KUALA LUMPUR, Feb 18 — The resurfaced sugar dating issue in the country has triggered various arguments over its legality and morality with different views on the matter.

While many groups have linked the activity to sexual exploitation of women, youth advocate and Challenger president Jean Vaneisha Ravindran seems to have a different viewpoint on sugar dating.

The 26-year-old told Malay Mail that she sees no issue with a platform that provides a transactional expectation involving consensual adults.

"A platform like Sugarbook offers a transactional experience and the users knowingly engage in such activities with their eyes open.

"We should be pushing for sexual harassment laws, address women exploitation issues and child marriages rather than banning platforms where consensual adults make decisions to [address their needs.]”

In fact, Jean said there was a need to look at the underlying factors that had made this the only path for young women to address their financial issues.

The final-year student at a private university said there needed to be more proactive action to address the underlying factors leading to such issues.

According to her, the bigger problems included exploitation, economic inequality, the rising cost of living, and costly private education in the country.

"Since the Covid-19 pandemic started, many students are struggling to finance their education as they may no longer have their-part time jobs.”

She also hoped that if the universities, especially the private ones could have provided more financial aid options, relief, or extension of payments.

Sugarbook, which is no stranger to controversy since it was launched in January 2017 triggered uproar last week after claiming that many of its sugar babies were from local universities.

Following calls for immediate actions, the Malaysian Communications and Multimedia Commission blocked access to Sugarbook on Monday.

It was reported that the Selangor police have arrested a senior executive of Sugarbook on suspicion of soliciting for prostitution and abusing network facilities.

However, an application for remand was rejected by the High Court after the suspect pledged to give his full cooperation to facilitate police investigation in the case.

Commenting on the recent reports that many varsity students had turned to sugar daddies to fund their studies, Jean said it was not that they wanted to take the option of doing something that was not dignified.

"I think if that’s the only option available, you should just be able to make that choice without society having any problem with it.

To ensure the sugar dating relationships don’t lead to sexual harassment or abuse, she said there must be legal avenues to deal with exploitation issues that go beyond consensual activities. 

At the same time, she said those engaging in such activities must be well-informed about the possible consequences and risks such as exploitation, rape and abuse.

Echoing similar sentiments, social activist Syed Azmi Alhabshi said blocking dating websites may not make much of a difference without taking other steps to address the issue.

"It’s like blocking pornography websites.

"When you block one, another website emerges with a different name but offering the same content.”

In fact, he said there are many factors involved before such activities like sugar dating become a norm in society.

According to him, people don’t just stumble upon a platform like Sugarbook or develop interest for such activities overnight.

"Interest slowly creeps in society through the environment, conversations, and what’s shown on social media.

"It will then spark one’s curiosity to give it a try.”

Syed Azmi also noted that sugar dating had been around for ages, but the youth nowadays seem to be more daring — wanting to experiment what they see on social media without thinking of the consequences.

He said sugar dating websites often glorified lifestyle or was a platform to make quick money and because it was consensual, people may say it was fine.

"But what if a young girl goes through one of these dating sites and gets raped or sexually abused?

"Then everybody will blame the girl.”

Syed Azmi warned parents to be aware of their children’s behavioural changes to ensure they did not get trapped in such relationships.

"If your children stop to have meaningful conversations with you or use the internet as their guru, then you should be aware of them even more.”