Sex worker D.: “They complain that it’s hell at the front, but they still go back there”
Since the beginning of the war, no one understood how this would affect sex work. Before the announcement of mobilization, everything was fine, and after that, the outflow of men began to go abroad. It is the solvent ones who are active buyers of sex services. And the second outflow is the mobilized, of whom there are hundreds of thousands. They left and we lost our clients and our income.
This has led to greater risks for sex workers, such as taking on clients they have never taken before. Previously, not everyone worked with immigrants from Central Asia, but now they do, because there are no other clients. Immigrants do not have much money, and because of this, many girls are forced to lower fees and increase flow. Sometimes they take drunks, in a state of drug intoxication, before such clients were refused, but now they are forced to take them. No men – no work, and no work – no money. And there are no men because of the war.
The sex worker community is very diverse and attitudes towards what is happening are also different. There are those who are categorically against the war and want the victory of Ukraine, others are on the side of Russia. And there are those who do not care, and for them the main thing is work, they even use the war for marketing. For example, they say that they provide discounts to participants in hostilities; I have seen such announcements in Moscow and St. Petersburg. I saw that in the salons they offer a service format – to come and punish bad Ukrainians, that is, “fuck a Ukrainian”. Men themselves began to ask for a discount on dating sites or call on advertisements: “I fought, I defended my homeland, and you must either give me free or take less money.”
Clients themselves are now asking for a discount: “I fought and defended my homeland, you should take less money from me”
There is one sex worker in Novosibirsk, Angela, who works on the highway. She chose mobilization points and military registration and enlistment offices as points of her work. There are many men there, they want to relieve stress, they leave the draft office, they see Angela with a car and go to her to relieve stress. It's such an attraction. For her, war is a way to find a place where customers can hang out. In one of the public pages, I read that on one of the shells intended for Ukraine, it was written: "For Angela."
Some pimps have moved their brothels closer to the places where the conscripts are trained. The men are alone there, without wives, they have enough money, because they have to be paid there. So there are even fights among pimps. It is impossible for individual women to get a job there, but for brothels – yes. Of course, this is all done with the permission of the local police, because without them such issues cannot be resolved.
Another consequence of the war, in addition to the loss of clients, is the fear for personal safety, the need to work with dangerous clients. Those clients who fought and returned, all behave differently. If a person was adequate in peacetime, then in principle he remains adequate, and if he was an aggressive idiot, then now it is even worse. There was a case in St. Petersburg when a whole detachment of seven or eight people came, they were on vacation and made a noise, one had a grenade, and he threatened to blow everyone up. Then it turned out that the grenade was not real, but the girls did not know this. There are enough such fools in peacetime, but now it's scary, because there are a lot of weapons.
There are enough fools in peacetime, but now it's scary, because there are a lot of weapons
Girls sometimes say that clients come who say that they fought and that they need to go back, but they don’t want to, because there is a nightmare and hell, but they see no other way out for themselves. These behave appropriately.
Also, the Russian military order virtual services and self-satisfy in trenches, dugouts and shelters, right at the front. Many sex workers provide both real and virtual services. The price tag is usually much lower: from 500 rubles for 10 minutes, although it can reach up to 3000. See what is being ordered. So it's more of a side job. Most girls for an extra charge will not refuse to do something virtual, to show something – some with an open face, and someone with a closed face does it. It could just be a sexual conversation. A man at this time may turn on the camera, or may not turn it on. Many girls ask to be turned on to make sure that there is not a crowd of drunk youngsters sitting there.
One friend told me about such a client: he called directly from the trench, paid 1000 rubles for 10 minutes, told his fantasies. Communication there is constantly interrupted, as soon as he takes off his pants in the bushes – his battery runs out. I recently asked her: “Well, does this friend keep calling you?” She replied that she had stopped – maybe she found another, maybe they killed her.
Sex worker K.: “They go to war brainwashed like in ISIS”
Because of the war, there was less work. Some of my clients live abroad. They are Russian-speaking, but they don't come here. Someone in America, someone in China, someone else somewhere. The same thing happened when the first sanctions were introduced in 2014. I worked in the salon, there were no clients at all, one girl did an hour a week for the entire salon, and we all lived on this money. Then slowly everything crept up, but in waves. And now again – for three days there is work, and for four – silence.
