How Belle de Jour got her figures wrong
Brooke Magnanti's skewering of others' bad stats is excellent. It's a shame she isn't blameless hers
By Helen Lewis Published 26 April 2012 11:57
Belle de Jour writer Brooke Magnanti. Photo by REX Features
Brooke Magnanti is one of our best-known female scientists – albeit not for her research. Accounts of her time as a high-end sex worker, published under the nom de plume Belle de Jour, were made into a glossy TV series fronted by Billie Piper. Her new book, The Sex Myth, attempts to join her two lines of work, cutting a useful, Ben Goldacre-ish furrow into areas where sexuality meets public policy.
Magnanti pulls apart the canards in the government’s review into the “sexualisation of childhood”, led by the Mothers’ Union president, Reg Bailey. She zaps away a widely cited claim that lap-dancing clubs in Camden led to a 50 per cent rise in rape. At her hands, zombie statistics get a brutal comeuppance. A chapter on the wild exaggeration of sex trafficking builds on work by the Guardian’s Nick Davies.
These are all fascinating but the book does not quite hang together. This is principally because, as well as a dissection of bad social science, it is a pro-prostitution-and-porn polemic. Even if you are sympathetic to her arguments about the weak evidence for the harm they do – and I am – melding these two approaches makes for one unsatisfactory encounter.
First, because she introduces an irritating Aunt Sally: the feminists. Magnanti cheerfully generalises about them in exactly the way she claims they do about sex workers. The feminists hate porn. The feminists hate prostitution. The missing word is “some”. (Incidentally, Magnanti refuses to talk to me, citing an online argument I can neither find nor remember.)
Her lack of nuance in engaging with critics and unwillingness to see her own viewpoint as anything other than objective are weaknesses. She is upset that the Secret Diary of a Call Girl TV series was “accused of glamourising sex work”. Her distress is baffling: it’s bleedin’ obvious that it did. It was a glossy star vehicle.
The most important flaw, however, is that Magnanti is not as careful in deploying research to advance her arguments as she is in debunking the statistical sleight of hand of others – particularly on prostitution. The Magnanti who debunks Bailey would sneeringly gut the Brooke who writes about sex workers.
Take the centrepiece of her argument on prostitution: a pair of studies of sex workers, the first by Suzanne Jenkins of Keele University and the second by Eaves, a charity, and London South Bank University. The second study was the more negative of the two about the effects of sex work on prostitutes, finding physical, mental or sexual health problems in lots of cases. Magnanti criticises this because “the sample they’ve recruited is not representative of UK sex workers overall”. It focuses too heavily on streetwalkers, a minority who have “more chaotic” lives.
“As a former statistician dealing with population-based data,” she says, “I know that one of the most important criteria for an acceptable study is to make sure the sampled population reflects the status of the population as a whole. If this is not done, the results are not reliable.”
The Keele research, on the other hand, is commended for “turn[ing] almost everything we know about sex work on its head”: a third of the respondents had degrees, 85 per cent of the women were aged 26 or older and a top answer to “How long do you plan to do escort work for?” was “I have no plans to stop”. Magnanti praises it for using “not simply street-based women, either, but women, men and transgendered sex workers in all areas of the business”.
Case closed. Except the word used to describe the sex workers in the Keele study was “escorts”, which usually means those who advertise themselves on the web or with agencies. Not streetwalkers. A look at the original study reveals that Jenkins confined her research “to sex workers who advertise their sexual services via websites as escorts”.
The Eaves research may well be skewed in favour of the experiences of streetwalkers. But the Keele study is skewed against them. Neither is representative of the industry as a whole, yet Magnanti mysteriously claims the one that supports her views is.
The error rather bulldozes her argument and undermines the book. If you’re going to be a smart arse – and she is, relentlessly – make sure you’re right. Magnanti, although fascinating on the misuse of statistics generally, does seem to have come a cropper when using them to push her own agenda.
