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<TABLE cellSpacing=0 cellPadding=1 width="100%" border=0><TBODY><TR><TD><SPAN class=TopStory>'Love tourism'</SPAN>
<SPAN class=Subheadline></SPAN></TD></TR><TR><TD>Diane Abbott
Sunday, August 13, 2006
</TD></TR></TBODY></TABLE>
<P class=StoryText align=justify>One of the big growth areas in tourism has been single women from Europe and North America travelling to the Caribbean for what is politely described as 'love tourism'. Now, here in London, playwrights and filmmakers are putting this issue under the spotlight.<TABLE cellSpacing=0 cellPadding=5 width=110 align=left border=0><TBODY><TR><TD>
</TD></TR><TR><TD><SPAN class=Description>Diane Abbott </SPAN></TD></TR></TBODY></TABLE><P class=StoryText align=justify>In March, I saw a Royal Shakespeare Company production Trade written by Debbie Tucker Green. It compared and contrasted three women. Two were British black women who had travelled to the Caribbean for sex; one an older professional woman and the other a young "hottie". The third woman was the longstanding partner and "baby mother" of the man servicing the two tourists.<P class=StoryText align=justify>Recently a new French language film Heading South opened in
London. It is about rich, white, middle-aged women travelling to 1970s Haiti for "no-strings" sex with young black men. And next week a production called Sugar Mummies opens at the Royal Court Theatre.<P class=StoryText align=justify>The pre-publicity says: "Jamaica: a sensual paradise where sun, sea and sand are free but anything more comes at a price. Welcome to the 21st Century where women travel across the world in search of sex, love and liberation. But the reality is that hard cash equals hard man.<P class=StoryText align=justify>It seems that the type of encounters, that used to be seen as holiday romances, are increasingly described by academics and writers as female "sex tourism". The men involved certainly take a very business like attitude to their activities. A journalist quotes a beach boy in Negril as saying proudly: "We are in business. We sell ganja, coke and good loving".<P class=StoryText align=justify>However the female tourists manage to blind themselves to the reality that they are buying sex. British academics Jacqueline Sanchez Taylor and Julia O' Connell -Davidson bluntly describe the way that the female tourists think.<TABLE cellSpacing=0 cellPadding=5 width=200 align=right border=0><TBODY><TR><TD>
</TD></TR><TR><TD><SPAN class=Description></SPAN></TD></TR></TBODY></TABLE><P class=StoryText align=justify>"Racist ideas about black men being hypersexual and unable to contain their sexuality enable them (the female tourists) to explain to themselves why such young desirable men would be eager to have sex with older and/or overweight women, without having to think that partners are interested in them only for economic reasons". The writer of Sugar Mummies, Tanika Gupta travelled to Jamaica to research her play. She believes that both parties are exploiting each other.<P class=StoryText align=justify>"A lot of the women talked about how big the men are and how they can go all night. But what I found most depressing is that the whole thing is not real. So many of the women think that they have found real love. It is all very delusional. At first I thought it was all about white women exploiting black men. But it is not. It's very mutual."<P class=StoryText align=justify>Men have always gone abroad looking for easy sex. But the rise of female "sex tourism" is a new phenomenon and reflects the increasing income and independence of women in North America and Europe. And on holiday these women do things that most of them would never dare to do at home, such as have sex with black men half the
<SPAN class=Subheadline></SPAN></TD></TR><TR><TD>Diane Abbott
Sunday, August 13, 2006
</TD></TR></TBODY></TABLE>
<P class=StoryText align=justify>One of the big growth areas in tourism has been single women from Europe and North America travelling to the Caribbean for what is politely described as 'love tourism'. Now, here in London, playwrights and filmmakers are putting this issue under the spotlight.<TABLE cellSpacing=0 cellPadding=5 width=110 align=left border=0><TBODY><TR><TD>
</TD></TR><TR><TD><SPAN class=Description>Diane Abbott </SPAN></TD></TR></TBODY></TABLE><P class=StoryText align=justify>In March, I saw a Royal Shakespeare Company production Trade written by Debbie Tucker Green. It compared and contrasted three women. Two were British black women who had travelled to the Caribbean for sex; one an older professional woman and the other a young "hottie". The third woman was the longstanding partner and "baby mother" of the man servicing the two tourists.<P class=StoryText align=justify>Recently a new French language film Heading South opened inLondon. It is about rich, white, middle-aged women travelling to 1970s Haiti for "no-strings" sex with young black men. And next week a production called Sugar Mummies opens at the Royal Court Theatre.<P class=StoryText align=justify>The pre-publicity says: "Jamaica: a sensual paradise where sun, sea and sand are free but anything more comes at a price. Welcome to the 21st Century where women travel across the world in search of sex, love and liberation. But the reality is that hard cash equals hard man.<P class=StoryText align=justify>It seems that the type of encounters, that used to be seen as holiday romances, are increasingly described by academics and writers as female "sex tourism". The men involved certainly take a very business like attitude to their activities. A journalist quotes a beach boy in Negril as saying proudly: "We are in business. We sell ganja, coke and good loving".<P class=StoryText align=justify>However the female tourists manage to blind themselves to the reality that they are buying sex. British academics Jacqueline Sanchez Taylor and Julia O' Connell -Davidson bluntly describe the way that the female tourists think.<TABLE cellSpacing=0 cellPadding=5 width=200 align=right border=0><TBODY><TR><TD>
</TD></TR><TR><TD><SPAN class=Description></SPAN></TD></TR></TBODY></TABLE><P class=StoryText align=justify>"Racist ideas about black men being hypersexual and unable to contain their sexuality enable them (the female tourists) to explain to themselves why such young desirable men would be eager to have sex with older and/or overweight women, without having to think that partners are interested in them only for economic reasons". The writer of Sugar Mummies, Tanika Gupta travelled to Jamaica to research her play. She believes that both parties are exploiting each other.<P class=StoryText align=justify>"A lot of the women talked about how big the men are and how they can go all night. But what I found most depressing is that the whole thing is not real. So many of the women think that they have found real love. It is all very delusional. At first I thought it was all about white women exploiting black men. But it is not. It's very mutual."<P class=StoryText align=justify>Men have always gone abroad looking for easy sex. But the rise of female "sex tourism" is a new phenomenon and reflects the increasing income and independence of women in North America and Europe. And on holiday these women do things that most of them would never dare to do at home, such as have sex with black men half the