>> being a sex worker will always be a potent metaphor for selling
>> out.
seems to me there is no metaphorical path, natural, strong, weak, whatever, that leads from the working lives of women in the sex business to the lives of the media priests or the wall street pimps.
but by all means, go ahead and try to flesh out a concrete mapping between the life of, say, a sex worker in the combat zone in boston (is it still there????) and that of a Tom Brokaw or a Michael Milliken. show how a snapshot of their daily lives feels the same, operates on similar principles, whatever.
and i sure hope people dont get their impressions of the lives of sex workers either from 'Pretty Woman' OR women __OFF__ the job site.
>> But no other workers lay themselves so
>> literally and vulnerably bare to receive their wages.
^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^
when media workers 'lay themselves literally and vulnerably bare' (cf. Marv Albert (NBC radio and TV sports announcer), Rob Lowe (actor), it usually means loss of wages and end of work (at least temporarily).
it wasnt too long a time between Nixon's exposure on tape and his exit stage left...
dick morris (worked for clinton), when it came out about his extra-sex life, he was out of work....(now presently rehabilitating himself on the talk shows)
in each of these cases, the guy walks __away__ from his work exposed, with his tail between his legs (whatever THAT means)... but they each had enough money from previous covert operations to weather the shame and scorn in private.
but, tom brokaw, dan rather laying themselves bare __FOR__ wages?
bill gates, crotch shots in PC Magazine?
i dont think so.....
>> which is why so many Wall Street workers (yes, I also maintain
>> friendships in that industry) love to call themselves "whores" and
>> "prostitutes", ...
>> was my perception that too
>> many on the left seem to think that if we could only repair the
>> language we could change the world.
seems to me the whole point of keying in on language is its a great (albeit sometimes superficial) place to catch first sight of contradictions and blind beliefs...
cause, go back and read this 'Wall Street workers' sentence again. if there are folks walking around on wall street making huge bucks doing GOD KNOWS WHAT, and THEY think of themselves as whores and prostitutes AND THAT metaphor is not accurate IN ANY WAY, then that might mean that .... [fill in the blank].
__ ____ Les Schaffer godzilla at netmeg.net ___| ------->> Engineering R&D <<-------- Theoretical & Applied Mechanics | Designspring, Inc. Westport, CT USA Center for Radiophysics & Space Research | http://www.designspring.com Cornell Univ. schaffer at tam.cornell.edu | les at designspring.com