flirting with her. I went to the second floor to see the girl who I intended to see but she was busy. As I descended the stairs the maid was still there. I told her that if she did not want me then I would come back later. She said that I could have her. She was smiling at me, and I wasn't sure if she was joking.

I should have taken her up on her offer, but I had planned to see the girl on the second floor because she was recommended and I stuck to the plan. But it made me realize how exciting the spontaneous encounter can be. That is why I still long for street girls.

When most men are walking along a street and they see an attractive woman in a short skirt and a skimpy top, they want to go up to her and chat with her and flirt. They want to ask her if there is anywhere they can go and have sex. They want to get her alone and lift up her skirt and pull down her knickers. For most men this is a fantasy. But there are places where you can go where it can happen.

You may say that street girls are ugly but there are two things I can say about that. Firstly, women on crack tend to become more beautiful before they lose their looks. They loose body fat and can have angelic faces. Secondly, lots of 'street girls' aren't addicts and may not even be drug users, as a recent experience of mine on Tooting Bec Common illustrates. Also, you don't have to go with ones you don't fancy.

Last month I went to Tooting Bec Common. I did not expect to see any girls there because of the police crackdown but I was immediately approached by two girls. One was a plump black girl who looked about 25 years old. The other was a thin white girl who looked younger. I was suspicious at first because I thought they might be police.

I said I would go with the older one and she took me along one of the tracks in the undergrowth. She asked me what I wanted and I said I wanted to finger her. She said that it would cost £20 and I said I only had ten. She stopped and lifted up her dress. I thought she wasn't wearing any knickers at first but she was wearing black knickers. We got them down and I started playing with her pussy.

She was smiling and seemed to think it was fun. I asked her if she knew any other girls, hoping she might know Katy or Nicky. She started talking about her friend, then called her over. I asked her why was she doing that. I was a bit wary. The girl came along to see me with my fingers up her friend. The older girl said to the younger girl that I would give her £10 to feel her pussy, but I said that I had not said that. Then I got nervous and said I was going.

I had asked the name of the older girl but I have forgotten it. I have been to the Common since, hoping to see them again. I can see now that they weren't a threat, just two girls wanting to make a bit of money and have a bit of a laugh. It made me realize that there will always be girls like that going to the Common on a sunny summer afternoon. Doesn't matter what Harriet Harman or Amanda Austin say or do.

These two girls are not what I would call street girls. The real street girls that I have known are something different. If you know how to handle them you will not be robbed and they will want to be with you and have fun with you. Some men say that they would never go with a prostitute because they don't want to be with a woman who does not want to be with them.

I have never dared to take up the offer that I have had twice from street girls that I have taken back to my flat. I asked both of them if they have had sex with another girl and they both said yes. They have lost all inhibitions and can enjoy sex with older men and with each other. They have said they can come back and bring another girl with them. It is difficult enough to control one street girl let alone two.

When I started looking at a forum about street girls I got the number of a local street girl from one of the members. He wanted a phone number in return. I gave him the number of Chrissie who I had met on the Common. He suggested that the four of us meet up at my flat. I said I did not want that. I did not know him. It was too much of a risk.

I have read on the forum about the parties they had with this girl, and what they did to her. They like to party, they like loud music. If you are in a flat or a hotel room with a couple of street girls and they have their crack and alcohol and loud music then that is the most fun you are ever going to have. If you dare to do that.

Perhaps you cannot understand the attraction of this. If that is so, then there is something lacking in you. I have no respect for you. If you would never go with a street girl because you lack the imagination to understand the attraction, or you are too frightened, or if you think it is all too sordid, then that's fine. I have no interest in promoting the 'street scene'. I want you to keep away from it. But don't pretend that you are being moral. It isn't a moral position to want to have nothing to do with something or to refuse to discuss it. It isn't moral to not be bothered to try to understand the complexity of an issue while pretending you want to help the 'victims'. I would rather spend time with a street girl than a petty-minded holier-than-thou dimwit.

replies to comments

Before I proceed I want to quickly reply to 3 comments that have recently been made to the post that I did on January 29 this year titled Street-girls, escorts and cocaine.

The first comment seemed to be accusing me of trying to single out prostitutes as a group when there are other groups like health care professionals who may have just as much of an involvement in recreational drug use. I would have thought it would be people who are working in the media or the financial sector who are probably most likely to snort some cocaine on a Saturday night. One of the themes of my blog has been that prostitutes are not so different from other types of people, and different types of prostitute are not so different from each other.

I'm sure that most doctors would say that they don't ever take drugs and they don't know anyone who does. And they would be truthful. Most doctors probably would not snort cocaine at a party. But that is irrelevant to the truth that many doctors and other health care professionals do exactly that. I'm sure that there are many prostitutes who can honestly say that they do not take drugs and do not know any other prostitutes who do. That doesn't mean anything.

