Influences on ethical decision-making among porn consumers: The role of stigma

This paper presents findings from a grounded theory study of consumer ethics among feminists who use porn. It presents a range of exogenous and endogenous factors reported to be influential on ethical decision-making in this context and demonstrates how such factors may be perceived as impeding or facilitating the types of behaviour that consumers consider to be more in keeping with their moral and political beliefs. It furthermore highlights how such influences are often undergirded by seemingly deep-seated stigma around pornography, and often around sex and sexuality at large. The paper concludes that the direct and indirect effects of stigma may present additional obstacles for “fairtrade” and feminist-branded porn projects seeking to leverage consumer demand to support the development of more ethical industry practices. While it has been argued that stigma-reduction efforts can help reduce exploitative practices in the porn industry – by improving sex workers’ ability to demand rights, freedoms, safety, and better labour conditions and remuneration – the analysis from this study suggests that such efforts may also result in secondary benefits. These may be brought about by (a) removing obstacles to the types of consumer practice that could in turn support worker rights and livelihoods, and (b) disrupting rationalisations used to justify consumer choices that threaten to undermine these ends.