{"id":52,"date":"2006-04-04T16:49:31","date_gmt":"2006-04-04T06:49:31","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.msnaughty.com\/blog\/2006\/04\/04\/erika-lust-and-corny-porn-for-women\/"},"modified":"2006-04-04T16:49:31","modified_gmt":"2006-04-04T06:49:31","slug":"erika-lust-and-corny-porn-for-women","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/msnaughty.com\/blog\/2006\/04\/04\/erika-lust-and-corny-porn-for-women\/","title":{"rendered":"Erika Lust and “Corny” Porn for Women"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"TheIn April 2005 I wrote about a Erika Lust<\/a>, a new filmmaker who’d made a short erotic film for women. In January I wrote an email to Erika asking what she’s been up to. Yesterday I received her reply.<\/p>\n

She’s started a blog here<\/a> and has made her short film The Good Girl<\/a> available for free.<\/p>\n

Erika says she’s done this because she travelled widely trying to find distribution for her film or even some decent industry contacts and instead met with a bunch of “old fashioned pimps” who were rude and unhelpful. So she decided to get her work out there through the wonder of downloading.<\/p>\n

I can’t get the Quicktime download to work at present so I can’t give you my thoughts on the movie. It looks good, in any case, and it’s great that Erika has made it available.<\/p>\n

Her blog is only new, and she’s already raised the ire of Tony Comstock<\/a>. I myself feel the urge to comment on one of Erika’s posts, entitled I’m sooo sick of corny porn for women<\/a>.<\/p>\n

Erika writes:<\/p>\n

“Why does everyone think that women want erotica? How come all there is for women on the market is soooo terribly corny, tacky, gayish and outdated?<\/p>\n

“Take my word for it, young modern women don\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t want flowers and sensibility, we don\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t wanna see a couple making love in front of the fireplace, we are tired of clich\u00c3\u00a9s, tired of seeing a poor innocent unsatisfied women who is not in touch with her own sexuality, who needs a strong and mysterious man to show her the world of pleasure.”<\/em><\/p>\n

I’m not sure what “erotica” Erika has been looking at, but judging by the pic of a Playgirl movie, it sounds like she’s having a go at the concept of “women’s erotica” as being exclusively soft focus, plot driven, romantica. I must admit, if all I’d seen were Playgirl movies I’d be feeling grumpy too.<\/p>\n

So here’s the thing. I’ve heard this argument before. Lots of women are frustrated that “erotica for women” has come to mean softcore stereotyping and gormless guff. Indeed, I’ve been on the receiving end of abuse from another female webmaster who decided I was sexist because I called For The Girls “porn for women”, and the site included elements of romantica. Apparently simply using the term “porn for women” upsets some people because – to them – it suggests a one dimensional definition of what women should<\/em> enjoy in their porn. <\/p>\n

Some of my thoughts (and rants) on this topic are in my old blog:
\nThe idea of porn for women as a sexist concept<\/a>
\nThere’s just no pleasing some people<\/a>
\nPorn for women entering a new phase<\/a><\/p>\n

I used to occasionally try and define “what women want” to male webmasters when they asked, but I don’t do it anymore, because it’s damned impossible. The more I talk with female porn consumers, the harder it gets. Chicks like so many different things, you could spend days cataloguing their tastes. Some like the money shot, others hate it. Some want to see close-ups of genitals in their porn, others want the camera to keep it’s distance. Some women love seeing naked men, others are left cold by pictures of dicks.<\/p>\n

Thus I’m not so sure that all young women don’t want flowers or romance, because I’ll bet some of them do. And indeed, even some of the young girlies who are into filthy hardcore as much as the next man may feel inclined to indulge in a little squishy romantic erotica every now and then.<\/p>\n

I’ve done my share of assuming in the past. When I started out in 2000, I reckoned that most woman wanted what I wanted – and this has actually been a successful strategy up to a point. My porn has always reflected my own tastes – and they’re fairly vanilla, hetero tastes in the broader scheme of things. I’m partial to the odd spot of romance, just as I enjoy seeing well-made hardcore. If you can give me hot, realistic hardcore in front of a fireplace, giddy up. And I know that plenty of other women share my tastes because they buy my product. “Write what you know” as they say.<\/p>\n

At the same time, I know that heaps of other women aren’t into what I offer. That’s cool. You can’t be all things to all people (although perhaps I need to build a few more smut sites to cater to different female tastes).<\/p>\n

And while porn for women has meant softcore stuff in the past, that’s only because it’s still a relatively new concept. Yes, Candida has been making her films for 20 years, but no-one else has even tried, which has meant that Candida’s vision or women’s porn has become the standard.<\/p>\n

Today we have Estelle Joseph, we have you, Erika, we have Anna Span, we have the Puzzy Power manifesto, we even have the female directors from Playgirl and Inpulse making their particular brand of women’s porn. Then there’s the women behind the magazines Sweet Action<\/em> and Scarlet<\/em>. And there’s also the internet, which has offered women a chance to explore their own tastes and sexuality in a private, accepting way. I like to think For The Girls and my other porn sites are part of this.<\/p>\n

The point is, people are in the process of creating a new genre. What we’re seeing now is all kinds of attempts to please female lovers of porn. That, in itself, is a great thing. Not everything is going to satisfy my tastes (if you’ve read my review of Velvet Thrust<\/a>, you’ll know what I mean). Even so, I’m sure there are some women out there for whom it’s perfect.<\/p>\n

Everyone is bringing their own perspective to this game, and it seems that there’s a bit of a turf war going on here and there to establish the “true” porn for women. Often you’ll hear the phrase “At last! A women’s perspective” or “Finally! A female porn movie!” or even “Yes! The first site to offer women what they really <\/em>want!” (I’ve been seeing this for at least five years now).<\/p>\n

But when I really think about it – they’re all good. Anything that tries to cater to women and offer a female viewpoint of sex, be it film, photography, writing or art, is to be encouraged.<\/p>\n

So, Erika, while I disagree with your viewpoint, I can see that it reflects your own tastes. And it’s a legitimate perspective that you bring to your work and that lots of other women will welcome. By all means, dispense with the fireplaces, the 80s hair and the corny romance. Create – and demand – porn that you find sexy. It’s the only way we’ll ever change the industry – and the world.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

In April 2005 I wrote about a Erika Lust, a new filmmaker who’d made a short erotic film for women. In January I wrote an email to Erika asking what she’s been up to. Yesterday I received her reply. She’s started a blog here and has made her short film The Good Girl available for free. Erika says she’s done this because she travelled widely trying to find distribution for Read More …<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":4,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[15],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-52","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-pornforwomen"],"aioseo_notices":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/msnaughty.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/52","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/msnaughty.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/msnaughty.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/msnaughty.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/4"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/msnaughty.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=52"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/msnaughty.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/52\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/msnaughty.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=52"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/msnaughty.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=52"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/msnaughty.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=52"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}