The only answer to this I can muster is that the prosties insist their johns use condoms. Is this so? I heard that, when Wade Boggs was with the Red Sox, the team was playing the Indians in Clevceland, and someone told Boggs that 20% of th3e Cleveland hookers had the AIDS virus! Boggs–he and Margo were an item at the time–snickered, about his teammates, “Oooooo! They could be in trouble!”
That prostitution should still exist, with a lethal disease as a high risk, seems strange!
Not that hard to understand:
Everyone thinks it won’t happen to them.
Prostitution survived syphillis (even before antibiotics or condoms). AIDS isn’t going to shut it down.
I have a friend who frequents prostitutes and amuses us all with his stories (don’t ask where I get friends like this… they just show up). His main complaint nowadays is that they ALL require you to wear condoms, for every type of sexual encounter. It’s not just the prostitutes in areas where it’s legal and regulated (the Netherlands, certain parts of Nevada) but even the ones in Mexican towns. They won’t do anything without a condom.
Sounds reasonable, Athena. I’d like to know if Mexican hookers are as sexually agressive toward male American tourists as popular lore would have us believe.
Sigh… the ignorance that still abounds about prostitution amazes and depresses me.
As a general rule, you are safer with a prostitute than you are with some babe you pick up in a bar. Except for the very lowest of the low, junkies selling it for a fix, hookers are not fools, and they are extremely careful about protecting themselves from disease. The same can hardly be said of many average folk.
My stepmother was a prostitute. She now runs a non-profit organization devoted to the art of prostitutes. I learned alot from her.
Stoid
I have a friend who frequents prostitutes and amuses us all with his stories (don’t ask where I get friends like this… they just show up). His main complaint nowadays is that they ALL require you to wear condoms, for every type of sexual encounter. It’s not just the prostitutes in areas where it’s legal and regulated (the Netherlands, certain parts of Nevada) but even the ones in Mexican towns. They won’t do anything without a condom.
Wow… Never seen a 24 minute lag on a double post… Is Rod Serling in the house? Athena, do you notice the missing time - hey C#3, I think we have an abduction here!
Yer pal,
Satan
First off, I don’t know how the above double post happened. 'taint me who did it.
Dougie, seeing as I am the repository of all useless knowledge (for me, at least) I know how to find whores in Mexico. You ask taxi drivers. They know where the whorehouse is, and are happy to bring you there, wait for you to go about your business, then bring you back to your hotel. No, you can’t usually bring the whores back to your hotel - not because the whores aren’t willing, but because most hotels who cater to American tourists do not allow the whores in the rooms.
Stoidela, if you pick up a babe in a bar, chances are she’s a prostitute.
I can’t imagine what I might’ve done to cause it, but I was reading this thread when Athena’s second post appeared. I read through Stoid’s (at that point, the last) post and hit the back button to go to the forum listing and the second Athena post showed up.
No, I’m not a front man for the aliens.
Because a girl who knows the ropes ain’t likely to get tied up.
There are worlds and shadings in the term “prostitute”. One term doesn’t cover all the nuances of ladies (and yes, they are) who are sexual entrepreneurs.
Hey, get a clue. It’s market driven, and I don’t see any clear signs of the market disappearing, right? They don’t call it the “oldest profession” for nuthin’.
Anyway, I’d wager that practicioners in the higher and middle range of the proffesion are very careful indeed. BTW, I use the the term “professional” w/ no irony or overtones.
But this particular market is also a magnet for those desperate, addicted or hopeless enough that the clinical necessities of safe sex are–in the truest sense–an obsecene joke.
To be blunt, we persist in trying to both ignore and criminalize prostitution. The street corner hooker, often addicted and backed against a very unforgiving wall, counts AIDS as just one more crappy hand in a stacked deck.
Sorry, Didn’t mean to rant, but they’re people and no one, NO ONE, should ever be forced into that tight a corner.
There but for the grace,
Veb
In an, I think, related view, think of the continued existence of the cruising-for-anonymous-sex aspect of the homosexual world.
I’m a straight man who has had an ongoing relationship, w/much ado, w/a woman who is very involved in the world of show dogs (she bagged a, whatever, you who are into it can straighten me out, “second” at Madison Square Gardens in the miniature Poodles once). The only reason I offer this is to establish that I know more gay men than the average straight guy.
And I know that the cruising and unprotected sex still goes on. Several of the guys have spoken to me on the subject, and I’ve been to the city tank to bail out a friend who got caught “shopping dick” at the Galleria. I think there’s some combination of what RealityChuck said (It can’t happen here - sorry for the rephrasing RC) and that fatalism most of us survived - you remember, “I’m going to live forever or until I’m 21, whichever comes first.”
