Falling for a Provider
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Re: Here: THESE were the two choices:
To my two possible interpretations
The first possibility is that you are essentially stating an element of your definition of friendship, namely that it is an essential (as opposed to merely conventional) feature of friendship that both people are devoting time to the relationship purely for the value of the relationship itself. The second possibility is that you believe that the exchange of money between the two people makes sincere feelings of companionship or general affection (or whatever feelings one normally associates with friendship) impossible or very difficult...essentially that the commercial aspect prevents a real friendship from forming.
your entire reply consisted of
If we were playing "Gotcha!", I'd claim to have scored a point now...the "for the record" bit now seems more significant!
Of course, that is not what we are doing, so I now gather that you did not mean your original claim in either of the two ways I enumerated.
I guess that I still don't exactly understand what you meant by your original claim; it seems to me to be a somewhat vague and shifting combination of several things - partly a matter of principle/definition (friends shouldn't/don't charge friends for companionship), partly an inference about her feelings (she wouldn't charge you if she was really your friend), partly a matter of what a guy can claim know for sure about her feelings (it can't be regarded as friendship until after the payments stop but the companionship continues), partly a matter of conventionality (friends compensating each other for companionship is essentially unknown in other contexts), partly some sort of weird philosophical issue which might be called the Schrodinger's cat of provider friendship (it retroactively appears when you stop paying her and she continues seeing you), partly a matter of the overlap or lack thereof between the sex and the companionship, and so forth...
I am left a bit dizzy too, trying to sort it all out, but I will make at least one more post trying to say a little more clearly, at least, how I see it.
-Ww
To my two possible interpretations
The first possibility is that you are essentially stating an element of your definition of friendship, namely that it is an essential (as opposed to merely conventional) feature of friendship that both people are devoting time to the relationship purely for the value of the relationship itself. The second possibility is that you believe that the exchange of money between the two people makes sincere feelings of companionship or general affection (or whatever feelings one normally associates with friendship) impossible or very difficult...essentially that the commercial aspect prevents a real friendship from forming.
your entire reply consisted of
If we were playing "Gotcha!", I'd claim to have scored a point now...the "for the record" bit now seems more significant!
Of course, that is not what we are doing, so I now gather that you did not mean your original claim in either of the two ways I enumerated.
I guess that I still don't exactly understand what you meant by your original claim; it seems to me to be a somewhat vague and shifting combination of several things - partly a matter of principle/definition (friends shouldn't/don't charge friends for companionship), partly an inference about her feelings (she wouldn't charge you if she was really your friend), partly a matter of what a guy can claim know for sure about her feelings (it can't be regarded as friendship until after the payments stop but the companionship continues), partly a matter of conventionality (friends compensating each other for companionship is essentially unknown in other contexts), partly some sort of weird philosophical issue which might be called the Schrodinger's cat of provider friendship (it retroactively appears when you stop paying her and she continues seeing you), partly a matter of the overlap or lack thereof between the sex and the companionship, and so forth...
I am left a bit dizzy too, trying to sort it all out, but I will make at least one more post trying to say a little more clearly, at least, how I see it.
-Ww
That's the answer to your question about "who would order you to leave your wife" and "who would make love exclusive." I know this isn't a fun topic for here, but you did ask.
However, that's entirely beside the point I was making ... uh, last week. It is possible to love more than one person, and maybe you do. My point was that she doesn't.
[/i](I apologize for coming back to this thread so late. I've been offline for a few days.)[/i]
However, that's entirely beside the point I was making ... uh, last week. It is possible to love more than one person, and maybe you do. My point was that she doesn't.
[/i](I apologize for coming back to this thread so late. I've been offline for a few days.)[/i]
It's the slow ambiguous evolution
Perhaps I can better illuminate our different starting points as follows:
When you say
or jm says
I do actually understand your basic point. If one of my conventional friends suddenly started asking to be paid for his/her time socializing with me, I would of course be shocked and cease to regard it as a friendship (in addition to refusing to pay!). Similarly, if I spent social time with a provider and she then proceeded to carefully calculate the cost of her time...including discounts for longer dates, regular customers and perhaps a different rate for social time vs private time...and gave/told me the bill, I would not consider it a real friendship, however she behaved otherwise. You guys are imagining such clear, black and white, cases of being charged for companionship, I suppose.
