A common criticism of mainstream porn is that it’s unrealistic. Detractors argue that everything from the clichéd storylines to the fake orgasms combine to create depictions of sex which are void of intimacy at best, and downright harmful at worst.
It’s true that porn has its problems. Fetishization and violence (although research shows this is decreasing) are still regular fixtures on “tube” sites — the free, largely unregulated sites like Pornhub and Xtube. Those sites also frequently feature pirated content. But the industry is largely changing for the better as platforms, creators, and studios merge with the social media movement.
In 2009, entrepreneur Cindy Gallop launched MakeLoveNotPorn, a video site filled with crowdsourced “real world” sex scenes. The idea came from her discovery that, in lieu of comprehensive sex education, young men in particular were using porn as an instruction manual. Lovers were literally trying to fuck like porn stars — and unsurprisingly, the results were disastrous.
Gallop concluded that cultural anxieties around sex and pleasure were doing us all a disservice; they were (and still are) repressing valuable conversations, leading us to confuse the curated fantasies of porn with the messy intimacy of real, unscripted sex. Her solution was to invite the public to share sex scenes like they would social media posts; these would be vetted by a curator and, if approved, published and monetized. A crowdfunding campaign was launched, and MakeLoveNotPorn was billed as a “social sex revolution.”
“It’s a transition from ‘free the nipple’ to ‘pay for the nipple’ — here, we can make money for the extra millimeters of flesh which would be censored elsewhere.”
The years since have proven this to be true. Sites like Lustery have followed suit by spotlighting real couples, and progressive directors like Shine Louise Houston and Erika Lust have launched campaigns to fund their work through fan…
