So I’m watching “The Colbert Report” and he’s got this chick on who wrote some book about “raunch culture”, meaning the supposedly new (although how one can ignore the fact that history is full of famous, influential courtesans is beyond me) trend of glorifying porn stars, strippers and the like.  The woman is bemoaning the idea that porn actresses and strippers can serve as role models for ordinary women in celebrating, exploring, and owning their sexuality, because porn stars and strippers (according to her anyway) are basically all “faking it”.  She points out the absurdity of women pretending to be like people who are pretending to enjoy sex, and how that’s not a terribly good way to learn how to actually enjoy sex.

Now I’m not at all sure I buy the idea that the huge majority of women who work in the sex industry ARE faking their pleasure…I think that it takes a strong exhibitionistic streak, which implies taking pleasure in putting oneself on display, to get very far in this line of work…but I am willing to suppose that a lot of the plasticized young starlets who are the most visible face of porn (and stripping) are in fact more interested in the money than any other aspect of the job.  Which is why it’s so very, very important that the field of porn be broadened to include women (and, for that matter, men!) who are something other than the underweight, fake breasted, nineteen year olds that mainstream porn studios focus on so obsessively.  And why it’s imperative that the government regulations which are ostensibly there to protect children from predators but which actually serve merely to hinder independent porn production be reconsidered.

It’s not wrong, stupid, or demeaning for ordinary women to wish to emulate women who have higher than average sex drives and the openness of mind to embrace and cultivate those talents, any more than it is wrong for women to choose sports stars, musicians, or any other talented, ambitious person as a role model.  It IS rather silly that the system be set up so that the women who are most rewarded by the industry are those who haven’t even been alive long enough to begin to scratch the surface of the creative, hedonistic potential of sex.

It’s particularly dumb when you consider that most men aren’t really all that interested in screwing mindless, plasticized 19 year olds…and that women are every bit as interested in watching porn as men are.