The Ethics of VR Porn #1 – Keeping it Adult and Safe

Image credit: Where Is The Map?

At its very core, virtual reality porn is the most advanced mean of adult entertainment and it’s meant to satisfy our sexual cravings in visually, acoustically, and psychologically immersing ways. The action you see and hear goes to unprecedented lengths and depths, and sometimes you experience situations that seem very believable and happen in real life. As a matter of fact, when we review VR porn, we generally tend to take into consideration the immersion factor and just how likely the action seems to happen.

And yes, it’s all great. If used with the virtue of moderation and if abuses are avoided, then the films will satisfy your needs and expectations regarding sex. And it’s all great if you’re a technology enthusiast who wants to step in and experience a yet rudimentary state of our future intimate interactions. After all, with the development of high-speed internet infrastructure, the hardware innovations which provide crystal-clear and realistic images, and the paradigmatic shifts taking place in our social norms, it is nearly inevitable for adult entertainment to extend its means and coverage.

Can we say that VR porn is the pinnacle of the adult industry’s continuous development? Well, yes. Image credit: Good Times Indeed

Moreover, one can definitely argue that VR porn supplies for a demand that has been around for centuries. We started out with stories and rudimentary paintings of desired sexual partners and evolved alongside with our means of expression. Yes, it can certainly be affirmed that pornography is a form of art, in spite of its commercial purpose. It’s a modern medicine that is meant to help us forget about our stressful lives and conveniently satisfy our sexual needs without being obliged to find a partner (though porn is arguably better when you’re watching it with a partner and gets even better in VR).

However, there are many pitfalls and traps along the way, and we should be frank and honest about them right from the beginning, just so we retain the adult and consensual nature of our beloved medium. Many articles have been written about being able to shoot your own VR porn with cheap equipment, and VirtualRealPorn has even launched its own section for amateurs. Yes, some really good stuff will be released through these means, but we also have to take into consideration the real “amateur market” which contains lots of abuses and infringements of fundamental human rights.

Right now, VR porn is highly regulated and of premium quality, due to the fact that we have an oligopoly of studios which compete to release top-notch titles starring great actresses and actors.

Everything about the depicted action is professional, consensual, and safe. Nobody is really being abused, nobody is subjected to any kind of unfair treatment without written consent, and the target audience is mature and open-minded. As a matter of fact, I generally believe that the consumers of VR porn are more educated and better people than the average guy who surfs on other big porn tube sites.

At this stage of development, VR porn is highly professional and exclusive. Not too many people have access to VR headsets or filming technology, so the medium is safer from inappropriate and unlawful content. However, we have to make sure that it remains so. Image credit: Valentine’s Day Surprise

But it can get a lot worse. Just imagine how it is going to be if the sick people and perverts who shoot juvenile pornography or expose immoral (and even unlawful) acts through their recorded footage end up getting their hands on VR filming equipment. Such an undesirable event would ruin the great community and following that has been built around the VR world. Certainly, this website won’t begin to feature their illegal amateur content but part of the charm, innocence, and even professionalism of the genre will be gone.

The world is filled with sick people and, most of the times, you don’t even have to take a walk into the shadiest neighborhoods of your hometown to discover such specimens. Sometimes all you have to do is to check websites like 4chan (with its /b section), or surf the Dark Net (the hidden side of the internet, which can be accessed really conveniently with the ToR browser). I recall once trying one of the ToR-enabled chat windows which supposedly encrypt and secretize your conversations, and I had the chance to meet somebody who was persisting on asking questions about crime and murder. It was creepy.

We have to really defend our medium and keep everyone we don’t want outside. Everybody can shoot amateur porn these days, since every mobile phone has a decent camera, and the recording technology is cheaper than ever. However, the VR medium has a special status which is mainly due to the high expenses involved in being able to see and/or produce immersive content that can be enjoyed through the headset. What we have to do is to keep it this way and ensure that everything that gets released for us is very high quality, lawful, authorized, and legitimate. Amateurs can be nice, but the potential consequences of encouraging them too much can ruin everything.

VR porn studios have clear records of their performers, sign contracts which stipulate the kind of treatment their stars are to be subjected to, and know that they’re accountable to the government and bound by the laws.

In a nutshell, they’re honest and transparent businesses which pay taxes to our government and finance public education, the healthcare system, and the infrastructure we all benefit from.

On the other hand, amateur content is unregulated, unsafe, and can portray outrageous practices just for the sake of grabbing the attention (becoming viral). Call me conservative on this one, but I just wouldn’t allow this great community to get ruined by subpar content that purposely attempts to create a shocking factor. In this democratic environment, we don’t get to choose what gets released and what doesn’t based just on our judgment. However, we can discourage whatever it is that we despise by refusing to watch. Not giving attention and avoiding the scenario in which we spike up the viewing statistics is definitely a case we should avoid.

