Every girl who worked for me was someone’s daughter. It would be hugely hypocritical for me to say, “It’s good enough for their daughters, but not for mine”. – Becky Adams
Last week Becky Adams, a retired brothel owner, once again ignited controversy among busybodies, moralists and hypocrites by reiterating her statement (first made publicly seven weeks ago) that like many other people, she wouldn’t mind if her daughter followed in her footsteps:
…Becky Adams, 45…insists she would be happy if [her 16-year-old daughter] Emilia chose to be a “high class escort” — and says she would even help to get the teenager started…“Society may judge her but I wouldn’t. At least prostitution is an honest profession. I’d much rather she work as an escort than a banker. I couldn’t understand her wanting to do something morally wrong, something that could jeopardise someone else.”
…Emilia, who is currently working in a shop and at a car showroom while studying travel and tourism, agrees with her mum. She said: “I don’t have a moral problem with having sex with strangers…I’m not promiscuous but sex isn’t a massive thing for me. I certainly don’t regret losing my virginity at 14…One of mum’s girls in particular became more like an aunt to me. I loved being surrounded by these nice, glamorous women. It was a happy family.”
Becky is glad that her youngest daughter grew up surrounded by her girls and the tools of the trade, claiming that it has made her more open-minded and relaxed about sex…“I think my work showed Emilia that the reality of prostitution is just very ordinary. The girls have their shifts and they go to work. They can have a bad day or a quiet day, just like anybody else…prostitution is a service…Emilia has seen…how it can save marriages — how a man whose wife is fighting cancer will visit a prostitute rather than start an affair. She’s not shocked by anything as a result…”
Those who can’t understand Adams’ position appear to be suffering from what we might call the Fallacy of Universal Mores, the false belief that everyone feels the same way about sex as they do. These people, of whom the “no woman could willingly choose prostitution” crowd is a subset, apparently imagine that those who choose sex work are ashamed of ourselves and hate our lives, and would therefore never want our children to make the same choices we did. They just can’t get it through their thick skulls that some women really don’t find sex work horrible and degrading, and therefore would not oppose daughters taking up the trade if that was what they wanted to do. Here, for example, is a short film of Ouled-Nail dancers taken in 1938; as I explained in my column of one year ago today the women of this Berber tribe often worked as dancers and prostitutes, and daughters were trained by their mothers. As you can see, this little girl is already learning her dance moves:
Even among well-adjusted sex workers who say they would mind their daughters taking up the work, the usual reason is not anything prohibitionists imagine, but rather the stigma and the dangers resulting from criminalization. Some others (myself included) object not on principle, but because of the belief that a specific daughter is not suited to the work; Adams states in the interview that she believes Emilia would do well as an escort but not in brothel work.
But there’s another aspect to the “shocked” reactions which is even more indicative of disordered thinking; as I pointed out in “Mother’s Day”,
…People who [ask, “Would you want your daughter to do it?”]…aren’t concerned with the danger of prostitution, because if they were we’d hear it used as an argument against women joining the military, doing police work or participating in dangerous sports like boxing…Let’s set aside for a moment the obvious point that there are lots of things people wouldn’t want their daughters doing (smoking, excessive drinking, getting pregnant out of wedlock, working at Wal-Mart, going into politics) which aren’t illegal, and the equally obvious fact that we don’t get to choose our offspring’s occupations (though some certainly try). Let’s consider only that people do lots of things their parents wouldn’t like, and that most prostitutes have parents who would be upset and appalled at the choice. It’s not your decision whether your daughter becomes a hooker; it’s hers. And if she does make that choice (which 1% of all Western daughters do for some portion of their lives), do you really want her hounded by cops, forced into dangerous situations, unable to seek legal recourse if she’s robbed or raped, and branded as a pariah for life because of it? Or would you rather she have the ability to repent what you see as her mistake and leave the job later if she chose? Finally, is it worth rejecting your own flesh and blood for making a decision with which you disagree, and which hurt nobody except (in your opinion) her?…
Presumably, those who cannot comprehend why a whore would accept her daughter’s decision to practice the same profession believe that the mother should adamantly denounce her own decisions (thus demonstrating that she has poor judgment and is therefore incompetent to give advice on the subject). Or perhaps they think she should be a hypocrite, indulging in the common parental “Do as I say, not as I do.” In either case, they apparently hold that a mother should reject her daughter for making a decision she disagrees with. I suppose I shouldn’t be surprised at the lack of thought demonstrated by their reactions, though; after all, these are the same people who support paternalistic laws whose consequences are far more damaging than those of the behaviors they supposedly “protect” people from.
