Guest post: Why is porn different?
Originally a comment by morganmine on Why no outrage?
If this was a discussion about how, say, factory workers were exploited (low pay, long hours, dangerous working conditions, etc.) would the “choice” argument still come up? It seems pretty uncontroversial to talk about the exploitation of people working minimum-wage jobs among the left. There seems to be a pretty good understanding that these people are working in these jobs because their options are limited; that having limited options shouldn’t condemn one to unsafe working conditions (because you always have the “choice” to quit, right?); and that these industries should be criticized and held accountable for the way they treat their workers. Why is porn different?
Adult film actresses have talked about the brutality they have been subjected to during film shoots. They have talked about signing up for one sex act, then when they get to the set they are expected to do something else entirely, something they absolutely did not want to do. And it’s either do it or walk off and not get paid. They have talked about their clear “no” being ignored while the film was rolling; about being held down against their will; about having to do drugs and alcohol in order to get through a scene. They have talked about the damages done to their bodies and the diseases they have contracted. If workers from any other industry were talking about this, would we still be talking about those workers “choice” to work in that field, or would we be asking questions about the way the industry treats its workers?
The thing is, there is very little in the way of regulation in the porn industry. Some of the larger producers and distributors seem to be a little better about the way they treat their performers, but they are not the only ones making porn. There is also the “amateur” and “professional amateur” categories, and there seems to be precious little oversight in these categories. These are not niche porn categories sought after by only a few individuals. And the thing is, because there is so little oversight, no one knows whether the “amateur” porn they’re watching is something that the performers consented to or not. There is no way to know whether we are watching a filmed rape. Even something as “mainstream” and “tame” as “Deep Throat;” as the star of that movie, Linda Boreman, said she was forced into porn and prostitution by her abusive boyfriend.
Even if it is only a small percentage of porn that contains the rape and abuse of women, does that mean it is acceptable? Do we shrug our shoulders and say those women “chose” to do it, or do we take a good long look at the industry and how it operates?
And that doesn’t even get into the issue of depictions of violence against women being portrayed as sexually arousing. Why is critical analysis of porn and its depiction of women so controversial? Any other medium, any other genre, there may be a a disagreement about whether those depictions of women are sexist or not, but no one ever makes the argument that because an actress “chose” to play that character or the writer “chose” to write that character that way, that the argument is invalid.
I don’t think there is any argument that sex workers should not receive the protections that other workers have or that the industry is free from exploitation. The discussion on the other thread was whether there was a significant difference between employing someone to do pornography or beating them up. It was in the context of that discussion that the question of choice and consent came up along with other important (as it seems to me) distinctions between real violence and pretend violence etc. It would come up in exactly the same way if someone tried to argue that there was no moral difference between employing someone to work in a factory or keeping them as a slave, say. But I doubt anyone would make that argument. Well, noone but Ayn Rand maybe.
The argument isn’t that the actresses choice invalidates critical analysis, it is that it makes a difference to our moral relation to the performance. Is there a significant difference between someone being murdered on film and someone pretending to be murdered on film? I would say, obviously, yes. It would seem absurd, to me, to feel the same outrage at both. Others seem to want to deny that difference, which is where this discussion started.
Cab drivers and convenience store clerks are at high risk of criminal violence on the job. But that violence isn’t ‘built in’ to the job itself.
Bars and restaurants are notorious places of sexual coercion and abuse of employees. By management and customers. Though both managers and customers are violating ‘acceptable’ standards of conduct by doing these things. (though it appears that the abusers consider their behavior entirely normal)
We are still a culture more comfortable with violence than with sex. Eroticism in Hollywood films is made ‘acceptable’ by hiding it under violence: Fay Wray’s nudity in ‘King Kong,’ all those damn’ vampire films etc. etc. ‘Normal’ entertainment is still more comfortable dealing with sex in the frame of violence toward women.
Porn consumption seems to be driven, in large part, by male rage and hostility toward women. By the adversarial and coercive view of sex embodied by ‘our’ president, the MRAs the PUAs etc.
Workers in porn are in the crosshairs of both incidental (cab driver) and direct (cocktail waitress) abuse. But even if porn were a safe, personally remunerative career that might be ‘chosen’ by autonomous mature 18 year olds, the product is saturated with every Bad Thing about pop-culture sex. With the abuse and coercion acted out on camera as a sales point.
