Selling sexual service is morally worse than selling massages as the prostitute (1) damages bodily integrity by treating her body as a commodity (2) damages sexual autonomy by relinquishing her body sovereignty, and (3) reinforces discriminatory beliefs of female sexuality. Selling massages, on the other hand, (1) does not involve objectification of the female body, (2) does not involve surrendering of body sovereignty, and (3) has significant less effect in reinforcing sexist beliefs.
This essay will only discuss the case of female prostitutes and female masseuses with male customers.
By definition of prostitution (the exchange of sexual acts for money), some cases of sugar babies could be counted as prostitution if sex is the primary aim. It is a more selective form of prostitution where the prostitute has greater control over whom she has sex with. Prostitution involving sugar daddy still damages bodily integrity, but damages sexual autonomy and reinforces discriminatory beliefs to smaller extents than traditional prostitution practices. It is still morally worse than selling massage, but due to word limit, this essay will focus on the traditional prostitution industry.
Selling mere services vs (selling services + a lease of a commodity)
First, I would like to draw a distinction between selling mere services and selling a service that inextricably tied with a short “lease” of a commodity under certain conditions.
When a masseuse sells the massage, the customer is not allowed to use, i.e., touch, squeeze, kiss, etc, the masseuse’s hands. The customer is thus only buying the service without the “lease” the masseuse’s hand.
The selling of sexual service generally comes with the “lease” of the prostitute’s body. The customer is allowed to use---i.e., to touch and penetrate the prostitute’s body. The lease of course comes with some conditions that limit the degree of violence that could be used. I don’t think any selling of sex can be severed from the “lease”. Practically speaking, few will pay
The masseuse is selling the massage, while the prostitute is selling the sex and renting her body temporarily.
By “renting” one’s body for use, the prostitute is treating her body as a commodity, and relinquishing the sovereign of her body. In comparison, a masseuse does not treat her hands as a commodity, still retains her body sovereignty.
Treating one’s body as a commodity damages the body integrity. And the relinquishment of one’s body sovereignty, even partially, undermines her sexual autonomy, thus making prostitution morally worse than selling massage. I will explore the definition of sexual autonomy later.
Counter-arguments
Defenders of prostitution argue that choosing to sell sexual service is a form of expression of their sexuality and thus should be supported as it enhances sexual autonomy (Nussbaum 1999, p288), and that since it is the prostitute’s own choice to sell sexual service, her sexual autonomy remains intact (Schwarzenbach, 1990–1991, p123). I will address these arguments step by step. In order to offer the strongest arguments, I will focus on cases where prostitutes enter the contract voluntarily.
Sexual Autonomy: the dispute in its definition
With regard to the defense that an exercise of free will to enter into the prostitution contract is an enhancement of autonomy, I agree with Gauthier that while the willingness to exchange sexual self-governance for economic benefits may be an exercise of economic autonomy, this is damaging to one’s sexual autonomy (Gauthier, 2011).
Gauthier noted the disagreement on the relationship of sexual autonomy and prostitution can be attributed to the disagreement on the definition of sexual autonomy (Gauthier, 2011). The different definitions (as explained later) reflect the different valuation of female sexual satisfaction in sexual acts. This is crucial as the moral difference between selling prostitution and massages depends on how much moral weight sexual autonomy carries in that definition.
A broad definition assumed by writers such as St. James, Richards, and Schulhofer is that if the sexual acts are “self-determined”, i.e., originated in some desire of the agent performing them, they can be said to be sexually autonomous. In this case, a desire for economic gain suffices to make prostitution in line with sexual autonomy. On this account, the line between economic autonomy and sexual autonomy is blurred, if not non-existent, since the presence of any desire would render an act sexually autonomous. This corresponds with the view that autonomy is normatively content-neutral, thus one can still be autonomous when she agrees to be a slave (Friedman, 2003). This conception of autonomy is rivalled by another account which holds that one must value autonomy in order to be truly autonomous (Oshana, 2003). For the sake of this discussion, I will not go in depth into this dispute.
