PLEASE NOTE: This is a minimally-edited transcript that originates from a program that uses AI.
Anita Rao
This is Embodied, from PRX and WUNC. I’m Anita Rao.
When B. Chionne first heard about sugar dating in college, she was intrigued. What if in exchange for her time and attention, she could get enough money from a sugar daddy to pay her bills.
B. Chionne
I was happy to say, you know what, I'm gonna try it one time. If I don't like it, I'll never do it again. If it's successful, then maybe I am onto something and I, I was onto something.
Anita Rao
B. was a sugar baby on and off for about a decade. She’ll tell us about how that experience shaped her views on intimacy, money and power. Plus we’ll talk with a researcher about the sugar daddies’ perspectives.
Lauren Cormier
The sugar benefactors were getting a lot of companionship from it. It wasn't just sex. What I found interesting was that they really enjoyed this element of mentorship. And that was a part of it that, uh, they felt quite good about.
Anita Rao
Inside the world of sugar dating, just ahead on Embodied.
When B Chionne was in college, she faced a common conundrum. How do you juggle classes and a job? She didn't want work that was too time consuming, but she was also kind of broke.
B. Chionne
I think I was just online looking up fast ways to make money. And then I stumbled upon an article from a sugar baby explaining her. And I was like, there's no way there's men out here that pay just to be with pretty girls.
Anita Rao
Sugar babies are typically younger folks who have emotional and physical relationships with older partners in exchange for money and gifts. The transactional relationship between sugar babies and sugar daddies is called sugar dating.
B. Chionne
I mean, at first I was just like, this sounds like prostitution. This doesn't really sound like something I can tell my mom or my friends. So I really had to bury a lot of that before I just said F it. Let's just go ahead.
Anita Rao
B went on her first sugar date in 2016 and was a sugar baby on and off for about a decade. This experience fundamentally shifted her thoughts on money, power, and what she wants from her own romantic partnerships. This is Embodied our show about sex, relationships, and your health. I'm Anita Rao.
Sugar dating has surged into the public consciousness in the past few years. In large part because of social media, I personally have experienced disappearing down the rabbit hole of sugar. Baby TikTok,
TikTok Montage
Spend the day with me as a sugar baby. And of course my sugar daddy just bumped me a car, and obviously a cat can be company.
My current sugar daddy is this 58-year-old attorney. These men want your intention and if you can't keep that going on for a long period of time, at some point they're gonna turn their heads away and they're gonna go onto the next sugar baby.
Anita Rao
A lot of that content shows off the sugar baby lifestyle or offers practical advice, but that content wasn't really around when B started sugar dating. So she wrestled with most of her reservations about becoming a sugar baby on her own.
B. Chionne
I was really just focused on being able to provide for my needs. And the thing is, I could have asked my mom for some help, but my pride just wouldn't let me.
Anita Rao
Hmm.
B. Chionne
And so I compartmentalized those. Things I had that were in the front of my mind and said, you know what? I'm not the first one to do this. I'm not the last one to do it. Why not? And I've also just always had a mindset throughout my life of wanting to do whatever I wanted without regrets. Sometimes, you know, you just do it for the plot, and I was happy. So, you know what? I'm gonna try it one time. If I don't like it, I'll never do it again. If it's successful, then maybe I am onto something and I I was onto something.
Anita Rao
Did you have like a number in mind, like an amount of money that you wanted to get? Because I know I've done the, like how to get fast cash Google search before, and it usually takes me to like surveys, like do online surveys for $15. So like did you have a number in mind that made you say like, no, online surveys, like, I need to do something else.
B. Chionne
Um, I think my main thing was I need to buy groceries.
Anita Rao
Mm-hmm.
B. Chionne
So. I was like, if I can walk away with a hundred dollars, I'm like, okay, I can buy groceries with this. I might have some money. Back then, the economy was so much better than what it was, so I had money left over. I can, like, I can get my nails done or I can get books for my classes. So I was like, a hundred dollars is my goal to know if it was, if it was good.
Anita Rao
Okay, so you started, you decided you're gonna do this. Um, you'd read a tiny bit about it.
B. Chionne
Mm-hmm.
Anita Rao
How did you then go about like entering this world? I know the sugar dating landscape has really changed a lot in the past decade. Mm-hmm. But back when you were kind of first looking, it was 2016. Tell me about Yeah. Kind of how you got into.
