Last year, I was short on cash and struggling with full service work. For the first time in my life, I approached a porn company.
This was no ordinary porn company—they made this known every step of the way. They were “alternative” and “empowering.” They were “feminist” and made “erotica.” They were a company that was not like the others.
They were full of shit.
Here’s what working for them looked like:
They had me sign a form in which I promised that filming for them was just a hobby, not my job. It was a lie—one that was already pissing me off. They handed me a camera, took my passport for collateral, sent me home with a list of very exact specifications for what to film, and had me shoot my scene myself. Then, they had me come back to deliver the work. They complained about the amount of makeup I wore—said it didn’t fit their more “natural” style, though it was the same amount of makeup I had worn every day for the past 10 months—and handed me $200. They didn’t invite me back. They did invite back my skinnier, scar-free friend.
So feminist, right?
Here’s the thing: For porn to have a feminist counterpart, that would imply something about it was inherently anti-feminist in the first place. Instead, what happens here is that this company gets everyone so worked up about them supposedly being an ethical alternative to mainstream porn that nobody notices that they’re an international corporation paying next to nothing for people to style, shoot, produce, edit, and perform in their own work. It’s okay, though—it’s just a hobby!
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