The Association of Sites Advocating Child Protection (ASACP) has released Best Practices for Social Media. ASACP’s Best Practices were developed to help businesses maximize their ability to stop online child pornography and to help parents prevent their children from unknowingly viewing age-restricted content on the world-wide web.

According to Pew Internet Research, nearly three quarters (73%) of online teens and an equal number (72%) of young adults use social network sites. You can see the research here.

“Since children’s use of social media network sites are continuing to increase and the adult industry continues to lead in the use of technology, it is important for ASACP to consistently update its Best Practices” stated ASACP CEO Joan Irvine. “Granted there are no perfect solutions, but ASACP’s Best Practices are the best tools available to protect children and your company. We encourage everyone, whether they are an ASACP member or not, to review them regularly at the website.”

Social Media Best Practices

• Label all sexually explicit ‘social media content postings’, including but not limited to text, video, audio, images or widgets enabling any software functionality.

• All social media content postings should indicate “Age-Restricted” or “Sexually Explicit” based on the content.

• When you direct people to age-restricted content or commerce on or from online social networks & mobile devices, ensure that all of your social media and mobile pages, from blogs, ads, and ecommerce tools, to videos, fan pages, apps and widgets are labeled with the Restricted to Adults – RTA website label.

Irvine added “As a result, if parents or guardians have activated one of the many parental filters including those in the Apple and Microsoft operating systems, minors will be blocked from access to and prevented from the ability to purchase age-restricted material and products.”

Founded in 1996, ASACP is a non-profit organization dedicated to online child protection. ASACP comprises of two separate corporate entities, the Association of Sites Advocating Child Protection and the ASACP Foundation. The Association of Sites Advocating Child Protection (ASACP) is a 501(c)(4) social welfare organization. ASACP manages a membership program that provides resources to companies in order to help them protect children online. The ASACP Foundation is a 501(c)(3) charitable organization. The ASACP Foundation battles child pornography through its CP Reporting Hotline and helps parents prevent children from viewing age-restricted material online with its Restricted To Adults – RTA Website Label. ASACP is the only association in the world that coordinates the adult entertainment industry’s efforts to protect children online. It has spent over 14 years creating progressive programs to protect children. ASACP’s relat ionship in assisting the adult industry’s child protection efforts is unparalleled. Companies and individuals interested in supporting ASACP may go to www.asacp.org for more information on how to get involved.

The ASACP is a great organization that helps protect children. I truly feel that as those in the business of entertaining adults, we have to keep in mind that our entertainment is not meant for children – and we should participate in making sure that our entertainment is kept only for adults. As a non-profit entity, the ASACP depends on donations and participation to keep itself running. Please, if you have an adult site, use the RTA label. To donate, please go here.

Adult performers primarily operate on ego – and male performers seem to operate on that more than female performers. It’s an industry that operates on physical attractiveness, a measure of youthfulness, and ability to perform on cue. It’s a hard (pardon the pun) industry for men – their performance is clearly visible. Female performers can get away with, well, performance — in the acting sense of the word. There are only a few performers that work without having met all of the superficial criteria laid out above (for instance, Ron Jeremy) — but those performers are rare, are still able to perform, and come with an established history in the business. I have a lot of respect for male performers because if I were a guy, I probably wouldn’t be able to perform on cue like they do.

I’m not sure which “industry veteran” with whom you spoke, but I do know that performers in general have been feeling the pinch of the decline of the adult industry. Fewer bookings means less money, and less money means the inability to do those things that came so easily (again, pardon the pun) when money was flowing. More performers competing for fewer shoots means that everyone’s frustrated — financially as well as sexually, even in an industry that is built on sex.

Personally, I think it’s hypocritical to be a performer in the adult industry and then expect their life partner to not “give away anything so important and valuable.” Saying “I’m off to shoot a scene with a hot xxx performer, but you can’t do the same because for me it’s work, for you it means you’re cheating,” implies a double standard, which often results in industry relationships falling apart.

Is there drug use in the industry? Alcohol abuse? Of course. Is it more or less than drug and alcohol abuse in other business sectors? I’m not sure. I know of enough lawyers and stockbrokers who are on cocaine to stay awake to do their jobs, and enough blue-collar workers who abuse alcohol, and varying degrees of that scattered in between. It’s an escapist methodology that doesn’t stay restricted to the adult industry – and to say that it is limited to that line of work is narrow-minded and shallow.

