Erotica has existed since man first was able to think. A once large industry has now burst out as a giant in entertainment due to the Internet. Most people with access to the net has seen pornography either intentionally or accidentally. This list takes a look at some of the more obscure facts surrounding pornography. NOTE: This list may be Not Safe For Work. The images are mostly okay but the text is definitely not.
While nude images of humans have existed for as long as civilization, it was not until the Victorian era that pornography in the sense that we know it existed. Prior to the 19th century, there were a few laws regarding sexual behavior, but none regarding images of sexuality. The Victorians were a prudish bunch and they outlawed depiction of nudity for all but the upper class, who they felt had the moral strength to cope with the images. When Pompeii was discovered – with all of its nude statues, they were quickly moved off to The Secret Museum in Naples. Despite this, pornography was very popular in the Victorian world, but people were discreet with their use of it.
Considering the fact that Australia is an open democracy, it is illegal to sell any X-rated materials (or to rent them) in all but two of the states there. The two states which do allow it are the ACT and Northern Territory. Because of a discrepancy in Australian law, it is not illegal to own or transfer X-rated material across state lines, so ACT and the Northern Territory are home to almost all of Australia’s porn mail order companies. In 2007, the Government made possession of some X-rated material illegal for certain aboriginal communities.
The porn industry is a very powerful one – so much so that it has had major parts to play in the “format-wars” over the years. Not only did it play an important role in the HD-DVD vs Blue-ray war, but it helped secure the victory of VHS over Betamax. With a market of well over 50 billion dollars a year, it is no surprise that porn producers hold much sway in entertainment. Porn revenue is larger than all combined revenues of all professional football, baseball, and basketball franchises.
Contrary to what many people say, the countries with the easiest access to hardcore pornography also have the lowest sex-crime rates in the world. A good example of this is Japan where a study in 1995 found: “[s]ex crimes in every category, from rape to public indecency, sexual offenses from both ends of the criminal spectrum, significantly decreased in incidence. Most significantly, despite the wide increase in availability of pornography to children, not only was there a decrease in sex crimes with juveniles as victims but the number of juvenile offenders also decreased significantly.”
There are two main core non-governmental groups that oppose pornography: religions and feminism. Both of these groups claim that pornography can be addictive, characterized by an over-use or abuse of pornographic material. They believe that five steps in addiction exist, and that they ultimately can lead to cheating on a partner or even sexual crime (contrary to the above evidence). Feminists also believe that pornography is demeaning to women. The Roman Catholic Church considers the viewing of pornography to be a “grave offense” – in other words, viewing pornography leads to damnation.
The average male pornstar makes anywhere between $50 – $1500. They are paid per scene (not per hour) and generally are not paid royalties. On the other hand, women can make up to quarter of a million dollars a year and some female pornstars have become so wealthy that they have retired young and rich. The richest porn star is Jenna Jameson who recently sold her $30 million club to Playboy for an undisclosed sum.
If you are male and want to get into a career in pornography, your chances of being accepted for mainstream porn are tiny. If, however, you are willing to do gay porn, there is a huge hole in the market and you will find that unless you are incredibly hideous, your opportunities are huge. But back to straight porn. If you want to get a job as a straight male pornstar, you are most likely to do so by taking an attractive female with you who says that she is only willing to perform if you are involved. The high demand for attractive women will get you a foot in the door.
On average, 50% of hotel guests order pornography on their televisions. A survey of Hilton, Marriot, Hyatt, Sheraton and Holiday Inn hotels found that nearly 70% of their overall profits from room services come from the hire of porn movies. In some countries where it is illegal to broadcast or have pornography, hotels are exempt in order to accommodate the “needs” of their foreign clients.
The total number of pornographic websites is around 4.2 million at the time of writing. That totals up to around 370 million individual pages of porn. On a daily basis, there are around 68 million search requests for porn, and 2.5 billion spam porn emails. 20% of men admit to viewing porn at work during the working week, while 13% of women admit the same.
In the early days of the film porn industry, people called “fluffers” were employed by film studios to “arouse” the male participants prior to filming scenes. They would perform sexual acts on the actor. They were also required to keep the actors “cleaned up” between scenes and were normally considered to be part of the makeup department. While fluffers are almost entirely a thing of the past, there are some studios that still employ them – particularly in “gang bang” type scenes. Digital cameras and drugs like Viagra have removed much of the need for fluffers.
Contributor: JFrater
Anon…r u from Chile?
Okay, kutuup. What do you mean by degrade? And what if those involved don’t buy your definition?
