Trigger warning: SuicideGirls is a porn company that shares explicit images on their social media. We advise anyone who may struggle with porn to avoid looking at their accounts.
Many people contact Fight the New Drug to share their personal stories about how porn has affected their life or the life of a loved one. We consider these personal accounts very valuable because, while the science and research is powerful within its own right, personal accounts from real people seem to really hit home about the damage that pornography does to real lives.
This is a real-life story we received from a Fighter who was involved with porn, selling sex, and stripping. Her story shows the reality behind these industries, and how closely connected they truly are.
I grew up in a very strict home. I wore skirts down to my ankles and if I even wore pants—they would end up in the trash.
I was homeschool and nerdy, so I actually went to national competitions for my academic accomplishments. I never dreamed I would ever sell sex and do porn.
My father left when I was three years old, and it hurt, but I wasn’t as hurt until I found out that he sexually assaulted my oldest sister who had been a child at the time of the abuse.
When I finally found him online, I remember begging him for an answer as to why he would do such a thing. The only answer I got from him was that I wasn’t old enough to know, and I kept pushing for answers.
After, he got upset at me for continuing to ask, and ended up denying I was even his child. I guess that played a huge role in my downward spiral into things.
Fulfilling a fantasy
When I was 17, I started reading erotica books obsessively because I wanted some form of love or even attention, even if it was just fantasy.
It helped soothe this ache I felt, until my best friend and I started reading it together. The first time I got into doing porn itself, I remember taking almost nude photos tied to a black pole in her room. I had gone from a girl who always followed the rules to being the girl I had always judged.
I was hurt at 18 when I first had sex, and the community I was in turned its back on me when they found out.
I wasn’t allowed to talk or be near the other teens, because I was a “bad influence,” so I ran away into an abusive relationship just to escape my suicidal thoughts. I was hurt, dejected, and soon after, I was hooked on porn while I dated around.
When I was 19, I had a boyfriend that stole from me and took so much of my money, and after that, I was short on cash and desperate. My friend suggested I try stripping, and her boyfriend could set it up for me. It would only be a “one-time thing,” I remember thinking.
He ended up taking everything from me, including the keys to my car and my apartment. He had total control over me, and I was scared. Soon after, he prostituted me out. He was my pimp, and I was stranded.
I was fully being sex trafficked, and I didn’t even realize it.
An all-time low
Three months, later I stopped the real job I had while being trafficked—commonly known as being “pimped out”—and ran away to stay with my aunt.
I told no one my address besides my close family and friends. I was scared every day my mom would find out what I had done, or the police would come and lock me away. I did change my life for a while, but my hurt and pain weren’t gone.
I wasn’t in control of my life, and even after that, I was still addicted to porn knowing full well how a lot of them on set were treated. Two years later, my life was actually going well and a detective called asking questions about the man who trafficked me. Thankfully, I was never charged with anything since I had turned my life around then.
Then, when I was twenty-three, someone stole from my neighbors, and they blamed it on me. I got evicted because of that. Again, I was stranded and stuck.
I moved to Texas and was desperate, once again. I had boyfriend down there and I had just started dating before the eviction showdown happened, and I ended up with no job and no license in that state. At that time, my boyfriend was really into the SuicideGirls—this “pin-up” style adult photography site—and I thought it would fun to be one.
Online, they had ads for “girls modeling,” so I went ahead and did it. I figured I wasn’t having sex, so what was the harm?
Still, I felt empty and dead inside doing the shoots, but I really needed the money. I still hadn’t found a good job that could support me, and I ended up meeting a guy who asked me if I wanted to do webcam. I still had the same mentality—I wasn’t having sex with anyone on camera, so what’s the harm?
Little did I know, it was harmful to me. I kept going down this path and I think I subconsciously knew where it would end up, eventually.
The last straw
I ended up breaking up with the boyfriend in Texas, and I was mad and upset at how things had turned out between us. Again, I was desperate and needed money to get back to my state and my old job…so I agreed to do a porn video.
I remember sitting there before the shoot and freaking out inside. Like, what was I doing? To myself? To my future? I think the producers could tell I was nervous and wanting to back out. Before I knew it, they got me drunk and I ended up going through with it.
