We all are selling something to someone.
The employee sells his time.
The businessman sells his product.
The artist sells his creativity.
The scientist sells his intelligence.
And someone sells her body.
But society has a strange morality about what is acceptable to sell.
Sell your brain for eight hours every day — respectable.
Sell your labor — respectable.
Sell your intelligence — respectable.
Sell your genitals for two hours - prostitute.
Why?
Because we have become sophisticated enough to believe that some parts of the human body are respectable to commercialize and others are not.
The brain is valuable.
The hands are valuable.
The body is valuable.
But somehow, the moment it is the genitals, morality suddenly enters the conversation.
Every body part has a function.
So who decided that one function can be sold with dignity while another makes the person immoral?
Now take a woman who marries a wealthy man.
She gets financial security.
A comfortable life.
Social status.
Material possessions.
Perhaps she doesn't.
Perhaps she genuinely wants all of these things.
Society doesn't investigate.
Society celebrates her.
“She found a good husband.”
But take another woman who needs money and openly sells sexual access to a man.
Same human body.
Same desire.
Money involved.
But society gives her a completely different identity.
Prostitute.
Why is one transaction respectable and the other disgusting?
The answer may be uncomfortable:
One is socially packaged. The other is openly declared.
Now look at something as ordinary as the latest iPhone.
A man buys an expensive phone for his partner.
Why?
Perhaps affection.
Perhaps status.
Perhaps to show the world what a “perfect couple” looks like.
Perhaps there is an expectation attached to it.
And perhaps sexual intimacy exists somewhere inside that relationship too.
The money is not handed directly for sex.
It is converted into a phone.
Then the phone becomes affection.
Affection becomes intimacy.
Intimacy becomes relationship.
And nobody calls it flesh trading.
Because the transaction has passed through a product first.
Money → object → relationship → intimacy.
Society is comfortable with that.
But say:
“Money → sex.”
And suddenly everyone becomes moral.
The same thing happens when families arrange marriages.
The girl's family looks for a man who can support her.
His income matters.
His house matters.
His career matters.
His financial stability matters.
His ability to provide matters.
Then the marriage happens.
And sex becomes part of the relationship.
We all know how important sexual compatibility can be inside marriage. A completely sexless marriage can become a serious source of conflict and, depending on the circumstances and jurisdiction, may even become relevant in divorce proceedings.
So where exactly does the morality begin?
At the wedding?
At the money?
At the jewellery?
At the legal document?
Or only when a woman says openly:
“I am selling sexual access for money.”
Why does all the morality suddenly fall upon her?
Perhaps because she made one terrible mistake.
She made the transaction visible.
She didn't know the sophisticated language.
She didn't know how to convert money into gifts.
She didn't know how to convert security into romance.
She didn't know how to put sex inside a socially approved institution and call the entire arrangement something beautiful.
She simply knew:
“I have a body. You want access to it. You have money. This is the price.”
And society rejected her.
Not necessarily because she was doing something fundamentally different from every other human transaction.
But because she didn't know how to package it.
We have capitalized almost everything.
Our time.
Our intelligence.
Our attention.
Our appearance.
Our labour.
Our relationships.
And eventually, we capitalized sex too.
We just gave it a respectable name.
Marriage.
Some people understand the rules of this system.
They know how to use desire.
They know how to use money.
They know how to use status.
They know how to use insecurity.
They know how to use the human need for validation.
They provide the body at the right time, the affection at the right time, the intimacy at the right time — and receive money, security, gifts, status or social position in return.
And society calls it love.
But that poor girl who doesn't understand this social game?
She doesn't know how to exploit someone's desire through the approved machinery of marriage and consumerism.
So she sells her body directly.
And society calls her a prostitute.
Maybe she is not immoral.
Maybe she is simply bad at the game society taught everyone else to play.
And perhaps that is the most disturbing part.
We are all puppets of a system.
Some sell their brains.
Some sell their labor.
Some sell their time.
Some sell their bodies.
But the system decides which sale deserves respect.
And the most successful players are not necessarily the ones who don't sell.
They are the ones who have learned how to sell without looking like they are selling.
So perhaps the real question is not:
“Who is a prostitute?”
Perhaps the question is:
“What are you selling - and what beautiful name have you given the transaction?”