Adult Film Labor

Workers in the porn industry derive their livelihoods from sex, which most conceive of as private and, therefore, an activity with only a damaging public work face. But capitalism in its current, postindustrial iteration, characterized by the rise of the gig economy, the decline of unions, and the spatiotemporal pervasiveness of work, has forced a redefinition of the divides between private and public, life and work. In so-called late capitalism, life is work, sped up by the internet and digital existence. Our private, authentic selves become public commodities for sale. And the 40-hour work week at a central location has increasingly given way to dispersed spot work that can occupy any time or place. Porn workers have weathered these apparent contradictions for decades, however. As such, their labor can offer a reexamination of those truths about work that we hold to be self-evident, allowing us to look with nuance on dichotomies of victim and agent, public and private, life and work. Porn labor provides us with an opportunity not to exercise our morality but to reconceive the very nature of life and work themselves.