Bringing Love to the classroom...

Being in the porn industry for about fourteen years plus, as we learned in her special guest lecture, Sinnamon Love has really done it all...

From personal interviews, Professor Miller-Young reports that:

"Sinnamon Love had been attending nursing school while raising two children as a single mother when she started performing in adult films. She was behind on her bills even though she was working full time at a children's clothing store. Love was stressed that she spent most of her day between work and school and did not have enough time with her children."

(Miller-Young 33)

As Love put it, welfare was not an option for her. She was determined to support herself and her family on her own. And due to the limited opportunities and flexibility in the workplace offered to single mothers, pornography was the best option; "the often inflexible and demanding nature of conventional work that motivates entry into pornography. Porn is appealing because it offers more flexibility and independence," (Sharon A. Abbott 23). One Love started the business however, she was hooked; "Love gave up her plans for nursing school because she realized she could make even more than a nurse if she focused on building a career as a porn actress," (Miller-Young 33).

Many factors contributed to Love's successful career. For one, she entered the business at a time where there weren't as many actresses on the scene, especially those in her market- Love is a beautiful and petite Black woman who is very adventurous sexually. And as she put it, she wouldn't do anything in front of the camera that she wouldn't do in her personal life.

"Like prostitutes, a few [pornstars] make a great deal of money while most make a modest or meager living," (Abbott 20). Love managed to be one of the few by playing her cards right. She works on various projects and in various markets including BDSB fetish, managing new actress, producing films, and running multiple websites herself. By "being her own boss", Love challenges notions that women are just objects in the porn industry.

According to some studies, "'becoming known' is a greater motivating factor to enter the industry than money" (21). Although this may be true for some, Love stresses how she still does not consider herself a "pornstar". Indeed, it was not until rapper Naz recognized her and proved himself to be a huge fan that Love realized what an impact her career has really had.

Mireille Miller-Young, "Hardcore Desire: Black Women Laboring in Porn- Is It Just Another Job?" Colorlines Magazine, Fall 2005, 31-35

Sharon Abbot, "Motivations for Pursuing an Acting Career in Pornography," Sex for Sale, Prostitution, Pornography and the Sex Industry, Ronald Weitzer, ed., New York: Routledge, 2000, 17-34.

Siobhan Brooks, "Dancing Towards Freedom"

In "Dancing Towards Freedom", Siobhan Brooks writes from her perspective about what happened in San Fransisco when her and her co-workers at the peep show, "The Lusty Lady", started to unionize.

The Lusty Lady had some qualities to it that made it ideal for the first sex worker business to unionize. For one, it was a peep show, not a strip club, where girls danced together in a room, separated by glass between themselves and the customers. They were paid hourly, not by tips. The business was said to run like a "family", under better, safer, and cleaner conditions compared to neighboring strip clubs. Further, as Brooks reports, "most of the women at the Lusty Lady are students, artists, or both; they are very intelligent and creative, refuting the stereotype of strippers as brainless sex bunnies," (Brooks 252).

Although it seems as though the Lusty Lady is an ideal place to work for women in the business, the women discovered that it was not all it was worked up to be. Especially for Brooks, a woman of color, she realized that specifically in terms of racism, the Lusty Lady was no exception; "I did not notice the race relations on stage at first because, as with many job settings, the racism is very covert. Now I feel a sense of family and support from the dancers and support staff, while simultaneously being aware of the racism" (252).

Brooks "noticed that I was almost always the only woman of color on stage with the white dancers," (253). Further, white dancers were rude with the few customers of color that did come in; "some of the dancer reacted to customers of color; many were impatient with Asian and Latino customers who could not understand English well, and some dancers were hesitant about dancing for Black customers," (253).

Management also fell into racist ideology. They believed that women of color were not as desirable by customers, and therefore did not schedule these women in the "Private Pleasures Booths" where more money was to be made. Brooks mentioned how "the few Black women (about six out of seventy women) were hardly every performing in the Private Pleasures booth, though we were all available to do it," (253). Management responded to complaints of this discrimination by saying that "white men did not want to pay extra to see Black dancers," (254).