I felt miserable and at my all-time low. How did I get here? Not only had I been forced to sell sex through trafficking, but I also had then done porn. I had been used, then let myself be used.
They asked me what I wanted to be called in that porn video, and all I could think was that I wanted to burn the studio down instead.
Now, I’m scared my husband will come across something I’ve been in and realize it’s me. He was the boyfriend in Texas, and he took me back after time apart and married me, but he has no clue about the porn.
He does know I was blackmailed into selling sex when I was younger, which is legally defined as sex trafficking. But porn? If I can, I’ll take that to my grave.
Truth be told, I just hate porn so much. Whenever the memories come up, I wish I could erase them. It’s not something I can take back now, but I’m hoping that by sharing my story I can shed light on what life is like on the other side of the screen.
Trapped, scared, and pushed into going through with it, my pain is someone else’s sexual fantasy. My desperation and confusion is someone else’s objectification. I hope that by being open about what happened, people can know the truth about porn. It truly does kill love.
–T.
Sex trafficking on screen
These are the words of a sex trafficking survivor.
Wait, this woman was never chained up—no one ever put a gun to her head or threatened her life. How could she be sex trafficked when none of that stuff happened to her?
What is sex trafficking?
Sex trafficking is officially defined as a “modern-day form of slavery in which a commercial sex act is induced by force, fraud, or coercion, or in which the person induced to perform such an act is under the age of 18 years.”Trafficking Victims Protection Act (TVPA) of 2000, Pub. L. No. 106–386, Section 102(a), 114 Stat. 1464. https://www.govinfo.gov/content/pkg/BILLS-106hr3244enr/pdf/BILLS-106hr3244enr.pdfCopy
That means any instance in which the individual on screen was forced, tricked, or pressured. That means trafficking in the porn industry is much more common than most people realize. Here’s an article where we talk about how that happens regularly.
That means that someone can be trafficked and still receive a paycheck and sleep in their own bed at the end of the day. That means that this woman was sex trafficked on multiple occasions—while she was being “pimped out” and forced to sell sex, and while she was plied with alcohol so she wouldn’t back out of doing a porn scene.
Yes, that is trafficking. At that point, she cannot consent to going through with it—and isn’t that the point of what the producers did? She wanted to back out of the scene, and producers pressured her to go through with it by getting her drunk.
At that point, the porn she performed in was not simply a video of a drunk porn star—it was a video of an exploited and trafficked woman.
According to cases reported to the National Human Trafficking Hotline, pornography was the 3rd-most common form of sex trafficking, after escort services and elicit massage businesses.Polaris. (2020). 2019 data report: The U.S. national human trafficking hotline. Retrieved from https://polarisproject.org/wp-content/uploads/2019/09/Polaris-2019-US-National-Human-Trafficking-Hotline-Data-Report.pdfCopy
You might be thinking, “Well, professional porn producers who are in the mainstream industry would never do that…she must have been on some fringe fetish site that was more sketchy.”
Trafficking absolutely has happened on mainstream porn sets, and been uploaded to mainstream porn sites.
If you’re not convinced content on mainstream sites isn’t all consensual, read this Jezebel.com story, this story on Daily Beast, this story on Complex.com, this Rolling Stone story, this Bustle.com story, this story on CNN, this NY Post story, this Gizmodo.com story, this BBC report, this Florida Sun-Sentinel report, this Daily Wire story, this Buzzfeed News profile, and this UK Independent story for further proof that the mainstream porn industry features nonconsensual videos and videos of trafficked individuals. And yes, this includes videos on Pornhub and other mainstream porn sites.
We’re not claiming that all porn is nonconsensual. We’re pointing out that some of it is and some of it isn’t, and there’s virtually no way to guarantee which is which.
So what will you do about it?
Research indicates that most porn consumers are unconcerned about the potential mistreatment of porn performers. At the same time, however, about 70% of porn consumers who do learn about mistreatment in the porn industry take some form of action to combat it.Tollini, C., & Diamond-Welch, B. (2021). American adult pornography consumers’ beliefs and behaviors related to pornography studios mistreating their performers. Sexuality & Culture, doi:10.1007/s12119-021-09872-3Copy
If you watch porn, be one of those in the 70% and take action—decide that exploitation is not entertainment, and watching isn’t worth it.
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