Porn 2.0 straight from the horse's mouth. Consumption and Production of User Generated Content

Abstract: The research of pornography has always been sorrowful and affected by many accusations of researchers being ‘Porn apologists dressing up personal convictions to look more objective by attaching the word “studies” to the title of their journal’ or often according to anti-porn advocates they were ‘expressing their own opinions rather than producing research’ and were likely to write ‘fulsome articles […] declaring “porn is wonderful for men” (Atwood & Smith, 2014, p. 8). Their work was ‘ill-considered post-modernist and populist positioning, rather than critical analysis (Atwood & Smith, 2014, p. 8). On the other hand being critical of pornography did not stand in neutral light either. In pornography context being “critical” was always associated with being anti-porn in the sense of producing ‘criticism of pornography’, with fault-finding and condemnation being of primary importance, but this research is not anti-porn neither pro-porn oriented wishing to contribute to greater understanding of consumer culture rather than identifying faults of it. Consumers in the research of pornography are objects of a great controversy (McKee, 2005a). There are ongoing debates of how pornography damages individuals (Hamilton, 2004, p. 4) with the attention to relationship issues, violence, sexual abuse or crimes, particularly on young individuals. Such opinions are usually raised in public debates by politicians, journalists, church leaders and academics; however the voice of consumers and prosumers of user generated pornography is missing. The only time it is heard is while those who consider themselves as “addicts” are seeking to stop watching pornography (Taylor, 2005). Thus consumers and prosumers of user generated content (UGC) are misrepresented, stigmatized, objects of epistemic violence. In our study we offer qualitative study from the perspective of consumers and producers employing consumer culture theoretical framework. We investigate prosumer culture of UGC content challenging academicals criticism of porn consumers and their actions revealing new areas of study and broadening the understanding of UGC content representing previously unheard consumers and prosumers.