Facebook: The New Face of the World's Oldest Profession

Crankyjewishguy (CJG) often blogs about news stories he's read that involve professors and academics and the interesting, but often, shall we say, dubious research they pursue, but CJG really isn't sure what to make of this story. According to MSNBC.com, a Columbia University professor named Sudhir Venkatesh, whom CJG presumes is not Jewish, "spent a year gaining the trust of and tracking 290 prostitutes in New York to study the 'contrasts between old-world prostitutes and new-age sex workers.'" Wow, and they pay him for that?

CJG thought that by "old-world" it meant he was doing a historical comparison between, say, the Spanish prostitutes of Columbus's time and those of modern times, but that's apparently not the case. What he's studying is those who solicit business the old-fashioned way, by standing on dark corners in short skirts and low-cut tops and looking extremely available, for example, and those who are using Facebook, Craigslist and other new media to grow their business so to speak. In fact, according to Professor Venkatesh, 83% of the prostitutes he surveyed have a Facebook page which means CJG is going to be going back to his list of Facebook friends this afternoon and scrutinizing it very closely.

The new face of the world's oldest profession.

According to the good professor, in this day and age "no self-respecting cosmopolitan man looking for an evening of companionship is going to lean out his car window and call out to a woman at a traffic light." Right. If he's "self-respecting" he's going to troll the sex ads on Craigslist from the comfort of his own den while his wife and kids are upstairs sleeping. And the rise of new technology, says the professor, has made the trade "less risky and more lucrative," so much so that it has attracted "some middle-class women seeking quick tax-free income." Whoa! Good thing this guy doesn't work for H&R Block! CJG is pretty sure that the Internal Revenue Code does not exempt income earned from illegal activity from taxation (in fact, he just looked it up and he's right), though he's equally sure few actually declare it on their returns. Sorry, professor, tax free income is what you get from municipal bonds and certain mutual funds, not from turning tricks. Better stick to your field of expertise.

This is how today's discerning, cosmopolitan man arranges to pay for sex.