User:Mac1151/Women's pornography

This is my sandbox page for editing the Women's Pornography article.

Main Issues
There are two main issues with this article:


 * 1) This article does not have enough links to other articles. After looking at the Manual for Style/Linking, I will be looking for pieces of information, mostly people or events that may be unique to this topic, that may have an article with information useful to readers who want to learn more about the field.
 * 2) This article's tone is too argumentative for Wikipedia. I will be looking at sentence structure and citations in order to appropriately rephrase the article and add citations when necessary.

Editing
Women's pornography, sometimes referred to as sex-positive pornography, is pornography often produced by women and aimed specifically at the female market – rejecting the view that pornography is only for men.

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I removed the last few paragraphs to keep the lead section short. These quotes may go into a section later called History, or I may add more information to create a comprehensive timeline.

Erika Lust
Erika Lust is a feminist porn director, producer, and screenplay writer. She is also the founder of Erika Lust Films. Lust got her start in directing and producing feminist adult films because she found mainstream porn "unrelatable, unimaginative, and unattractive", so she wanted to do something about it. In 2005, Lust began to film her series called XConfessions. Lust Productions subscribers submitted their fantasies to Lust and she picked two each month to film for her new series. In everything Lust produces, she wants the viewer to see realistic scenarios, real characters, and real pleasure. For Lust, an important component in feminist porn is consent and respect; making sure the actors want to participate and that they want to experience arousal. Lust's films want to demonstrate real passion and connection between the actors. Lust says, "We make love, not porn. And we do all this with a feminine, aesthetic and innovative approach."

Angie Rowntree
Angie Rowntree is a director, writer and producer of women’s pornography who got her start in the 1990s, launching her flagship site, Sssh.com, in 1999. Of female porn directors, Rowntree says “There may not be a lot of us, but we’re passionate about what we do, and we’re working hard every day to provide women with porn that does appeal to them.” Rowntree said Sssh’s mission is straightforward: “We want to create movies that our customers want to see and enjoy watching. The only real difference between what I do and what producers of ‘typical’ porn do is that I’m serving a different audience, and instead of assuming we know what they want to see, we ask them what they want to see.”

Jacky St. James
Jacky St. James is a writer, producer, and director who has been recently working with Bellesa Films. St. James won the AVN Award for Best Screenplay in 2012 and was nominated for many more through 2018. She directed films for Bellesa House, a project through Bellesa Films where performers are allowed to choose their partners and clothing and perform without a script and without makeup. The project is open to anyone who is willing to perform, regardless of prior experience in the porn industry, gender, body type, race, or age. Real-life couples were also welcome to perform. Bellesa House was created with the intent to film passionate sex and to develop engaging storylines in pornographic film. Outside of her work with Bellesa, St. James stresses the importance of comfort with female performers. She also speaks out against the restrictiveness of free porn.

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The first paragraph has nothing to do with a specfic producer or director and would be more appropriately placed in the Contrast to mainstream pornography section.

I added subcategories for each notable person in this section for better organization. I may add pictures in the future.

I added categories for more recent popular feminist pornography producers and directors.

Contrast to mainstream pornography
Women are mistreated, disrespected, and degraded; this is accepted as normal and is expected to appeal to a male audience states Bryan J. Lowder, writer for the magazine Everyday Feminism. He elaborates that most pornographic movies are filmed by men in a way that allows their target male audience to portray themselves in the role. As a result, women are presented as objects of desire and not as subjects of pleasure.

Mainstream porn does not show concern for the female performer's comfort or respect. Although the majority of porn audiences are male, more women are opening up about their interest and how they would prefer porn that considers female viewers and is not as crude or rough as mainstream pornography. A number of women are dedicated to creating this alternative to mainstream porn. They care about making films that do not include horny schoolgirls, naughty nurses, or "bad step-mom and daughter" relationships. They also banish stereotypes about women's sexuality and expectations surrounding body shape and size.

The ideology behind mainstream pornography is founded on a belief that sexual activity in a patriarchal society is intrinsically male and that male sexuality is naturally aggressive or destructive. Furthermore, it assumes that women cannot choose to be free participants in an industry that's purpose is to satisfy the male gaze and contributes to male aggression. Radical feminist scholar and writer Andrea Dworkin named male power as the “‘raison d’etre’ of pornography”, as well as stating that pornography in itself is a means for expressing male power in her 1981 book Pornography: Men Possessing Women.

