Australian studies in law, crime and justice

Public to private : where prostitutes work

Published in:
Working girls : prostitutes, their life and social control / Roberta Perkins
ISBN 0 642 15877 0
Canberra : Australian Institute of Criminology, 1991
(Australian studies in law, crime and justice series)

There are a number of circumstances and environments in which the exchange of sexual pleasure for cash occurs. For instance, in some bars and hotels of Sydney women sit and drink with the express purpose of meeting men and offering sex for a fee. About fifteen years ago the author became aware of a hotel in the centre of the produce markets in the inner city area of the Haymarket where mostly Aboriginal and Islander women hung around to service the produce workers sexually when they finished work. The hotel manager was well aware of the situation and, in fact, supported it by offering rooms to customers at an inflated tariff. The place received a great deal of attention by police, partly because of the frequent brawls that occurred, but also because of a particular racial bias of many policemen at that time. The hotel was never closed nor the licensee arrested, perhaps due to an "arrangement" with the local police. This was a lively area of prostitution in its "heyday" but it came to and end when the produce markets shifted to Flemington in the late seventies. Although this was the women's only livelihood, most bar prostitution today is casual and clandestine.

Another form of prostitution once flourishing among a small group of women was that catering to merchant seamen. The women involved were given the derogatory term of "ship molls" and they operated in certain hotels of the city and Pyrmont (an inner city wharf area) frequented by seamen on leave. Occasionally these women were invited on board the ships for "parties" and "orgies" but mostly their work was conducted on shore. Today, they are rare as speciality prostitutes in Sydney, while, a small handful of such women still work as "ship molls" in the southern New South Wales industrial port city of Port Kembla. In Sydney, seamen on leave now visit the established and well publicised inner city brothels, although sometimes escorts are hired for "orgies" on board visiting ships.

"Courtesans" or women who date, marry or become mistresses to wealthy men for financial gain are not unknown in Sydney's "haute classe" social circles. However, it is often difficult to identify them clearly as their true intentions remain closeted and even their besotted beaus, lovers, and spouses are usually convinced their relationship is based on love or desire and not mercenary premeditation. It is quite unlikely that any of these women would admit to being prostitutes, but the only real thing that separates them from the much maligned streetwalker is that they do their hawking in exclusive society instead of under a street lamp.

Juvenile prostitution often receives a great deal of media attention, usually following an unqualified comment by a politician, a visiting dignitary or leading churchman. Then comes the usual police blitz of rounding up any likely looking youngster on the streets of Kings Cross after dark. These "kids of the Cross", as they are often dubbed, quite often turn out to be young adults dressed as teenagers to attract the paedophilic subconsciousness of many street clients. In spite of the large number of teenage prostitutes stated by outraged officials, the fact is there are very much fewer "under-aged" prostitutes than often supposed. In three consecutive nights in October 1986 the author counted no more than 30 street boys and girls in known areas of street soliciting in Kings Cross. Their ages ranged between 12 and 15, and they usually roamed about in pairs or groups from pinball parlours, Fitzroy Gardens in the heart of the Cross and Green Park in Darlinghurst, regular areas for client pick-ups. Their young ages prevent them from working in the established areas of street prostitution because the women resist their presence there. In mixed-sex groups they spend the night in casual prostitution as they require money, "hanging about" and "scoring dope", and when they retire to bed it is often half-a-dozen or so to a rented room, in squats or in a youth refuge.

There are an infinite number of prostitution operations, and these are but a few of them. They are referred to here as casual, clandestine and minority forms of prostitution. The rest of this Section concentrates on the "professional" forms of prostitution; that is where there is no doubt about the commercial nature of the exchange and the women involved very much identify as prostitutes at work, even if there is a strong denial in their social lives. Often, there will be an attempt to avoid the reality of their situation through a pretence that they are working only for a brief period, or by a preference for the term "working girls" as their social designation rather than "prostitute" or "whore". The term "whore" is particularly abhorred by Sydney prostitutes, unlike many of their European and American counterparts, who use the term in reference to themselves frequently. On a politically motivated level it serves to "defuse" the stigma of whore used as a derogatory term by society at large. However, the resistance to it by prostitutes in Australia is probably because of a belief that the word is more a label for social identification and psychological propensity, whereas "prostitute" is more closely linked with the occupation of commercial sex, and is an occupational designation, like "plumber", "bus conductor" or "engineer". In any case, most Sydney prostitutes prefer to be called "working girls".

"Professionals" work full-time or part-time as a prostitute, and sex work is their only source of income, or, at least, is the largest portion of their income if they have two jobs. These women work on the streets, in brothels (parlours, bordellos, or "traps") as "straight" prostitutes, bondage mistresses and escorts, and about a quarter work in private as "call girls" or agency escorts.

Female street prostitution in Sydney occurs regularly in three areas: the heart of the commercial section of Kings Cross; along William Street, which connects Kings Cross to the city centre; and on Canterbury Road, a major arterial road in the western suburbs. Each of these areas has a slightly different mode of operation, and these will be described in turn.

