Rachael Simpson

I spend a lot of time on social networks. I’m on facebook A LOT. Its not all mindless quizzes, I’ve spent some time abroad and like to keep up with my friends in different times zones, also I have a lot of ambitious friends who have moved abroad for work or, with the luckier ones, love.

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Also I’m at an age where many of my friends are going through big life changes, buying homes, having babies, getting married and social networks let me see the photos, watch the videos and read the blogs.

Facebook and twitter are probably the two biggest contenders for my attention. Twitter I use for news and to speak with fellow journalism students. Facebook is more social and friendship related things. So far I have still not found the perfect networking tool for family. Although a friend of mine claims he has – with a password entry only personal website where he updates from Thailand to his family in the UK, however at this stage its a onesided medium.

I recently joined googlewave after an invite from Cristiana, but she is my only google friend and I haven’t really figured out what to do with it yet.

Anyway, network sites are everywhere and people really do use them, from Linkd In for prospective employers to bebo’s youthful charm and colour – they are the biggest digital game in town.

So what better way to investigate social sites than by setting up my own! I have set up a group using ning.com which allows you to format the page anyway you want, put up media content, have discussions and blogs and members with their own profiles. I called it Music In Glasgow and so far I have one member, me.

Maybe people will join, I hope they do. The site is dedicated to any and all live music in Glasgow and I’m still experiementing with it.

Just caught the end of Stepford Wives and it got me thinking about how womens roles have changed in the last 40 years. Well I think about it quite often but specifically women and their careers. Stepford Wives came out in 1972, a time when feminism was beginning to explode and a time unlike any before in terms of women and their careers.

During the second world war many women took up posts to provide support for the war effort. They took over the jobs the men could no longer do as they were off fighting. After the war, women didn’t want to go home, they didn’t want to give up working, they gained some respect from their years of service but its taken a long time for us to make our way into the work force on equal terms.

Pay is still not equal however, women still earn less than men. An interesting article on Americas history is here.

A show I particularly love is Mad Men (set in the 60’s at the fictional Sterling Cooper advertising company) and I really enjoy the way women are represented and the casual sexism of the time period which is neither overdone nor ignored, it fits the reality.

Flame haired sex bomb of the Ad office is Joan Holloway, head of the secretaries, comfortable in her own sexuality and happy to use it to get on with her life. For many years she enjoys her independence. She is ridiculed by the rest of the typing pool when they realise she’s over 30 and still working. Given the opportunity to cover some TV research work she shines but is quickly replaced when a suitable man is found. Joan doesn’t fight for her corner, though hurt by this oblivious rejection, this is just the way men act towards women and she simply accepts it. Joan later becomes engaged to an abusive doctor although she pretends to be content and desire a housewifely life, she also shows signs of wanting a career and continuing her independent life but doesn’t see it as a viable option in the long run.

The show is a fascinating watch and the male characters just as engaging in their stories.

Woman today should be on a level playing field, and should be judged equally along side men, who ever best for the job, it should be a fair fight between us both. We should be well beyond affirmative action. Individuals should be valued for their skills and unique abilities, but at the same time, you’re always going to laugh or make jokes at the group which is similar but different from you so I wouldn’t expect jokes about men and women to go away, I just would hope that when people make them, they realise it IS a joke. PC behaviour doesn’t solve problems, it just masks them. Education is the real cure.

So often recently I read stories with research into ‘working mother syndrome’ where children suffer because their mothers have careers. Fathers are excluded from these studies, no-one seems to worry about the absence of a male role model – which is surprising given the amount of male emasculation happening within advertising and current lack of strong male role models in the public domain, perhaps another blog on that! Male parenting is just as vital. With the recession, mothers who have taken a career break to raise young children are finding it harder and hard to get back into work. If a woman has the luxury of choosing whether to work or stay at home then I think either decision should be supported.

I personally subscribe to the theory that it takes a village to raise a child so finding a balance between yourself, your partner (or simply the other parent), friends and extended family is what needs to happen.

While woman have remarkable talents you can’t be mother, lover, cook and career girl all at the same time, you need to be yourself first and foremost. Pressure on women is enormous if you look at magazines, I’m 26 and according to cosmo, by the time I’m 30 I should be married, have a mortgage, a career promotion or two, have run a marathon and also maybe have a kid on the way – not a bad plan by any stretch, but should I feel like a failure if I’m don’t do it that way?

Life is not by numbers, things will happen as they happen – Christine’s story about older engagements is proof of that!

The only person a woman should answer to is herself, life is to be lived, suffered and enjoyed.

The area I live in is adjacent to a marvelously colourful area full of local character, the international financial district. In this cultural hub you will find the most delightful casinos, prostitutes and drunken rabble rousers. My flats are directly through this patch and thus to get home or go to work I must walk through this part of town or face a much longer walk through a no less savoury set of streets to reach my destination. Being a poor student and part time night club bar attendant, taxis are not a viable option due to my financial instability and public transport is not particularly cheap or local to my desired locations. But what I do have is a pair of sturdy legs and lots of near worn out shoes, thus I walk, everywhere.

As a young woman I realise there is a risk to walking at night, or even during the day, unaccompanied in a busy city. However much I feel strong and confident or feel I have a right to walk where I need to or feel well versed in self defense; the fact I must accept is that I fall into a category of people who are frequently attacked. The issue of violence against women in Scotland and particularly Glasgow is one I will come to later in this blog, at the moment I wish to focus on another area I mentioned earlier – prostitutes and soliciting.

