SEXIS WRONG

ack up, you’re reminded that she really is a girl next door
going wild and not just your garden variety exhibitionist slut.
And it’s also where the faint glimmer of humiliation finally
comes in. It’s true that I didn’t see much sexual shame when
the girls pulled their shirts up to show off their boobs. But I
did get a whiff of it when they pulled their shirts back down
to cover them again. In that moment, you do see the return
of modesty, the hyper-awareness of lost dignity seen in the
attempt to regain it. Call it the “what the fuck did I just do?”
moment, if you don’t want to be so high-falutin’. It’s subtle,
but it’s definitely there. And while I doubt they were purposely
screwing around with kinky shame fetishes, the “Girls
Gone Wild” editors clearly made a deliberate effort to include
that moment—again and again.
Are the girls being exploited? Arguably. In the strict Marxist
sense of being used to make money for someone else without
being proportionately paid for their labor, certainly. They’re
being paid for their labor in T-shirts and Mardi Gras beads—
that pretty much settles that. But it’s also clear that the girls
are getting something out of it: They like the attention; they
get off on exhibitionism; they enjoy feeling sexy and wild;
they like having an excuse to do dirty things they wouldn’t
ordinarily do. Money isn’t the only thing you get out of being
in a dirty video, and it may not even be the most important
thing, especially if you’re not a pro. I myself performed for an
adult video for no money back in my salad days, for a small,
indie, low-low-budget lesbian porn company (Clips by Fatale
Video, if you want to look it up). If anyone said the producers
were exploiting me, I’d be sorely tempted to smack them. I
was a grown-up. I wanted to do it; I got what I wanted out
of it, and I don’t regret it. And I don’t like being patronized by
being told that I didn’t know what I was doing.
For what it’s worth, the GGW producers make the argument
that they don’t pay the girls because the whole point of the
videos is the amateur vibe, and if they offered money they’d
be sure to get pros in the mix. A strict Marxist would probably
say they were full of shit, but having seen the videos (and not
being a strict Marxist), I do see their point. There was one
extremely dirty dirty-dancing scene in Bad Girls where I suspect
that the girl was a stripper...and while I love and adore
strippers, my suspicions did make the scene less hot.
Are the GGW producers taking advantage of the wild girls’
drunkenness and poor judgment? Will the girls regret it later?
Possibly. If a Girl Gone Wild wants to run for President or
something, almost certainly. A lot of us have done things in
our youths that we now regret and can’t take back. (My entire
first relationship leaps to mind.) That’s part of how we learn,
how we grow, what makes us who we are, blah blah blah.
And telling people—especially women—that they can’t make
decisions—especially sexual decisions—because they’re inexperienced
and impulsive...it’s beyond patronizing. It’s so far
beyond patronizing that it moves into contempt. Besides, I
saw way less flat-out drunkenness in the GGW videos than
I was expecting. Tipsiness, yes. High spirits, yes. Impaired
judgment, probably. Drunkenness to the point of obliterating
consent—no. And anyway, according to that nice publicity
man, Mr. Horn, any Girl Gone Wild who changes her mind
can get her footage pulled, as long as she does it before the
video is edited. (If she changes her mind after the video’s
been edited, she has to pay for the extra production costs of
yanking her scenes. And if she changes her mind after the
video’s been released, tough beans—she’s a grown-up, and
she gets to live with her decisions.)
Now, Mantra was successfully sued in mid-2005 by a woman
who gave them a verbal okay to being filmed for “Girls Gone
Wild” but later said she was too drunk to fully understand the
consequences. But the case didn’t seem to be about whether
she actually was too drunk to consent; the crux was that
they filmed her in Virginia, where you have to get written permission
to use someone’s image commercially. So while the
GGW folks obviously aren’t as careful about consent issues
(legal or personal) as they somewhat piously claim to be, I’m
not sure this lawsuit really changes anything ethically.
So where am I now with all this? After spending I don’t even
know how many hours watching six “Girls Gone Wild” videos
on three DVDs (plus one “Guys Gone Wild” disc—I swear to
God, I thought it was just a joke on the Onion, but there really
is one), what am I left with?
Weirdly enough, I’m very much where I was when I started.
I’m still dismissive (although rather less so), still fascinated,
turned on, embarrassed about being fascinated and turned
on—and despite having seen several of the videos, still kind
of curious. The whole tease thing is remarkably effective; if it
doesn’t leave you completely frustrated, it leaves you ravenous
for more, hoping to be taken just a little further the next time.
I’m disappointed and frustrated with most of these videos; in
fact, I’m wondering what the hell I’m going to do with them
now...and yet I’m finding myself seriously tempted to get one
of the new ones. Island Orgy/Daddy’s Little Girls, if you want
to know. The GGW website promises that “you’ll witness sexy
18-year-old Amber loose [sic] her virginity to another girl” and
that “sweet young things corrupt each other when Daddy’s
not around,” and I keep thinking that this could be another Bad
Girls/Girls Who Like Girls, with the great, nasty scenes in the
hotel rooms. I also know I can’t get the thing in time for my
deadline, so I can’t even justify it as research or a business
expense. So I keep trying to think of someone else I can write
it up for, so I can write it off on my taxes...and so I can order it
without admitting that I just want to use it to get off.
GIRLS GONE WILD 169