The Daily Beast has put up an interesting if somewhat depressing interview with a Mistress Snow. If that name is familiar, you might have seen an article she wrote last year in The Chronicle of Higher Education. That detailed her experience of working in academia as an adjunct professor while earning money as a pro-domme and what happened when she told her academic mentor about her sex work side gig. In short, her mentor reacted with horror and vindictively withdrew critical letters of recommendation. The Daily Beast article is a follow-up that provides more details on what happened and why a professor would need to earn money swinging a whip.
I initially described it as interesting but depressing, and re-reading it again only deepens that impression. It costs a ridiculous amount to go to college in the US and as a result there’s a terrible student debt problem. Yet adjunct professors, who make up over 50% of all US college professors, are earning an average of a little less than $24K a year. That’s less than a Starbucks barista and with much worse benefits. Yet when Mistress Snow supplements her income with a pro-domme gig, the tenured academic world reacts with horror and tries to screw her career. It takes a really special kind of system to rip-off both students and their teachers while punishing anyone who won’t conform to it. I think this quote from the article really highlights the craziness…
I make way more money per hour playing a professor in the dungeon than being one in real life.
Note this image is not of Mistress Snow. I don’t have an attribution, but I’d suspect it’s from one of the UK School Mistress themed sites.
Also I should point out that Mistress Snow of academia (twitter here) is not the same as Goddess Alexandra Snow (twitter and pro-site) or Snow Mercy (twitter and pro-site).