On the other hand, a narrower definition adopted by Elizabeth Anderson and Scott Anderson states that an act qualifies as sexually autonomous only if it is sexually self-expressive, engaging the sexual desire of the agent (Anderson, 2002, p763). By this definition, the signing of contractual agreement to satisfy another’s sexual desire at the expense of one’s own sexual desires in exchange for a non-sexual good is not sexually autonomous (Morgan, 1987, p26). And the sexual autonomy is distinctively separated from economic autonomy by engaging the element of sexual desire. On this definition, in cases where the purpose of marriage primarily is to secure the exclusive access to sex provided by the wife, and where the wives are not sexually satisfied but keeping serving their husband sexually in exchange for financial security, they could be labelled as not sexually autonomous. But I think most marriages cannot be reduced to a means to exchange sex for money as much more factors such as family, reputation, emotional bond, etc, are entangled.
The difference in definitions highlights the different perceptions of the value of female sexual satisfaction in sexual autonomy: The broad definition places little importance on it as female sexual satisfaction could be left out of the equation of sexual autonomy; while in the narrower definition it is vital. I will use the narrower definition as it is morally significant to put female sexual satisfaction in the image of female agency, the reasons of which I will explain later.
Is Prostitution self-expression of sexuality?
Even in ideal situations where prostitution is entirely voluntary, it is far from a self-expression of sexuality that demonstrates sexual autonomy in my opinion.
As observed by Elizabeth Anderson, the prostitution’s actions governed under the voluntarily-signed prostitution contract express not the prostitute’s own valuations but the will of her customers (Anderson, 1993, p156). She has little say in how she wants to have sex, whom she wants to have sex to, and she has to do it even if she finds the customer repulsive. Even if the prostitute may not generally represent sexual submission to men, the contract to have sex with someone for whom she has no sexual desire conflates women's sexual freedom with being a willing object of male desire” (Gauthier, 2011). Identifying the subjection of oneself to conditions where one’s own desires could be rightfully ignored with free sexual expression is harmful (which will be explained later).
One may argue that the masseuse’s contract is similar in the sense that both involve the surrendering of some freedom, as explained earlier, the extent and nature of exploitation differ immensely in terms of mere service and service that involves the violation of bodily integrity and sexual autonomy.
Female sexual desires in images of female sexuality⸺How morally important is it?
As argued earlier, prostitution is not a free self-expression of sexuality as the prostitutes become mere object of male desires. To portrait prostitution as a display of sexual freedom advances the notorious “false representation of female sexual agency”, where the sexualization of women is disconnected with actual female sexual pleasure (Gauthier, 2011).
Such false representation resembles the historical and modern regional cultural erasure of female sexual pleasure in the images of female sexuality. Such disconnection is damaging. Researches show that young women’s disregard for their own sexual satisfaction in heterosexual relationships is correlated with their reluctance to frame sexual violence as rape or sexual assault (Tolman 2002, p6). Because they take their sexual role as to satisfy male partner rather than themselves, sexual transgressions are more likely to be deemed as “bad sex or sex gone awry “rather than sexual violence. Thus, false representation of female agency reinforces discriminatory sexist beliefs about female sexuality which is harmful to females.
Even when outsiders stop defending prostitution as a display of freedom, the prostitute’s decision to sell sexual services voluntarily, when they have alternatives to make money, could reinforces the discriminatory beliefs, which in my opinion is part of the reasons why prostitution is stigmatized.
Summary
In light of the importance of putting female sexual satisfaction in the image of female sexuality, the narrower definition of sexual autonomy is more appropriate. Prostitution is morally worse than selling massages as it (1) damage bodily integrity by treating her body as a commodity (2) damages sexual autonomy by relinquishing her body sovereignty, and (3) reinforces discriminatory beliefs of female sexuality