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Feminist responses in Hot Girls Wanted
Hot Girls Wanted demonstrates to viewers the complications that come along with amateur porn. Reviews of pornography range from anti-pornogrpahy feminism to sex-positive feminism however this film explores an unbiased opinion. This film could be seen as either sex-positive or anti-pornogprahy.
Anti-pornography feminist views
Those with Feminist views of pornography argued that much of what is seen in pornography is abusive to women. In Hot Girls Wanted, issues of objectification and exploitation of the young women filmed caused internal issues amongst them. The degrading sexual acts seen throughout this documentary are: women getting slapped in the face, racial slurs, and women forced to vomit and then eat it. These actions could lead to sexualization. Two of the main characters Tressa Silguero and Rachel Bernard reflect back on their sexual experiences which lead them to being physically, mentally, and emotionally abused. They refer to being treated as objects and that they were 'working' and did not actually enjoy intercourse just the money. Some pornography exploits the idea of the mistreatment of women (i.e Facial Abuse[1]) or want women to stretch out their vaginas with non normal human sized objects, which occurs in this film. The main characters discuss how hard it is to deal with such sexual acts.
According to the Media Education Foundation, the sexualization of girls in media, and the ways women are portrayed in the dominant culture, is detrimental to the development of young girls as they are developing their identities and understanding themselves as sexual beings.[2] Viewers see this when producers ask the characters if they have sexual lives outside of the industry. The majority of the time, Tressa and Rachel, responded that they don't have intimate lives outside of pornography because of the fear of how men would treat them. However, people who are not knowledgeable of this documentary believe that because pornography is consensual that these women are knowledgable about all acts and do not acknowledge how women like Tressa and Rachel feel.
Sex-positive feminist views
Sex-positive feminism is the belief that sex is a freedom for women. While critics like Gail Dines analyze the idea of pornography, others like Ellen Willis celebrate the idea of sexual exploration. The characters in this documentary choose to explore pornography and to escape from their everyday small time lives. The women shown in this documentary enjoy the industry, the attention and monetary gain they receive. Viewers are witness to the monetary gain because of how often the women express how much each sexual act costs for example, one sexual act may pay $900 US dollars. Sex-positive feminists take a variety of views towards existing pornography. Many sex-positive feminists see pornography as subverting many traditional ideas about women that they oppose, such as ideas that women do not like sex generally, only enjoy sex in a relational context, or that women only enjoy vanilla sex.[1] They also argue that pornography sometimes shows women in sexually dominant roles and presents women with a greater variety of body types than are typical of mainstream entertainment and fashion.[2] Viewers see these ideas reflected in the women in this documentary. They are independent, comfortable in their own bodies, and making their own decisions.
References
- ^ "FacialAbuse.com: The Truth About their REAL Abuse and Exploitation". www.antipornography.org. Retrieved 2015-10-22.
- ^ Jhally, Sut, Jean Kilbourne, and David Rabinovitz. Killing Us Softly 4: Advertising's Image of Women. Northampton, MA: Media Education Foundation, 2010.