I met with one client who went to the front as a volunteer. He received the Putin Prize and decided to spend it on prostitutes. That guy gave us everything. He took off his new T-shirt and gave it to me. He was happy and said how lucky he was with us. He drank whiskey all the time and listened to a propaganda song about the war on YouTube: Bastu or some other of our pop songs. He said that he would go again, that he had to defend his homeland. He was not violent, but brainwashed. There is ISIS, who are preparing suicide bombers who are ready to kill themselves – that's how it was. Words can't even describe how shocking it is to see a person in such a state. And he is young and not stupid. What did he put in there?
It seems to me that they simply do not realize that it will be necessary to kill other people. And women do not understand what their husbands will have to do. What does the word "war" mean to them? He went to war and brought money, but they don’t want to think about what is behind this. And many of them are bloodthirsty. He, for example, thumps, and she, perhaps, generally thinks: “He will be killed, and thank God. They will give me an award and they will slap him. Fucked me for two years, and now I'm going to live in clover. I don't know how else to think about it. This is very strange.
Their wives also do not understand what war is, they think that he went to war and brought money, but what is behind it, they don’t want to think
Because of the war, girls also often began to work abroad, because there is no work in Moscow. One friend went to China and is now in prison there. She was going to Macau to work in a casino, but ended up in a twenty-story brothel house. There is such a house – and in every room there is a prostitute. They go to her for a “shot” – the express is like this: they do the job and leave. Friends who went there took away two or three million rubles a month, but this is just a conveyor belt. You go for a month and earn money for an apartment or a car.
Another friend was recently threatened by a client. His leg was torn off in the war, and we joked about him: “You never know where he will arrive and where he will leave.” Before that, she drove a car to him for MOT, and he wanted to deceive her. He said: “Your car is rotten, you need to invest a lot of money in it. Let's do everything for you." So that's how we dealt with him. In response, he called from different numbers and threatened her: “I will tear your head off. I’ll figure you out by cells, and Khan to you. ” Of course, it’s unpleasant to hear this, but, on the other hand, don’t be shit, and you won’t be treated the same way.
There was another client from the upper middle class and quite educated. When mobilization was announced, he said that it was a man's business to defend his homeland, and he had to go. He is my age. Many of my peers think that if they said, then you have to go. But there are also men who believe that all this is for the profit of people who are in power.
Dominatrix Y.: "My job is to accept the injury"
I can’t say that there are a lot of customers, but there is some surge. When people realize that perhaps death lies ahead. My specificity is a dominatrix, many men dream about it, but admitting to yourself is a feat, calling is an even greater feat, and coming is generally heroism. And when there are sharp moments in politics, the first two stages pass quickly, and they move men faster to the third step.
Faced with the abyss of the unknown, people want to get to know their bodies better.
I had guests who came on vacation with SVO, but I didn’t notice that they were somehow wild. But this is due to the fact that I am a dominant and carry out violence in a game format with obligatory strokes later. I mean: blow on the wound, tea, coffee, pour. They, on the contrary, are looking for an accepting figure in me, perhaps a mother, in order to plunge into care.
They come to me to relax. What is the point for him to relive those events into which he will plunge again, say, in a few days? Therefore, our entire meeting, in fact, is devoted to psychological dialogue. We talk a lot, and about very personal, intimate things. Sometimes we remember school loves, first sexual experiences, these are secrets that he would not share with anyone else. We don't discuss politics. When a person comes back from the war, he first of all wants to talk about himself and about that first love, about that first girl who then did not kiss him or, on the contrary, forced him to kiss. And now he asks: "Make me kiss you." It's always very personal.
Basically, what is my job? It's about accepting injury. And he understands: “She doesn’t judge me, she understands me, because then, at the age of 15, I was very scared to kiss a girl at a disco. And this woman accepts me for who I am.” But the fact that men want to be understood, and want to find at least for a short time a haven for their experiences, is always out of politics, it is always purely personal, intimate.