The XX Factor: What women really think.

True Romance

To Hanna's question about whether any of us feel we could pull off a "fake romance," a la those high-end prostitutes who "date for months before pairing up'' and stroke more egos than anything else: Most women are pretty good actors, I think, having been trained from the beginning to smile and make people feel good. But what I wonder is how fake these romances for hire really are; if that Pennsylvania college student is so gaga for her sugar daddy, how is that different from what the Real Housewives of wherever feel for their rich hubbies?

When I was single, in another century, I finally eased up on judging women who seemed to be chasing dollar signs when I realized that it wasn't so much that they were making some kind of moral compromise or settling for security as that they just found money sexy, the same way I found it a turnoff. No kidding, wealth was a mark against a guy in my book, which was filled with social workers, dollar-a-word writers, and men struggling with possible religious vocations. Not because I'd taken a vow of poverty or was making a stand on principle, but because that just was my taste, same as that college girl Meghan wrote about goes for Louboutins and the "poshest'' hotel in Atlantic City.

Either this "be your own pimp" option further blurs the definition of prostitution or it brings clarity to the trading of sex/youth/looks for money/power/security. But that's a trade that sure is taken for granted in our culture—or so it seems on all these "win a rich bachelor" reality shows. And though it's our own bargains we should worry about, it's hard not to look at the people on both ends of those deals and think: Wow, you get what you pay for (and pay for what you get.)