Erika Lust's Blog, page 4

The scalpel curse

I've just seen an article via the Feministing website about Kate Winslet founding the "British Anti-Cosmetic Surgery League" along with fellow actresses Emma Thompson and Rachel Weisz. Proud of her curves, Kate says it goes against her morals and against the way she was brought up by her parents.

At first I was a bit skeptical because many actresses talk about this topic but actually do go under the knife to lose a few years, but it seems she holds her point.

It made me think of the whole cosmetic surgery situation.

First it's easy to say "I'm never having cosmetic surgery, I will be beautiful no matter how old I am". Sweet, but menopause, wrinkle neck and arm fat might take you by surprise and make you go over your statement in one morning-look at the mirror.

But why are we so afraid of getting old?

Well, it does remind us that we don't have so many years left and make us wonder about our life, and especially our death. But being old now lasts a long time, and death can come much before that.


Then, the looks. Nobody wants to feel "ugly". But it's just that our criteria for beauty is set wrong. We want to have giant legs and big (firm) boobs for the rest of our life because we are told everyday that beauty and attraction from men are the only thing we got. Our role in society is seducing and giving pleasure to men, we are reduced to the biological attributes of our gender and are denied the possibility to be worthy in other domains of life like work, culture, society. So when we stop fitting those criteria, the very same criteria that are spread by mainstream porn and the media, we become useless and ugly. Sad, right?

And the saddest part is that women often fall for the old guy with white hair and wrinkles on the forehead. Why? Because they're judged on their character, self-confidence and other attributes rather than their looks.

So we try to freeze our youth to fit the mold forever and avoid becoming the old witch we know too well.

But let's moderate:

Of course I'm not saying it's like that for everyone, I'm just saying this is what we're told and we can see this phenomenon everyday.

I care about my looks, I want to be pretty for my partner, as well as he does for me, and that's ok. It's about feeling good and free ourselves from this sexist grip by assuming our sexuality.

Lust & Liekens – Sex in the city of Barcelona

Hi everyone,

Holidays are definitely over, well, at least for me. After this exciting year I was happy to just close my eyes for a bit and make up for all the sleep I didn't get to have with the shooting and everything.

I also had the pleasure of travelling to Belgium and meeting the fabulous crew of Goedele Magazine, to celebrate the release of an exclusive DVD: "Lust & Liekens". This DVD is the fruit of a great collaboration. It features clips of my movies as well as videos of the Goedele crew on the shooting of my latest movie, Cabaret Desire. They indeed came to Barcelona to see how feminist porn is made from the inside!! The DVD also features an interview and images of the wonderful city of Barcelona.

While in Belgium, I had the pleasure of going on Belgian TV! on a show called Villa Vanthilt, during which they asked me about my way of making porn and about female pleasure. You can watch the show right here.

I am really happy to work with Goedele, which is an amazing magazine. Its audience is mainly female, but instead of telling you how to give your man more pleasure or how to lose 7 kg in a week, they actually write about interesting stuff, culture, women, travel, society… because women aren't only women, they're human beings with other goals than looking pretty.

Here are a few pictures of this northern escapade, go Belgium!

The everlasting prejudices on Birth Control

Today I saw an article in the online Huffington Post with a video of Republican Steve King explaining how health insurance covering birth control is not constructive to society and how "If we let our birth rate get down below replacement rate we're a dying civilization".

It amazes to still have to fights these fights, in a society that wants to evolve but still puts into consideration these basic rights every chance it gets.

Birth control enables us to live in a sexually educated and healthy environment without gender oppression. Is having babies you can't take care of make our civilization better? How come they don't concentrate on the fact that financial speculation is genuinely ruining lives? People don't know how they're going to take care of the children they already have…

Birth control isn't a free pass to have orgies every day, stop working and be degenerates, it's a way to give children a chance to be happy and educated and build a better society.

Besides, if it's avaible for people who can affort it, it is elementary that people that aren't as wealthy can get birth control as well!

Here's the video, I'd like to read your comments about it!

The everlasting prejuidices on Birth Control

Today I saw an article in the online Huffington Post with a video of Republican Steve King explaining how health insurance covering birth control is not constructive to society and how "If we let our birth rate get down below replacement rate we're a dying civilization".

It amazes to still have to fights these fights, in a society that wants to evolve but still puts into consideration these basic rights every chance it gets.

Birth control enables us to live in a sexually educated and healthy environment without gender oppression. Is having babies you can't take care of make our civilization better? How come they don't concentrate on the fact that financial speculation is genuinely ruining lives? People don't know how they're going to take care of the children they already have…

Birth control isn't a free pass to have orgies every day, stop working and be degenerates, it's a way to give children a chance to be happy and educated and build a better society.

Besides, if it's avaible for people who can affort it, it is elementary that people that aren't as wealthy can get birth control as well!

Here's the video, I'd like to read your comments about it!

100th episode at Crash Pad

The Crash Pad series are already very famous and they're a huge hit by Pink & White productions (owned by award-winning director Shine Louise Houston), a film company that prides themselves on "beautifully fucked and beautifully produced" explorations in queer sex.

