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Do porn stars count as human beings? - The Something Awful Forums
Mod note: thread title edited
A month or so ago a goonette posted a thread about becoming a pornstar.
Asside from a large amount of creepiness an argument broke out about the level of respect and consideration consumers of porn should have for pornstars.
It seems other groups are expressing concern about the working conditions of Pornstars.
Quote: : Groups to file complaints against 16 porn companies
Two foundations will register their concerns with California's workplace safety agency.
They allege that failure to require condom use endangers performers' health.
Vowing "never to stop pushing" for condom use in porn, AIDS Healthcare Foundation officials said Wednesday that they plan to file complaints today with state officials against 16 California-based production companies they say have violated workplace safety laws.
The complaints will mark the latest move by the Los Angeles-based advocacy group to pressure the porn industry and government regulators to do more to safeguard the health of adult-film performers.
The foundation sued Los Angeles County last month alleging that public health officials had failed to prevent the spread of sexually transmitted diseases and to enforce laws requiring employers to protect workers against exposure to bodily fluids.
The suit was filed after the disclosure that an adult-film performer had tested positive for HIV.
"You can go to any porn shop or any hotel and pull up incontrovertible evidence against every one of these companies," said Michael Weinstein, president and chief executive of the foundation.
"Is there anything today that prevents them from going in and finding any of these porn sites to be dangerous workplaces?"
Foundation officials, joined by the nonprofit Pink Cross Foundation, which helps workers leave the adult industry, plan to file complaints with the California Division of Occupational Safety and Health based on a review of dozens of DVDs.
Foundation spokesman Ged Kenslea said that although the survey was not scientific, they did select films made by California-based companies.
Of 58 films reviewed -- including Vivid Entertainment's "Nasty as I Want to Be" and Hustler's "This Ain't the Partridge Family XXX" -- only two included scenes with condom use.
The films were made by some of the biggest and best-known companies as well as smaller companies that specialize in gay, Asian or African American adult films.
Cal/OSHA officials declined to comment because the complaints have not yet been filed.
They said they continue their own investigation into the most recent HIV case, as well as 18 additional HIV cases since 2004 reported to them by the Southland porn industry's primary health clinic.
The state has subpoenaed patient records, but that access is being challenged in court by the American Civil Liberties Union, which has alleged a violation of patient privacy.
Industry officials have downplayed the seriousness of the most recent HIV case, which appears to be isolated to one female performer.
They argue that voluntary guidelines requiring monthly tests for sexually transmitted diseases and quarantines for anyone who tests positive have kept performers safe.
"The industry has done an admirable job of policing itself," said Steve Hirsch, founder of Vivid Entertainment, adding that he does not believe the industry should be held to the same bodily fluid regulations as a hospital.
"If Los Angeles County chooses to enforce mandatory condoms, what you'll see is all adult production leave California.
It will move to other places."
Some who have left the industry report a darker side.
Former adult film performer Shelly Lubben, founder of the Pink Cross Foundation, said she contracted herpes and became infected with the human papillomavirus, or HPV, while working in the industry and had to have half of her cervix removed.
"We want the fans to know what they're contributing to," she said.
"They're demanding harder and grosser porn.
We want to educate them to exactly what they're watching -- diseased people.
. . . It's illegal for bodily fluids to touch skin, and yet it happens every single day in the porn industry."
http://www.latimes.com/news/local/l...0,6589201.story
Expecting condoms to be universally used in porn seems a reasonable expectation both for the safety of porn actors and for those of the wider public.
Porn actors don't just have sex with other porn actors and having porn be a breeding ground for STIs and HIV just makes it more likely for cases in the california area.
Regardless why should porn actors risk getting serious or even fatal illnesses just for our entertainment?
Given that the demographic of Something Awful is likely to include a lot of porn consumers and given there have been previous arguments about the level of rights porn actors deserve I thought it would be interesting to see what you guys think.
Do you think there is any reason why condoms shouldn't be universally used?
Somebody fucked around with this message at Aug 24, 2009 around 04:52
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Porn with condoms is awful.
It would be like forcing people who host cooking shows to wear hairnets and gloves.
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XK posted: Porn with condoms is awful.
It would be like forcing people who host cooking shows to wear hairnets and gloves.
action movies are awful because they don't use real guns
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Coffeetable posted: action movies are awful because they don't use real guns
But they look like real guns.
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Scarymonkey posted: This will work as well as prohibition and the war on drugs.
Yes because all drug deals are recorded on video and distributed to the public?
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Scarymonkey posted: This will work as well as prohibition and the war on drugs.
