What a sex worker can teach us about human connection | Nicole Emma | TEDxSaltLakeCity

some people think you can live without intimacy without connection I think that's total crap a few years ago a client emailed me and he said today a miracle happened since my wife passed I've been very lonely I AMA so much has been hugged in over two years I'm not handsome I'm not rich I don't know how to talk to women but you held me you rubbed my back you listened to me vent about my grief this might just be a job for you but today you saved my life now I'm not a psychiatrist I'm not a doctor I don't work for a crisis hotline I'm a sex worker [Applause] and as a sex worker I see a side of people most of you don't just so we're on the same page the term sex work refers to sexual encounters by consenting adults or some sort of payment now before your imagination goes crazy hold on think about this on average studies have shown that sex only lasts five point four minutes so if they're paying for an hour or three what are they actually paying for they're paying for a place to be their true selves a place to talk about challenges without being criticized or judged a place to try new things without losing everything they've built and frankly sex is a really strong need for them and it often consumes them because sex is how men feel loved and worthy you see we're all designed for connection to find our tribe it's how humans work in fact have you ever known someone that was deeply rooted and connected and yet committed suicide probably not in 2016 alone there were almost 45,000 suicides in the United States I also want to point out that almost 80% of those were men that's four times the number of women why is that happening why so many more men as a woman I can pinpoint the person in my life that was pivotal to helping me get through the hard times through my divorce when I lost a brother the times I just needed a friend we all need just one person in our lives that sees who we really are under everything else and loves us anyways and oftentimes men don't have that to demonstrate I'd like the men here today to think about a time you might have heard one of the following phrases man up toughen up don't be a [ __ ] real men don't cry how old were you the first time you heard that younger than 10 younger than five what was going on in that moment were you afraid were you sad were you hurt did you get the support you think it needed did you get to cry or did you learn to keep it inside from a very young age our boys are getting messages that having feelings and eating help is bad this happens at school in sports on TV and sometimes on their own families they come to believe that their value their manhood is in their muscles their money or their mojo think about that you don't get to pick your body there's only so much you can do with it money can be really hard to make happen if it ever does and you can go away very quickly so if you only have three ways to prove yourself and the first two you can't control no wonder they turn to sex to feel better no wonder they get desperate and aggressive when they feel lonely or unworthy so oftentimes they create this mask or persona if you will to keep themselves protected from shaming or criticism usually from other men a mask of what a man is supposed to be stoic logical tough fearless emotionless and said sex is the only time that men get to take off that mask it's easy to understand why men often feel like they need to be connected sexually in order to express themselves emotionally on the other hand women often feel like we need to be connected emotionally to express ourselves sexually right and this dynamic this mismatch that happens often times leaving leads the guy feeling alone or rejected and then poof they're in bed with a sex worker but what happens if he's too poor too afraid or too ashamed to hire someone like me former NFL player Joe ermine once said boys who can't cry shoot bullets because our men don't have tools or outlets for alienation or rejection or loneliness we see violent outbursts all around us they just implode domestic violence abuse radical hate groups police brutality in cells there were 382 mass murders in 2016 alone almost 17,000 rapes and 7500 additional murders as a society we are largely missing the fact that the way we teach our boys to be men is directly related to the violence that we're seeing [Applause] sure violence has many causes genetics situational conditioning we can't cure the genetics yet we can't prevent all the bad situations but we can and we must address the conditioning and it starts with how we talk to our children we must stop telling them to man up or stop crying we must stop excusing teasing and bullying as boys being boys we must allow mistakes and learning emotions and empathy we need them to see that healthy manhood is about facing your fears overcoming challenges and living with compassion if you notice before I didn't mention what kind of sex worker I am and there are many it's because it doesn't matter I do whatever it takes to help people heal whether that's a pretty woman experience or naked therapy my job includes consoling a man who misses his children on the other side of the country to teaching someone about female anatomy to reminding someone what it feels like to be touched who's been deprived for so long to helping someone who's disabled feel normal just for a minute now don't get me wrong this job's not glamorous and it is certainly not easy there's always a guy that wants to call all the time you know I'll know somebody like that right or somebody that wants to do something really funky okay but there's a greater good here these people deserve to feel important and connected to and if they could find that somewhere else they would have we're all people that need help we pay for help all the time we pay for tax attorneys we pay for car repairs we pay for childcare housekeeping there is just this huge stigma around sex just as much as we seek healing for our minds and our bodies we ought to be free to seek healing for our hearts and well our parts too just as you'd hire a mental health professional I'm a sexual health professional but it's not about the sex it's about intimacy and connection thank you [Applause]

Channel: TEDx Talks

Views: 2,549,855

Rating: 4.8062506 out of 5

Keywords: TEDxTalks, English, Life, Connection, Men, Sex

Id: r7xLfeTytns

Length: 12min 37sec (757 seconds)

Published: Tue Dec 18 2018

Reddit Comments

[u/Giaexperience]

Intimacy and connection. That’s what we all want!

[u/[deleted]]

I love TED Talks!

This is one of the reasons why I love what I do and find it so rewarding sometimes. It’s not always just about sex, we help people on a deeper, emotional level.

What a lovely woman.

[u/762Rifleman]

Saved! Hats off to you who pointed me here.

[u/renerdrat]

Great talk. I LOVE TED! I swear I constantly am listening to talks that are so thought-provoking, interesting and insightful. I wish the need for intimacy was addressed more often in mental health and just media in general. Thanks for sharing.

[u/CowManuver]

Seriously though, how can I become a client of Nicole?

[u/Diarrheea]

Giving Voice to the herd of Mammoths stampeding through the living room, in the backwater of 'Feminism' and Female Nature. Great important talk, but only part of the story. This is not just from Nurture and Culture, but very much a consequence of Biology and Nature.

Women in general do not have A CLUE about the conditions of the Male Existence, and infinitesimally few ever WANT to know. Women in general are RUTHLESS, CRUEL towards and indifferent to Male Suffering. The demands women make on men are INHUMANE, often resulting in life long emotional violence, manipulation and humiliation. Female Sexual Power always was and is all encompassing and inescapable. Yet, they WANT MORE...

Women don't generally love men as men love women, but view men (more or less unconsciously) as a resource - then PROJECT their dark side onto Men, the eternal Expendables, Scapegoats and Targets of Shame and Guilt in Western society. The vast majority of women would crumble within weeks if put in the average man's existential and emotional situation, as referring to the opposite sex.