B. Chionne
Within the research that I did, I also found different websites that I could use, and I was on a few. But the main one that I found the most success on was seeking arrangements. Mm-hmm. At the time, it was seeking arrangements and now it's just seeking, and I had to sift through a lot of trash before I found a normal person. It really kind of deterred me a little bit 'cause I'm like, all these profiles are fake, like, or they're asking for bank information and this is a scam, you know? So it took a lot of patience. And determination.
Anita Rao
And how does it look? I'm thinking about like dating sites that I've been on where like you have a profile and photos. Mm-hmm. And information. Do you have as much information about the sugar daddy as they have about you, or how does that work?
B. Chionne
It's an interesting psychology game because as a sugar baby, your profile wants to show you as this fun loving, super young, beautiful girl that's just like. All about fast life and want you wanna bring the youthfulness out in him. That's kind of what the goal is to portray on your profile. For the sugar daddies, they had a lot more leeway with how much they put on their profile. There were some that they wouldn't even put a picture. It would just probably have discreet. Private DM me because it was viewed like they had the power so they didn't have to do more. They didn't have to be convincing to give us time. We had to be more convincing 'cause there's more sugar babies out there than there are sugar daddies. So you want to be very specific with your photos, your verbiage, everything. It's, it's really down to a science.
Anita Rao
So what did you know about your first sugar daddy before meeting up? Like how much was available?
B. Chionne
So I knew that at the time, he was 37 or 38, and I was like, ill, that's so old. I knew what he looked like. He was a handsome guy. Um. We were able to chat and um, and yeah, so I knew a little bit of what he did for a living, and then after that it was just, okay, let's go to dinner and see what happens.
Anita Rao
So what did you do to prepare, it sounds like from what you're saying, like you had a little bit of the ick going in, like thinking that he was older, but you still decided to do it. So talk to me about kind of your feelings and then how you got ready for that first date.
B. Chionne
Oh gosh. Um, I did it so quietly, first of all, 'cause I was still in my dorm, so I didn't tell anybody what I was doing. I also made sure I looked up the restaurant that we were going to because I never liked to stand out in the, in a bad way. Also, I'm a black woman, and so even at that age, I wasn't ignorant to the looks of. Certain minorities being in certain spaces or, you know, even just being as young as I am, like how, how can she afford to be in this
Anita Rao
Yeah.
B. Chionne
Five star restaurant, you know? So I was really conscious of making sure I portrayed myself in the most mature way possible to show I'm in this space because I deserve and I belong to be in this.
Anita Rao
So you said you kind of kept it pretty private, you didn't tell anyone. Did you have any safety concerns about like meeting up with a stranger who was gonna pick? I think he picked you up on campus, right? So like being in a stranger's car? Mm-hmm.
B. Chionne
The moment he said he was gonna pick me up, I was like, Ooh, this is extra scary. I was really hesitant about it, and at that time I was a novice in that world, so I didn't really feel like I had much of a choice, so I forced myself to just go with it and hope for the best, honestly. Uh, but yeah, I had a lot of reservations. I think the only thing I did. Say was I told my mom that I was going off campus with a friend. Okay. Um, definitely didn't tell her where, 'cause she would be like, how are you affording that? You know, and questions I don't have answers to.
Anita Rao
So when and how did you all kind of talk about the terms of your relationship on the date and how did that come up? Like how did it shift from normal banter to like, okay, mm-hmm. What's our, what's our business arrangement?
B. Chionne
Yeah, it was in the middle of dinner. He kind of just went straight at it and said, so what are you looking for? And I knew from my research that was basically, what are we doing here,
Anita Rao
Uhhuh?
B. Chionne
It was really awkward for me. I'm not gonna lie that I think that was the most awkward part of it, because I didn't feel right. Saying, I want X amount of money from you for this. It was just, it was really uncomfortable for me. So I kind of handed it back to him and I asked him like, what do you want? What are you looking for? And I kind of tried to use what he was expecting to calculate in my head what I think. It was worth. But yeah, I, I kind of just let him lead the reins with that conversation. 'cause it was, it was so weird for me. I didn't know how to carry it out.
Anita Rao
So what did you all decide? Like was it just this one date or what terms did you agree to?
B. Chionne
So we agreed to. I would get paid for my time, like going on dates like this. So even if it's just like a dinner date with no benefits after, he would give me like a hundred dollars just for my time. And if we decided to take things further and be intimate, maybe like 500 a week or we would do something monthly. I think we landed on a weekly arrangement agreement.
Anita Rao
So how long did that first relationship last? Do you remember? Like months or?
