Part 2
Let me also add this: the notion that people who do professional porn are "comfortable" with it is incredibly overblown. It's almost a media created talking point just so the mainstream media CAN get the topic of porn onto TV to appeal to people's more prurient interests and to boost ratings. People see a big porn star like Jenna Jameson momentarily crossing over into the mainstream (for example, doing an interview on TV)...or they'll see Areeya's name plastered online and see that she has her own photo sets and film clips and her name is seemingly iconic...and because they see "big" stars like that in the spotlight, people then assume that everyone else who works in porn must be comfortable with it. Hell, for that matter, they take it one step further and assume everyone doing porn must LOVE what they do.
And yet, speaking again as someone who has met professional porn people - whether they work in front or behind the camera -- the MOST common thing I'll always hear is: "I use a fake name and do whatever I can to hide my REAL identity because I could NEVER live with myself if my family or friends or boyfriend or the people I work with EVER found out what I was doing!" Seriously, if you guys think people who do professional porn are really SO comfortable with it, why the hell do you think they create FAKE names for themselves like "Gina Lolalumps" when their REAL name is something normal like "Jane Rothman."
Or think of it this way. If porn people are so comfortable with what they do, did you ever wonder why 99% of them change their names while every OTHER working professional in Hollywood -- again, whether they work in front of the camera or behind it -- DOESN'T? If porn people are so comfortable with what they do, ever wonder why they do everything possible to keep their porn activities OFF their resumes or information about themselves 100% PRIVATE while every other working person in Hollywood is doing the exact OPPOSITE, and is doing everything to get as much information about themselves out there? In order to generate work and to get more jobs?
Gee, here's a clue for you: it's because Jane Rothman, moonlighting porn girl who did a few porn loops to make some quick cash for whatever reasons she had that day, suddenly woke up to reality after a few bills were paid and NOW she lives in fear that her family, friends, loved ones and co-workers... past, present and future...will find out what she's done. And worst of all she's scared that she'll never be able to put her porn loop behind her.
And THAT is the cautionary tale to be told here: For the rest of her life, she's going to be biting her fingernails and wondering when and where that porn loop is going to reappear and HOW it's going to affect her life at THAT point in time. Sure, it's great to film a porn loop now, make a few bucks, pay a few bills. Only problem is, how will Jane feel down the road when she's dating someone who doesn't know about her past and suddenly finds out? How will Jane like being in a nice, romantic relationship and having to turn to her lover one night and say: "Uh, honey? I have a confession to make." Or even if Jane tells him upfront what she did -- even if he shrugs it off initially and says "That's okay. At the time, you did it for the cash and I can understand that" -- what happens when the porn loops reappear down the road and he sees them? And now their existence affects BOTH of their lives and he is forced to react because now they are no longer an intangible and are very, very real to him?
And trust me again, porn is even more insidious today.
Because in today's digital world NOTHING disappears for long.
In fact, with that in mind...
POP QUIZ FOR THOSE WHO AREN'T COMPUTER NERDS: How many of you know about an American/European Internet consortium that was formed a few years ago, which has already been hard at work collecting and cataloging everything on the Internet and storing it all on massive data servers? And when I say everything, I mean EVERYTHING -- right down to every person's MySpace page or your photos on Flickr or whatever else is out there -- yes, even including collecting your posts on public message boards and filing them away, too. If it's online, their goal is to grab it, file it, catalog it, and create a digital library for the 21st Century and beyond where anyone can look up anything. Ever used Google and hit the "cache" link at the bottom of a listing to call up a web page that is now gone or been taken offline? Think of it this way: the goal of this project is to make sure that NOTHING can ever disappear again, so that that anything that's EVER been online would STILL be available for all to see - from now till the end of time. We're talking the ultimate digital database here.
And that's something for you all to think about the next time you post your real name or your photos online. Or you post things on message boards that reveal incredibly personal information about yourself. Just remember: right now somewhere, someplace, someone is grabbing it and saying "Hey, catalog this and toss it into the database, TOO. Someone's gonna want to look this guy/girl up one day."
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