I enjoy reading your replies.
I think it can be bad to demonize it, but not always bad. It depends on the intent. Too often especially in real world progressive circles I see people latching on to a defense of the industry, or at least the female practitioners, as if it's some grand moral battleground.
To me, this loses sight of the simple fact that in a truly gender-progressive society, no market (or at least not one of the current size) would exist for sexual services. It's precisely the asymmetry in gender sexual dynamics that makes it a viable business. The solution to a fundamentally exploitive market isn't to encourage its operation by 'rounding' the rough edges. It's bad for young women, it's bad for lonely men, it's bad for humans in general and perverts interactions normally occurring in a trusting and intimate context.
Re: the value of sex, I wouldn't call one's sexual history adding or devaluing the sex they're having now........but it certainly does play into it; just as one's past experiences with everything in life will play into the person they are today. I wholeheartedly agree with your sentiment of 'avoiding extremes and applying some finesse' here, as I think too often people take extreme views on this, either demanding chaste puritanism or speaking like some kind of sexual libertarian in which a free market full of frequent pairings is a functional and desirable place.
To bring it back to the game, this is why many pages back I commented to td1900 how I really wish the game had more non-mc sexual encounters; specifically carnations/candidates and customers. Without those, these discussions tend to remain academic, and it's easy to separate the game characters from their professions. When those do occur, it really challenges the player to think about how they really feel towards these questions.