B. Chionne
Honestly, I think it's so crazy because when he dropped me off back at the dorm and he held my hand saying goodbye, I got grossed out and I had never talked to him again.
Anita Rao
Oh wow. Okay.
B. Chionne
It was. I don't know what it was when he held my hand. It was really icky to me, and I was like, I cannot have sex with this person. I can't do it. But that was the first instance of where I dipped my toe in the pool and I, I was like, I need to do a little bit more digging physically. 'cause I also wasn't that intimate when I was at that age. Like I wasn't experienced in sex, so. I felt like I needed to get more experience with sex before I could dive into this, like with both feet
Anita Rao
Just ahead, we'll talk about how B got back into sugar dating and how this experience has shaped her thoughts about power and intimacy. You're listening to Embodied from W-U-N-C-A broadcast service of the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. You can also hear Embodied as a podcast. Follow and subscribe on your platform of choice. We'll be right back.
This is Embodied. I'm Anita Rao. Today we're talking about sugar dating. It's typically a relationship between a younger person and a wealthier older person. The younger sugar baby provides emotional and often physical companionship to the older sugar daddy in exchange for gifts or financial support. B. Chionne first tried sugar dating a decade ago. At the time she was in college and needed money for living expenses while she finished school. But after her first sugar date, she realized that she wasn't quite comfortable with having a sexual relationship with a sugar daddy. So she hit pause. Then two years after graduating, she decided she wanted to try sugar dating again to help pay for the lifestyle she wanted in DC and this time she took a different approach to physical intimacy.
B. Chionne
I was more comfortable in my own skin at that time. So when we did get intimate, I was able to compartmentalize more than I was before. It's kind of like I. It's really weird to explain it like this, but in the moment I feel like I kind of removed myself like I wasn't in my body.
Anita Rao
Hmm.
B. Chionne
And then afterwards, and then it was all done. That's when I kind of like came back and I was like, oh, that wasn't that bad. But it wasn't that bad because I didn't feel like I was experiencing it. It was just like somebody else.
Anita Rao
Is that like a, I guess when I hear you say that, I think like about that being a trauma response, did it feel traumatic or did it just feel like, I don't know, how were you thinking about that?
B. Chionne
No, it didn't feel traumatic at all. Uhhuh. Um, it just felt like it was kind of my way of separating sex from emotions because. I never wanted to get the two mixed up in my own personal life. So if I'm, if I was dating a guy that I actually did like, and it wasn't a sugar daddy, the sex that we had was for us, it was emotional. We were tune. It was all about us versus having sex with a sugar daddy. I felt like I didn't want him to have that type of access to me wholeheartedly, and so that was the way I was able to make a clear distinction between the two.
Anita Rao
Did you think about yourself as a sex worker?
B. Chionne
I did not. I, I really didn't, and I still don't, to be honest, I don't really consider that sex work. I know by definition, if we're talking about sex workers, right? We think you know anything transactional involving sex. You're a sex worker, whether you're on the street on as a prostitute or being a sugar baby, or call yourself a escort at sex work. Sure. But at the time. I didn't consider myself a sex worker. I just considered myself a girl who met a bunch of guys who I could take advantage of, who wanted to provide something for me. I could provide something for them. And that's it. I really, you know, a lot of people put it in that sex work category, and I completely understand why, but I just personally don't because at the end of the day, I feel like we're all. Having sex in exchange for something. Hmm. Even if it's not straight out cash on the table. You know, there's a girl out there having sex right now for a promotion, but she's not considered a sex worker. There's a woman out there right now having sex in exchange for like reassurance or love, and that's an emotional transaction and that's not considered sex work. So I don't put myself in that category 'cause I feel like we're all using sex. To our advantage in some type of way.
Anita Rao
When you say that, it brings me back to something you said very early on, which was like when you were first talking to that person on that first date, you viewed him as having all the power in that mm-hmm. Situation. Mm-hmm. And mm-hmm. When we're talking about like sex and power, and you're saying like someone having sex for a promotion, like that's obviously the person who they're having sex with is. In the position of power to decide whether or not they get the promotion. Like that's problematic. But how, like, how does the power piece happen in your mind and like how were you thinking about that at this time? That you were kind of more comfortable as a sugar baby? Did you feel like you had the power? Did you feel like it was shared power?
B. Chionne
Um, I felt like it was. Shared power, but still leaned more in favor of him.
Anita Rao
Mm-hmm.
B. Chionne
Because I associated money with power. So because I was the one in need of that resource, I felt like he had more power. But it gradually changed as I became more experienced and just more mature and understood how the world worked a little bit more. But yeah, at that time it was definitely a little bit more shared power.
