The Art of the Pimp: One Man's Search for Love, Sex, and Money (45 page)

The hardest rule of all that Dennis imposes is that his current love must always be happy. He told me that he is only happy when the woman whom he believes is the love of his life — in this case, Krissy — is happy. He also believes that if he indulges his girlfriends with everything an impoverished young girl might want, they will love him and remain faithful. He cannot imagine what they really want or expect from him, so he gives them what he thinks they want: clothes, designer handbags, a total makeover so she is ever sexy and admired. She will be at his side for rides on private planes, gigs on TV, and she will enjoy fine dinners in cool restaurants with celebrities. These dreams and fantasies, plus ongoing reassurances
from Dennis of his abiding love, fail in the long haul because he has other rules she must accept in exchange.

Dennis will not agree to be monogamous. His girlfriend
du jour
must accept his infidelity and all of his sexual preferences. He likes threesomes — one is never enough for him. Krissy, wanting him to be happy, complied with gritted teeth, dreaming of a beach in Hawaii to escape her distaste and shame. She could not tell him how she felt. Lonely and sad, she wept in private, terrified that Dennis would soon replace her. She is proud that she left him, even though she faced debt and a past that is hard to explain on a résumé.

Dennis believes that because he is honest about his rejection of monogamy and about his sexual antics, his girlfriend should accept his rules — that she should agree with him. He complained, “Sure, I fuck other women, but that’s just who I am.” He does not see what a threat they face, and so they leave. He is bewildered because he loves and loses every time. “They owned my heart and soul, and they left me. I gave them everything and it was never enough.” What Krissy describes in this book is the familiar pattern of all his failed relationships.

Dennis was a good student. He learned from the powerful men who, unlike his parents, had wise rules for living a successful life. Dale Carnegie’s
How to Win Friends and Influence People
taught Dennis how to smile, to make others feel good, how people listen to logic and respond to emotion, and how people like to be heard. From Al Goldstein, the Titan of the Sex Trade, whom he idolized, he learned how to court the press and publicity, and he had many “inducements” at the BunnyRanch to tempt reporters to visit, then write and promote him and his business.

All of these lessons became rules in the “Bunny Bible,” much like a manual for an appliance that must be followed to the letter.
Dennis is God and the Bunny Bible is his guide to living at the BunnyRanch. His girls must put all the emotional baggage they come in with in a “box” and leave it there. Then, put a smile on your face and treat the client as king. Dennis’s belief is that if they play by the rules it’s like Girl Scout camp in midsummer. (I wonder if he has ever been to a Girl Scout camp?) Should they slip up, he will take them aside and have them study an appropriate passage in the “Bible.”

The problem is that Dennis also has a lot of unwritten and unspoken personal rules not found in the “Bible.” The girls who work for him and the women who love him must keep these rules or feel the wrath of the godhead. For example, Dennis rejected his two young daughters when he claimed they dipped into his bank account. He never questions why they did it. He also claims they sold his house, without his knowledge, and he doesn't question that either. But for a long time he was sitting by the phone hoping for an explanation , so clearly it hurt.) Maybe they were mad at him or naively thought that he had so much cash it would not make a difference. He — and we — will never know, for if he believes you betrayed him he will abandon you. He has not seen either of his daughters in twenty-two years.

Dennis, who dreads being abandoned, is quick to do it to those who break his rules. His father, who lived with Dennis and helped him build the business, also abandoned him, I believe because he could not tolerate Dennis’s rageful reactions when he broke Dennis’s rules. Apparently, his father and his father’s girlfriend messed up Dennis’s home. When Dennis later reached out to him, his father expressed no interest in repairing their relationship. When his dad died, lonely and impoverished, Dennis was told of his “loss” by a neighbor.

To every new love of his life (he seems to believe each new love is his true love), he says “We’re
going to be together, but I am going to see other women.” Sex, according to Dennis, has nothing to do with how he feels about his current girlfriend. He who transforms women to his liking (much like my granddaughter dresses up her Barbie doll) will not allow any of them to change him in any way. At first, bedazzled with the money, attention and promises of undying caretaking and devotion, they comply.

