Misogny running rampant on sex trade advertising websites reveals the limits of the Nordic Model, writes Paul Chambers.
In my interview with Scotland for Decrim in Issue 146 of the Scottish Left Review, I asked about how online advertising websites and forums relating to the sex trade affect the women who work within it. Their reply was eye-opening:
“The biggest issue with online sex work and advertising online is the businesses who run the websites taking a large portion of the money generated by the worker. Often, this can be as much as a third of total income. With full decriminalisation, workers will be able to form trade unions and take part in collective bargaining, so we are able to hold these businesses to account. With the Nordic Model and other forms of partial criminalisation, the power is given back to these businesses.”
This response is an important one. There has been much discussion around the rise of the manosphere and its misogynistic, anti-feminist ideology. There has also been coverage on the negative aspects of platforms such as OnlyFans, which have seen its creators subjected to “disturbing demands, exploitation, and safety concerns.” The online aspect of the sex work industry in general highlights what happens when these two issues converge.
In the 21st Century, sex workers rely on websites to advertise their services to prospective clients. As Scotland for Decrim noted, up to 1/3 of total income can be taken from sex workers to pay for these advertisements. In Scotland, and England and Wales too, the most prominent of these websites are AdultWork and Vivastreet, where sex workers lay out their services and rules.
For clients, or “punters,” the option is there to leave reviews for sex workers they have met or attempted to do business with, and the language used in these reviews is often less than respectful. However, many of the profiles are controlled by pimps who are trafficking women against their will to have sex with such punters. And the few independent sex workers who can push back rarely do for fear of bringing themselves more negative reputation and less business.
In addition to AdultWork and Vivastreet, the forum UKPunting is used primarily for punters to review sex workers, without even the limited restraints which AdultWork places on these. Comments such as “Didn’t bother me but if you require perfect teeth this is not your girl.” The comments don’t have to be true either, for if a punter receives a service or a response they’re unhappy with, they will use the site to disparage the sex worker in question, doing damage to their reputation and business. Now, this happens in England and Wales where sex work is legal but not decriminalised – with the Merseyside area being a shining outlier. So how bad is it where it is either criminalised or partially criminalised?
On the island of Ireland, one website dominates the sex trade – Escort-Ireland, which both advertises sex workers and hosts a forum for punters to post comments. Sex workers can use the forum too, but very few do as many of them don’t control their online profiles. The site is owned by Peter McCormick, a convicted pimp and former officer with the Royal Ulster Constabulary (the forerunner of the Police Service of Northern Ireland, or PSNI).
From 2015, the Nordic Model of sex work, which criminalises the purchase of sex but not the sale of sex, has been law in Northern Ireland. It has also been law in the Republic of Ireland since 2017. Advocates of the Nordic Model claim that it will end demand for paid sex and reduce trafficking. Instead, however, demand is very high – over 1,000 women on average are advertised on McCormick’s website, which reportedly makes €6 million annually – and trafficking cases are reported regularly.
In Northern Ireland, the Women’s Aid charity stated in November 2024 that they receive one referral per day to support a trafficking victim, after a case was reported of two trafficking victims being rescued from a south Belfast flat. That same month, 14 Czech women were charged with operating a prostitution ring in Ireland and Northern Ireland after a joint investigation by the Irish and Czech authorities. And a more recent joint investigation by the Irish and Brazilian authorities working with Europol raided a trafficking operation, where 29 young women were recruited in Brazil and coerced into sex work in Ireland. One of the pimps, Gabriel do Nascimento, “controlled online profiles for multiple escorts, as his English was better.”
A rather bizarre recent thread on the Irish forum boards.ie indicated that the trafficking operation was well known among the punters on the Escort-Ireland forums, who isolated the area of Dublin where the trafficking was concentrated in Dolphin’s Barn, an inner city suburb. A poster using the handle ‘Silvergrey25’ stated on the boards.ie thread that:
“Everyone there knew there was something off about Dolphins barn, and there were several threads about it. All the profiles being the same, all posting videos around the same time. The better forum users expressed concern, others didn’t care and thought the girls were worth a punt.”
