Sex work is also done in Helsinki during the Christmas holidays. “I’m drawn to the idea of being able to offer company to a person who otherwise wouldn’t have it at Christmas,” says sex worker Tiia Forsström.
Christmas approaching fast. For many sex workers in the capital region, it means one working day among others, say the workers interviewed by HS.
A sex worker from Espoo Tiia Forsström tells HS that he himself would have liked to work this Christmas, but for practical reasons it is not possible. He recently got a fresh tattoo, which still needs to heal in peace.
Forsström belongs to the minority of sex workers in the sense that he talks about his profession openly under his own name.
SEX WORK is done in Helsinki every day and every moment, but very few people see the whole, how the industry actually works today. Accurate information is difficult to obtain, as many operate in the shadows of society.
According to varying estimates, there are about 10,000 sex workers in Finland. In 2005 Anna Kontula presented in his dissertation that the number of sex workers would be at least 8,000.
According to Statistics Finland, more than 100 million euros are spent annually in the domestic sex work industry. So it’s not a small phenomenon.
According to some estimates, more than 95 percent of sex work clients in Finland are men. And most of the sellers are women.
During the last ten years, the everyday life of sex work has changed radically. Some time ago, the sex workers on duty on the streets moved to the online market.
Tiia Forsström does sex work openly with her name and face.
Forsström according to it, it is not at all exceptional that colleagues also work on Christmas holidays. According to him, it is as common as in other professions.
According to Forsström, many things are attractive about working at Christmas. The background is that then different pain points related to loneliness or relationships often come to the fore.
“I’m drawn to the idea of being able to offer company to a person who otherwise wouldn’t have it at Christmas,” he says.
On the other hand, for many of Forsström’s regular customers, Christmas is nothing out of the ordinary.
According to him, it cannot be said that the customer base of sex workers is somehow different at Christmas or that there are more or fewer customers than usual.
Neither in his thirties doing sex work in Helsinki Emily not going to work on Christmas. He does not appear in the story under his own name, because there is a strong social stigma associated with sex work.
In previous years, Emilia has worked on Christmas, but for her it is just another working day.
“When I’m at work, I usually don’t think about whether it’s Christmas, Midsummer or Sunday morning. It doesn’t matter to me,” he says.
Emilia believes that many sex workers in Helsinki will be at work as usual this Christmas. A few of his colleagues, on the other hand, have gone on vacation and plan to spend Christmas with family, for example.
According to Emilia’s experience, there are plenty of customers at Christmas, especially in the evening and at night. That’s when, according to him, many men are alone at home and start looking for company.
“On the other hand, for a lonely person, Christmas is not necessarily any different than an ordinary weekend.”
Emilia does a lot of sex work in hotels. It’s common.
According to Emilia, this fall’s accelerated inflation and rising energy prices have been reflected in the sex workers’ daily lives, so that there have been fewer customers overall.
The observation is also signed by the executive director of the Pro support center, which assists people working in the sex and erotic industry Jaana Kauppinen.
“When the financial room for maneuver is small, this is one of the first services that customers cut back on or stop altogether,” he says.
Tiia Forsström wants to point out that Christmas, which is traditionally thought of as a family celebration, can also be a very stressful time for some sex workers.
“We are not just service provider machines, but people whose parents don’t necessarily know about doing sex work or approve of it,” he describes.
According to him, the matter involves considerations very similar to those of sexual and gender minorities who have not yet come out of the closet.
If you have avoided telling your relatives about it, you usually don’t want to bring it up even at Christmas. Therefore, according to him, Christmas can be associated with a lot of sadness and difficulty.
On the other hand, Forsström emphasizes that there is often a warm sense of community between marginalized groups of people. Many spend Christmas with their chosen family, so to speak.
“If you can’t talk about anything important with your childhood family, many people prefer to spend time with friends and colleagues.”
Read more: This is how sex is sold in Helsinki – Veera, Emilia and Maria tell where the sex work of the 2020s takes place and what customers really want
Read more: Tiia Forsström sells sex in a detached house in Espoo and knows what is wrong with many Finnish bedrooms
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