What about the statistics surrounding STDs and the adult industry? Anyone who says that STDs do not occur outside of XXX, and that XXX is responsible for the spread of STDs is, again, narrow-minded. Blaming any industry that an outsider doesn’t understand is nothing new — it happens in religion, politics, and mainstream business all the time. The adult industry requires testing of its performers — something that isn’t required by most men and women in the dating scene. There is no desire in common society for a couple who is just starting to be intimate to check each other’s sexual health history. The implication is that it’s rude to ask, and presumptuous to assume that the other person might have an STD. As a result, people get infected on a regular basis outside the industry. At least we’re regulated in that regard.

Does the industry attract people who are “weak minded”? Perhaps, at one time. Perhaps, even now, within a certain segment of the populace. It’s an industry that showcases barely-legal performers in sexual situations, and to an extent, capitalizes on the rebellious nature of teens finally out of their parents’ rule. Yes, it attracts the desperate. High school dropouts who became single moms, who turned to stripping, who turned to porn as a means to put food on the table and a roof over their heads – you hear that all the time.

However, the industry is no longer LIMITED to those with no education and a dead end life. With the recent recession, the industry also saw older performers and college graduates enter the adult workforce as a means to ride out the economic turmoil. Of those who did come from educated (whether in life or in school) backgrounds; many performers were also sexually open, and used the industry to experiment and explore their own sexual boundaries. So the assumption that those who perform in the industry are “weak minded” no longer holds true.

My response to Chris Hedges would be this: he assumes there is no socially redeeming value to adult entertainment because he already has preconceived notions about the industry (and other aspects of society) prior to his writing. Everyone is different. Everyone has a different kink. Having, as you noted, twenty-five guys masturbate all over a girl may be a sexual turn-on for some, not limited to the viewer but to the performer as well. For some, it’s not. It’s all about perspective. No one is forcing the girl to sit and take that sort of treatment (unless she has a pimp, which is another conversation altogether). The girl CHOSE to be in that position, and these days, it’s not only because she is being lured by a paycheck (with the decline of the industry, pay for scenes isn’t what it used to be) or being forced to by a pimp. If that isn’t empowering, I’m not sure what is. Assuming that something that YOU find perverse or a turn-off would be the same for the rest of the world is, as I said before, narrow-minded, shallow, and self-centered. Do all women have to conform to only being allowed to enjoy sex in the missionary position with a certain number of strokes before the man ejaculates? Is it bad that a man/woman actually enjoys him/herself in the throes of rough sex? Anal play? Bondage? Does that make him/her evil? Or does that allow people to accept their own private proclivities without feeling as if they themselves are a social outcast? Does it allow people to wonder if something really is enjoyable, and explore their own sexuality with themselves or with a partner? Does it ultimately help us accept and be more tolerant of each other’s differences?

Personally, I feel that your time on this planet, regardless of industry, is what you make of it. I entered the business as part of an emotional sabbatical after a traumatic breakup — I CHOSE to work with tested talent in scenes that I agreed to because, in all honesty, I felt it was safer than going to a nightclub or a bar, or even answering a personals ad. I’d had enough bad experiences with civilian people that I thought were honest with me, who turned out not to be. If there is anything that could be said about the adult industry, it is that at least the parameters were roughly, bluntly, shamelessly laid out. You and your scene partner are paid to perform in front of a camera in a sexual situation. Sometimes there is chemistry, sometimes there is not. You agree to the scene, positions, and dialogue in the scene prior to performance. When the scene is done, people are paid — and you may never hear from them again. You may not see them for months, until you are both hired again to be in another scene. The cycle repeats. There’s no deceit nor pretense as to whether or not the scene is truly romantic. It’s a job.

Getting into the adult industry may have been the single-most boost to my self-esteem in my life. I’m a larger girl, categorized in the industry as a BBW (big beautiful woman). Like most bigger girls, I was teased through most of my childhood. Society doesn’t portray bigger people as sexy or beautiful — we’re supposed to be funny. Comedic. Acceptable to be made fun of. As an adult performer, I not only had a hair/makeup person tending to me, but fans who would take the time to tell you how beautiful, sexy, attractive, desired you were. My experience may be different from other performers, but for me, it was uplifting.

My time in the industry was not a career choice; it was a sabbatical. Perhaps that may be the difference between performers who are bitter and those who are not; I never intended for my time in this industry to be a life-long career. I got in while I was in my mid-thirties, not when I was “barely legal”. I picked what scenes I wanted to do and turned down projects that didn’t appeal to me. Over time, performances have slowed (as they do for most performers, as new girls constantly come in to take your place), and I found that I no longer want to perform as much as before. Perhaps my “sowing of my oats” period had come to an end, but I was ready to date again, and was lucky enough to find someone in the industry who I adore spending my time with. There’s no judgment; trying to date someone outside the business comes with its own set of problems due to social norms and assumptions of whorish behavior, and I don’t have to deal with those issues with my partner.

