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TwitterAh, porn. Let's say it together.
Porn. Porn porn porn.
I like porn. One of the many, many things I resent in people with bigger audiences than myself is when they say, "I think there's nothing wrong with porn, and it can help certain lonely people…."
He always says this with a little bit of a stutter, because he was probably raised at least pseudo-christian and he knows he's guilty as sin, and at the moment he says porn is good for lonely people he's relying on the assumption that everyone knows he's not lonely but he's just given himself away with the stutter because he remembers all the porn on his non-government issue computer in the back of his closet and he realizes he's a lonely bastard after all.
I am not lonely. I've been lonely, sure, and I enjoyed my porn, but I enjoy it just as much when I'm socially active and in a happy relationship. Furthermore, I don't consider it harmful to my relationships to enjoy my porn, and I have never lost a relationship because of porn. Nor should this be mistaken for defensiveness; though I know that I am for the most part speaking to my own liberated kind in this venue, if you have read this far and consider me a pervert, I urge you to read on, not because I will convince you I'm not a pervert who enjoys strangers performing complicated gymnastics while naked, but because I intend to break down and explore porn from an aficionado's perspective, and you might learn something.
First, a caveat: This blog is not going to cover intense fetishes. I'm a fan of light bondage, I think it's hot when a girl keeps her shoes on, I have a healthy, all-American, consumerist admiration of good lingerie, and, honestly, if you don't fantasize about two girls at once, you're gay and thinking about two guys at once. However, I stick to living members of my species and the classic sexual fluids. Am I repressed? Maybe. It's not like I'm going to run for office any time soon, but I like talking about sex, and I think avoiding certain practices just makes me more sociable. Also, I'm not covering gay porn. Again, maybe this is repression, but I'm just not gay at all. Not for lack of trying: I've made out with more guys than most of the girls I know. I went to a liberal arts school. But after a few years of experimentation, I had still never actually been sexually aroused by a guy, so I decided sexuality is genetic, and I just happen to be completely straight. Personally, I like having a whole gender I can relate to without sexual tension.
Also, if you're under 18, don't read this.1[1]
Now, the anatomy of porn.
I started with Playboy, way too young. Not too young to know what I was looking at, but too young to know the Playboy models are neither real nor optimal. I have only one single memory of believing in Santa Claus, when I was four years old. I knew dad was buying the presents, putting the money under the pillow, and, for some twisted reason, making me run around looking for dyed eggs, so having my bubble burst over what real breasts look like was about the only childhood disillusionment I ever endured. Once I got over the shock of realizing that not all breasts were airbrushed silicone, I was not disappointed, and I was ready to steal my own porn from the book store. This is how I graduated to Penthouse, and eventually Cheri, which was really the… well, you know all the puns.
From the magazine world of mainstream porn, there's a standard fantasy. All women are cock hungry sluts, and if they're not, they just haven't been properly introduced to the cock by their uncle or sorority sisters. Well, okay, that's taken for granted, but I admired Cheri for taking the obvious a step further: Cheri consistently refers to its men as porn addicted perverts. This taps into the obvious: you're hiding out with the blinds pulled reading your porn, and what do you know, it's about other guys who hide out reading porn with their blinds pulled, except these guys are constantly being discovered by 18 year old cheerleaders who can't resist the sight of a guy jerking off. This is brilliant, because as much as men jerk off, we are, in this society, supposed to hide it. Having grown up in a liberal and experimental secular world, I hide it the way I hide picking my nose. The damned have God looking over their shoulder, so they have to explain it to the guilty voices in their head. We all have some sense of either religion or propriety keeping an eye out on us, and are unavoidably embarrassed when we're caught jacking off alone. In the porn world, jacking off is an indispensable part of everyday etiquette, and is the standard way of letting strange lesbians know you're spying on them and would like to get involved.
It is very important that masturbating is part of whatever you're masturbating to, because it validates what you're doing. You don't have to feel bad. No, on the contrary, this is what you should be doing. You're not having horny thoughts, you're trying to take care of your business in a private, acceptable way, and these horny sluts just keep grabbing your cock away from you. Who could blame you?
Porn is about masturbation. Porn is about random sex, and the woman as a sexual object is mirrored by the man being douchebag who just wants to get fucked. It's not balanced, but the viewer is not supposed to identify with anyone, they're only expected to identify with the cock. Personally, I don't like seeing the guy. Who cares? I just want a dick I can relate to.
Anyway, the internet has made magazine porn almost passe. It's easier to hide, it's easier to get, and it's cheaper.2[2] After some research, I noticed a particular pattern in the more popular porn series, including Bangbus and its derivatives, most of Peter North's work, College Fuckfest, and some others of note.
It goes like this:
1) The setup. Doesn't really matter what this is. In both scripted and amateur porn, there's a setup. Sometimes it's an elaborate trick on the girl, sometimes Agent Busty is debriefing Agent Rod, sometimes two people are naked in this basement, and oh what's that camera doing there. There's probably a bit of talk, doesn't matter.
2) The blowjob. However they got their pants off, things start with a blowjob. This is basically a rule. The woman starts the show, or is strongly encouraged to start the show. In more enlightened porn, the guy goes down on the girl early on, but by and large, this porn is for the guy, and its important the girl wants him enough to blow him, if just to make him comfortable
3) Positions. On the table, doggy style, some semi-missionary, anal if it's anal porn, maybe a little 69ing, though this seems to be losing popularity. This takes up most of the video, but it's all just leading up to:
4) The cum shot. Everybody's know what this is, and this is the root of porn. Specialty porn distinguishes itself by specifying where the cum shot actually goes, and how happy the girl is to receive it.
5) The denouement. This is usually a joke or a light hearted moment at the end for the viewer to watch once they're done, and is thus the only memorable plot point. Usually, it's to make the viewer think, "Wow, those chicks really do like having cum dripping off their face," or, "Man, that jerk really put one over on her." Whatever it is, it's to reinforce the message that this is people fucking, it's just what these people do, and they're going to go do it again, for your benefit, in twenty minutes.
In all this, porn rides a delicate balance between two ideas. First, this is an unrealistic fantasy that requires very horny people and possibly money, and it's staged. Even if it's not staged, it's staged. If it's actually not staged, it feels a little too close to home, and even if that's your thing, it's not the mainstream. Second, it might happen to you. It just might.
And if it doesn't, you can still kill five minutes objectifying wome- the opposite sex… no let's face it. Most porn objectifies women. Why would I defend an art form that primarily objectifies women?
I'm not defending it. Nor do I feel any particular need. Exploitation is currency. And more to the point, why would I feel obliged to defend a roomful of people who all just got paid more money than I did to have more fun than I was having? The porn industry isn't for everyone, or nice to everyone, to be sure, but for some people, it's a lot more than they could do elsewhere, and again, more fun.
As for me, I never pass up a chance to take a few lessons from the pros. I can happily say I'm better in bed because of a few things I've learned from adult entertainment. And the rest of it? Well, I don't really want my girlfriends to be nymphomaniacs fucking every available coat clerk and elevator boy. But the illusion of sex without any kind of complication, commitment or restraint, sex with total abandon and serving satisfaction at the end of the day, is kind of a nice thought. Would I rearrange my life to get that all the time? No. And I would probably have to dispense with the thought of having good relationships if all I did was prowl for sex. Would all that sex be as good as the sex in a decent relationship? I'm not sure. It's worth discussing, but Cherry and Buffy just started washing the windows for their sorority charity, and I better go keep an eye on them.