However, in my experience with providers as friends, that is just not what happens. You start out paying for both sex and social time explicitly, perhaps very explicitly, but gradually over time the whole situation becomes much more ambiguous and ill defined. How much you offer to pay, how much she seems to expect, to what extent you are getting a more and more discounted rate vs just being off the clock altogether, whether it is because she enjoys your company or just greatly values your business or a combination of the two, whether it makes a difference if you or she suggests an activity or meeting, and on and on...all get extremely mixed up and unclear. It can feel like walking on egg shells and is often quite confusing. Most likely it looks equally messy from her perspective. You have to feel your way together, either by discussing the issues directly or by sort of indirect signaling (which women generally like better I think), through a long evolution from impersonal commercial companionship (with sex) to a real friendship (with or without sex). It can be a trip and a half, if you have the stomach for it.
This is all quite different from other friendships...which never have a commercial phase from which they must somehow emerge, and conventional ideas about friendship are of limited relevance.
My take on it is that you have to relax, toss out your definitions and preconceptions about the nature of friendship, trust your feelings/instincts but also keep your wits and street smarts about you to make sure that you are not being exploited. Again, she needs to do much the same thing. So, for me at least, she is my friend if I feel about her as I feel about a friend and can see that it is reciprocal. I pay minimal attention to the money issues and give them as little weight as possible; oddly enough, this seems to cause them to fade away more rapidly.
-Ww
Perhaps I can better illuminate our different starting points as follows:
When you say
or jm says
I do actually understand your basic point. If one of my conventional friends suddenly started asking to be paid for his/her time socializing with me, I would of course be shocked and cease to regard it as a friendship (in addition to refusing to pay!). Similarly, if I spent social time with a provider and she then proceeded to carefully calculate the cost of her time...including discounts for longer dates, regular customers and perhaps a different rate for social time vs private time...and gave/told me the bill, I would not consider it a real friendship, however she behaved otherwise. You guys are imagining such clear, black and white, cases of being charged for companionship, I suppose.
However, in my experience with providers as friends, that is just not what happens. You start out paying for both sex and social time explicitly, perhaps very explicitly, but gradually over time the whole situation becomes much more ambiguous and ill defined. How much you offer to pay, how much she seems to expect, to what extent you are getting a more and more discounted rate vs just being off the clock altogether, whether it is because she enjoys your company or just greatly values your business or a combination of the two, whether it makes a difference if you or she suggests an activity or meeting, and on and on...all get extremely mixed up and unclear. It can feel like walking on egg shells and is often quite confusing. Most likely it looks equally messy from her perspective. You have to feel your way together, either by discussing the issues directly or by sort of indirect signaling (which women generally like better I think), through a long evolution from impersonal commercial companionship (with sex) to a real friendship (with or without sex). It can be a trip and a half, if you have the stomach for it.
This is all quite different from other friendships...which never have a commercial phase from which they must somehow emerge, and conventional ideas about friendship are of limited relevance.
My take on it is that you have to relax, toss out your definitions and preconceptions about the nature of friendship, trust your feelings/instincts but also keep your wits and street smarts about you to make sure that you are not being exploited. Again, she needs to do much the same thing. So, for me at least, she is my friend if I feel about her as I feel about a friend and can see that it is reciprocal. I pay minimal attention to the money issues and give them as little weight as possible; oddly enough, this seems to cause them to fade away more rapidly.
-Ww
Re: THE question
Thinking about this, I'm not sure I agree with either statement. I suspect there's a normal distribution of sorts, with middle-market indies being more likely to fall in love with clients. The high-end indies may be more likely to shark guys out of their funds. I mean, I just don't know that a $600 hr whore is more likely to be looking for love than a $300 one.
Of course, being a cheapskate myself who has never spent more than $400 on a session, I really don't know what I'm talking about here. I may be expressing a genetically engineered sense of class warfare.
Thinking about this, I'm not sure I agree with either statement. I suspect there's a normal distribution of sorts, with middle-market indies being more likely to fall in love with clients. The high-end indies may be more likely to shark guys out of their funds. I mean, I just don't know that a $600 hr whore is more likely to be looking for love than a $300 one.
