I was having an interesting conversation with my fiance about the female body in mainstream porn. He said that while most larger women start in fetish porn specializing in large breasts or big butts, many of the more successful have made their way into mainstream pornography. The strict standards of body type that we see in modeling and media is changing in porn.

Also, April has lovely yabbos. haha

Everyone else, just read up a few posts for the Feminism 101 comment. It’s worth reading!

You know what one of the most popular porn webistes is? Bangbus.com. It’s where a group of a-holes drive around in their van, pick up a girl, fuck her in the van and then dump her on the side of the road and leave her. It’s all staged of course, but it’s really interesting that the climax of their videos isn’t the typical “money shot” you get in most porn. It’s the part where they dump the girl on the side of the road and leave her stranded and drive off laughing at her after having fucked her. It scares me to say that, but when I see that it has a stimulating effect on the most animalistic part of me, seeing a woman treated like dirt and discarded afterwards.

That’s porn, and it’s one of the more tame and popular examples of it. It’s not fit for any woman to be a part of that. It’s de-humanizing to the woman who endures that (even if she is getting paid for it), it’s dehumanizing to the males who view it and it’s dangerous to us all as a society.

Because you don’t know the truth of it. You can’t. So, is choosing to get off while watching another woman be raped a feminist “choice”? NO. No, it’s not.

There are real women getting violated by men who think spooging in women’s eyes, double penetrations and ass to mouth are HAWT. They think that because they think violently degrading women is HAWT. To hell with that that at any size.

And Alice:
“I’m not ignorant; I know the damage that porn can/do(es) to psyches and expectations.”
What the HELL? So how do you justify it then?
Also, who has been coralling sexuality here? Since when does porn = sex? Does there have to be a “healthy depiction” for that sexuality to exist. That’s how entrenched the porn mentality has become– if we don’t see a titillating image of it, it might as well not exist.

Do I think there are problems with the industry and the society that perpetuates those problems? Absolutely. Do I think there is no place for depictions of sex and sexuality in visual/aural/written media? Absolutely not.

Much bandwidth has been devoted to this very topic, but I will try to be brief. I also recommend the actual “Finally, Feminism 101″ site for an in-depth treatment.

Misogynistic: Pornography is the fetishization of human female bodies at the expense of female human beings. It is always, ALWAYS, in the service of patriarchy. No matter how much we may wish to “reclaim” our sexuality, any visual record of it can always be re-purposed by the male gaze once we put it in print, on video, or on-line. And the patriarchal male gaze sees the female body as nothing more than a meat-sock, designed for pronging and more pronging. No agency, no desire, no will.

Dangerous: Porn performers rarely are allowed to use condoms, and are therefore at very high risk for STIs, several of which are fatal. Porn performers are also pressured to engage in more dangerous and painful sex acts as their career progresses. Simple penis-in-vagina penetration is not enough for today’s porn consumer. Porn is growing more violent, more degrading, and more dehumanizing every single day.

Oppressive: Porn culture, and its twin brother rape culture, radiates outward into the whole culture. Teen boys think gang-rape is okay if the girl is drunk (why? porn.). Grown men think women want to be pounded for hours with a Viagra-hardened dick (why? porn). Walmart sells “porn star” t-shirts and thongs in children’s sizes. Young men expect their partners to engage in the expensive, painful, and potentially dangerous practice of the Brazilian wax. Maxim magazine calls anal “the new third base”. The mainstreaming of porn affects all of us, close to home, in our own personal sex lives and our own personal beauty habits. We find ourselves expected to enjoy the things that women are paid to endure, because porn teaches men that women actually like it. Not just some women: ALL women. And women who don’t like it? We’re prudes, or hairy, or uptight, or need therapy, or need a good deep-dicking, or, in sum, are Less Than the women who choose to pornify themselves. Porn oppresses everyone.

Not so brief, and not thorough, but I gave it a try.

http://uts.cc.utexas.edu/~rjensen/articles_gender.html

Maybe this is a Feminism 101 question, I’m interested to know why you feel porn is destructive, misogynistic and oppressive, and why exactly is April Flores going to regret her life and her choices.