Porn star martini Pizza Express

[Flour8977]

Why are Pizza Express advertising 'Porn Star Martinis' on every table at their restaurants? AIBU to find this disgusting for a family restaurant? I don't really wish to explain to my 6 year old what it is.

Rubbish - I’ve engaged with you throughout and you know that.

On the point you misunderstood - you must understand that there is a difference between “porn” in the abstract, and “porn culture”. One is the abstract thing; the other is how it is expressed. So if “porn culture” meant “erotica on AO3 about a sexually fulfilling female-focused encounter between Hermione and Ron in which both are shown as experiencing adult, mutually satisfying pleasure” for example, we probably wouldn’t be objecting to it, would we?

However, the objection is to the current porn culture - which is violent video content on pornhub, glorified by men who have a commercial and sexual interest in portraying women and girls as bodies to be broken, slapped, “smashed” and objectified.

If “porn star” just meant Bettie Page and erotic fantasies of burlesque dancers written by Anais Nin, you probably wouldn’t find many women who could get that bothered about it. But the current forms of porn do make a difference and pretending they don’t is just silly.

On the looking at pornhub - well. I always make it a rule to inform myself about something before I go around spouting off about it - it’s a good rule. So the fact that I know what’s on pornhub and what’s on AO3 makes a difference to my argument against your point. I prefer a little light erotica on AO3 myself - don’t we all - but don’t, love, kid yourself that that’s what men call porn.

It's a new and trendy drink but I agree - not in a family restaurant!! There are hundreds of cocktails they could sell that don't have dodgy names.

I do know what is on pornhub. I don't have to watch it to know which is not something you appeared to grasp.

You can't say you have engaged to justify your insults. Why do you feel you have the right to insult at all?

How does it help your argument or make you appear more intelligent?

You don’t have to have watched any porn to know what it’s like? How does that work? And if you don’t approve of it, why are you defending it? Do you think the women and girls in it are “stars”?

@tigerbird

You don’t have to have watched any porn to know what it’s like? How does that work? And if you don’t approve of it, why are you defending it? Do you think the women and girls in it are “stars”?

I’ve never seen film of child abuse but I know it’s wrong. I’ve never had sex with a sex worker or been to a strip club either but I still have opinions on them.

@tigerbird

Apologies for misinterpreting and for your explanation, which makes sense but was an explanation I missed from previous posts. All I'd read previously was about exposure and normalisation but you've given a more lucid explanation.

Not that I expect a response to my questions (so am not having a go for you not responding earlier) but I did ask what other aspects of society has similar effects on normalisation.

I think you answered this in your post i.e. food porn, pimp my ride etc. but are you suggesting that we need to eliminate and rewrite entire sections of our language? In some ways you've brought me round. However, as with all languages, words change and meaning evolve. Porn is one such word that has evolved and is no longer exclusive to the sex industry but more generally to anything that stimulates. In this respect food, property, car porn isn't IMO related to women or normalisation of misogyny.

@PriamFarrl we’re not talking about things that are clearly illegal, though, are we - the idea of the “pornstar” is about whether the way porn is presented in culture is appropriate for kids to read about in a pizza restaurant. Even Pizza Express aren’t going to promote a cocktail called the Kiddie Fiddler or suchlike. Porn per se is not illegal (or indeed, necessarily unethical). But the way it is normalised, glamourised and promoted in the current culture might not be what we want for our children, or indeed ourselves. Do you grasp the difference?

You don't need to explain anything to the six year old though. You just say it's the name of the drink just like any of the other names ! I don't get it

@Lunar27

I think the premise of your argument is that there's a very clear cut link between a named cocktail and the industry. Whilst frustrating, we don't all think so and that this normalisation is particularly valid.

So why not change “Pornstar” to “passion fruit” if there’s no meaning behind the words? Why is Pornstar used at all for a cocktail do you think?

Of course Pornstar has been particularly chosen to make this drink sound more interesting. The fact that some people find pornstar acceptable everyday language is odd especially in the context of a family restaurant.

@tigerbird

You don’t have to have watched any porn to know what it’s like? How does that work? And if you don’t approve of it, why are you defending it? Do you think the women and girls in it are “stars”?

I am not defending porn at all where have I? If we are taking words so literally no I do not think they are balls of gas in the sky.

But i also don't think they are stars in the context you are using it.

I have seen porn. But I have also read the accounts of women who have left the industry, the men who have directly correlated their problems with the porn they viewed and listens to the criminal profilers who have linked criminal activity to the porn the perpetrators committed.

I don't have to watch it to understand it.

"I don't really wish to explain to my 6 year old what it is."

Just tell them what it is; a drink for adults

@CupOfCake

Eh, why the biscuit?

It's pretty low, even for Pizza Hut. I'd complain.

It's not Pizza Hut, it's pizza express

@lightisnotwhite pornstar martini is it's own brand in a way.
It's attracts people as it is seen more upbrand than any other run of the mill cocktails that have grown a bit old.

The use of it in # is more prominent etc.

[quote Lunar27]@tigerbird

Apologies for misinterpreting and for your explanation, which makes sense but was an explanation I missed from previous posts. All I'd read previously was about exposure and normalisation but you've given a more lucid explanation.

Not that I expect a response to my questions (so am not having a go for you not responding earlier) but I did ask what other aspects of society has similar effects on normalisation.

