absolutelyBangkok archive · Nightlife & Entertainment
Originally published Nov. 15, 2007
Call it hypocrisy: How the Bangkok Post dropped the Nite Owl a few years ago, but enjoys good business with classifieds such as “Barbar — Fetish Experience,” “V.I.P. Models — Business Men Choice” — or “Body Club — Oil Massage by Men.”
Massage by men. Not only for men. There’s quite a trade in town of male prostitutes offering their services to female clients.
Talk about it with associate professor Nither Tinnakul of Chulalongkorn’s Department of Sociology. He did a study about this newer escort culture. Puts the number of female prostitutes in Thailand at 100,000. The number of male prostitutes at a not less staggering 30,000.
Professor Tinnakul’s project was mainly aimed at new escort services that are importing hundreds of prospective black gigolos — “forungs” — from Jamaica and Africa to Thailand to satisfy the surge in the demand for these services among the Thai female elite.
According do Tinnakul Thai women are paying upwards of 10,000 baht per night for the servicers, who are “fiercer”, more “thrilling” in bed and more “well built” than their Thai peers. Or Western peers for that?
But it is not only lust driving a market that is mainly kept under cover. We’re all aware of the old culture of cut off penises here in the Land of the Free. Thai women are leaders in penis slashing. The tradition has kind of died down. Or has it?
Read, in this context, our story about Mara Altman who still hasn’t orgasmed in Bangkok.
But one of the lingering effects of the Asian economic crisis is prevailing as ever: The women’s need for revenge against their philandering husbands. “The women want some equal rights,” says Tinnakul. “Some kind of freedoms. They need something.”
Tinnakul goes on: “Male prostitutes here not only serve for Thai women, but also for Western females and female tourists from mainly Korea, Taiwan, Hong Kong and Singapore.”
Oho, and what about the “ horny Japanese housewives heading off to Bangkok to grab a slice of the Thai life “?
We talk about substantial figures.
How they get their servicers? “Mostly through friends,” professor Tinnakul told absolutely. “They have their own networks and websites. There are bars and places. It is had to get into these circles, they’re built on trust” — but are all common and readily available in Bangkok.
And constantly evolving. Professor Tinnakul did the research some years ago. “Nothing basically changed. The balance of supply and demand is still the same.” With supply increasing during more difficult economic times — and prices falling with falling arrivals of relevant tourists.
The local male market prostituting itself consists of Thais as well as immigrants, Tinnakul says. “Thais and immigrants are more for the tourism market” — whereas the long-perpetrated image of the black man as a sexual toy flourishes as a niche market among higher-up Thai females.
Call them “escorts” or “gigolos” — they’re a stereotype, but not rare here in Thailand, as the comprehensive study of Tinnakul shows.
Sensing any racial degradation? Sexual prowess at the cost of black men being less progressive or caring? And honestly, I don’t see too many black men around anymore lately…
How scandalized Thai society felt by Tinnakul’s report. Since in paying for the favors of such men, Thai women are defying tradition. A Thai top politician was quoted as saying that all the hoopla about foreign gigolos raised by Tinnakul’s report was undermining the good traditional Thai family and making men suspicious of their wifes.
And don’t forget about the so called Thai ballroom dancers: Mostly young, good looking dancers and dance teachers who spend their Saturday evenings and Sundays in the company of an elder, paying Thai lady — who not only expects to dance.
Tinnakul knew about the sensitivity of his research. He says he was just uncovering what is viewed as a taboo in Thai society: “This exists in the Thai society — just look at the English newspaper for an example. You look at the advertising and you’ll find lots of advertising about this kind of job,” Tinnakul once told Australia’s ABC. “This topic is not talked about because it is something people don’t think it exists in Thai society — or maybe think it’s not a good thing to talk about it.”
Fact is:
forungs fetch the highest prices.
“The place where most male prostitutes are from though,” says professor Tinnakul, “is Cuba. A student of mine did the research. Cuba seems to be the world’s biggest market with male prostitution and female tourists.”
Met any Cuban lately?
And competition here in Thailand is ever increasing, the professor says. With white male prostitutes arriving from Europe.
Why all the black and white servicers in Thailand?
“Maybe,” says the professor, “they can satisfy the women better.”
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