Women's pornography is produced and directed by women, and it is intended for the female audience. One of the goals of women's pornography is to produce something that the customers want to see and will enjoy. This type of porn is a minority on the internet, but is high quality, based on women's actual feedback. It is a common misconception for people to assume that women are not as easily aroused by sexually explicit images as men. Women that produce porn believe that male-produced porn ignores the sexuality of women and objectifies them. Anti-pornography feminists believe that the solution to this is to abolish pornography, but pro-pornography feminists think the solution is create porn that attends to women's sexuality. Pornography produced by women is placed in the category "romance" by the Adult Video News (AVN) awards. This new category was added to the AVN awards in 2010. The AVN awards are movie awards that recognize writers, directors, and producers for their achievements in the creation of American pornographic films. Women's porn directors focus on different styles, but pay particular attention to the actual story, the actors, music, locations, and aesthetics of the scenes. The directors' main concern is making sure women enjoy the porn by making it realistic.

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I deleted the last two paragraphs for now because they are large block quotes that should be summarized instead. I hope to add the information back later.

Performers' reactions
Porn stars have differing views on the idea of women's pornography. Some performers embrace the movement, like Asa Akira, an award-winning porn star. Akira stated “I’m part of the new era of porn. We’re feminists, very sex-positive people. We’re not victims of rape, not drug addicts, we don’t have any daddy issues.” Some performers also note the problems in the industry and then turn to directing themselves, like Madison Young. Young felt that most mainstream adult film videos lacked substance and sent confusing and potentially harmful signals about sex and body image to viewers. As a result, she turned to directing to add to the new movement of porn. Madison makes sure to include verbal consent, body positivity, and inclusiveness to all her performances.

Other performers do not see need for a specific type of porn just for women. As porn star James Deen put it, “Why is there porn explicitly only for women? By saying there needs to be porn for women, you’re basically isolating women as a gender, and saying, “This is how women should think. This is how their sexuality should be.” It's counterproductive (from what I understand) to the equality movement.” Performer Samantha Bentley believes that pornography already includes equality for women, stating that women are necessary for the porn industry and are represented and paid equally or more than men.

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I split the paragraph into the "positive" and "negative" takes for this topic. Hopefully, there will be more to add to this section in the future, particularly to the negative section to appeal to Wikipedia's standards of balance.

Characteristics
The main purpose of women's pornography is fulfilling the desires of a woman audience. As a result, the focus emphasizes women as subjects of pleasure reaching real orgasms. Women’s pornography audio emphasizes what is being felt; the use of the female voice to display pleasure enhances the performance of orgasms. The camera shots, such as close-ups of the face, also emphasize pleasure and emotion. Other camera shots that are sometimes used include angles that display the faces of the male performers, rather than just their penises, in attempt to eroticize the male body more. Showing more of the male bodies negates the objectification of the female body in typical porn. Furthermore, women’s pornography pays special attention to the care of performers by ensuring their comfort and consent with their performance and performance partners. Director Erika Lust says mainstream porn is "fake" and "crappy"; instead she wants to show "real sex". Not being slandered and disrespected by a man is what women's pornography is supposed to look like. Women's pornography portrays real connections and real pleasure.

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I moved some of this section to the Contrast to Mainstream pornography section to split the ideological and film characteristics of this genre.

Individualist feminism and sex-positive pornography
An individualist feminist view upon pornography is that both male and female derive pleasure from consuming the pornography. Women state that they "see their consumption of pornography as both a source of sexual pleasure and affirmation of their sexual identities, as well as an exercise of freedom of choice. " Another belief that is shared within the Individualist feminist community is that pornography should be legalized.

In opposition to individualist feminism are conservative feminists against pornography. A large movement on TikTok has accused the pro-pornography movement of grooming minors and encouraging them to get involved with sex work as soon as they are legal. The sex worker exclusionary radical feminist (SWERF) movement believes that sex work and pornography are inherently harmful to women and cannot be ethical. Both pro- and anti-pornography feminists acknowledge that mainstream pornography is harmful to women, but they take different approaches to solving this problem.

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Removed a link from this section that was causing problems with uploads. I am not sure how this was published to the page, but could not be published to my sandbox. A large portion of this section was removed due to the inappropriate link, so I am hoping to add to this section content-wise.

Harmful effects of pornography
One of the effects of mainstream pornography that women's pornography addresses is the frequency of violence in pornography and its effect on sexual violence against women. A positive correlation has been found between violence in pornography and support of violence against women. Violence against the LGBTQ community, particularly lesbian women, has also surfaced because of the rising popularity of the lesbian pornographic genre.

Another effect of mainstream pornography is the unrealistic standards that it sets for everyday women. The integration of pornographic consumption into everyday life has led women to feel incompetent compared to performers, which can lead to increased rates in divorce and a strain in relationships.

Edit Comment
Reorganized page, added subsections for Producers and directors section, and added information. Removed faulty links and corresponding information.