With all the legitimate problems with the exploitation of women in the business, which are serious and should be corrected, I think arguments about how “degrading” ***** is run onto the rocks when you consider the gay variety, especially for liberals who feel there is no real difference between straight and gay men except for one little detail, who they go to bed with. If so there should be no real difference between straight and gay *****, and this clearly isn’t true.
To be blunt, while women can fake an orgasm for the camera, men can’t, and you know what I mean. The “money shot,” and see my previous comment about when your check comes. Whatever acting and fakery there may be in straight *****, the actors in gay ***** are, visually and unmistakably, having a ball. (Sorry.) As men you and I both know that unless a guy’s really into the scene, really enjoying himself, the “money shot” and everything that leads up to it just ain’t gonna happen. You yourself spoke of people “getting kicks” about doing *****, meaning they’re enjoying it, so how are they degrading themselves?
Now, if you personally just find the stuff distasteful, don’t patronize it, and I have no problem. If you want to PREVENT adults from being involved, as actor, producer, or consumer, than I do have a problem.
Woops! I read you too fast, kutuup. You complained of “people getting kicks out of people degrading themselves,” and clearly were referring to the customers/consumer side, not the production side. (Though, at least with guys, they’re undoubtedly on both sides at various times.) Don’t like to be imprecise.
But I think my point still stands.
Most of people’s arguments against ***** don’t really stand against my favorite kind: Erotic art. All I need is a set of pencils and a devious imagination and I’m set. I make some decent scratch selling prints and commissions, too.
OmG p0rN! Me liky
Bonus Thing You Didn’t Know About *****ography: The women in ***** don’t actually want it harder, faster.
Fred: Oh my god… you just tore my world apart. Lol
120. Crimanon
“Anon: Can I quote you on that?”
Depends to whom, in what context, and for what purpose. If you’re going to commercialise it, I want my whack.
Talking of wrinklies. At one time I had a book of *****ographic art (yes, post 124) of all eras and nations (no, it didn’t include the entire Karma Sutra!). Doubtless it got loaned out and for some obscure reason beyond my imagination, not returned. Various works by the Great and Good were included. There was a Chinese example of an extremely ancient man receiving what we might call ‘a lot of massed Fluffy help’! You could have called it squeezing the juice out of a shrivelled mandarin I guess. Hahaha.
It reminded of that repulsive news item about Madam Mao, she of the famous Gang of Four fame, procuring 15-year-old virgins on a regular basis for her husbandly Chairman towards the end of his life. With luck they at least helped to shorten it and leave a few unprocured 15-year-olds in peace in China, among other benefits!
Steve T., (123),
“But I think my point still stands.”
As the late, great Eric Morecombe used to say (with appropriate knowingly owlish expression): “There’s no answer to that”.
Anon: “No fun at all in becoming and old man if you can’t put “dirty” in front of it.” There should be a quotable LV list and That has to be on it.
Am I the only one who wants at least One example of every style/type/theme of *****? With the obvious exclusion of “kiddie” and unstaged violent acts?
And the greatest Movie ever!!!!! http://www.piratesxxx.com/main.php Part two is almost as good maybe even better!!!! If you haven’t seen it, Find it, buy it rent it, borrow it… Just get it!
***** is degrading to women only in the fact that it leaves them open to be judged by their audience.I.e. men ages 13-?. And a woman *****star can be a feminist too. I wouldn’t be suprised if Ms.Jameson was. I am a feminist, and I can enjoy ***** on occasion. I don’t go out of my way to watch it, but I don’t freak out and get preachy when it’s on either. The thing I don’t like about it is the fact that men look at women like they’re meat. I recently heard a guy refer to the women he has slept with his ‘meat’. WTF?? Girls, stand up for yourselves!! Don’t take that kind of crap. And feminism is good. Don’t think prohibition when you hear feminism, thats not what its about. And @ 39- Its so true. I get SO grossed out when my boyfriend masturbates in front of me. Or when I think about him doing it in the shower or something. And @ 64- haha, yeah. nasty. I have an ex that used to try to talk like a guy in a *****o. It was bad, I never came cause I was too busy trying to block out the ‘yeah girl’, and ‘you like that *****?’, or ‘Mmmm, yeah, take that d**k’. ect ect. Eeew! haha yeah that relationship did not last. Boys, don’t talk unless it’s appropriatley timed and practiced beforehand. Talking dirty can be fun but don’t get ahead of yourselves, you’ll ruin the moment. blaaahhh awkward ***** moments are the WORST. haha.
shut up crimanon!!
I knew almost all of these…sad, i know, but when ones job is in the the middle of nowhere, with almost no women in site for two weeks (the few women who do work up here tend to hide in their rooms when not working) one gets to know the “ins an outs” of the ***** industry quite well. Great list though, not what i was expecting to see today…and on that note, time to browse the internet…for…tax…advice.
