What’s in a name: Sugar daddies or Johns?

The topic of sugar daddies has been coming up a lot recently thanks to a certain politician, so the question I’m getting asked is: Are sites that promote sugar daddy/sugar baby relationships actually prostitution sites? I’m not going to answer this from a legal perspective because I’m in no way a lawyer. What I will do is give some perspective on these websites and relationships as a sexologist, and the first thing I want to point out is that not every sugar daddy/sugar baby relationship is based on sex. Sometimes the relationships are the guy wanting companionship, or to have someone attractive on their arm for an event.

If its about sex, then I can see where some people might think of it as prostitution. But really, how different is it than what some people’s regular dating lives look like? A hear a lot of straight men complain that dating costs a lot of money. They’re taking their dates out for expensive meals and events (or at least they were before COVID) and why? So they can get what they want. How is that really all that different from sugar daddy websites?

Sugar daddy/sugar baby websites and relationships aren’t new, and I’m sure this will come up again in a few years, but there’s the thing I really want to talk about — it’s how we look at the women in these relationships. If women are gold diggers (or whatever cool term the kids are using for that these days) then we judge them for pretending to be interested in someone when really they’re only interested in what the person can provide. When women are…