Less than human

I find it extra-ordinary than men can quite casually make use of prostitutes, many of whom are in the grip of some personal problem that can only be worsened by having to perform constant sexual acts they aren't enjoying.

They are more than likely weighed down by mental health issues, emotional problems, drug addiction or the scars of childhood sexual abuse, but these burdens are of little interest to the customers whose only goal is instant pleasure.

Clearly it's seen first and foremost as a simple financial transaction much the same as buying a loaf of bread or a bottle of shampoo, and the personal well-being of the person giving the service is of scant concern.

I really don't understand how a man can have such an impersonal and functional attitude, can so easily and callously objectify another human being.

It also amazes me that men can so happily visit prostitutes but hide it from their wife or girlfriend, knowing full well how horrified she would be if she found out. They are able to lead a kind of double life of everyday respectability alongside a seedy other self.

I've never been to a prostitute in my life. In my younger days I was totally unaware of the reality of prostitution. It was something that was joked about, Carry-On style, as if it was some sort of light-hearted frolic. At that time I wouldn't have indulged simply because it seemed a bit vulgar. Nowadays of course, having had my eyes opened, I wouldn't contemplate it because of the intrinsic dehumanising that's involved.

Also I don't have that compulsive sexual urge that men who use prostitutes claim to be in thrall to. Good grief, isn't your regular partner enough for you? I'm not sure I believe in that sexual compulsion anyway. Men love to fall back on it, but it's such a convenient excuse for bad behaviour.

The oldest profession in the world? Nothing professional about it. It's just emotional and physical abuse dressed up as human need.

Gone missing

I was astonished to read that up to 200,000 children go missing in the UK every year. Can you imagine all the grief, guilt, anger and bewilderment parents and carers go through as they realise their child has gone and face the agonies of trying to find them and wondering if they might be seriously injured or even dead?

Some children just get lost accidentally for a few hours. But it's terrible how many children deliberately disappear, possibly for years, because of overwhelming personal problems or family tensions they simply can't sort out. They feel their parents don't understand their difficulties, or aren't giving them enough help, or are actively hostile to them.

They're being bullied, they're secretly gay, they're taking drugs, they're failing at school, they've been abused, they're depressed. Whatever the reason, they feel their home life is making things worse rather than better, and walking away from it actually seems the sensible choice.

How sad that parents who presumably love their children are unable to give them the support they need, because they're too busy to listen or they trivialise the problem (or they are the problem) or they simply don't know what to do.

And how distressing it must be when children go missing for years or even decades, with no clue as to where they might be and whether they're alive and well. There's not even a letter or phone call to reassure their parents they're just living their own life and haven't come to a grisly end.

The continuing despair of Kate and Gerry McCann over their long-lost daughter is only the most dramatic example of how a child's disappearance traumatises the parents and family. But there are plenty of other families in similar despair.

Even learning your child is dead must be easier to deal with than the endless uncertainty over their fate, simply not knowing anything, imagining one horrible scenario after another, day after day. It could very well drive you crazy.

Parents always fear their children's disappearance. But if it actually happens, it must be so much worse than anything they've imagined.