Porn, a question of respect

Last Friday, I hosted a house party. I opened up my room for my friends and their friends. I never really thought that my job as a porn director and actress would change the way people interact with me, but, it does. I guess I was a bit naive. Some people introduce me as ‘the porn girl’, while others just look confused. At that party, I had an interesting exchange with a British woman. I didn’t know her, she was a friend of a friend, and she came with her boyfriend, or I think he was her boyfriend. What she told me stayed in my head the whole evening…

‘I have no respect for porn actresses’

So, I was sitting on the floor, smoking a cigarette and chatting with people. Suddenly, my flatmate calls me and says ‘you might want to join in on this conversation’. So I did. A woman was sitting on the chair, next to a guy who already looked totally wasted. She said ‘I have no respect for porn actresses’. I was a bit surprised by this statement, mainly because I’m used to hanging out with open-minded people here, in Berlin. I didn’t really want to go into a debate about porn but I thought, ok, let’s see what she has to say. I told her right away, ‘I’m a porn actress’. She looked at me, surprised. ‘No, you’re a porn director’, she said, to which I replied ‘And I’m also a porn actress’. There was a short silence. I’ve had this in the past. When people know I direct porn, they feel some sort of admiration, because, you know, ‘it’s so cool!’. But when I tell them I also perform, they suddenly look down on me.

She didn’t expect it and I think that she thought she had to justify herself, so she proceeded to explain to me why she had no respect for me, while she was sitting on my chair, in my bedroom. She obviously had no respect for anything.

‘Men watch you and jerk off to you’

She started to explain why women who do porn downgrade themselves, because they show their private parts to old pervs who jerk off to them on the Internet. First, I have no problem about old guys masturbating. It doesn’t make them perverts. We all do it, and I hope I will still jerk off to porn when I’m old. I told her it didn’t matter to me that men saw me naked, because I do porn for myself, not for others.

‘But they don’t care about you’, she said. So what? I don’t do porn so that men care about me, I care about myself.

Besides, I told her that a lot of people probably already jerk off to her without her knowing, but she replied ‘at least, I’m not naked’. I said that it’s important that we demystify sex and that we should take the sex taboo down so we can all experience sex freely, without shame. But she saw that as a sign that I didn’t respect myself enough.

‘Girl on girl is ok’

I told her my first scene was with a woman. ‘Oh, but that’s ok’, she said. Which literally made no sense to me. Then I told her about my scene with a man, and it changed everything for her. The fact that I was penetrated by a man that I had no emotional connection with made all the difference for her. So, the only element that was important was The Dick. The fact that I was fucked by a man, with a dick, meant I didn’t deserve respect. She probably thinks of me as a prostitute. I’m a sex worker, and I’m not ashamed about that. But it’s really funny sad that a woman who likes dick is automatically considered a slut in a lot of people’s mind.

What surprised me is that she does watch porn, she said it herself, so what’s the difference between her and the ‘old pervs’ she mentioned before? What troubled me even more is that she has nothing against porn actors, just porn actresses. Because apparently it’s ok for men to fuck on camera, you know, they’re just men, sex machines who only think with their dick, so it’s ok. But women who debase themselves by participating in it deserve all her hatred. So she consumes porn but only feels shame and disrespect as a consequence.

I told her all about how porn helped me take control of my sex life and feel good in my skin, but it didn’t mean anything to her. I somehow understand that she can be traumatized by mainstream porn, which often treat women like objects, but I was startled at the fact that she wouldn’t accept any initiative to change that.

‘I would never do it’

‘I would never do it’, she added. It’s totally fine that she wouldn’t perform in porn, I’m not asking all women to be porn actresses, but why judge women who do? Is she so much better than all of us that she feels she can deny her respect for people who are different from her? Why not try to understand? I’m not saying you have to agree, but why automatically shut the door on a possibly interesting exchange?

It’s also weird that somehow, sex in private is ok, but as soon as there’s a camera, it becomes dirty. As if we should be ashamed.

The guy is still looking at me weird.

I’m used to close-minded people, but I have to admit, it was weird to be among all these people and be the only one that didn’t deserve her respect, according to her. Respect is pretty overrated when you think about it. Everybody goes crazy when they feel disrespected. People might have a totally different perspective on things and we’re all trying – well, not all sadly – to figure out lessons from this life.

She left without saying goodbye.