ASK A HO

It’s been well over a year since I last updated this blog - and what a year and a half it’s been! My gender transition crossed over to my work life, the economy crashed, and financial aid is my main form of income now, not sex work.  I probably come across less enthusiastic, but I like to think of it as being a more grounded pragmatism that has started to come through - seeing friends get arrested, burn out, and bad dates rubs the shiny surface off the glamor of prostitution.  I’ve been a go to person for a lot of people who have been thinking of getting into sex work.  Sometimes I feel weird about that - it’s hard to explain how this work has been the best thing that’s ever happened to me and also simultaneously altered my sexuality and sense of myself in ways that I sometimes wish I could get back without that filter of experience. 

I would like to offer that this blog is neither meant to encourage or dissuade people from doing sex work, simply to offer some guidance in how to do it in ways that might be safer than simply diving in without any information.  The criminalization of the industry creates a silence which is incredibly unsafe - what other job is it illegal to share information on? And why are we surprised when people have bad experiences that often could have been either avoided or at least shifted had they been more prepared?

 With all that said - here are my answers to some questions I’ve received recently:

 Do people still use craigslist?
Yes…no…kind of.  I mean people do use craigslist, I use craigslist
- but only when I’ve feeling desperate or like trying out a new niche
without messing with my regular persona.  It’s not the best - for the
adult services portion you need to pay 10 dollars for your ad and then
5 dollars to renew it, advertising for "generous" or "married men
contact me to work out the details" on casual encounters will get you
flagged and because it’s now all through an account, your account can
get canceled and that’s just a pain in the ass.

However, at times craigslist can be good for connecting with the type
of trick who cruises escort ads wantonly during insomnia and might go
for something ‘interesting’, it seems (and there should be some market
research on this) that craigslist johns are interested in a wider
range of provider than a lot of specific escort websites.  However,
for free, and with clients who might have a stronger grasp on the
concept of engaging with escorts (and paying them) women can use The
Erotic Review (http://www.theeroticreview.com/main.asp), Redbook
(myredbook.com), and Backpage (http://www.backpage.com).

How do you put up an ad without getting busted?

Luck.  Oh and racism, sexism and classism.  I have white skin, use
fancy language, am actually putting up an ad (and therefore working
indoors), and am probably too confusing as a female to male
transsexual for the cops to be bothered targeting.  But, you know,
despite all these things the "straight male who would love to spend
some time" with me next week could be a cop.  There are no guarantees.
 And language like ‘donation/roses’ or acronyms doesn’t actually
protect you - except if clients use it instead of explicitly talking
about cash that could be a good sign, or it could be the cops fucking
with you.  Who knows?  There is no special spell that will keep you
from getting busted, it’s a risk you have to chose to take…or not.

What should your ad say? "sensual massage"? something like that? or more
direct?

Well, if you want to do FBSM (full body sensual massage) then, yes it
should say that.  FBSM providers get targeted by vice less than FS
(full service) providers, but also get paid less - although you could
always go with the tactic of offering one service and then ‘doing
extras’, which can sometimes net you more money if you advertise like
you’ll only do it for that special someone.  Of course, it’s not so
nice to other providers of FBSM to do more hands on activities because
it adds to a culture of expectation that they might as well, but you
know…you wouldn’t be the first.

 Do you put your real phone number in the ad?
Don’t put a number in an escorting ad that you don’t want showing up
in a google search.  If you put a phone number in your ad you’ll get
more business than if you just organize via email, but you’ll also
have to talk to people you could otherwise filter out with a simple
click of the ‘discard’ button.  Your choice will depend on where you
stand on the money vs irritation equation.

Should I just come to ___ so you can take me under your wing and teach me
how to be a hooker?

Please no…as much as I love company, ___ is bursting at
the seams with hookers.  I have to be honest, it’s not a great time to
get into the industry.  Every one has had the exact same idea and the
market is bloated with a lot of people who are economically desperate,
which means prices go down and expectations go up.  Not to mention
that giving people advice on how to work is a pandering charge.  If
you have a vision then go with it — even low paying sex work is
better than many legal jobs, but just keep in mind that there is no
way that I (or anyone else) can give you a key to make it always safe
or easy, most of the time it probably will be, but sometimes it could
not.  Take care to protect yourself and know your limits.  Figure out what you are looking to get from working and stick to that plan.  Good luck!

Dear Ask A Ho

How does one become a stripper?  Is it just as easy as knowing how to dance/be sexy?

