A
Art Mann
Guest
Grace Bellavue: "Social media has given
sex workers a real opportunity to be heard”
Laura Parker | NewStatesman PUBLISHED 27 MAY 2013
In Woody Allen’s short story "The Whore of Mensa", a call girl service dispatches pretty blondes to clients’ hotel rooms. Except there’s no sex: the girls are all literature majors, getting paid to sell intellectual stimulation to men who fancy a hurried tête-à-tête on anything from Proust to Chomsky.
Outlandish as Allen’s fantasy is, it’s apparent that while sex sells, the package deal of sex and brains sells even better.
Grace Bellavue is the closest thing Australia has to a celebrity sex worker. The 25-year-old Adelaide escort is a sapiosexual’s wet dream: a brainy ex-digital marketer who’s as likely to tweet saucy details of life as a sex worker as she is her opinion on marriage equality.
"Nefarious escort, writer, miscreant and vagabond with a penchant for scotch and hip hop," her Twitter bio reads. Her profile picture is her face – another don't of sex work – layered over a larger image of her lingerie-clad ass. Last week, she tweeted: “Off to a hotel suite for some anal, blow jobs, wine, spa baths and hot sex. Time to go to work.”
In person, Grace – real name Pippa – is even more fascinating. I meet her at the Grace Hotel in Sydney’s central business district, where she stays each time she’s in town to amuse herself. Wearing a mid-length pale pink Peplum dress and tailored black suit jacket, she sits down to a plateful of sushi from the breakfast buffet and apologises for being late.
“Housekeeping came early, so I had to run around hiding all the condom wrappers from last night and get out of there as fast as I could.”
She’s in town for five nights as part of an Australian tour she undertakes at least four times a year to keep her growing list of interstate clients happy. Many of them already know her intimately: with more than 9,000 Twitter followers, almost 70 per cent of her bookings now come through social media. She tweets about politics, gives advice on blowjobs and encourages other sex workers to get online.
Her willingness to discuss the more sobering aspects of her job and her ongoing campaign to improve the rights of Australian sex workers – she’s a regular contributor to Australian women’s blog Mamamia, and last year presented a talk at TEDxAdelaide about the future of sex work – has turned her into the unofficial spokesperson the sex work industry never had.
In a way, it’s all the product of very good marketing. Grace’s personality is her brand. She left the job security of call girl agencies two years ago to start her own freelance escort business, and, using her background in digital marketing, launched a slick-looking website and a Twitter account that quickly found a market. It’s a rare strategy in a line of work long associated with shame and secrecy."
“The idea of allowing your private psyche into a public domain for comment alongside your body is a daunting thing,” she says over breakfast.
“We still have a lot of stigma, judgment and backbiting due to the nature of our profession. But social media has given sex workers a real opportunity to be heard.”
READ FULL STORY HERE
Fascinating read on my Twitter feed this morning.
(Slight confession: I swapped the magazine photo for a different pic of Grace that I prefer.)
sex workers a real opportunity to be heard”
Laura Parker | NewStatesman PUBLISHED 27 MAY 2013
In Woody Allen’s short story "The Whore of Mensa", a call girl service dispatches pretty blondes to clients’ hotel rooms. Except there’s no sex: the girls are all literature majors, getting paid to sell intellectual stimulation to men who fancy a hurried tête-à-tête on anything from Proust to Chomsky.
Outlandish as Allen’s fantasy is, it’s apparent that while sex sells, the package deal of sex and brains sells even better.
Grace Bellavue is the closest thing Australia has to a celebrity sex worker. The 25-year-old Adelaide escort is a sapiosexual’s wet dream: a brainy ex-digital marketer who’s as likely to tweet saucy details of life as a sex worker as she is her opinion on marriage equality.
"Nefarious escort, writer, miscreant and vagabond with a penchant for scotch and hip hop," her Twitter bio reads. Her profile picture is her face – another don't of sex work – layered over a larger image of her lingerie-clad ass. Last week, she tweeted: “Off to a hotel suite for some anal, blow jobs, wine, spa baths and hot sex. Time to go to work.”
In person, Grace – real name Pippa – is even more fascinating. I meet her at the Grace Hotel in Sydney’s central business district, where she stays each time she’s in town to amuse herself. Wearing a mid-length pale pink Peplum dress and tailored black suit jacket, she sits down to a plateful of sushi from the breakfast buffet and apologises for being late.
“Housekeeping came early, so I had to run around hiding all the condom wrappers from last night and get out of there as fast as I could.”
She’s in town for five nights as part of an Australian tour she undertakes at least four times a year to keep her growing list of interstate clients happy. Many of them already know her intimately: with more than 9,000 Twitter followers, almost 70 per cent of her bookings now come through social media. She tweets about politics, gives advice on blowjobs and encourages other sex workers to get online.
Her willingness to discuss the more sobering aspects of her job and her ongoing campaign to improve the rights of Australian sex workers – she’s a regular contributor to Australian women’s blog Mamamia, and last year presented a talk at TEDxAdelaide about the future of sex work – has turned her into the unofficial spokesperson the sex work industry never had.
In a way, it’s all the product of very good marketing. Grace’s personality is her brand. She left the job security of call girl agencies two years ago to start her own freelance escort business, and, using her background in digital marketing, launched a slick-looking website and a Twitter account that quickly found a market. It’s a rare strategy in a line of work long associated with shame and secrecy."
“The idea of allowing your private psyche into a public domain for comment alongside your body is a daunting thing,” she says over breakfast.
“We still have a lot of stigma, judgment and backbiting due to the nature of our profession. But social media has given sex workers a real opportunity to be heard.”
READ FULL STORY HERE
Fascinating read on my Twitter feed this morning.
(Slight confession: I swapped the magazine photo for a different pic of Grace that I prefer.)
