LINA BEMBE
“PASSION IS MANDATORY”
“True passion and conviction are vital.” I found this sentence neatly written in a beautiful notebook with a bright green cover and cosmic black-and-white details on the back, the thick ivory pages where I wrote reflections on my newly chosen porn career. The indie porn scene in Western Europe—especially in Berlin—has a DIY atmosphere, full of talented, creative people from diverse backgrounds who are uncompromising about their art and politics. People who often divide their work between shoots for the money and shoots to express radical ideas about politics, feminism, and how marginalized folks like to fuck. This atmosphere nurtured the idealism that marked my early years in the industry, when I wrote that “true passion and conviction are vital.”
Idealism had to be the motivating factor. I’m a person of color, yet cis presenting, young looking, thin, conventionally attractive, and able-bodied. Even with all these privileges, the opportunity to make good money shooting commercial “ethical” or “feminist” porn was never really high. But what the scene lacks in commercial success, it compensates for with creativity. I remember having pizza with an American performer, their first time in Berlin, and talking about the European indie scene. They mentioned that people in this part of the world seemed to do porn out of “passion.” I agreed with them, while thinking to myself: As opposed to cookie-cutter films, just for the wank, just for the money? To me, during that time, passion and artistic value were the most natural motivations for doing porn.
The political relevance of porn, revolving around bodily autonomy and the possibility of claiming sexual agency, felt very close to a path I was already exploring in my personal life, although not as consciously before choosing porn. I had finally found a way to express myself that seemed fulfilling to me and that others could enjoy. All these findings were summarized in that notebook, full of notes about the senses of safety, empathy, healing, and self-love I felt during my first years in the industry.
A few years after my initial notebook musings, I still think that in porn I found my true vocation. I’m still convinced of my ability to express through porn aspects of myself that I would have been otherwise unable to show, like how vulnerability can actually embody strength and power. However, there were other facets of porn work that I didn’t consider as thoroughly at the time. Questions of safety practices or acceptable working standards, for which visible information and guidance are rather lacking. Regardless of how fulfilling I found my new path in porn, I also had to face a number of tough lessons about what it really means to do indie porn in Western Europe in our contemporary moment.
UNDER THE GUISE OF AESTHETICS AND INDEPENDENCE: THE ABUSE
During my first months in the industry, I wanted to work in films usually catalogued as “feminist porn.” I did my research and followed the work of fellow performers I admired. Following the path of admiration, I met the director who now I call my abuser. In interviews he talked about the importance of proper remuneration on porn sets, how he would never take advantage of his power position as a director, and about not crossing performer’s sexual boundaries. Impressed by his emphasis on ethics in porn, I contacted him and proposed to meet. We planned to shoot a couple of videos under a “content share” format—per his suggestion—a term quite new to me at that time, but that means that we would create the films together and be able to use them for economic gain through our individual channels. At the time I didn’t have any platform to sell my own content, but thought it wouldn’t hurt, in case I decided to sell my own stuff in the future.
We met for beers on the night before the shoot. We talked about how my journey within the industry had been, how work was going for him, our challenges and aspirations. We exchanged plenty of laughs. He was respectful, and he gave me advice. I felt I could trust him. The next morning, I showed up at his place ready to shoot. We started with a coffee. I had plenty of time to do my hair and makeup, and prepare my outfits. The atmosphere was relaxed: he and I were the only ones there, and I didn’t feel nervous about performing with him. The films we planned were to have natural lighting, a minimalist atmosphere, and a focus on me and my reactions. They would center on receiving oral sex, masturbation, and soft fetishes—all of which made me feel safe and reassured, more so than if we had gone for intercourse or sexual acts that, to me, demanded more intimacy.
By the time we finished shooting, I was satisfied with this new collaboration that seemed fruitful. In the midst of my satisfaction, he suggested we shoot an extra video. An extra video in which we would perform together.
I agreed. It wouldn’t hurt to shoot another. Everything had gone so well, and I didn’t know when would I be back in town. It would be another simple premise, both of us performing non-penetrative sex, with the focus mostly on me, in the same room where we shot the previous films. However, this time was slightly different. Half my body was tied up, the natural light was gone, and there was no extra lighting to compensate for it. He seemed more aroused. I noticed those changes at the time, but they didn’t seem overly lascivious, not enough to question his behavior or stop the scene altogether. Now I realize that the degree to which I remember these details is an indication that something was off, and I knew it at the time.
Many months later, despite our “content share” agreement, this director never delivered that last film. Every time I asked for it, I got a different lie. In short, my abuser deceived me into having sex with him under the guise that we were creating work that would bring us both profit. I had no concrete plans for setting up a platform to sell my own content, so I was in no rush to get the films we shot together. Eventually, he confirmed that the video was not only missing but irreversibly “lost.”
It took me a while to realize that his behavior was abuse. For years he tricked me into seeing him as a colleague: he offered advice and expressed himself as an ally, as someone committed to changing the things that are wrong within the industry—the pay gaps, sexual harassment, and inconsistent STI testing standards in Europe. He got invited to panels and hosted talks about ethics and pornography. Since we lived in different cities, I was out of contact with fellow performers who could perhaps have warned me about him or given me any sort of information regarding his abusive behavior. I only realized I had been tricked when other performers started to make public their appalling experiences with this person, some of them quite similar to what I went through.