Kings Cross streetwalkers stand against walls and shopfronts on the footpaths of the well-lit "red light" streets within close proximity to private hotels or rooms rented for the purpose of taking clients. The usual method of operation is for a prostitute to initiate contact with a male pedestrian by asking him if he wants a "girl". But a male strolling the area with prostitution in mind might initiate contact by asking a prostitute how much "she is". Most of the clients are tourists, country visitors, young men from the outer suburbs having a "night out" in the Cross, and sailors from the nearby naval base. Very few married men in Sydney risk chatting to a street prostitute under the area's bright lights with its milling crowds in case someone known to them spots them.

Kings Cross street working attire is quite mixed, from jeans and little make-up to sexy dresses and heavy make-up. The women who choose tight-fitting garments that show off their figures to advantage usually do the most business. The women claim that red and black (most especially), either together or alone, seem to have the best effect, and spiked-heel shoes attract most clients.

In such a confined area competition is strong and each woman has a well-defined working space ("her spot"), which she guards jealously. Vigorous objection follows any encroachment on this space, occasionally leading to violence between contending parties. Sometimes an innocent female visitor to the Cross finds herself at the receiving end of a prostitute's verbal abuse when she unwittingly stands on a claim. Arrangements are often made between women so that each is aware on which particular days or nights she has a right to work on a particular location.

The professional pimp has gone nowadays, and is replaced by the "sitter" as protector against male violence. These are usually lovers of the women or hired off-duty club bouncers, and they pass the time sitting in nearby coffee shops or lounging on cars where they can keep an eye on their girlfriends or charges.

Since most of the streetwalkers are addicts, a high customer turnover is preferred as this brings the most money in the shortest space of time. Thus, "short time" or the "quickie" is aimed for with prices between $30 and $50, depending on whether the client is prepared to haggle and whether the service will include halfstrip (removing the woman's top) or not. The absolute minimum is fellatio or coitus removing only the woman's panties and taking only five to fifteen minutes. An efficient worker will be back on the street soliciting within half-an-hour.

Street working on William Street is quite different to Kings Cross. Rather than take their clients to hotels or flatettes, most women on William Street pay for the use of rooms in nearby houses leased by enterprising entrepreneurs. Instead of individual spaces, they stand on the street in clusters, according to the proximity of these houses. Thus, these women are found to cluster about street comers about I 00 metres from the house of their choice. Each house has a hired "sitter" whose job it is to organise rooms as the prostitutes arrive with their clients, and to deter violence from aggressive customers.

This does not imply a cooperative effort in business. In fact competition is even fiercer on William Street, where potential clientele come from passing male motorists. The object then is to catch the eye of the cruising motorists, rather than attract men with conversation as in Kings Cross. The dress of William Street workers is scantier and more revealing than in Kings Cross, with short skirts, leotards and fish-net stockings bringing attention to the legs, or wearing eye-catching colours and dazzling outfits. Also unlike Kings Cross, the men driving along William Street are more likely to be married Sydney residents, preferring the anonymity of traffic lines to the bright lights of Kings Cross.

When a car pulls up at the William Street kerbside, the driver will beckon to the woman of his choice. She will approach the vehicle from the passenger side and speak to the man through the open window, careful not to place her head inside the car and thus avoid the possibility of being seized by the hair and dragged in. The bargaining of services and prices is conducted between the man and the woman through this open window, he attempting to obtain a maximum service for a minimum fee, she trying to get agreement on the minimum service for the maximum fee, until eventually a compromise is arrived at. Then the woman will point to the house where the service will take place and agree to meet him outside. Most of these women have learned through experience not to enter the client's car, but to see him on their terms, in a house well protected by a "sitter" and the presence of other people.

Nearly all of the William Street women are addicts. They are strictly forbidden to take drugs on the house premises by the "sitter" and shooting-up inside will result in instant dismissal. In the past,. less scrupulous house owners and "sitters" actually dealt in drugs, but nowadays the women have to arrange to meet their drug dealers outside.

Operations on Canterbury Road are similar to William Street in that potential clientele are motorists cruising along the kerbside. But there are no houses to which the women might take their clients and they are forced to use the men's cars for servicing. Consequently the women are strung out along a four and a half kilometre stretch of road. Some of the women claim that the lack of Organisation means less competition and greater business. But, of the three areas of street prostitution, in the opinion of most streetwalkers interviewed Canterbury Road is the least desirable. Having to resort to "car jobs" increases the risk of injury and being robbed considerably. Furthermore, the relative isolation of the Canterbury Road worker compared to say, William Street, is a potential risk from misogynist men with no intention of paying for sex. Because of the proximity of dwellings, schools, churches and a hospital on this road, it means few locations are "legal", unlike Kings Cross and William Street, and the Canterbury Road worker is at constant risk of arrest. The quieter area attracts more drug dealers in cars and also increases the risk of arrest for the women caught in possession of recently purchased quantities of drugs.

