In honor, here’s a video to learn how to put a condom on with your mouth.

Sex workers and clients have pretty much the same motivations regardless of the money spent. Sex workers all feel they’re offering a certain set of benefits and services, regardless of the money spent. Sex workers and clients all run the same social/legal/disease risk, regardless of the money spent.

I’m not saying all sex workers/clients are the same. Obviously not. But when we’re talking about human interaction – there is little change from one end of the spectrum to the other. Every sex worker – from a street worker up to a very high-end escort who charges thousands – feel they offer their clients attention, affection, entertainment, mental/emotional support and stress relief. The intensity varies, as does personal inclination, but the end result is that every sex worker wants their client to leave with the same good feelings and return to see her again. Money has no role in this essential part of sex work.

The amount of money spent seems to be the great titillation in the Spitzer scandal. Money is an aphrodisiac and who needs arousal more than a country on the brink of recession?

The more I find out about sex work from a range of sex workers, the more I realize all the issues are essentially the same – it’s a matter of degree. Money plays a role in marketing; it plays a big role in paying one’s bills. It does not play a role in the essence of sex work – the actual interaction between two people.

And money seems to be all the public is focused on.

Madeline Kahn has the funniest sex worker role I’ve ever seen in a movie. Her deliberately awful performance as Lili Von Shtupp in Blazing Saddles is great for a laugh without making fun of sex workers. It’s even richer if you’re feeling a little burned out.

You can see her memorably terrible singing on YouTube. Even better — sit down, make some popcorn and enjoy the whole movie. She’s in most of it.

Yet another example of how power-crazed rulers don’t understand sex or humanity. (Hitler was off the deep end more than most, but Bush has gotten into the marriage game too, though for different reasons than Hitler.)

It seems that The Internet Escort’s Handbook just another entry in the sad, sad world of sex workers writing about their experiences. Although I don’t consider the book to be literature in the strictest sense, that I’m a former sex worker writing about sex work apparently tags my efforts as “fuck lit” and not worthy of serious consideration. (Had Bunting actually read my book, she might’ve had more derogatory things to say.)

I’m certainly honored and excited to make it into The Guardian with so little effort on my part. I need the publicity help. But the argument…

Bunting believes the “happy hooker” is just a myth (mostly fueled by fuck lit). She has a problem realizing that prostitution, just like any industry, has a range of experiences. Much as I want to help stop a lot of the problems inherent in the business, it’s not going to completely happen. There will always be women who get taken advantage of and hurt (as with dating and marriage). The best any of us can do is work on harm reduction and helping those who are harmed.

Likewise, there will always be women who never have those experiences and are never touched by negativity in their job.

One extreme does not mean the other doesn’t exist, nor does it mean one set of experiences make the girl better or worse than any other girl. At least fuck lit writers are presenting a balanced view because every book that Bunting mentioned has a different slant, a different perspective.

That’s far more than Bunting offers.

Apparently “real” women’s voices are being drowned out by us fuck lit writers because at the end of the piece, Bunting calls for women to find their voice again.

Thanks for the invite, Bunting. My voice is right here.