[QUOTE=Beware of Doug]
I can’t recall ever seeing a prisoner doing a slave. You might want to read the manual again.
[/QUOTE]
Humph. Obviously I meant it as a short list of “victems”
Although I bet there’s stuff out there where a prisoner takes another prisoner as a slave (isn’t that the cliche?), or takes a guard as a hostage or whathaveyou. Iwouldn’t know, I’m not that kinky 
.
[QUOTE=Beware of Doug]
That’s kind of the essential dilemma here. We’re taking an incredibly subtle and individual human experience and turning it into a commodity. It’s dehumanizing because it has to be.
[/QUOTE]
Sex is quite often a commodity outside of porn, and the people who treat it as such are quite human. Treating sex as a commodity is very human, and not especially dehumanizing. And I’m not talking just about money; plenty of sex in personal relationships is given as an exhange or reward for something, or used as a tool.
[QUOTE=Phase42]
4 - Sex positions. I remember in the late '80s and early '90s, porn directors seemed to be obsessed with “doggy-style”, and it got a bit tiresome. Now, they’ve fallen in love with a different position, The Reverse Cowgirl: woman on top, facing the man’s feet. I am seeing this over and over and over and over. So maybe this is a question for the ladies - does facing his feet when you’re fucking him provide a drastically more intense sensation than what you get by facing his head? Or is this one of those positions that serves no real purpose other than providing a better view for the camera? Either way, it’s getting old. Speaking for myself, when I have sex, I want to see my partner’s face. I want to watch her breasts moving. I want to see her reactions and her arousal.
[/QUOTE]
I kinda like reverse cowgirl on occasion, but I think the reason it’s so prevalent in porn is that it lets you show the woman’s whole body and as little of the man as possible. 'Cause, you know, God forbid the average straight male pornviewer would have to look at a naked man more than absolutely necessary.
[QUOTE=Priceguy]
I kinda like reverse cowgirl on occasion, but I think the reason it’s so prevalent in porn is that it lets you show the woman’s whole body and as little of the man as possible. 'Cause, you know, God forbid the average straight male pornviewer would have to look at a naked man more than absolutely necessary.
[/QUOTE]
Take a good look at the kind of man who typically appears in ( straight ) porn movies. Take a good, long look. Now, get really drunk until you black out and the image goes away. 
More seriously, you don’t need to be homophobic to find men unattractive.
I enjoy the escapism of porn and am not too concerned about plot (after all, one generally does not watch for the plot); however, my biggest beef with porn is that they take these otherwise attractive women and vamp them up (meaning tons of makeup, hair teased out to there), which renders them completely unattractive. I get so distracted by the actress’ appearance that what they’re doing become an afterthought.
Additionally, I’m not a big fan of the overacting. I mean, I do like to see people having fun, but the amount of acrobatics that goes on in what looks to be an already uncomfortable position really makes me sit back and think, “Wow, that’d never work.”
[QUOTE=Der Trihs]
Sex is quite often a commodity outside of porn, and the people who treat it as such are quite human. Treating sex as a commodity is very human, and not especially dehumanizing. And I’m not talking just about money; plenty of sex in personal relationships is given as an exhange or reward for something, or used as a tool.
[/QUOTE]
OK, I’ll rephrase. They’re turning it into a mass market commodity.
Realism in porn? Sorry, I’m not going to pay for “Get away from me, creep!” or “I have a headache” or “Where do you see this relationship going?”
But Phase42, where are you getting your porn? Obviously not the same place I am. There is a river of the stuff you seek out there, and it’s really not hard to find.
[QUOTE=Phase42]
heh A few years ago I wrote a rant on this topic. Salient points copied and pasted here for your reading pleasure (some of my points are related more to photographic porn than to video porn):
1 - What is the deal with all these models in hardcore scenes grinning at the camera while they’re having sex? The woman is going down on the man, with her head turned to stare into the camera. The woman is mounted up on top of the man, staring at the camera. The woman is in some awkward, ridiculous position, getting screwed, with her neck craned in a really uncomfortable-looking way to leer at the camera. Note to the directors: STOP IT! This is not sexy or arousing! At best, it makes it look like the woman is completely detached from what’s happening. Like the man is nothing more than a prop. At worst, it makes it look like the woman is laughing at the viewer: “HA HA! You’ll never get to do this!” This is even worse in a spanking or BDSM scene - looking at the camera makes the whole scene look even more fake than it already is. If you’re paying attention to the camera, you’re not paying attention to your partner.
[/quote]
I think I can help you with that one. It’s an appeal to male fantasies. I think the primary appeal is to voyuers – by looking at the camera, the model is acknowledging the voyuer’s “participation” in the sex. The man as you say is nothing more than a prop, the woman is there to satisfy the voyuer’s desires using the man as a prop. Rather than distancing the actress from the scene, it’s supposed to create a closer connection between the viewer and the actress. So long as she’s got her eyes closed or is looking at the bed or her costar, she’s distanced from what she’s doing … she’s an actress playing a scene. But when she acknowledges the viewer, the fourth wall has been broken and she’s just a naked woman with a cock in her mouth or her butt or wherever, acknowledging that she is a naked woman with a cock in her mouth or her butt or wherever. In that respect it’s much more intimate than just watching an actress doing a scene.
I’m not a voyuer so I don’t really “get” it in the direct way a voyuer does, but that’s my understanding of what’s going on.
