Kinky Sex on the Dockside?

Though you might think that all sex workers are sexually adventurous, many dockside sugar girls cling to a host of idiosyncratic sexual taboos. Some refuse oral sex, others kissing, and most balk at anal play. (These taboos can change if they're drunk or high, though.)

One reason for their "conservatism" is because, in Cape Town, they come from Christian and Muslim households where sex is fraught with ambivalence. So the women bring their anxieties about sex with them to their work. However, in contrast to other sectors (like escorting) where men expect to enjoy "no limits" sexual service, sugar girls can hold on to their taboos because their foreign seafaring clients often don't demand anything more than conventional intercourse.

Indeed, most dockside encounters never go into the realm of fantasy, like playing roles, wearing costumes or using artificial devices. Those sorts of situations are usually found in other sex sectors that are dominated by local and international whites.

For instance, one of dockside prostitutes I interviewed used to occasionally service European tourists. But she said that, compared to the seamen’s rather traditional tastes, these white johns were quite kinky.

One time she went with a German guy. After eating a big meal together at a Chinese restaurant, he took her to a hotel where the coffee tables in each room were made of glass. After they stripped for sex, he asked her to straddle the table so that he could lie below her and look up at her naked butt. Then he asked her to dump her bowels on top of the glass so that he could masturbate while he watched.

She couldn’t believe the request. But once he forked over a few thousand rands for the pleasure, she simply straddled the table and shat her sweet ‘n sour pork all over the show.

It was one of the strangest experiences in this lady's sexual career. But the more that she interacted with white tourists, the more she realized that these men were seeking unusual experiences, not just sex. One guy gave her a "golden shower" while she was in the bath-tub: he got a thrill from peeing on her.

And another fellow yelled out his own son's name while she was giving him a blow job.

Of course, human sexuality is incredibly diverse and complex. But that complexity seems to narrow in certain prostitution sectors. For while some men purposefully seek out prostitutes to make their wildest fantasies come true, the seafarers seem to be content with "conventional" sexual encounters.

Part of the reason for this, I suspect, is that the seafarers seek out sugar girls for more than just sex. They also crave companionship and conversation. The women provide this at the nightclubs, by hanging out with their men for hours: drinking, dancing, and chatting together. Thus sex is just one of many services the dockside prostitutes provide. It is part of a larger package of social amusements. The women can maintain their conservative (though promiscuous) sexual boundaries because the men will still be satisfied and will still pay.

Gentle vs. Grabby Sailors

Foreign sailors who go to dockside nightclubs in Durban tend to treat the club prostitutes with greater respect than the sailors in Cape Town. None act violently toward the women, but the seafarers who berth in Cape Town tend to handle the ladies more possessively than their counterparts in Durban. They are "grabby" in comparison. Why?

I think four reasons explain this difference:

Numbers: 60-80 women regularly solicit from the sole remaining seamen's club in Durban. The ladies often equal or outnumber the 50-100 sailors who arrive at the club each evening. This makes for a relatively relaxed atmosphere for the men. They rarely have to compete against each other for a woman's attention. Partners are usually available.

But in Cape Town, only 40-60 women (in total) regularly solicit from 3 dockside clubs. Relative to the 60-130 men per evening, the ladies are in short supply. On some occasions, the imbalance is extreme. Add alcohol to the mix and some men get anxious they may not get a companion for the evening. This inspires them to act possessively with the women. They sometimes grab or grope the ladies on the dance floor or as they pass by. It signifies a desperate attempt to get the women's attention in what is clearly a solicitor's market.

Time: In Durban, the guys are literally "here today, gone tomorrow." Because they are on container ships that have rapid turn-around times in the harbor, the typical solicitation cycle with a sailor is one night. If a guy acts rude during the evening, the women can just ignore him and focus on other men. They need not cater to him any further.

But in Cape Town, the sailors typically work on deep-sea fishing trawlers that berth in Cape Town for spells of 5-30 days. These men come to the clubs every night they're in town. The women do not feel they can snub the rude men because, within a few days, they may become valuable clients. The women do not want to close the door on any guys because, given their long stays in port, they may become sources of money in the future.

Frequency: Most sailors in Durban visit the port a few times in their lives. Or perhaps just once. They rarely go there on a consistent basis.

But in Cape Town, the trawlermen return multiple times during their South Atlantic voyages. They typically visit Cape Town every 4 months during their two-year contract. (Then they go home, get another contract, and start the sequence again.) They may be regular callers for years. This encourages the women to see solicitation as a long-term strategic process. Thus, they put up with a man's touchiness because they don't want to lose access to him as a potential client. Any of the guys might become repeat-clients for many years, a prospect too good to ignore.

Class Status: Durban is Africa's premier container port. Most seafarers who work on container vessels are middle-class or middle-class aspirant. Thus they tend to be rule-followers who behave themselves overseas. They're rarely troublemakers with locals (unlike the old cargo ship salts of yore).

But in Cape Town, most of the sailors are East Asian trawlermen, drawn from the poorer sections of China, Vietnam, Indonesia, and the Philippines (while the wealthier officers come from Japan, Taiwan & Korea). The women say that these guys party harder, have a tougher work life, and are less refined in their flirtations than the container ship seamen. They see the trawlermen as having "lower class" standards of interpersonal relations.

