Make Way For Feminist Porn!

Yep it’s a thing—and it’s set to change the porn industry forever. Morgan Reardon meets the female filmmakers, experts, and revolutionaries putting their pleasure (and ours!) first.

- Morgan Reardon

I saw my first porn flick when I was 23, while in bed with a boy I liked. At first, I was excited. It felt naughty. But seconds later, I felt the complete opposite. In it, two ‘college’ girls—with boobs so big I instantly felt inadequate with my C-cups—were having sex with up to 16 aggressive ‘jock guys’.

Instead of feeling turned on, I felt nauseous. ‘These girls aren’t enjoying themselves, right?’ I thought. A few more attempts over the years didn’t prove much better. In fact, I felt more excited by a screening of Fifty Shades Of Grey than anything recommended on RedTube, so I’ll admit I was just a little dubious when I heard about ‘feminist porn’.

Put simply, the genre focuses on female pleasure and celebrates different body types— everything mainstream porn does not. Not heard of it? Get ready to: many women in porn are sick of being seen as playthings, and are grabbing the industry by the balls. Pardon the pun. Leading the way is Swedish porn director Erika Lust, who made her first short film, The Good Girl, in 2004 while studying political science, feminism, and gender studies. The flick, told from a female perspective, signified a change in the way porn could be made. She’s made more than 100 films since (think actual story lines, soft lighting, and no degrading language) and scooped several accolades at the Feminist Porn Awards in Toronto. She’s the Steven Spielberg of indie erotica.

“When you look at porn’s history, it was born as the liberation of sexuality,” says Erika. “The people making it were visionaries. Then, it turned into a business driven by people who weren’t interested in sexuality or cinema, but in quick money.