Too raunchy for you, anon who I don’t know? I get the feeling that you are some how uncomfortable with my comfort and can’t articulate exactly what it is that I said that offends you.
Instead of telling me to shut up, how about you just voice your grievances nicely? Why ruin the vibe?
Great list! I love learning about ***** and *****ography.
I smell insider information. muhaha!
im one of those 13% you pointed out. ;D
Melina: Interesting stream of consciousness at the end there. Thanks.
Point taken about women in ***** being seen as pieces of meat. But every *****ually active adult kind of, you know, likes that to some degree. You want your husband/wife/lover to want your body, don’t you? And maybe you want ….. ? And the last time the two of you were balling you were thinking about ….. ? And there’s the fantasy ***** is fueling.
Yes it’s complicated. But one thing you don’t bring into the mix is stupid notions about dignity. Dignity and ***** are not compatible, and that’s how people make such fools of themselves, pretending they are. I like the aphorism by Heinlein’s Lazarus Long:
“A true lady takes off her dignity with her clothes, and does her whorish best.”
That’s something that, man or woman, you can try to live by. I sure do.
haha good catch
Thanks to #1, I finally get what the director was implying in the “Brian Goes to Hollywood” episode of Family Guy.
Hey, now, I resent being tagged as anti-***** just because I’m a feminist. There are feminists who are *****-positive – I’m one. You just don’t hear about them because the Catherine McKinnons in this world have louder voices.
Anon (128)
“…You could have called it squeezing the juice out of a shrivelled mandarin I guess. Hahaha.”
LOL… That almost made the watermelon I´m having for breakfast shoot out of my nose!
On a side note, Cyn or anyone, do you think we can clean up 142 – 144? These type of posts always put me in a foul mood…
*done
Cyn
Do yout free movie are vacancy for male to shoot *****ography pictures
to me ***** is more of a “meh” than anything else. i can enjoy it on occasions, but i wont ever go out of my way to watch it. my girlfriend has some big issues about *****, not religious or feministic ones, but she claims that me watching it lowers her self-esteem, though i cant stress it to her enough that, for all intents and purposes, to me she is perfect. good thing for me then that i dont really care that much for it.
and is a ***** a movie really more expensive in a hotel than a regular one? seems kind of strange considering people usually finnish the regular movies.
and to all those who claim to be feminists and to like *****: i always had my mind set about feminists and feminism, but cant you explain in what ways you, as a feminist, differ from a non-feminist? i would be quite interested to hear that.
The use of *****ography as a *****ual outlet has proven itself to be a safe and healthy alternative to, say, rape, *****, or just plain not getting any. Yay for *****!
Yay! I wouldn’t be alive right now without it. High school Sucked! With out ***** I would have gone insane, it seemed to be the only thing I could really focus on.
While every one else was curling up to a good movie, I snuggled with my favorite “text”!
Well said NickChuck, “Yay for *****!”
Wow, Crim. You must really like this list!
Stevt T- Your welcome. And on the dignified side of things, I don’t remember saying anything about ***** and dignity, because, like you just said, it is not comparable. The witticism is funny, and I do agree with it. It’s ALL about the woman when the lights are out and the clothes come off.
The-Horned-God- Your girlfriend is probably a feminist and doesn’t know it. It’s just that people have these preconceived notions about feminists being unattractive, lesbians, and/or old & wrinkly. (Not to be *****ist, but I believe males threatened by women with power are the cause of such nonsense.) Feminism is about equality in social, intellectual, and financial aspects of soceity. For example, a female and male work on an assembly line, making toys for children lets say. Now, the female makes about 68 cents to every dollar that man makes for the SAME WORK! Why, you ask? Feminists ask that same question, whereas the ‘non-feminist’ is fine with it. Or at international math competitions, you won’t see many females on a team representing their country, because it’s believed that men are better than women at mathematics, which is as ridiculous as saying the world is flat. ANYONE, woman or man, can excel at anything, with pratice. A non-feminist may not agree, she may think that men are better at math. In time, I believe we will be seen as equal to men. In reality, we are, but guys just need that comfort blanket, knowing that they are the sole provider or bread winner or their wife/child/family cannot survive without them. It may be disturbing to them to think that may not be true.
stellar list!! and speaking as a woman, i love watching *****. i’ve watched it with boyfriends and by myself. i’m not into anything crazy, just guy/girl stuff, but i find it can be quite a turn on…
go team *****!