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31 comments
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I've apparent a lot of interviews with Dr Magnanti and she consistently comes beyond as intelligent, with a absolutely top akin of cocky respect. Unfortunately a lot of prostitutes are affected in to it or do it out of desperation, which is wrong. But I anticipate if a woman like Brooke, who has a akin head...
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Magnanti's highlighting that one study is not representativve of the sex-worker population while failing to highlight that another is also not representative is a flaw, but it's not a fatal flaw.
It doesn't falsify any of her debunkings of other research.
Also, it's not that far wrong: only a small minority of sex-workers are streetwalkers, but quite a high proportion do advertise online. Therefore, the Keele study is likely to be more representative of the pouplation of sex-workers than the South Bank one.
Old, ugly women hate prostitutes because they highlight their own sexual worthlessness. Feminism is a sexual Trade Union for ugly old boots, nothing more.
what an absurd statement. i'm a hot, young woman who constantly gets attention from men -- and i'm against prostitution and pornography -- because they reflect the wider issue of power imbalances between men and women -- and for many other reasons, not least that conventional pornography reduces women to sluts and whores in a horrible, misogynist way, and promotes an incredibly bland and reductionist sexuality. let's see the men who defend prostitution open their orifices for money. oh and feminists don't 'hate' prostitutes. feminists are in solidarity with all women -- that's what feminism means. it is in fact the men who hate women who can use prostitutes without feeling a terrible guilt about engaging in the abuse and enslavement of another human being.
I dont think you dont understand men at all. Men dont go to prostitutes just for "sex"...its more than that....its a misconception, perpetuated by women who dont understand men at all (a.k.a femenist).....
Just for clarity, as author of the study under discussion, I certainly don't claim my sample to be representative of the population, the sex-working population, or even escorts advertising on the internet. I would add that although I aimed to study 'escorts, many men, and women, work in more than one way/place simultaneously. e.g., many escorts work some of their week in a parlour, many started as street walkers or parlour workers before going independent. I personally interviewed over 100 sex workers and their experiences were wide-ranging - but that doesn’t mean others didn’t experienced sex work differently. Also, the question about plans to leave escort work were one of large bank of questions, and respondents were able to add explanatory data to their response, so some clarification of their meanings were elicited. Having said all that, my intention is not to promote sex work or to condemn it – it more about how the law infantilises and pathologises women and how in the name of protecting women it can place them in a more vulnerable position.
"Having said all that, my intention is not to promote sex work or to condemn it – it more about how the law infantilises and pathologises women and how in the name of protecting women it can place them in a more vulnerable position."
hear hear. no matter what 'side' people are on this is of vital importance. once we have all the moralising taken out and for once try and focus on data can we create informed policy that is likely to serve society well.
Agreed, and I would like women who used to be prostitutes getting a chance to speak up - not just the glossy, happy hookers like the author, but women who are raped, trafficked, beaten and abused. Women like Stella Marr and Dublin Call Girl. Their experience is just as important as Brooke's.
Just for clarity, as author of the study under discussion, I certainly don't claim my sample to be representative of the population, the sex-working population, or even escorts advertising on the internet. I would add that although I aimed to study 'escorts, many men, and women, work in more than one way/place simultaneously. e.g., many escorts work some of their week in a parlour, many started as street walkers or parlour workers before going independent. I personally interviewed over 100 sex workers and their experiences were wide-ranging - but that doesn’t mean others didn’t experienced sex work differently. Also, the question about plans to leave escort work were one of large bank of questions, and respondents were able to add explanatory data to their response, so some clarification of their meanings were elicited. Having said all that, my intention is not to promote sex work or to condemn it – it more about how the law infantilises and pathologises women and how in the name of protecting women it can place them in a more vulnerable position.
