SEX SOLICITATION BY SHORT WAVE RADIO

STATUS OF THE CB PROSTITUTE Professional prostitutes recognize a status scale which is differentiated by style (Benjamin & Masters 1964). In recent times, some prostitutes use the Citizens' a.and (CB) radio to solicit drivers and rendezvous with them along interstatehighways. This has opened a lower niche in the profession of commercial sex service. • Operating from a mobile van, a highway rest area, or a truck stop,' CB prostitutes cater to truck drivers who sett Ie for the cramped quarters of a truck cab instead of a bedroom. And the truck driver identifies himself by his radio call name ove'r the airwaves to any CB operator within broadcast range, including other truck driver's who may know him. The driver also faces a greater risk of venereal disease, because this form of .sexual exchange ma'kes no provision for sanitation or prophylaxis for disease prevention. We collected data for 2 years at one interstate rest area in Oklahoma, known to the drivers as "Good Buddy Park." This includes tape recordi ngs of CB .transmissions between prostitutes and truckers, and direct observation of the nocturnal activity in the area-. The CB prostitute has created a lower-level entry position i.n the profession, and may bear some special occupational stigma, besides that conventionally accorded the deviant role of prostitute. The descend-ing scale of prostitutes inclu.des 1) the call girl, 2) the streetwalker, 3) the bar prostitute" and 4) the flea bag (Bryant 1977). To this list, Rosenblum (1975) adds the dance hall girl, adolescent, camp follower, brothel prostititue, "beat" prostitute, and those dealing with the more perverse fetish and sado-masochist sex services. In modern times, the CB prostitute has only recently been accorded a ca·tegorical distinction, although she is functionally like' the 'twagon-yard whore" in 19th Century United States, along the interstate post roads (Ingle 1980). The CB prostitute, like the massage parlor prostitute, has n,ot yet been recognized in the occupational scale of pros,t i tution. Rosenblum employed 3 criteria to establish the strata of prostitution: income, general method of operation, and ~'tientele. According to Bryant (1977), the 'call girl occupies the' top stratum of prostitution on the basis of income. The streetwalker is the most visible, and therefore, more vulnerable to law enforcement action. Bryant claims tha't the street walker caters to middle-class clients, while the bar prostitute usually works bars frequented by ski lied, semi-skilled, and unskilled workers of the lower middle-class. The "flea bag'" prosti tute services home Iess men on sk i d row. Winick and Kinsie (1971 28, 132) present two methods to classify prost i tutes: 1) by the degree of visibility, as flagrant, semiflagrant, semi-clandestine, and clandesine; and 2) by personal sa(isfaction afforded by the locale of their work. They discuss the relative advantages of the working atmosphere of red light districts, brothels, massage parlors, taxi-dance halls, cribs (no longer extant), fai rs, streets, hotels, bars, andcall houses. For the CB prostitute, we will consider Rosenblum's criteria of income, method, and clientele, Bryant's concepts of appearance and talents, and Winick & Kinsie's concepts of visibility and satisfaction with the work locale~