The public exposure is one disadvantage that deters most prostitutes from choosing to work on the streets. Violence is also more prevalent here than in any other form of prostitution. Bashings. robbery, rape are just some of the hazards, usually associated with "car jobs". But others include street violence, which means that avoidance of "car jobs" is no guarantee of eliminating injury. One woman in 1985 was lassoed on William Street by young maniacs in a car who then accelerated, dragging her behind the vehicle. Verbal abuse and ridicule from passers-by is another hazard, which can be emotionally debilitating unless the street worker can develop a psychological barrier to the jibes and barbs and learn to deal with these by clever repartee or ignore them. Much of this negative interaction with passers-by is linked with the community's overall difficulty in accepting the presence of street women, and it undoubtedly reflects a recent popular sentiment that prostitution is acceptable so long as it is not too visible.

But street prostitution has some advantages too. Firstly, it allows bargaining with customers, and providing the minimum of service means it is the most lucrative form of sex work. This makes it especially attractive to heavy drug users. The low overheads for an independent street worker, whose only major outlay is nightly rent of a room, and the flexibility enabling a street worker to work as long as she likes, or for only a brief time, provides her with control and manipulation of her working life. For some women standing out in the open, exposed to the gaze and seem of all, threatened by the potential danger, risking limb and reputation, filled with the mixed emotions of fear, tension and excitement, street working offers an adventure matched by few other everyday experiences available to women. For these women standing alone on the street late at night is the female equivalent to a man's adventure into unmapped territory.

In October 1986, at the beginning of this study, 71 brothels (parlours or bordellos) existed across the Sydney metropolitan region. Three years later, when writing this book, exactly 61 remained. Although this latter figure includes a few new premises, many more had disappeared altogether. The decline was due to some forced closure under the Disorderly Houses Act, but most closed down because of a general decline in business. Although public fear of AIDS has been largely responsible for this downtrend, much of it is also due to the gradual decline in commercial sex with the increase in casual sex in society over the past 20 years. This will be discussed at length later, but, for the moment, let us look at Sydney's brothel industry in some detail.

"Brothel" is a general term used to describe houses of prostitution and assignation. In Sydney, however, it is a specific term within the sex industry for the little houses in East Sydney. They have been a part of a tradition of brothels located in East Sydney, Darlinghurst and Surry Hills for well over half a century, directly descended from Tilly Devine's Palmer Street trade and the little brothels of the lanes in the 1960s. In 1983 22 of these houses existed throughout East Sydney and Darlinghurst. Three years later only four remained, and still remain today. The rest had been forced into closure by the Disorderly Houses Act, the City Council and the local resident action lobby. It was definitely the end of an era. But it is ironic that it should have survived the extensive police pressures of the past only to end in a period of "decriminalisation".

The operation of the East Sydney brothels is traditional. One or two women usually occupy one of these little terrace houses at a time. They stand in an open doorway to attract attention from passing male pedestrians and motorists. Their dress is similar to the women on William Street. The open door and red light are the signals indicating that the house is a brothel. When the door is open, it acts to invite men to step inside and inquire of the prices and services. When it is closed it signifies that the occupants are busy. Furniture and decor in these places are minimal and not intended to impress visitors. Instead this indicates cheap prices and quick service. Bargaining and "short time", like streetwalkers, are the preferred options. These places have an advantage for the client, according to Lisa, who, like most of the workers in these brothels, is a "professional" of many years and gained her apprenticeship on the streets in the late 1950s and in the lanes in the 1960s:

Men feel comfortable coming to our houses. They don't want to go to a massage parlour and be asked if they want all weird and wonderful things. They just want to come in here, have sex, pay their money and go. Young girls rush them; they are frightened if they go with the girls around the Cross they will be ripped off. They like the homey atmosphere of our houses. They feel safe here, and they know that if they leave their wallet on the dressing table and they come back in an hour you're going to give it to them. They know they're not going to catch anything, and no one's going to bash them over the head. They feel welcomed and they know they can come in, sit down and watch television.

The other kind of brothel is much more extensive. Colloquially it is referred to as "parlour", having derived from the term "massage parlour" and probably introduced into Sydney in the late 1960s (with the demise of the brothels in the lanes) from an American West Coast concept of disguising a brothel as a massage clinic in order to avoid the law. In the 1970s Sydney parlours, like their American counterparts, had prostitutes dressed in the white uniforms of a masseuse, massage tables instead of beds, and no condoms on the premises, so as to minimise arrest. Most parlours were also paying police as much as $1000 a month to "turn the other way". But with the changes in law in 1979, this subterfuge and extortion was no longer necessary and "massage parlours" became brothels, plainly and simply. It is possible that some police corruption continued by using threats of arrest of managers for living on the earnings.

Parlours can be divided into a number of "types". For example, at one end of the trade is the average suburban parlour, with its armchair comfort but lacking exotic and expensive looking trimmings. At the other end are the elaborate, extravagantly decorated, "haute classe" parlours, which one well-known manager of the famous "Touch of Class" parlour, the late Zara Powell insisted should be referred to as bordellos (Reines 1985). These are mostly found in the inner city suburbs of Potts Point and Surry Hills. A third type might be the so-called "Asian parlours", which have Asiatic decor and employ Asian (mostly Thai) immigrant women. Finally, there are the few bondage and discipline parlours, which cater for speciality services involving sadomasochism, fantasy jobs and other "kinky" sex.