I don't understand this analogy at all.
Please do explain.
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ReV VAdAUL posted: Do you think there is any reason why condoms shouldn't be universally used?
Well, I think lesbian pron should be exempt.
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Cerv posted: I don't understand this analogy at all.
Please do explain.
People prefer condomless porn and will either pay more to see condomless versions or, if they have to, get it from the underground instead.
Porn is about pleasure fantasy, condoms hinder the illusion of the fanatasy.
It's the reason why Japanese porn where they pixelate the cooters of the actors isn't very popular.
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Scarymonkey posted: People prefer condomless porn and will either pay more to see condomless versions or, if they have to, get it from the underground instead.
Porn is about pleasure fantasy, condoms hinder the illusion of the fanatasy.
It's the reason why Japanese porn where they pixelate the cooters of the actors isn't very popular.
Is this real?
Whatever they're doing that DOESN'T require a condom just don't use one and whatever that DOES require one you can't see the drat condom anyways
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Guilty posted: Is this real?
Whatever they're doing that DOESN'T require a condom just don't use one and whatever that DOES require one you can't see the drat condom anyways
Unless you're watching lesbian porn or are turning your head whenever they show the man junk, then yes you can see the condom.
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Guilty posted: Is this real?
Whatever they're doing that DOESN'T require a condom just don't use one and whatever that DOES require one you can't see the drat condom anyways
What act wouldn't require the use of a condom?
Any skin contact can spread herpes or warts.
How can you claim the condom isn't visible?
Have you ever actually seen a pornographic movie?
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Mandatory condom usage will kill the LA Valley porn industry.
That doesn't mean we couldn't see some kind of resurgence in the future, maybe attaining current profitability levels but for a good 20+ years everyone is going to be making a lot less money.
The main thing that would transform the Porn industry in a purely positive way would be a strong union.
This would extremely help male talent and would certainly help female talent.
Get rid of or reform the 'agent' thing.
Agents from what I've seen are creepy dudes or women that exploit another person for very little actual work compared to other industries with 'agents.'
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Scarymonkey posted: People prefer condomless porn and will either pay more to see condomless versions or, if they have to, get it from the underground instead.
Porn is about pleasure fantasy, condoms hinder the illusion of pleasure.
It's the reason why Japanese porn where they pixelate the cooters of the actors isn't very popular.
Underground distribution is likely to make the industry a lot less money.
Sex shops are already licensed are closely monitored and to generate revenue pornsites need to be prominent and interlinked with each other.
Given the low production values of porn its certianly possible underground non-condom porn could make a profit but you're working on the assumption people will care enough to seek out non-condom porn which is far from certain.
Heck take your example of pixelated porn, yeah its not too popular but it keeps going so it must still be making a profit.
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I understand both sides of the argument pretty well, but I would like to point out that the porn industry does do a pretty good job of protecting itself from STDs via their mandatory testing and quarantine process.
Owing to the fact that the most recent case of HIV was limited to one person, and the fact that there's not weekly outbreaks of chlamydia, gonorrhea or other common STDs being reported, I'd say those processes are fairly effective.
You're taking a gamble when you gently caress a stranger regardless, but it's in the porn industry's own interest to keep their performers safe and healthy, right?
I'm of course not in the industry, but I would think that a serious case like this is quite rare and it was dealt with quickly and efficiently.
If the performers, all around, thought they'd be safer with condoms in addition to everything else, they'd start wearing them/demanding their use of their own volition..
Or am I totally off the mark with about that?
I don't want to argue about people's preferences in the porn they watch, but it's pretty clear that bareback porn is vastly more popular than condom porn from the numbers the article Quote: d.
If that what people want to pay to see, and mandatory condom use will drive sales down without producing a real benefit to the performers' health, then of course they're going to pack up and go elsewhere to film.
Regardless, do the people actually performing really need an outside group suing for this?
Do they really want to bring OSHA standards into use for people loving in front of a camera for money?
I'm just dubious about the motives of the foundations doing the suing.
If it's really about health standards and making condom use a law will honestly make porn stars safer, then I guess everyone will grumble and watch their condom porn.
If these guys are using a single case of HIV (that was discovered and dealt with before it became a serious issue) to attack the industry because they don't like kinky porn, then I'm not down with that and the people doing the loving can make their own decisions about it.
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Korak posted: Mandatory condom usage will kill the LA Valley porn industry.
That doesn't mean we couldn't see some kind of resurgence in the future, maybe attaining current profitability levels but for a good 20+ years everyone is going to be making a lot less money.
