dcortez

Until now, the 'law' has been a (good and bad) method of keeping adult industry content within some fuzzy zone of what might be generally accepted by various communities. It's far from perfect and laced with side-effects rooted in political agendas, but some of the hardfast rules relating to CP, and niches which go 'way too far' actually make sense (to enough of us).

As adult entertainment moves towards securing it's legitimate place in our culture (good for all of us), there is a growing need to ensure that the industry as a whole takes stewardship and responsibility for its participants.

Rather than relying on laws (which are generally made up by those who know little about our industry and operate on a contrary agenda), I propose we establish:

Adult Industry Best Practices Guidelines

... developed by our industry, enforced, and maintained by our industry.

ASACP (a great initiative and organization) offers a Best Practices document, but it is CP-centric and does not address all the issues which relate to the products and conduct of the adult industry.

This is NOT about censorship - this is about PEER REVIEW.

This is NOT about diluting explicit sexuality - if anything, by demonstrating a socially responsible aproach to providing sexual theme entertainment, the 'evil sterotypes' often used to generalize us by those with contrary interests, will lose their effectiveness in signing up supporters.

This is NOT about forming unions or collecting fees for inefficient middle management - this is about distilling what the adult industry entails now, articulating it, assuming a considered and deliberate posture with respect it, promoting, maintaining, and defending it.

Without this, we may find it difficult to move up to the next level and truly be at par with any other legitimate industry. With a peer managed approach, we would be able to lobby WITH CREDIBILITY for or against anything which may impact our success (laws, social perceptions, equality in community access, etc.).

Recently, to my thinking, and apparently to the views of many others, there have been instances of (technically) 'legal' content production and promotion, which send a very bad message about the rest of us.

Some of this 'legal' content which is seriously tainting our industry involves:

- Extreme degradation of women

- Violence against women (choking, slapping) in a sexual context

- Explicit vomiting induced by forced oral sex

The fact that the aforementioned content MIGHT be legal and is apparently 'backed up' by consent and paperwork is IRRELEVANT.

I do NOT want this content associated with our industry.

Safe, sane, and consentual extreme sexuality is fine by me, but the content I am referring to does not even come close to instilling that sense.

It seriously hurts any progress we have made in establishing ourselves as a responsible industry. It sends a bad message to the communities we do business with and within.

With a set of Adult Industry Best Practices Guidelines, it would be easier to deal with harmful agents such as this.

CC Processor which observed the Adult Industry Best Practices Guidelines as part of their TOS, would prohibit or shut down offenders.

They are ALREADY doing this with respect to CP, scat, and beastiality. For the most part, I rarely hear anyone in this industry complaining that they cannot produce content for those themes.

Some issues may be too gray to define as unacceptable, but to my thinking, the ones I listed earlier are not that difficult to condemn by enough of our peers.

1) What are your thoughts on this?

2) Would you support the establishment of Adult Industry Best Practices Guidelines.

Thanks,
-Dino