I decided to share my experience on social media, as did others, the stories piling one on top of another. For me, making my abuse public was one of the few feasible measures to seek relief and heal the intense feelings of shame and rage I was processing upon realizing what had happened to me. I wanted to warn other people and see doors close to my abuser. Doing this as part of a collective effort made all the difference: my community validated my experience and I felt supported. The general audience beyond the porn industry had mixed reactions: many people wrote messages of support, but every now and then I received messages from people who blamed me for my situation, implying that abuse is a natural outcome of this profession. Not that I cared too much about those reactions, but the reminder of the pervasive, tired clichés about the industry was ever present.
FEMINISM IS A PRACTICE, NOT A GENRE
Slapping the “feminist” label on porn doesn’t mean the performers are safe from the most elemental problems of the industry. Feminism is sometimes embedded in porn as if it were an aesthetic choice, not an ethical one. On occasion it is used as a branding strategy to mark a fictitious difference from “bad” mainstream porn and profit from it. If “feminist” porn ignores the working conditions of its performers and producers, it is not “ethical” porn, no matter its aesthetics. Calling porn “feminist” without applying those values on set can potentially allow for abuse.
When we get fixated on the idea of feminism or ethics as a genre—a means of market differentiation—we end up buying into the fantasy that this niche is where the “good” people in the industry work, implying that there can be no abusers in our ranks. I fell into this trap at the beginning of my career, when I was writing about my true passion for porn in that beautiful green notebook. I was excited about the novelty of doing work that looked different from the porn I watched in my early years, which I found mostly dry, formulaic, too white. I was eager to make the “good” kind of porn, and I see now that the idea of making “good” porn out of passion turned against me. Not only did it prevent me from detecting abuse at an earlier stage, it added an extra layer of shame when sharing my bad experience: If you’re the “good” people, why didn’t you detect the unethical behavior earlier?
In my experience, working with a self-marketed ethical and feminist company has demanded unconditional endorsement: “We can only continue working together if you’re fully over the ways in which you feel wronged by us.” These were the words of a self-proclaimed feminist and ethical director who paid me less than my white, cis male costar and who sneakily omitted information about testing reimbursements. According to them, if I wanted to continue working, it was entirely up to me to get over the ways in which they admittedly wronged me. A classic manipulative move. Their “feminist” agenda had no room for actual processes of mediation, accountability, or reparations.
When I’ve defended myself against these self-proclaimed feminist and ethical companies and directors, they have reacted as if their unethical behavior was an unthinkable possibility. I’ve often doubted myself—had second thoughts about the price of speaking up being worth the effort. There’s usually plenty at stake: privilege dynamics that could affect the work or the economic, legal, emotional, or mental stability of performers. In the case of sex workers, denouncing any form of wrongdoing inevitably becomes a form of overexposure. Whoever suffers abuse also has to struggle with legitimizing their claims, with being seen like a person worthy of reparations. When I have spoken to journalists about mistreatment in the industry, I have asked for various rounds of fact-checking because I fear any inaccuracy may bring controversy. I run the risk of being labeled a troublemaker, potentially affecting my ability to get work, as well as my emotional well-being.
On the consumer side, “feminist” porn as genre provides audiences with relief from the shame of porn consumption, an alternative that seems softer, “higher class” on many occasions, less loaded with the usual stereotypes about the mainstream industry. “Feminist” porn as a genre has capitalized on this layer of guilt. It has often spread the illusion that glossy aesthetics and pop feminism are all that is needed to “change” the industry, often forgetting that “change” should also happen behind cameras.
Feminism in porn should be a set of actual practices put to work in all stages of the production process, reflected in the final product. It’s important to be clear about how our feminist ideals can take shape on sets and to continuously reexamine them for potential biases, hierarchies, and unchecked privileges. It is also important to recognize that even in the most ethically conscious, well-meant scenarios, things can go wrong. Still, there are actions we can take to prevent abuse, such as protocols or the guarantee of accountability processes in case problems happen.
As performers, we can demand more transparency at an early stage of the production process, ask for references within the industry before accepting work, be inquisitive and demanding about key work procedures such as contracts and delivery deadlines. On a collective level, it’s important to share more information and resources, organize ourselves, and advocate for fair working standards—whether that means unionizing or forming any other visible organization that best serves our needs. These are feminist practices because they keep workers safe and hold those with the most authority accountable.
In order to gain validation and acceptance—and definitely to avoid losing work—many people offer up a happy face and claim fantasy working conditions, which blurs the very elemental fact that regardless of the porn genre, sex work is fundamentally work. We do not have to seek “empowerment” by claiming our work always makes us happy. We should defend our right to have bad days, to admit that feminism is a multifaceted, complex practice, not just a label directors can use to feel good about themselves and sell products without putting in the work.
I have performed in DIY productions with powerful political messages for the sake of the art. I’ve paid my rent from working on mainstream productions. I’ve made ends meet working in glossy “feminist” films that don’t live up to those ideals. I’ve shot intensely pleasurable films. I have directed films of my own, collaborating with people I respect under clear rules about compensation for their work. I’ve educated myself on the value of independent, “clip store” content: how it can offer far more diversity than a lot of porn companies (feminist included) and help many performers stay financially independent and afloat. Over the years, my limits have gotten more firm and clear. I have also understood that doing porn with artistic aspirations entails a certain amount of privilege, enabled by a set of relative advantages. Passion is a privilege for those who can afford it. But porn is a job that needs to be handled for what it is: sex work.