Pinkeen:
Bash Ayn Rand (or anyone else) for things they’ve actually said or done. Rand seems to be a person who deserves some flack, so people feel free to give her flack for things she never said or did.
Pinkeen at #1
But the violence in most porn is not pretend violence. There are no professional stunt doubles or special effects in most porn. The women in violent porn are actually being beaten and brutalized. What you see happening on camera did actually happen to that woman in real life.
Pinkeen at #2
And again, the violence depicted in most porn is not pretend, it is really for real being done. It is really happening to the woman. Her co-stars are not pretending to hit her; they are hitting her. Her co-stars are not pretending to choke her; they are choking her. She is suffering actual, real pain and harm.
The argument Gail Dines is making is that we, as a society, can look at images of a man being beaten and brutalized and feel outrage and empathy for the victim; but take the same actual scenario and have it happen to a woman in a porn film and we, as a society, do not feel the same empathy and outrage. She was arguing that violence against another human being is not seen as outrageous or worthy of empathy as long as that human being is a woman who is being f***ed. On the other thread, the argument for why these two situations were different was that the woman “chose” be there. Whether or not she chose to be there misses the point of what Gail Dines is saying. She is saying that it is wrong that we, as a society, can sexualize violence against women.
Arguing that it’s pretend violence doesn’t really address Dines’s point. It also isn’t the reality of what happens in porn.
Morganmine, I don’t think that’s true. I think most of violence you see in porn is pretend. Rape is illegal, the porn actors are pretending.
Yes, that does sem to be her argument, but it is a baffling one, because in one scenario the violence is being inflicted against the victim’s will and in the other the violence is often pretend and always (we assume) inflicted with the consent of the actors in return for money. If Dao had agreed in advance to be dragged off the plane in return for a fee as part of a movie, there would have been no outrage even if he sustained injuries in the process (as many actors admittedly do). The difference has nothing to do with a social tolerance for violence against women but and understandable distinction between consent and non-consent.
You will see much greater levels of violence that the UA incident inflicted on men every Saturday on football and rugby pitches around the world, with no outrage. That’s because we know (or assume) the players have consented to take part for reward.
If Dines is arguing that it is wrong to ‘sexualise’ violence against women (and, presumably men – a lot of violent pornography has men as the victims), that is a completely different argument. I would be interested to hear why, but it isn’t one she made in the article we are discussing. The question of why we are more outraged than one kind of violent image than another, has been answered I think.
Well, I was just speculating off the cuff. I think Rand did argue that paying taxes was a form of slavery, though, didn’t she? which isn’t far off in the loopy stakes.
Pinkeen #6,
Multiple people have explained to you that this is false.
(Unless you count the part where the woman is *pretending* to be enjoying herself, of course. That part is fake.)
Cressida, some people have claimed it’s false, but I don’t see a good reason to accept those claims. The main complaint of violence in porn, rape, is pretend by definition. So we can agree on that much. It seems likely that choking, say, is pretend too. Why not pretend? It is just easier and cheaper and impossible to tell the real from the fake. So I think it is unlikely that much of it is real. The little bit of ‘violent’ porn I have seen was so blatantly fake that I might be prejudiced though.
http://www.theapricity.com/forum/archive/index.php/t-98713.html
Or, from literally the first page of a single Google search:
http://www.thedailybeast.com/articles/2013/03/18/blood-sweat-and-sex-my-hard-life-in-porn.html
http://fightthenewdrug.org/10-porn-stars-speak-openly-about-their-most-popular-scenes/
http://www.theblaze.com/news/2013/10/24/ex-porn-star-reveals-the-horrors-of-working-in-the-sex-industry/
https://www.lifesitenews.com/blogs/former-porn-star-porn-was-the-worst-darkest-thing-ive-ever-been-involved-in
Cressida – I suspect you’re spitting in the wind. Pinkeen seems to have staked out his position, and there appears to be no movement whatsoever.