Speaking as a father of a daughter; I wouldn’t want her to become a prostitute because it is illegal. I don’t think it should be; but my wishes aside, prostitution currently is illegal, just as drug dealing is, and I would prefer that my daughter engage in legal work. (I’d prefer honest as well, but if she truly desires to become a P.R. person, an attorney, or a banker, I can’t very well stop her.)
I have known two sets of mothers and daughters working at Nevada brothels. They worked the same shifts. I do not know if they ever worked together.
At the opening of the OuledNail clip, I thought they were going to do the Ed Sullivan-Elvis thing and only show them from the waist up.
Watching the mother and daughter together reminded me of the hand clapping games that the girls played in elementary school, most often with two participants, but as many as four.
The OuledNail clip looked like belly dancing. Is it a more original form of what we’ve come to associate with Arab cultures? And was it specifically done as a means of advertising their capabilities? Or as a separate form of entertainment?
A lot of American belly dance moves and customs (such as the coin jewelry) are derived from Ouled Nail dancing. As for its purpose, a little of both; they made their bread-and-butter money from tips for dancing, but the big payoffs were from harlotry.
I love that last little bit at the end when the little girl was doing the dance move pretty well then I think she must’ve gotten off beat a little because she looked back at the musician like, “Okay, did I screw up or was that your fault?” heh.
I don’t have daughters, but I do have nieces. If one of them told me she wanted to take up harlotry…
One of them I really do not want to enter this line of work, because she has a history of poor decisions and bad management. I’d like her to get a nice, quiet office job with a somewhat controlling, tough-but-fair boss. Not that she’s likely to seek my advice anyway.
Another I think would be fine if it’s escorting or a legal brothel in Nevada, though her mother would blow a gasket. She’s had her own history of some poor decisions, but she’s grown up a lot since having her baby. Not sure I’d encourage her in it, though, because there is the social stigma and, if not the Nevada option, the dangers of criminalization. But she, like the other, is unlikely to seek my council on such a decision.
The two of my nieces I see most often (and who would be most likely to talk to me about it) are fine. Actually, they might talk to me about it because they know that I read this blog. There is social stigma, there are the dangers of criminalization, but if they can avoid plain old-fashioned bad luck, they’d be fine. They would be dealing with the overloaded market in Dallas, but hey.
All of this being said, it’s all hypothetical. I think the one might dance, but none of them have expressed any interest in hooking, and because of (let’s say it together) social stigma and criminalization, I’m pretty glad of that. Plus, when you get down to it, it’s her decision, whether I like it or not.
Hi Maggie, I’ve just come across your blog and your comments on my article. A little late I know, but I’d like to say thank you, and what an excellent post. I may steal your words about the safety hypocrisy if I may! Have a happy 2013.
Lots of love
Madam Becky Adams x
I would be honored. Happy New Year to you as well, and good luck with your new Para Doxies project! I consider service to the disabled a very important part of our work, so I’m really interested in seeing if the “authorities” will allow you to do that good work without interference.
[…] *http://maggiemcneill.wordpress.com/2012/09/11/somebodys-daughter/ […]
nice post.
Here is my personal thought:
http://ilovemyunusualjob.wordpress.com/2013/06/24/prostitution-would-you-like-your-daughter-to-become-a-prostitute/
“she is entitled to do whatever she wants with her body…when you have children, you are raising individuals with their own personalities and characters, who will have their own quirks and abilities, and whose choices will differ from your own. If you don’t like that idea, perhaps having children is not a good idea…”
Wow, so true, I wish more parents would think about that before having kids..
Anyway, if I’d have a daughter one day, I wouldn’t like it if she entered prostitution, for reasons you stated in this post. I would try my best to talk her out. But if she would stick with her decision, than I’ll be there for her if she’s in trouble or needs support. And it’s probably needless to say that the stigma also affects parents. Those who lets their daughter ‘do her own thing’ are ‘bad examples’.
I LOVE your Blog… I am a former Stripper, I worked in Seattle and Vegas.
TOO many times people use the words Exploitation, I LOVE how you cover this on this blog.
As for this entry…. I am a mom of a 17 year old daughter…. and YES, I would
be fine if my daughter wanted to follow my footsteps.
She has asked me about stripping, and if I would be OK with her doing this for a living, and I always tell her that as long as she was in a country that had GOOD safe clubs, I would have no problem with it.
Quite frankly, I wish I was in a country with good clubs… I live in Sweden now,
and due to the Feminist Bullshit… the Clubs here are NOT safe.. They are owned and operated by the Russian Mob.
I am NOT so comfortable with that, to be quite honest.
However, if I lived in the USA again, or in Britain or France, I would
be dancing to this day. 🙂
anyway, I LOVE your Blog.. and will be passing it on to my daughter.. 🙂
Thank you for telling the TRUTH.