Honest and real, the episodes of this acclaimed series rely on a great cast of characters including actress Jiz Lee and Nina Harltey.

They recently celebrated the making of their 100th episode that's why I'm happy to dedicate this post to this great initiative!

Extract video below

Hail to the V

A little creepy ad to end the week – the Summer's Eve commercials featuring hand puppet vaginas. Yes.

The intentions are good but it ends up being a bit weird, and the most "irrititating" part is the two stereotyped versions of the ad that are targeted at African American and Latino women. You'll see for yourselves…

Watch the first video – second video – third video

What do you think??

There's actually a pretty funny parody by the Colbert Report below

The Colbert Report

Get More: Colbert Report Full Episodes,Political Humor & Satire Blog,Video Archive

Seeing the male everywhere

I've found this not so amusing post on Maryann Johanson's blog Flick Filosopher, its title is "Winnie the Pooh: slayer of feminist fantasies". I was intrigued of course although I suspected it had something to do with the Smurfette Principle we've already talked about here a while ago.

Maryann explains how she finds "insidious" that all characters of children animation Winnie the Pooh are all male but Kanga, the kangaroo mother who can only be defined by her gender, while the other characters, all male, gather many other defining characteristics: clumsy, smart, daring… And as I read along the rise of Maryann's anger towards the male gender being the default, the neutral aspect, when even animals that could be male or female are always seen as male like Toy Story's Rex or Slinky for example, I was amazed to see the precautions one has to take when criticising this kind of entertainment.

We almost have to apologize for criticising these overly famous movies for fear of being accused of seeing the devil everywhere. But people need to understand that when we point out this kind of problem, it's not literally about Winnie the Pooh, for all I know he's a decent bear cub, it's about us living in a male-dominated society where women, as succesful as they might be, always end up being judged, not for their intelligence or other quality, but for their gender.

That's how we end up reading articles in the media such as the Guardian's piece about Christine Lagarde, first woman to lead the IMF, with the following title: "Is this the world's sexiest woman?". Now, I don't think this is seeing the devil everywhere.Why do women automatically need to be defined in relation to men? being their fantasy, their mother, their girlfriend…

Anyway, talking about smurfs, it is also sad to see that the remake is about the hit the screens and to confirm that mainstream cinema has nothing new to offer. They're even making a remake of Spiderman's remake…

How to be a Woman

"How to be a woman" is Journalist Caitlin Moran's new book, which is "part-memoire, part-rant".

Caitlin Moran is known for her great humour and her uncensored view of feminism. She actually defines herself as a modern, strident feminist, and makes people see that feminism is not a threat, but rather a realistic view of contemporary women with modern lives and values. According to her, it's not "all about sisterhood", it's not about women against men, it's about finally seeing the daily prejudices, small or big, against women in society. She talks about her three-day-labour of her first child, of her later abortion in details, about wearing heels…

A book I recommend, it's important to have your own opinion about feminism and this project really helps you get an updated view of feminism, although I don't personnally agree with everything Caitlin says, like: "I don't think that women being seen as inferior is a prejudice based on male hatred of women. When you look at history" – achievements in arts, science, exploration, for instance – "it's a prejudice based on simple fact."

This is totally wrong. History doesn't happen in a minute. Women did achieve a lot, ie emancipating themselves from male dominance little by little. It has nothing to do with them being inferior, today's women are not a different breed than the past's, it has to do with the fact that they couldn't have access to proper education and were trapped in a socio-religious cage from which men were afread to let them out, and we're still fighting against that.

However, she agrees that a more imaginative porn would help, so she's half forgiven.

The title: "How to be a woman" is bit sharp, and it reminded me of the post about the We Are Man viral campaign, but she doesn't actually set a special behaviour for women, instead she talks about today's women and how she reacts to life.

So since feminism isn't on one piece of paper, it is important to know about other views and other initiatives, like Caitlin's.

Read an extract of the book on The Guardian.

Bikini nightmares

This is just a little post to remind all of us that we all look nice in a bikini as long as we enjoy being in it.

With the hot summer coming, adverts, diets, images, articles, on TV, on magazines… basically tell us we're fat and ugly. Maybe we are, but it's not anybody's business. I'm not going to say the classical "the inside is the most important", we all want to feel and look good, find our balance and be happy. I've been on a diet several times, especially after giving birth and it's ok. But I know many women and men who feel very selfconscious when they see that time of the year coming, and starving yourselves to flirt with a Don Juan on the beach just isn't worth it. Just enjoy yourself and your love handles or overly white skin will soon disappear.

These mainstream images we see every day don't mean anything.

People have hot sex and fall in love everyday, wheter they're tall, fat, weird-looking or have an annoying mother in law. So please, let's all enjoy our summer, enjoy the sugar in every caipirinha you drink and any other kind of sugar you might get…

Two-year-old Handcuffs

Last night I went to Coppelia for a little celebration: two years ago we were releasing one of my best short films (according to my viewers) – Handcuffs – and it was also the first gathering of my current team, the ones who make all this possible and help me make good porn and erotica every day.

So thank you all for enjoying and participating in Handcuffs!!

What is it like two years later?

Watch Handcuffs here

Here's little photo with the extras…