Writing a book about porn can take a person on some strange research missions, but for me the most bizarre was no doubt the three days I spent at the Adult Entertainment Expo in Las Vegas in 2008. Imagine being in a cavernous hall with hardcore porn being projected onto every wall, your voice drowned out by the fake orgasmic noises coming from the movies. Scattered around the room are scantily clad women sitting on tables with their legs wide open so fans can take pictures of their barely covered crotches.
I went around the hall interviewing porn producers, many of whom were more than happy to talk about their work. It became clear very quickly that what gets these guys excited is not bodily contact but profits, niche markets, and bulk mailing. In all the workshops I went to, nobody talked about sex, just his or her business plan for increasing revenue.
One of the representatives from RealDoll--a company that specializes in life-like sex dolls--explained to me, with a straight face, that these dolls are "great for men who want to learn how to be with a woman." One porn producer was keen to tell me that his movies were more tasteful than the usual hard-core ones, even though his latest had a woman kneeling in a coffin as she was being anally penetrated.
One afternoon I sat down next to Patricia, an African American security guard being paid a little more than minimum wage. I asked how she was, but she looked at me suspiciously and turned her back, assuming I was a pornographer. Only after convincing her that I was an anti-porn feminist writing a book did she open up to me to complain bitterly about the work detail, since she had never before seen porn. Patricia was especially upset by the African American women porn performers, and every time one passed us, she asked me to go tell her that that it is "not good for her to be doing this stuff." Patricia and I struck up the kind of friendship one does when you feel like you have found some sanity in a crazy place.
When I started to write Pornland, my first thought was: How can I find the words to describe just how brutal mainstream Internet porn has become? In my lectures I show images, but this was not an option for the book since I didn't want to become one more purveyor of porn. I knew that I had to describe today's porn, because many of the readers--especially women--would have an outdated image in their heads of a naked woman seductively smiling in a cornfield. The first thing I did was to type porn into Google and just describe, in a somewhat clinical fashion, the images that jumped out at me. This is not an easy read, because today's mainstream Internet porn is filled with images of body-punishing sex acts that are designed to debase and dehumanize women. These are not fun, creative, playful images that feed our sexual imaginations but instead are industrial products that depict a type of sex that is formulaic, generic, and plasticized.
Porn images are not only found in those materials we call pornography. The imagery and themes have now migrated to pop culture. Whether it be Miley Cyrus in Elle spread-eagled on a table dressed in S&M gear, or Maxim doing a feature on the "Top 12 Porn Stars," we are inundated with images, messages, and ideologies that promote porn. Using interviews with hundreds of college-age students, Pornland takes a close look at what it means for young women and men to grow up in such a culture and how it shapes their identities, sexualities, and ideas about intimacy, relationships, and connection.
One problem I knew I had to deal with as I was writing the book was the inevitable accusation that, because I am anti-porn, I must be an anti-sex prude who is out to police people's sex lives. To criticize porn today is to be seen as criticizing sex, because--thanks to the porn PR machine--porn has now become synonymous with sex.
The way I address this in the book is to ask the reader what would happen if this book were a critique of McDonald's for its exploitive labor practices, its destruction of the environment, and its impact on our diet and health. Would I be accused of being anti-eating or anti-food? I suspect that most readers would understand that the critique was focused on the large-scale impact of the fast-food industry and not the human need, experience, and joy of eating. So I say in the preface that this book should be read as a critique of the industrialization and commodification of sex by corporate predators, and not as an attack on sex itself.
It is this industrial setting that often gets ignored in the heated debates over porn. I write about porn as an industry because I want people to understand that it needs to be seen as a business whose product evolves with a specifically capitalist logic. This is a business with considerable political clout, with the capacity to lobby politicians, engage in expensive legal battles, and use public relations to influence public debate. As with the tobacco industry, this is not a simple matter of consumer choice; rather, the business is increasingly able to deploy a sophisticated and well-resourced marketing machine, not just to push its wares but also to cast the industry's image in a positive light.
I have no plans to go back to the Expo in Las Vegas next year, but you can be sure the industry will be there planning how to develop new niche markets and marketing techniques to keep an increasingly bored and desensitized consumer base interested. Patricia won't be there either, since she packed in her job as a security guard straight after the Expo and moved as far away from Las Vegas as possible.
Emily Southwood: Adventures in Pornland: Not So Adventurous
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I wouldn't go as far as banning porn (for each its own), but just like alcohol or drugs, education about its effects is necessary. What are teenage boys learning about sex and relationsh
I don't think there is extensive research done yet on how porn affects society since the advent of the internet, when it became extremely accessible for all.
So you began your book with an agenda and a pre-concei
But no, the various religions wouldn't go for anything that straightfo
Want to see a real feminist try Theresa 'The Darklady' Reed (who already commented) or Violet Blue (responded on http://our
Therapist Russ Funk who is a anti-racis
The important organizati
And Robert Jensen has written great articles and his important book,Getti
Paul Kivel who is the founder of The Oakland Men's Project in California who has been a long time anti-sexis
Not every one in the industry is exploited. Yes, exploitati
If you ask me, I think the bigges number of people being exploited by the adult industry are the male customers. After all, they are usually the biggest percentage of customers for this industry!
Paying as much as $4.99 a minute for someone to talk dirty to them? Who would you say is being exploited? She's making $300 an hour and he's paying it!
Truth is that even most of those that protest adult book stores, etc with their church groups are often seen returning later as customers when their wives and church buddies are not around. Some return with their wives. Many people who are swingers will often see other church members, soemtimes their pastor and his wife at the swingers clubs.
Get over it, as long as there is biology, porn will be a thriving business.
Then we can compare notes.
Oh, and what are your credential
BTW, why aren't you concerned about the male actors in the movies? Aren't they being "exploited
You attended the main trade show for the adult industry. What did you expect them to be discussing there? This trade show just like any other trade show held in Vegas or any other city around the world is for the purpose of increasing business and profits. Were you that disappoint
I would like to know if when you attended aAVN interviewi
Just as there are McDonald's
I acknowledg
So what? I'm sure 87% of non-pedoph
Post hoc, ergo propter hoc.
(Which of course was never actively argued for, but lumping lung cancer with "porn problems" left the ultimate point sort of vague to me.)
Your over-simpl
You even lump the RealDoll with porn -- and indicate contempt for those who benefit from the company of such dolls.
Sex workers are of great value to those with social anxiety, loneliness
Workplace issues, naturally, need to be addressed in the adult industry, but they need to be addressed everywhere
BTW -- I'll match your token 2008 attendance of the Adult Entertainm
As for its benefits, I strongly doubt that there's been research done. But if you think about the blankie or dolly or teddy that you dragged around as a child, you've got the general picture -- children keep such things because they're a source of comfort and affection when it's not available from other sources. If you amend that thought with the reality that sexual release is part of adult "comfort," a RealDoll is more or less the same thing.
If a person is lonely and buys a doll to spend time with, isn't that as valid as a person who's lonely and buys a dog to spend time with? And before you suggest that a dog might be used sexually, I suspect that most RealDolls remain virgins.
Do you also question the usefulness of vibrators for women? What if they look like a penis? Is it merely the sexual desires and practices of men that are somehow unsavory?
Gains ignores LGBT and feminist-p
My second wife was a high priced call girl. When I met her it was because I hired her.
Anyway, I was a biologist before going in to the pot trade. What I was hoping for was some enlightenm
Thanks for nothing Darklady and jhine...
What sex addiction and prison sex has to do with the topic at hand is beyond me. No wonder you've come away with nothing from this conversati