Perceptions des femmes exerçant différentes formes d'activités sexuelles rémunérées hors rue sur leur pratique

This research is an analysis of the perception on their activities of eight women of different age groups who have undertaken or are still practicing various forms of remunerated sexual activities in an indoor context. Most common forms of remunerated sexual activities addressed by women in the study include nude dancing with and without contacts, escort services, massage parlours and the phenomenon commonly known as "sugar daddy", when women exchange services for remuneration with a particular client. Even though street prostitution was not specifically addressed in the study, two female participants in the sample practiced both indoor and outdoor activities. The term “remunerated sexual activities” has been chosen to ensure a neutral perspective. We wanted to focus on an unbiased approach that encompasses both common views on prostitution, on the one hand, the one that is known to be the abolitionist vision, which maintains that prostitution is a form of exploitation and of sexual violence committed primarily against women, and in that sense, it should be decriminalized for women but criminalize customers and pimps. On the other hand, the “pro-sex work” vision, arguing that "sex work" is a choice and it is a job like any other, deserves to be decriminalized completely, even for customers and pimps. Our approach was used essentially to get the subjective visions, that might be more nuanced than what we hear in the writings and debates on the subject, a way of giving a voice to those women we do not hear a lot about.  The theoretical framework that underlies our analysis is the intersection of discrimination. The main sources of discrimination that emerged in our sample were those of age, social and economic status and ethnicity, for one person. Those sources of vulnerabilities increased the probabilities for women to go toward those practices, to stay in it and to return after a break, sometimes to meet their basic needs, to be able to pay for drugs or to reimburse some debts and/or afford luxury. The aim of the study is to discover and understand the perception of women regarding their experience in various forms of indoor remunerated sexual activities. To achieve this, we describe, understand and analyze the path that led women into engaging in remunerated sexual activities; identify and understand their journey and experiences based on their type of practice, more or less intense, more or less varied and more or less extended in time, of remunerated sexual activities and finally, place their perspective on the continuum of the social debate surrounding the phenomenon, whether it is more a way to exploit women versus a form of work like any other or somewhere in between, where we could locate the perspectives of women on a continuum where many of them found their way into more nuanced visions of their reality. A qualitative methodology was used where semi-structured interviews were conducted. It allows to discover nuanced perspectives among them, and for others, to validate their perspective among the polarized visions we often hear in the actual debates and studies, meaning some of them situate their realities more in a form of sexual exploitation and others in a common form of work.

Keyphrases: Prostitution, Perceptions subjectives, Remunated sexual activities in an indoor context, Prostitution, Sexual exploitation, Sex work, Personal experiences, Subjective perceptions