Who would really accept this deal? Dennis does not see that he provides them with no real relationship. They quickly discover when they complain that they’re hurt and angry, that they might be expelled from this fragile fairy castle of a relationship.

I believe that despite all the talk of love, a relationship depends on three factors: respect, trust, and accountability. Be respectful, even when angry. Trust that you have shared values. And be accountable — do what you say you will do. Dennis fails on trust (he is sensitive to the slightest “betrayal”) and does not respect the women in his life as equal human beings (they are dependents that must be indulged). Clearly, he is not accountable.

Krystyn was a working girl (and the one and only for Dennis at the time) who was jealous not of his other sex partners, but of Suzette, the loyal confidant and madam who managed his business. He is dependent on her, but they were never sexually involved. He calls her “the wife I don’t sleep with.” Her tremendous influence over him concerned Krystyn to the point that she wanted Suzette fired. Dennis erupted, blasted her, and left her that day forever. They had been together for just over a year. There was no discussion or attempt to understand her point of view. He moved out in a fury — another disloyal woman who dared to tell him what to do (like his mother).

Dennis loves his own rules. They protect him from his own self-critical insecurity. He is always right. He will rebel against
anyone who tries to impose rules or conditions on him. Thus he is never really in a relationship, but in a dalliance with a woman he adores, spoils, indulges, and makes go to work on twelve-hour shifts at the ranch. There is no room for her in the relationship, and so Dennis remains in control and does not see the earth cracking beneath his feet. He suffers immense depression following losses, but never learns. In a sense, he is always alone.

DENNIS THE NARCISSISTIC PERSONALITY

The cruise ship sailed, headed for Mexico. Dennis and Sunny — his then girlfriend — were on deck together watching a beautiful sunset. Sunny felt happy — alone with Dennis, she hoped and expected that he would propose to her. After all, she had responded to Dennis’s training and raised her prices at the Bunny Ranch to over $1,000 a party. The cruise was her reward for her effort. Dennis, unwilling and unable to commit, as usual, declined. They had a terrible fight. In a rage, Dennis booked her a seat on the next plane out, and did so without her knowledge. Sunny refused to leave the ship. Cruel and unusual punishment for a girl who loved him and wanted security, but there is no room for those he believes he loves to be unhappy, demanding, upset, humiliated, and sorry for themselves. All these emotions lie beneath every angry outburst, and they describe all of us at times.

He has no empathy — this means he is tone deaf to how and why his girlfriends all feel the way they do: scared, humiliated, angry.

Narcissism is a fancy word for self-involvement and self-centeredness. All narcissists are thin-skinned and hypersensitive to criticism. Dennis won’t tolerate anger. He is a terminator who is clueless about his lovers’ hurts and fears or his part in creating them. His next lover will know in advance of his terminator reputation,
and she will probably believe that she will be the one who can change him. No way, she will discover.

Dennis is all too aware of his own painful feelings. Sad and broken hearted, he mourns his loss and blames “her,” and regrets all that he has done for her. His indulgence is really a way to make himself feel like a hero and buy admiration and devotion. “My attitude is, if you’re spoiling a woman emotionally, sexually, and financially, it’s going to be pretty hard for a guy to come along and take her away from you.” When they do, he is truly baffled at his loss, and doesn’t get what women need and want. Since he doesn’t understand women he can’t trust them. Nor does he see that he unwittingly invites the breakdown of relationships that leave him so bereft.

He told his pal Ron, “If we weren’t rich and famous only fat and unattractive women would want us.” In fact, no woman he loves will want him after a while. His jaundiced view of what women want seems confined to sex and stuff. He insists that he could never stop “fucking other women” and he knows that this has destroyed his dream of a
real
relationship. He describes a relationship like a shower. When the temperature is just right you feel so good you could stay forever. But when the water is cold, it’s time to get the fuck out.

So, he must keep up his act to be popular, and let no one close enough to hurt him — so goes his self-centered belief. No one paid attention to his feelings as a child or showed even a little concern and, I suspect, no acceptance and reassurance. Empathy is learned within our family and other connections as we grow and develop. Empathy is the essential skill missing for him. It is one he needs to develop if he wants better relationships in the future. All children are self-centered until they learn to recognize and think about others’ feelings. In this sense, Dennis is very emotionally immature.

