Whoops! Truth, or fiction?

Today, I read through the Shirley Shave blog in it's entirety, and, much to my disappointment, it's obviously fictional.

Shirley's story started out seeming pretty plausible, but after a while, there were too many things that didn't jive with the plain facts of the adult industry. (Note that I read all the posts in chronological order, from earliest to latest--when you just read a few posts at random, they seem much more realistic.)

At first, it was little things, like the fact that she got her first job on the very day of her audition, with no mention of an HIV test.

There was also mention of multi-day production schedules. This is actually pretty unusual--most shoots are done in one day, especially the low-budget type of stuff that she was allegedly performing in. Only large, big-budget productions shoot on multiple days, typically.

There was no mention of Viagra for the one guy with wood problems. Viagra has been a true boon to the porn industry, and is used even by big name male stars if they run into trouble. The days of seeing semi-hard dicks in porn videos appears to be gone, as far as I can tell.

There was mention of male performers who move freely back and forth between straight and gay porn. In reality, this does not happen, because female performers are terrified of "catching AIDS from a gay performer." Yes, I know AIDS is not a gay disease, but a lot of porn actresses are apparently unable to grasp this simple fact. Likewise, they seem unable to grasp the simple fact that the level of condom use in gay porn is much higher than in straight porn, so HIV transmission is probably less likely in that side of the industry. In any case, male performers in straight porn avoid doing gay porn because they know full well that once they cross that line, there's no turning back.

Then there was the mention of a mafia connection for the big, evil porn producer, who proceeded to rape her. Do such things happen in the porn industry? Who the hell knows? I've never heard any plausible accounts of that happening, but, then again, what would it take for me to consider an account like that "plausible"? On the other hand, if there was a producer who was in the habit of raping his best actresses, you would tend to think that word would get around the grapevine--that not all of his victims would simply lie back and take it like Shirley did. And the mafia allegation is just annoying. The porn industry is so diverse, with so many teensy little production companies, making so much money, it's really hard to see how organized crime would be able to wield much influence there. Not to mention that porn is legal, so, by definition, it's not organized crime, is it? I don't doubt that mafia interests are making some money off of porn, but I find the kind of strongarming portrayed in this story to be pretty unlikely.

Finally, towards the ending, Shirley's loser ex-boyfriend somehow manages to spread a rumor in the industry that she's HIV positive, resulting in her no longer being able to obtain work. That's just not the way it works. The adult industry is extremely wary of HIV infections: testing of performers is done regularly, and an agent who actually cared about his performers as Bernard supposedly did would insist on it. Whenever someone tests positive, the first thing that happens is the entire industry comes screeching to a halt while that performer, and anyone who he or she had sex with, is tested again, to make sure the first result wasn't a false positive. When you compare this to the way Shirley's story plays out, there's a pretty big incongruity there. Furthermore, even if it did play out the way it's written, if Shirley was such a gorgeous, young-looking blonde babe, she would have at least been able to make some money stripping or posing for nude photo layouts. There's always work available for a gorgeous young blonde who's willing to take her clothes off.

Taking all these things into consideration, it seems pretty certain that, not only was the whole story made up, but it was made up by someone who doesn't entirely know what he or she is talking about.

There were some things I liked about the story, though. Things like this:

I enjoyed my outlaw life and rebelling against all the straight crap, respectable jobs and monogamy. My dad held a respectable job and beat the shit out of me. What was so respectable about that? Many of the men I went out with were bad to me. Everyone was sinister in some way. I was a good person. I had ego enough to know that I was a better person than most. But someone somewhere said my job was one of the most sinister of all, close to war.

And this:

The sight of a healthy woman's body could bring joy to people. People liked to surround themselves with beauty in the same way they surrounded the warmth of a campfire. Sex was as important as shelter. Some people were afraid of sex because it could be overwhelming if used wrong. Like the sky could be beautiful and blue one day, make tornadoes another. I myself never forgot the blue. This didn't mean that sex never did me wrong. I had been abused and misused throughout my life. But even the sun caused cancer to some, made other things grow. I never forgot that sex was a beautiful thing, a serene kind of beauty like a painting or the ocean. So I was happy to be a part of it by posing for the camera. Like a perfect glove made from lights and lenses. I didn't feel guilty or immoral posing for Bernard. I was a sexual creature as much as I was human. I had been my entire life. Plain and simple, I liked fucking. And I was taken in by the camera eye. Each picture was framing my young body forever. I was happy to be part of some long-standing dirty tradition, a world that I had always heard about and was curious, but now was seeing first hand. So many other girls had come into Bernard's office to do the very same thing, smiling and eager and proud and doing something daddy would frown on but every other man would lust after. It wasn't any cold, callous waitressing job. Small beads of sweat were beginning to form on my body, a hot, arousing, sexual sweat. This felt like a beginning.

In general, the writing was pretty good--much better than you're likely to run into in the general blogosphere. I offer my congratulations to the writer, because I think it was a pretty good effort. On the whole, however, the story really doesn't convey a positive or realistic impression of the adult industry, and, since it is also fiction, that means it pretty much falls into the category of negative propaganda. So I guess I'm going to have to take the link down.

Oh, well. I'm sure I will find plenty of other good links, sooner or later.