I apologize in advance for the length of this post. Also, I originally posted this in the Upstate NY forums, but somebody suggested I respost it here, so I did.
This might be a bad idea so if it is, please feel free to tell me/shut down the post, but I'm really curious about the inner psychological lives of us in this community. I often wonder that I cannot be the only person who has grappled extensively with the different implications of being a 'hobbyist'. I'll be the first to admit that when I first started hobbying I was thrown into a deep, deep depression after every encounter because I found myself thinking that I couldn't possibly love my relationship partner while also participating in these acts. To be brief - I got over it and I'm still here. But I have some lingering questions about US as a group of people.
First - conventional wisdom would tell us that we are all 'deviants' of some kind, with the hobbyists being predatory exploiters and providers being unable to give consent because of a variety of reasons. For example, this taken from a wikipedia article on criminology and the hobby:
...[some] "argue that the act of prostitution is not by definition a fully consensual act, as the prostitutes are forced to sell sex, either by somebody else or by the unfortunate circumstances of their lives (such as poverty, lack of opportunity, drug addiction, a history of severe childhood abuse or neglect etc): "
In the academic literature on prostitution there are very few authors who argue that valid consent to prostitution is possible. Most suggest that consent to prostitution is impossible or at least unlikely."
[39]. "
(...) most authors suggest that consent to prostitution is deeply problematic if not impossible (...) most authors have argued that consent to prostitution is impossible. For radical feminists this is because prostitution is always a coercive sexual practice. Others simply suggest that economic coercion makes the sexual consent of sex workers highly problematic if not impossible...""
I should state that I DO NOT agree with all of this- and I generally think a lot of the academic work about the hobby is under developed because it's from an outside perspective. Further, I do see that there are some more unsavory aspects of the hobby that do involve the sex trade and child prostitution - I, myself, find those to be wrong. That said, I am exceptionally curious about what patterns of experience or factors exist as commonalities between all of us.
Do you think we as a community on this forum can discuss this? How did we get here? Are we all just damaged goods by some sort of traumatic moment or abuse in our lives? Are all providers seeking to make up some deeply awful self-esteem deficiency? I realize this is a deeply personal question so I don't expect providers to share us their stories/conflicts, but I am curious about the true reasons we end up here - and if we are open to discussing this non judgmentally I think it would be amazing.
For me - I'll just say I got into the hobby because it was a lot less stressful and way more efficient to contact a provider and get that girlfriend experience than it was to put myself out there in the dating scene and expose myself to rejection or compete with other men. I think it is fair to say that the beauty and class of many of the women on this board put them in a category that some would say are 'out of our leagues' in the non-hobbying world. There is also deep, deep feelings of acceptance I get between provider and hobbyist in that it seems like we acknowledge that in some way we are both "social outcasts" and there is an intimacy and connection that is generated by a mutual acceptance of an aspect of ourselves that we keep hidden from most of the world. This is usually unsaid but I wonder if it's there, lurking under the surface for many of us.
On the flip side - I also enjoy the fantasy of being involved with a variety of beautiful and interesting women, so in some ways I like the aspect of making those fantasies into reality. There is also the excitement inherent in the fact that hobbying is somewhat taboo.
Lastly, I have found that the pragmatic reasons I argue to justify the legitimacy of the hobby (i.e. better than affairs, it's consensual, just meeting a need, mutual enjoyment of provider and hobbyist without commitment and etc) - are all things that occurred to me AFTER I began hobbying - I was drawn to it first, and rationalized it later. That's just me.
It's easy to oversimplify and say that we're all just horny dudes with crappy sex lives at home that want to meet young, attractive women - and that providers are all women who are seeking some sort of validation or affection. It's easy to say that we're all sex addicts and drug addicts who cyclically enable each other, but I find that those statements are a load of crap. The common narratives and generalizations I think we can agree are not adequate to describe our experiences as providers and hobbyists. What do you think?
I apologize for the length of this - it's quite a novel - but I was so excited by the idea of discussing this, I just had to get it all out. Also, I'd be happy to discuss this with anyone through PM as well. And if you think I suck then hey, you can post that too. I just thought I'd take a minute to be real about my questions and see if anyone else out there wondered them too.
Introspective discussion about ourselves from within the hobby
Morality
I'm just a naturally curious person who thinks about these things and wants to talk to others about it.
