Just how common is escorting and males offering sex for money on the gay scene and is it increasing ?

Unfortunately, escorts are actually pretty rare nowadays, with the overall increase in standard of living and proliferation of social media.

30 years ago, young, twinks used to flood street corners selling delicious, clean ass for low prices. Nowadays, every professional gay escort wants to charge as much as possible on RM and other sites. And the college twinks on apps like Grindr are rarely persuaded by money. You have to work extra hard to spot the ones with financial trouble. The destruction of backpage and CL adult section was also a terrible blow to gay escorts.

The world is a darker, colder place.

Since there's one in the White House, it's obviously gone mainstream.

If you count cam-shows (doing solos, solos with sex toys, performing with someone else, etc.) it did increase.

If you count sugar daddy situations then it also increased.

Thanks to social media and hook-up apps we know a lot more about the strangers around us. Back in the old days you didn't know for sure what patrons did for a living unless you knew them already, talked with them, or they wore their actuall business / work clothes (and even in that case it could've been a disguise or part of a role play fetish).

It's our very own awareness to these things (thanks to social media and hook-up apps) that make them look like they have increased. Escorts and hustlers always existed (there even were so called dive bars that were "tagged" as places where you could find hustlers offering their services).

Good points made r4 although I would say such activity seems less taboo and shameful and more open than it was twenty odd years ago on the gay scene even if it isn't more widespread?

r3 Why do you think sugar daddy situations have increased? what is behind that change?

A thought: bars used to be where gays would go to socialize, get dates, one-night stands, etc.

But they don't go out as much because of apps.

But the (what?) over 35 and up crowd still have their watering holes, as well as watering holes they revisit -- is this simply a case of going where the clients are?

There still is a lot of this. It's very common among older guys or guys with money.

They simply don't want to waste the time. If you have a decent job, you can pay $100 or $200 easily and get your choice of guy. Since they only want sex, they have it and that is that.

If they go to a bar or even Grindr, they are liable to spend hours and hours looking and winding up with nothing.

R1, yes, the increase in the standard of living is just dreadful.

[quote] I would say such activity seems less taboo and shameful and more open than it was twenty odd years ago on the gay scene even if it isn't more widespread?

I agree that people are much more comfortable to admit that they embrace their sexuality and sexual desires. Just look at Folsom Street Fair. But imo that's the only thing that changed. People were always sexual beings behind closed doors, but didn't share that with others (sometimes not even with their spouses!). Sure, back then you may not have told your friends that you go to sex clubs or bathhouses (or hire hustlers and escorts) on a regular basis, but you still did it. Again the increase comes from your friends being aware of the fact that you're trolling sex clubs and bathhouses and eager to share how great or how bad it was (and how much better it was in the 'ol days).

The proliferation of Instahos and dating apps has completely removed the stigma about blatantly asking for money aka “gen”. If you read through a dozen or so Grindr profiles you will come across that term at least once, same with the Instahos. They are not subtle about it either. It’s endemic and only going to get worse since obviously it’s working. But a ho is a ho.

What does "gen" mean r11 ? Has gay for pay escorting increased in the era of fitness model instahos and do you think this is a good development?

I think there has been a huge increase in the past 10 years, and I believe it's mostly about economics and generations, much as DL hates to hear about Boomers etc.

2 cohorts ago, the silent generation, everybody was too closeted, and opportunities were few. Their children, the Boomers, were slinging ass for cash mostly in major cities in the 60s-70s. I think after that, the Boomers sublimated their desires by pursuing money, or they married and went into the closet.

Boomers were mostly willing to fuck their youthful peers, most of whom were doing well financially, so there wasn't as much of this daddy nonsense and little need for financial exchange. AIDS took out a bunch more guys. For a couple decades at least, from the mid-80s until the mid-2000s, I don't think there was a ton of hustling going on for these reasons - fucking peers and general sex paranoia.

I was one of the 90s hustlers, and I was popular, in part because there weren't many guys doing it, because my young generation (x) was much smaller than the older generation looking for sex (boomers). You had to be either real horny/kinky to want to hire a hustler, or you had to be in a rather difficult situation socially (closeted, isolated, lonely) in order to need the services of one.

By the 00s and 10s, things started changing a lot. Boomers were getting old, but they had Viagra. They weren't giving up on sex. Better nutrition and healthcare meant people were staying hard older. They had lots of disposable income. As has been discussed to death already, Boomers are a spoiled, self-centered and immature bunch. These types tend to want to hook up with youngsters, because arrested development.

In the earlier days (90s) of Gay.com, AOL, later A4A and Craigslist, there was hooking up, but not much hustling. In particular, gay.com and AOL would take down your profile if you used it for escorting. A post advertising oneself for rent was uncommon, and I lived in several medium to large US cities during this time. By the 00s, the Millennials were ripe for fucking, and were mostly fucking each other. But the eldertards went after them with gusto. (There may also have been a bit of a delay in eldergays adopting the ways of online dating.)

I remember rebuffing the eldergays. They were very pissed off about this. They demanded that people do as they want, and that includes sex - in my mind, Trump is a perfect example of an addled, spoiled Boomer. The millennials weren't doing real well financially. So the olds figured it out - they'd pay for sex from young people.

