In all my grown-up years on the planet, I’ve met precious
few adults in my orbit who haven’t been grateful when they’ve had steady,
fulfilling well-paying jobs. Right-wing conservative bloviating notwithstanding, most people I’ve met - and
most whom I haven’t, I suspect - would
rather earn a steady paycheck by their own sweat, talents and capabilities than
subsist on the social safety nets put in place by agencies and governments admirably
concerned about averting people’s personal disasters.
Moreover, here in the US as in numerous other places
around the globe, there’s a long-standing belief that one’s ability to earn a
living ought not to be limited by anything other than an individual’s talent,
creativity, business acumen and personal grit so long as other people and
society at large are unhurt by one’s money-making endeavors. In fact, the
durable spine of any capitalist economy is pretty much dependent upon this
notion of a vibrant, flexible, creative free market powered by individuals’
willingness to work hard and play by a normative set of rules.
That said, when it comes to sex work and the people who
engage in it, the flinty fist of a yet-puritanical culture pretty much
continues to stigmatize the sort of flexible free-market minded pragmatism that
can be characteristic of sex workers.