If you need someone to explain this to you, just go back through this site; I think Ophelia has been doing a good job of that for a long time. To wonder why sexualized violence against women is a bad thing is to admit that you are clueless about what many of us go through in the ‘normal’ course of our day, and how it is to be regarded as someone who doesn’t really count in the scheme of things; it is ‘normal’ to regard women as objects, and objects that are not that valuable to boot, so if we are kicked around it isn’t that big a deal. Now, do I think most people feel like this? No, I don’t…not consciously, anyway. But it becomes very easy to look at many of the things that happen in ordinary life to women, and consider them ordinary, boring, ho-hum, nothing to worry about, just a bit of a grope at the water cooler. (Long time readers of this site will no doubt recognize that last one – yes, I used that on purpose. Dawkins is an ordinary male, probably with no concept in his head that he has questionable attitudes toward women, and apparently even sees himself as somewhat sympathetic with the overarching goals of feminism. Yet he can see a “grope at the water cooler” as perfectly all right, not anything to get up in arms about – that is the danger of sexualizing violence against women, and not getting outraged, EVEN IF THE WOMAN AGREED TO BE IN THE MOVIE AND GOT PAID).
Adult actresses who have left the industry have talked about the actual, real, non-pretend violence they have experienced while doing porn. Even former actresses who remain positive about their experience in porn talk about the damage inflicted on their bodies.
Rape is indeed illegal; that doesn’t stop it from happening. James Deen is well-known mainstream porn actor. Multiple porn actresses have come forward with rape and assault allegations against him. At least two women have accused Deen of raping them while on set with film rolling. One of those scenes is billed as “the weirdest scene in porn.” Linda Boreman, screen name Linda Lovelace, has called “Deep Throat” her filmed rape.
What, exactly, do you think happens during the filming of an amateur porn film? There are no professional stunt doubles in porn. Do you think the camera cuts away right before the actress is hit, the director yells “cut” and makeup is applied to simulate bruising, then a sound guys dubs in sound effects during editing? Do you think that’s CGI when a woman is “gagged” to the point of vomiting? If you have a strong stomach, you could google “donkey punch” and “rosebud.” These are some examples of the physical violence that is inflicted in porn.
That’s a big assumption to make. Again, former porn actresses have stated that they would agree to one thing, but when they get to the set, it’s something entirely different, something that they did not consent to. Former porn actresses have stated there were times, when the film was rolling, that the male star would simply start doing something that they didn’t want. That their “no” and “stop” were ignored. And there is no way for a porn viewer to know whether or not the woman in any given porn film has consented to any given act, as there is no real oversight,especially with amateur porn.
And in professional sports, you have regulatory bodies that provide oversight. There is protective gear that must be worn. There are referees. The game is played between people with roughly the same physical size and prowess. There is training and practice. In porn there are no such things.
That is precisely the argument she is making.
Yes, that “we assume” is rich. Who’s “we”? Several of us have made quite clear that we don’t assume any such thing, and that it’s self-serving for customers and fans to assume that.
Also, not true that there’s no outrage about violence in football. Do keep up. Google football & concussions, for a start.
There is some controversy about violence in sport but nothing like the outrage that we have seen over the United Airlines event, in kind or quantity. Surely that’s uncontroversial? And I think it’s easy to explain without making theories about gender or sex.
Dines says she doesn’t understand why there was so much press over the Dao assault but so little over depictions of violence in porn. But the things aren’t alike because most people do not believe porn actors are being assaulted. If they are, that is a scandal but of a different kind. Workplace abuses are wrong and can be horrific and should be investigated, but most people simply don’t take much interest in sex work and assume that it is consensual.
Iknklast, I don’t think it obvious why sexualisation of violence – in fantasy – is wrong. Your very strong visceral reaction might make it feel to you that it must obviously be wrong, but that isn’t an argument. If Dines makes that argument it might me interesting, I’m not saying there is no argument just that it isn’t the one she is making here. As it is I think she is just saying something a bit silly.
Really? Then what is all this I’ve been reading in magazines for the past five years about concussions, and risk, and outrage? I read magazines that usually ignore sports; all of them have been harping on this issue. People are getting hurt. The NFL has been put in a bad position PR wise, and has had to make some changes. Yet these are grown men who choose to play the sport, and if they are high enough on the food web, they are making oodles of money (no porn actress could hope to match it). But mother’s sons are getting hurt, and there has been a lot of noise about it.
My reaction is not a visceral one. I used to take the same stance; I don’t like porn but saw no reason why one couldn’t do it/consume it if they wished. Free speech, after all. My position has shifted over the years as I began to read more thoroughly and more carefully. Over time, ideas can change, and a problem with porn does not need to be ‘visceral’. And no, I am not going to give you a list of books/sites/articles/magazines that I have read, because I do not have that kind of time in my life, because Cressida has already provided you with links, and because I think you are intelligent enough to do the research on your own, and if you are not willing to do that, you are not going to read sources I list for you.