Hey Andre! I’m a heteroflexible cisgender woman in her 20s who works in the sex industry as a cam model and XXX content producer. I’ve been with my boyfriend for about 7 months and I just found out that he has been purchasing other sex workers’ content without me knowing (subscribing to Snapchats and OnlyFans accounts, he might also be chatting with them, idk). We’re monogamous and while I appreciate him being supportive of MY work, this feels like a weird boundary crossing. Am I overreacting?

Hi there, reader! You came to the right place. Let’s get to your quandary. 

To be honest, your boyfriend sounds pretty rad. Not only does he support and respect your work, but it seems like he’s interested in and financially able to support other providers’ work as well. Sex workers were just one of the numerous marginalized communities disproprtionately impacted by COVID-19, and, as such, they need financial assistance more than ever. Even if you engage in legal work and pay your taxes, our government has gone so far as to explicitly write us out of receiving any Small Business Administration (SBA) assistance based simply on moral bias. The fact that your boyfriend recognizes this and has committed to throwing cash at multiple sex workers is commendable! 

As a sex worker, I know full well that the clientele and fans who consume my work do so for a variety of reasons. Some are single and lonely for human interaction and comfort (especially now during the era of stay-at-home orders). Others are in open relationships and have intentionally negotiated boundaries with their partners to allow for them to engage with sex workers. Still others are in monogamous relationships with partners who are no longer meeting their intimate needs; they typically enjoy their XXX consumption surreptitiously, lest it be perceived as “cheating” (here’s an article on why watching pornographic content should not be considered an infidelity).

The more shame someone holds around consuming content of a sexual nature, the further they’ll typically go to conceal it (oftentimes fearing they’ll be judged by those they care about the most). It’s that deception that often causes partners to react in an intensely disapproving fashion; they assume that if their partner is keeping this secret from them, that they must be doing so because it’s incriminating or wrong in some way. They feel like they “should” be upset even if they authentically don’t mind it; why else would their partner have hidden this from them if it didn’t mean something “deeper” about their relationship? Ask yourself: Am I responding to this out of anger/concern about the deception? Or is the nature of the secret the authentic source of my discomfort?

All that being said, there ARE some red flags that you should be looking out for:

• If his generosity is causing legitimate financial strain. Assuming that you two don’t share your finances, if your boyfriend’s activities are impacting his capabilities in a way where bills are going unpaid, groceries aren’t hitting the table, etc. you have every right to stage a compassionate yet firm intervention with him about his use of funds.
  

• If he admits he is leaning on these sex workers for more than entertainment. Often when folks reach an intimacy-related hiccup in their relationship they will seek out alternative ways of filling that void BEFORE approaching their partners in earnest about the issue(s). This is because most of us are raised without any formal education around initiating and sustaining healthy communicative patterns with others. As such, approaching a loved one about something that feels very vulnerable to us (like sex or intimacy) can feel scary, overwhelming, and “like work”. So, we make the lazy/comfortable decision to forgo that essential communication and instead cross our fingers that our partners will remain in a state of loving ignorance. This isn’t fair to our partners, obviously, and if your boyfriend is seeking a deeper form of connection or companionship with these workers (while being monogamously committed to you), he needs to take a break from his extracurriculars and address this with you, STAT.
  

• If you feel like the time he is committing to his patronage is interrupting your intentional time together. Has your boyfriend been spending increasing amounts of alone time away from you? Has he canceled pre-existing plans with you to spend alone time instead? Are these behaviors abnormal for him? Intervention time. 

Finally, I don’t know HOW you discovered that your boyfriend is a “patron of the performing arts”. Did you snoop in his phone? Did he initiate an intentional conversation about it? Did a sex worker friend tip you off to his patronage? Regardless, it sounds like your boyfriend’s engagement with other workers wasn’t discussed at the start of your relationship, which means you weren’t given an opportunity to share your thoughts and perspective on it. Well, there’s no better time than the present! And keep in mind -- I’m sure many other sex workers’ partners are currently supporting YOUR endeavors!

Best of luck to you both!