In the United States, we have an awkward relationship with porn. We don’t talk about it, but we know that everyone—and I mean everyone—is watching it. Movies such as “Don Jon” walk a fine line between porn addiction and humor. I don’t view porn in a negative way. I think we can learn a lot about our own sexualities from watching porn.
First off, you can learn what turns you on in a safe and non-judgmental environment. Just because you watch a specific genre of porn it doesn’t mean you have to act out what you see online. If you don’t want to include your partner, you don’t have to. Your porn-watching life doesn’t have to mesh with your real life.
So you like to watch people dressed up in banana suits calling each other Fister Mantastic and howling like dogs? You don’t have to emulate the act in your sex life, but you do discover a new facet of your sexuality and you can find new things that turn you on. I started watching bondage porn way before I realized I was into BDSM. The porn acted as a gateway to what I was curious about.
You can see what “normal” sex looks like now; porn has come a long way since the glory days of Jenna Jameson. There are so many new genres of porn that include female-friendly and amateur, so you can see how normal people act in bed. These genres usually include real female orgasms–not the fake-screaming-after-two-minutes-of-intense-pounding-with-no-foreplay orgasms.
When you’re watching the more organic, natural, “normal” porn, you also realize that your body is normal. You’ll notice some parts of our bodies jiggle more than others. Most people don’t have Scarlett Johansson bodies, and that’s okay.
You’ll also notice there are sometimes some noises that happen during sex that are completely normal—like queefing, more lovingly known as vagina farts. All of this is completely normal.
When you’re watching porn, you can also learn about new sexual positions that you may have never thought of or tried. Step out of your missionary comfort zone! Different sexual positions can, in fact, feel very different from one another. Watching different positions can also help you be able to articulate between hard and fast versus soft and slow. You’ll learn to be more open to asking for exactly what you want and how, you want it.
Different varieties of porn can also prove that women can be just as sexual as men, even without the bad-girl persona. So often in mainstream porn, women are innocent until one guy turns them into a hypersexual minx, who was the girl next door until that night.
In my opinion, you can be the girl next door with a healthy sexual appetite. You don’t have to lie in bed in your Snoopy pajamas, yearning for a sexual release; you can have a sexy night to yourself and learn a little bit about what you like at the same time.
