While reading this, I kept waiting for the author to say, “One thing I have to tell you, though: D is actually a woman, and the customers are older men. Does this change your opinions of D and ‘his’ choices?”

Confessions of a student prostitute

Publication date: 27 Mar 2012

A student needed to find a way to fund his medical degree. Did he make the right choice?

“D” moved to the United Kingdom for his medical studies and had to pay tuition fees at an international rate. Not long into his course, he faced the prospect of dropping out of medical school because he could not afford the fees; subsequently, he began working as an escort, organising his dates and booking his clients via the internet.

He went on his first “date” 15 months ago, with a middle aged businesswoman seeking a pleasant, “no strings attached” evening with a young attractive man—a desire, she explained later, resulting from her busy work life, which left her with little time to develop personal or sexual relationships with men. When completing the online booking for this date, D was also given the choice of selecting an “evening of unlimited fun.” This option came with extra pay, but D did not take up the option that time. He has since been on more than 50 dates and currently goes on an average of three dates a month. He still sees his first customer and has had many “evenings of unlimited fun.”

D has been able to expand his client base and currently sees about 13 wealthy women. After he saw some women more regularly, a few started to have strong feelings for him and believed that they were in some sort of relationship. He has since promised at least four of these women that he has given up his sex work, although they are unaware that he continues to have other clients. Although some clients have openly stated that they would rather start afresh with him, D thinks this is unlikely because he only dates them for the money; he strings the women along and tells them what he thinks they want to hear.

D currently lives in a rent free flat, has his own car, and is comfortable financially—as a direct result of the funds provided by these women. By now, his initial reason for entering the escort trade—to fund his medical degree—must have been met.

According to UK laws, although the exchange of sexual services for money (prostitution) is legal, soliciting and controlling prostitution for gain (pimping) are illegal.[1] D believes that what he does is legal; he does not exchange sexual services in public (although one can argue that the internet is a public domain), does not work in a brothel or for a pimp, and has not been forced or threatened into prostitution since it is his personal choice.[2] Therefore, he is not breaking any UK laws and is safe from legal persecution. However, D could be disciplined by the General Medical Council, or his medical school, if it can be shown that his job as a prostitute will have a detrimental effect on patient care—which D does not think it will.
Moral and social ramifications

Two important aspects of D’s story are the moral and social ramifications of such a story becoming known to his family, friends, and future patients. One could argue that initially D did not contravene his moral or ethical responsibilities because he worked as a prostitute not necessarily for personal gain but because he had to fund his medical degree. However, as a medical professional with the responsibility of dealing with patients and their clinical, emotional, and psychological concerns, patients tend to expect a clean “moral slate” from a person in a position of such trust.[3]

I discussed D’s situation with fellow medical students, whose opinions and feedback were varied. Younger students responded with admiration, respect, and even envy (especially the male students), with most stating that they would also love the opportunity to be an escort, albeit not always for the money. The impression from these responses was that most of the younger students thought that escort work was fun and an easy way to make money while at the same time “hanging with desperate older ladies in high society restaurants.”

Feedback from older students, primarily postgraduate students, tended to be more of condemnation and disgust. The general opinion was that a potential medical doctor’s morality should not be compromised. Many of these students pointed out that, as medicine was their second degree, they had also experienced financial difficulties (although not to the same extent) and yet did not “sell their soul” by resorting to prostitution. Older students seemed unwilling to believe that certain situations would drive a student into the escort or prostitution business.

The feedback seemed odd, because the age gap between the older and younger students surveyed was not large enough to explain why opinions were so different. The differences in opinion could have been attributable to the naivety of the younger students or the “worldliness” of the graduate students, rather than to the differences in cultural or generational beliefs between the two student groups.

Despite these differing responses, I was repeatedly asked about D’s passion for medical school. The general consensus among the students was that if D’s passion for becoming a doctor was great enough to justify the personal conflicts associated with commercial sexual work, he was not doing anything wrong, provided that he fulfilled all the legal criteria for being a sex worker.

If D’s secret sex work became public knowledge, it could well affect his medical career. D’s particular case raises uncertainty about whether it is acceptable for any medical student experiencing similar financial difficulties to enter the commercial sex industry. Where should we draw the line? And can he still successfully justify prostitution as a means to an end? The distinction between being an escort and working as a prostitute is a fine one—15 months ago, D was just a young medical student who took up escort work as a way to finance his university tuition fees. But today D is prostituting himself.

Many students, including myself, believe that if studies are not grossly affected by how they are funded (loans and bursaries are rarely enough), and what we do to make money is within legal and moral boundaries, then it doesn’t matter how we make a living. Morally, D’s situation is open to debate. What is certain is that opinion will always be divided over whether prostitution can ever be regarded as an acceptable way to make a living.

Competing interests: None declared.

From the Student BMJ.
References

Sexual Offences Act 2003. HMSO, 2003.
Policing and Crime Act 2009. HMSO, 2009.
American Academy of Paediatrics. Committee on Bioethics. Appropriate boundaries in the paediatrician-family-patient relationship. Pediatrics 1999;104:334-6.

More seriously, and to show where the teeny tiny germ of truth in that is, I’d like to point out that Krystal Cole the Neurosoup girl has taken DMT anally. But that’s because if you take it orally the mono-amine oxidase (MAO) in the stomach breaks it down and it won’t do anything for you. She didn’t want to inject or take it with an MAO inhibitor (they interact with almost every medication and many foods), and smoking it was painful. So up the back door it went.

But teens wanting to get drunk off vodka will simply drink it.

http://tinyurl.com/bp9cty9