Patrons wait patiently outside the 'Sweetie Shop' where each Friday, the attraction is Diamond, one of 15 male sex workers in Jamaica who perform sex for audiences at adult clubs.
LIKE MOST businesses, the sex industry in Jamaica has been changing to accommodate the demands of its clients. Sex workers and club owners who continue to offer the traditional menu of girls dancing around poles only, may find themselves out of business.
With access to information regarding sex industries in other countries, those in the business are finding it necessary to come up with new and exciting means of keeping and attracting clients. This has given rise to a burgeoning male sex industry resulting in more female clients, massage parlours, movie deals and the newest addition, live sex on stage.
MORE MALES SELLING SEX
The 2004 'Knowledge, Attitude, Practice and Behaviour Survey', commissioned by the Ministry of Health, showed a significant increase in males who sell sex. In 2000, males in the age group 15-24 years accounted for two per cent of the sex worker population. This increased to six per cent in 2004. The increase in males aged 25-49 was even more significant, moving from a low of 1.2 per cent in 2000 to 15 per cent of the sex worker population.
"This is most worrying among males 25-49 years and here, one is forced to reflect on the phenomenal growth in advertised massage parlours in recent years," the report stated.
GROWING INDUSTRY
"The (adult entertainment business) is recognised as a growing industry and like any other business, there is competition. Freaky Nights are a feature in almost all the nightclubs, pushing at the barriers and boundaries. It is a marketplace where people buy sex and the service," Boris Bloomfield, Prevention Coordinator for Vulnerable Populations, at the Ministry of Health, explained.
He said the Ministry of Health is aware that live sex on stage is part of the activities at some nightclubs.
SELLING SEX FOR A LIVING
Diamond, 33 years old, sells sex for a living. He claims he is one of five 'professional' male sex workers in Jamaica who perform sexual acts on stage. Once per week, on Friday nights, he works at a nightclub in the Corporate Area. He earns up to $10,000 for performing sex on stage. If he has sex with one woman, he earns $5,000. However, that figure is doubled if he participates in a threesome, that is, has sexual intercourse with two women during the same session. The live sex sessions last for one hour.
Diamond says he started having sex in front of an audience in 1988 at a club in Spanish Town. He boasted that he was the first man to have done so in Jamaica. In 1989, he stopped performing on the request of his son's mother, whom he met at a dance. He said their relationship lasted until 2000, when she walked out on him. Left on his own, with his young son who was three years old at the time, he returned to the nightclub circuit and has not looked back. Since 2000, he has worked at several clubs in Clarendon, Kingston and St. Andrew. He claimed he turned down an invitation to perform at a nightclub in Ocho Rios on Tuesday nights, as he wants to be home that night in St. Catherine with his son, who is now nine years old.
"I have to get him ready for school in the mornings, so if I worked on Tuesday nights, he would miss school on Wednesdays and I don't want him to miss school," he explained.
Stories courtesy of Panoscope, a series of the Panos Institute of the Caribbean.
HIV and the sex trade
WHY IS it important to target sex work settings with HIV prevention and care initiatives?
In many places, sex work settings are characterised by high rates of partner change, low rates of condom use, unsafe sex and high rates of sexually-transmitted infections (STIs). Consequently, the risk of HIV infection is often high and the virus can quickly spread through sexual networks encompassing sex workers, clients, regular partners and associated lovers, spouses and children. Furthermore, some sex workers or clients may be involved in additional types of risky behaviour, such as drug use by injection.
VULNERABILITY
In many places, underlying economic and socio-cultural factors cause vulnerability to HIV. These factors - which may operate indirectly - are related to the low status of women, a lack of educational or economic opportunities, and local attitudes to sex and sexuality which create a market for sex work while simultaneously stigmatising those involved in it.
In addition, the social and legal status of sex work can create situations in which sex workers have little control over the conditions in which they work, and as well as present barriers to the use of health and social welfare services. At the same time, the stigma and fear commonly associated with HIV contribute to a reluctance to come forward for HIV-related services.
COMPETITIVE AND ISOLATED
The internal structure of the sex industry may also increase vulnerability to HIV and hinder sex workers' ability to protect themselves. Sex work can be competitive and isolated, making it difficult to maintain social or family links. Working conditions can be highly exploitative, leaving individual sex workers with limited power over their lives. Vulnerability is highest where sex workers are isolated from mainstream society and where they lack internal solidarity and their own social support networks. In such circumstances, the capacity for community action around health and other issues may be low.
Together, these various social, legal, interpersonal and epidemiological factors create the conditions in which HIV and STIs rapidly spread.
