(Please note that content could be triggering. Reader’s discretion is advised.)

My first introduction to porn was through those sex story apps, which had language options in it, and the stories were categorized. You could set a passcode to open the app and it came with an unrecognizable icon, a super handy feature especially for people like me. Because let’s be honest, privacy is a myth in brown families. You know which app I’m talking about! Stop pretending to be innocent! Most of us had it in our phones. The app was a relief because it meant I could finally give my class 9th biology textbook a rest. For the first few days it was all exciting and fun. But after a while, I noticed how several videos were categorized under problematic titles like sex between brother and sister, mother and son, father and daughter, and other relations like “bhabhi and devar“. It started feeling icky. I mean, who even came up with the idea of people having sex with their parents? That’s plain disgusting. I’d prefer my biology book over this, please.

After a few months, I shifted from sex stories to video pornography. I thought that would be fun, to actually see the action happening. In all honesty, for a while it was. It was also a bit freaky to see “it” for the first time. I mean, come on, seeing a pee pee for the first time is like WHAAAT??? But that didn’t last long either. Things got dark.

The categories of videos got more worrisome with new additions like forced sex, rape videos, revenge porn, underage women, hidden cameras i.e videos recorded without consent. And don’t even get me started on the racist and ageist undertones with categories like interracial and MILF. For the unversed, MILF is an acronym for “Mother, I’d Like to Fuck”.

Pornhub is the world’s biggest porn site, visited 42 billion times last year with almost 6 million videos uploaded every year on the platform. Recently, it was accused of hosting multiple videos of rape and abuse on the platform, pointing to lack of safeguards and checks regarding the content uploaded. In October 2019, a 15-year-old in Florida was trafficked and went missing. She was found after 58 videos of her rape were uploaded on Pornhub. Another survivor’s (name undisclosed) rape video was uploaded on the site and it took several months to make Pornhub take it down after she threatened them with legal action. By that time the video had countless views and downloads. Imagine the trauma of a survivor who had to revisit her ordeal as it was up on display to be watched by millions of people. Pornhub was also criticised for hosting videos of the company, GirlsDoPorn which went under trial for sex trafficking and tricking women into pornography. Even though the trial against the company started in August 2019 in San Diego court, Pornhub did not remove GirlsDoPorn videos from its site until October 2019, showing complicity in the rape culture.

An online petition was started by non-profit organisation, Exodus Cry against Pornhub. Laila Mickelwait, founder of Exodus Cry accused Pornhub of “profiting from rape, sex trafficking and abuse of women and children by monetizing the videos”. Pornhub has refuted the accusations insisting that they have robust procedures to stop illegal content uploads and defended the material posted as legitimate fantasies protected by freedom of speech. Exodus’s petition has been signed by over a million people, supported by activists from 192 countries, over 300 organisations and the campaign has compelled legislators in Canada and US to call for federal level investigations into Pornhub’s parent company, Mindgeek.

Another worrisome thing is the titles of these uploaded videos. How many titles of porn videos say anything demeaning about a man? I’ve honestly come across none. Meanwhile, almost all porn video titles contain words like slut, whore, cunt, all being different versions of slut shaming and sexism. And then there are all these aggressive words like “fucked, drilled, pounded, slammed, ruined, destroyed, extreme etc” clearly indicating in the title itself that something violent, wrong and unpleasant is being done to women in the videos. A lot of them are blatantly titled “punished”, indicating sex can be used as punishment against women. That, coupled with violent, demeaning and aggressive language and actions of men in the videos spitting on the women, urinating on them, manhandling them, slapping them are plain scary and disgusting.

I asked myself, Why the hell have I been watching this nonsense? For a country like India with no sex education, porn has been the most common mode of people’s introduction to what sex is. It was my introduction to sex, my sister’s, my brother’s and my friends’. These millions of problematic and violent porn videos are a common and accessible mode of “sex education” for a curious teenage brain. The videos filled with sexist, misogynist, abusive slurs being screamed at women inadvertently form our notions and knowledge of sex. The manhandling. The physical abuse. The unrealistic expectations. No wonder, people in our country now think it is okay to use slurs like, bitch, slut, whore, randi towards women on social media. No wonder they think rape threats are a way to shut women down. People end up confusing porn with real life sex. The idea of sex is porn. Violent porn. Rape videos served as porn. Rape culture enabling porn.

I’ve had several conversations with women where they’ve told me that sometimes while watching porn, instead of arousing them it jolts them to their core. “I cannot see a video and fantasize about me being manhandled, slapped and being called a whore by my boyfriend while having sex”. Girl, me neither!! I just want to enjoy some erotica in peace without coming across non-consensual, misogynistic or violent content. But most of these damn porn sites are such a bummer!

There is also this chicken and the egg debate in my head, whether it is porn that feeds violence into people’s minds or is it people’s violent desires that are being depicted in porn? Either way, it is disgusting and life threatening for women. It is insane how porn showcases that male sexual pleasure is all about causing pain, discomfort and shame to women while for women sex is all about enduring that pain as an obligation. Consider this, porn is always about what men want to do to women during sex and never about what women want, what satisfies them or their sexual desires. You could clearly tell how the male gaze and their pleasures are prioritised in the content. Sexual pleasure of women has seldom entered the conversation.

So you see, I am conflicted. We didn’t have sex education growing up. I resorted to porn as it was my only insight into knowing what sex was all about. And I personally believe that for proper understanding of sex, consent and physical desires we need to see what is it and not just read it in a textbook. I encouraged my friends, both men and women, to watch it because I didn’t want them to be clueless and unprepared for their first sexual experiences. And porn helped. But at the same time, porn is problematic. It harms people’s lives. So, I share a love-hate relationship with porn. It’s like that boyfriend I can’t let go because he is too attractive but at the same time toxic as hell.

Some people also argue about the necessity of porn, for masturbation and foreplay and state that banning porn altogether is infringement of freedom of choice. So, what’s the solution? Firstly, we need to advocate for compulsory sex education in schools to shape awareness and understanding of healthy sexual behaviours. And secondly, if you do want to watch/read porn, go for ethical, woman friendly, queer friendly content. (Yes, it exists!)

In the end, consume safe porn and have safe sex. Also, happy masturbation!

Written By: Karishma
About the Author
Karishma is a CA final student. She aspires to be a writer and poet. If not her books, you’d find her on the internet calling out sexism, spreading joy through memes, dog/cat videos and propagating feminism, her only religion. You can follow her work at heartnotes101 on Instagram.