Welcome to Porn Glamour Age. Welcome to the times when porn stars use their real names, and young rappers lap dance for Satan in Prime Time.
Looking for Porn
Are you old enough to remember when porn was hidden and forbidden? I am.
I remember the thrill of finding porn. Only over shared porn magazines at first, or shining new ones just taken out of their discrete unlabeled envelope. Later, the glorious arrival of VHS. There was no porn glamour back then, bur rather the imagery of the dirty, sick, sinful, and forbidden.
Notably, I still remember my excitement the first time I saw a pile of porn magazines. Until that moment, I had only reached to one at the time, at friends’ houses. Back in the early 80s, Honchos and Hustlers shone on top of the pile, on a side table. However, what I remember the most is a small collection of Tom of Finland’s magazines. One of the stories, where the main character hooks up with a Black sailor, inspired years of my masturbations.
Not much later I saw my first porn in VHS. A fuck buddy who was escorting took me to visit one of his clients. The guy was a retired dancer from the Teatro Colón who had a color TV and a video player. What a luxury. I will never forget the porn plot.
A group of Arabic terrorists kidnaps a wealthy college athlete. Expectedly, the victim suffers a case of Stokholm syndrome. What was going to be a rape turns into the beginning of a passionate romance. There is a side story where the less attractive room mate ends also fucking with the less attractive terrorist.
My erection was out of the charts. The retired dancer dropped his removable denture and gave me one of the best heads of my entire life. Unfortunately, I never saw a dime of the money I am sure my friend made that night.
Porn to the Rescue
And then, Internet arrived. We were still far away from glamorizing porn. Rather than idolizing it, we normalized it. It was just every where and for free.
Up to what point Internet pornification contributed to turn American mainstream culture from Puritan into more sex affirmative, is still open to debate. However, the switch is out of question. Without a significant change in USA mainstream culture, Lil Nas X video and success cannot be explained.
It is a fact. USA mainstream opinion and attitudes towards sex are increasingly friendly. Nowadays women have more sex, and everyone is starting their sexual journey at an early age. Sexual minorities are more accepted, and even celebrated in urban culture. Although we can not yet talk about Sex or Porn Glamour, a precondition for glamorization is now present. Sex is more popular, and porn also is.
Internet arrival interacted positively with this trend, until the pandemic started. All the trends, all the gradual changes effected by the digital revolution in our economy and culture, switched to drastic imposition. Our lives have been digitalized, and so our sex.
In the midst of a global crisis that forced us to distance physically, porn came to our rescue, and flooded our screens and sexual lives.
Pornifying trivialities
Before celebrating Porn Glamour, we had to normalize Sex and Porn. Internet and the post pandemic saturation achieved that goal. Of course, this radical change in the culture triggered the need for changes in porn production. Not only changes in the economics, but also in the content.
The explosion of independently produced porn confronted adult performers with new challenges. Actually, these challenges were not actually new. The pioneers in independent porn production (like Caged Jock), have known since the beginning how hard it is to maintain a diverse, appealing, consistent production to keep and grow their audiences.
Imagine that primary challenge multiplied ad infinitum by the Boom. Competition is ferocious in a context where traditional porn outlets are shut, sex work is withdrawn, and a sex affirmative new culture motivates thousands of young hot men and women to become adult entertainers.
The first way to face the challenge was being creative. Historically, performers did that by finding/inventing new kinks, new positions, new stages. The process started indeed inspired for finding new transgressive practices. However, in the context of a sex affirmative culture where sex is less and less associated to The Dirty and The Forbidden, this imagery only works for the older consumers. For them, perhaps there is no possible Porn Glamour.
And trivializing Porn
Indeed, sex and porn have left Tabu Land for many of us. Far from finding satisfaction in being Kinky and Forbidden, we find solace in what is playful and joyful. The adult performers who have better understood this new context are those behind The Cooperative.
Clearly, under Rhyheim Shabazz and Eyefilmz leadership, The Cooperative consolidated a new trend. Actually, they started several tendencies. Porn Glamour is just the last one I came to identify.
One relevant for this post is what we called Neo Vanilla Porn. When mainstream mindset was ready, they brought sex out of the dark and the dungeons, to outdoors sun. The imagery around the forbidden, around sex like an uncontrollable animal force exploding in “inappropriate situations”, was gone. Now, the imagery is around celebrating sex joyfully. Sex is not anymore a force that burst out of our control. Instead, is just one more natural activity to share with friends by the pool, in diversity.
Trivializing Sex was a huge step towards Porn Glamour. However, we are still not there. With a Neo Vanilla mindset well established as a mainstream trend, we were ready to move forward.
Porn Glamour
Perhaps porn glamorization was going to happen anyway. However, even when a historic process is unstoppable, it is worthy to appreciate its particularities.
A significant contribution to porn and sex glamorization should be accredited to Brazilian performers. The new Neo Vanilla mindset breaking ground in the porn market was already mainstream culture in Brazil and other South American countries. The refreshing way (far from previous exploitative approaches by USA conventional studios) Brazilians collaborated with The Cooperative gave us the first glimpses of porn glamorization.
It is not surprising, after all. Uncontaminated by Puritan poison, many cultures South of the United States have always had a more relaxed and less sinful view of sex. Thanks to Brazilian influx, porn was more than ready to break the limits of just being normal. Their mastery of Instagram, and the natural way porn stars are popular influencers brought the missing condiment.
Like Hollywood stars’, porn stars’ lives are not just admired. Increasingly, they also are desired. Porn consumers want to live like our favorite stars. We are not satisfied with just consuming porn products. Besides, we want to learn about the stars lives. What do they eat? Where? What music do they like? how is their everyday’s life? Porn Glamour has arrived.
Sex and Porn are Joy
Finally, we are leaving behind demonizing narratives around Sex and Porn. After many years of associating them with physical, psychological, and drug abuse, we have moved to a different landscape.
In contrast, my current favorite performers are all healthy, educated, reasonably happy, and professionally successful. As the industry moves away from being a marginalized activity, is slowly coming to join the field of the acceptable. Porn performers are starting to be seen (and to see themselves) as positive contributors to our culture.
Right now, the glamorization of porn is mostly coming from independent artists. I wonder, once the studios are fully back, what their contribution will be.
A major obstacle for the industry respectability is the lack of professionalism and vision of the studios. As long as the industry continues to be fragmented, we will not have any lobbying power to gain more rights and favorable policy. As long as exploitative practices still exists, it is going to be hard to build alliances between performers and producers.
While the studios put their act together, we have our artists’ Glamour. Are you ready? Because this is just the beginning. Welcome to Porn Glamour Age.
Hasta la próxima pinga, amig@s!
