Porn and Capitalism, We All Sell Ourselves For Money

...just a little.

Exploitation & Porn reflect our society

By Sadie Ryanne.

Mainstream porn is exploitative and degrading. But it’s more complicated than that.

We should be focused on dismantling a society that forces us to sell ourselves, not one particular industry within that society – especially an industry that is currently (for better or worse) the livelihood for some of the most vulnerable people in our culture

A few months ago I signed up for a workshop for sex worker activists at HIPS and presented with the Red Umbrella Project.

It’s called “Personal Storytelling for Social Change” and encourages sex workers to tell their/our stories in the face of widespread ignorance about the realities of sex work.

I see it as claiming space within a dialog that is overwhelmingly dominated by non-sex workers, especially white, middle class, cis [on the same side] Christians and feminists.

So, I was thinking about what I would say about my experience in the industry. Then, my Facebook displayed an advertisement for an organization called “Porn Harms.”

It’s just another group dedicated to exposing the negative impact of porn on women (presumably by perpetuating sexist ideas) and men (presumably by degrading their morality/masculinity).

The website is full of questionable research about how porn is addictive and obligatory appeals to how it “destroys families” and “corrupts children.”

Can porn perpetuate sexist/racist/cissexist/transphobic ideologies? Absolutely.

Is most porn ethically bankrupt? Of course.

Can it be fun and empowering? Sometimes.

Some sex-positive activists — particularly relatively better-off ones who do sex work purely by choice — focus on this last one.

They talk about how porn can be reclaimed, and even make anti-oppressive porn that is by and for female, queer, and trans people. (Can you tell I had a subscription to Crash Pad?)

I think it’s amazing that we have stuff like Doing it Ourselves: The Trans Women Porn Project working to portray trans women’s sexuality in a realistic way, and not based only on some cis guy’s fantasies.

We desperately need more of that. You should probably buy that movie, and then go make your own. (If you want to.)

But the reality is that a lot of mainstream porn is exploitative and degrading. A lot of people do it purely for money. If we only defend porn that is understood as “queer” or “empowering”, we still leave ourselves open to attack from the right and from anti-porn feminists.

If pro-porn activists only focus on queer/liberating porn, the right’s accusations about mainstream porn (and the people who work in it) will go unchallenged.

If we don’t speak explicitly about mainstream porn (the oppressive, cis supremacist kind), they will keep dominating the discourse on this type of porn.

And by extension, the people who depend on it for a livelihood. People who have worked in mainstream porn should be allowed to tell the story from our points of view.

So, yes, mainstream porn is exploitative and degrading. But it’s more complicated than that.

This got me thinking about other shit I’ve done to survive under a capitalist economy. I would say all of it is exploitative and degrading in some way or another.

Under a capitalist economy, we’re all forced to sell ourselves somehow. Judging or focusing on one group of marginalized and oppressed people (a) makes no sense and (b) perpetuates the harm done to them.

The same moral condemnation used against porn is directed at prostitution and other forms of sex workers, who often have it a lot harder than people like me who aren’t working dark alleys with anonymous strangers at night.

Porn performers have to deal with stigma and certain levels of fear, while street-involved sex workers face the brunt of physical violence. (The contrast is no accident, by the way. Porn is legal and regulated.

“Prostitution” is criminalized. Abusive photographers can be reported. Abusive pimps get away with it precisely because the cops are just as abusive.)

But it is the same whorephobia underlying both kinds of oppression. The prudish voices that condemn porn are usually the same voices (even the “feminist” ones) decrying the “moral depravity” of prostitution.

And that’s the idea behind the criminalization of prostitution: policies that put more sex workers on the streets, behind bars and in danger.

We should be focused on dismantling a society that forces us to sell ourselves, not one particular industry within that society — especially an industry that is currently (for better or worse) the livelihood for some of the most vulnerable people in our culture.

We should be trying to build a world where, instead of working for the profit of others, we work for pleasure and for the benefit of ourselves, our communities and our planet.

Focusing on porn, and ignoring the larger context of capitalism, only serves the interest of those in power and harms those with the least power.