I understand Melina’s point about equality in social, intellectual and financial arenas being the *main* point of “Feminism.” I think most people would agree with that women and men should be treated equally. However, my problem with feminism as a movement is that it isn’t cohesive at all. Even with the the differences between first, second, third, whatever waves set aside, it is nearly impossible to define feminism. Coming from Eugene Oregon, which has quite a large number of activism-minded people, I’ve seen discussions of feminism break down into convoluted arguments about “eco-feminism” and how being vegetarian is feminist.
Notions of equality exist without feminism. If it weren’t for the feminist movement, women wouldn’t be treated as equals in western society, and often still aren’t, etc… However I don’t call myself a feminist because it is as meaningless as saying I’m a libertarian, without a whole bunch of justification as to what I actually mean.
The topic of ***** is interesting because as someone else said, it isn’t all positive or negative. Some of its fun and *****y, and some of it is downright awful and purposely demeaning. I think most people without an agenda would agree.
Angelina: It goes along with my thoughts on nudity, personal choices, and total enjoyment of life and the human form (without enjoying the human form, you can’t enjoy the entirety of life).
A good adult flick is nothing more in my mind than an erotic novel for men. Since we aren’t as thought stimulated. ***** should be if done correctly a piece of art. To be taken in, thought of and relished for it’s hedonistic glory.
It’s not so much the List that I like, it’s the ideas of a more liberated freedom of expression.
The Catholic church says its a grave offense, but yet they tolerate and condone the molestation of innocent children every day instead of removing those men like they should be removed.
Crim: Oh, I just thought you liked boobs a lot. Sorry! My bad!
Now that my wife isn’t in the apartment I can read this list and the comments. Most people have already covered the points I would make. Congrats on the generally respectful tone of the discussion, everyone.
Jamie has never confirmed or denied the existence of a significant other in his life. I was imagining the scene in the jf/other household:
other: Hi, honey, I’m home. What are you doing?
jf: Hi, sweetie. I’m just – er – well – um – researching – um – *****ography for a LU list.
other: Yeah, right!
I yearn the existence or easy findability of what you might call “classy *****”. There’s so much trash out there.
I can report that Korean ***** is very tame.
I like reading your lists and pass this web-site to others. Thank you for just “listing” the facts without using the ***** pictures. My first visit to your site I went to read about tatoo’s and it surprised me and still haunts me. I did hear a fact some years ago that not all men who view ***** become rapists but most rapists did view *****.
Angel: Well Duh! Boobs Rock!
Astraya: Pin-ups 2 maybe good for you then, if you are looking for something classy. Black and white film, Corsets, light bondage (it’s almost laughable). if you can make it past the boob punching without laughing again, you find out that it makes a pretty nice art flick.
I can’t find a good review, but it’s all over torrent, so it’s there to download.
Googles Jenna Jameson. lol
***** is inevitable,but control …..nehi hota
oh how i love *****
158. tulda: ***** is inevitable,but control …..nehi hota
****
I always preferred nehi orange.
Fact number 9 is not true.
X rated ***** is accessible in all states through so many different stores.
I also noted one of the comments stating that it is illegal to access ***** sites here… Im sure that isn’t true either.
The law with *****ography in Oz is that, you can only make *****ography movies for public sale in the A.C.T, our Nations Capital.
Video rental stores like blockbuster for example cannot rent out X rated, only R rated. However X rated Adult stores that sell XXX dvd’s, toys, costumes etc etc are all over and even Franchise stores have exploded and popping up everywhere just like McDonalds.
Nice & funny list
Not quite sure what brought it to mind, but I remember those at school who knew telling the rest that the biggest erotic put-off in the world was watching a load of people of all shapes, sizes and ages capering around in the buff in a naturist (or nudist) colony. (That word ‘colony’ is so wonderfully archaic in the context, like – an ant colony!)
163. Anon: That was something I always thought about; big, fat, hairy old men, and exceedingly plump, saggy, blue-haired ladies cavorting about just as God made them, and not embarrassed at all!
I was once at a nudist camp, but not in the nudist part, and I was mortified. Everyone acted as if they had the finest body ever to grace the earth, and everyone of them was sadly mistaken. It was a horrid 3 days ( we were on a shoot, and needed the background, not the bodies).
On #7,
I would not rely on rape statistics from Japan. Many Japanese women would never report being raped because people look down on rape victims. And going to the police can be very traumatising because the victims must often go back to the scene of the crime and have their pictures taken while they act out the rape with a police officer.
Also, I don’t think *****ography itself is bad, there have been images of ***** in Japanese artwork for centuries, but the attitude in modern Japan is not healthy: Most people will not talk about ***** at all and married couples have ***** much less often than in other countries. But there is a lot of *****ography with children and a lot of it revolves around rape of young girls and violence.
