Summary: For all the other fluids that appear regularly in porn, women’s natural lubrication is strikingly absent.
Another observation after skimming thousands and thousands of (mostly hetero-centric) porn photos: you see women dipped, sprayed, bedewed, or slathered with everything from waterfalls to sweat to rain to chocolate to paint to saliva to blood (menstrual or otherwise) to fruit juice to Jello to mud to surf (lotta surf for some reason) to suds to KY Jelly to snow to urine to tears to, of course, semen. Lots and lots of semen (or perhaps tinted methylcellulose, hair conditioner, or even plain old-fashioned post-processing pixels. And no that’s not the exhaustive list.
But never, as far as I can tell, the one liquid that almost never appears in pornographic photos are women’s actual, original vaginal juices.
You’ll see women wet in “cream pie” photos, but the whole point of that fetish is that it’s men’s ejaculate leaking back out. And you’ll occasionally see women peeing and, even less occasionally, “squirting” or ejaculating. But neither pee nor semen nor… liquid forcefully-ejected fluid from the urethral-sponge are the same at all.
Maybe I’m just not getting out as much as I used to but I have this distinct impression that women lubricate in many sexual situations.
To forestall one nomination lubrication occurs often enough even in stressful, coercive circumstances for counselors advise victims of criminal behavior. So even in the very unlikely event that all women in porn was coerced one would still expect to see more than one does. And to forestall another nomination, yes I’m aware that not all women become noticeably wet during sex, or even lubricate at all. But again, out of several thousands of samples one would expect to see more than dozens of instances.
Anyway, whereas I’m more sanguine than many about the now near-universal habit of women (and, increasingly, men) shaving everything below their eyebrows, which is often criticized as an inaccurate representation of natural women’s bodies I am concerned with the sort of awesome consistency whereby women are presented as wet from everything from motor oil to milk but only very rarely from themselves.
So! What do you figure that’s all about? My first impulse is to blame Rule #1 of the bogus Two Rules of Desire wherein any hint of women’s arousal would be taboo. Although in order to do that I’d have to ignore the point that lubricating women are a total staple of written porn. People with experience in porn are particularly welcome to weigh in with more prosaic explanations.
No theories at all, but a
Submitted by chingona (not verified) on Sat, 2009-12-12 23:38.No theories at all, but a question: Why does it concern you more than other aspects of porn that aren’t realistic?
[Hi Chigona. I should have been clear that I was talking more in terms of anatomy and decoration than, say, behavior. (For instance a main point of this post is that it concerns me that in terms of behavior folks in so much western porn seem so eternally somber.) Specifically I’m less concerned about body-hair depictions first because it varies a lot and second because it’s trending in both sexes, and that trending tends to soften the gender imperative. Lubrication is a lot more universal though, and at least based my experience with numerous actual people, its absence in porn — even porn depicting intercourse — seems as odd as a corresponding absence of erections would be. So while semi-gendered expectations about hair might be annoying a persistent gendered expectation that women are always dry… when in real life it’s rather important to all concerned that they’re not… is kind of freaky. —fl]
Not that I’m any grand
Submitted by Stasha (not verified) on Sun, 2009-12-13 06:12.Not that I’m any grand gourmand of porn, but I’d suspect the reasons have more to do with Filmmaking 101 than with anything in the “real world” of sex. Props add to the drama and, in an odd way, the believability of the story; if the audience can “see” it, they can’t “get it.”
For example, imagine a simple scene set in a kitchen. Our hero is making a bowl of cereal. If the Director, DP, and Editor just includes shots of the actor blithly filling his bowl, pouring milk, then eating the audience is left to wonder obvious things like “hey, where’d the milk come from?” The obvious answer is from the freakin’ fridge that we know is in every kitchen BUT without a shot of the hero taking the damn milk out of the icebox we the audience have a whole in the narrative that (may) distract from the scene.
Applied to porn, (and yes, I know this is a real silly comparison!) adding some other form of liquid is akin to going to the fridge. Since we can’t trust the audience to believe the obvious (women lubricate naturally in a way that’s hard to film) our Director has to add some chocolate syrup.
Another is that the unreality can add to the drama simply because it’s more interesting than the truth. Gansta and Western genre films and the associated gun play is another example. Holding a handgun sideways is almost a gaurnteed way to miss your target, but in part due to the cool factor and in another part do to character differentation, Gangsta characters almost always do this. Ditto for cowboys shooting from the hip.
