By Nina Aron
One porn star accused another of rape on November 28. The accuser, popular porn performer, Vice columnist and artist Stoya, tweeted that it “sucks” to see “the guy who raped you idolized as a feminist.” She was talking about James Deen, who was her boyfriend and scene partner between 2013 and 2014. In a second tweet, she was more graphic, saying Deen held her down and forced her to have sex, ignoring her protests and her safe word. Since then, six other adult film actresses have come forward with harrowing stories of sexual assault, most often on set.
The term “porn star” is more than a stock phrase in the case of James Deen. Called the “Ryan Gosling of porn” by Esquire and the “well-hung boy next door” by GQ, Deen is perhaps the best- known male porn actor today. Though unassuming at 5’8”, he’s captivated female viewers and has often been referred to as a “feminist” (though he’s eschewed the label). His public persona has reached well beyond adult entertainment. Deen has hosted his own PG-13 cooking show, James Deen Loves Food, written an advice column for gossip site The Frisky, and starred opposite Lindsay Lohan in The Canyons, a roundly panned mainstream film written by American Psycho novelist Bret Easton Ellis.
Stoya and Deen seemed like the perfect couple (or coupling). They represented a happy, hipster pornscape focused on pleasure and consent. A world where enterprising boys-and-girls-next-door can become million-dollar brands. But Stoya’s allegations have swiftly destroyed Deen’s career. He’s been dropped by major porn studios, had his advice column yanked, and been condemned steadily and fairly unequivocally in major media and social media, where the hashtag #StandwithStoya was born minutes after her first damning tweet. His videos aregetting less traffic. Some have suggested women simply expunge him from their fantasy worlds.
Women engaged in sex work have always been especially vulnerable to rape and assault. The female star of the first blockbuster porn film made bold allegations of horrendous abuse. But the way our culture listens to such allegations has changed, as Stoya’s case starkly shows.
Linda Lovelace (nee Boreman) had an unremarkable Catholic childhood in the Bronx, then at age 22 became America’s first porn star in the 1972 film Deep Throat, (Yes, the name of the Watergate informant was an allusion to the film). The plot is intentionally ridiculous: A woman who doesn’t enjoy sex sees a doctor, who helps her realize that her clitoris is actually in her throat. The generous doctor helps her learn how to use her new gift and says she should perform it on many men until she finds one to marry. The rest is (oral) history.
Deep Throat was a cultural phenomenon, a hardcore porno that played in mainstream movie theaters and was reviewed in the New York Times. The film reflected the victories of the sexually liberated ’60s yet, as a tale of a woman whose ultimate physical pleasure comes from performing fellatio, showed how very, very far women had still to go. It ignited great controversy and became a cause célèbre for free-speech advocates. Stars like Warren Beatty and Jack Nicholson and public figures like Truman Capote and Jacqueline Onassis openly admitted they’d seen it. The film made millions. Hugh Hefner dubbed Lovelace the “new sex goddess of the 1970s.”
But Lovelace claimed after the film that she’d been brutalized by Chuck Traynor, her husband and manager, and forced to perform in the film at gunpoint. She wrote a memoir called Ordeal in 1980, chronicling years of abuse, rape and forced prostitution. The book coincided with heated debate within the feminist movement about whether pornography causes harm to women. Lovelace became a spokeswoman for the anti-pornography movement, appearing with feminist leader Gloria Steinem and seeking legal representation from anti-porn scholar Catherine MacKinnon. She even testified before Congress on the dangers of pornography.
Lovelace, like many sex workers and porn actresses who followed, was seen as complicit in her own degradation. Her credibility was frequently called into question. Steinem has said that Lovelace suffered not only “gang rape and internal injuries,” but spent years being “disbelieved and ridiculed.” She is still often treated as an unreliable source. The sexual violence she experienced was downplayed in the semi-biographical 2013 film Lovelace.
In an industry where dramatizations of rape are commonplace, defining rape and assault can seem murky. And sexual assault in the porn business often goes unreported. But the reception of Stoya’s allegations and the many women who’ve come forward since demonstrate that more and more, sex work is being treated as what it is: work.
James Deen is now being called the “Bill Cosby of porn,” but it took three decades for Bill Cosby’s actions to come to light and for the public to be willing to let go of his “good guy” image. Deen, porn’s consummate “good guy,” has been ousted within a week. Like so many news events, Deen’s may be a case of so-called “trial by Twitter.” But it also signals that the world is more willing to believe women.
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