I was recently discussing the idea of women’s porn with another female webmaster. She had concluded that it was all about roses and romance, and being treated with kid gloves, which was not her thing. We also talked language. “Text that says ‘Cum watch these hungry sluts getting gagged on cock” is something that I would click to view,” she said.
I was musing about that sentence when I read this post at Sugarbank, discussing the whole “slut, whore” thing.
Here’s my opinion. I could really do without the constant use of the words slut, whore and bitch in porn. They don’t turn me on. Indeed, I find them to be a turn off and a distraction from arousal.
Why? Because I can’t see past the original meaning of those words, and the often derogatory way in which they’re used. I can see why they might be sexy to some people, but for me they’re like a big bucket of liguistic cold water.
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Slut is a pet hate of mine. It’s a word used to describe a promiscuous woman. Now that would be fine if it didn’t also carry the baggage of being an insult. It’s a term of derision, one commonly used to put down a woman who is overtly sexual or who has multiple partners, something that sins against society’s version of what women’s sexuality should look like. In this context a slut is a bad woman, a dirty woman, an uneducated woman… and she’s also a woman that men can happily take advantage of and discard without a moment’s regret.
Mainstream porn loves the word slut because it helps to create a mindset about the women depicted. She’s promiscuous, which is good because it’s porn and we’re horny, right? But she’s only a slut, so we don’t have to respect her in the morning. We don’t have to think about her wants or needs and we don’t have to care about her. Sluts are there to be used and abused. Given the selfish nature of masturbatory fantasies, that may be unsurprising, but the undertone of derision remains.
The word whore describes a woman who is having sex for money, which is accurate when it comes to porn stars (because nobody performs in porn for nothing) but it’s used in much the same way as slut. There’s always a negative tone. A woman who is a whore is to be shunned and condemned. She’s not “nice” like a wife, even though she’ll do the things a wife won’t.
Indeed, mainstream porn works hard to keep that whole Madonna/whore dichotomy going. Porn is only ever about “nasty girls”, the sort you fuck but don’t marry or take home to meet mother. There’s no room for a multi-layered female sexuality within this construct.
Bitch is an interesting word. In the 1980s it was a Joan Collins word… a bitch was a powerful, uncompromising woman who often lacked “proper” feelings and emotions. It used to be OK to be a bitch because it meant you were in control. Today bitch carries some of those overtones, but it seems to have slipped back into derogatory territory. And in porn, I get the feeling that “fucking stupid bitches” is about taking back that some of that female power. Showing her a thing or two. To me there’s also an element of anger and hatred involved when a man calls a woman a bitch.
Contrast this with the way porn speaks about men. They’re studs and players. To paraphrase a quote on the Sugarbank thread, why aren’t male porn stars described as “degenerate losers”? Why is Ron Jeremy a stud and not an ugly hairy bastard?
Actually, the answer to that question is simple. I looked up my thesaurus and I could only find one term for a promiscuous man that carried negative overtones: lecher. The rest were the sort of words you could easily attach to James Bond: Gigolo, rake, womanizer, bachelor, philanderer, Don Juan, Casanova, debauchee…
Now, I don’t doubt that by now there are several women jumping up and down and saying that slut, whore and bitch don’t mean that to them, and that they get turned on by dirty talk and yada yada yada. Well, that’s lovely, girls, but I’m talking about ME and what I think. And I just don’t find those words to be sexy because all I see is derision. Hatred is not a turn on for me. I don’t feel the need to dislike the people who are making me aroused (and indeed, I feel sad that so many other people do).
When it comes to the idea of women reclaiming the word slut through self-labelling (like wearing t-shirts that say “slut” or talking about yourself as a dirty slut), I can see that it’s worth trying. I don’t have a problem with women labelling themselves as sluts or using it to describe their brand of porn. But I’m not sure that doing so completely erases the past stigma of the word. It’s difficult when slut can still be so easily launched like a missile at any woman who chooses to have sex more often, or with more partners, than the “norm”
So I don’t use the words slut, whore or bitch to describe the people on my porn sites. The guys are studs, hunks, centerfolds, hotties and babes. The women are vixens, minxes, sirens, nymphos, mistresses, honeys… and babes. No-one is “gagging for it”. No-one is stupid, or skanky, or desperate, or pathetic. Rather, they’re beautiful, lovely, gorgeous, sexy, horny, hard, eager, loving, hot, wet, moist, soft, luscious, sensual, spread, fuckable, lickable, suckable and wonderful.
If this doesn’t float the boat of certain people, well, so be it. They’ve got about a million other porn sites that will give them what they want. I want my porn to be respectful, positive and joyous.
By the way, my stroll through my lovely old 1950s Roget actually gave me a few more words to ponder. Section 951 deals with sex, but it’s all under the heading of “impurity”. Ah, how times change.
Many of the words listed are quaintly old-fashioned, swept out of use by modern linguistic changes. Words like wench, wanton, hussy, floozy, temptress, scarlet woman, Jezebel, courtesan, harlot. They’re words that have lost their sting, thanks to the passing of time. Will slut end up the same way? We’ll see.
Meanwhile, I must find a way to make use of the word wench. Preferably preceded by the word buxom at some point.
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