Hey Dategirl!

My girlfriend is a stripper, but this is not the problem. I can handle that part, even though the clubs she dances in are very sleazy. What’s making me insane is that she is also an escort. I just found this out and couldn’t eat or sleep, so I went to her agency’s Web site. It was even sleazier than the bars she dances in, and the photos made her look like a cheap slut, which she is not! She is a good girl.

Unfortunately, after I saw that, I confronted her about her work and asked her if there is ever any “contact” with clients. She said that it is her call but that she never does. This is an enormous leap of faith on my part, but it feels right to trust her. But she got super pissed off during the conversation and practically hung up on me. I am not sure I will hear from her again. I had to ask. I can’t just ignore her job, especially when I saw it spilling over into our private life: One time we were laying in bed and she jumped up to go meet one of her clients after he called.

I’m wondering what you know about the escort scene. Is sex between escorts and their customers very common? Was I in the wrong to bring this issue up in the first place? I can handle it if she is telling me the truth. But I also know that if we continue to date I will definitely try to change her. I’m torn. I don’t know what to do! A female friend of mine offered to find out for sure if she was a prostitute by having one of her friends hire her and see what happened, but that felt wrong and I could not go there.

Prudish Paul

Honey, I’m sure your girlie is a very “good” girl, but any broad who makes her rent by gyrating butt-naked in front of strangers and dating men (chastely or otherwise) for cash is no Polly Purity. It doesn’t make her a bad person, but don’t kid yourself—she’s probably not gonna be up for sainthood anytime soon.

My first reaction is that you’re being played, but then maybe she’s such a beautiful girl with such amazing conversational skills that men shell out beaucoup bucks merely to bask in her glow. Only you would know the answer to that. In the interest of professionalism, I consulted several of the pornographers that pepper my Rolodex. My buddy Buzz used to be an editor at one of the sleaziest sex mags in the country. I called him at his now legit job and asked him what he thought about your dilemma. “I’m going to blame the victim here,” he snorted derisively. “He shouldn’t have gone out with a stripper in the first place if he’s gonna have issues with this sort of thing—if he’s going to gripe about technicalities, it’s his own damned fault.”

Looking for a more sympathetic soul, I rang up my friend Amy, who is also well acquainted with the world of sex-for-hire. I asked her if she knew of many escorts who got paid without giving up the goods. “I know people who don’t have sex with clients, but they get paid to give enemas or make them dress up like girls,” she offered helpfully. Enemas, eh? I’m guessing that wasn’t the answer you were looking for.

Chad, yet another porno pal, proffered this: “I can see what she says being true, but I can also see her not being too successful. It is up to the chick whether or not she’s going to do anything, but the understood part is that if a guy is calling a $300-an-hour escort, he’s gonna want to fuck her.”

So the experts are pretty much in agreement that your girlfriend is feeding you a line—but does it really matter? You say you respect her, but in the next breath you say that if you were to stay together, you’d try to change her. This attitude is both wrong and insulting. You can’t impose your morality on her any more than she can try to bully you into believing that what she does is just peachy. You two are incompatible. It takes a hearty breed to date a sex worker, and honey, you’re not that guy.

Got dating issues? Write Dategirl at dategirl@seattleweekly.com or Dategirl, c/o Seattle Weekly, 1008 Western, Ste. 300, Seattle, WA 98104.