Just for clarity, as author of the study under discussion, I certainly don't claim my sample to be representative of the population, the sex-working population, or even escorts advertising on the internet. I would add that although I aimed to study 'escorts, many men, and women, work in more than one way/place simultaneously. e.g., many escorts work some of their week in a parlour, many started as street walkers or parlour workers before going independent. I personally interviewed over 100 sex workers and their experiences were wide-ranging - but that doesn’t mean others didn’t experienced sex work differently. Also, the question about plans to leave escort work were one of large bank of questions, and respondents were able to add explanatory data to their response, so some clarification of their meanings were elicited. Having said all that, my intention is not to promote sex work or to condemn it – it more about how the law infantilises and pathologises women and how in the name of protecting women it can place them in a more vulnerable position.
suzanne
Cash is intensely democratic. Anyone can have it and you can do what you like with it. No government bastard can tell you what. I love it. I don't know about you.
No it isn't and you only expose that you don't understand democracy is by saying so. For a start you say anyone can have it, really? then why are there poor people.
Also, porn and prostitution are a poor substitute for genuine eroticism and sexual liberty.
well, that's what I think anyway.
As James Joyce, or one of his characters, opined: "What's wrong with Mrs Fist and her five orphans?"
The Sex Industry and its offshoot pornography in all shapes and sizes depend on that four letter word 'cash'.
There's nothing democratic about it. All sex workers need the cash for themselves or the extortionists they work for.
The supply-siders who put the two parts of the equation together then cream off the excess just like stockbrokers and sleep the sleep of the just.
Dirty Old Men
I am totally pro-prostitution and porn. And so ought you to be if you are a democrat. What do we want? Prostitution and porn. When do we want it? Now!
sad little demons like you fergus never evolve above the entrapments of the temptations of your lowest chakra.
you are a pitiable little wretch, not a 'democrat'.
when you have passed through many more lifetimes your brain and spirit will eventually evolve, in your case which means you will have reached the stage of perhaps amoeba, or maybe even a two celled organism.
you don't have a daughter but if you accidentally got stuck with one, your karma would mean you ended up watching her getting torn apart by demons like yourself
XD "chakra". Hahahahaha!
The UK hardly manufactures goods to trade anymore. It looks as though the City of London is losing its share of the world financial market - so I've read. The property market has been buoyant but I believe it's slowed and anyway, it can only ever earn a proportion of the money generated in foreign income. Still, we must trade to live and there is a large and growing number of women deciding not to start a family.
When I was younger there was much talk of the balance of trade. This balnce will require a large source of foreign earnings from somewhere and if you take a look at many high streets now they seem to be dominated by foreign multi-national, bookmakers (all owned by off shore companies) and charity shops.
It's probable that some of the women who have decided against having a large family are going to be inexhoribly drawn to the huge sums of foreign wealth finding a cozy home here and find work in the sex trade.
This has happened elsewhere - Thailand, The Philipines, The Czech Republic, Albania, etc;. I am not optimistic about the effect this trade is going to have on our social fabric.
"...yet Magnanti mysteriously claims the one that supports her views is."
Check Martha's blog
http://www.newstatesman.com/blogs/politics/2012/04/you-agree-column
Well I never
To be fair though feminists absolutely hate the word 'some' .
What exactly was meant by 'I have no plans to stop [escorting]'? Was it clarified? Because it doesn't in and of itself mean 'I love sex work. I want to do it forever and forever and never stop! It can also mean 'the circumstances that led to me becoming a sex worker have not changed and so I have to continue being a sex worker'. It can also mean 'I don't see any other options in life because I now lack self confidence/feel outside society/have a weird gap on my CV because I''ve been escorting & can't get work/am reliant on the money/frightened what will happen if I try to leave/have people depending on me/don't feel I have choices/have a drug or alcohol problem/don't know how to change my life/where to go to get help doing/am worried what people will think/am fearful/uncertain/trapped/ depressed' as well as 'I like my job. It's fine' which seems to be what Brooke Magnanti is assuming it means.