The main thing that would transform the Porn industry in a purely positive way would be a strong union.
This would extremely help male talent and would certainly help female talent.
Get rid of or reform the 'agent' thing.
Agents from what I've seen are creepy dudes or women that exploit another person for very little actual work compared to other industries with 'agents.'
The LA Valley porn industry deserves to die as long as it fights against poo poo that is a basic health issue for their employees (i.e.
Mandatory condom use and strict testing).
As it is, money is more important than the safety of their workers.
If I was to work construction, I wouldn't be able to be on the jobsite without a hard hat and steel toe boots.
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Condoms would prevent disease from spreading.
If your job had the risk of diseases whenever you went to work, wouldn't you want to be able to not worry about that if possible?
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ReV VAdAUL posted:
Heck take your example of pixelated porn, yeah its not too popular but it keeps going so it must still be making a profit.
Pixelated porn still exists because it's illegal to distribute non pixelated porn in Japan.
From Wikipedia :
Quote: : There is also a thriving genre of underground pornography in Japan (called urabon) that ignores these censorship laws;
It has become especially prevalent on the Internet, as there are no mechanisms in place to prevent its transmission from Japanese nationals to the outside world.
The Internet is international, if people really wanted condomless porn and it was illegal in the US, they would easily just get the German poo poo in each others mouth variety.
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Thpook posted: The LA Valley porn industry deserves to die as long as it fights against poo poo that is a basic health issue for their employees (i.e.
Mandatory condom use and strict testing).
As it is, money is more important than the safety of their workers.
If I was to work construction, I wouldn't be able to be on the jobsite without a hard hat and steel toe boots.
Why don't boxers and basketball players wear helmets?
Someone should sue and force them to.
And pro-wrestlers should wear full body Tyvek suits so they don't get their body fluids all over each other.
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XK posted: Why don't boxers and basketball players wear helmets?
Someone should sue and force them to.
And pro-wrestlers should wear full body Tyvek suits so they don't get their body fluids all over each other.
This is a really bad comparison, if you have sex with someone without a condom and they have something, you are virtually guaranteed to get it.
If you roll around and play sports with someone who has HIV the odds of you getting it are very low.
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Caedus posted: I understand both sides of the argument pretty well, but I would like to point out that the porn industry does do a pretty good job of protecting itself from STDs via their mandatory testing and quarantine process.
Owing to the fact that the most recent case of HIV was limited to one person, and the fact that there's not weekly outbreaks of chlamydia, gonorrhea or other common STDs being reported, I'd say those processes are fairly effective.
Yes, the industry's self regulating body doesn't report high incidences of STIs.
Given that it is in the industry's and the performer's (short term) interests for the industry to appear clean and healthy its very hard to see these checks will be very stringet.
Unless the STIs affect the performer's appearance and thus profit levels the industry wont care.
When it does affect a performer's appearance they'll try and hard it for fear of being black balled.
Quote: : You're taking a gamble when you gently caress a stranger regardless, but it's in the porn industry's own interest to keep their performers safe and healthy, right?
I'm of course not in the industry, but I would think that a serious case like this is quite rare and it was dealt with quickly and efficiently.
If the performers, all around, thought they'd be safer with condoms in addition to everything else, they'd start wearing them/demanding their use of their own volition..
Or am I totally off the mark with about that?
Wearing a condom or requiring your male partner to wear one is seen in the industry as giving a clear sign you are infected and thus makes you likely to get black balled.
In all sorts of industries workers don't have or aren't allowed things that would keep safe for various reasons, be it cost issues for their employers or just the inability to force their implementation.
Quote: : I don't want to argue about people's preferences in the porn they watch, but it's pretty clear that bareback porn is vastly more popular than condom porn from the numbers the article Quote: d.
If that what people want to pay to see, and mandatory condom use will drive sales down without producing a real benefit to the performers' health, then of course they're going to pack up and go elsewhere to film.
People buy more clothes produced by sweatshop labour than ethically made stuff because its cheaper does that mean sweated labour is good?
Its not like theres a 50% option to get condom or none-condom porn.
Condoms aren't used in the industry so people can't buy it.
Your argument seems to be unless people actively prefer condoms in porn theres no point to implementing it.
Quote: : Regardless, do the people actually performing really need an outside group suing for this?
Do they really want to bring OSHA standards into use for people loving in front of a camera for money?
I'm just dubious about the motives of the foundations doing the suing.
If it's really about health standards and making condom use a law will honestly make porn stars safer, then I guess everyone will grumble and watch their condom porn.
