Bad porn reprise
<p>Many people wrote me with comments on my essay<br />
<a href="http://esr.ibiblio.org/index.php?m=200206#109">Why Does Porn Got To Hurt So Bad?</a>.  For all of those who<br />
sent praise, thank you.  It&#8217;s actually nice to know there are so many<br />
people who would like to reject the bad-porn aesthetic. For all<br />
of those who refrained from calling down fire and brimstone on me for messing with smut, also thank you. I&#8217;d have ignored you,<br />
but thank you anyway.</p>
<p>I got two responses I thought were particularly interesting.<br />
One was from a gentleman who works as a pornographer.  He<br />
opined that I overestimated the porn industry by supposing that<br />
bad porn reflected market demand.  The real problem (he claims)<br />
is that it&#8217;s hard to find women who simultaneously don&#8217;t look<br />
hard and jaded yet are willing to bare all for the camera.  Most<br />
outfits, he said, don&#8217;t even try. They settle for the fake-pearl-and-synthoboob look out of laziness, knowing it&#8217;s crap<br />
but will sell well enough.</p>
<p>This doesn&#8217;t explain to me why, if Veronika Zemanova can look like a girl one might willingly take to bed in one picture and an unnatural womanoid-thing in another, they don&#8217;t try to photograph<br />
women like her in the more natural mode more often.  But perhaps<br />
this one was just a trick of the light.</p>
<p>Another respondent proposes the interesting theory that the<br />
girls are dressed (or rather undressed) to look inaccessible<br />
because if they weren&#8217;t, there might be an epidemic of stalking<br />
as various creeps and wackos tried to get next to them.</p>
<p>It would be touching to believe the porn industry cares that<br />
much about its performers, but I&#8217;m skeptical.</p>
<p>Finally, I got mail from <a href="http://www.germanlucy.com/lucysgirls/images/lucykiesgrube04.jpg"><br />
&#8220;German Lucy&#8221;</a>, who said she was honored to appear in my<br />
essay and quite enjoyed it. Rather to my astonishment, her email style<br />
suggests that she really is &#8220;as sweet-natured and unjaded as she<br />
looks&#8221;.  She answered my questions plausibly and thoughtfully and didn&#8217;t even pitch me to sign up for her site.</p>
<p>Holy Diogenes, Batman!  I think I might have found the<br />
one honest porn star&#8230;</p>