The usual parlour arrangement involves an owner, a manager, a receptionist. and a number of prostitutes. Sometimes the owner and the manager are the same person, and sometimes the receptionist has the job of managing the premises. The manager's role is to organise shifts by Fostering each prostitute's working time throughout the week; to keep a ledger of cash received and paid out; to o@anise a linen service or the washing; to purchase toiletries, bathroom and other items; to pay prostitutes their earnings at the finish of their shifts; and to hire and fire staff. The receptionist's role is to answer the phone, make appointments for clients, answer the door, and see to the client's comfort in the waiting room. Although receptionists are not usually assigned authority over the prostitutes, those who have never previously worked in the sex industry sometimes assume a position of superiority over prostitutes based on the common social designation of whores as low status women. Ironically, under the present legal situation receptionists are vulnerable to arrest for "living on the earnings of a prostitute" while the prostitutes have legal status.

When a customer walks into a parlour without a prior appointment, he is the immediate focus of attention. The receptionist offers him a complimentary drink and then advises the prostitutes on duty so that they might see him for a selection. The receptionist is anxious to process her part in the operation so as to minimise the time she must spend pampering to his needs in the preparatory stage. She is also often anxious for him to be taken to a room by one of the prostitutes quickly to avoid becoming a sexual object herself. Men entering a brothel assume that all the women inside are available for their sexual whims, otherwise, they rationalise, whatever are they doing there? However, prostitutes make themselves available in the brothel; receptionists never do.

The system of selection is not always the same in every parlour. In some the client enters a lounge room and is seated among the workers, so that he may select the woman of his choice after a look around and a short conversation involving all of them. In others, each worker on duty enters the waiting room individually so that the client might choose one of them after a series of such entrances and exits. A number of parlours parade their workers in a line, known to some prostitutes by the derogatory term of "meat rack", in order for the client to size each woman up and compare them before he makes his choice. Whichever selection process is used it has the effect of putting the women in a competitive relationship with one another. Some prostitutes, critical of this system, argue that a client is looking for sex and anyone of the women would do. But a tradition of selection has evolved over the years, so that customers expect to see a number of available women, and this does nothing more than feed their egos and vanities.

Most suburban parlours operate on a two shift basis (16 hours) while many of the inner city premises have three shifts and are open 24 hours a day. Women who have been with the same parlour for some time are in the best position to obtain shifts suitable to other routines in their lives and most convenient to their regular customers. Newcomers usually end up with the shifts no-one else wants.

Unlike the streets and the East Sydney brothels, prices in a parlour are fixed by the management and the customer pays for the prostitute's time, rather than a minimum or maximum service. Thus for half an hour of her time a man might pay $70 to $90, depending on the place, or, for an hour of her time he is expected to pay $ 1 00 to $150, and so on. This usually entities him to fellatio and coitus (as many times as the man is capable of in the allotted time) and any other kind of sexual activity carries an extra fee, or is negotiable with the prostitute. In most parlours, prostitutes are obliged only to participate in masturbation, fellatio or coitus. If a woman is averse to other forms of sex or "kinky" sex, she may decline the request and refer the customer to a bondage house.

The amount of money a prostitute is credited with by being selected by a number of clients in her shift is usually split 50/50 with the house. Thus, if a woman sees 10 men in a shift and each sees her for half an hour at $70 per half hour, she brings in $700 and takes home $350 as her earnings. Some premises expect "shift money" or $20 to $50 per shift from each prostitute as well, others charge for use of toiletries or drink money, all of which most workers interpret as exploitation. But the practice of "extras" is declining because with decreasing business and fewer workers, most parlour owners are anxious to attract more prostitutes to their premises. In an effort to increase the number of workers, some parlours have even made the split 60/40 in the prostitute's favour.

The big inner city parlours attract more workers because their appearance and reputations are assumed to have a higher turnover of clientele. Some of these fabulous parlours, with their plush, luxurious and expensive interiors, have cost as much as a quarter of a million dollars just to renovate. Customers are waited on by a manager making certain their needs are served, by a receptionist introducing them to the workers, and by a drink waitress serving the complimentary beverage. Each man is ushered into a different waiting room, giving him the impression of exclusivity, and ensuring his every whim is satisfied. Many women interviewed have expressed dissatisfaction after having worked in these places, which usually expect them to dress in designer clothes, wear expensive jewellery and have their hair dressed at the most exclusive salons, all at their own expense. In others, there is a list of workers' earnings displayed for all to see, with the name of the week's highest earner placed on the top each week. If a woman's name consistently appears on the bottom she is fired. Intended to motivate ambition in individuals in a spirit of "fair" competition, it promotes envy, suspicion and lack of confidence. Resentment among the workers in this kind of atmosphere is high, and women have pointed out that rather than a "fair" arrangement, high earning power depends on a number of factors other than an individual's ability, personality and looks. It depends on such factors as one's shift (night workers tend to do better than day workers), one's personal commitments restricting her to daytime work, the inconsistency of client turnover, and favouritism with a boss. A system intending to increase business, often actually has the reverse effect with a rapid turnover of resentful women.

