They aren't here for the scenery...

I think most of us have the same mental picture when we here the phrase "sex tourism" - that of the old white man paying for a sleazy tour to Thailand, probably for child prostitution. This isn't just an image - I've seen this sort of thing the world round, not just in Southeast Asia but also in the Middle East, and yes, in Senegal, where certain beach resorts are notorious for octogenarian European men and their underage companions. It's pretty fucking disgusting.

It's hard to express just how morally abhorrent it is when people travel specifically for the purpose of abusing children. It's certainly a matter for international justice. One problem, though, with the discourse being so focused on the extreme cases, is that honest and frank discussions of the role that sex plays in travel is pretty hard to come by.

The question that a few weeks around the Senegalese coast has raised for me is this: who, exactly, is a sex tourist? Clearly the old men who fly down to hurt underage girls fall into this category, but they're an extreme. Plenty of people, though, do pay for sex here. As a western man, if I go to a nightclub, I will be approached by dozens of prostitutes, and they obviously get enough business to keep coming back. There are, of course, male prostitutes here as well. I get propositioned fairly often, if more subtly than in, say, Morocco - the taboo against homosexuality is a big deal here. Along the beaches, a Western woman will find herself offered sex pretty regularly in some places (although much more so in the Gambia). I have libertarian inclinations about prostitution (at least when consenting adults are involved), so I'm not about to judge these people as harshly as I would the aforementioned octogenarian. In any case, these relationships are at least clear: people are exchanging cash for sex, period. There isn't a lot of room for misunderstandings or grey areas along these extremes.

The more interesting case, I think, is also the more common. What should we think about the many young and middle-aged Western women who come for 2-week holidays and instantly end up with gorgeous young Senegalese boyfriends? Everywhere you go in this country, you see couples like this, and however optimistic you might be about intercultural romance, you can't help but assume that many of these relationships are a bit more prosaic. You can bet your boots that most of these relationships don't last once she's on a plane home - and it's almost always a "She". Senegal having the same gendered double standard as most other countries, a local man can get away with strolling around town holding hands with a foreign girl. If a local woman tried the same, it would be incredibly destructive to her life and reputation (at least, if she was anything but a member of the "westernized" upper classes. In any case, these short-term relationships are almost always between Western women and local men. Relationships between foreign men and local women tend to divide more clearly into serious ones - often ending in marriage - and prostitution.

The question, of course, is how to think about what it is that these young men are doing. The recipe is pretty obvious: you have Senegal, with beautiful beaches, cheap flights to Europe, and most importantly, legions of underemployed young men who spend their days working out and end up with spectacularly sculpted bodies, but still no money. Obviously, it isn't the easiest topic to raise, but I get a sense from asking about it that some women pay these men directly, but most just give some parting presents or gifts at the end of their holiday. You see the same thing all over the Carribean.

Here's where the real moral grey area kicks in. I'm not so cynical as to rule out the possibility of real romantic relationships between Westerners and Africans. I see them quite often, and marriages are common enough - a good part of the tourist infrastructure is run by mixed couples. Still, there are two immense gulfs to be crossed here: culture, and money. There is almost always some ignorance of the other partner's culture when the relationships begin, and there is almost always an incredible income gap. In relative terms, it would be like dating a millionaire. I've had plenty of friends run into this a few months into a relationship, when the local partner suddenly decides that the relationship is serious enough to start asking for serious money. Does this mean that the whole thing was done under bad faith? Not always, no. But sometimes. That's the big minefield, of course - the very real emotional attachment that runs both ways in relationships that might also be built on the hopes for a material better life. When a young lady comes down here for a 2 week affair and falls for the fellow, it's not easy to know what to do.

So who is exploiting? Is it the young Senegalese who try and make some money out of lusty Westerners, or the Westerners who use promises of gifts to sweeten the deal? I'm not sure I'm comfortable judging either side harshly or on anything but a case-by-case basis, but it is, I think, something that deserves a little bit more discussion than it gets.
Peace
Josh