If you ask me, VR porn has to remain clean, professional, and consensual. The rise of amateur content can generate a series of problems involving some of our society’s lesser virtuous people, to say the least. Image credit: Super Bowl Night

Yes, amateur content looks more authentic and captures a certain degree of clumsiness and sloppiness that we, regular everyday people, can all relate to (after all, we’re normal people who have sex to cool down our urges, we aren’t professionals). But how can we know when the VR filming technology is being used for abusive acts that either involve underage performers or make them perform certain acts against their will?

Even the professional studio-released VR porn tends to have narratives and scenes that include BDSM and punishment, and it won’t be long until mentally deranged people begin to replicate what they see and desire… except that the degree of consensuality can certainly be questioned.

Every great power comes with a great responsibility: we have to make sure that the medium remains safe, consensual, and void of crime and abuse.

This article is mainly inspired by a story I’ve read about some really shady activities on the Dark Net and on websites like 4chan. Unfortunately, even the noblest and most innocent of intentions can lead to something disturbingly perverted, immoral, and illegal. It’s scandalous when you think about it, but there are thousands of pedophiles lurking around the web. They use fake usernames, they know how to hide their true identities, and they seem to be keen on trying to convince underage girls to either send them nude pictures or even meet them for other perverted acts with sexual implications. We’re developing a medium that will certainly become appealing to them, and it won’t be long until they begin to produce content for their own twisted enjoyment.

VR porn delivers high-quality professional studio-produced content that amateurs cannot ever replicate. Image credit: Overcrotch

We can’t stop content from circulating and being distributed around but we can choose the quality of content we watch. That’s why it would be wiser to stick to the professional and “authorized” content, even though it’s all staged and fake. So is professional wrestling, yet millions of people return next week to see how the narrative has evolved and what the new dynamics become. Yes, something authentic, raw, and unstaged stirs our interest much more but is our foolish curiosity really worth the revenues we’re about to generate for some really sick people? If you ask me, the answer is a certain “NO!”

The principle is simple: capitalism is based on supply and demand. In the absence of a demand, the supply side will be small and insignificant. But if we develop a preference for unethical and unlawful content and encourage the producers, then we will trigger switches and leverages we really can’t handle (not to mention that we’re threatening the safety of people who might not give their willing consent to appear in these films). We like living in friendly neighborhoods, we tend to be protective when we hear about crime, and we’re often quite willing to cooperate with the authorities in order to preserve the state of peace and security among all members of society but in this particular case, it’s a lot better to prevent the content from being made by not giving it attention.

VR porn has so many advantages and so much potential that it would be a shame if we allowed it to lose its purpose and substance.

Aside from entertaining our minds and senses, VR porn has the potential to ease the pain of people with significant disabilities which keep them from having a normal sex life, it can help elders rediscover and rejuvenate their sexuality, and it can even act as a safe space for sex offenders to unleash their urges (which largely benefits the society at large). But these are only the benefits that we like to brag about.

There is also a darker dimension to everything and sometimes the internet conceals our darkest, most perverted, and intimate desires though they might lead to harmful actions. Thanks to its female POV subgenre, VR porn can also be a factor that strengthens gender equality and enables women to have similar immersive experiences that fulfill their desires and fantasies. Therefore, it’s safe to say that VR porn is also the safest medium where adult content is being presented, aside from having its immersive qualities.

Deterring by not giving attention to sensational, attention-grabbing, immoral, and potentially illegal content might just be the best strategy. We help VR porn remain high-quality and great, but also reduce online crime. How sweet is that? Image credit: Making Hard Twister Sex

During the last 4 months, I’ve had the pleasure to write about the many dimensions of the VR technology, praise its potential, and even imagine ways in which it can improve. We’re all pioneers of this new technological revolution and we might just be looking at the gadget that every household will possess out of necessity. Maybe that 70 years ago, televisions also seemed like a bad idea and an unlikely replacement for the radios but now they’re means of information and entertainment in billions of homes, offices, restaurants, and public spaces around the world. VR might just be the main factor of a new technological revolution.

However, at this early stage, we have the power to choose the directions that the market takes. According to our will and demands as early adopters of the medium, studios mold their content and cater whatever they understand that we’re most likely to like and consume. When the production costs are high, there really isn’t much room for experimentation, and the films that really try to shift paradigms are rare. What we have to do, though, is deter abusive content from becoming popular, and report to the authorities any unlawful content we discover on the internet. We can’t stop sick people from filming their stuff, but we can report it and prevent its popularity.

Pornography is for adults, about adults, and it involves consenting adults. This is the lesson that we have to keep in mind in order to keep the VR branch clean and safe. 2D porn has begun as an amateur medium and was professionalized much later, so it’s the premium source for content produced at home with a camera. However, it also features cases of abuse, crime, and law violation that we can avoid in VR.

So, dear readers, how about we make sure that VR porn remains safe, consensual, lawful, and clean?