Relations between workers and management varies considerably from parlour to parlour. The assumption that a female boss in a female parlour is a better arrangement than a male boss is not always correct. Some men in charge are considerate towards their staff, and some women in charge act like tyrants. About half of the parlours are managed by men and about half by women (although in many instances the owner is a man), but the problems that most often occur between a boss and a worker are more often due to poor industrial relations than unequal gender relations. There are, of course, instances where male bosses sexually harass their staff and some expect to sleep with new workers to "try them out". But, some workers claim to prefer male bosses because they are easier to manipulate than a female boss. Most workers, though, express a preference for a female boss, regardless of how tyrannical she might be, because female bosses are more likely to have a greater concern for health and safety in the workplace. Women managers will appreciate the need for mandatory condom use in a parlour more than men in charge, who, like the client believe that condoms are a barrier to satisfactory sex. Female bosses are also more likely to have empathy for a worker suffering menstrual tension and not assume it to be a ploy for avoiding work, as some men are likely to do. On the other hand, female bosses are more likely to detect a sham when it occurs.

The crux of the tension in industrial relations in the brothel trade is linked to a conflict of interests. The boss is motivated by profit; the worker by personal feelings. Thus, the boss expects the worker to see every client, unless he is diseased or violent, and is not prepared to accept her reluctance on grounds of physical repulsion or her fatigue. Some bosses believe their workers are basically lazy, and even rejecting a client under suspicion of infection is considered an excuse to avoid work. Seeking a second opinion on a client's state of health serves two purposes: to assure the worker that she assessed correctly; to convince the boss that she wasn't lying. A client sitting too long in a waiting room is assumed by some bosses to be one of the worker's boyfriends hanging around or a drug dealer. They want clients processed in a parlour like an assembly line, with their workers tirelessly doing the processing like machines. The human factor of weariness, and inability to function varying from individual to individual after a given time, and the psychological limitations to repetition are rarely considered in the quest for profit. When workers complain of overwork, a boss might put on more staff, which then increases competition between workers, builds up staff tensions, and contributes to resentment among workers for the inevitable lowering of income. Unlike other industries, prostitutes have no union or industrial arbitration to turn to when they feel dealt with unfairly.

Like any other work situation the presence of a boss in a parlour increases tension and decreases efficiency. The workers become nervous under a belief that the boss is scrutinising their work, while the boss is suspicious in the belief that the workers are "ripping him/her off" by wasting time or dissatisfying customers. Any worker who spends too long in a room with a client or appears to be too nice to a customer, is often suspected of making private arrangements either to get extra money from the client and thereby short-change the boss, or to see the client outside and thereby deprive the boss of regular income. The problems of the brothel are often not so much related to police harassment, customer aggression or prying officials, but more usually due to the day-to-day administration of the place.

The ultimate solution for most Australian prostitutes in Sydney when they feel they are being exploited, harassed and abused is to move to another parlour where the conditions are more satisfactory. But that is often impossible for the immigrant prostitute, especially if she is in this country illegally. Most of the immigrant prostitutes are Thai, but large numbers also come from Cambodia, the Philippines or China. Even with a three or six-month visa it does not permit them to work in Australia. But many continue to stay and work in Australia after their visas expire, which means they become illegal aliens and as such are targeted by federal immigration officers. These women are often caught in an economic dilemma. Most have borrowed heavily from opportunistic agents in their own countries to travel here. These agents are operating an illegal trafficking business and the fees they offer to accrued interest for arranging passage are highly inflated. One Thai woman claimed she had a debt of $21,000 to these agents, but more often the debts range between $10,000 and $15,000 per woman. Since many of the women come from poverty stricken families, and they believe Australians to be extremely wealthy, they grasp the opportunity to work in Australia as prostitutes in the firm belief that they will pay off the debt well before their visas expire and have ample cash to send back to their families. Invariably, they not only fail to do so but often accrue a further debt in order to pay the first and end up on a treadmill of prostitution and debt peonage.

Arrangements for a working venue are usually made in advance by the foreign agents through contacts in Australia, so that the Thai woman with no knowledge of English will be taken to a parlour soon after she arrives. Most (but not all) of the brothels receiving the immigrant prostitutes are the "Asian" parlours, so-called because of a decor of pagoda gables, rice-paper lanterns, Chinese screens, prints and other objects, and the Buddist shrines (used as altars for prayers and offerings by the women). Most of the clientele are South-East Asian men resident in Australia, with the occasional overseas visitor and Australian male looking for an "exotic" experience. Because most of the workers are in similar circumstances, these parlours act as a cultural refuge in an alien and sometimes hostile world beyond. Faced with the reality of a much smaller income than anticipated, many of these women are forced to work double shifts, or 16 hours a day, seven days a week, in an effort to rid themselves of their debts and send relief back to their families. Thus, it is not whips, chains or locked rooms keeping these women tied to a ceaseless life of commercial sex but debt, poverty and a genuine fear for their safety if they return to their homelands still owing the traffickers.