And the beat goes on…
Apparently the desire for sexual gratification outweighs certain considerations of continued existence for a significant part of the population. I don’t take any illegal drugs, but, hey I was a teenager in the 60’s. I navigated my way through by learning that, say, barbs and alcohol is not a good mix. Lots of others didn’t and some of them are still, accidentally, alive.
The restroom fellow I refer to above is HIV+, and he’s no dummy. He’s VP of a title insurance company and can track a nickel for 20 years. He fucking knew the risks! Went there anyway. What can I say.
I don’t know how to wind this up. I’ve had several friends die. I’m middle-age now and the circle of 25 or so gay friends I had is down to 3 that are uninfected (two are a monogamous couple and the other one older and mature) and a half dozen of the disco bunny generation that are still around.
Have you ever had a friend commit suicide? I have, a couple of times. Besides your grief, you have to deal with your anger at your friend. Why the fuck didn’t you call me? I could’a got things sorted out for you a bit. Well, it’s a muted, because of the drawn out process of the disease, variety of such that you experience when your friends die from AIDS. A good old fashioned heroin OD was pretty much over that night.
Ah, well, I hope I’m still on topic - I’m not even going to proofread; I need to let all that fall behind me and be cheery beatle tomorrow.
Here’s a shocking story of sex for security scam. Bachelors beware!
Since other sexually transmitted diseases in the pre-AIDS era did not put an end to prostitution (even when there was still no treatment for those often fatal diseases), why would you expect AIDS to put an end to it?
Part of my second question was: Are Mexican hookers as sexually aggressive as popular lore would have us believe? I have had this matter rattling around in my mind for years, since a wise-guy cousin–who, I admit, is often as sincere as Eddie Haskell or Reggie Mantle–told me that as soon as Mexican hookers see a male American tourist, they will approach him and often put their hands down his pants! Granted my cousin often puts me on, but I’d like to know The Straight Dope about this before I ever travel there!!
“Why are there still prostitutes now that we have AIDS?”
What do you mean “we”, paleface?
Modest? You bet I’m modest! I am the queen of modesty!
AIDS contrary to expectations, hasn’t by in large found its way into the heterosexual community. This coupled with the fact that a large number of bi men (in fact every bi man I know) are exculsively involved in man to man sex (despite their claims) limit the exposure.
A friend of mine is a health care worker. He works with a large section of the gay community, and over 95% of his AIDS infected patients that engaged in barebacking are bottoms.
This leads to the fact that is less dangerous to give it than receive it. Hetro men don’t have it so they can’t give it.
This leads to the following statement: Unprotected sex is in any case very dangerous and is plainly a risk regardless of postition. While being a bareback top is less risky is is still an extremely high risk activity.
Markxxx,
Sure, gay people are a high risk group regarding HIV. But I wouldn’t go so far as to say that AIDS did not reach the ‘straight’ part of the world at large. Besides sex, there’s of course drug addicts, blood transfusions, etc. Remember, this disease is here to decimate the entire population, not just gay people. Although this will not happen because of medical science and media attention, AIDS is in fact to modern times what cancer was in the old days, and what the Plague was in the dark ages. There’s too many bunnies in the dunes, which means some illness will arise that will set the numbers straight. With the worlds population breaking 6 billion this week, and rising might I add, it’s just a matter of time after the moment we come up with a cure for AIDS before a new and even more vicious disease evolves.
I’m sure your reasoning is sound and fact-based, it just sounded a little casual for a matter not to be taken lightly. That’s all.
And oh yeah, I’m sorry if this Doom-scenario ruined your morning coffee - have a nice day anyway 
Regarding the OP: why prositutes still are around now that there’s AIDS ?
The answer is simple. There will always be Amsterdam. This city will never die - if 5% of all people visiting Amsterdam (something you must do at least ONCE in your life) frequent a prostitute, the business is not going to die. And 5% is pretty accurate.
Amsterdam’s just an example: this reasoning goed for any town you like, and it goes for locals too instead of just tourists. It just seems that tourists are more easily inclined to go to hooker than locals - at least over here.
OK, that’ll do for now, right ?
Coldfire
“You know how complex women are”
- Neil Peart, Rush (1993)
Some people (men) value getting off more than anything they can think of, including life. Prostitutes will tell you that they’ve often been offered more $$$ to let men do them without the condom, and this after they’d shared needles with someone they knew was AIDS-infected. I saw this on a program about a San Francisco “Johns’ Education” program they’re using to try to turn the finger pointing to the Johns, not the prostitutes. They pick up guys soliciting undercover cops and have them listen to ex-prostitutes tell their horror stories about life on the streets. After, they interviewed some of the men and they weren’t even phased. “Yeah, sure…I’d do it again.” It’s just a worst case scenario of letting your you-know-what do your thinking.