DENNIS THE HISTRIONIC PERSONALITY

Dennis and his longtime sidekick, Ron Jeremy, are both outgoing and often outlandish. These are histrionic traits; this means they seek attention and admiration as a temporary fix for their self-criticism and fear of being rejected by outsiders.

Dennis loves to brag about his extraordinary achievements and spins the glories of the BunnyRanch. He brings his girls to media events as point-of-sale, value-added commodities.

Ron loves to flash his million-dollar penis in public, an organ that has already been seen by millions in his porno movies. He acts in outrageous ways to pull attention, and this has made him a hero of and envied by many college-age guys. Dennis and Ron are emotionally dramatic. For a histrionic person, an upset is a tragedy — an insult is an assault. They rage, they cry, and they sulk like small children.

They have a mutually beneficial friendship. Dennis has Ron as a wifely caretaker who will never let him down. Ron gets Dennis as a pal he can entertain by doing naughty adolescent things and in return Ron, the classic cheapskate, makes Dennis pay for everything.

DENNIS’S SADOMASOCHISTIC HABIT

There is also a sadomasochistic connection in this relationship. Dennis calls Ron “she” and “my bitch,” but permits him to actively humiliate him in shocking ways, such as pulling down Dennis’s pants in public or setting up a private sexual liaison for Dennis so Ron can spy on his private parts and win the biggest-dick-in-the-room contest. Dennis loves it. He is turned on by humiliation — he grew up with it. He is like many of the proper, upright public figures — a priest, a politician, a pillar of society — who come to the
BunnyRanch not for intercourse, but for humiliation. To temporarily surrender control and be free of the usual rules and values that made them successful is their turn-on. While dominated, they are temporarily liberated from the responsibilities in their lives. A spiked heel, a leather whip, a dog collar and a leash, they beg, “hurt and humiliate me — it turns me on.”

Dennis has his own “dominatrix.” His name is Ron Jeremy.

“We are like an old married couple,” Dennis claims. Ron tells of how they both intend to buy side-by-side condos when they retire to Florida together. One hopes that they won’t flash the senior ladies who stand in line for those early bird dinners.

DENNIS’S UNRECOGNIZED SADISTIC BEHAVIOR

Dennis continuously challenges the concept that he is like other pimps who threaten and abuse their girls, all of whom are needy women who seek the security and protection of a big daddy. Like beaten wives, they cling to what is familiar — a man who claims to take care of them but who sadistically exploits them for money and sexual satisfaction. Fearing abandonment, they concede to please him.

Cami Parker was one of these girls. She was a new recruit who was instantly his new love. At last she felt special and grateful for the cheap gifts and expansive attention Dennis gave her. As he had done before, he stirred up the other girls to be jealous of Cami. He lied to them, making all sorts of promises, “You are my next girlfriend — I am leaving her.” Anything to evoke fury and jealousy. Cami at first believed that she was
the one
 — they all did. She tolerated a lot of hostility and rejection by her “rivals” for a few years, until she came to understand that Dennis relished the pain and turmoil he caused, just to be wanted and desired.

The image of Dennis — overweight, unfit, diabetic, and now in his late sixties with a knee replacement — having sex on top of a very young, skinny girl would cause many people to dial 911 and ask for child protective services.

There are no exceptions. Dennis uses the women he “loves” for his own desires, loyal companionship and sex. Like any pimp, he exploits them. This is sadistic behavior and it is both unrecognized and denied. For Dennis has a warm-hearted response to suffering. He is fast to defend his friends in trouble. When slighted, betrayed, and criticized, his cold-hearted rage and refusal to look at his part in the problem is a sadistic response.

DENNIS THE ADDICT

Dennis is not as he believes — a man with far more testosterone than other males, a superman in bed with extraordinary needs. He is an
addict
. Addicts want to get high. They are immature and insecure, often self-hating and always self-pitying. Whatever their “drug” of choice, whether chemical substances or behaviors such as gambling or obsessive shopping, addicts are driven to get high in order to drown out their emotional discomfort. The fix is always temporary.