For Black performers, pornography is a lucrative industry. But with white men making the majority of decisions, the content is often skewed by racism.
Rather than continuing to share videos of police violence, it’s time for the industry to prioritize preventative measures. Here are some ways that could happen.
Ethical Porn
As the world moves into a more ethical era, people within the porn industry have been having conversations about how to make porn more responsible. As a result, the term “ethical porn” has been popping up around adult media. But what does it mean?
Ethical porn seeks to reclaim pleasure. Where mainstream porn depicts sexual pleasure only through a narrow age group, skin color, body size, or sexuality, ethical porn depicts all sorts of pleasure and sexualities. It reflects real sexual experience and explores the many ways that women, femmes, and people of color are capable of experiencing pleasure.
It also doesn’t portray dehumanizing fantasy content like sexism and racism. These damaging stereotypes can spill over from the fetishized and objectified images that are often found in pornography, resulting in real harm for the performers involved.
When you buy a video on an ethical porn website, you are paying directly to the content creator. The money can then be used to create more of the kind of content you enjoy. You can request that they do more girl-on-girl scenes, for example, or that they don’t perform a certain type of action. It’s similar to the idea behind buying organic produce at a health food store or supporting a vegan lifestyle. The more you support this type of work, the more it grows and the better representation of Black people in pornography can be achieved.
Black Trauma Porn
Some people use graphic images to highlight the traumatic effects of racism, believing that they can evoke empathy from outside communities and spark action toward racial justice. However, the overuse of these images can easily become exploitive turning into trauma porn. It becomes a perverse fascination with the pain and suffering of others, and it can cause lasting racial wounding for Black students.
The use of graphic imagery is reminiscent of the slasher genre, where films like Them feature an endless stream of Black people being killed by white racists. Unlike the horror movies of Jordan Peele or Wes Craven, which explore a wide range of topics and themes, racial horror is a genre of film that relies on graphic content for shock value. This can be a helpful tool for creating discussion about anti-Black violence, but it should be used with caution to avoid inflicting traumatic damage on audiences.
While racial horror can raise awareness about issues such as lynching and police brutality, it can also contribute to the idea that Blackness is violent and a death sentence. Instead of focusing on how to solve these problems, the media seems to be consumed with stories about Black victimization. This overuse of traumatic images reinforces the notion that Black lives are worth less than others, and it could make people less likely to take real actions to fight injustice.
Black Lives Matter Porn
Black Lives Matter has become a cultural touchstone for a generation. Whether it is the militarism of police forces at protests, or the nooses hung around the necks of Breonna Taylor, Botham Jean and other victims of racist violence by police or vigilantes, the movement has been a powerful force for change. But the impact of this activism has extended beyond just influencing police policies and into the nitty gritty of our lives.
Pornography is no exception to the influence of social movements. The XVideos website, which is one of the world’s most popular pornography sites, has a useful feature that allows users to organise their favourite videos according to country of consumption. The result is unsurprising – in countries with mono-racial populations, the most popular pornographic content tends to reflect the colour of those consumers.
While some Pornhub stars have spoken out against racism, it is hard to ignore the fact that the industry itself reflects and exacerbates it. The fetishisation of black men, for example, is unavoidably linked to the racist genealogy of their enslavement and subjugation. The hyper-masculine and violent tropes of black masculinity that pervade interracial pornography are a perfect example of this.
Thankfully, Black Trans and gender-fluid adult performers like Shine are challenging these power dynamics and the racialisation of pornography. Their work shows that a broader range of voices is needed to counteract the myopic and male gaze that dominates pornography and create more nuanced and diverse depictions of sexuality and bodies.
Black Women in Porn
Despite the rise of black porn and a growing audience for it, racist stereotypes persist in the industry. Pornography sexualizes everyone, but it often combines racism and sexism in ways that hurt Black women more than others.
For example, black women who perform in pornography are commonly referred to as “ebony sex workers.” This type of sexwork is described as having a low status and a bad reputation that is reinforced through sexy titles such as “Black Ghetto Freaks” and “Inner City Sluts.” These girls are also depicted in rundown buildings, trash-filled alleys, or on the streets. Moreover, their hairy pussies and assholes are gaped at with awe, and they are depicted as slutty whores or gang bangers.
The fact that Black women continue to be portrayed as sluts or whores despite the rise of black porn shows how far the industry has to go in terms of anti-racism and representation. However, a new generation of Black producers and performers have created ethical porn to challenge these racist stereotypes.
One such producer, King Noire, created the website Royal Fetish Films to make a safe and sexy place for Black women to have their sexual fantasies reflected. Her films are a response to the negative portrayal of Black women in pornography, and they demonstrate that black porn can be feminist, safe, and sexy.
