So today it's Lady Porn Day- a day created to start a discussion on women, masturbation and porn consumption, a conversation I'm pretty fond of and think about a lot myself. I think the thing I've liked most about this day so far is that even the way this has been advertised is up for discussion and debate, because it has a lot to do with how we look at porn.

I agreed with MayMay about the depictions in the flyers:

Of these 12 “fantastic official Lady Porn Day banners,” which Rabbit (perhaps unsurprisingly at this point) says were sourced from Tumblr, female bodies feature in a grand total of 11 of them. Male bodies feature in a total of 3. Of those three, 1 banner shows only male bodies, while the other 2 both show a heterosexual pairing. Of those 2 with a heterosexual pairing, you can see the woman’s face in both photos while the man’s face is visible in only 1.

And for those keeping score on the racial and body size fronts, there is only 1 dark-skinned model in the entire collection, and 1 model even remotely approaching “plus” size. But at least they are token-included. There are, of course, zero submissively-depicted men.

That’s why I feel neither inspired nor impressed by the supposed discussion this project purports to be hawking the blogosphere’s way. Far from beingsomething novel, the homogeneity of these images are simply another all-too-obvious “hidden” standard: a male gaze coming from a woman’s eyes.

I'll admit, I struggled to find a banner for Lady Porn Day that appealed to me yesterday when I put up my post for Fantabulosa, because none of them even seemed remotely queer- I basically picked the queerest one they had. Now, however, Rabbit White has made it so you can make your own banner, and I'm happy that the selection shown on the official post is getting to be more varied (update- they all seem to be gone now, boo).

I've been thinking quite a bit about this, and also about ethnicity and diversity and inclusiveness in the realm of sex positivity. Not just because of Fantabulosa, which is really just a vehicle for me to encourage my friends and their friends to create DIY porn that shows our diversity and band together as a collective, but also because of a post over on Filament Magazine's blog around inclusiveness, this post about an incident at the Women Who Rock conference, and this post by Madame Thursday:

Because I’m tired of people defending porn, acting as though somehow I’m a sex negative person and a traitor to sexual liberties if I disdain and actively hate the U.S. porn industry that holds up “feminist” porn, or porn directed by a few women who have been trained in the male gaze as though it will appease me. As though women haven’t been repeating the sexist, male-centered messages we’re fed all our lives, as though most of these feminist directors aren’t white, able, cisgendered women who come with loads of their own prejudices. Women can oppress other women. And indeed, much of misogyny and rape culture in the U.S. is transmitted from woman to woman, from mother to daughter, friend to friend, sister to sister. So don’t tell me that because the person behind the camera has a vagina and ID’s as female that I should be impressed by a product that looks and feels exactly like what men put out. 

 Which makes a great point about something I personally hate in porn- this idea that just because a woman made it it's suddenly feminist and has a female gaze. Anna Span is to me a HUGE example of this, and I don't honestly know how she got a Feminist Porn Award when her work screams white male gaze to me- with scenes like "Lez Be Friends" showing two super femmes with makeup and long nails half-heartedly playing with each other. Ugh. And yet somehow she spent time as a feminist porn darling. Even the F Word asks "But why is it assumed that Span’s porn should have more significance than showing horny men and women indulging in coitus?" Well, when you're getting awards for feminist porn, I expect there to be some sort of quality control, like the people involved looking like they have some chemistry maybe?  I don't get it. So yes, I understand Madame Thursday's pain, and it's frustrating when that sort of thing is awarded as good feminist porn.

But then, here I am, a cisgendered, white, middle class, able bodied woman who wants to make porn, ask questions, throw sex parties that are inclusive. I understand that being fat and queer doesn't erase my other privilege, so I'm both aware and wary of getting involved with trying to make a difference. I worry that by trying to encourage my British friends to make their own porn, it'll be an uneven depiction (most of them are white, for example) and therefore counter my goal- more hot porn with more variety. At the same time, I also feel like it's important to have British queer porn and ethical fat girl porn, both of which are underrepresented.

And, of course, porn, like photographs, is limited to who is willing to be on film. If you don't have fat, disabled, lower class, trans or people of other ethnicities who want to be involved with these things, how will they ever be seen to the same extent? Should it not be made at all unless it ticks these boxes, like positive discrimination? And yet there's also my awareness of the Derailing for Dummies argument that it's not up to minorities to educate everyone else. I try to educate myself as much as I can on issues of gender/race/class theory, but I will never cover it all. And, even after uncovering these privileges, what am I prepared to do to lessen it?

I will readily admit that one major privilege I have is that critical race theory is not something I've had a lot of contact with. When I was younger, I was constantly stressed and angry about everything- sexism, racism, environmental issues, animal rights, LGBT rights, reproductive rights, the ethics of food, etc etc etc. As I got older I realized that trying to do something about everything would eventually kill me, and I decided to tackle specifically the world of sexuality. Having gotten involved with that I've discovered that I need to specify further, as porn, sex work, public sex/sex parties, sex writing, etc all entwines with issues around race, class, sex, gender, and body politics. Can I really credit myself as a thoughtful human being if I don't consider these things? Can I do that without getting back to that place of being an anxious, miserable wreck? Is it unacceptably selfish to focus on a few things I feel I can do something about and have skill in when there's so much else to change?

As the Hate Destroyer, retiree (and now full time Nazi propaganda destroyer) Irmela Mensah-Schramm says- "if you don't do it yourself, who will do it? and if you don't do anything, how can you obtain anything?"

It's a lot to digest, and I'm really just getting started. But, heh, happy Lady Porn Day- I think I'm going to celebrate with a much-needed stress-relieving wank.