Monday afternoon: reports have been sent; reports have been ignored; things that require any brain power have been surreptitiously filed away. The mind is full of memories: beautiful, sun-kissed, prosecco-hazy memories of the summer that lead to that inevitable, millennial question: "Can’t I just have someone pay my way through life?" Once, as a student, I signed up to an escort service because I wanted money to buy shoes (sorry Mum) but only got as far as one uncomfortable phone call with an elderly man during which he asked me what services I provide and I gave him the classic, and classically unsexy, "I can do whatever you want me to do". I am a poor man’s Julia Roberts.
I swiftly removed my profile and my escort career was over as quickly as the phone call had been. But what about people who do manage to do this successfully? I get the motivation for a "Sugar Baby" but what, besides the obvious, is in it for the daddy?
Unsurprisingly my investigation got off to a slow start but a few unanswered tweets, some questionable profile pictures and two days later, I had a couple of cautious but willing participants. Both handles were @SugarDaddy so let’s call them Daddy One and Daddy Two because that also sounds extra naughty.
"I have been contacted by several playboy models and porn stars" Daddy One boasts; all traces of nervousness gone after initial protestation of inexperience.
I should add, for context, that this conversation is happening in my Twitter DMs against a backdrop of noisy tourist children running around the British Museum.
Did he take them up on the offer?
"One of the playboy models was out of her mind asking for $50,000 if I'd like to meet her."
That’s a no, then?
I'm curious as to how two young men found themselves in this line of work, when I’d always attributed Sugar Daddies to lonely, rich widowers and bachelors-who-left-it-too-late.
Daddy Two, a guy in his 20s from Detroit, is also relatively new to the scene, having explored it for about a year. He talks about his experience as if he fell into it like a grad job: “It wasn’t really me thinking of myself as a sugar daddy at first,” he says. “I found a woman attractive on social media and simply gave her money.”
While Findom (a portmanteau of Financial Domination) is a fetish that's starting to creep into mainstream conversation, both Daddies insist that it's not what drives them: "It's not a fetish. I do this because I like spoiling ladies but don't like the relationship commitments," Daddy One tells me; a Middle Eastern guy in his mid 20s.
What I've seen so far on the internet is a mix between a fetishized and professional relationship but when I put the question of motives to the guys they both talk about wanting to help people, choosing ladies they feel "deserve" their lavish gifts and Daddy One even goes so far as to say he "hate(s) girls who ask for things. I will spoil you if I want to."
"I'm not lonely or anything it's just that I do make a lot of money," expands Daddy Two. "It's more of a habit than a fetish, I just really enjoy making them happy. Knowing they have someone if they need help."
I don't think you could quite call it a God complex but a Good Samaritan complex seems accurate. These men both get off – either sexually or non-sexually – on being needed, not wanted.
Daddy One's bravado is back as he continues to tell me he's "not [an] ordinary bloke", as if for a second I thought he was: "I am not the mainstream guy who wants the attention and will pay for it.
"I just like to spoil girls that I think deserve it.
"Most of the time I also help them if they have a legitimate Go Fund Me account to help with surgeries/school."
So, what about the sex? To my surprise and confusion, both say they’ve never actually met a woman they’ve paid gifts and money to due to small issues like security, time, or the fact they live on the other side of the world.
Daddy One claims he doesn’t care about sex; with ladies in his personal life who take care of those kicks.
I suggest they’re just internet relationships with money, but Daddy Two is vehement: “The answer is no, I do not use the internet for sexual desires.”
I can feel Daddy One pulling away as we continue to chat and, deciding that delving into the question of Middle Eastern attitudes towards women was unwise over Twitter with a stranger, I go for my theory of unrequited love:
"In terms of relationships then, have you had them in the past?"
"What do you mean relationships?"
"So, girlfriends. Or dating exclusively without financial reward."
"Never had that."
