Sunday, April 3, 2011

Being a porn actress isn’t a crime, so women shouldn’t be harassed because of it

Recently two women in separate incidents were exposed by students at schools where they worked as having been employed previously as porn actresses.
One lost her job and the other has been suspended.
These women did nothing inappropriate with the students in their schools. They are being punished for doing things in their personal lives that, while legal, conservative people dislike.
The teenagers who ratted out the women weren’t old enough to be watching porn in the first place. If there’s a problem here, that’s where it lies.
In March, a high school science teacher in suburban St. Louis who worked in the adult film industry in the mid-1990s resigned from her job after a student outed her. AVN writer Mark Kernes wrote an excellent article explaining how current and former porn actors and actresses are treated like “second-class citizens.”
More recently, a Canadian high school student harassed a clerical worker at his school when he discovered that she had acted in several adult movies. When she refused to give him an autograph, he created a Facebook page under the woman’s porn name and outed her. She’s been suspended and is waiting to see if she can keep her job.
This is why actors in adult films use fake names. But even that doesn’t afford them much protection from harassment.
A disgruntled porn producer is connected with a WikiLeaks-style website that exposes the real names and addresses of over 12,000 former and current adult performers. The site, Pornwikileaks.com, is opening those performers up to potential harassment and embarrassment. (See articles at CNet and AVN.)
Some retired porn performers have resorted to Witness Protection Program-style vanishing acts, such as Bambi Woods from “Debbie Does Dallas.” (See archived article from the YesButNoButYes blog.)
The Internet is making it easier for people to harass porn performers. Such harassment is plain wrong, regardless of what people think about porn.

Dec. 24, 2011, update: 'Samantha Ardente,' High School Employee Fired For Porn, Launches Porn Firm. (Huffington Post)

Photo: Canadian porn actress Samantha Ardente.

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