This type of institutionalized racism is extremely harmful to people of color, in this case the dancers and the customers. Brooks reveals how she "internalized the notion that I was not as attractive as the other dancers...I had to fight insecurities about my appearance in the presence of white women, since they are perceived as the ideal beauty standard," (253). Further negative impacts were that women of color then choose to work at other businesses where the working conditions were worse, but they could make better money. We see this pattern of lower quality clubs servicing customers of color, and therefore employing more women of color. Complete race and class segregation and discrimination; "Black women make less money in the business than other women, a fact reflective of the general economy," (253).

Though the Lusty Lady has since successfully unionized, the same race relations persist. Internal tension between the dancers themselves, as well as women of color workers and management continue to push women of color to lower quality work places. As Brooks says, it is true that as a Black woman, her "freedom in the work place is always limited by white supremacy" (255). However, she continues "to fight racist policies, practices, and attitudes, and I know I am not alone," (255). How can you contribute to the fight?

Siobhan Brooks, "Dancing Towards Freedom," Whores and Other Feminists, Jill Nagle, ed., New York: Routledge, 1997, 57-65

Chicks with Dicks!!: Lesbian Pornography

Heather Butler, in her piece "What Do You Call A Lesbian with Long Fingers? The Development of Lesbian and Dyke Pornography", outlines the characteristics of lesbian's depicted in mainstream pornography and how the depiction has changed through time and with the advent of Queer pornography. She carefully reviews "attempts to authenticate lesbian sexuality through representation, as well as to interpellate the potential lesbian viewer," which legitimate Queer identity on screen, and also as active consumers of porn (Heather Butler 167).

The main characteristic of lesbians as shown in mainstream porn is that the two or more women are prepping themselves for "real sex" with a man; "the 'lesbian,' as she is typically represented in heterosexual pornography, is most often used as a warm-up for sex between a man and a woman," (168). This trend started back in stag films where two girls are usually having a good time with themselves, and once it starts to get hot, the man enters. This theme is still present in mainstream porn today, a theme that denies lesbian identity entirely, and shows not a bisexual identity, but rather a "bi-curious", but not so serious, sexuality.

Queer pornographers, and a small handful of mainstream pornographers, have attempted then to change this pattern and represent a sincere lesbian identity, "to represent lesbianism as an actual choice, not contingent on heterosexuality and a lifestyle that remains discrete from the heterosexual imperative," (170). Indeed, a lesbian identity is not fully defined by what one does sexually, but is contingent on an actual Queer lifestyle.

One way that pornographers have sought to represent lesbians, is with the figure of the Butch Dyke. The Butch Dkye is visual evidence of Queer identity and lifestyle. In mainstream pornography, the Butch Dyke may be limited to her gender role, in terms of being the "top", more aggressive partner. However, in Queer porn, the Butch Dkye has enjoyed a more varied sexual role, one that challenges mainstream notions of gender behavior; "with the figure of the butch, the lesbian gains maximum visibility... the butch destabilizes any fixed notions of gender that we might have had concerning masculinity and femininity," (169).

To further play with our notions of gender roles, Queer pornographers have twisted around with the use and power of the phallus; "Lesbian pornography inherently uncloaks the impotence behind the phallus model and proposes alternatives to simply 'taking it' or 'faking it,'" (168). With the use of dildos and strap on, pleasure moves from the body with the phallus, to the body receiving it. In mainstream pornography, the man's pleasure is at focus, he is the one who can produce the "money shot", the visual evidence that sex has taken place, been pleasurable, and is finished. In Queer porn then, the woman's pleasure is at focus, something we hardly see otherwise. Quoting Jackie Strano, Butler writes that the dildo is "a pleasure tool, an extension of my energy, attached to my clit... it exists to make a woman come, to give her pleasure... and does not come out or come down until she says it does according to her orgasmic wax and wane, not mine as a man's basic physiology would dictate" (187).

Indeed, as we saw in the Queer porn, "Sugar High Glitter City", the strap on can be used in a variety of ways to pleasure both partners. The dildo is not just the object of pleasure for the one wearing it, but rather, the pleasure is dictated by the receiver.

I recommend this film for those of you interested in authentic representations of Queer woman sex. Gender roles are fluid, there is a varied representation of bodies as well as racial diversity, and of course, safe sex and communication.

Heather Butler, "What Do You Call a Lesbian With Long Fingers? The Development of Lesbian and Dyke Pornography," Porn Studies, Linda Williams, ed., Durham: Duke, 2004, 167-197.