Gender Roles Are Paramount In Massage Parlours

By Adriana Noton


In massage parlours across the world women provide services that men pay for and receive. They are not health or beauty salons. They are understood to be places that men go to for specific types of service for which they will pay generously.

The word 'parlour' is derived from the small room where guests were received privately in the Middle Ages by nuns who belonged to a religious order. Perhaps a father, uncle or guardian would be politely received in such a room when he had business with the convent. He would not be allowed into the inner sanctum of the convent and when his business was over, he would be ushered out.

Massaging also has a long history in human affairs. Almost instinctively people massage themselves and others when muscles are sore or stiff. The action brings relief and when expert hands are applied the relief is considerable. This is because experts know about the human anatomy and where to knead or pummel. A professional masseuse is a lady who has perfected her natural comforting reflexes.

Female caprices are as varied and whimsical as nature itself. Unsurprisingly there are many variations on the theme of the small private room where men can receive a massage in private from a woman. Ambiguity, suggestion and female archness are in the very roots of the term.

At airports and in many city establishments treatments are offered that have little overt sexuality in them though offered by attractive young women to men. Fully clothed clients recline on medical beds and are massaged from head to toe through their clothes. Usually the procedure ends with a gentle circular movements around the temples, or along the neck muscles to dispel tension.

Thus far the enterprise seems quite innocent and guileless. But when a single man and a young woman are confined privately in a small room for an hour things seldom remain straightforward. In their inimitable way women manage to make each and every enterprise across the world unique. Some are places to get a very sedate health massage; others are brothels masquerading under a coy euphemism.

When a man enters places of a particular kind he might find himself surrounded by three or four attractive ladies. In theory he may choose the one he wants. In practice he will choose the one who sits on his knee or slips close beneath his arm. It's her turn. The ladies have decided.

Gender roles are paramount in massage parlours. Men are typically men and women are women. The man is likely to be driven along his one track mind by testosterone which has built up pressure within him which must be released. Blindly he seeks the long forgotten comfort of his mother's soft breasts which afforded him ultimate security and satisfaction when he was an infant. Understanding all this his female partner will sell him the intimacy that he longs for, on a temporary basis. Then he will be shown the door and she will wash him away entirely in a shower. For her temporary intimacy she will deservedly have earned about the same as a medical expert, even if she is illiterate and without training.




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