If these guys are using a single case of HIV (that was discovered and dealt with before it became a serious issue) to attack the industry because they don't like kinky porn, then I'm not down with that and the people doing the loving can make their own decisions about it.
I addressed this above but are you serious?
Given that implementing health and safety rules costs money and thus affects profit you really can't see why government oversight is necessary to protect workers rights?
As someone else mentioned unionisation of porn actors would further protect their rights and improve safety conditions.
Expecting the people making profits to regulate themselves is assinine.
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I can see both sides of the argument here.
They need to get some rules in place to stop poo poo like the recent HIV outbreak (did we ever find out the name of the woman who caused that, by the way?), and to just stop diseases in general.
But, a lot of profit comes from condomless porn, like cream pies and other such things, so the industry would definetly be taking a hit, and a large section of the consumer base would be upset.
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TheJoker138 posted: I can see both sides of the argument here.
They need to get some rules in place to stop poo poo like the recent HIV outbreak (did we ever find out the name of the woman who caused that, by the way?), and to just stop diseases in general.
But, a lot of profit comes from condomless porn, like cream pies and other such things, so the industry would definetly be taking a hit, and a large section of the consumer base would be upset.
It's fake cream in those cream pies most of the time dude.
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Gay Black Fascist posted: It's fake cream in those cream pies most of the time dude.
Maybe if you're going to those sites with the giant fake cocks where they spray milk all over them, but there's a huge market for actual internal cumshots too.
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Oh no if they use condoms I can't look at the penises so easily!
I love looking at penises, give me all your penises.
Clear pictures of penises only please.
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Gay Black Fascist posted: This is a really bad comparison, if you have sex with someone without a condom and they have something, you are virtually guaranteed to get it.
If you roll around and play sports with someone who has HIV the odds of you getting it are very low.
Per the Lancet medical journal, the odds of transmitting HIV per act of intercourse with an infected individual is 0.0011.
http://www.cirp.org/library/disease/HIV/gray2/
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XK posted: Per the Lancet medical journal, the odds of transmitting HIV per act of intercourse with an infected individual is 0.0011.
http://www.cirp.org/library/disease/HIV/gray2/
Thank god HIV is the only disease!
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ReV VAdAUL posted: Expecting the people making profits to regulate themselves is assinine.
The people that make profits do regulate themselves quite well, because there's an incentive to do so.
Healthy actors can keep working and it helps prospective new actors feel more comfortable into entering the business when they can feel relatively safe about their work.
Heck it's probably a magnitude safer having sex with a porn actor because of their mandatory testing over having sex with someone you haven't been in a long relationship with.
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Some actors and actresses require them as part of their contract.
Every single company gives the stars the right to refuse to work with someone, for any reason, condoms being one of the reasons.
Sure, those who don't care get more work, but the health-conscious ones are hardly blackballed at all.
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Scarymonkey posted: Pixelated porn still exists because it's illegal to distribute non pixelated porn in Japan.
From Wikipedia :
The Internet is international, if people really wanted condomless porn and it was illegal in the US, they would easily just get the German poo poo in each others mouth variety.
Nonethless the legal porn exists and underground porn still exists.
On top of that condom porn isn't nearly as obscured as japanese censored porn.
Yes on the internet if people are really desperate to see non-condom porn they'll see it but I really don't think people care that much.
Should we not try to protect workers because there will be a black market?
Heck I mean should all labour laws in the west be abandoned because it makes our labour more expensive than the third world?
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Caedus posted: You're taking a gamble when you gently caress a stranger regardless, but it's in the porn industry's own interest to keep their performers safe and healthy, right?
This is exactly the same as safety on a building site.
You might think it'd be in the industry's interest not to let the workers be injured, but there's an endless supply of replacements and it's far easier just to tell anyone unable to work anymore to just gently caress off.
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Scarymonkey posted: The people that make profits do regulate themselves quite well, because there's an incentive to do so.
Healthy actors can keep working and it helps prospective new actors feel more comfortable into entering the business when they can feel relatively safe about their work.
Heck it's probably a magnitude safer having sex with a porn actor because of their mandatory testing over having sex with someone you haven't been in a long relationship with.
No, they have an incentive to do the bare minimum to make the industry look clean.
Thats all. ReV VAdAUL fucked around with this message at Aug 23, 2009 around 14:12
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Honestly with this thread title it should have just been a poll that says 'rights for pornstars?
Yes/no" as a general statement and knowing opinions towards sex workers I'm fairly sure 'no' woulda had a strong unironic showing.
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