How Porn Misrepresents the LGBTQ+ Community
Many people look to porn to learn about sex and relationships. According to a survey of LGBTQ+ people in the UK, 64% said that porn has been a source of education for them. [1] Porn, however, is not produced with the intention of being used as a teaching tool. Instead, it gives viewers misconceptions about sex and sexuality — including misinformation regarding the LGBTQ+ community.
Porn Profits from LGBTQ+ Misrepresentation
Producers of mainstream porn, including those who are not in the LGBTQ+ community, create content that is allegedly intended to cater to an LGBTQ+ audience, but the content they produce tends to misrepresent LGBTQ+ relationships while promoting derogatory depictions for a heterosexual, cisgender audience.
Based on the existing content on mainstream porn sites that is categorized as featuring LGBTQ+ individuals and relationships, the porn industry seems to be more interested in profits than proper representation.
No one deserves to be abused, misrepresented, or fetishized for entertainment or profit. It’s never acceptable to exploit LGBTQ+ individuals and their relationships, yet it has become so normalized in the mainstream porn industry that they’re profiting from it at LGBTQ+ people’s expense.
Misrepresentative “Lesbian” Porn
Let’s talk specifics.
While “lesbian” is a popular search term on porn sites, most mainstream “lesbian” porn is made for cisgender, heterosexual men. Because of this, there are many inaccuracies about LGBTQ+ sex that caters to misinformed fantasy rather than an accurate representation. Examples include fake fantasies and exaggerated caricatures, particularly in “girl-on-girl” scenes that fetishize lesbian relationships.
In response to inaccurate “lesbian” porn, some lesbian women have expressed how they feel about porn fetishizing them for heterosexual men. Many have said how dehumanizing it is to continually see porn storylines that fantasize how the “right guy” can seduce a lesbian. Lesbian viewers say that it’s not genuine and representative of real lesbian relationships and can cause some people to take their relationships less seriously.
How “Gay” Porn Misrepresents
It’s not just lesbian porn that is misrepresentative of real people and their relationships — gay porn also capitalizes on dehumanizing stereotypes to bring in viewers.
One stereotypical storyline in porn depicts gay men as predators looking for straight men to seduce. Plus, a 2022 study that analyzed the content of gay pornography found that approximately 1 in 3 gay porn videos contains sexual violence or aggression. [2] Many other storylines elevate racist stereotypes, too. But clearly, these toxic tropes are not remotely representative of real gay men.
Because of a lack of educational resources in our society for LGBTQ+ individuals, many gay men look to porn to learn about gay relationships. However, they often find these and other recurring toxic themes, and because proper representation can be difficult to find, some young viewers see fantasized scenarios in gay porn as a healthy way to pursue relationships.
The unfortunate fact is that this type of porn is not usually based on safety, consent, or real relationships. These misrepresentative storylines fetishize sexual assault and rape and misrepresent gay men in the process.
What Porn Gets Wrong about Bisexual Individuals
Porn also capitalizes on misrepresentations of individuals who identify as bisexual — especially women. In mainstream porn, bisexual women are also often portrayed as predators with high sex drives who are willing to have sex with anyone and even engage in threesomes, regardless of the circumstances or relationship commitments of the others involved.
This can have a real impact on how viewers understand and think of bisexual people. In fact, 42% of bisexual people in a 2020 UK survey said that they felt that their bisexuality was a motivating factor in their experiences of sexual violence. [3] Like all other people, regardless of sexual identity, those who identify as bisexual want to have real connections with others, and their lives are not all about having sex.
Porn so often dehumanizes bisexual people and perpetuates harmful stereotypes about them as being hypersexual or even predatory.
How Porn Can Dehumanize Trans People
Transgender people are some of the most likely to be normalized in the porn industry, but they are also dehumanized in specific ways. While not all videos portraying transgender individuals focus on their punishment and belittlement, far too many do. They are also degraded and humiliated, with many videos focusing on painful sex acts and using derogatory terms in the scripts and titles.
LGBTQ+ consumers tend to look to porn to learn about sexual ideals, which is understandable because of a lack of representation in mainstream media, but ultimately problematic considering the abuse and degradation of trans people in porn. Like other types of porn, it perpetuates toxic fantasies that fetishize their degradation.
Considering how so many people turn to porn to learn about sex — especially those who might not see themselves represented elsewhere — how might the porn industry’s violent and derogatory portrayals of the trans experience worsen the real-life degradation and dehumanization of trans people?
LGBTQ+ People Are Not Fetishes
We often say porn kills love because porn creates sexual ideals that are not only unattainable but abusive and harmful at times. Porn can influence consumers’ sexual attitudes, expectations, and behaviors. [4][5] Based on available content on mainstream porn sites, it’s clear that porn can turn LGBTQ+ people into fetishized objects rather than portray them as real people.
At Fight the New Drug, we believe all people are deserving of love and respect regardless of their size, shape, sexual orientation, gender identity, or any other diversifying factor. It is unacceptable that the porn industry gets a pass to fetishize anyone in the name of entertainment.
However, the unfortunate fact is that pornographic content that degrades LGBTQ+ couples and individuals exists because there’s a demand for it. Porn normalizes it even further, and a toxic cycle is perpetuated.
So let’s spread the facts about the porn industry. Porn kills love, and LGBTQ+ individuals and couples deserve love and respect, not fetishized abuse and misrepresentation.
[1] Durex. (2021). #MySexMyWay: Survey results. Retrieved from https://www.durex.co.uk/pages/my-sex-my-way
[2] Fritz, N., & Bowling, J. (2022). Sexual behaviors and aggression in gay pornography. J.Homosex., 1–21. doi:10.1080/00918369.2022.2093688
[3] Melville, S., Stonborough, E., & Gooch, B. (2020). LGBT in britain: Bi report. Stonewall. Retrieved from https://www.stonewall.org.uk/system/files/lgbt_in_britain_bi.pdf
[4] Koletić G. (2017). Longitudinal associations between the use of sexually explicit material and adolescents’ attitudes and behaviors: A narrative review of studies. Journal of adolescence, 57, 119–133. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.adolescence.2017.04.006
[5] Peter, J., & Valkenburg, P. M. (2016). Adolescents and pornography: A review of 20 years of research. The Journal of Sex Research, 53(4–5), 509–531. doi:10.1080/00224499.2016.1143441
