2020’s Most Read Sex Work Writing on Peepshow Media

“The sex work career that I have built—which has moved far beyond those initial encounters in cam rooms into my main source of income, my community and a significant part of my identity—has been more fraught than I could have imagined when I first started.”

“When I began, I didn’t know that my work in the adult industry would shape most of my interactions, change people’s perception of me and cause major strife in my relationships with my extended family. I also didn’t know that the work itself would be so intense, creative, raw and emotional, and that I would have a hard time imagining going back to a ‘normal’ job.”

3. Porn Industry’s #MeToo Moment Leads to Calls for Change by PJ Sage

“Those of us in the industry know that stories of abuse are constant, circulating though whisper networks of performers. As both male talent and as a photographer, those collective traumas are palpable to me in the caution many models carry into new working relationships.”

“While performers are continuing to come forward with new stories, outrage over pervasive abuse within the industry has already begun to galvanize a performer-led movement for change.”

4. Strippers Forced to Choose Between Safety and Economic Stability as Clubs Reopen by Reese Piper

Facing both a loss of unemployment benefits (due to work being once again available) and a simultaneous uptick  in the number of COVID cases, strippers are weighing the risk of the virus against increasing economic insecurity.”

“Weighing the risk of safety with economic realities is something sex workers are familiar with. Stripping is a job that comes with a multitude of risks that, for many, are worth it because the job provides an opportunity to make more than minimum wage with fewer hours of work.”

5. The Future of BBW Porn: An Interview with Lasha Lane by Jessie Sage

“There are so many things that the adult industry is capable of doing. We are capable of shaping minds; we already shape perception. We can demonstrate a new way to treat each other, we can be a tool used to change the way people perceive each other.”

“Women and Black people especially are finding that they had a certain amount of power that they didn’t know they had before. The matrix has been opened to them. We are seeing it, and we are taking it. It is scaring people—and that’s okay. We were scared too, but now is the time. There are certain points in history where we change, and this is one of those times.”

6. Beautiful Agony and Serene Self-Pleasure by R.T. Collins

“This restriction and the uniform framing of the films creates an interesting experiment in visual stimulation as we can’t see their hands or usual sexual parts; instead, focus on their facial expressions, their movements, their sounds. We’re encouraged to scrutinize their faces for pleasure— recognizing the tensing, the furrowed brows, the shortness of breath, the flushed cheeks, and the eventual moaning (or quiet) climax. It’s fascinating, slightly academic, awkwardly intimate, and hot as hell.”

“I found myself becoming invested in these people’s orgasms, willing them on, becoming excited when their faces screwed up and their chests got red and they came, gasping and sweating. The camera stays on them a little longer, as they sleepily smile at the absurdity of what they just did. This afterglow is gorgeous—real and emotional.”

7. EARN IT Poses a New Threat to a Sex Worker Community that is Already Reeling by Lorelei Lee

“EARN IT would also make tech platforms subject to laws enacted by states, regardless of whether those restrictions are consistent with restrictions in other states, thereby forcing tech companies to follow nationwide—and potentially worldwide—the laws that are passed in the most conservative states.“

“Sex workers, survivors, and sex working survivors have been through too much to let Congress again pretend to address violence while instead increasing marginalized people’s vulnerability to violence.“

8. Before Life: Remembering the Pure Perversions of Damien Moreau by Caitlin Donohue

“If you are familiar with Damien only through these works, then you likely don’t know of his love of Wyoming granite outcrops or his New York City visual arts career. I didn’t, until he died, and then I wanted to know everything—to speak to everyone who knew Damien, to revel in his unfathomable intuition and relentless beauty. I wanted to write about him, and finally, enough time passed that I felt like I could do so.”

“Damien needed us to make his art, but we often needed him to articulate barely-parsed sides of our sexual beings. He’d find their best lighting, make sure he captured their finest iteration, and present them back to us, edited for the gods.”