Anita Rao
So how much of your time and like income were you getting from sugar dating as opposed to other kinds of work as you continued to get more into it?
B. Chionne
Well, straight out of college I wasn't really able to. Get into a career that I enjoyed. So I was living at home and of course I wasn't paying rent or anything like that. I lived a very comfortable life. By the way, I think a lot of people have this misconception too, that sugar babies, they have like a rough life and they can't do anything. I lived a very privileged life. I went to private school my whole life. Like I grew up with a single mom, like she provided everything I wanted and more. So it was more just so. My pride wouldn't allow me to go to my mom for what I felt were frivolous things. So. At that time, I, I wasn't working in my career field, but I also didn't have huge financial pressures or burdens on me to feel like I needed to like, make a certain amount of money so I could live and just get by. So when it came onto my finances as a sugar baby, I think I was just making whatever I felt like I wanted to just do things I want wanted to do without having to ask my mom. For money.
Anita Rao
Do you have a sense of like what your monthly or yearly salary was from being a sugar baby at that point?
B. Chionne
Mm. Monthly I would maybe say, I wanna say maybe 2000 a month.
Anita Rao
Okay.
B. Chionne
It depended on how like active I was and. Into it with whatever guy I was with at the time. So I would say maybe 2000 at that time.
Anita Rao
So then in around 2019, you moved to la. This point you're in your mm-hmm. Mid twenties.
B. Chionne
Yes. I was around like 23.
Anita Rao
23. Okay.
B. Chionne
Yeah.
Anita Rao
So how were things shifting for you at that time in terms of like the balance of time you were spending sugar dating versus other kinds of life and work stuff?
B. Chionne
Um, at that time I was in survival mode. Mm-hmm. Because that was the first time I was away from home. And though I could still rely on my mom financially, again, my pride, I didn't want to, I made this huge leap to go to LA just 'cause I wanted to change my scenery. And so I was like, I have to make this work by any means necessary without compromising myself too much. And so. In the daytime, I was a writer, an entertainment writer, and doing social media. And then at night I was bartending and doing bottle service. So I was providing for myself just to get my foundation set. And then once I got my foundation set, that's when I got back into sugar dating. Um. Because I, I needed to create my life so I could also create a realistic expectation for what I need from the sugar daddies. Once I did get back into it,
Anita Rao
That reminds me of a line that you wrote in a piece about sugar dating. Okay. You said I must keep a firm grip on reality by being aware that I'm selling a fantasy, so I wanna know more. Mm-hmm. About. This line that you have to walk as a sugar baby. And I guess particularly like when you're in the fantasy realm, what are the things that you are doing? What is the version of yourself that you are performing for these sugar daddies?
B. Chionne
Oh, that's such a good question. I'm really mimicking them 'cause as I got older. I've realized men are, they have a little sociopath in them. They, they do. They're very narcissistic. They love themselves and I found that when I would mimic men and kind of just show who they are with a mix of giving them the woman that they want, that was kind of just like that manipulation that I needed to do to gain. Their trusted gain favor. So that's where the fantasy kind of came from. So if I'm with a guy and he's asking me like, have you ever, you know, traveled to The Bahamas before? And I'm like, no. I've never been. Like, what's it like? It sounds so beautiful. I've only seen it on pic and pictures of it online. I'm Jamaican. I grew up in the Caribbean, so The Bahamas is nothing to me, but to him, that's something impressive. So I stroke his ego and I allow him to think that he's impressing me. So things like that. It's, it's, um,
Anita Rao
So do you, are you lying? Like, do you. Like, I guess, how do you think about that?
B. Chionne
Yeah, you lie.
Anita Rao
Okay.
B. Chionne
You lie. I mean, men wake up lying every day. They wake up, they, their eyes open, they breathe in, they lie. That's just, that's how I view men. So at the same time, I look at it as a business. It's a business. I'm trying to gain you as a, as a business partner, I have to stretch the truth a little bit. I have to paint a really pretty picture for you to say, you know what, this is a really good, you know, business partner for me in this. Realm of work that I'm in. So, yeah, I mean, I guess you can consider it a little bit of lying, but it's, it's not in a malicious way. It's nothing, you know, it's not hurting anyone. It's everyone's benefiting.
Anita Rao
This is like a full performance, like you're, you're basically creating a character. You're playing this character. How do you navigate the line between that kind of performance? Your own very real boundaries about what you do and don't wanna do what you do and don't feel comfortable with.