That seems a lot like skewing the results of a survey if your argument is backed up by a very open and non clarified question rather than science or facts. If you want to show that sex workers love their job and enjoy doing it, then you should be asking the questions that allow that to be shown. I think both sides are guilty of fiddling the stats to suit them, but I also think the pro-camp seem to lack the enthusiastic endorsement from sex workers they think is out there and the lack of stats might say something in itself.
There's a reliable law of the internet that says anyone who attempts to correct the spelling or grammar of another contributor will invariably commit an error in spelling or grammar in the self-same post.
The same thing applies to correcting the statistics of others. Come to grief myself more often than I can remember.
So you're perfectly correct to call out BM for what appears to be over-enthusiastic endorsement of the Keele study (haven't read her book, so taking your word for it).
On the other hand, I would like to know what proportion of sex workers come under the heading 'escorts who use the internet to advertise their services' as against stree-working prostitutes.
I've got a strong suspicion that the former is a much, much larger group than the latter (I'm sure I've seen estimates that less than 10% of prostitutes work streets).
If it could be argued that the sample in the Keele study represent say 80 or 90% of all sex workers, then Magnanti would not be entirely incorrect to consider them a representative sample - or at least a much more representative sample than the Eaves study.
Anyone know? Indeed, is a statistic like that in the book?
Ally,
In the book, Magnanti says that "while it's hard to come by exact numbers, evidence shows that streetwalkers only account for 5-20 per cent of all prostitutes". She doesn't give a source for that.
The Keele study which she champions says that the proportion is higher, from memory. Will find the link. Its author explicitly states: "The particular sex-work community that I wanted to access for research purposes were escorts who use the Internet as a marketing and communications tool; therefore, my target population were, by definition, Internet users".
Just found the reference from the Suzanne Jenkins study:
"However, in the UK, fewer sex-workers are working in this declining segment of the sex industry, and for women, it is now thought to be less than thirty percent at the very most (Scambler, 2007:.1092; Kinnell, 2008:.110). This is even less for male sex-workers, where street-based prostitution is thought to comprise only around 2-5% (Cameron et al., 1999:.1524; WMP, 2002)."
Thanks Helen
Guess the next question is what proportion of sex workers advertise themselves as escorts on line! There are presumably plenty who work in "parlours" and others who advertise in other ways (eg local papers or whatever)
Not that it really matters. Your fundamental point is that if street workers don't respresent all sex workers, neither do internet savvy escorts. You're absolutely right to call her out on that.
You are on the right track though. You correctly question on what grounds Brooke Magnenti was not right to claim that her sample was representative - it presumably is representative of the vast majority of sex workers. Helen, I think, has gone a little off beam here.
@ Dave K
Brooke Magnanti was certainly not right to claim the study covered “not simply street-based women, either, but women, men and transgendered sex workers in all areas of the business”. It surveyed *no* street-based women. It surveyed only escorts who advertised online; the study's author is very upfront about the particular sector of sex workers she is talking about.
Just for clarity, as author of the study under discussion, I certainly don't claim my sample to be representative of the population, the sex-working population, or even escorts advertising on the internet. I would add that although I aimed to study 'escorts, many men, and women, work in more than one way/place simultaneously. e.g., many escorts work some of their week in a parlour, many started as street walkers or parlour workers before going independent. I personally interviewed over 100 sex workers and their experiences were wide-ranging - but that doesn’t mean others didn’t experienced sex work differently. Also, the question about plans to leave escort work were one of large bank of questions, and respondents were able to add explanatory data to their response, so some clarification of their meanings were elicited. Having said all that, my intention is not to promote sex work or to condemn it – it more about how the law infantilises and pathologises women and how in the name of protecting women it can place them in a more vulnerable position.
suzanne
I am glad someone has challenged B Magnanti's superiority complex with regards to stats and sex research.
I haven't read the book. I am a supporter of sex workers rights but I do agree she goes for polemic a lot.
Good article. Lies, damned lies and statistics. One solution is to take the coveted title of "scientist" away from statisticians in the behavioural fields.
Great stuff, Helen!