[QUOTE=Evil Captor]
I think I can help you with that one. It’s an appeal to male fantasies. I think the primary appeal is to voyuers – by looking at the camera, the model is acknowledging the voyuer’s “participation” in the sex..
[/QUOTE]
I think for this to work for me it would have to be played out in a realistic way. So let’s say the porn is about a guy and a girl in a very open relationship. They go to a club, and the girl sees another guy she finds very attractive. She starts flirting with the guy and asks him if he wants to come back to their house and have some fun.
So now we’re at the house. The scene would be the boyfriend sitting on a couch watching, and the girl would be on the floor getting railed by this stranger doggy style. And as she’s getting pounded she looks into the eyes of her boyfriend. In this situation I could project myself as the boyfriend on the couch. I can imagine myself there watching them put on a show for me. And I think that would be very hot.
However, when a girl looks into the camera she’s acknowledging my existence. Except I don’t exist. At least not in this universe. And that’s what makes it so distracting.
[QUOTE=Senior Smith]
However, when a girl looks into the camera she’s acknowledging my existence. Except I don’t exist. At least not in this universe. And that’s what makes it so distracting.
[/QUOTE]
Personally I like videos where the girl totally acknowledges the camera. There’s no backstory, no pretense, just “I’m going to strip/masturbate/suck/fuck and you get to watch me.” That’s about as honest, realistic, and intimate as it gets.
[QUOTE=tdn]
But Phase42, where are you getting your porn? Obviously not the same place I am. There is a river of the stuff you seek out there, and it’s really not hard to find.
[/QUOTE]
Entirely on the Internet. Keep in mind that I originally wrote my rant several years ago. At the time, my unfortunate living arrangements included a content filter on my 'Net connection, so what porn I could access consisted mostly of the free samples found on TGP (thumbnail gallery post) sites that managed to sneak past the filters. Now that I have no content filter to deal with, I’ve been able to find more of what I like. Still, some of my points are still valid in many cases, particularly my points about facials and the “reverse cowgirl” position (which has become even more prevalent since I wrote about it). And “spooning” is starting to get old as well.
The best example I found of my facials complaint was a site, the name of which I can no longer remember, that featured two “actresses” who happened to be sisters (and sometimes their alleged mom got in on it, too) whose whole schtick was that they loved facials. And in every video, they enthusiastically blew guys and then abruptly switched to looking disgusted when it came time for the main event. Still, I have since found plenty of better material.
[QUOTE=Senior Smith]
I
What pisses me off about this type of fantasy is that it actually can be realistic without that much effort. Show us two high school seniors that just turned 18. They don’t have to be 18, they just have to look 18. Show them in a locker room by themselves. Show them in real cheerleader outfits, and real cheerleader underwear, and real cheerleader socks & shoes. Give them actual haircuts and makeup that most 18 year old girls have. Make them actually talk and act like 18 year olds. Even though it’s been a while since high school, I still know what cheerleaders looked and acted like.
…snip…
So, what do you guys think? Realism in porn, Yea or Nay?
[/QUOTE]
I don’t know that “real” outfits, cheerleader or otherwise are what I consider the biggest offenders regarding the lack of realism in porn. Not that I make a habit of watching it. But I have seen a movie or two.
IMHO, the problem with lack of realism in porn is not in the scenery and such as you list in your OP, but with the action itself. The girls screaming at full volume, their opening the door to a complete stranger and 5 seconds later they’re having sex, and the WAY they have sex. Ummm yeah, that’s what really turns on a woman.
NOT.
So…IF for some reason, I were to be interested in watching porn, then yeah, I’d want realism. REAL realism. As in a man (or men) who actually know what they’re doing, rather than the two brillo pads fighting over a hotdog that usually goes on in porn.
[QUOTE=CanvasShoes]
As in a man (or men) who actually know what they’re doing, rather than the two brillo pads fighting over a hotdog that usually goes on in porn.
[/QUOTE]
Do I want you to explain what this means? I don’t get it.
[QUOTE=CanvasShoes]
As in a man (or men) who actually know what they’re doing, rather than the two brillo pads fighting over a hotdog that usually goes on in porn.
[/QUOTE]
That’s a great way to put it. As a female (and I do acknowledge that there are precious few porn companies that market to females, though more and more do), it’s kind of off-putting to see some guy or a couple of guys pounding at a woman when it’s clear that what they’re doing is more mechanical/automatic than anything else.
In other words, while I do appreciate the hard-and-fast stick-it-in mentality and that works occasionally when done well, it usually makes all the actors look like they’re on autopilot and not really there mentally The guys are just trying to cram their dicks into as many orifices as possible for the camera while the woman is making these ridiculous “Oooh!” faces and occasionally screaming at the top of her lungs.
I don’t really even expect tons of foreplay, but having the actors enjoy what they’re doing and look like they enjoy what’s going on would be better than most porn I see now.
Oh, and as an afterthought, watching girl-on-girl action usually makes me even more uncomfortable because the women often spread each other open so wide (again, for he camera) and lightly smack each others’ clits. That looks like it a) takes a lot more flexibility than most woman have to spread one’s legs that wide and b) hurts to have your genitals smacked. Ow! And they always focus only on what’s between the legs - I don’t know of any woman who, unless she’s in a real hurry, would prefer not to be touched anywhere else. Plus, I always thought guys liked watching other women fool around with each others’ boobs - is that unusual?