This question seems no different than asking a pro wrestling fan, if they think the matches are real, and the winners are the best at actually wrestling. It is completely, ignorantly, condescending of the complex reality of the situation, and relationship between the viewers and performers.

Let’s describe the same situation with different participants. This will be you and one of your favorite actors. Let’s leave sex and romance entirely out of it. You have to pick someone who’s sex and gender you aren’t attracted to. You have the chance to talk to them over zoom for an hour every day, because your paying them.

You can talk about anything you want. The movies they were in, the characters they played, the costars and directors they worked with. You can even talk to them about your own acting, or a script you’re working on. You could even completely nerd out and ask them to perform it with you. This fanfic scene that you wrote specifically for the two of you. Would you believe that they meant and felt, all the things you wrote for them to say? Of course not! That’s insane! Is it still fun to play a private scene with your favorite actor? Of course it is.

Who wouldn’t want to play their own version of the No Country for Old Men scene where the gas station attendant unknowingly faces off against Anton Chigurh? “Well if I’m standin’ to win everythin’… Wha’da you stand to loose?” I would love to work out different ways that scene could go with Javier Bardem. That would be so fun!

EDIT: That’s only one of the many kinds of ways these relationships can work.

Another is the provider angle. A guy might base his self worth on his ability to financially provid for a wife and family. Kind of a toxic notion yes. But one that’s millennia old, and still very real all around the world. For one reason or another he has lots of means to be a provider, but no family to provide for. In the product these women offer, he has a very real way of fulfilling that role.