What I am saying is that people in the media, the financial sector or health care professionals often snort a bit of cocaine or something else once a week or once a month at a party. Especially if they are young. Escorts are no different from that, except that they are more likely to do it.

Who is more likely to take drugs, a doctor who has worked hard all his or her life dedicated to his or her career, or someone who sucks cocks for money? Obviously the latter. It is doctors whose money is 'earned the hard way'.

On different forums I have seen what escorts have written about their drug use. One woman, a regular contributor to the PunterNet forum, said that she liked crystal meth. You can easily get addicted to cocaine, as Daniella Westbrook and so many others have shown, but crystal meth is so much more dangerous. So maybe you should think about that before you hand over your money to an escort.

Monday, July 27, 2009

bleak future for street girls

I like to read the PunterNet forum and sometimes I contribute. There has been a thread recently called 'Street girls'. I was going to make a contribution but I didn't get round to it and now it has been closed. There were a lot of snide remarks and it dealt with issues that have been dealt with before by myself and others in previous threads, so it wasn't a high priority for me. It was interesting how much hatred some people have for men who have sex with street girls. I think there were contributors who were not involved in prostitution but were either extreme feminists or religious.

Extreme feminists and religious people have a lot in common, although they would not like to admit it. They both take an ideological approach, see everything in black-and-white terms, and don't want to learn anything because they think they know it all already. Ideological approaches always end up harming the people that they say they want to help. They are all hypocrites because if they really wanted to help they would first try to understand what the problems are.

Now it has been decided that there will be no more discussions on the PunterNet forum of the subject of the street scene. I predict that this will make the PunterNet site less credible in the eyes of the general public. Many people will have thought “They discuss prostitution but at least they are willing to show the dark side as well as its more acceptable side”. Now they are not willing to discuss the dark side. They want to make out that it is like Secret Diary of a Call Girl. Hiding the truth will not make anything better.

There were many points raised in this thread that I would like to address. I am no longer able to contribute to the thread because it has been closed. I am no longer able to start a new thread because the subject of the street scene has been banned. So I have to do it here. There were 2 points that I thought were the most important. I will address them both in this posting and then if I can be bothered I can address other points in later postings.

Someone made the point that street girls have enormous problems and that people like me are adding to them. It is not me who is adding to their problems, it is people who want to ban things and drive them further underground.

I have mentioned Amanda Austin, the local resident who campaigned for prostitutes to be removed from Tooting Bec Common. Now it seems that she has achieved her aims. I have only seen 2 prostitutes there this year. This is probably more due to the activities of Harriet Harman and Jacqui Smith than Amanda Austin.

According to Amanda Austin the Common was awash with used condoms and drugs paraphernalia. This was a lie. Tooting Bec Common is a big park and the prostitutes restricted their activities to one small area of the park. The only used condoms that could be seen were in particular areas of the undergrowth. The only drugs paraphernalia I have ever seen in several years of going there was an improvised crack pipe. It was there for many weeks, which just shows that what rubbish could be seen was an accumulation of many weeks-worth.

I often wonder if Amanda Austin and her fellow campaigners ever thing about what has happened to these women, as I do. Perhaps they think that they have all given up drugs. I don't think they care, there seemed to be a lot of hostility to the women from residents, although of course they are always willing to shed crocodile tears if it helps them get their way.

When I first started going to the Common about 9 years ago, there were many women there of different types. I would say 3 different types. There were women who occasionally went to the Common when they had rent to pay or a bill, or because of delays in getting benefits. There were other women who drank or took some drugs but were not addicts, or who would not have considered themselves addicts but recreational users. The third group were the hardened drug addicts who came to the Common because it was a safer and easier option for them than getting into cars at 2 or 3 in the morning in New Park Road or Brixton Hill.

What has happened to these women is different in each case.

The first group will be having even more problems because of the economic downturn (caused by Harriet Harman and her chums) and they will be getting evicted or sitting in the dark or not having gas to cook their children food (Ms Harman is getting 'evicted' soon).

The second group will be shoplifting and committing other crimes. Perhaps the men in their lives will have to do more burglaries. Or maybe selling cocaine to kiddies (there has recently been a big rise in cocaine use among young people). So if Amanda Austin gets burgled and her teenage daughter gets a cocaine addiction like Daniella Westbrook it should not come as a big surprise.

And then the third group will be getting into cars at 2 or 3 in the morning in New Park Road or Brixton Hill and maybe sometimes never be seen again. They are likely to face injury. So I wonder if Harriet and Amanda and their fellow campaigners are proud of themselves about what they have achieved.

Another possibility is the more attractive and more organised women in groups 1 and 2 decide to become full-time prostitutes. Which I'm sure is not what Harriet Harman and Jacqui Smith originally intended.

