Our first article in this issue calls for a fresh look at how we do histories of pornography. For many scholars working in pornography studies there is the temptation to seek to uncover the disruptive or resistant elements of represented or performed sex. But as Peter Alilunas confesses, sometimes those projects have the opposite effect, that the ‘difficult nature’ of porn studies and its explorations of pleasure, power, and regulation lead to definitions that bring their own exclusions and containment practices. His essay offers a clear call to avoid ‘a new kind of “charmed circle”, one where some scholarly topics and projects are identified and supported, and others are not’. Alilunas surveys elements of production, performance, and consumption from the 1970s to 1980s, making an important case for thinking about how and why terminologies might matter and why it is necessary to take a step back to examine the assumptions that underpin our own investigations, and their consequences.
Terminology matters to Sarah Ashton, Karalynn McDonald, and Maggie Kirkman too. In ‘What Does “Pornography” Mean in the Digital Age’, Ashton and colleagues review past practices of porn research in order to explore what ‘pornography’ is in the digital age. It will come as no surprise to readers of this journal that defining pornography, both as genre and individual representations, can be fraught and that significant politics can lie beneath our definitions. Ashton and her co-authors ask how social scientists can be sure that they are using the same measures and definitions. Particularly when talking of digital media. In a discussion which reflects on the formation and application of a suitable definition, they provide an overview of contemporary pornography in the digital age as a practical resource for researchers.
In ‘Understanding the Believability and Erotic Value of “Heterosexual” Men in Gay Pornography’, Mark Kiss and his co-authors examine another area of definition and consumption. The popular trope of the ‘gay for pay’ performer is teased apart in order to explore its parameters, its ‘authenticities’, and its value as desirable alongside three other categories – ‘bisexual or gay curious’, ‘coercion’, and ‘situational same-sex desire’ – that make up a significant proportion of commercially produced gay porn. Via various testing methods, Kiss and colleagues investigate the popularity of heterosexual themes in gay porn, delving into the variables deemed most erotic by consumers.
Focusing on the successes and weaknesses of studio-produced pornography in the digital age, Vince Barnett examines how branding impacts consumption of pornography, how taste formations might function in relation to pornography DVD selection and brand loyalty. His account explores in detail the sales figures and the increasing trends towards platform consolidation, picking apart the ways in which different players in the pornography business across the globe have retained customer recognition and sales performance in the face of the rise of tube sites.
Geoffrey Locke's ‘Cuckolds, Cucks, and Their Transgressions’ assesses the relationship between cuckold porn and cuck memes’ depictions of white masculinist anxieties. Cuckoldry has been a theme for playwrights and novelists for centuries, but more recently cuckolding developed into a subgenre of pornography. Even more recently, the terms ‘cuck’ and ‘cuckservative’ have spread to mainstream discourse in the months leading up to the 2016 US presidential election, where it was used to express distain for progressive politics. Locke explores the ways the cuckold has capacity to subvert yet reinforce normativity – its transgressions in porn also confirm heterosexist, white masculinity and, in the ‘manosphere’, the racialized revision of cuckoldry is used to express sexual–racial myths as a term of insult by alt-right opponents of the ‘metropolitan liberal elite’.
The law never sleeps, particularly when it comes to pornography. Two articles in this issue focus on the oddities of the UK legislative field. On the one hand, the 1959 Obscene Publications Act is supposedly brought into the twenty-first century with the seeming liberalization of some of its provisions, while, on the other, the State institutes Age Verification for all commercial porn sites. Despite being one of the few bits of ‘good news’ for the United Kingdom's Tory Government currently mired in its Brexit debacle, the launch of Age Verification for online content has been subject to constant deferrals. Originally passed into law in 2017 as part of the Digital Economy Act, the rules will now come into force in mid-July 2019 and give new powers for the British Board of Film Classification. The Department for Culture, Media and Sport has claimed that age verification is in the best interests of children and, as Margot James (Minister for Digital and the Creative Industries) put it, will make ‘the UK the safest place in the world to be online’. Independent scholar and activist Pandora Blake delves into the intricacies of some of the consequences of this new law. Julian Petley, a veteran observer of numerous moral panics and attendant legislation against pornography, explores the limits of the recent intention to liberalize some prosecution guidelines for the Obscene Publications Act.
Debates about pornography and its merits or demerits as sex education continue to rage in the United Kingdom and globally. Kate Dawson, Saoirse Nic Gabhainn, and Pádraig MacNeela test the claim that young people turn to pornography for sex education where formal classes have left them dissatisfied. In a study of Irish university students, aged 18–24 years, they found that a majority had used pornography for sexual information, but their reasons for doing so varied considerably. Education and Ireland are also the subject of our forum section in this issue. Across three articles, Caroline West, Aoife Tobin, and Kate West explore the particular struggles to debate sex, sexuality, and pornography in a country still dominated by the influences of the Catholic Church. The ethics of porn and its potential for education are explored in Caroline West's interview with porn performer Blath.
Finally, this issue also includes a short introduction by Patrick Kielty to the Sexual Representation Collection at the University of Toronto. Researching pornography and associated sexual cultures has often proved difficult precisely because of the paucity of available archives. We hope to make this a regular element of the journal, so please do get in touch if you would like to introduce an archive to our readers.