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Tue 17 Nov, 2009 12:34 am
The jig is up. Belle de Jour, the former prostitute behind the popular column "Diary of a London Call Girl" and TV series "Secret Diary of a Call Girl" is really British research scientist Dr. Brooke Magnanti, 34. Dr. Magnanti gave the oldest reason for turning to the oldest profession -- to pay for her PhD.
She came forward now allegedly out of fear that an ex-boyfriend might out her. Not even her literary agent knew who she really was.
"It was time. I've felt so much guardedness and paranoia about remaining anonymous recently," Dr. Magnanti told The Sunday Times. "... I don't want this massive secret over me anymore."
But let's step back a moment -- Dr. Magnanti's story isn't anything we haven't heard before. Melissa Beech (not her real name), a college senior from a swanky suburb outside Philadelphia, has written about how a sugar daddy is paying for her schooling in The Daily Beast. Until last fall, a student alleging to be a call girl detailed her experiences at the blog Confessions of a College Callgirl. In the summer, a Knoxville, Tenn., media outlet interviewed a 19-year-old using escorting to pay for massage therapy school. (Stifle that laugh.)
The number of students having sex for tuition money has exploded in Europe, and experts believe it will continue to rise due to the rising costs of education. British researchers found this unusual trend in sex work has grown by 50 percent over the past seven years. In early 2008, France's education minister vowed to increase financial support after a freshman's diary and a book of interviews with undergrads exposed their experiences with prostitution.
It makes sense. There are few jobs you can work while going to school full-time that can truly help you pay for an education. (Read the claim by "Freakonomics" authors Steven Levitt and Stephen Dubner that prostitution can get you the most buck for your bang.)
So since we've heard stories like Dr. Magnanti's before, maybe there's still an outcry because society still can't accept a woman using both her sexuality and her smarts. Why can't a smart cookie give up the cookie as a means to an end? Or maybe it's the fact that Dr. Magnanti went really far in her education that irks us. Commenters are hissing that she's somehow less, her degree somehow not as credible, because she paid for it with carnal currency.
The most shocking part of Dr. Magnanti's story may be that she didn't get exposed before now. With her revelation, maybe stereotypes of exactly what kind of woman engages in the sex industry will start to fall away.
And maybe the next time a highly educated woman admits she did the deed to get a degree, we won't judge her so harshly.
@Sglass,
No.
I made enough with the usual student drudgeries...waitressing, cleaning, tutoring etc.
I DID have a few offers from older guys wanting to be a sugar daddy in those years, though, I must say!!
I turned 'em down flat.
@dlowan,
Youse is a good girl wabbit. I respect you for that.
@Sglass,
To me in the US the main problem is that the government in supporting student loans programs had allow the cost of education to increase at double the overall rate of inflation year after year.
It amuse me greatly that the cost of an on campus parking premise at my former university is now at the same level as the total tuition cost in 1972 for an engineering degree.
I feel sorry for the young men and women who are now coming out college with a debt load similar to having purchase a home and perhaps never being able to reach the break even point where their added lifetime earning power from the degrees cover the cost of the education.
Add to that unlike most others debts you can no get rid of it by the bankrupt process or in almost any other manner.
@Sglass,
I sold access to my ears/eyes/brain etc to help subsidize my education. I signed up for nearly every paying gig the psych and optometry departments had going. Test my hearing, test my vision, figure out if I can be hypnotized ... I was game for it.
I'm not sure I'd go for the full body sale, but I think I'll go with the never say never response. I certainly don't have any ethical or moral objection to it.
Yes, but only if I get to decide who can buy it.
Of course no one is interested in the merchandise I have to sell.
@djjd62,
djjd62 wrote:
i'd rather sell my soul
Who you kiddin'? You sold that the day you registered with A2k.
@Merry Andrew,
imagine her dissertation and coursework
@Merry Andrew,
I have a faint memory of selling, don't remember the circumstance. Alternately, I trained people to take blood by using my veins many times, guessing fifty; donated for our lab procedures countless times, donated saliva for salivary IgA test controls. Took godawful pills - aha, that was for something like fifty dollars - to test gout pills and their effects on various chemistries. But really, that was to help out the neighbor lab.
Ok, I took those stupid pills.
Never did the prostitute scene, much less for science.
I gave it away free, occasionally.
@ossobuco,
Adds, I worked 30-35 hours a week back then, a matter frowned on by the university for good reason. I was never a sparkle in the university's eye.
@oolongteasup,
Quote:
imagine her dissertation and coursework
Yeah - that'd be the hard part. I have no moral objection to it myself, but it would be utterly impossible for me to touch someone I wasn't attracted to or to allow them to touch me.
I couldn't do it unless I wanted to for any amount of money.
There's this one guy I know who seems totally unaware that he invades personal spaces, and although he doesn't even touch me - he leans in so close that I instinctively shrink back from him even though I tell myself not to do it, as I don't want to hurt his feelings, but as I said, it's an uncontrollable and instinctive reaction.
I can imagine there'd be much to be repelled by if one were a prostitute. I don't think I'd be able to handle that diplomatically.
As I recall, her position is that she did it for the money partly, but also that she enjoys the work. She was in prostitution after she had financial need as well as during that time.
@hawkeye10,
More power to her then - I couldn't even be a dentist or a doctor for the same reason....maybe not even a nurse.
I'm very attuned to my senses- particularly smell- so if I find it sensually unpleasant - I can't do it.
@ehBeth,
Massachusetts General Hospital is great for that sort of thing. A lot of old folks on SS do it to suppliment their retirement income.
@djjd62,
how much do they charge for sole in Canada?
This reminds me this joke:
Quote:The train was travelling along when a beautiful young woman entered the compartment which was deserted except for a businessman reading his paper.
The man peered over his paper and asked "Would you let me **** you for a dollar?"
"Certainly not!" exclaimed the young woman, and the businessman returned to his paper.
A short while later he looked across again and said "Would you let me **** you for a million dollars?"
After a brief pause, the woman replied "yes, I suppose I would." Again the man returned to his newspaper.
A few minutes later the man asked "Would you let me **** you for five dollars?"
"Certainly not!" replied the young woman, getting angry now "What kind of girl do you take me for?"
"We've already established that" replied the man, "We're just haggling over the price!"
@Sglass,
No, Frenchmen aren't that cheap..
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