Living Out Loud

Preface and Disclaimer
The following is a very personal perspective on a topic. It is not intended as a manifesto, or as a means of chiding those who choose a different path than I choose. It is simply my own personal experience/ perspective. I would never presume to know or choose what is right for anyone else.

A little background: I am “out and proud.” While I am bi-sexual, this isn’t what I am most “out” about. If I ever met that “Miss Right” and brought her home to my family, it might be received strangely, but I believe they’d take it over my current career choice (especially if she were a doctor). What I am out about is my career. I have always believed that being honest with others and ourselves is the route to happiness (although I also recognize that there are some who would prefer to be happily in the dark and protected by their lack of knowledge about certain things, especially where their children are concerned).

After watching the 2008 film, Milk, with Sean Penn, I decided to readdress being “out” as a companion (view trailer here http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=unu-9vM9VZw). I was familiar with Harvey Milk’s story from my social science classes in college, but watching the film reignited my passion for living “out and proud.” Also I realized a fundamental reality, that being honest and proud of myself and all of my life choices was the first step to changing the laws and social mores around my chosen profession as a companion and a bi woman.

Gay rights are defined as a civil rights issue. Whether or not being gay, lesbian, bi-sexual, transgendered, or purple for that matter is the right choice for you or not, it seems like it should be fundamental that there be basic civil rights that extend to protect all citizens. However, this has not historically been the case for those whose sexual preference is different from that accepted within larger culture.

The same can be said for those in the sex-work or companion professions. Sex-workers are disproportionately targeted as victims of rape, violence and murder. In addition to being subject to these atrocities they are endlessly harassed by police and judged and prosecuted more harshly than their clients when faced with legal action. The treatment of sex-workers by legal authorities while in custody is also notoriously deplorable. In 2009 Marcia Powell died while in custody in an Arizona prison as a result of exposure after being held in a pen in 108 degree weather (http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,526132,00.html).

For these reasons, because it is a civil rights issue and also because I want to see a change in the social mores and laws around sex-work, I take being “out” very seriously. But being “out” is also a very personal choice, one that can come with serious consequences, including the loss of one’s relationships with friends and family.

Outing myself: Ultimately I made the choice to out myself because at a personal level I didn’t like lying or being evasive when close friends or family asked me about my job. I also didn’t want to buy into the secrecy and shame that accompanies it. In order to be proud of myself, to feel good about myself and my relationships with others, I needed to be out about my job.

To be a person who is so open and honest with others while denying something that is part of my daily existence didn’t square with my personal ethics. So I did what any self-respecting semi-political, proud, inspired and possibly socially suicidal, feminist companion would do. I began to out myself.

Initially it was just to a small circle of my friends who I trusted implicitly. Later that circle grew to encompass my family and finally, although this took the most courage of all, a very close friend who had also been my teacher throughout my grade school education.

Their reactions were as mixed as the people in my life, although many were surprisingly “cool” about it. Most were understandably concerned for my safety. Some wanted specific, solicitous, juicy details, which I provided in a vague compulsory manner, but with little interest (the sexual proclivities of others are way more interesting when you aren’t actually the one on the other side of the bed). Others asked few questions, but made comments that belayed their own ill informed perspectives on the topic... No I didn’t have a pimp, no I never had, no I was never going to.

And then there was my family (namely my father and little sister). As a woman who specializes in understanding men, many of whom are also fathers, I fail completely to understand the internal workings of my own father. Or perhaps I understand him too well and don’t like the truth of the situation.

My father and I continually duplicate a cycle of mutual disappointment. He belays his disappointment in me in many not so subtle ways. These are evidenced by his complete disbelief that I rejected the professional career I worked towards for 12 years, divorced the husband I adored (still adore) after 7 years together and ultimately choose my completely socially unacceptable career. Allie scores 10 points on the rebellion scale, rah rah!

In turn I struggle to understand my father’s miserable complacency. I watch as he toils endlessly and often fruitlessly to fulfill the expectations of his parents, my grandparents (dead for over 20 years now) and to please his second wife, despite the castrating comments she fires at him across the dinner table whenever they have company.

When I tell my father that I am a professional “gentleman’s companion.” He hollers, “You can’t just do whatever makes you happy!”

And now my sister. I wasn’t raised with my father’s other children, my siblings, my half-siblings really. For this reason I dotted on and adored them during my weekend visitation time, allowing myself to evolve fantasies around our familial closeness. These fantasies were grounded when my little brother moved to California and took up residence at an unknown location, leaving only a PO Box as a means of contact. Which left my sister.

I tried not to feel concerned when my 19 year old sister refused to come to the phone when I called on Christmas day. I told myself it was a “teenager thing.” Moreover I tried not to be bitter when I reflected on the college education my father is paying for her to receive and recalled that at her age I worked 25 hours a week at a seedy strip club to pay my own way through college.

And even all of this was palatable until... Until after being out of contact with my sister for over 6 months I requested her cell phone number and email address. I was told that she didn’t want to talk to me because of what “I do.”

The consequences of being “out and proud” have finally found me. Ouch! And they have found me in the way that is hardest to accept. My little sister, who is a decade younger than I am, who named her dolls after me and refused to leave my lap at the dinner table, has decided to estrange herself from me.

But ultimately, what is there to do but to accept it? I understand that my job has been hard on my family, that being honest sometimes is the hardest thing to do and that the truth can be very hard to accept. Still I hold onto the knowledge that it is what is right for me. I also believe that in some small way this little sacrifice might help to reduce the overall negative judgements placed on those in the sex industry. I hope that through my acceptance of myself, others will find a vehicle to accept themselves and their differences and ultimately to be more accepting and less judgmental of others.

A note to families: It is this kind of response from families that cuts more deeply than any other social disenfranchisement of those in the sex industry. The attitudes of family and friends of sex workers play a key role in changing negative social perspectives. Also it is important to understand why women in the sex industry are frequently targeted as victims of violence. It is the unfortunate and often inaccurate belief of those who prey on sex workers that they have no community connections. There is a misconception that women (and men) in the sex industry are disposable, without family and friends and therefore easy targets who won’t be missed. Family and friends have the power to impact social perceptions through their own acceptance and non-judgement.

Lastly, despite the sadness that accompanies my family’s rejection, I recognize that I have the same power. For this reason I will continue to live out loud, “out and proud.”