Sex ought to be a free pleasurable act but I think it has become increasingly commodified by the porn industry. Whe I said this to a friend he said it has always been commodified in the sense that prostitution is our “oldest profession.” But I’m not talking here about “cold, unloving rubber-insulated sex in a seedy hotel room” of the type that Jeffrey Archer didn’t have but ordinary straight-up boy meets girl sex.
I think it fair to say that most teenagers today learn about sex, not in the classroom,but by watching internet porn. Though, I’m told, all life is out there, the mainstream stuff will likely entail a beautiful girl with a body bald as a baby’s, massive pert breasts, tiny waist, cute bottom; vital statistics only to be found on a Barbie doll or a woman who has undergone the surgeon’s knife. A full face of make-up and collagen-improved pouting lips complete the picture. And of course the sex is athletic and great, no embarassing noises or awkward moments. And as Martin Amis says “every sexual act ends with something girls hate-you know,the facial?”
So if you cut your teeth on this nonsense, and read Fifty Shades Of Grey for good measure (the submissive virgin comes three times during her first sexual encounter),surely the reality is going to be rather different. Or is it just me? What I’m trying to say is that sex like everything else has become caught up in the ethics of hard work. Suzanne Moore writing in The Idler told of how her school friend “tried to impress on me that sex was an activity that you had to work at, practise, evolve techniques for. I had never liked sports of any description. I was lazy I couldn’t be bothered…Cosmopolitan was full of lists of what makes people good in bed…” This huge effort is all wrong and makes you feel as if each encounter is fraught with pressure, especially for the woman. If you are trying to compete with these porn role models the whole time will be spent thinking “how do I look?” or “God I hope my legs aren’t stubbly” or “Can he see my varicose veins in this light?” Surely all this rubbish rather takes the edge off what should be a free and fulfilling act? I prefer Suzanne Moore’s response “To be frank, I have never understood what was so wrong with lying back and thinking of England..when sex becomes such major toil, a labour of love,let me tell you that it is your revolutionary duty to phone in sick.”
If things continue in this way I fully expect to see sex classified as an Olympic sport. My husband’s friend has had a pole installed in the bedroom so his wife can indulge him of an evening. Call me old-fashioned and lazy but lying back on a pile of silk cushions hold far more appeal.it is never like that in the porn films though,and I have also noticed that there is no seduction. Wouldn’t it be wonderful if the leading man read a few lines by William Blake or Andrew Marvell. Even these lines from Zodiac Mindwarp would do:” You talk too much/ Button your lip/ Just take a trip/ Behind my zip.” I think even that though is too intimate and real for modern pornography.