In time, I know I will stop performing altogether. Understanding that youth and beauty fade, and with that, the amount of work diminishes, is something that those who enjoy their time in this industry understand. I’ve already started to take the steps to have a career that doesn’t rely on performance — and I’ll be able to look back at my time in the adult industry as something that was exciting, titillating, and an interesting life experience.

Anyhow – that was probably an incredibly long response to your email. Please feel free to ask me any questions, if you need more info on any particular part of what I have written.

Warm Regards,
Kelly

With adult performers such as Sasha Grey and Tommy Gunn appearing on mainstream shows such as Entourage (and you KNOW the drama that is upcoming because Vincent is dating a (gasp!) pornstar while up for a Stan Lee production), the perpetuation of assumptions about the industry is bound to continue.

I’m not sure to what extent my diatribe to the writer will be used, but I hope that perhaps it’ll be enough to make people question their assumptions about the people who choose to make sex their business.

Former model Liandra Dahl is said to have claimed G Media used cash payments in order to woo teenagers into performing sex acts that are illegal when in the presence of a camera.

“It is utterly unethical to mislead very young people into choices that could affect their entire life,” Dahl lectured.

This is the very reason why I don’t mentor teens or mothers. I just don’t think that minors should be exposed to certain things until they are of the age to make those decisions with an intellectual, logical mind – one that understands all the possible ramifications of being an adult entertainer in a society that has strong negative social mores against that sort of work. And mothers have an obligation to be a role model for their children.

This isn’t Italy, where a pornstar can run – and win – a seat in government. And although we have things like the Stormy Daniels for Senate campaign in Louisiana, it’s really not going to be changing ideas in middle America. If you’re an adult entertainer, the common perception is that you weren’t smart enough to do anything else but sell your body. You’re a bubble-headed bimbo that uses her body to make her living. And if she’s loose enough to do that, then she also must be so horrible that you can’t hire her in your office.

That’s the perception. It’s a misconception for some (yours truly trying to show the exception to the norm).

So why convince girls who are just starting their independent lives for the first time that adult entertainment is the way to go? Or, if doing so, why are companies neglecting to at least say, “Hey. You’re pretty, you’re sexy. But maybe you want to consider all your options first.” You’re just not finding companies doing that, because they know there is a demand for teen talent and the bottom line comes first.

“Saved by the Bell,” “90210,” and countless other mainstream television and film projects use non-minors in minor positions. Why not do the same for adult talent? Many of those actors were in their 30s, you know.

I know a lot of people don’t agree with my values, and that’s ok. I would never consider myself a role model for the young. I do consider myself a role model (or at least try to) for intelligent adult women who have a healthy sexual identity. You’re just not going to see me taking on any teen talent or mothers under my wing. They’ve got far more important things to do right now. Come back and see me once you’re not in a position to influence the easily influenced, or be influenced easily yourself, have graduated college and worked a few jobs, and you STILL want to consider a hobby in the adult industry. I’ll still ask you a barrage of questions before you start though.

It’s learning that your customer’s wife is pregnant.
It’s learning that your customer’s just been laid off.
It’s learning that your customer’s just moved into town and doesn’t know what’s a good place to go to eat a good steak.

All that information can be translated into crafting something special for that customer. Sure, it may not be an immediate sale. It may take a while. But a funny thing happens. The minute YOU become emotionally attached to someone, they feel comfortable opening up to you. And the minute you ALLOW someone to become emotionally attached to you, they become slightly loyal. Not only does the customer feel awesome, but you might also inadvertedly learn something that’s missing from your product as well – something that might make it better for your customer the next time they come around.

This is how companies USED to do business, before the megamarts and conglomerates. People used to be loyal to their butcher and baker, not just because they made a good product, but because they knew that they were safe shopping there. They knew they could walk in and order “the usual”. They knew if someone in their family died, their baker would CARE. Hell, their butcher might give them an extra quarter-pound of ground beef if they knew you were short on cash.

My dad used to do this. He bought nothing but Toyotas for years when we lived in Japan. He found a dealership that he liked – and he was loyal to them. He knew that if he had a problem, he could take the car to them, and they would treat him like a VIP. It wasn’t that Toyotas were better than Nissans. It was how he felt. His experience with the people that ran that dealership made him feel like he wasn’t just a guy with a wad of cash to spend.

Now that we’re in a global society, we have the luxury of being able to do this on a much wider scale. So start caring. And not in a glossy, nicely-presented ad. Engage your public. And ACTUALLY care.

Become emotionally attached.