More women looking at porn.

I am so slow!

Beyond
Irk said in post 4 How many of the people that search for 'porn for women' are trans women?

4th post BeyondWW

Ah sorry irk, I missed your post!

I am sure the exploitation is across the board.

Men don't seem to understand, or pretend not to understand, what most women do seem to understand, around having unwanted sex for money.

When you mention straight men who do gay porn - "gay for pay" - all of a sudden they understand completely.

I think it's a combination of not seeing women as full 3D people, this weird thing they have where they care about "their women" but not about others, their enjoyment of porn / using prostitutes / whatever being such that it's easier not to think about it. The distressing thing is that men who use prostitutes hardly ever report when they suspect trafficking. The p*ntersnet "reviews" where they say they thought she didn't want to / it obviously hurt / she was crying and so on but do it anyway. With porn even the standard stuff as viewed by a woman looks uncomfortable / painful / degrading and while sure some women like that stuff, it's not niche, it's the norm. And then of course there is a lot of porn where the whole point is that the woman is being brutalised, degraded, hurt.

Surprised that no one in 36 posts has wondered what definition of "women" they are using. Given the recent increase in "women" sex offenders who aren't female.

I know someone who did gay porn when he was younger, but he is bi-polar and I suggested to him that he had been exploited during manic episodes and he hadn't thought about that and was clearly creeped out by it.

Find it sad if it is true - women participating in their own degradation. Do wonder how much porn is consensual, suspect hardly any. Women who says it is empowering, sceptical about their life history.

X posted

I agree - I didn't mention the fact that there is no ethical way to exchange sex for money.

And when people talk about amateurs (no money involved) - how do you know it's not revenge porn or even something done when they were a bit drunk - perhaps with one person being more into the idea than the other? Or even a different power dynamic in the relationship?

I went on one of the sites a few years back and on the welcome screen, most of the featured content featured women who were or seemed to be unconscious in home type situations. ie rape, probably real let's be honest.

A couple of years back one of the services said they were going to take down such content. And acted as if this was really big of them and weren't they ethical and marvellous. For removing content that was probably (let's be honest) actual drugged / drunk women being raped.

Gay porn (men&men) is popular with women.

Because they get to watch the sex, but not have to relate to the person who is on the receiving end of whatever is going on, and also, having seen some gay porn, the standard output (that I've seen) is very different to standard het porn. The men are not so violent with each other. There is more caressing and even kissing. It's completely different. In my admittedly limited experience.

Few thoughts

Normalisation and mainstreaming of porn, along with accessibility, means that many more young women and girls will be searching it. It's "normal" to watch porn and so girls and women will go looking. And also to find out what it's all about.

Searching "porn for women" certainly implies that standard porn is not made for women which is kind of obvious. The different category is needed because not everyone wants to watch women being treated as they often are in porn aimed at men. However, not all men like seeing women abused either. How do they know that the people searching"porn for women" are women?

The porn industry has a STRONG interest in saying women do it to, as it's mainly women who are against the porn industry.

Tallulah "I'm starting to come to the conclusion that it's unethical to pay someone to do anything sexual / reproductive with their body at all." Yes I came to this view over the last decade or so, maybe in some kind of different utopian world it would be OK, but I would think in a utopia there wouldn't be a demand. In this world - I agree with you.

It is not a stretch to imagine people being all 'sex-positive', fun fem, 'liberated' etc at a particular period in their life, perhaps to do with the circle they move in, the person they are in love with or the past the are trying to reconcile or rebel against.

There's a possibility that people get swept along by a culture of normalisation and make 'ethical porn'... only to bitterly regret the permanent compromise of their sexual privacy for the rest of their lives, when they move onto a new phase.

I'm starting to come to the conclusion that it's unethical to pay someone to do anything sexual / reproductive with their body at all.

Objectifying doesn't mean finding someone attractive/enjoying looking at someone.
It means seeing that person/class of people as having no purpose other than how they serve you. So seeing a woman as useful like a vacuum cleaner or a blow up doll, rather than as a person in their own right.
Men and women watching porn are not necessarily objectifying anyone. People watching porn and disregarding the fact the actor is doing something that will be causing pain/distress is objectifying as it means you see the actors function as to provide a scene you want over their distress (Im thinking choking or that poor Japanese actor who suffocated on seen in a bukkake film).

Ethical porn to me would be amateurs, doing it for the pleasure and not getting paid. Just getting off on being exhibitionists. Its possible. Just rare.

I still wouldn't watch it mind. I have no interest at all in watching people have sex. To me its something that should be private, but if both parties are happy with randomers watching, thats up to them I guess.

It's perfectly possible to have ethical porn. There are plenty of people who really like the idea of being a porn performer, so no need to coax or pressure those who are not keen on the idea. Ethical producers discuss what's going to be filmed with performers before shooting starts, and never spring anything on anyone on the day.

I don't think it is possible to have 'ethical porn'.

You have to agree to certain things and then do them in front of camera, even if you don't feel like it. People will feel pressurised to not back out if they get the willies or whatever, because they would let everyone else down.

Not being horrendously bad doesn't make it 'ethical'.

There is a steadily growing movement towards ethical porn (where all performers are treated with respect and properly paid). A lot of people like watching sexually explicit material (and reading sexually explicit material, too.)
Porn has always been better at promoting different body shapes and different kinds of people as sexy and desirable than mainstream media, and a lot of the ethical stuff focuses very strongly on diversity.

Unfortunately, at the moment, the government's ignorant, nasty and stupid approach to 'the porn problem' ie anything sex-related online is basically going to get rid of all the interesting, independent, wide-ranging stuff and leave nothing but the mainstream women-performing-for-men's-benefit stuff... which doesn't have a very good track record for good treatment of performers, either.

I think a problem with porn, is that the people who want to be filmed aren't usually the same people anyone wants to watch - so there is this horrible underbelly of getting younger, more attractive people to do visually appealing (not necessarily physically enjoyable) things that viewers want to see, but they have no natural inclination to do, acted out in front of the camera ..... and women tend to sense the exploitation, desperation, pain and humiliation more than a male viewer.

I used to watch it with my husband and sometimes alone, mainly amateur stuff that looked like real sex.
I haven't for years. Initially because it became harder to find stuff that wasn't really violent, aggressive, staged and looked unenjoyable for the participants. More recently because I have read so much about the damage porn does to the actors making it and the people using it that I really can't stand it now. I guess I feel about it a bit like a vegetarian feels about meat eating, even if they have eaten meat in the past.

We have had long threads on here before about ethical porn but I don't believe there is any such thing.