Established porn-for-women site Sssh.com broadcast yesterday an event called “Women in Porn: Shattering the Myths,” an interactive panel discussion that pits prominent women working in the adult entertainment industry against some of porn’s harshest critics to debate the nature of the industry and women’s changing role in it.
Read on…
Broadcast live on July 22, the video broadcast event is now available to viewers free of charge on MindBrowse.com and here on EroticScribes.com
“When critics of porn take aim at the adult industry, one of their main arguments is that the industry is inherently misogynistic, and that the women who work and perform in the industry are basically broken people, poor souls, who have been manipulated into working in porn,” said Angie Rowntree, founder of Sssh.com and organizer of the event. “To women like me, who work in this industry absolutely by choice and are passionate about what we do for a living, that’s an extremely insulting and demeaning claim. This event gives some of the industry’s strongest women a chance to look their critics straight in the eye and prove to them that they’re wrong in making that assertion.”
Panelists Included:
Penthouse Managing Director Kelly Holland
The organizers said Holland brought her impeccable professional credentials and a long history of achievement both inside and outside the adult entertainment industry.
“We’re absolutely delighted that Kelly accepted our invitation to contribute her perspective to this important discussion,” said Angie Rowntree, owner and founder of Sssh.com. “I think some of the adult industry’s harshest critics simply don’t believe that women like Kelly — meaning strong, independent, smart and accomplished women — actually exist within our industry, and Kelly is a wonderful living example of just how wrong they are.”
Holland entered adult in the mid-’90s, while working on a film documentary about the industry for European television, when she was asked to direct an adult movie. That directorial debut launched a career that has garnered her high praise as both a director and an executive, leading to her promotion to the high-level Penthouse position. The executive’s list of accomplishments at Penthouse includes substantially growing its broadcast division globally. Today, Penthouse Entertainment boasts 10 distinct channels reaching more than 100 countries and 400 million households.
In an interview prior to the event, Holland started, “I’m looking forward to a lively and challenging discussion,” Holland said. “While adult entertainment is in many ways more accepted by the public than ever, there’s still a host of misconceptions, stereotypes and stigmas attached to our industry that we need to address head-on. The Women in Porn event provides a great opportunity to answer our critics in our own words, without the media filter that often emphasizes only the most sensational and salacious elements of this ongoing cultural debate. ”
The organizers noted that in addition to her work with Penthouse, Holland also serves as the President of The Animal Rescue Alliance (TARA), which is currently preparing for its 5th annual“Vice is Nice” fundraiser, set for July 26 at Rancho Providencia in Chatsworth, California.
Ashley Fires, the official spokesmodel for Clips4Sale.com, also produces and directs content for her own site, AshleyFires.com, and the sci-fi “fembot” site, SciFiDreamGirls.com.
“In addition to being an outstanding performer, Ashley is a independent thinker and brilliant business women” said Angie Rowntree, owner of Sssh.com and organizer of “Women in Porn: Shattering the Myths.” “Ashley can speak first-hand about life in the industry on both sides of the camera, and from the perspective of an entrepreneur as well. It’s a broad and diverse point of view, and it makes her an ideal participant for this event.”
Fires, who has been interviewed by publications and websites like the LA Times, LA Weekly, Huffington Post and The Daily Beast, said she’s looking forward to the opportunity to address some of the criticisms directed at the adult industry — and at women like herself.
“I am very honored and much obliged to be part of this discussion with these amazing women,” Fires said. “I hope this debate will help to clarify the stereo types and shatter the myths about women in the adult industry.”
Fires has appeared in over 100 adult features, working with top-shelf studios like Adam & Eve, Hustler, Digital Playground, Wicked, Elegant Angel and Penthouse. She has also been nominated for multiple awards, including the XBIZ Awards for Best Web Starlet and Best Performer.
Marketing guru and MakeLoveNotPorn co-founder Cindy Gallop
“As someone who is both a distributor of sexually-explicit videos and, at times, somewhat critical of the porn industry, Cindy brings a very interesting perspective to the discussion,” said Angie Rowntree, owner of the porn-for-women site Sssh.com, who is organizing and sponsoring the event. “As one of the world’s leading thinkers in advertising and marketing, Cindy also has very impressive credentials outside of the adult entertainment industry.”
A graduate of Somerville College, Oxford, whose background is brand-building, marketing and advertising, Gallop opened U.S. office of advertising agency Bartle Bogle Hegarty in New York in 1998 and was named Advertising Woman of the Year in 2003.
In addition to her MakeLoveNotPorn (MLNP) enterprise, Gallop is the founder and CEO of IfWeRanTheWorld.com, described as “co-action software” that launched in beta at TED 2010, and was later taught as a case study at Harvard Business School.
Gallop founded MakeLoveNotPorn.com in 2009 and in 2013 together with co-founders Corey Innis (CTO) and Oonie Chase (UX Lead) beta-launched MakeLovePorn.tv, a platform that enables people to share their homemade sex videos online and share in the revenue generated through rental of the videos by site users.
Gallop maintains that while the videos distributed by MLNP are sexually-explicit, they are not porn — not “amateur”, but “real world sex.” The MakeLovePorn.tv site proclaims that it is “of the people, by the people and for the people who believe that the sex we have in our everyday lives is the hottest sex there is.”
“MakeLoveNotPorn’s mission is to make it easier to talk about sex, by making ‘#realworldsex’ socially acceptable and socially shareable, because other social media networks and platforms won’t,” Gallop says of the inspiration behind MLNP. “When we don’t talk about sex, porn becomes default sex education, in not the best way. Porn isn’t the issue; not talking about sex is. That’s why our tagline is ‘Pro-sex. Pro-porn. Pro-knowing the difference.’”
Dr. Chauntelle Tibbals, Moderator
Tibbals has been instrumental in organizing Women in Porn: Shattering the Myths, and is “deeply informed on all the issues we want to cover.
“Chauntelle has been researching the adult industry for more than 10 years, and is one of the few academics who has taken the time to consider the industry’s nuances and approached it with an open mind,” Rowntree said. “She’s is the perfect person to moderate this discussion, and has been an amazing resource for us during the planning of the debate. ”
Tibbals said that helping to organize the event “has been extremely rewarding.”
“As a sociologist and social justice advocate, it’s been wonderful to contribute to an event that’s working to broaden public understanding by encouraging multiple perspectives,” Tibbals said. “Not everyone has to agree, but everyone’s voice is worth consideration. I am excited to help break down the ‘talking about’ and encourage the ‘talking to.’”
Tibbals’ research has been published in numerous scholarly journals including Sexualities, Gender Work & Organization, Journal of Contemporary Ethnography, and Stanford Law and Policy Review. She has been quoted and cited extensively by cultural and news media outlets including CNN, Business Insider, Slate, and NPR.
“This was a truly open discussion, one in which we faced the criticisms directed at our industry head-on,” Rowntree continued. “We may disagree with our critics, but we respect their opinions, and we see value in answering them point by point in a setting like this, rather than just dismissing them as prudes or moral crusaders.”
Panelists discussed a wide variety of topics, and the event was live tweeted and monitored at @ssshforwomen under the hashtag #WomenInPorn. Viewers intereacted during the event and posde their own questions and points, which were then be discussed by the panelists.
“Porn has reached a point where it’s just part of the broader cultural landscape now, so this isn’t just a discussion to be had by the industry and its critics,” Rowntree said. “We’re giving porn’s fans and detractors a voice in the discussion too, via Twitter.”
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