-Intrigued

Well my inquisitive friend,
What kind of stripper are you looking to be?  A classy stripper at a VIP room gentlemans club?  A private dancer? A bachelor party worker?  A peep show girl?  Because all these things require different things to become employed.  
Most of the places I’ve worked stripping, the major requirement was that you be in possession of 1 (ONE) vagina, and be under 60.  When I first started, I was chubby, awkward, and a terrible dancer.  But after a couple months of dancing 5 days a week I was A. in pretty good shape and B. a damn good dancer.  You watch other dancers, you experiment, you learn from the reactions of the audience.  Most people get good, or they learn to survive through other skills.  
If you are slender, blond/redhead, not tattooed, with sizable breasts - I guarantee you can get hired pretty much anywhere, even two of those four will take you many places.  But getting hired is only the beginning, in the great scheme of things looks aren’t the most important element.  To be a successful stripper you need to have, or to develop a number of qualities.

The first one is a lack of shame/guilt.  You can have the best badass moves and be a barbie doll but if you are ashamed about flashing your gash for cash it’s going to be bad for you.  You wont get a lot of clients, because if they wanted to be around people with body hang ups, they’d probably just stick to their wives/partners.  And the customers you do get will be ASSWIPES.  Save a ho dude brahs, who will give you their number but never any money.  People who will push push push, make you feel guilty for asking for money for sexual favors so you just end up giving them the sexual favors for free.  Those who get off on seeing someone in distress, without respectfully hiring a pro-submissive.  You have to leave it behind, and I understand that everyone feels a bit crappy about their body or ponders on the feminist quandry of consumable bodies.  But if you go into this you have to have a work persona that has none of these concerns.   Believes that their job is in no way demeaning, and will not accept any behaviour which would turn it into being so.

The second one is the hustle.  You have to be engage-able with.  Now, of course there are exceptions to the rule, the untouchable stripper who men grovel at the feet of to put a 20 in her g-string.  But that’s not really my tactic, I try to be ultra friendly.  And this wont get you any cool points from your friends who are just dying to hear how you rip off johns and leave them to die.  But I’ve found that method of working to be not terribly sustainable.  If I hate my clients, then I hate myself for making them have an enjoyable experience, and if they don’t have an enjoyable experience they generally don’t come back.  So, be sweet.  Listen to them talk about their day and what a huge cock they have and about blah blah blah…you’ll be inside your head composing shopping lists and you’ll come out with more cash and have to do much less work.  

The third is to be a good dancer.  Yes, it is important.  Knowing how to move your body to to create the illusion of intimacy, to portray your body in the most flattering way possible, to visually fuck them without touching them.  To be a good dancer you need to make eye contact.  You need to tease, crawl up to them then roll away.  During private dances, make body contact that makes them think they’re special.  Breathe in their ear.  Linger face to face for a couple seconds as if you are about to kiss.  Stare at their crotch and smirk.  And also keep your balance while you stand bent over in 5 inch heels, pulling your ass cheeks apart so they can get a good long look, because that will be the most frequent request you’ll receive.  Yep, honey it’s a classy world, but somebody’s got to do it

Good luck

Ho

dear ho

a friend and i are looking to start a naked housecleaning service. pure voyeurism, no touching outcalls. we’ll be using a buddy security system, having another person come along who will take a cut of the fee. we’re trying to decide on an amount to charge. one person suggested $140/hr, i thought the service could be worth more like $200/hr with $30 out of that to the buddy for each. what do you think is a reasonable amount to charge? we’re having to spend a lot of time filtering email requests, so we’re trying to make it worth that time also.

ho props,
service sub at a price

Dearest SSAP’s
Sorry it’s taken me so long to respond, contrary to the luxurious lives portrayed by borders bargain pile fancy courtesan tell all’s, sometimes a ho has a hectic life. 
I’m going to say something here which may be controversial…I don’t really know how effective or useful bringing along a security person to a one-on-one booking is. I’ve only done it once, when I had a booking where I was going to be tied up and the person I was doing it with was unable to supply me with references.  Are you very small?  Are you going to be incapacitated in your ability to protect yourself in some way?  If not chances are you could hold your own against any bullshit a client pulled out on you, unless of course he was a genuine fucking menace in which case I’m unconvinced that having a friend outside would help that much anyway. 
A.    I’ve never had a client force me to do anything I didn’t consent to.  Sometimes I’ve done things I didn’t like because I felt pressured, but a security person wouldn’t have been able to help in that situation anyway.
B.    There are other ways of creating safer work environments without paying someone to sit outside, looking very obvious, on your clients doorstep or in a car outside their house making them very nervous.  And don’t think that bringing the buddy inside is going to work.  A non-naked extra person is going to make your client feel like he’s about to get robbed.