Of course, being a cheapskate myself who has never spent more than $400 on a session, I really don't know what I'm talking about here. I may be expressing a genetically engineered sense of class warfare.
Re: Re: THE question
Well, I don't really know either. My logic was that high end ladies see a smaller number of clients and can thus put more effort into developing an individualized commercial relationship with each...such "personalized" commercial relationships seem more likely to evolve into non-commercial ones. Also, the clients of upscale ladies are probably more likely to be able to afford the extended dates that are required (or at least very useful) for a deeper relastionship to develop.
-Ww
Well, I don't really know either. My logic was that high end ladies see a smaller number of clients and can thus put more effort into developing an individualized commercial relationship with each...such "personalized" commercial relationships seem more likely to evolve into non-commercial ones. Also, the clients of upscale ladies are probably more likely to be able to afford the extended dates that are required (or at least very useful) for a deeper relastionship to develop.
-Ww
I think this is bullshit.
I have a friend who is an accountant. I've known this guy since we were 9 years old. We used to be altar boys together. He was one of my groomsmen. We literally grew up together.
When he does my taxes, I pay him for his time. It's the honorable thing to do. Otherwise, I'm taking advantage of him. And friends don't take advantage of other friends.
In short, I guess I'm repeating what slinky says, and making it clear that I'm paying for sex. The relationship is something different. Although it does make the paid sex more intense at times. Which is nice.
I have a friend who is an accountant. I've known this guy since we were 9 years old. We used to be altar boys together. He was one of my groomsmen. We literally grew up together.
When he does my taxes, I pay him for his time. It's the honorable thing to do. Otherwise, I'm taking advantage of him. And friends don't take advantage of other friends.
In short, I guess I'm repeating what slinky says, and making it clear that I'm paying for sex. The relationship is something different. Although it does make the paid sex more intense at times. Which is nice.
I have worked with many different people in the years I have been working, and have become friends with many of them. When we were seperated at work the friendships also seemed to end. While you are seeing a provider, one you see on a regular basis, I feel there is a friendship there similar to that in the workplace. I am sure that friendship pretty well ends when you stop seeing her. There are so many different types of friendships that it is hard to be able to say you can never be friends with a provider.
Re: Re: Re: THE question
Of course women providing personalized sessions are also more likely to have developed strong emotional boundaries and second selves. If you are only paid to 'lie there', I think you don't worry so much about emotional protection. So, if you can actually manage to engage a low market providor in personal conversation, my experience has been that you don't really have to worry about any masks.
Of course women providing personalized sessions are also more likely to have developed strong emotional boundaries and second selves. If you are only paid to 'lie there', I think you don't worry so much about emotional protection. So, if you can actually manage to engage a low market providor in personal conversation, my experience has been that you don't really have to worry about any masks.
Sure, you pay your accountant friend to do accounting. And you pay your commercial sex friend to do commercial sex. But would you pay either to just hang out with you?
JL's point wasn't that you couldn't pay a friend for sex (an issue that I'm frankly surprised hasn't shown up). His point was that a friend wouldn't demand payment for doing friend-like like things. There is absolutely no reason why you should expect your friend to do your taxes. Put it another way, your accountant friend hangs out with you (for free) when he isn't doing accounting work for you. Does your commercial sex 'friend' hang out with you (for free) when she isn't fucking you?
Or let's take it even one step further. Your accountant friend would continue to spend time with you (for free) if you never hired him to do your taxes again. Would your commercial sex friend be happy to spend time with you (for free) if you never paid her to fuck you again?
JL's point wasn't that you couldn't pay a friend for sex (an issue that I'm frankly surprised hasn't shown up). His point was that a friend wouldn't demand payment for doing friend-like like things. There is absolutely no reason why you should expect your friend to do your taxes. Put it another way, your accountant friend hangs out with you (for free) when he isn't doing accounting work for you. Does your commercial sex 'friend' hang out with you (for free) when she isn't fucking you?
Or let's take it even one step further. Your accountant friend would continue to spend time with you (for free) if you never hired him to do your taxes again. Would your commercial sex friend be happy to spend time with you (for free) if you never paid her to fuck you again?
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