B. Chionne
Mm-hmm. Um, so now I am a lot more firm in my boundaries because I carry myself with the mindset of what you won't do. Another man will. So for me, I have that confidence in when I create a boundary and I, and I'm firm in that I also, I'm not as worried about if I say no, then he's never gonna talk to me again. That, that was a concern, that was an insecurity of mine before. Now that I'm older, I'm like, you know, some men like a little bit of a headache. So I don't mind saying no with a lot more confidence and I'm more selfish. Mentally, I'm more selfish physically. I'm more selfish emotionally because I have to protect myself at the end of the day. No matter how good a sugar daddy can come off, no matter how pure and genuine, at the end of the day, he's for himself and I need to be for myself and well like being mindful of that reality, it really helped me kind of just like shape the way I come about my relationships with them.
Anita Rao
Once you were kind of in this rhythm full-time in your twenties, how did that affect your own personal, romantic relationships and your ability to kind of pursue those things in your personal life?
B. Chionne
At first, like I said, compartmentalize, so I. Would date guys, regular guys who weren't sugar daddies, and the bar was really low for them, like very low expectations because at that time too, I wasn't really dating for a relationship either. I didn't really start wanting a boyfriend until I turned about 27, 28. So even then I was just having sex casually and going on dates casually. And if I liked a guy, I liked him. If he disappeared tomorrow, then I'll find another one tomorrow too. So that really wasn't much of an issue. I, I wouldn't say I put them all in the same category, but emotionally I didn't have any ties to anyone. So it wasn't really hard to separate the two. Once I did, um. Kind of start getting a little bit more serious with one guy in particular, my expectations for men was raised drastically, like expecting a certain level of respect, you know, and also not being as forgiving, you know, it gradually changed my experiences with sugar daddies. Affected my relationships with regular guys and I, I think in a positive way because, um. It made me feel like I just deserved more in both aspects.
Anita Rao
So you're saying the getting closer to a particular sugar daddy made you change mm-hmm. What you wanted from your personal life?
B. Chionne
Yes, absolutely. It made me definitely raise the bar like in standards of where we went to dinner, the type of car that I would like him to, to have his financials. Stability, um, his ability to provide. Um, I wasn't dating for potential. I wasn't looking at potential that the word potential makes me wanna throw up. I wanted a man who had it. Already and is growing on it, that it, it raised in, in those ways.
Anita Rao
How about the emotional piece? Because I imagine like as a sugar baby you're doing, I mean, you've said compartmentalization a lot, so like you're compartmentalizing Yeah. You're not revealing your full emotional self to them. Yeah. But in a personal relationship. You probably want to, like was it harder to let yourself be vulnerable in your personal relationships?
B. Chionne
Yeah, yeah, yeah, absolutely. I mean, and, and still is, I'm not gonna lie. I am, I am very self-aware, but I, and it's so I know my weak points when it comes on to emotional. Not even connection, but just like expressing myself. Mm-hmm. But that wasn't really created by the sugar daddies, to be honest. The wall I have emotionally with men was created by the men I dated with actual intention.
Anita Rao
Hmm.
B. Chionne
So. Those were from like the genuine heartbreaks and cheating and just like emotionally abusive situations. Those are the experiences that created that wall for me.
Anita Rao
Did they know you're a sugar baby?
B. Chionne
No.
Anita Rao
Okay.
B. Chionne
I didn't tell them that. They would never be able to deal with that, and so I shielded that aspect from them. They knew, however, they did know that I was someone who liked. The finer things, they would see my car and know you have to match this. There was an intimidation that was kind of like unspoken though, for sure.
Anita Rao
So you're living these like many different lives. You say you're good at compartmentalizing, but how about like your, your friends and your mom? Like how much at this, at this point, like how much do those people that are really close, do you know about your sugar dating?
B. Chionne
So. Now all of my friends know about my life. They know every detail, every funny story I they know 'cause I don't have any shame in it anymore. My mom, I protected her from it. 'cause my mom is very modest and I think she also has the mindsets of the whole sex work correlation. So my mom wouldn't outright say, yeah, my daughter's a sugar baby, but she will. She understands that there are men out there who appreciate her beautiful daughter and they wanna spend money on her. And I mean, I'm 32 years old. I'm, she's not naive to the point of knowing I'm definitely having sex with men and. Before she probably would, would've been very judgmental, but now she's a lot more accepting and you know, she actually has conversations with the guy that I'm dealing with now. Like sometimes I'll be on FaceTime with him and they'll have conversations with each other and I just leave the phone with her and they'll be talking on their own. So we've come a long way. But yeah, my relationships are very open. I'm an open book with, with everyone.