I think you answered this in your post i.e. food porn, pimp my ride etc. but are you suggesting that we need to eliminate and rewrite entire sections of our language? In some ways you've brought me round. However, as with all languages, words change and meaning evolve. Porn is one such word that has evolved and is no longer exclusive to the sex industry but more generally to anything that stimulates. In this respect food, property, car porn isn't IMO related to women or normalisation of misogyny.[/quote]
Language changes all the time - the difference might be that we might actively want to resist certain changes or have different ones - in relation to racism, sexism, homophobia and so on. Some language changes don’t happen to tap into deep cultural structures of misogyny or racism: others do, and why shouldn’t we then push back against them? There are plenty of eg. racist terms that were acceptable fifty years ago that no longer are; or terms that are derogatory to people with disabilities that were common thirty years ago that we no longer hear, thank goodness. That’s not just an accident. People actively tried to eliminate them and said they were not okay.

I think that when there just happens to be the normalisation of lots of teens that are derogatory or exploitative of women in our language and culture, that it isn’t accidental and they do retain some of their original contexts. You might think that “porn” has become a neutral term. Sadly, with the effects we’re seeing if the normalising of viewing and producing more and more extreme misogynist pornography, I don’t think it’s a neutral word to teach children, and I don’t think it can be happily divorced from the contexts in which it’s an exploitative industry that harms girls and women. However though, if you disagree, you disagree.

It's attracts people as it is seen more upbrand

Crikey! Isn’t the point that it’s ”naughty” and “adult” and a bit tacky? It’s the entire opposite of “upbrand”. More like “kitsch downbrand”!

*terms not teens! 🤣

@tigerbird

It's attracts people as it is seen more upbrand

Crikey! Isn’t the point that it’s ”naughty” and “adult” and a bit tacky? It’s the entire opposite of “upbrand”. More like “kitsch downbrand”!

You can think what you like but it's been such a massive money maker from a nice, well dressed and pleasant clientele.

Predominantly young women in a group who are socialising and conversing.

@tigerbird

Thanks. I'm onboard with cultural shifts away from words that no longer represent current thinking and we should definitely be working towards the elimination of misogyny from society. The elimination of porn would be preferable and this would naturally get rid of these words that are causing controversy.

I guess the difficulty I have with this is the connection between a named drink and the industry. Ultimately because society is so bad in many other ways that I just don't see the significance of a drink, which just happens to have pornstar in the name.

If porn has been normalised, it wasn't because of a drink, whose name is only 20 years old. It's because of wider societal issues that we need to address but IMO not by hiding a drink away from our kids, until they're old enough to buy one from a bar.

@lightisnotwhite

From Wikipedia:

Although the name has proved controversial, Ankrah denied that he named it a "porn star" martini to be deliberately provocative.[4] In interviews, Ankrah claimed he used the "porn star" name to evoke "a stylish and confident drink...[that's]….pure indulgence, sexy, fun and evocative". Ankrah also denied being a fan of pornography, or idolising any porn stars in particular.[7]

@springtimeishereagain

It's a new and trendy drink but I agree - not in a family restaurant!! There are hundreds of cocktails they could sell that don't have dodgy names.

It’s neither new nor trendy, it was invented 23 years ago.

Isn’t using it to imply something “stylish, confident, sexy, fun and evocative” exactly the point? It’s meant to sound glamorous and stylish because porn is imagined to be glamorous and stylish. Whereas it’s anything but.

[quote tigerbird]@PriamFarrl we’re not talking about things that are clearly illegal, though, are we - the idea of the “pornstar” is about whether the way porn is presented in culture is appropriate for kids to read about in a pizza restaurant. Even Pizza Express aren’t going to promote a cocktail called the Kiddie Fiddler or suchlike. Porn per se is not illegal (or indeed, necessarily unethical). But the way it is normalised, glamourised and promoted in the current culture might not be what we want for our children, or indeed ourselves. Do you grasp the difference?[/quote]
Yes. I agree. Porn should not be glamorised in a situation where it is likely to be read about by children.
I don’t need to have seen porn to know about it.

Some posters must have very simple six year olds if they would be satisfied with 'it's just a drink' when it would be obvious from the menu that it was a drink in the first place.
As for the argument that it's a very popular drink with the women, it tastes nice and the women buy it partly because of the name? Lots of things are popular but that doesn't mean we should just accept them. It tastes nice? - if you say so, but I find it hard to believe if it was called say, Passionfruit Martini, it would sell less. If it would, what does this say about the mentally of the women ordering these cocktails?
I think some of these posters being faux naive about it all are either men, trying to defend the porn industry, or women who are trying to come to terms with their partner's porn use.

@tigerbird

Isn’t using it to imply something “stylish, confident, sexy, fun and evocative” exactly the point? It’s meant to sound glamorous and stylish because porn is imagined to be glamorous and stylish. Whereas it’s anything but.

I don't know to be honest. That's the opinion of the person who came up with the cocktail but for the rest of us, I don't think porn has an image of glamour. Far from it as it as I thought porn was all a bit seedy. If not it'd be far more prominent but yet it's all a bit undercover with people deleting browser histories and using VPN's etc. You never really see pornstars on mainstream media either, being interviewed or pictured in magazines etc.

Baskin certainly seems to think “pornstar” is “upbrand” as an image!

I think this is the key though - most adults know perfectly well “pornstar” is a misnomer because the porn industry is seedy and “star” is the last thing women in the business often end up being. But teenage boys and young men do seem to think it’s glamorous and sexy; and so do young women who think OnlyFans is cool and no problem, and that cosmetic surgery, lip fillers and so on are fashionable (very much a look that came from porn actresses).

In that sense alone porn has become much more normalised amongst young people than when I grew up.

It’s depressing - there’s a hugely high rate of coercion, drug abuse, STIs, PTSD and suicide amongst actresses in the porn industry. “Star” just perpetuates the cultural myth that it’s a fantastic sexy empowering job when in reality it really isn’t. In the same way that there’s a cultural narrative now amongst naive young people about the sex industry being empowering and fantastic - all “blow jobs are real jobs” and webcamming is great because it makes you feel sexy and free.