This is what ethical porn looks like – and why you should be watching it

Hardly anybody pays for porn these days, but that doesn't mean you don't have a duty to be an ethical consumer...

Pornography isn't a taboo, it's something we should be openly talking about – a notion that might not come naturally to guys in the UK, but why should we ignore something most of us watch and enjoy? So let's meet the pioneering women who are making it their lives work to produce sexy movies for both genders, without being seedy, salacious or violating performers' rights. via LustFilms / Twitter "Ethical porn", as it's called, guarantees genuine performer choice on condoms, encourages optimal sexual health screenings, promotes transparency around pay rates and – perhaps most importantly – uses strict age verification for performers.

Erika Lust

Erika Lust is an internationally recognised filmmaker who has been instrumental in promoting the aims of the 'feminist pornography' movement over the past few years. Simply by using innovative storytelling, real life dialogue and cutting edge presentation methods, Lust has created moral porn with a great production value. Her trademark brand of indie-film aesthetic mixed with arthouse erotica is strangely mesmerising to watch. She insists on her site that her work is "still entirely feminist":

“Sometimes when people start thinking about feminist porn they don’t understand what they’re speaking about. Suddenly they think feminism is the opposite of chauvinism. It’s not.  It doesn’t mean that we should see men as objects, that’s not right. Feminism is a simple idea – people are people.”

According to Lust, hardcore pornography addiction has distorted the way an entire generation of young men think about sex and intimacy. And it's not just damaging to women... While wanking won't actually make you go blind, studies do show that regular mastabation decreases sex drive and the desire for social interaction, especially in young males.

Cindy Gallop

Every time you masterbate to overproduced, airbrushed porn, your neurological system is being tricked into thinking you're having sex with beautiful women. Biology rewards sex for obvious reasons, but masturbation isn't sex. Instead, the brain is flooded with endorphins giving you positive reinforcement for just being a man on a sofa. Not useful. Nobody has expressed this sentiment better – or indeed more eloquently – than Cindy Gallop, an entrepreneur who believes that society is still reluctant to talk openly and honestly about sex. For Cindy, men are tugging themselves into oblivion. And she might have a point... Cindy describes herself as a "Pro sex, pro porn and pro knowing the difference" person. Through dating younger men, she claims to have discovered the pervasive and nasty effects that porn has had on masculinity and on global internet culture. Today, her alternative branch of sex-education, a user-generated video sharing platform aiming to "make real world sex more available online", has helped countless men overcome sexual issues. Let's be grown-ups about this, we all watch porn, and maybe we have a personal responsibility to be watching the right porn. So why not try it out for yourself? Cindy Gallop's 'Make Love Not Porn' series and Erika Lust's first movie, 'X-Confessions', are both great places to start.