I wasn’t talking about America, in that instance. Eastern European porn is, I believe, still deeply connected with the Russian Mafia.
I’ve known a lot of strippers, and only a few porn actresses, but I feel like the women in porn are far more damaged than your average stripper. For the most part, strippers are just regular people who an irregular job, but porn takes so much more commitment.
I’m not familiar with female porn actors, but the males don’t seem any different than any other segment of the population (except that few of them are fat . . . at least the gay ones).
It saddens me that any woman would choose that path to earn a buck. It really does depress me because it shows how callous the world can be.
In my estimation it’s considerably worse than being a prostitute because the minute you put yourself on film fucking someone then it’s there for all eternity in the public domain. At least with being a prostitute there is a reasonable chance of remaining anonymous and changing careers later. Before the internet it may have been safer to do porn, but these days, when you take your clothes off for a porn film there’s the sound of a thousand doors of opportunity slamming shut. Having kids? What will you tell them when their 15 year-old friend shows them a video of you taking on the basketball team? Getting a regular job? How long until someone “outs” you?
If the majority of porn actresses actually made a good living, I’d see why some people might choose it, despite all the drawbacks. But they really don’t. They mostly just make rent money and that’s about it. Sad.
I have a theory that any mental damage incurred to porn actors is due mostly to living in a christian dominated society. With out the Christian doctrine telling them and everyone else on the planet telling them “this is bad”, I’m not sure they would have self esteem issues. Or turn to drugs to help them cope with such issues.
This thread is hilarious - there is only one person in it so far who in any way seems to know porn stars and is offering actual data, the rest is “well my world view sees porn stars this way, so thus it is” without any experience to back it up.
I’ve actually known gay porn stars and both of them are professionals outside of their on screen roles (one is an architect, the other is a phd and theatre director) and I’ve met plenty others who have been in porn or have been asked to be. None of them were particularly fucked up (and I KNOW what fucked up looks like), although one is a bit sex obsessed hence why he was probably asked to get into it in the first place. I’m also facebook friends with several other gay porn stars and none of them seem to me much different than the average person, except they’re more sex positive and aware of the value of their looks.
I don’t know what the average female porn star is like as I’ve never met any, but the pronouncement of all of them as broken people with daddy issues is as useful as saying that all social workers are to a person bleeding heart liberals who couldn’t make it in any other job, or everyone who goes into the military is someone who can’t think for themselves and is too stupid to do anything other than be ordered to kill people, or some other such generalised stereotypical nonsense.
There might be a difference between American and Western European porn actresses and Eastern European actresses (the same goes for prostitutes).
For the first group it would seems they are at least somewhat ‘wild’. As mentioned above, for most people in these societies porn isn’t really an acceptable carreer choice…so the girls ending up here, might be a specific subset op the population (what that means for mental health…I don’t know). As example, the most famous Dutch pornstar (who is often in the mainstream media) is Kim Holland, who used to be a Jehovas witness. When she talks about this period of her live (including all restraints on what she could do), it is quite clear it had an effect on her current carreer.
For Eastern Europeans it is probably mostly about the money, I would think they are far more likely to end up with issues because of the job, than having issues that lead to the carreer choice. I recently saw a report (on the Dutch show Spuiten en Slikken) about the large amount of straight Eastern European men doing Gay porn. These guys claim to be 100% straight (and straight porn is being shown on set, so the guys can preform) but really want this job because of the money.
This is IMHO. That’s hardly unprecedented.
I only answered the question about porn being good for society because I’ve seen several reports online that in societies where porn is readily available, incidences of rape and sexual assault tend to be lower. A good thing, in my opinion.
I have no idea what the mental state of porn stars is. I don’t follow celebrity blogs and don’t keep track of their lives. I just don’t feel I can judge based on how they act on the job. They are doing something I wouldn’t do, but there are a LOT of people in the world making a living doing stuff I would not do who are considered normal by society. People really can be different from you mentally and still be quite all right.
For the record, the intensely sexual nature of porn work tends to get people roused and when that happens, the bullshit factor goes through the roof, so I tend to take what is said about porn and porn stars with about a ton of salt.