A look at some of the punter comments on the Escort-Ireland forums bears this out. From ‘biglad69420’ we have “It’s fairly strange what has been happening in Dolphins barn regarding that house, we all know which one it is and we’ve seen the other forum threads about it also.” and from ‘JohnJoyce’ we get “Aye but some of them are nearly too tempting lad lol.” It is quite clear that what was happening in Dolphin’s Barn was common knowledge among the Escort-Ireland forum users before the raids happened in September 2025, and was a matter of indifference to more than a few of them.
That the website enabled this is clear from a post made by independent escort Stephanie, one of the very few escorts who can post on the Escort-Ireland forums, who made the following comment: “Unfortunately this cannot be discussed openly on the boards – post will be deleted… That we cannot openly talk about it! Infuriating”
So, you had a situation where a trafficking operation was happening in the capital of Ireland, this was well known among punters there and publicly posted about, but any who expressed concern had their posts deleted while others who were either enticed by these trafficking victims or felt able to recommend them were able to post without risk of censorship. A perfect blend of toxic masculinity and exploitation of women in one horrific situation, all enabled by the most prominent website operating within the Irish sex trade.
The entitlement of these punters, and their desire not to be held to the same standard they hold the women they visit and review, can also be seen in the case of a punter who calls himself ‘TonyStark’ (yes, after the alter ego of the comic book hero Iron Man). A long-tenured member of the Escort-Ireland website with 85 reviews and over 1,000 posts on the forums, he threw a fit at an escort called ‘Sofie’ for refusing him any service by pointing to an issue with his back. He not only left her a critical review, but went on to start a thread in the forums complaining about her too and seeking sympathy from the other punters (which by and large he got). The only comment she made in reply was: “Am sorry hun, What you want me to say, It was not only your back. And for me health comes first…. Sorry.”
A more damning review of ‘TonyStark’ came in former sex worker Anna Rajmon’s memoir Elis – Irish Call Girl, which depicted a revolting little man with appalling hygiene who her agency instructed she had to ‘entertain’ to get a good review. Again, he got irate, and proceeded to accuse her of lying about him. Once more, he got a few sympathetic voices from other punters who also feel entitled to leave reviews of all kinds of the various women they visit on the public website, but don’t want to undergo the same scrutiny.
The hypocrisy and double-standards here are clear, and ‘TonyStark’ is far from an isolated case. Other punters condemned Rajmon for critiquing them by username, as though their actual identities were compromised. In their eyes, this seemed to be a far worse crime than any of the horrific treatment Rajmon describes enduring while working in Ireland’s sex trade.
Denying women the right to speak and act on the same level as men can be seen as an acute issue within the Irish sex trade, whether it is on personal hygiene or the more serious subject of sex trafficking. This is an issue which the supposedly progressive Nordic Model has done nothing to alleviate in the decade that has passed since it became law. This issue displays the concentrated misogyny and anti-feminist mindset of many men who seek the services of the same women they clearly despise.
As Scotland still remains locked in a debate over the introduction of the Nordic Law here, which thankfully was delayed due to “significant concerns” with the bill put forward by Alba MSP Ash Regan, this is an acute question not just for sex workers, but women in Scotland generally. After all, sex workers are usually the canaries in the coal mine. Compromising the safety and self-determination of one set of women will lead to those values being compromised for all women.
The solution to this was posited back in Issue 146 by Scotland for Decrim. By empowering sex workers, letting them form trade unions and collectively bargain, the websites which enable the misogyny and anti-feminism which runs rampant across their platforms may help bring these to account. And that might point the way towards dealing with misogyny and anti-feminism in wider society too.
Paul Chambers is a ghostwriter and virtual assistant with a strong interest in civil rights. He has previously written for Bella Caledonia.