My conversations with these guys followed very similar patterns in that neither one pays for sex; they just spend copious amounts of money on Amazon wish lists and surgery bills to feel needed. Is this the new Hugh for the internet age? Or, being amateur in my search, have I just stumbled upon the amateurs of the industry? I did find them on Twitter, after all.
It must be so easy for Sugar Babies to play on, knowing the Daddy would struggle to catch up with them if they took the money and ran. "Well of course there are those that like to run off after sending a big amount," Daddy Two laments.
I saved the burning question that most people ask until last: "How DO you have the money to splash on ladies?"
Daddy Two: "All I can say is that I am self-employed."
No need to dwell on that one, I think we get it.
Daddy One: "Family business."
Ah, so Daddy One has a Sugar Daddy of his own.
That’s a no, then?
I'm curious as to how two young men found themselves in this line of work, when I’d always attributed Sugar Daddies to lonely, rich widowers and bachelors-who-left-it-too-late.
Daddy Two, a guy in his 20s from Detroit, is also relatively new to the scene, having explored it for about a year. He talks about his experience as if he fell into it like a grad job: “It wasn’t really me thinking of myself as a sugar daddy at first,” he says. “I found a woman attractive on social media and simply gave her money.”
While Findom (a portmanteau of Financial Domination) is a fetish that's starting to creep into mainstream conversation, both Daddies insist that it's not what drives them: "It's not a fetish. I do this because I like spoiling ladies but don't like the relationship commitments," Daddy One tells me; a Middle Eastern guy in his mid 20s.
What I've seen so far on the internet is a mix between a fetishized and professional relationship but when I put the question of motives to the guys they both talk about wanting to help people, choosing ladies they feel "deserve" their lavish gifts and Daddy One even goes so far as to say he "hate(s) girls who ask for things. I will spoil you if I want to."
"I'm not lonely or anything it's just that I do make a lot of money," expands Daddy Two. "It's more of a habit than a fetish, I just really enjoy making them happy. Knowing they have someone if they need help."
I don't think you could quite call it a God complex but a Good Samaritan complex seems accurate. These men both get off – either sexually or non-sexually – on being needed, not wanted.
Daddy One's bravado is back as he continues to tell me he's "not [an] ordinary bloke", as if for a second I thought he was: "I am not the mainstream guy who wants the attention and will pay for it.
"I just like to spoil girls that I think deserve it.
"Most of the time I also help them if they have a legitimate Go Fund Me account to help with surgeries/school."
So, what about the sex? To my surprise and confusion, both say they’ve never actually met a woman they’ve paid gifts and money to due to small issues like security, time, or the fact they live on the other side of the world.
Daddy One claims he doesn’t care about sex; with ladies in his personal life who take care of those kicks.
I suggest they’re just internet relationships with money, but Daddy Two is vehement: “The answer is no, I do not use the internet for sexual desires.”
I can feel Daddy One pulling away as we continue to chat and, deciding that delving into the question of Middle Eastern attitudes towards women was unwise over Twitter with a stranger, I go for my theory of unrequited love:
"In terms of relationships then, have you had them in the past?"
"What do you mean relationships?"
"So, girlfriends. Or dating exclusively without financial reward."
"Never had that."
My conversations with these guys followed very similar patterns in that neither one pays for sex; they just spend copious amounts of money on Amazon wish lists and surgery bills to feel needed. Is this the new Hugh for the internet age? Or, being amateur in my search, have I just stumbled upon the amateurs of the industry? I did find them on Twitter, after all.
It must be so easy for Sugar Babies to play on, knowing the Daddy would struggle to catch up with them if they took the money and ran. "Well of course there are those that like to run off after sending a big amount," Daddy Two laments.
I saved the burning question that most people ask until last: "How DO you have the money to splash on ladies?"
Daddy Two: "All I can say is that I am self-employed."
No need to dwell on that one, I think we get it.
Daddy One: "Family business."
Ah, so Daddy One has a Sugar Daddy of his own.
