Sexual Economy in Platform and Heading South

As the most lurid example of the consequences of the developing world’s exploitation by America and Europe, it is perhaps surprising that there has been little artistic focus on the effects of sexual tourism. While mainstream films such as Blood Diamond examine the brutal effects of western capitalism on Africa, there have been few artists willing to take on the sex trade.

Two of the most notable works on the subject have come from France; these are the 2005 film ‘Heading South’ and Michel Houellebecq’s novel ‘Platform’, published in 2001. Both explore the motivation drawing the West’s middle aged and middle class to countries such as Thailand and Haiti on the trail of sexual pleasure.

Heading South’s action takes place in Haiti, in the late 1970s. In the background of the film, Baby Doc Duvalier’s dictatorship grows ever more decadent, while petty officials take on greater powers to dominate and exploit the local population. The undertones of violent exploitation are foregrounded from the off, as an ageing woman begs a hotel bar-manager to take her daughter, and protect her from rape and murder.

On the island’s beaches, however, there is another story. Wealthy older Western women gather here, surrounded by lithe young men who pander to their every whim. This is a genteel form of exploitation; offers of money would be crass. Instead, gifts are exchanged for sex. The women are liberated from the societal norms of their home-countries. They smoke grass, and frolic in the surf, in a way which would surely be judged inappropriate by their peers.

That the behaviour is indulged reveals an important truth; the young black men, though adult, are infantilised by the women. Dependent on handouts for clothes and meals, they are robbed of all agency. Romanticising this process, the women create a myth akin to that of the ‘noble savage’ – they would not consider a flirtation with the black underclasses of Europe or America, but here, ‘close to nature’, the young men are imbued with almost heroic qualities. The exotic is infantilised, fetishised and commercialised.

There is an important truth for the women as well. As they approach menopause, and retirement, their economic value to their own society is in steep decline. Once they have lost the ability to produce wealth, or produce children, they will be cast aside. In order to validate their continued existence, they must move from the harsh West to the South, where they still have the capital to excite desire; the economy of sexuality has driven them to Haiti.

The focus of this desire is a Haitian called Legba. Almost preternaturally handsome and determined, he is also headstrong and charming, and the women compete to buy his affections. The nomenclature is important; in Voodoo mythology, Legba is a symbol of youth and virility. In Haiti, however, Legba is seen as an old and faded power. In Heading South, Legba is killed because of his association with the whites. In reality, the Haitian tourist trade collapsed in the early 80s, and thousands of such young men would no longer have been able to live off their wits and attractions.

The film’s strength lies in its skilled handling of characters. The women are allowed monologues which explain their motivations, the alienation they feel in their own countries, whether it be a repressed sexuality or the frustrations of low-paid work. The Haitians meanwhile are never allowed to become stereotypes of poverty and superstition. Legba’s back story shows the island’s history of pride, and he fights fiercely to protect his culture from the tourists, only allowing them to experience a watered down version of Haiti’s music.

In Houellebecq’s novel, a middle-aged French couple, both with respectable, professional-class jobs, embark on a business venture, creating sexual pleasure palaces for European tourists across Africa and Asia. This is capitalism at its sharpest edge, all aggressive promotion and ruthless exploitation of its resources – in this case, young natives. The venture is an enormous success, attracting sexual tourists from across Europe on a grand scale.

For Houellebecq’s characters, again, their failings in domestic life drive them to seek fulfilment in exotic, poor countries. His protagonist, Michel, complains that French women are ‘too hard’ on men. He is effectively impotent in the workplace, a cog in a machine. His clients are largely German, for whom the author reserves special vitriol, as a nation lacking entirely in culture and imagination. They have become addled by late 20th century capitalism; they are fit only for sex and exploitation.

As Platform has a broader timeline than Heading South, we see Houellebecq’s grim prediction of the consequences of this sexual trade; the couple’s Balian resort is blown to pieces by an armed gang, presumably (though not explicitly) linked to Muslim extremism. The exploitation of the country’s natural and human resources is bloodily avenged, and the decadent Europeans are destroyed by an enemy they never thought capable of defending itself.

Together, these two works portray Western culture sliding into decadence; as individuals lose their cultural capital, and become increasingly alienated, they embark on their own heart of darkness journey. The only interaction is exploitation, the only relationship is competition, as the women holidaying in Haiti struggle to dominate the ‘pack’. In both works, sexuality, like every other function, has been reduced to an asset, and like every other asset, the market for it is heading to poorer countries, which will be stripped bare by the powerful. What remains to be seen is the reaction.