“Have you ever had sex?” 

My mouth went dry. I stood in a circle of high school freshmen girls nervously biting their lips and upperclassmen boys smirking with utter anticipation. A succession of yeses and noes along with giggles fill the air until it was my turn to answer. I say “yes,” trying to match the energy of my peers, but my voice wavered. I was lying, but I didn’t want others to know how little I knew about sex on an intimate level. 

Fast forward six years and finally, the moment came: my first time. 

I was a mess of feelings: ready, nervous, eager, stressed, but most of all, worried. Worried because I had no clue what to expect, what my body would be like before, during, or after, and what to do with my body. So I turned to the one thing I thought would lay all my thoughts to rest while switching to my incognito tab: porn.  

Open any pornographic website and chances are you will see a plethora of highly exaggerated and sensationalized forms of sex that in nature seem a bit unrealistic. Not because all of the sexual positions are impossible, but because actual sex is much more than going through the motions. 

An entire professional production of actors, directors, producers, and camera crews are behind the scenes of any porn set. As a viewer, we only see the surface of that production value—the lighting, the actors wrapped around each other, and the camera angles capturing every single, microscopic detail.  Our attention is solely placed on the actors in the height of their work, rather than on what occurs before or after. We see no other form of engagement or communication behind the scenes.

But of course, I didn’t realize this at the time. While scrolling through the videos, I couldn’t help but feel like my body didn’t match theirs. Why didn’t my vagina look like that? Am I supposed to shave? How do I bend like that? Is this what sex looks like?  

Political communications major Serge Ganthier ‘23 thinks porn should be watched with a conscious mind that knows the actors in the scenes are playing a character and that the scenes do not represent real intimacy. 

“If you find yourself watching porn at a young age, you would have all these high expectations for things that don’t actually happen,” he says. However, Ganthier also pointed out watching porn could be a learning experience for those not familiar with sex. 

I had already taken up Ganthier’s advice on watching porn for educational purposes. But the inaccurate representation of intimacy in porn was still a source of confusion and insecurity for me. 

Visual and media arts major Ashley Miller ‘22 isn’t impressed with how porn depicts sex and intimacy, especially when it involves queer women.

“For lesbian porn, I feel like it’s mainly designed for men because like all of my guy friends say, ‘Oh, my favorite category of porn is lesbian porn,’ but that shouldn’t be how it is,” Miller says. “It’s not accurate. They just take all of the love, sensuality, and care out of it.” 

Miller recalled her experiences exploring with other partners, who more often than not disregarded their own pleasure. “I’ve noticed with some queer women they feel like they have to put on a show when they’re having sex with another queer woman because they feel like there’s a looming male gaze in it all.” 

There was not a bone in my body I wanted to expose after my first couple of searches. Yet, I think that was the point. 

There is a particular audience when it comes to most porn sites that obviously doesn’t include me. Rather, it includes porn’s biggest consumers: men.

Porn can still be used as an educational tool in some aspects, but it’s important to keep in mind that the sex portrayed in porn is exaggerated and theatrical. My body with all of its flaws and complex emotions wasn’t going to magically appear on the screen. My sex life wasn’t a movie with perfect lighting, sure. But it is very much real. 

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This article appears in the October 2019 print issue of Your Magazine.