Sex tourism primarily occurs in "third world" areas like Southeast Asia and the Caribbean; while on vacation, sex tourists utilise their financial means to gain control over local, often vulnerable male or female sex workers. Sex tourist destinations are produced, advertised, and used mostly by and for western men – a trend that is characterised by the unequal power relations, shaped by the overarching forces of history and globalisation that allow male western tourists to exploit the services of often non-western prostitutes, often facilitated by an equally exploitative middle-man or brothel keeper.
Amsterdam, a well-known sex tourism destination, is a relevant illustration of the preference for the sex tourist. Male tourists gaze at and visually consume the bodies of such women in the city's innumerable windows that display scantily dressed women of various kinds (which may possibly be compared to the setting of a zoo or aquarium - dehumanising women). Sex tourists thus have the financial power to select not just a destination but a ‘body’ for consumption.
Assuming that prostitution is accessible worldwide, why do people feel the need to travel across the world to find sex workers? Blame the exoticization and eroticization of ‘third world’ women, based on racial and gendered preconceptions of sex workers as submissive, docile and also free of the influence of western feminism. Sex tourists are able to “reaffirm” their masculinity through perceived sexual dominance over sex workers.
Because the tourism industry sells the image, myth and dream of a destination, rather than its facts, eroticized versions of these locations and workers are created to entice men to travel there. Facilitated by the internet and pornography, the sex tourism industry has become even more prevalent, allowing affluent Western men to take advantage of their gender, class and culture and nationality. The non-Western sex worker is designed to be consumed by male tourists in the same manner that tourists can partake in and enjoy the pleasure of viewing exotic places and people.