The Pornography Industry: My Experience and General Views

            No other film industry is as contentious or worthy of debate as the pornography business, which depicts sexual acts, real or performed, to ease the world of sexual frustration. Its existence has been questioned by the religious community, politicians and the general public. Porn exists in its form today not only due to the huge demand that it sees fit to supply to but partly because it is protected by freedom of expression. In the United States and the United Kingdom especially, any group can express themselves freely in so far as the messages they express do not carry a high chance of inciting violence. Pornography steps on the edge in terms of freedom of expression legislation, as some label it as an industry which promotes sexual, domestic and general violence towards women. Porn has stood the tests and generally isn’t deemed to incite violence.

It seems the majority of the supply of porn is aimed at gratifying males rather than females, take a look at these recent porn search keywords from around the globe which illuminates the dominance of the male consumer. 

           

Keywords such as ‘hentai’, ‘milf’, ‘pov’ (point of view of male pornstars), ‘massage’ and ‘anal’ all feature pornography where females pleasure males and not necessarily the other way round. This is not just in a few countries but prevalent around the world where internet and pornography are allowed. This is significant in that the sexual needs of men are assumed to be higher in value or they could just be easier to satisfy. Either way, females are left not only with a limited supply of pornography for them to use but also feel as they are being objectified by most of the pornographic world.

Many feminist and women’s rights groups have fought legally and culturally against the objectification of women in porn. Few have succeeded in changing legislation to restrict pornography, the most powerful change however occurred in 2009 which witnessed a prosecution right against extreme pornography. Extreme pornography is any image or film which is deemed pornographic and contains content which shows humans in a life threatening situation or in any position which puts them at a risk for serious injury. Feminists, rightfully, are still left dissatisfied with the pornographic industry with its degrading and male orientated content. Some have taken a different approach by taking matters into their hands and creating a market for female porn, this has given rise to the feminist pornographic movement.

Erika Lust (Erika Hallqvist ) is a feminist porn director and producer from Sweden who works in Barcelona. She has been at the fore front of this movement in recent years and aims to provide great cinematic content with high quality film and exciting plots to please the female and male community. This is what Erika has to say about regular pornography:

‘At the University of Lund, even though I was studying, thinking and reading about porn, I didn’t actually like any of the porn that I saw,” she remembers. “The first time I saw a porn film, I had the same reaction that many women have – while I was aroused by some of the images, for the most part I found it unsatisfying. The audiovisual quality was awful. I didn’t identify with anything that I saw. The women did not look like they were enjoying themselves, and the sexual situations were totally ridiculous. We’re modern women! Not slutty Sharons, horny teens, desperate housewives, hot nurses, and nymphomaniac hookers, always looking to service pimps, multi-millionaires or macho sex machines. Not always looking to please rather than be pleased. I wanted to know: where was my lifestyle, my values, my sexuality?’ – Erika Lust (http://erikalust.com/about/)

I have had  a unique experience in that I have worked as a male performer for Erika Lust during my year abroad in Barcelona studying physics. I starred in two films of her Xconfessions project which entails performers acting out confessions and fantasies written in by people from around the world. From my experience I can say that working with a top feminist director really changed my views of feminist porn. I once thought it was being made in pure spite against males however the movement is really focused on creating realistic, intimate and high quality cinema. It is more of an artistic movement than simply providing quick and ‘not thought out’ content to serve sexual arousal. Erika Lust and similar companies are flourishing culturally and financially as they are forging a whole new market for themselves and women especially are putting their faith and money into companies which can fulfil their unique sexual demands.

Most men, like I once did, assume that feminist porn would not fit their sexual demands at all. However they could be in slight error there, as the porn produced by feminist companies does not lack natural attractive females, sexual passion and many other things which males find instinctively arousing. Maybe the reason for the dismay of males might be due to the fact, that for years, they have been subjected to a superficial and fake pornographic world in which silicon breasts trump naturally voluptuous women and unrealistic female roles become a subconscious desire in the real world.

Ethically feminist porn promotes natural and equal sexuality; it does not encourage the gross humiliation of either gender. It really is the future for porn as it not only keeps the industry alive (the demand will never go as we are humans) but it also serves as a cure for the patriarchal, male serving and simply ‘crappy’ productions of regular porn.