So ways of looking after your safety when working:
Do a reference check
Ask clients emailing you to provide you with the name, phone number, and internet advertisement of at least one another pro that they’ve had dealings with.  Email this person with the name, email, phone number and any other information your client has given you about themselves, and tell them that you are going to call them to check that they have indeed seen this person and if they were a gentleman, and any other information they would like to bestow on you.  Confidentially of course. Then call them, even if they email you back before then.  Make sure you speak to them on the phone and that they are a real person!
If your clients can’t provide that info, and you are still getting a good vibe off them, ask for their full name, work phone number, and the name of the company he works for.  Call the company, ask to be put through to Ben Bigcock, and see if he picks up/has an answering machine with the same info he provided to you earlier. 
Have a call in buddy
When you get to the booking have them pay you up front.  Golden rule of hooking: ALWAYS ALWAYS GET PAID UP FRONT.  Then in front of them, call a friend – say something like: “Hey, me and Benny Boy Bigcock are at 587 Hardon Ave having a good time.  I’ll call you in an hour!”  Organize with your friend beforehand what to do in certain situations.  If you don’t call back, what you want to happen.  How much time they should allow you for give or take time.  Code words to indicate that all really is well, or that secretly something is wrong.  And be responsible, always call in…and hook this up with someone who WILL check up on you, and has access to the clients information.  This also gives you a clean excuse to wrap up the booking “gee I’d love to keep chatting/dusting/slurping on your cock, but I need to check in with my friend, otherwise they’ll worry!”
So, that is my perspective on security.  When you first sent me this email I thought you were going doing bookings as a team, getting ass out together, buffing those doorposts in sweet naked companionship.  I think that if you are concerned about security, that could be a way to go about it, provide perhaps a sexy element to the cleaning if you were to say you were good, good friends.  And you would also have someone there to get your back. 
In terms of how much you should charge.  You should charge what you feel is worth it for your time and the energy you are putting in.  If 200 is it, then you should definitely not go under that.  And to me it seems like a bargain- a perv and a clean house, what a deal! 
Good luck !
Yours,
Ho
 

Dear Ask a Ho

what do you charge when working as a hooker?

for things like blow jobs etc. what is the different pricing?

- Intrigued

Well intrigued,

This is the question I get asked the most often and it’s also unfortunately one I really can’t answer very well.  

Well I can, in a way, because your specific question asks what "I" charge when working as a hooker, and what I charge roughly goes like this:

350 bucks an hour for FS* pro-submission 

300 hr GFE* escorting 

250 hr domination/fetish services with no sex 

150 for a blow job

100 for a handjob

Now these donations* are subject to change with such extenuating factors as: what city I’m working in, where I’m working (brothel, independently, strip club, etc),  what gender I’m presenting myself to be***, what my body looks like at the moment, what the client wants, how much I like the client or how financially giving they seem, if they’re a regular, how much I need money, how much sleep I’ve had/how much I’m in the mood for all this monkey business, what risk there is to my mental/physical health…etc.  So as you can see, these things can change at the drop of a tiny tiny gold hooker hat pin.

Now the question that is behind that question usually is, how much can YOU charge?  And I have no idea.  I’m not like a bra fitter who can narrow my eyes at you, look you up and down, and be like "men will pay….435 dollars and 95 cents an hour to stick a dick in you".  But probably you can get heaps, I mean I charge a lot and I FAIL at a lot of things you would think should be adult entertainer 101 requirements.  I can’t shave my legs worth a damn, they are always stubbly, no matter how much time I spend scraping them raw in the shower.  I’m chubby but not BBW, I’m covered in weird tattoos, don’t style my hair, and am not particularly sexually skilled** and I still charge what I consider to be ridiculous amounts of money.  Chances are you can charge that much, or more!  Especially if you want to go to the effort of starting up a website, putting some effort into grooming, buy a lot of sex toys, getting some good photos for advertising, cultivating a mane of flowing locks or hardened pecs or some desirable combination of the two.  

Or maybe you’ll charge less because you want lots of work and have a good incall space where you can chill out eating burritos and watching Americas Next Top Model.  Johns come by and you can see a bunch in a day, that become regulars because it’s affordable, and not have to haggle over elaborate scenes or prices.  That works for lots of people as well.  I personally am a little bit work repelled, and set my prices on the higher side so that I don’t have to work often, just hard.  

In any case

hooking = better money than any other job that doesn’t require 8+ years of formal schooling, often more than ones that do.  

