An opinion on pornography that others might find offensive

[hyphenate]

Perhaps most people will find this offensive, but I was thinking about this for a good while, and here is my opinion:

Many women who are part of the porn industry are far more liberated than their sisters in the rest of the country, regardless of what those other women are doing.

Okay, to back up my opinion on this, let's eliminate the young girls who are brought into the porn industry without any idea of what they are getting themselves into. That's just plain wrong, and it's horrific to think how many girls are part of that industry without having any choice in the matter. I'm not talking about them, either. I'm talking about women who are in the porn industry by choice, who have made making porn films their livelihood.

I've read articles, seen interviews and generally have listened to many of them in discussions. They take their jobs seriously, and they want to make sure that some health measures are taken before they participate in something, for one thing, and another thing, they are well respected within their own peer group. Many of them hold college degrees, including Masters degrees, and many of them are single mothers. One woman I read about has a house in Beverly Hills, is sending her daughter to college at a prestigious university, and thinks nothing about starring in porn flicks. She takes precautions, uses birth control pills, and goes for a physical check-up about every 6 months.

Indeed, the woman indicated that there are many like her. They make their own hours, and they are never emotionally involved with their "work" and they don't "take it home with them." They put in their hours and go home.

As to their liberation status, what more could any of us want? A 9-5 job, with good health benefits, a decent salary and a nice home to live in. What's wrong with that?

These women, who chose to enter this relatively dubious area of employment, count on the male libido to fund their salaries, and surprisingly, this puts them in control, NOT in the position to BE controlled. What more can we hope for? When we are no longer in the position where we are being abused or controlled, but are in the driver's seat? This is ultimately the place we all want to be, even if many don't see it as such. These women are fantasies for males to play out to, who can never be truly reached, and who are unreachable. Unlike prostitutes, those women who act in porn films are protected to an extra degree from the public's touch. They have an extra wall of security which they can utilize to keep their private lives private.

Any one want to discuss?

[democracyindanger]

1. Boy, is this a GD thread if I ever saw one.

[ret5hd]

2. .

:beer: :popcorn:

[Pithlet]

15. I'd rather have Snow Caps

They don't carry those at any of the cinemas around here anymore. It'll probably have to be one of those giant size ones, too. Good Lord.

[youthere]

17. Hey can I have some of that?

This should be good.

[Spider Jerusalem]

3. I'd say that may occasionally be the case...

but many pornographers are little better than glorified pimps who prey on vulnerable and psychologically damaged women (I've actually met and talked to some of these people, and they were quite open about this. I had to bathe in bleach afterwards).

[mongo]

11. Who are you talking about?

Not that I'm saying they aren't out there, but are we talking about someone local to you and not even in the real industry?

[Spider Jerusalem]

14. A few people I met who are in the online sector of the adult industry...

I'm not saying it's the case for all or even most in the industry, of course (I'm aware that most are a hell of a lot more professional), but these guys ARE out there, as you say.

And I'm also aware this is a lot less common in the adult film industry specifically than the general adult-entertainment industry at large, btw.

[derby378]

4. I think that's the "Nina Hartley argument"

She's a porn star, bisexual, and feminist. Sounds like some of her arguments.

[hyphenate]

5. Is she a very attractive blonde woman?

Perhaps it is she that I saw being interviewed.

[mongo]

6. Sounds like it. Did she look like she was in her 50's?

Or 40's? She's 50 something now, but she's still a knockout. And one smart lady to boot.

[hyphenate]

7. Sounds about right

Very intelligent. Comes across very well.

[Beware the Beast Man]

21. Yes. She and another former porn star (Sharon Mitchell)

run a counseling service for prospective porn stars. They basically run down all the ramifications of joining the industry. I remember seeing something about it on MTV a few years ago.

[VelmaD]

8. "These women are fantasies for males to play out to"

That one sentence sums up my problem with most of the mainstream porn out there. I can't claim to be anti-porn because I edit gay erotica as a side-job (written not filmed) But I can say that the amount of porn I've seen that degrades women leaves me feeling very sad for our society. As long as it's about "fantasies for males to play out to" rather than about producing erotica that bother genders can appreciate...I'll continue to struggle with my ambivalence toward most porn.

[mongo]

10. Yeah, there's a lot of crappy porn out there

1000 titles get released every month.

But as Nina recently said - "a society gets the porn it deserves"

If we got rid of the obscenity laws, I think new and more creative people would jump in to fill the void - and create more couple friendly movies. Although the biggest companies are already trying to cater to this market, they fall somewhere short of the mark.

I've been doing a study (no jokes please), of late 70's - early 80's porn - and of videos made of 8mm stuff from the 60's. They just seem to have so much more creativity to them.

[mongo]

9. I think that you are right on

But I want to know who exacatly enters the business in the US not of their own free will.

Also, every performer is tested for STD's on a regular basis, much lower than every 6 months. It used to be every 8 weeks, now I think it is every 6. It is a requirement for working in the industry.

The other thing that I would like to point out is that AIM (adult industry medicine) shows every new performer a "so you want to be in porn" video - it actually scares a good percentage (I don't remember exactly, and the article isn't online) out of the business before they start. Actually, Nina Hartley was one of the people that put the video together.

There are good companies and bad companies to work for, like any other industry.

