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The ethical porn consumer
At a party a few months ago, I got involved in a late night, drunken conversation about porn. A male friend of mine was talking to a woman I hadn’t met before. My friend insisted that some of the porn consumed online was the result of some kind of coercion, even rape. The woman thought that might be an exaggeration, but we all agreed it was possible. Then the woman said that men (and women, but especially men) needed to publicly admit that they watch porn, and that this admission would help in legitimizing the profession and industry. Legitimization, she felt, would at least throw light onto it and thus more scrutiny on how performers were treated, where the porn comes from, etc. This conversation, in addition to a documentary I saw about Hugh Hefner, was the impetus for a recent column on “ethical porn” that I wrote for The Globe and Mail, whose headline was “How to revel in porn and feel good about it.”
A long time ago, a woman once said to me, when discussing the inherent problem of pornography and prostitution: “If something can be bought and sold, then it can also be stolen.”
I think there is a certain logic to this, and a debate about whether porn, at its base, could ever be ethical could certainly spring from it. However, when writing the column I wanted to start from the assumption that men and women will always consume porn. We have for decades and I don’t see it ending. Overall, I think it’s better to not get too much into porn if you can help it, but I also think completely repressing the desire to view it is equally problematic.
To whatever extent that you do watch porn – and most of us do – I think it’s important to understand that we have a role as consumers to support porn that is at least made in a relatively ethical manner.
A couple of the sources I used in the article wrote blog posts with additional thoughts after the column came out. There’s this one, from Peter Nowak, author of Sex, Bombs, and Burgers. And also this (scroll down to number 6 on her list), from the Montreal-based self-pornographer Seska Lee, pictured above.
2 Responses to “The ethical porn consumer”
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Great thoughts on this subject! Putting some stress on the consumer is definitely a fresh take on the industry. Ethically speaking, I don’t think we’ll ever really come to any sort of moral conclusion. Porn is something we consume and admit we consume and leave the conversation there.
Do you know about the Feminist Porn Awards? They awarded this one site, I think it was called the art of blowjob an award. It’s incredibly sexy and far as I know, ethically produced. Feminist Porn Awards may be a good source of this kind of thing, too. They’re put on a Toronto sex shop called Good for Her.