A Feminist Discourse Analysis of Sex 'Work' - of /courses - Victoria ...

328 Feminism & Psychology 11(3)
economic terms, a demand for sex services. What has been labelled the ‘male sex
drive’ discourse (for example, Gilfoyle et al., 1992; Hollway, 1984, 1989) was
one of the reasons offered for the ‘demand’ for sex workers. Extracts 1 and 2 are
examples where biological and evolutionary arguments of gender difference were
used to explain men’s sexual ‘overdrive’.
Extract 1
Brooke: (Anna: have you thought about why there is a demand for sex work) yes I
have and this is what I think ok (Anna: yip yip) men and women are very
different and ah I think at the beginning of time even back in the cave man
days they’re programmed to you know spread their sex . . . testosterone um
(.) they like variety (.) they’re visually stimulated um they’re more um able
to separate themselves emotionally I think than women . . . it’s very convenient
for the gentleman who has a lovely wife and lovely kids (Anna: mm)
but yet has the urge to do what he’s programmed to do for thousands of years
and that is spread it round (..) you know um have the variety . . . (Anna: so
you’re talking like it’s a biological thing) yeah yeah
Extract 2
Crystal: no I don’t know what it is that makes them want to but like when they’re
asleep their dicks are up and down all the time you know I think it is something
that is built in like a nature thing (Anna: right) to make sure there’s
always people on this planet men have got an overdrive that’s always to have
sex (.) to plant seeds
Extract 3 is an example of a socio-cultural explanation for sex work.
Extract 3
Rose: I don’t know it just seems to be part of the male culture as well (Anna: yeah)
people get taken they go in groups after meeting sometimes and their uncle
gives them money for the first time and stuff like that (.) it really seems to be
an acceptable part of the culture.
Sophie, in Extract 4, also suggested socio-cultural forces creating the demand
for sex work. The use of the psychoanalytic term ‘libido’, her reference to a
specific age group and use of reported speech all contribute to the persuasiveness
of Sophie’s explanation.
Extract 4
Sophie: I think it is um I personally think it’s a man’s personal libido but I also agree
that the younger men from 18 up to 25 26 the peer pressure oh I scored such
and such last night you know I mean I’ve heard it at pubs before ‘oh I was
rooting her the other day’
Men’s ‘need’ for sex, when not mentioned explicitly, was implicitly assumed
in explanations for the sex industry. Sex work was constructed as providing a