Although I'm glad my post sparked and interesting and thoughtful discussion on the place of art in camming or whether or not camming can be art in itself, that really wasn't the intention of my post! I framed it in terms of artistic integrity because yossarian was annoyed with girls bandwagoning, and claimed that doing things for monetary reasons made them disappointingly mercenary (which, as we've discussed, is kind of silly to specify, being that this is a commercial site- if girls wanted to just do cool things on camera for free, they'd start a YouTube channel).
My point with the art comment was that I didn't understand what ethical code girls are betraying (the implication with the term "mercenary") by trying something that has already become popular and is clearly successful. Yes, it's one thing to offer to do something you hate just for the sake of making tokens- that displays a sad lack of creativity, in my opinion. But to evaluate the intentions of a whole slew of camgirls just because they aren't the first to do what they're doing as though they've "sold out" is annoying in its own right.
What I was trying to say is that EVEN if one DID evaluate camming and camgirls by artistic standards and held them to the same integrity as a musician (because it felt like that's what yossarian was doing), it would be ridiculous to assume that producing "art" and doing so by employing aspects of current trends in order to make money are mutually exclusive pursuits.
yossarian said:
Bob Dylan could have done a disco album in the 70s, or a rap album in the 90s, or he could start slapping models' asses and twerking with Miley tomorrow--and he might have made a shitload of money doing it--but he had the integrity not to. He does what he wants and trusts that his audience would follow. I've seen some really original models like Aella and Veronica Chaos, but they are few and far between. Most girls are trying to make a living, so I understand what you're saying about trying new ways to make money. I guess when I said bandwagoning I meant "doing things because everybody else is doing them." That's sort of the opposite of what I want a camgirl to do--I want her to be herself. If I want to watch Kickaz in the library, I'll watch Kickaz in the library.
I'm gonna try really hard to not be offended by the "Aella and VC are original but they're rare examples" line for various reasons, but I am going to point out that if you want girls to be genuinely themselves, you need to stop assuming that anything they do that's already been done by many is a deviation from that genuineness or from originality itself. It's not like the Bob Dylan thing at all- it would be like accusing all modern musicians of not being genuine or not being worth listening to because they use piano and guitars and not some new and unique instruments, or the C G Am F chord progression as opposed to something more novel. These are tools of the trade. They are industry staples. They are mechanisms that have proven highly effective and compelling in crafting unique and interesting pieces, so they've become standard.
Hell, when it comes down to it, even Aella (whom I love and admire, for the record) is doing a lot of things that are already very popular- spanks, shots, Hitachi control shows- she adds her own personality to it and does have a TON of creative and unique aspects to her performance like the gnomes and the chipmunk head, but its not like she's any less "guilty" of this "doing things because everyone else does them and they clearly work" thing.
Sorry, perhaps I'm really invested in this discussion because I feel like I'm exactly the kind of camgirl to whom you're referring, but I don't feel like I deserve the criticism. I do many things that could be considered bandwagon-y. I don't do penetrative cumshows, anal, squirting, or any of that jazz, so my room could be considered pretty vanilla, but I offer spanks and pussy spanks. I do library shows. I do hot wax and hitachi control shows. I have a whiteboard and my bed has pretty string lights above it. But my library shows don't involve me getting down and dirty in the stacks as much as they involve doing ridiculous dances and army crawling down the aisles, which I'm pretty sure is the most unique thing a camgirl has done for tokens in a library, and yet by the sheer fact that it's a library show I'm being lumped into the bandwagon category. One of the ways to win spanks in my room is by correctly guessing whether Schrodinger's Cat will be alive or dead in my neat little Schrodinger's Cat box, yet when I do the spanks I'll apparently be seen as only doing them for the money. It's just really frustrating to be held to some impossible and arbitrary standard of originality and legitimacy when I think I'm one of the most unique girls out there. I'm sure there are others who feel the same way.
There's always a saturation point with bandwagons and trends, and then aspects of those trends will be assimilated into standard operating procedure. At one point in the very beginning, I'm sure a girl figured out she didn't have to do privates all the time- she could offer to do countdowns in public chat and make more tokens there. After a while, other girls picked up on it and started incorporating it into their routine. Some people probably griped about how annoying it was to see countdowns everywhere. Now, nobody questions it because it's standard. I think it's really cool, actually, to see how social media adapts and is repurposed like an organic, ever-growing entity.
TL;DR- Blah blah blah art, blah blah blah Bob Dylan, blah blah Lilah whining some more.
)) :appl :clap_1