Thankfully, this touchiness is never violent, even if it is annoying. Cape Town's dockside prostitutes say that they do not face client violence like streetwalkers often do. But the women do wish that the trawlermen would act gentler with them like the container ship crews.

The Problem with Local "Johns"

Cape Town: Last night a local drunk guy stumbles into a dockside nightclub. Not many sailors around and the ladies are restless for business. The owner lets the drunk man in, hoping that he might spend some money on the girls.

Half-an-hour later—as I'm talking to the owner downstairs—the drunk comes skidding down the stairs head-first. He slams into the opposite wall of the stairwell. The bouncer stomps down the steps behind him. He takes a look at the crumpled heap and grabs him by the collar to haul him outside. He roughly deposits the drunk on the sidewalk, giving him a final slap across the face for good measure.

One of the prostitutes comes down the stairs and says that the guy had been cursing the girls and verbally abusing the staff. The bouncer asked him to leave, but he persisted. Then the bouncer clapped across the face and sent him tumbling down the stairs. To all of this, the owner doesn't even blink.

Violence in this context isn't uncommon, but this particular scene reveals some unique aspects of dockside prostitution.

At "seamen's clubs"—where local ladies solicit sailors for business—drunk men are everywhere. And for the most part, they're harmless. But if a local guy comes around, there can be problems.

Local guys don't feel welcome at dockside clubs. They're surrounded by foreign sailors and the local women aren't interested in them. Though they're in "their own" country, they get the distinct feeling that they don't belong. This can piss some guys off, especially if they're drunk. So they mouth off at everyone—going on about "this is South Africa!" and "you girls are just whores!"—but then the bouncers sort them out.

One of the reasons why local women solicit at dockside nightclubs is so they don't have to work with local men. The women can protect their privacy and anonymity by going with seafarers who have no impact beyond the dockside. Locals, though, can hassle them within and beyond the clubs. And, according to the women, they're more likely than sailors to throw it in their face that they're prostitutes. So the ladies tend to ignore locals (unless they demonstrate that they're really generous and really cool).

Male Needs & Prostitution Sectors

The needs and constraints of sex-buying men determine the logic and structure of the different prostitution sectors. Though most analyst's focus on female sellers, it is the johns who actually determine the shape of each prostitution niche.

For instance, the dockside sex sector caters explicitly to the needs and constraints of transient foreign seamen. Their transience and foreignness, as well as their work life and social demands, forces prostitutes to accommodate them in certain ways. Truck-stop women cater to truckers who also have special work-related constraints. Courtesans cater to international businessmen. Call-girls cater to local middle- and upper-class men. It is not that the women who dictate the profile of the sector; they participate in a sector that is already structured around the needs of men. It's a case of sellers meeting the buyers' demands.

So what are the sailors' needs and constraints? How might they compare to johns' needs of other sectors?

SAFETY: Foreign sailors are particularly vulnerable to local predators who can take advantage of their relative ignorance of the city. They can rob, abuse, or injure them. Thus sailors demand safe places for their social and sexual recreation. Without safety and security, they will not proceed with sexual negotiations.

From the 1970s, dockside nightclubs have provided a safe space for foreign seamen to drink and socialize with their mates, to enjoy the companionship of local women through dancing and conversation, and to engage in negotiations with a women for a post-club tryst. (Before this time, brothels were more common for dockside sexual recreation, but due to the containerization of cargo which obliterated the traditional dockside community—and the declining numbers of seamen—downtown nightclubs have become the norm.) The clubs maintain the safety of the sailors by discouraging local men from entering and by enforcing strict rules against theft and violence (by sailors and women).

Safety concerns are not a high priority for men in other sectors because they are rarely targets of abuse. The women are.

SOCIAL OPPORTUNITIES: Sailors usually arrive at the clubs in groups with a crucial social agenda: male-bonding. Nightclubs recognize the importance that sailors place on creating affective bonds outside the workplace. It enhances their trust, esprit de corps, and teamwork capacity when they're back on the ship. So the clubs give them a space to drink, dance, sing, shoot pool, watch TV, call home, etc. They can enjoy camaraderie with their mates while tasting the pleasures of female companionship.

The women who solicit from them must accommodate their activities to this larger need. This is not a problem. For the men, success with females—even if they are prostitutes and, by definition, available for hire—has long been a staple of male bonding. So most of the women's efforts actually complements the male-bonding sessions at the club.

OTHER SECTORS: In contrast to foreign sailors, local curb-crawlers who pick up streetwalkers (usually in cars) do not strive for safety or social opportunities. They already enjoy safety. And they prefer to roam solo. Their nocturnal dalliance is explicitly focused on finding a sexually available woman and having sex with her. Curb-crawlers have a more concentrated view of what he wants from a prostitute: streetwalkers strip their services to the bare minimum to accommodate these sex-buyers. No need for a brothel, a club, a male-bonding situation, or sophisticated conversation for them: just a body to satisfy their sexual urges.

Guys who seek instant availability and a level of discretion often choose brothels. Then they do not have to drive the women around (like curbcrawlers), take them to their homes (curbcrawlers, sometimes), don't have to socialize with men (like sailors), nor engage in conversation. They don't want the hassle of wooing a woman at a normal nightclub because that can imply relationship entanglements which he seeks to avoid. The brothel offers available women behind closed doors.

All of this is to say that different prostitution sectors cater to the needs and constraints of sex-buying males. It is important to understand this when considering prostitution and the role that women play within it.