Anita Rao
We talked earlier about power and you said you thought. Sugar Daddy's kind of held the power 'cause they have the money.
B. Chionne
Mm-hmm.
Anita Rao
But some of your thinking has shifted. Mm-hmm. Tell me about that shift and, and especially kind of how you think about the money piece of all of this at this point.
B. Chionne
So that shift came, I would say, when I was meeting up with a guy and he wanted to meet me on his boat. I was like, absolutely not. Sex trafficking is real. You are insane. Um, and so that was my first hard, no, we need to, you know, revisit this and he respected it fully and I was like, oh, he's. Accommodating. And so by experiencing that, I just became more comfortable with saying no. So the safety aspect really is what is, that's like the highest priority for me. So I started sharing my location with my friends and my mom. Um, I let them know, like there are some friends where I would send the guy's profile to them or send the guy's phone number to them so they would know exactly who I was with. Before that, I was like, I don't wanna be a stick in the mud. I don't wanna come off like I'm just like this immature little girl who's scared. But now I'm like, I don't care about any of that 'cause I only have one life and I refuse to live it. You know, recklessly in a way, and then get it cut short just because I was doing something for fun and I was worried about how a man would feel being worried about a man's feelings over my safety, that will never be me ever again.
Anita Rao
Just ahead, we'll take a break from Bee's Story to learn more about the sugar Daddy perspective with a researcher who studies sugar dating. As always, you can hear the podcast version of the show by following Embodied on your platform of choice. We'll be right back.
This is Embodied. I am Anita Rao. We're going inside the world of sugar babies, sugar daddies, and sugar dating today. These kinds of relationships have been around for a long time. As far back as ancient Greece, you can find evidence of older, wealthier folks, compensating younger people for companionship or sex. But sugar dating has gotten much more visible in the past several years because of social media. And as more people are talking about sugar dating researchers are also beginning to take note.
One of those interested researchers is Lauren Cormier. Lauren is a PhD student in clinical psychology at the University of New Brunswick. She studies human sexuality and relationships like B, the former sugar baby. We've been talking to. Lauren also first learned about sugar dating while on a college campus.
Lauren Cormier
I feel like I've been on university campuses forever and so there's always this sort of whispering about sugar babies paying tuition through sugar dating, and so. I think around 2020 when the COVID-19 pandemic first hit, um, and everyone was staying home, there were these concerns about finances for a lot of people. And I think these alternative forms of relationships just became kind of. Maybe more interesting, maybe a little bit more talked about. I think within the past five, six years, there's probably been an increase of media tension on sugar dating. And sugar dating actually stood out to me because it is a relationship model where structure is unusually visible. It's it's typically talked about, it's embedded within it. So these expectations are often explicit rather than implied. And I just found that. Incredibly interesting, um, because there's not a ton of research on it.
Anita Rao
What really pulled me, especially to your research was that you all weren't just trying to talk to sugar babies, but you wanted to talk to sugar daddies as well. So you all sent out these surveys about sugar dating to both sugar babies and the people who hired them. You had about 77 people who met your criteria. I'm curious to know what you heard about motivation from the sugar benefactors, the people paying for this, and what surprised you based on what your assumptions were going in?
Lauren Cormier
Mm-hmm. I think what we found was that. The sugar benefactors were getting a lot of companionship from it. It wasn't just sex. They actually wanted to spend time with a young, beautiful person. And what I found interesting was that they really enjoyed this element of mentorship. A lot of them stated that they enjoyed helping. A young person get to know more information about business or know how to get ahead in the world, and that was a part of it that they felt quite good about. Some others of them were married and they believed it was a good alternative to divorce because their sex lives were not as exciting within their primary relationship, and so this was something that they could do to still feel young and enjoy that part of their lives without. Destroying their home life essentially.
Anita Rao
Tell me more about the relationship structures that you heard about. We learned from B that like even she had so many different experiences from just kind of a one-off date to a longer term relationship that involved, you know, much more and physical intimacy. What was kind of the range that you heard about in your.
Lauren Cormier
Oh my gosh. There was a huge range and um, I'm actually happy to hear that Bee's experience sort of matched that. And we did have some people who were more pay per meat, um, and we had people who were in years long. Relationships, and I believe we had at least one sugar baby who stated that they were hoping that their sugar relationship would turn into more of a, what they called vanilla relationship, more of a traditional relationship structure. So sort of seeing that relationship change over time because they were so committed to each other and because they did enjoy their time together so much so. Really, we did see that, that large range.