[TheHelplessLlama]

12. So, wait...

you're telling me you actually read the articles?

I agree for the most part, but as you pointed out, ONLY for "women who are in the porn industry by choice, who have made making porn films their livelihood."

[Dastard Stepchild]

13. Liberated from what?

I'm not sure how a woman being filmed having sex without the burden of loathing herself necessarily makes this woman "more liberated" than her non-porno starring sisters.

But mostly, I'm not sure what you mean when you say these women are liberated. From what are they liberated?

[hyphenate]

18. Part of what I'm talking about

is how mainstream women tend to feel sorry to a large extent for women who are part of the porn industry. They go on the assumption that all women who are in it are lead there by unscrupulous agents, are desperate for cash, or are prostitutes on a slightly higher level than those on the street. After reading some of the articles and seeing these women being interviewed, I come away with the feeling that some of these women are NOT coerced into the industry, but enter of their own free will. They CHOOSE to make films, they CHOOSE to work in the industry, either for the pay, the good hours and networking, or some other possibly intangible reason. They're happy, and they enjoy their livelihood. This makes them navigators of their own direction, whatever it might be. Those who choose this industry obviously are not the sort who might choose to work as a waitress or secretary, but they aren't slaves to the industry they work in, either. It's a business to many of them, and that's the emotional agenda they work with every day.

[Dastard Stepchild]

22. Oh sure....

I'll agree that it would be incorrect to assume that all women are coerced into porn. I'm just not sure that proactively making the decision to be an adult movie star makes them more liberated than, say, me. I hardly feel repressed, even without a filmed money shot under my belt. :)

[Redstone]

16. They can do whatever they want to do. It's not my business

to judge, or to tell them what they should or should not do with their lives.

Redstone

[blonndee]

19. If you want to talk about this privately, my thesis is about

hard-core porn and popular culture. I think I take a pretty liberal AND critical stand on it. I focus on Hustler. My last paper was called "Dirty Pictures, Dirty Girls: Hustler and the Carnival." I plan to work this into my thesis.

But I do have issues with the lack of workers' rights in the porn industry as well as their lack of control of their own exploited images. Not to mention my own ambiguity about women--or, more appropriately--women's IMAGES being used as masturbatory tools ad infinitum. And Hustler's problems go far beyond being anti-woman. Which I will happily elaborate upon, if you wish.

That being said, I think there's a lot to be said for sex positivism, which seems to be present in your post. (And very absent in the anti-porn stances taken by both the extreme right AND the "Feminist" movement the MSM pretends to describe.) If sex weren't such a gigantic "deal" in this hypocritically puritanical country, then maybe the sex industry wouldn't be such a feminist issue. I am, by the way, a staunch and unapologetic, radical, left-wing feminist. WHY is sex such a big deal? Because it's good for controlling people. Like religion. And that's why prostitution, birth control, and anything having to do with a woman's body is such a gigantic political issue.

[noamnety]

20. Here's my concern

It perpetuates often unrealistic expectations of what women should be like, look like, how they should act.

That's not to say it should be illegal, I don't feel it's my job to be the morality police. Hey, I'm not gonna outlaw french fries - I just don't think they're healthy. But my personal view is that it has more negative effects on society than good effects, just like violence on tv has more negative effects on society than good effects. Even if some people get rich from it. Even if some of those people are women.

Studies show that watching porn makes a fairly large percent (a third) of women viewers feel bad about their bodies. And roughly half of the men who watch it report that it makes them less satisfied with their partners' bodies. I don't see the study online at the moment, but there was one I read fairly recently showing a drastic difference among men that watch porn and those that don't - concerning the percent that had encouraged their spouse to get plastic surgery. That's extremely troubling.

Also I think our exposure to it ends up having a numbing effect. We become somewhat immune to it. It leads to the removed attitude of some of the Abu Ghraib apologists - "they weren't sexually assaulted, they were just forcibly stripped and made to simulate sex acts, normal frat stuff."

The often quoted Zillman study raises serious concerns about whether people's attitudes toward rape become more accepting after repeated exposure to porn.

Porn that includes violent plot lines carries a whole separate set of issues, which I probably don't need to go into because (I would hope) we all know what those are.

As far as the actual actresses, I dunno, the only person I ever knew in the sex industry was a rape victim who was dealing with distancing herself from her sexuality. As she put it, she learned to just turn her brain off while performing - like her body wasn't part of who she really was. Like you said, she was emotionally distant from her work. I guess that's one way to deal with rape - disassociation. But then she had problems making the switch back, when she was in real relationships - the brain was in permanent shut down mode during sex while she just went through the motions.

That's one anecdote, and I won't stereotype from it or draw broader conclusions. But I don't think of her as far more liberated than I am.

[lildreamer316]

23. My husband is an ex porn star.I am an exotic dancer.

He enjoyed his time in the biz as much as (he says) he could considering it was Hollywood. His only problems were the attitudes of people in Hollywood in general (the eat-you-up; spit-you-out types). He said there are as many smart porn stars as real dumbasses and anyone who runs a "respectable" studio requires their stars to be tested every 6 months or they are not allowed to work. I have found the ladies that I've met to run the gamut from complete cokeheads to classicly trained degree-toting free-thinking women I would be glad to get to know better.

Great post; wish more would open their minds in this way.