Why I will Never Condemn People Who Choose to Work in the Adult Industry
Why I will Never Condemn People Who Choose to Work in the Adult Industry (1)
I did my best.
At ten years old, I tested into the talented and gifted program after being the only student in my fifth-grade class to receive straight A’s. From there, I performed relatively well, academically speaking. I took honors, GT, and AP courses in high school, and became the only non-native Spanish-speaking student in the history of my high school to jump from Spanish 3 honors to Spanish 5 AP literature. I scored well enough on my AP test to skip my foreign language requirement in college. I graduated as a member of multiple honor societies and obtained a 3.89 weighted GPA. Then, in college, I made the Dean’s list multiple times and received my degree in information systems.
So why am I saying all this? Society says to do well in school, so I made education my top priority. They say it will help you be successful, and to an extent it does…. until it doesn’t.
What society won’t tell you is that humans are superficial to the nth degree. People are overwhelmingly prejudiced. They have all these preconceived notions of who you’re supposed to be. I get assigned all manner of traits before I’ve ever even opened my mouth.
Despite the fact that I’ve done everything “right”, that I’ve taken my education seriously, every job I’ve had, and all my responsibilities seriously…other people, because I check certain boxes, will never consider anything past what they can see.
My most recent job experience as an analyst includes a situation where I had six plus people make comments about my appearance relative to my body. I was infantilized by a woman at the associate director level who was twice my age. We were going out to have a team lunch, and at one point in the lobby, she says, “You know. I have a child’s car seat in the back, but I don’t think anyone could ride in there…” Then she looks at me, “Oh well, maybe you could.”
Now, I’m not child-sized by any means. Save for having an extra small waist, I’m a healthy weight for my height and curvy in the traditional sense of the word.
Then you have the secretary to the superintendent looking me up and down in the break room and telling me what a nice figure I have. Like the associate director, I’ve barely had any conversations with this woman. Imagine if it were a guy doing and saying this.
Then two other older women asked me if I could fit in a dryer. I actually spoke to a male friend about this one, and he just said, “Why are they talking to you like that?” I’d like to know, and I have a few ideas…but I’m not done.
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Two more women (again older than me) made references to the size “I must wear,” which they would never do if I were extremely overweight. One of them specifically mentioned my breasts.
The worst of this job came from a man at the director level texting me about my breasts. He sent these texts on multiple occasions, two years apart:
And he has a wife. But as many women know, some of the most “single” men are married.
People are so dehumanizing and disgusting when you look a certain way. I’m a woman who is in IT or, at the very least, has been in IT-adjacent roles. They tell you that these types of roles are supposed to be empowering to women. But in the 7 years I spent in corporate jobs post-college, I never felt empowered.
Now, do I think I would be more empowered as an adult entertainer? No. It’s not my personality type or desire to be good at that kind of thing. Despite all the attention I get on my appearance, I’ve never led with it, and I’ve never wanted to lead with it. Beauty fades, but nothing makes you feel dumber than people undermining you because of how you look. People deciding they can talk to you any which way because of how you look in job types that have nothing to do with looks.
So I will never chastise OF models, strippers, or any other adult workers because you can do things the “right” way and it won’t matter. Perform well in school, show up to work every day, put your head down and do your best work, but it doesn’t matter when people are prejudiced. I still get reduced to my body regardless.
The job I worked was in the public education sector, too. Distance learning. It’s always the schools that have the most inappropriate behavior. Because every little anti-bullying policy, every sexual harassment policy they had was just full of it at the end of the day. Most people don’t care about the people on the receiving end of those things.
Companies are just virtue signaling with DEI BS. They could give a rat’s behind about protecting all these groups they claim to care about. The policies are just a symbol of inclusivity and safety. Rarely are they a genuine promise. If a job feels empowering, it’s probably tied to someone’s experiences with the job and whether or not they receive basic respect and decent treatment. We’re all selling ourselves one way or another. But if you don’t check the right boxes, it’s pretty much damned if you do, damned if you don’t.
Either way, I’m done.
Thank you for reading. This is the first publication of the series, “Why I will Never Condemn People Who Choose to Work in the Adult Industry”.