The woman who made the posting that I am replying to finished by writing 'maybe it's time to go away and rethink your moral standards...?'. Ethics is a branch of philosophy that has occupied the minds of some of the most intelligent people for centuries. They have not come to any conclusions but they always stick to certain rules.

People should base their morality on thinking instead of emotion. They should be informed about issues and be willing to share information and discuss facts and opinions, without being sarcastic or insulting. They should not try to shut people up, either by intimidating them or trying to stop their contribution to the debate.

They should try to understand the consequences of their opinions and actions. If they can see that the consequences of their actions or opinions have increased human suffering then they should not continue to claim that they are altruistic. They should realize that they are not altruistic, or that they are not altruistic enough to be willing to spend a little time listening to others who know more than they do and to think about things a bit. If they are unwilling to see the consequences of their actions, as I think is the case with Amanda Austin, then they are immoral people.

How is it that so many women can be happy to bring so much misery to other women?

The other post that I want to reply to today was made by a man whose contribution was well intentioned but misguided. He said that in a job he had he encountered a street girl who told him that 'she felt that she was worthless and would never amount to anything more in life so took drugs to numb the pain she felt'. This is the sort of thing that drug addicts say to make people feel sorry for them.

The fact is that if you take a drug like cocaine, crack cocaine, heroin or crystal meth you will like it and want more. You are likely to become addicted. It has nothing to do with self-confidence or feelings of worthlessness or whether you spent your teenage years in a children's home or were abused as a child.

People think that addiction will not happen to them. They think “Well, I never lived in a children's home and I don't have feelings of worthlessness, so I'm not going to end up as a street girl”. This is a fatal (often literally fatal) error of thinking. If you think that street girls are only a certain type of unfortunate individual then you are missing an important truth.

Last year on the Common I met a woman in her thirties (I guess) called Alison. She was from Dublin. I asked her if she took crack and she said she did. I asked her if she took smack and she said she did, but only smoked it, not injected it. She said that she used to run a restaurant in Ireland. I told her that I had never taken drugs. She said don't, if you take it and you like it it can change your life. This is the sort of thing I have seen again and again in the years that I have been going to the Common. I have never seen a 'teen runaway'.

The author of this post also said that he would have liked to help this woman but she would not consider rehab. There is a reason for that. The reason for that is that the life of a crack addict is a life of much pleasure as well as pain. You may not want to believe that but people who know about drug addicts know that they are getting too much out of it to give it all up. That might sound like a crass thing to say but it is an important truth to understand. They want to party all the time.

In any case psychological opinion is changing about drug addiction. I had a CBT therapist who had worked with drug addicts. She did not see them as victims. I told her about my involvement with street girls, and that some people see me as an abuser. She could not understand this. She did not see me as an abuser, and none of the street girls have seen me as an abuser, so why should I pay any attention to dickheads?

Of course there are abusers on the street scene. Just like in any kind of prostitution or in any sphere of life. There are men who like to have women under their control and to harm them. But I have always listened to street girls and tried to help them. Just because I fuck them (occasionally) doesn't mean that I can't care about what happens to them. You might say that I am pretending that I am benefiting them and am deluded, but it is not me who is pretending to have their best interests at heart and is deluded.

There will be more abuse of street girls now. Read this from this site http://www.scot-pep.org.uk/

Since the kerb-crawling legislation came in, nobody’s drug dependency or rent arrears or benefit delays have magically cleared up overnight. Women are still working on the streets, but with many of their regular clients avoiding the scene for fear of legal repercussions, they are seeing a greater proportion of unpleasant and violent clients, with a rise in requests for sex without a condom and services at insultingly low prices. Some are resigned to being out all night, since business is slow, they still need to make money, and in some cases they haven’t a hope of meeting their curfews in homeless accommodation. Clients want them to leave their traditional areas and meet them elsewhere, so that the clients won’t be targeted by police; as a consequence sex workers are working in greater isolation with a significant threat to their personal safety.

Friday, July 3, 2009

thoughts about Trina

If things had worked out between me and Trina and I had become a regular client I would have let her take a shower at my flat. If she had been hungry I would have given her something to eat or given her a cup of tea. If she had needed to talk I would have listened. If I had a washing machine I would have been willing to wash her clothes.

I would have been willing to do this for a girl. If someone is homeless or living in a squat then this could have been important to her. But I would never have let one stay in my flat, not even for one night.

Men have an attraction towards young women. That doesn't stop when you get older. I have had an attraction towards young women since I was a child and that is not going to change. Men also have an instinct to look after young women. You may not believe that but it is true. You may want to be cynical and think that it is just about lust.

There are plenty of people - especially feminists - who want to see things in black-and-white terms, with women as victims and men as predators. Reality is more complicated than that. You can't even begin to help people if you don't want to understand reality. Men who use prostitutes are not always as bad as they are made out to be, and people who are drug addicts are not as innocent as they would like others to believe.