Very different is the situation in the bondage parlours. The women who work in these places are among the most assertive and independent in the sex industry. As Marie put it: "in bondage I can have a say in my working conditions to a certain extent". Few other sex workers have the same amount of control over their working environment as the bondage mistresses. Bosses often do not interfere with the way they conduct their work, because in some instances the boss does not understand sadomasochism and fantasy and feels more comfortable keeping his or her distance. In the case of the ex-mistress who is a boss, she understands that this kind of work is a highly personal experience in which the mistress achieves the most efficient business if left to her own devices. Experienced mistress Fatale explains her situation:

I like working in a dungeon where it is quiet and I have full control over the environment. I put on music which I know will heighten the experience. I am conscious of every move I do, and it is an exercise in all my skills.

The compatibility with her working environment can be explained as being an extension of her private preferred home environment:

I feel comfortable in the dungeon. It's like the way I live at home, in total darkness, like a cave, and this is how I am. My home is like a dungeon and a dungeon is like my home, so I am going from one comfortable environment to another as I go from home to work.

To enter a bondage parlour is like passing into another world; a world of science fiction, of fairy tale, or Disneyland, or of a Hollywood set for a Gothic horror movie. The lighting is dim, reminding one of gaslight, and the hallway walls are festooned with chains, whips and graphic images of torture and pain. The dungeon is the centre piece of this world; a large room painted black and red, with racks, torture wheels, ceiling harnesses, a complete set of whips and canes of every imaginable type on display, and leather suits for confining movement, like the ancient straight jackets of medieval torture chambers. But the dungeon is not the only room in the house for client fantasies. For those with transvestite fantasies there is a "tranny" room, by contrast well-lit, and decorated with fluffy, frilly ultra-feminine dresses, rows of over sized stiletto-heeled shoes, and a dressing table that would make a film star envious. There is also a medical room, equipped with an operating table, charts and pictures of male and female anatomy on the walls, and every conceivable cutting, slicing, pulling, grasping surgical instrument available. Water sports with enemas and urinal pans are usually conducted in this room too. Then there are schoolrooms, baby rooms, kindergartens, the variation from house to house is endless. Like most parlours, bondage houses have a "girl's room" where the women can relax between sessions, adjust make-up, hair and clothing, and chat about the last client. Where most prostitutes in other parlours change into conventional garments in this room at the start of a shift, mistresses will be stepping into rubber outfits, zipping up studded leather garments, bat-suits, nurses, teachers or infant costumes ready for a day's work.

According to brothel workers, working in a parlour has one distinct advantage over working the streets: it is a safer, more secure environment. For a lonely woman, working in a parlour can offer an opportunity for regular contact with other women and even for striking up friendships. Cameraderies between brothel workers are not unusual because of the ample time to communicate with one another between visits by clients, especially since they have shared experiences at work, regardless of their individual backgrounds. There is less opportunity for this on the street, and whatever bonds form among streetwalkers these tend to be more often related to the after hours common experiences of scoring from the same dealers and using drugs together.

But brothel workers also express some disadvantages to working in a parlour. High among these are the restricted working hours, splitting half the takings with the house, and the imbalance of power with the boss in command dictating working conditions. Another common complaint, especially where workers are not communicative, is boredom, sitting around waiting for the next client. Some workers blame their high level of smoking and drinking on this. For avid readers and students filling in time with an assignment, this is less of a problem, and may even be an advantage. But for some women, the parlour can be a lonely, tedious, stultifying environment relieved only by the occasional session with a client. Where intra-staff relations or relations between staff and management are strained, the confined space of the parlour can intensify disharmony and alienation, and a petty disagreement might trigger off months of tension and exacerbate an already explosive situation. While this sort of situation can arise in any workplace, in a brothel, where there is an atmosphere of sexual tension, anxieties about clients, perhaps anxieties about one's own role, and the constant fear of public exposure, strained industrial or staff relations will exaggerate events to such a level that resolution becomes impossible. This kind of situation can encourage an ex-streetwalker, who may have left the streets because of the daily hassles of visible prostitution, to return to the free-ranging life of street soliciting.

Escort work also takes place in a brothel which offers house or hotel calls. An available brothel worker will be sent by taxi or hired driver to the place designated by the client over the phone. It works much the same way for escorts attached to an agency independent of the brothel trade. In either case escorts split the take 50/50, but there is a better opportunity of obtaining a fat tip or "extras" from a satisfied client in the afterglow of a good night out.

Zoe is an escort worker for an agency. She describes the arrangement thus:

I would phone up and tell them I would be on call that night. Then I got dressed ready to go out, and sat home waiting for the phone to ring. They might ring from the agency and say there's a client at the Menzies Hotel, or whatever, a business man with a Bankcard for two hours at $125 an hour. I would catch a cab to the hotel, meet the client in the bar, fill in the Bankcard or take the money, phone through to the office to tell them I've arrived, have a drink with the client and go out or up to his room. Most of the work was fairly chatty, chatting about his business or silly small talk, do the job in his room, and then phone through after it to let them know I've finished.

