i attended a panel on human trafficking a few years ago, and it was focused on child sex rings in particular. it was held after a play written by a local anonymous woman who had been in a child sex slave ring since she was 5 years old, one she was roped into by a then-14 year old cousin. the panel was led by 4 experts including child psychologist who specialized in rehabilitating sexually abused children, and a homeland security agent who specialized in cracking down on human trafficking in the american southeast.
tw for sexual violence and assault ahead
according to the account of the survivor, most of the girls in her ring ended up going into pornography once they turned 18 because it was harder to get clients once they were of ālegalā age, but the porn industry would take them in because 18 = good, right? and sex work was the only option for these girls. it was all they knew. at 18, most of them had been performing sex work for over a decade. and they didnāt see that as a problem. most of them went to school. had lives that appeared outwardly normal. had friends and family who had no idea what was going on.
when they entered the porn industry, do you think there were background checks? do you think there was counseling? considering amateur porn stars are financially responsible for their own travel fees, their preventative healthcare, their birth control, their wardrobes, their urgent care costs when they inevitably injure themselves/wear out their bodies from hours upon hours of performing often physically demanding sex acts... do you think they were fairly compensated? itās actually quite uncommon for a porn star to last more than 1-3 months in the industry, even those with thousands of videos produced and who continue to trend on sites like pornhub today. and the way pay works is like this: you get paid the more graphic and violent the content you film is. solo films donāt earn you much. regardless of your gender, filming scenes with other women only pay a little more than solo films. filming scenes with men is what pays, for both genders. the more aggressive and demeaning, the better the pay. you get paid a whole lot if you, for instance, let man violently deepthroat you to the point that you vomit. (source: documentary āhot girls wantedā)
how much more likely do you think women who have been groomed since early childhood are to accept these more demeaning roles? one of the most heartbreaking things i have heard one say to justify accepting this treatment was something along the lines of, āi figure as long as itās happening to me on screen, i may be preventing men from going out and doing it to other girls.ā this self-deprecating perspective is such a red flag, an indication that this is a person who was groomed. because when you have been sexually abused since you were a child, your self worth isnāt going to be very high. your boundaries will be stripped away before you are even given the blueprint for building them. and the industry doesnāt care. these arenāt human beings to them. they are products.
so when one audience member of the panel raised their hand and asked what the average person can do to combat human trafficking, the psychologist and agent exchanged a look and said, āyou may not like this answer, but for starters, a huge step would be to stop consuming porn.ā the fact is, there is no ethical consumption of it. ESPECIALLY when you are streaming from free hosting sites like pornhub, or xvideos, or redtube, or the countless others. there is no way to verify that the content uploaded there is consensual. or that, even in the cases where it is, one or all of the people filmed havenāt been groomed since childhood to perform sex work and are continuing to be exploited by the porn industry. even in the unlikely chance that the website you are using hasnāt had anyone upload such videos to it, free sites rely on ad revenue and often advertise websites that DO offer this. just a couple of clicks from pornhub can take you to actual child pornography.
there is no ethical consumption under capitalism, and that includes porn.
TERFs and SWERFs are not welcome on this post, btw. ok to reblog otherwise.
