I push my weight against the heavy art deco door to the apartment suite at Amsterdam’s Soho House, greeted by a buzzing Erika Lust, of Lust Cinema.
She’s beaming, fresh from a double win at the X-Biz awards for best feature and best actress for her film, The Wedding; a romping rom-com packed full of sex scenes that would make anyone squirm with delight. Trust me — I know.
Why? Well, the previous night I’d found myself sat front and centre at a screening in the Eye Filmmuseum, overlooking the river Amstel in Amsterdam’s city centre.
The picturesque, highbrow setting is not something you might usually pair with pornography, but explicit sexual scenes and sex workers have been the subject of art for centuries, found in bluechip galleries and museums across the globe.
So, why should this be any different?
The truth is, porn is a divisive topic for feminist groups, sex educators, politicians and the general public alike, despite 76 percent of men and 53 percent of women frequently watching porn. It begs the question, if the majority of us are tuning in, why does its inclusion in art institutions end in protest and puritanistic pearl-clutching?
A multitude of factors play into our views on pornography. For one, pornography’s etymology is steeped in slut shaming, coming from the Greek word pornographos, which directly translates to writing about harlots. So, sex positively speaking, we’re not off to a great start.
It probably doesn’t help that during the 80s, some anti-porn feminist groups argued that porn was about owning women, and that it removed agency from them. Radical feminists like Andrea Dawkin argued against pornography vehemently, and in her book Pornography: Men Possessing Women, repeatedly aligned pornography with sexual abuse material, (the two are not the same).
Though perhaps you could be forgiven for thinking that they are. Even today, allegations of abuse and child sex trafficking have been widely reported.
Porn isn’t an educatory tool, either — or at least, it shouldn’t be. A nationwide study conducted by Lovehoney recently found that 36 percent of men were using porn as one. But with the absence of a coherent and complete sex education, is it any wonder people are trying to learn about sex this way?
Erika doesn’t think so. “I see that porn is clearly mirroring the values we have in our society,” she says.
“Young people today, they watch porn as if it were sex education, even if it’s not, it was never meant to be. But still, that’s the way they use it,” she continues, “I think that it’s really sad when they reproduce it in their own lives without thinking critically.”
Critically thinking about porn, or having porn literacy, is something that is severely lacking across society. As such, it’s easy to position porn as the perpetrator of sexual violence – but the truth is there is a fundamental failing throughout our systems and processes which means porn is often too closely aligned and found in the same place as abhorrent materials.
However, we are not without the ability to look beyond sex-centric subject matters, to intellectualise, analyse and appreciate human sexuality. Even if the context of sex is non-consensual.
So, if The Rape of Proserpina can proudly sit in the V&A and Galleria Borghese can show Leonardo DaVinci’s Leda and the Swan, (which romanticises the rape of Spartan queen Leda by Zeus in Greek mythology), then why shouldn’t ethical porn, where consent is central in front of and behind the camera, be given the same kudos and presence in our mainstream cultural institutions?
It struck me, as the opening credits began and I reclined in my luxe cinema seat with my artisan gin and tonic, that the arena we experience arousal plays a huge role in how we are able to contextualise and reframe the shame usually attributed to enjoying porn. Here, on this big screen, surrounded by other like-minded, sexually liberal people, collectively watching explicit sex scenes felt incredibly normal — and, frankly, civilised.
My preconceptions were that I might find the situation a little seedy, or reminiscent of the grotesque curiosity many millennials remember during the virality of the “2 girls 1 cup” scat video (sorry to bring that up).
But this was far from that. Yes, I was horny, and the room felt electric as people shared glances between the seats. Truthfully, watching porn in a room full of people also watching porn dissipated any shame that I expected to be brought to the fore. In fact, I felt liberated.
We were all just adults who liked (or, at least were curious about) porn and sex. And, as a bisexual woman used to seeing trope-ish depictions of group sex and threesomes, I found the whole experience sexually affirming.
I bring this up while sitting on Erika’s plush emerald green settee and ask her if this is the intent behind bringing porn into a real-world setting.
“What I really enjoy is that it’s a conversation starter,” she tells me, “We lack good conversations about sex.”
For Lust, bringing people together to watch porn enhances the experience and helps to make porn feel socially acceptable. “I think that is also one of the things that really matters to me. One of my goals is definitely to spread sex positive culture. Because I really feel that is something that we need,” she explains.
When it comes to marketing this ethos, sex positivity is a risky business. Social media giants and major search engines have cracked down on advertising tools that promote any kind of sex-related content. As Lust explains, the censorship she faces as a director of ethical porn means that she is restricted greatly in her ability to reach people.
“I am not allowed to do marketing, I am not allowed to put an ad on Instagram,” Lust says and becomes noticeably frustrated when she talks about her own Instagram account, which had half a million followers before it was banned.
Lust’s not alone in this. Speaking with Dr Carolina Are, a social media content moderation (or platform governance) researcher at the Centre for Digital Citizens, Northumbria University, I learned just how much safeguarding policies negatively impact sex-positive content.
Dr Are explains that while brands and businesses promoting sex-positive content, like sexual health apps, sex educators and sex toy brands experience shadow banning, (a penalising limitation of visibility potential that’s applied to accounts that are seen to be breaking community guidelines), and sex workers are worst affected.
But it’s not just sex-focused content that finds itself falling foul of solicitation breaches. “I’ve seen fitness brands that have nothing to do with sex and sex positivity, showing a woman’s body only be hit by censorship,” Dr Are says.
She points out that there are intersectional layers to this kind of body discrimination that disproportionately impacts gender non-conforming folks, fat bodies and LGBT people.
She continues, “You get this paradoxical effect of hyper-sexualised ads appearing on TV and but not being able to market period-proof pants or lube on social media.”
However, Dr Are points out that these penalties aren’t felt as much if you’re peddling things like Viagra. “That’s fine,” she says, “Just not ads for things that women need.”
In Lust’s suite, I begin to understand why she needs the real world to accept her ethical and feminist approach to pornography, not only is the marketing through the digital sphere close to impossible to navigate, but because the policies driving our access to ethical porn, sex education and pleasure are interwoven. As too is our access to porn that prioritises the female gaze, consent and diverse representations of sex on screen.
And, while spaces like the Eye Filmmuseum might not be wholly accessible to people outside of the middle class, or aren’t already engaged in sex-positive discussions, that doesn’t negate the importance they have when it comes to allowing ethical and feminist porn space to reach more people.
“I think that this whole kind of movement of independent porn, if we’re going to call it something, is that it has to grow because it’s a crumb in the adult industry today,” Lust continues to explain, “For me, it is important to be represented in cultural spaces like the Eye Filmmuseum, which is a respected space. Because porn should be respected.”
Porn should be respected. The sentiment lingers in the air long after I collect my dictaphone and laptop. Feminist and ethical porn is showing us how we can be mindfully titillated by pornography, and how we can begin to take ownership of our consumption habits.
“Free porn may be free of charge of money, but obviously, you will always pay with something,” says Erika. “You will always pay your data, your information, your time, as a consumer of porn, you vote by click.”
If we want porn to represent better sex, and be a guilt-free entertainment pastime, perhaps it’s time to put our money where our mouth is. It’s time to vote for a better experience for all.