Anita Rao
How about the power piece? Because in a traditional relationship there. I mean, I guess they're, yeah, they're all different. They're all different ways that a power exchange or a power dynamic can look. But we, we talked to B a little bit about this, like, does money equate power? And she said at the beginning, um, it really did for her and she really felt like the sugar daddies had more power in the relationship. But over the course of relationships, and over the course of her time doing this, her thinking has. Evolved and she's been able to kind of say no and draw more boundaries and, and think of it as a more equal power exchange. What did you all hear about how people thought about power in the relationship?
Lauren Cormier
We really heard essentially what B is saying. So as researchers, I have to acknowledge my bias. I assumed that it really would be the older, wealthier partner. Usually the man, the sugar daddy that would have the most power. He's got age, he's got experience. He's clearly, or presumably financially stable enough to take on this, um, type of dynamic intentionally versus this intentionally seeking a younger partner who. You know, could be more naive, could be more or less experienced sexually or even in the world in business, who might actually have a true financial need. And so that in my. Research background, I would've assumed that that would be a clear power differential in favor of the sugar daddy. But we asked them about their perspective of power, and what we found was that both the sugar babies and the sugar daddies found that the sugar babies had the most power.
Anita Rao
Hmm.
Lauren Cormier
So these women were essentially saying like. I know what I have, I know you know my body, my time, my um, companionship is valuable and I can ask for what I want. And these sugar daddies were saying things like the pool of sugar babies is so much smaller than the pool of potential sugar daddies. Yes, I have the money, but if she doesn't like me or if I go about this the wrong way, she could always find someone else.
Anita Rao
That's so funny because I think B said kind of the opposite, like there are more sugar babies than sugar daddies. But then also that she felt like if someone wasn't kind of giving her what she wanted, she could. Move on to someone else.
Lauren Cormier
It is very interesting, and I think that's the thing about perception. We don't actually have a good prevalence estimate of who is engaging in these behaviors. Hmm. I think because of probably the stigma and because it's still a relatively new area of research, we don't really have any, any clue about. Who is engaging in this and, and how many people are. And so there does seem to be this, this perspective of the sugar daddies that sugar babies could find someone else because, you know, there's, there's so many sugar daddies, but really interesting to hear that B had the opposite perspective. I would love it if one day we could, we could put that to the test and really see what is out there.
Anita Rao
I wanna talk about the other pieces of how these dynamics play out. You talked about sugar daddy sing. There was a mentorship component that they enjoyed. There was a companionship component, but there is also physical intimacy. I'm curious how much that came up in your research and what you learned about kind of, did they think about it as sex work? I guess from both perspectives. The, the people paying for it and the sugar babies.
Lauren Cormier
It's such a good question, and I think that the answer is, it depends. Some people would say, yeah, I'm probably engaging in sex work. A lot of people don't. A lot of people don't see it in that way, even when they're describing these arrangements as. Pay per meet. You know, I tend to have the philosophy that you get to identify whether you are a sex worker or not. And so if you don't think that you are and it's technically a part of this unique type of sugar dating relationship, then I suppose it wouldn't typically count. Even though one might think a paper meat and you're having sex is sex work. But the core component of companionship, I think is really what. Makes sugar dating stand out because you could easily flip it and say someone who goes on a one night stand, and they particularly sought out an older wealthier partner because that's what they were attracted to. If they had sex with this person and they had a general expectation that he would pay for things and maybe get her gifts, would we call that sex work? I don't think so. And so it is sort of. Up for discussion and then sort of up for debate, but we left it kind of vague.
Anita Rao
How about the benefactors, like the people that are paying for it? Yeah. Did they think about it as paying for sex work?
Lauren Cormier
No. I think what we found was that they really believed that they were paying for companionship. Mm-hmm. Or paying for shared time one. Sugar Daddy even described it, I believe, as I get to date above my league by contributing financially. So he's not even saying like, I'm paying for sex. I'm, I'm paying to date, basically, like it's, I'm, I'm paying to sort of get into the game. If I am, I'm a less attractive man. So they even tend to describe it as a relationship.
Anita Rao
How safe do folks feel in these relationships? Like what did you hear about the concerns that come up around these dynamics, if any?