True, but there are some pretty definitive statements being made on this topic from people also claiming not to know anyone affected by it. Makes me think of the people who believe that gay people are all sick deviants, and so of course that’s why they would never get to know one.
I started to put in options for “mildly fucked up,” but the pollwas already too damn long.
It isn’t the same thing as porn, but I was listening to an NPR story about a woman who got a job answering phones at a high end escort service that catered to wealthy clients in the northeast area. She said most of the sex workers were pretty messed up and/or on drugs. There were a few who were doing it because they wanted to make a ton of money to buy a house/provide for their kids and then get out, but the majority had serious issues.
And that is for the higher end prostitutes, I’m sure the street level ones are far more troubled. But I don’t know if sex work vs. porn vs. stripping has the same level of psychological traits.
But that’s the point of the thread. Not what are porn stars actually like, but what is the public perception of them.
Well that seems slightly inapropos as an analogy. Besides, no one knows every single sex worker – everyone’s generalizing. I’ve met lots of strippers, and most of them seem nice enough, but it doesn’t mean they aren’t screwed up in some way, or at the very least have some odd ideas about the low-lifes who come in to appreciate their work every time they come in for a shift and extrapolate their views to the public at large. The few street whores I’ve been friendly with (genuinely friendly, not as a patron) seemed to have a screw or two loose, although they were nice enough as well on the surface.
It’s really not that sad. There is SO. MUCH. PORN. out there the chances of being recognized in town for videos you’ve been is microscopic. Plus, times are changing and having been in porn does not mean you’ll be disgraced and shunned if your job or community finds out. But unless you are in the top 10% of ‘porn stars’ in this country, or you go around telling everyone, there’s almost no way to be found out!
I don’t know anyone who makes a living doing hardcore pornos or has a high degree of porn fame, but I know about 10 women who have been in pornography to some degree (I know two women on the SuicideGirls site for instance :D). They have college degrees, have no problem holding jobs (‘real’ jobs mostly - one teaches college!), are married, have kids, and the fact that there’s footage and pictures on the net of them naked/performing sexual acts has pretty much zero effect on their lives.
I can only speak from knowing one porn actress, so my impression can’t really apply to the rest of the community. She was quite bright but very manipulative–a skill I think she picked up by being manipulated by the people that she dealt with. I also think she was very naive at the outset of her “career” and had no idea of what she was getting in to.
In some careers this is undoubtedly true, but there are many fields that I would imagine a background in hardcore pornography would disqualify you from including public education (K-12) almost anywhere in the United States.
I would also bet that l almost no law enforcement agencies would hire an applicant with a porn background (nude photos for Playboy might be a different story)
Many professional careers would be derailed if footage of the employee involved in actual sex came to light, probably including banking, finance and investment brokerages. NO firm wants the publicity of having Mary Jane the Gang Bang Queen as one of it’s Senior Financial Advisors…
I dated a stripper, and have met a few porn actors and actresses, including a couple of fairly famous gay porn actors. I’ve also met some people who did various kinds of prostitution, including a dominatrix here in Japan. My sister stripped for a while and later worked as an “escort”. So I’ve got some personal knowledge of what people in the sex industry are like.
Some of them are probably just as fucked up as the stereotype. Most of them are not. I guarantee that if you knew more about your average secretary or gas station worker, you’d find that they’re way more freaky than you’d think, and probably crazier on average than porn stars.
Some of the women who get into porn have “daddy issues,” but some of them know it’s a way to make a lot of money for doing something that’s fun and takes zero education. My track record with girlfriends who never did anything even vaguely related to the sex industry probably skews more screwed up in the head than the people I know who were involved in it.
I think this was more the point I was really trying to make, thanks Sleel.
Additional data point - was out tonight and said hello to someone I recognise who is in gay porn. Spent about ten minutes chatting to him, really nice guy and seems pretty clear that his porn career is just a good way to supplement his income. He’s trying to get his boyfriend into it as he thinks he’d do well.
I think I lack sufficient data (not to mention insufficient knowledge in psychology) to make a judgement call on the mental health of a bunch of people I’ve never met. Might as well make the same poll about dentists or accountants.