I think modern attitudes come from the conflicts with bringing Western Christianity to Japan. Before then there was *****ography and ***** but it was not considered shameful in itself, but after the Westernisation movement in the 19th century, people began to believe that *****ual thoughts could be evil (because Christian philosophy then looked down on *****uality). I think people developed a complex about *****ography, and now they think it has to be especially violent or disturbing because it is their little daily opportunity to be bad for a while before they go back to being uptight and not having actual *****.
Nicely made list – didn’t know about number 1, so that was interesting. Though I have to say – like many others commenting on this list – that to state that feminists find ***** degrading to women is a huge generalization… I consider myself a feminist and enjoy some *****, like many other women and men. Apart from that, this list is really well researched.
Btw: I live in Canberra, Australia. Any comedian I’ve seen here inevitably makes jokes about the availability of ***** and fireworks. Plus I find it ever amusing that you can stand outside a xxx strip joint in the middle of the city – and clearly see the (new) Parliament House.
I need to correct you on number 7, big time. While it may be true that Japan’s statistics do not show a high number of incidences, that does not mean they do not exist. How are they collecting the data? Based on convictions? Allegations? Surveys?
It’s a matter of fact that women are regularly groped in trains and subways in Japan – it’s so much of an issue that some major lines now offer women-only cars. None of this shows up in “official” statistics, it’s completely under the radar. *****ual harassment in the workplace is no shocker either. It’s way to comfy to just say, “hey look, Japan has lots of ***** and no ***** crimes!” But that’s really not the case. Not surprisingly, groping is a subject found in japanese ***** as well.
Oh and Naomi you are painfully wrong about Christianity influencing Japan. Christianity has virtually no influence on Japanese society outside of symbolism and loose traditions. Japan’s taste for the sadistic and perverted goes much deeper than that, and I really don’t know enough to explain it. If Christianity made people want to watch little children being raped by tentacle monsters, then the logical assumption would be America would be the leader in it (since America is far more influence by Christian ethics than Japan). Also virtually every culture has some *****ual taboos, not just Christian ones…..
It is my opinion that Japanese culture is very emotionally repressive and alienating, and this somehow translates into bizarre fetishes. Also strict gender roles result in extreme exaggerations of female submissions.
Also as an example, Dream of the Fisherman’s Wife was made in Japan in 1820..hard to say it was the result of Christianity’s influence.
As a feminist, I must defend my beliefs — third-wave feminism is characterized by *****-positiveness and ***** is pretty accepted. I personally think there’s nothing wrong with *****, though there are a few that ARE demeaning to women (ex: Deep Throat, because it was actually rape).
The whole point of feminism is that women should have choices to do whatever they want and not be judged for it any worse than men, and this includes having ***** and participating in *****ography.
Josh, (167 & 168),
Thanks for your thoughtful and intersting ‘psychologicl profile’ of aspects of Japanese society.
JFRAT – great subject
On “The richest ***** star is Jenna Jameson who recently sold her $30 million club to Playboy for an undisclosed sum.”
Anyone familiar with these things knows of Jenna’s success.
Anyone out there got an idea what that “undisclosed sum” might have been?
I mean she had her web empire, a publishing/production company with contract girls, extensive merchandizing , and much more.
It had to be millions – just curious.
I absolutely agree with #7.
“countries with the easiest access to hardcore *****ography also have the lowest *****-crime rates in the world”
The reason is quite simple. ***** is a basic instinct of a human irrespective of the gender. *****ual desires are characteristics of the ***** harmones and are not to be treated as an abnormal psychological disorder. *****ography basically yields big relaxation psychologically like an evening beach walk. Its the right of every h uman to enjoy it WITHIN GOOD LIMITS.
hi i think this list is ummm …. strange, and btw jfrater, how can i message u with out others reading it, coz i have a question about one of ur other lists, the one titles top 10 ways to commit suicide. plz tell me how i can email u, thanks, Dave
http://www.citizenlink.org/turnsignal/A000009143.cfm
“If, however, you are willing to do gay *****, there is a huge hole in the market and you will find that unless you are incredibly hideous, your opportunities are huge. But back to straight *****.”
That just made my day, jfrater!
I feel so immature whenever I hear the term ‘fluffer’ I giggle like a little kid. Always have since I found out what it was.
I think *****ography is going to be much more easily accessible (as if it weren’t already!) now that that liar Obama is president.
And more prvalent to all the little pervs.
OOPS–I meant: And much more prevalent than it is for all the little pervs.
WeAreJulius: I didn’t vote for him Either, but I’m not talking trash. Stick to subject, please. ***** Not Politics.