Escort work can sound glamorous and exciting, especially with a client with a high public profile. But it can also be the most dangerous of all prostitution work, as Zoe points out:

The job risk is much higher than in parlours. You are very vulnerable in the client's room and have no control over the situation, which can be pretty frightening if things get nasty. You always let the client know that you have to phone the office before and after the job so that he is aware that you are being guarded. If you haven't phoned in an hour after you've told the office you've arrived when you are booked for an hour job, presumably they would send someone out looking for you. But meantime you could be dead.

What is referred to as "private prostitution" in Sydney is the equivalent to the work of the American "call girl". This is the most clandestine operation of the "professional" forms of prostitution. The most basic example is one or two women in a rented flat answering phone calls from clients (thus, the term "call girl") and making appointments to see them in the flat. The number of women involved in one such business can be as high as four or five. There are also situations where a person rents an apartment or house and hires a few women as "call girls". The owner-manager might take all incoming calls and arrange the appointments. Although this kind of arrangement has all the earmarks of privacy and exclusivity, and certainly no one is seen without an appointment, in structure it is more like a mini-parlour then an independent "call girl" business.

In October 1987 I estimated there were some 76 "private prostitution" businesses (see p.64), and taking two sources in September and November 1989 there were a total of about 161 "private" and escort operations. To gain an impression of numbers of private operations the advertisements in two major weekly publishing outlets for prostitute advertisers, viz. Naughty Sydney, 8 September 1989, and Wentworth Courier, 1 November 1989. Under the column heading of "Home Entertainments" in Naughty Sydney were 46 entries; but after eliminating all duplicate phone numbers the total left was 38 businesses. Under the column heading of "Escort Services" in Naughty Sydney were 62 entries; but after eliminating all duplicate phone numbers and the obvious parlour advertisements the total left was 44 businesses. Under the column heading of "Personal" in Wentworth Courier were 175 entries, but excluding those for "straight" massage, male escorts, "call boys" and obvious parlours, the total left was 102 businesses. Adding all three totals together (that's 38 + 44 + 102) the number of entries was 184; but after eliminating all phone numbers duplicated from one column to the next the final total is 161 businesses. Consideration, however, should be given to the probability of some businesses with two or more phone numbers which are impossible to determine by looking at the entries. It is likely that, if known, the elimination of these would reduce the total quite significantly. This estimation does not necessarily mean that the number of "call girls" has doubled, but, applying the "rule of thumb" approach of 1987, and comparing this with the decline in numbers of parlours, there does seem to be some correlation between the decrease in one and the increase in the other. Ignoring probable discrepancies due to some businesses with two or more telephone numbers, and what appears to be a much higher ratio of single workers in 1989 than in 1987, the calculated average of two workers per business decided on in the 1987 estimates will give us a total of 322 women, compared to only 152 in 1987. Since as many as 10 parlours have closed between 1986 and 1989, it might be argued that 170 more "call girls" in 1989 represents the shift of previous parlour workers into private operations. Such a calculation, however, especially without knowledge of actual individuals involved in this surmised relocation, should be treated with caution, and used as a guide to possible trends only. Can this mean that "private prostitution" has become more attractive to those "professional" prostitutes as business in general declines in the sex industry?

Private prostitution depends solely on advertisements for recruiting business. The amount of new business acquired through word of mouth is almost negligible and certainly not sufficient to maintain a business. The trick to advertising prostitution is not to be blatant so as to attract the law prohibiting the advertisement of commercial sex, yet to make it obvious to the male reader what the advertiser intends. This can be done without mentioning sexual services (which also contravenes the obscene publication law) nor prices because the implications are potent enough for the interested parties. Advertising prostitution is highly competitive and for the "call girl" totally dependent on it she has to offer a "personal service" in order to compete with the big parlours, and she must individualise her advertisement to attract the potential client searching for his special sexual fantasy in order to compete with other "call girls". The result is often highly imaginative text, coupled with wit and a childish prattle which seems to accompany the fantasies of male sexuality. Some advertisements pander to male fantasies for exotica, others to coquettishness, and yet others to a kind of adolescent or infantile sex romp. A few examples of the text of these advertisements will suffice to illustrate the point:

Exotica

Oriental Delights Excitingly different International ladies of your choice. Try our new Spanish and Indonesian delight

Mediterranean Magic New to Sydney, leggy attractive lady, black hair, fair skin and very, very friendly

Black is Beautiful So too is Santina Carribean Beauty Dark hair, dark skin with fabulous body and a soft, caring touch

Sex romps

Leeza is sweet and serene but will make your desires just sizzle with satisfaction. She adores dressing up and will fantasise beyond your wildest dreams.

I'm sensuous & seductive with an unsatiable desire for nice guys who want something different. You do?