But unnatural and awkward positions as well as unnatuaral — and in a lot of cases unhelpful — liquids up the ante by adding something fill in the gaps in our imagination and introduce a prop the intended audience can enjoy. Note the intentional use of “intended.” There aren’t very many pornographers out there making good films for me to enjoy. Since I don’t have an army of prop people and set dressers cleaning my bedroom, the thought of someone pouring chocolate on me and my 400 threadcount sheets absolutely ruins the mood.
Enjoy the research Figleaf!
[Maybe so. Or partly so. I think part of it is that a lot of people (especially early on) don’t have that much experience with aroused women partners, when it’s not dark anyway. And so in that sense I could see how yes, it could be seen as distracting. And as Calico says, below, it’s not strictly “necessary” for women to look aroused as it is for men to have erections. Still, kind of… incomplete. Thanks, Stasha. —fl]
I wonder if it’s an effect of
Submitted by SnowdropExplodes (not verified) on Sun, 2009-12-13 08:42.I wonder if it’s an effect of the fact that making porn generally involves using quite a lot of artificial lubricant anyway? I’m just guessing here that maybe the lube applied before the shoot perhaps blocks the natural stuff from being observable.
I do know that in photos that I have taken of partners’ vaginas, or partners have taken for me of their own, natural lubrication is very evident, so it’s not likely to be an effect of the camera not being able to distinguish it clearly enough either.
It’s interesting to note that in hentai porn and drawn art, natural lubrication is often included as well as in written porn – in fact, it often is seen as an important part of the storytelling process when describing a sexual encounter, establishing that the woman is indeed aroused (often 2 Rules assumptions playing in the background with that, but that’s a different discussion).
I think the wetness with various substances is partly to do with reproducing the image of sweating due to arousal (and ev-psych “Just-So Stories” can be written about that!) Sometimes, I think it’s a symbol for her being a “dirty” girl (or being “made” dirty by the sexual acts about to be performed), and transmitting information about what sort of woman she is and the sort of sex she supposedly likes.
[Yup. There’s no technical reason slipperiness wouldn’t show up on camera during, say, intercourse… especially since it shows up quite often in people’s self-made photos. And even in porn where it’s possible to be too busy to be aroused (unless, for men, it’s your job to have an erection) you’d think as long as they were using lube they wouldn’t towel it off so consistently. But I think the real thing is that “dirty girl” business — ideology says women have to be made dirty, so it’s ok if anything (or as I’ve noticed everything) gets on her. Bogus but maybe people are getting what they want? Thanks, SE. —fl]
I took WAY too long
Submitted by Calico (not verified) on Sun, 2009-12-13 17:58.I took WAY too long responding to this. It seems like you are getting at something, and I’m not sure you can get there from here. Visible vaginal lubrication is not a terribly useful yardstick in determining the physical arousal or personal interest of the performers, let alone the producer’s interest in depicting female sexual pleasure, or the consumer’s in seeing it. But on to the comment!
You say no lubrication is visible. Some of these women are probably not aroused. Surprise! Others might be, but some natural lube looks just like artificial lube (clear). A lot of the time you can’t tell the difference and it’s useless to speculate.
I think it is sensible that some aren’t aroused. Unlike men, women don’t need to be physically aroused to make porn. It can be nice if it happens, but there is no reason to try, and many circumstances conspire to discourage it.
Some might be aroused and you just can’t tell. Even in my personal life, I don’t tend to get visibly, dripping-on-the-thighs sorts of wet. It happens a handful of times to the hundreds of times I want sex. I make enough natural lube, it just isn’t all over the place.
I do know many female performers douche before sex. This is kind of drying. Why do it? Well, other performers might go down on you, performers whose affinity for your natural vaginal taste and odors may vary, but you’re probably gonna have whatever goes in your vagina shoved in your own mouth as well. Also, the appearance and consistency of natural secretions vary widely, and especially when combined with lube. It means one less thing to think about.
[Hey Calico, thanks for answering. “Visible vaginal lubrication is not a terribly useful yardstick in determining the physical arousal or personal interest of the performers.” Good point as are all your other ones, especially the one about how natural lubrication varies in appearance and consistency. So I can see how producers might want to simulate the effect with artificial lube. What I don’t get is that there’s no effort to simulate it. I mean I’ve never met anyone who literally dripped with arousal. But then I’ve never heard of a guy who literally came in tablespoons or cups either but that doesn’t stop folks from simulating it for porn. So that’s what’s what I’m curious about. —fl]