Where I was living at the time, this became a thing around 2010. The recession was still a problem. Many guys would advertise they were looking for work. But I'm sure they got offered sex. Soon the ads were blatantly asking for or offering sex for sale. A contractor I knew made more money fucking men and women than doing bathroom remodels. Remember that this was illegal activity and there was no precedent for publicly putting oneself out there as a john or hustler.

Nevertheless, soon it was understood law enforcement didn't care, and by 2012, roses, gen and daddy were all over Backpage, CL, and the apps.

[quote] I am not outraged or anything escort work is part of life and not to be judged in my opinion.

You would be exceptionally hypocritical if you felt otherwise, since you told us you were looking for escorts online.

Exactly R11. There are lots of men on apps and sites who are hookers. They are also at bars but word gets around or they will just flat out tell you.

It is also all about location. There’s rarely man ass for sale outside of major cities.

Many young guys on Grinder ask if you can be "generous".

R13 there were lots of guys into sex for pay in the 80s, 90s, and early 00s.

I have never paid for sex or been a hooker but I have friends who would pay for a female or male escort or both a woman and man or multiple men together while traveling since they wanted sex or had a kink and did not want to spend hours online or in bars. Some of my friends at one time in their lives were hookers and it was to make extra fast cash, or to pay for hard drugs either with sex with a dealer, or cash.

R16 I have lived in rural areas and there were men and women who were hookers online and you would meet them in bars where they would approach you and make it clear that they are hookers.

True R17. When Craigslist was around I would on ocassion place ads looking for men to jerk off with or maybe get oral sex from, and lots of men ages 18-30 would reply asking if I wanted to be "gen$" even though my ads said how I was not looking for escorts or anyone like that. On Facebook and Instagram you will find all sort of men and women who are "models" looking for clients to be gen or for $$$, etc.

We still have craigslist in the UK r19

What is the story behind it being banned in the US?

Mind you many of the ads which whilst clearly being about offering sexual services for benefits are carefully worded these days so as not to break any rules but they are still pretty endemic on the site.

R20 it was banned in North America because a lot of sex traffickers would solicit and pimp out underage victims on there in the personals sections.

The "gay scene"?

Was it the case that there was pimping R21, or was that the perception? Granted, I never looked in the hetero-focused sections, but there was certainly none of that going on in the gay sections. Mostly old men chatting up other old men.

Sadly, the UK no longer has CL. Nothing has replaced. Today's modern, self-employed escort tends to ask for big bucks, for some reason.

OP how often do you look at escort ads if you could recognize 6 (!) of them in public? Do you study faces for easy recognition?

Fortnightly r25

No I just have a good visual memory.

It was properly like that in my younger years except I did not realise as there was no internet escort ads then.But all the same I sense there is even less taboo than there used to be in the gay community about escorts ,sex for pay etc

The Uk does have craigslist r24 and the sexy ads are under services

There's one guy in my town (deep South) who trolls Grindr and calls himself "generous." He'll pay for your services or wine and dine you and your friends and then fuck you or have you fuck him. It seems like almost every gay guy between 18-35 has done something with him or allowed him to buy them something. He was trying to get me to do something with him for about a year, but something about him really creeped me out.

R23 apparently there was pimping and sex trafficking going on Craigslist and of course other sites, in the casual encounters, erotic services, and F for M sections.

He must be very wealthy though r28

Have you chatted with any of the local guys who have been with him? If so what did they say?

It's very common now. So many uneducated young men who never studied STEM and the like to make middle class livings. Easy money, and so many get Medicaid.

Yes, they say he's a bit skeevy. My friend said he took him up on his offer and then ended up at his house with a butt plug shoved up his ass (my friend doesn't do anal). I think he felt like he owed it to him after he bought him dinner. LOL! I've heard other stories that claim he's big into fisting. He's not a very attractive man. Seems to be in shape, but he has a fake that looks like the Joker or something - always Botoxed or something. I've been with my fair share of older men, but they're usually the Sam Elliot/Bruce Willis/Dennis Quaid types. They wear their age well and it makes them sexier. No free meal is worth having to take a butt plug or fist up the ass from a guy who looks like the Joker.

R31 even if someone has one of the many degrees in STEM for a lot of jobs the competition is crazy since a lot of people have those degrees. A hetero friend of mine has an IT degree from a good university, and at one point he was going to quit his job when he just had started for a stupid reason but I said how he shouldn't do that, and he is doing well and likes his job and considers himself lucky that he has a well paying job in IT that's not been outsourced. Another friend that's hetero is a computer engineer and with his job for a well known company they wanted to outsource his job and have him move to India so he found work at a different company.

R28 and R32 avoid getting with that guy, unless you want a stretched out man hole? 😂🍆👊

Did the number of escorts go up in the aftermath of the 2008 financial crash?

No idea R35? I am not sure if there's a way to tell this? On apps and sites I have seen lots of men in their very early 20s who claim to be doctors, or in med school, and if someone is really a doctor or in med school to be a doctor, they will be extremely busy, and it is extremely stressful being in med school, studying for MCAT, and being in residency.