The pleasures of fetishization: BBW erotic webcam performers, empowerment, and pleasure

ABSTRACT

In this article, I argue that BBW (big beautiful women) webcam models who perform online as erotic webcam performers use their bodies, not just their words, to challenge anti-fat culture. These performers are not explicitly engaged in political activism. However, while motivated by an individual desire for money, intimacy, and pleasure, these erotic laborers challenge anti-fat discourses by branding themselves as BBW. BBW performers exploit anti-fat discourses in ways that challenge normative standards of embodiment and beauty and produce numerous individual benefits for cam models. BBW cam models report high levels of empowerment and improvement to self-concept. Additionally, I show that BBW cam models often experience pleasure as a fundamental part of their work, and in doing so, I also highlight what I am calling the pleasures of fetishization. I use this analysis to push back against feminist critiques that focus only negatively on the fetishization of fat bodies in pornography. Instead, drawing from feminist porn studies, I argue that it is crucial for scholars to account for experiences of pleasure in pornography and other forms of sex work. I conclude this article with a discussion of the significant implications of this research for scholars working in a range of social science disciplines.

KEYWORDS:

• Cam models
• webcamming
• pornography
• sex work
• pleasure
• fetishization
• intersectionality

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author.

Notes

1. Often fat activism is conducted by people who are both academics and activist. I do not mean to suggest that these two categories are mutually exclusive.

2. For a more detailed account of my research methods, please see Jones Forthcoming). Additionally, for an account of my challenging experiences acquiring IRB approval, see Jones (2018).

3. While some sites feature a few “chubby” or “bear” men, like traditional porn, there are relatively no fat men in the camming industry. Fat male bodies have little economic value in the entire sex industry. While beyond the scope of this article, scholars should study the absence of fat men in the erotic marketplace.

4. Here, I do not mean to suggest that transgender people are a homogenous group. There was a distinct underrepresentation of trans women, trans men, nonbinary, and genderqueer fat cam performers. As I note in the conclusion, this underrepresentation is an area in need of further research.

5. See Tarrant (2016) for a comprehensive discussion of the contemporary porn industry.

6. According to urban sociologist Jason Orne (2017), “Sexual racism is a system of racial oppression, shaping an individual’s partner choices to privilege whites and harm people of color.”

7. For an extensive discussion of the conceptualization of sexual capital, see Green (2008, 2014).

Additional information

Notes on contributors

Angela Jones

Angela Jones is an Associate Professor of Sociology at Farmingdale State College, State University of New York. Jones’s research interests include: African American political thought and protest, gender, and sexuality. Jones is the author of Selling Sex Online: Work, Community, and Pleasure in the Erotic Webcam Industry (NYU Press, 2019) and African American Civil Rights: Early Activism and the Niagara Movement (Praeger, 2011). She is a coeditor of the three-volume After Marriage Equality book series (Routledge, 2018). Jones has also edited two other anthologies: The Modern African American Political Thought Reader: From David Walker to Barack Obama (Routledge, 2012), and A Critical Inquiry into Queer Utopias (Palgrave, 2013). She is also the author of numerous scholarly articles published in peer-reviewed journals.