In Defence of Porn

There’s a meme that I’ve seen reposted on a few different social media accounts recently, particularly on “sex positive” accounts, a phrase which in itself I find quite odd but anyway I’m going to write about that meme today because frankly, it’s starting to get on my nerves. I don’t have permission to repost the image here but some of you may have already seen it but if you haven’t, it basically depicts cartoon men and woman before, during or after sex and bemoans the lack of these seemingly “normal” things being shown in porn, such as struggling to get your trousers off beforehand or, bizarrely, stopping for a water break.

Now as most of my readers know, I use to make some pretty generic hardcore porn and although I no longer film with men, I do occasionally still shoot porn with other women and shoot solo videos of myself (which you can check out on my OnlyFans page, should you be so inclined). I have been classed as a sex worker for a long time now and although I wouldn’t go as far as to call myself an advocate of porn, I enjoy watching it and I enjoy the money I make from making it. That being said, I wholeheartedly agree that porn can give both men and women unrealistic expectations of what is expected of them in the bedroom, as I have mentioned previously here, but I am also the first to argue that PORN IS FANTASY. If I’ve said it once I’ve said it a hundred times; fantasy is always better than reality and that is why most people watch porn – as a type of “sexual escapism” and to get themselves off.

I truly believe that people aren’t themselves when they are horny and a lot of people, myself included, like to watch things that they’d never personally do in their own sex lives. For example, I consider myself a staunch feminist and would never take part in anything involving more than one man at a time in both real life or on film because I feel like the woman is irrelevant in that type of scene and could be absolutely anyone, yet sometimes I find myself watching bukkake scenes. Then after I’ve cum and I’ve “sobered up” I go back to thinking group sex is derogatory to women. Am I a hypocrite? Probably, but I’ve been called much worse.

Do I think most mainstream porn is catered towards the Male Gaze? Of course I do although I am always confused by what people mean when they refer to “mainstream porn”. Is that literally meaning what comes up on the homepage when you open up a porn site? Or is “mainstream” referring to the generic “man fucking woman, man cumming somewhere on woman” scenes that usually spring to mind when porn is referred to? The world in general is oversexualized now and it’s considered “cool” to be a “freak” these days. You only have to watch music videos or go on social media these days to know that pressure on both men and women to appear overtly sexual or sexy doesn’t come solely from porn.

I agree that porn isn’t a realistic view of most people’s sex lives (unless you watch amateur stuff which I do, often) and as someone who works in the sex industry, I see first hand the impact that porn can have on the way some men speak to me or assume they can interact with me. But surely it’s the same with any fantasy genre? The vast majority of people are able to watch violent movies or play violent video games and NOT go out and reenact the things they’ve seen, just like most people are able to watch porn and understand that what they are seeing is an exaggerated version of sex, between two consenting adults, but for their viewing pleasure.

I wanted to break down a few of the points that were depicted in the meme I’m referring to, to give you a real view of what porn is like and why I think frankly, that the meme is wrong:

Things You Don’t See In Mainstream Porn

Period Sex – Just like anal, period sex isn’t for everyone but if you took 0.5 seconds to type in the words “period sex” on a mainstream porn site you would find a ton of videos showing just that. It’s definitely not everyone’s cup of tea but trust me, period sex is a big niche.

Falling off the bed – I’ve had a lot of sex, both on screen and off, and never have I experienced anyone falling off the bed during the act. Even if they did, I’m watching porn to get off to and a bit of slapstick comedy during a sex scene would turn me off big time.

Peeing after sex – Correct me if I’m wrong but a cumshot (usually always the male’s and trust me, I have things to say about that too) usually signifies the end of the scene and you’ve usually blown your own load by then. I literally couldn’t care less what the people do after the scene nor would I want to watch someone having a wee anyway.

Real, earthy orgasms – Once again I agree that “mainstream” porn is geared towards the man on screen’s orgasm and I’m going to assume that is because it is mostly men watching those scenes. I know there’s all these statistics out there saying women watch porn more than men and yadda yadda but I know from experience that most women I know who watch porn aren’t watching men cumming. That being said, there are sooooo many scenes that show real orgasms – literally just google “amateur” and you’ll find hundreds of thousands of scenes that real life couples have filmed of themselves having real life orgasms and real life sex. And not one of them falls off the bed, either.

Water breaks – It’s sex, not American fucking football.

Putting in the time for Her Pleasure – Once again, this is absolutely not true. As a connoisseur of female pleasure porn, I can ASSURE you that when I wanna get off from watching a woman having her pussy ate for extended periods of time, there are once again hundreds of thousands of videos of this, both in the professionally filmed and amateur category.

Struggling to Put on a Condom – Most porn doesn’t include condoms for the simple fact that every porn performer is tested for sexual infections CONSTANTLY and rigorously. Literally when I was making porn I was having a full sexual health check up, including swabs from not just my vagina but my throat too and bloods taken, every two weeks. No one is allowed to perform in a scene without providing professional sexual health certificates beforehand. That being said, I do think that porn can make people assume that they shouldn’t use protection in order to make things “feel better” and maybe porn should include a disclaimer saying why condoms aren’t used? I don’t know.  

Pubes – Agreed; in mainstream porn pubes aren’t common at all, especially female pubes, and I’m sure that I read somewhere that that is so the dick can be seen going in and out better. Nevertheless, pubic hair is again a big fetish so JUST SEARCH FOR IT YOU WILL FIND HAIRY MUFFS GALORE. A lot of men and women choose to shave or wax these days anyway so no pubes is just as realistic as pubes.

I appreciate the sentiment behind this meme and that the author of it was trying to show that porn isn’t true to life but there is a lot more to porn than just the list of videos you see when you click on the landing page of any x-rated tube site. Like I’ve said, yes most “mainstream” porn does seem to be geared towards the Male Gaze but if you look further you’ll see that there is something for everyone out there. I also loathe the idea that just because things seem to be geared more towards what men want to see, it’s automatically assumed that women can’t enjoy sex unless it centres around the idea of romance and love. Shock horror but some of us women actually quite like things being a bit rough or being spoken to in a derogatory tone whilst having sex. It’s not just men that get off on this stuff. I don’t mind if you call me a whore in the sheets just don’t do it when we are in Nandos. 

I wholeheartedly agree that porn isn’t a realistic representation of most people’s sex lives, but it isn’t meant to be. Just like nobody wants to watch Noah and Ally in The Notebook arguing over whose turn it is to take the bins because that’s not romantic, we all watch movies and TV shows and porn to see things that we don’t always experience ourselves. We want to see things that we desire, things that excite or move us and make us feel something. Life can be so mundane; let people get their kicks where they can.