Lauren Cormier
I think it varies. I think what we found was that the women sugar babies did have more concerns about physical safety and, and. The danger, potential danger of physical harm or, or being taken advantage of. And so they took more precautions than the sugar daddies did necessarily. So they would always tell a friend where they were going. They would have their location on their phone. They would try really hard to vet, uh, sugar daddies beforehand, before actually meeting up in person. So they took these precautions, but. We did find that they tended to feel more safe once they got to that step. I think because there's so much communication and explicit negotiation at the outset of a sugar dating relationship as opposed to maybe traditional dating, you just sort of name a time and place and show up. There's potentially more risk in that because you're communicating less with with a potential traditional dating partner than you would with a potential sugar dating partner.
Anita Rao
As a researcher, I'm curious about kind of what keeps you pulled into this topic. Like what do you think we can gain from looking at this more deeply or thinking more critically about this type of exchange and this type of relationship?
Lauren Cormier
Hmm. I think there's a couple of things that we can take from Sugar dating Research. One, I think it's important just in terms of. Our own knowledge. I think it's really important that we have the actual research, the numbers, so that we can. Either back up our assumptions or challenge them so that we can have this actual information so that we're not just getting things based on what we are exposed to and and how we might interpret that. Also, I think that just the explicit negotiation of power and exchange and terms of a relationship is something that could even be taken from sugar dating and applied more broadly into traditional dating, you know. Sugar babies are getting what they want and sugar daddies are getting what they want because they know what they want and they're presenting it upfront. I think not necessarily that in traditional dating you, you know, go on hinge and say, I want you to pay for my apartment, but to know what you want and to be able to express that at the outset, I actually think is something that traditional daters could find useful.
Anita Rao
Has it changed anything about how you date or how you think about power doing all this research?
Lauren Cormier
Actually, yes. So I was, I was single while I was going through, um, you know, a bit of the, uh, dissertation. Proposal process. And so I'm taking, you know, what we've learned from our initial sugar study and trying to come up with a new way to expand on the sugar dating research. And I'm on the apps like other women in their late twenties and early thirties and thinking about like. Maybe I will just authentically say like, this is what I want, this is what I need. Honestly, it was effective for me. In the end. I'm, I'm happy with, with my partner who I found, and I think that we're quite a good match. I think some people found it probably off-putting. Um, but, but I mean, in the end, I'm satisfied with the relationship that I have, and I do think that that being authentic was. Was a key part of that.
Anita Rao
Lauren Cormier is a PhD candidate in clinical psychology who has been studying sugar dating. After learning more about Lauren's research. I had one big question for B, how does someone inside the sugar baby community feel about researchers and journalists paying more attention to sugar dating culture?
B. Chionne
It's, it's a double-edged sword because. I love girls who find a way to make a way, you know, this is a very patriarchal centered society, but I feel like the more popular it is, it's. Painted really pretty and the dirty reality isn't shown enough. And so a lot of girls go into it thinking that it's just all butterflies, rainbows, and every sugar daddy is going to just give you what you want, when you want it, and that's not the case. And it's not for everyone and I would hate for girls to get into being sugar babies and not having that self-awareness yet, and then experience a really grimy side of it and cause trauma to themselves. So I just wish they would tread a little bit more lightly and be do more research before they go full throttle.
Anita Rao
Do you think anything can be gained from talking more publicly about sugar dating?
B. Chionne
Yeah, absolutely. A lot of girls start off like me feeling like they don't have much of a choice or they don't have a voice in what they want or feel like they're not supposed to put themselves first because they're supposed to be pleasing the man because he's the one who's providing. And that's not the case at all. And I think if we had more conversations. I feel like more stories with women like me who've experienced and grown from it, those girls will see. I don't have to fall at the mercy of this man because he says so you hold more of the power than he does. You just have to recognize that and own it, and don't let anybody else tell you otherwise, but also. Would I want my daughter to be a sugar baby? Absolutely not. If she came to me one day and said that she, she was a sugar baby, would I be har heartbroken? I would be sad, but I also would not judge her because hi pot, I'm kettle.
Anita Rao
You can find out more about B. Chionne and Lauren Cormier at our website, embodiedwunc.org. You can find all episodes of Embodied the Radio show there and make sure you're subscribed to our weekly podcast. Today's episode was produced by Kaia Findlay and edited by Amanda Magnus. Sara Nics provided additional editorial guidance. Adesina Newkirk is our intern, and Jenni Lawson, our technical director. Quilla wrote our theme music. This program is recorded at the American Tobacco Historic District. WUNC is a broadcast service of the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. I'm Anita Rao.