Fiscally yours,

Ho

* FS - Full service - Penis in Vagina/Anus

   GFE - Girl Friend Experience - Whoring with a smile! Generally includes making out, FS, some kind of affectionate behavior

Donation - the secret spell word ho’s use to try and convince ourselves we have control over getting busted.  Replace donation with payment.  Payment for legitimate services rendered, or about to be rendered on your ass.   

**Which is not to say I’m not a fantastic cock sucker and creative and a good communicator in bed, just that I think most people probably have sexual skills roughly equal to mine in different ways.  But I’m not audrey horne , I can’t knot a cherry stem with my tongue. 

***The gender payment hierarchy of the sex world is generally: men make the least, ciswomen middle, transwomen the most. 

Dear Ask a Ho,

How do you do a ‘dick check’? What are you looking for?

How do you make it sexy and not clinical?

Sincerely

Stymied in San Francisco

Sweet SISS

A ‘dick check’ is a procedure routinely performed by sex workers in my native country of Australia, where prostitution is legalized, and we can be a lot more upfront in our dealings with johns.  I’ve heard that it’s done in brothels in Nevada as well, but it doesn’t seem to be as common in the states.

In a dick check the sex worker has a client sit down in a well lit area and with a latex glove covered hand examines the genitals (we will assume here that the genitals in question are penis and balls) for sores that look like this:

http://www.famvir.com/info/tools/toolsprivate/resources/photos.jsp

or bumps that look like this:

http://herpes-coldsores.com/std/genital_warts_pictures.htm#Penile%20Genital%20Herpes%20(HPV)%20Pictures

or this:

http://www.herpes-coldsores.com/std/syphilis_pictures.htm

Then you squeeze firmly at the head of the penis with your fingers to see if anything comes out. 

OK –

Clear precum fluid

Not OK –

Greenish white discharge – which is an indication of gonorrhea

Questionable –

Dick cheese, or excessive smegma.  It can be a sign of thrush or infection but usually is just a sign of loose hygiene practices. 

Speaking of which.  Do the dick check before your client takes a shower!  The effectiveness of this procedure will be compromised if they get to bathe away all their sins first!  Showers in general are good health practice though, for you and them. 

Ok.  So how do you make it sexy?  Uh..well, generally I don’t.  I’m not an asshole about it, I work at not being intimidating or suspicious seeming (although I really, really am), but I kind of take this time as a bright and firm “getting to know your penis better” moment before sexy times commence, and can be vaguely nurse Ratched core about it all. 

However you COULD say the following lines while examining their member (whoever says it with the most heartfelt sincerity gets a prize!)

“What a beautiful, precious cock you have. You must be very proud!”

“I just love getting a long, hard look at the cock that’s going to be filling my throat later!”

“Damn, this cock looks just like one that gave me the best orgasm of my life! I was hanging upside down in bat cave when…”

If you don’t feel like you have the opportunity to do a formal check, you can still try and sneak one in before inserting anything in respective orifices.  Start with a hand job, or do a deep, intimate cleansing of their genitals in the shower.  Just try and get a good clear look and squeeze before you stick it in!

I hope this answers your question

Much love and good luck

Ho

Recently I’ve had a few friends ask me about starting sex work, how to get into it, what are ways of maintaining self care/advertising yourself/what expectations there are for what activities/prices/etc. I’ve played the role of answering these questions a lot during the last few years and so I thought that perhaps it’s time I actually write something that can be used as a reference for people on a grander scale.

So it’s time to ask a ho!
Ask me a question, any question. If it’s offensive…well I probably wont answer it, but I also wont really get offended, trust me I’ve heard it before. I will answer everything else to the best of my ability.

Of course my experience of the sex work is individual, I’ve worked mostly independently or in strip clubs/peep shows. I’ve done fetish, submissive, full service, GFE, stripping, pornography and masturbation shows. I’ve mostly worked illegally, but not in a high risk manner. If you have a question that I feel like I absolutely cannot answer, well I’ll try and pass it on to someone who can. But also just keep in mind you are asking a white, privileged person who works as a bio-girl who has had a pretty good run. I will answer questions honestly, not under the guise of sex worker activist or someone who needs to have a bitch about tight ass johns, but as helpfully as I can.

And no, I can’t tell you whether or not sex work is something you should do. There is absolutely no way I can know what your experience will be.

No identifying details will be added to published responses. I will never talk with anyone about any questions or communications you may have with me about this. I understand security culture, you should to.

Send your questions to: selina.vixen@hotmail.com
Responses will be published at askaho.blogsome.com
feel free to forward this message on!