No offense taken at all. I’m glad for the interaction and happy you read my work. This post in particular has been coming back up for me more and more, both in views and in the sense of being topical to much of what I read here lately.

I hope you don’t mind if I use this response as a sounding board for some further clarification of my premise. (But be warned, I’ll probably just ramble a bit.)

The entire premise is that virtual relationships are just as important as face to face ones for an increasing number of people.

I see men as being much more likely to rely on virtual relationships in lieu of real ones, than women. Men are transparent online in ways that women are not. This (I think) comes from the privilege of not being under constant scrutiny/attack/etc. simply for being a woman.

A man will pay money for the privilege of not having to put in the face to face time/work/energy into a social media profile and relationships that make him feel popular, sought after, and perhaps most importantly; heard, and validated.

He can use the power of anonymity to be himself in ways that would be impossible in his day to day life. (Your therapist is definitely not anonymous.) In such a way, a person can find their true self in the safety of an anonymous exchange.

The more he trusts in and benefits from that anonymous exchange, the more he will pay. I know this to be true, because that very exchange has paid the bills for me for a long time now. I have become pretty damn good at finding ‘virtual value’ to provide, in much the same way as a therapist does. But I think I do much more than what a therapist does, both in terms of personal engagement, and in terms of emotional labor.

For instance. I hear stuff that people don’t tell their therapist. For fear of being judged, looked down on etc. Even with your therapist you have to project a certain… image. It’s highly reactionary, and it’s a one way street emotionally. For your therapist to start feeling emotional about you in almost any way would be a breach of ethics, and also possibly psychologically dangerous for you.

Not so with virtual girlfriends, who put genuine emotional interaction at the front of their methodology.

As far as the sex part? I’ll tell you flat out, that guys who want these sorts of interactions to be personally significant, DON’T want to think of their digital muse as a porn star, even if that relationship (as many do) starts with a sexual attraction.

I do nothing nude anymore. I have simply grown out of it, due to being busy as hell and due to a number of other reasons. This hasn’t hurt my friendships, or stopped me from making new friends in any way shape or form. If anything, I have (after telling my friends I don’t do camshows/nude photos etc. anymore) found that my guy friends seem vaguely relieved. As if they have more of the real me. Like a nagging burden has been lifted off of our relationships.

The more a woman shows you of her real life online, the more she trusts you. This is a sign of social currency that extends far past camshows, or sex for money exchanges of any kind. It is THE yardstick for how any woman feels about you online. If you have to go digging around to find out about a woman online, you are doing it wrong. All wrong. If she doesn’t tell you, she doesn’t want you to know.

So when you say, there aren’t things that I reveal about myself, like where I live- you’re right. But there are shades to that, depending on the person I’m dealing with, and a definite step process to finding out certain details. That’s not a sign of being inauthentic, it’s a sign of being a security conscious woman online.

Guys are different. They know when they are winning when they feel like they are getting to know the real you. This is why stalking and doxxing are such a problem for women online. Guys know the power that they can possess if they unmask, or otherwise expose a woman online.

Girls know when they are winning when they get signal boosted, underwritten, supported, and otherwise receive agency for their emotional labor online, precisely because it is so difficult to achieve conventionally- in face to face interactions. Patriarchy. Etc. etc.

This can come in the form of money, and for many- turning that social currency into money is the no-brainer standard, and a much easier way to receive agency than say trying to break the glass ceiling.

The reason that this is ethical, is because of the emotional labor that goes into making these interactions intrinsically valuable.

Guys are just way less likely to put in that sort of emotional effort into online interactions. But they definitely notice when a girl does (or doesn’t) do it. Lot’s of guys are willing to pay for this undervalued skill, precisely because of the real good that it does in their lives.

Girls are learning this skill in their preteens now. They obsess over likes and shares like the most hungry of all social media managers. They understand the inherent value of digital currency. They know that just being popular on Youtube is enough to make you rich and famous. We think of pewdiepie like a sick, strange anomaly. Something to not be taken seriously. Our kids think differently, and it’s the adults who are slowly catching up.

From instagram models, to youtube celebrities, to virtual girlfriends- it’s all shades of the same interaction. The cult of the personality is alive and well. The more your fans can relate to you- the more popular you become.

But for adults, that cult of personality is much more effective when practiced on a one-to-one basis. Fanboys and Girls, turn into grown adults who want something more, yet don’t want to abandon the digital world where they spend so much of their time.

Thanks again for reading! ❤