Ladies of the night are common characters in literature and TV shows. Their portrayal ranges from heart of gold mother figures to down and out drug abusers to femme fatale nymphomaniacs. The ones I’ve seen and had extremely brief monosyllabic interactions with when passing through their “office” seem to fit none of these stereotypes (though the drugs issue in Central Scotland cannot be ignored). The ones I am familiar with stand on particular street corners and ask passing males if they are interested in ‘business’ in return when a ‘client’ is looking for a prostitute he asks if a woman is ‘working?’. Seems very formal to me for the exchange of such an intimate act but then again I’m not sure how you would phrase it otherwise. Its not a casual meeting or relationship, it’s an exchange of services, a transaction. At least this is the definition I have heard from men I know who have experience of this world. For my part I can not ever imagine what it would be like to use yourself as the tool of your trade. It could be said that its not just a trade of a physical act for money but also an emotional one, which is the same as many other professions. I think ‘oh I could never do that, I couldn’t bring myself to do that’ the very idea fills me with horror, but I’m speaking from a privileged position, I have the resources to study, a career in mind, family to support me a have a stable loving monogamous relationship, while not all prostitutes are from broken backgrounds, it seems very unlikely if you had all these things and nothing happened to change your circumstances, that you enter in to the line of night companion. But there it is, I’ve never been pushed into a desperate situation. Also, growing up with all the embellished stereotypes and my community and family’s disapproving attitude to prostitution have no doubt fuelled my feelings, but even at that I’d say I have a extremely adverse gut reaction to whole process that comes purely from my own judgement.

I feel nothing negative to the women themselves, perhaps because I feel they must have been pushed into their jobs, whether that’s true or not, and women still have a tough time of it, while we’re on our way towards a better more equal society, there is still a great deal of work to do before things are actually fair between the sexes. Also I feel concern for their safety, just as I would any woman who had to work in a potentially dangerous environment, usually alone without the support/protection/established official and legal responsibility of an employer offered in other jobs. The risk is greater with prostitutes, particularly as these women are at a great risk of violent attack, which apart from being a terrible thing in itself can lead to a vicious cycle of desperation. The men who solicit them however, I am pretty appalled by. Something about seeing a human being as something to be ‘hired’, not someone to be hire for their skills but an actual thing makes me extremely uneasy. I would find it difficult to look at a long term relationship with someone who had used prostitutes in the past and definitely couldn’t with someone who was actively using them. The language itself, the term ‘use’ makes me feel as though psychologically their view of women must be impaired. Of course times change, years ago the general or public opinion was different depending on which social circle you were in and which sex you were.

The Wiki-travel guide tells us a little about the red light district:

“The Calton area of the east end (East of the “Barras”) especially around the Tennents brewery, the eastern end of Glasgow Green from the Peoples Palace to Bridgeton Cross area. These areas function as red light areas more or less 24/7: however it should be noted that they are well worth avoiding at night as they are quite far from the city centre and are poorly lit. There is also a red light district in the financial area of the city(Anderston: West of Central Station) although this only becomes a red light district from about 9PM onwards (or after dark during winter). This area in particular is very heavily policed.

It should be noted that whereas prostitution is legal in Scotland, ’soliciting’ (i.e. prostitutes soliciting for business), and ‘running a brothel’ are illegal: brothels and ‘massage parlours’ can be (and are) frequently busted by the police and their ‘customers’ taken into police custody at least temporarily. It should also be noted that since the Prostitution (Public Places) (Scotland) Act came into effect in 2008, the police are increasingly cracking down on ‘Kerb Crawling’. Therefore lone males should drive or walk around the red light districts at their own risk, and should be aware that if the police suspect them of attempting to solicit a prostitute they can be arrested and charged. In these areas, especially during summer, prostitutes from these areas occasionally provide sexual services in ‘private’ (but open air) parts of the city. Yet again, this is illegal, and, again, ‘customers’ caught having any form of sexual activity in what the law sees as a public place (i.e. not a private residence or a hotel) will be charged.

Strathclyde Police, the local police force, has a Stay Safe while Travelling guide.”

Last week I was walking my usual route, a direct straight road from my home to where I was going to meet friends for a night out when I stopped momentarily to look for a cash machine, at this point I was approached by a man looking for a prostitute who leaned towards me and asked ‘are ye workin’?’

I replied with a discreet ‘WHAT!??!’ and the man quickly apologised and shuffled Gollum-like away down another street. Filled with indignation I looked over my outfit, a floral Topshop dress, leggings, boots, jacket zipped up, handbag, an expensive haircut and make up. No flesh on display, no animal print, gold jewelry or heels (the old stereotypical classics I have seen nearly all of the local prostitutes wear – but as a vaguely fashion conscious young woman, I do own heels, I do own a leopard print jacket). I was, to use the correct regional term, ‘pure ragin’ at having been mistaken for a hooker. Hookers don’t go to Topshop!!! Biased am I about how prostitutes look and clearly I feel deep down I am better than them. Thinking about it afterwards I change my attitude, I think I’m just better off than they are because I don’t have to do their job, and I think no one should have to.

Ironically enough though, I just read an article on a fashion blog which talks about Topshop’s new ‘hooker inspired’ high heels and the author wondered how you would wear them and look trendy but not to close to the inspiration, so while the prostitutes of Glasgow I have never seen wearing Moto jeans there is a case for art imitating life when it comes to trade professionals and fashion.

Stories I have read in the media paint the prostitutes of Glasgow as both sinner and victim but apart from sensationalising what is essentially old news about the ‘oldest profession in the world’, the general feeling seems to be concern for the women involved and the desire to stop these activities. Some stories are linked below if you’re interested in reading more.

Zero tolerance, Scotsman

Salt and Light Bus, The Scottish Sun

Magnet for Prostitution, The BBC

Risking Death, The Observor