investigation prostitution:

An anonymous readers' confession earlier this week on exchanging favours for finances got me really curious as to what was really going on out there in the runway realm...

So I scoured the net for anything and everything I could find...turning up some rather interesting reads:

From Runways to Redlight Districts

BBC Expose

I would like to stress that this is not to reflect all models. But, this is definitely an issue that is lurking in the crevices of the backstage world of fashion.

i had sex for money.

"Sometimes its hard being a model. You go through phases in certain seasons and cities where you'll be like crazy busy, and then the next thing you know things start to quiet down. And of course, when you're booking the jobs and making the cash you spend money just as quickly as you make it. I met this guy a few years ago. older guy. not sleezy in any sense. I needed some cash for rent. I ended up sleeping with him, and not necessarily getting paid for sex, but he knew i needed the help and he gave me $2000. From then on out whenever we met he paid me. I still see him once in a while. It's kinda nice because I don't really like being in relationships, so this way we have our casual dates and whatnot. no stress. I don't feel like a hooker. I don't really see it that way for some reason. But I guess that's basically what it is, since it's pretty much just sex and money. I think maybe on some fucked up subconcious level that I feel it's okay since modelling jobs in a sense is all about selling your body. I am not speaking on behalf of other models. This is just me myself and i.

It's weird how it all just sort of happened. It's not like I intended to start profiting off of sleeping with some guy. It was more like this unspoken agreement just occurred. We both knew. And I don't sleep with other people under those pretenses. In a way, it has kind of just become like another booking. And, whatever, we have fun together, my bills get paid, no strings attached; my kind of relationship."

-an anonymous reader

do your research.

girl signs contract. girl goes to shanghai. girl gets murdered. agency disappears into thin air. agency was in a shit box apartment. shit box apartment was in a shady side of town. mother agency was in vancouver. mother agency was a douche bag. modelling jobs turned into bar jobs. dollars at the disco. getting paid to party. bills to befriend boys. boy was bad. whatever happened to the runway. pages in a magazine. could've gone to paris. lost in shanghai. do your research.

DON'T tell my BOOKER.

SEX. DRUGS. ROCK n ROLL. In the land of pretty little things, sometimes life just ain't all that pretty. Not to say that its all out of a fashion horror film, but in the dark crevices of the world of fashion, evil is lurking.

Imagine a fairytale land where fifteen year old girls live 'happily ever after' in model apartments across the ocean and have druglords for agents. Well, in one particular case anyway. And where boys sleep with bookers in order to maintain mutual co-operation. This, my friends, is not fiction; it is fashion, through the eyes of babes not yet old enough to know how to do their own laundry.

Closer to home, yet still far enough off into the distance, models were sent in for a certain fashion week from a rather not-so-well-off country to prance the catwalk for a lesser price than the homegrown talent. Word on the street is that they were then disposed of to gentlemen callers for a little one-on-one private viewing, if you know what i mean.

Whether its wrong, or very wrong, being lucky enough to have been brought up in North America, I don't know if I am able to answer or fully understand that question. Without knowing the history of where these girls are coming from, perhaps being a fashion 'whore' in a place such as New York City doesn't seem all that bad to them.

One thing I do know is where there's bad, there's that much more good and it's more than possible to have a positive career in this chaotic business in which we call fashion. Just be aware of those dark crevices.