I’ll be honest: porn has historically always given me the ick just a little. Growing up as a Millennial, my first experiences of porn were I’m sure similar to most women my age: degrading, kind of gross, and unsurprisingly, designed for men – never me.
These first impressions shaped my relationship with porn for a long time: the likes of Pornhub made me feel extremely uncomfortable (rather than turned on), and as a proud feminist, I struggled to mesh my morals and ideals along with my need to be sexually gratified through this type of graphic content.
I also suffer from something called ‘silly little lover girl syndrome’: as someone who’s a hopeless romantic (I blame the rom-coms of the nineties), I like my content to have a story and often a romance angle in order to enjoy it. And traditional porn produced through a male gaze? This has just never cut it.
But things have changed over the years; there is so much more variety now, with porn for women specifically actually being a thing. As a result our relationship with the production of adult content has continued to evolve. For this reason, I truly believe it is possible to feel empowered through porn, if you know the kind to invest in and support – as well as the mindset to be in for it.
A short history of women and porn
As mentioned, it’s a commonly acknowledged fact that traditionally, porn has been designed through the male gaze (production and distribution of porn by male producers and directors), for the male gaze (the focus on male pleasure and gratification). This has often meant it has objectified women in a degrading, exploitative manner, at odds with women’s own desires and needs. Dark, taboo fetishes have been given more airtime than they should, including male violence and ‘rape fantasies’, while porn for women and the female gaze is much harder to find.
Indeed, one study indicated that of 304 scenes from popular porn videos analysed, 88.2% contained physical violence or aggression, while 48.7% contained verbal aggression. “Perpetrators of aggression were usually male, whereas targets of aggression were overwhelmingly female,” the study found.
It was also reported that in 2020, Pornhub banned unverified video clips, deleting more than 10 million from the site, when Visa, Mastercard and Discover suspended payment processing services following claims an investigation had discovered illicit and exploitative content that included videos depicting trafficking, abuse, and underage sex.
It’d be remiss not to link this type of on-screen content with an increase in IRL violence; violent porn can only reinforce dangerous stereotypes and narratives, encouraging men from a young age to engage in ‘rough sex’ and violence more commonly in their everyday life.
“Porn has traditionally been aimed at the male gaze, with more men historically having ease of access to online imagery,” says Anna Richards, Sex Expert and Founder of ethical sex platform Frolicme.com. “So, the style and content tended to always show women as the subservient and controlled party, dominated into servicing and prioritising the man’s satisfaction. The male-led industry catered predominantly to men, ignoring women in the process.”