December 31, 2005

Making money from the plague

A couple of niche sex video producers found a new hole (as it were) in the market: barebacking videos. Of course, a stack of very old material has long been available, ever since video was invented and earlier, quaintly dubbed the "pre-condom era". But since covering up against the plague is de rigueur, most recent and contemporary gay video output is rubbered up. Some political queers have started promoting barebacking as a radical statement of autonomy and free will ("gift-giving"). Since the porn industry is the earliest adopter of all, barebacking is back on screen but without any sexual-philosophical or political intent, just to make money. Or as GayPornBlog puts it:
"The bareback studios are financial insurgents, capturing a large segment of the market with the eroticism of danger."
We watched two offerings, on loan from friends but you can watch them online, from Sxvideo. The company uses this kink as its main selling tool. The word for the activity depicted is in larger size than any of the video titles, and it shows in the content: the films concentrate on nothing else, as is wont with fetish videos, but "unsafe sex".
This is a major difference with the pre-condom films where un-rubbered sex was just the norm, and in that sense I was really watching not a porn movie but a slo-mo snuff film.
You could argue that the people involved must have the freedom to put whatever substance into their bodies as they want, but I fail to see what difference there is between this and a (hypothetical) movie where junkies shoot up for real and share the needles, in order to turn on viewers (presumably junkies too if they are susceptible to be turned on by drug taking).
I felt rather sad instead of turned on.

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