Mature Lady has some spare time from the housework to entertain the weary businessman.

Bondage

Aunt Agatha. Good old fashioned discipline like Auntie used to give.

Obedient Stephanie needs a firm master to make her behave.

Naughty Michelle seeks firm headmaster.

Haute Classe

I am a sophisticated intelligent well-bred well spoken lady offering an opportunity for discreet executive to experience... a service in a class of its own.

Source: Wentworth Courier, 4 October & 1 November 1989.

The initial contact with the client is by the phone. He may be enquiring about prices, or just trying to find out if the woman on the other end sounds like his fantasy or suits his personality. It is this moment when the "call girl" needs to exercise all her skills at salesmanship, by coming across as pleasant, sexy and nice to be with, without giving too much away. After all, it might be a policeman on the other end and mentioning sex and prices could be construed as advertising. The most successful "call girls" are those with a pleasant disposition on the phone, a sense of wit and alluring. "Crank calls", curious schoolboys and "wankers" (men who telephone to derive sexual gratification from simply listening to a woman's voice) are non-profitable, and the "call girl" has to learn to distinguish these in order to deal with them quickly. While the advertisement might arouse a man's interest, the phone conversation has to make the woman irresistible because even after making an appointment some men fail to keep it. Many clients ring a number of "call girls" and then decide which they most like the sound of.

The "call girl" also needs to be skilful in evaluating her caller by his tone, expression and enquiries in case she invites a dangerous man to her place. But once this is done to her satisfaction and an appointment is made, the next step is to try to develop the new client into a regular. The business of the "call girl" turns over at a much slower rate than in a brothel, so she needs to cultivate a higher ratio of regular clientele. Men who prefer visiting a "call girl" to visiting a brothel are usually seeking more than sex; they are often looking for a female friend, companion or mistress. The "call girl" recognises this and acts the pseudo-mistress with her regular clients, so that she might have a number of mini-relationships going at the same time. The emotional strain of keeping such pretence going is much more draining than the brothel worker who sees her clients for the express purpose of sexually satisfying them. Although some clients in brothels do develop an attachment for certain women and this adds a strain in the relationship for the workers, the "call girl", from the first visit when the man arrives nervous and uncertain, must appear calm and amicable towards him even though she too might be secretly anxious, and thereafter as he becomes a weekly regular she has to maintain an intense level of intimacy with him. And, while she might be the only woman he has such intimacy with, she is on the same terms with as many as a dozen or more men. The streetwalker who refers to the "call girl" as a "lazy flatbacker" obviously has never been in her situation.

There are certain distinct advantages to the working life of the "call girl". Not the least of these, so far as she is concerned, is the anonymity of the work. Whereas the streetwalker is in public view for all to see, and the brothel worker is occasionally discovered by a man known to her, or worse, a member of her close family (like the Canberra parlour worker whose father walked into her workplace as a client), the "call girl" through the expediency of "sussing" a caller out on the telephone can usually detect anyone known to her. In any case, she can always spot a man who has made an appointment through the "peep-hole" in the door. "Call girls" are usually free agents, whose independence avoids the tensions of industrial relations and intra-staff conflicts sometimes experienced in brothels. Since much of their work is carried out in the daytime, a mother of young children can work as a "call girl" between say 10 a.m. and 4 p.m. by placing her children in a child-minding centre or creche as any working mother might. She does not have to abide by a roster system.

The chief disadvantage to working as an independent "call girl", especially if a woman decides to work alone, is the risk of violence. In spite of great skills at detecting a maniac on the phone a misjudgment sometimes occurs, and then the woman has to call upon all her powers of persuasion and remain calm in a potentially deadly situation if she is to escape injury. If this fails the results are sometimes fatal. The history of prostitution is filled with tragic situations when a woman is alone with a crazed misogynist, like Julie Plater, who was bashed to death on Christmas Eve, 1985, when she saw a man alone in a parlour in Harris Park, or of the horrifying death of the Kings Cross worker who saw a man alone and died with a leg of a chair shoved into her eye and brain.

The heavy dependence upon advertisements is another distinct disadvantage of running a private operation. If a newspaper in which an advertisement appears regularly suddenly decides to cease taking advertisements from prostitutes or deletes the "personal" column a "call girl's" business is drastically affected immediately. When the Manly Daily stopped running its "personal column" in 1986 the number of private operations on the North Shore rapidly declined almost overnight (although when another printed outlet was found some re-opened).

These then are the main types of prostitution carried out by "professional" prostitutes in Sydney. As stated at the beginning of this Section they do not differ much from similar operations in other western cities, and if they do differ noticeably it is usually in degree rather than kind. The famous "window" prostitution in Amsterdam, for instance, is not unlike the east Sydney brothels, except the Dutch prostitute sits behind a house window while the Sydney worker stands in a doorway. The women's attire, the male cruising, the bargaining, and closing curtains or door when busy are basically the same; the minor differences are but variations on a theme. Figures 4.1, 4.2 and 4.3 show the distribution of sex workers in the Sydney metropolitan region over recent years.

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