What words strike you as “bad” ones? Maybe that’s a kind of weird way to start off a column on a porn site, because, let’s face it – you’re here for the bad words. And pictures. Or at least, the ones that are so bad, they’re good. But what about words that give you that “bad touch” skin crawly feeling? Everyone’s got them. For me, the phrases that make me feel icky are a few genital descriptors: “meat curtains” for labia and “blue veiner” for penis. Just writing that makes me feel gross, but luckily on the average day I can avoid any mention of those phrases because they aren’t especially common.
Ian Denchasy, however, has a much harder time avoiding the turns of phrase that make him feel icky – because they describe the industry he works in. Along with his wife Alicia, Ian founded and runs Freddy and Eddy, an erotic boutique in the Venice Beach neighborhood of Los Angeles that began ten years ago as a website ploy to get free sex toys to review.
Today the business has blossomed into one of the most unique sex shops I’ve ever been into – Ian prepares cappuccino almost as soon as visitors arrive, while Alicia gives a personalized tour of their space. First timers can expect to spend an hour or more perusing, chatting and learning, and though they might leave with a new product, they’re just as likely to borrow a book or movie from the lending library the couple maintains.
And those icky words that make Ian shudder? “Porn,” “adult,” and “novelty.” During a gathering at the Adult Entertainment Expo last month, I had an impassioned conversation with Ian about those words, and the fact that they make him feel gross about his sexuality and his desire to seek out erotic entertainment that will respect him in the morning. Although over the last twenty years we’ve seen the rapid growth of the women’s and couple’s markets (hence sites like this one), words like these persist, and they don’t do us any favors.
After one too many years of being put through the paces of adult conventions and feeling assaulted by ickiness, Ian and Alicia took the initiative to pioneer a new kind of sexuality event, Love LA.
The one day event took place on Sunday, January 27th in rainy Los Angeles largely due to the passion of Ian and Alicia and the sponsorship of the LA Weekly and Xbiz. Although from a distance it looked like a typical adult trade show, the organizers made sure it was anything but. For one thing, they decided early on that there would be no porn. That’s right: no 18-year-old girls in lucite heels, no balloon-breasted women signing 8×10s for a long line of admirers. No porn.
Where the porn would be in other shows like it, Love LA had welcoming booths in which independent sex toy companies had their wares on display and did a lot of meeting and greeting. They also offered up seminars throughout the day that ranged from bondage basics to tips on role play to lighthearted crafty fun like making explicit shrinky dinks. The whole event was billed as “the first ever Sexual Health, Education and Entertainment Exhibition,” and it seems to have lived up to the hype.
Olivia Hayes, who commandeers the Pleasure Happens blog for sex toy retailer the Pleasure Chest, was impressed with the swankiness of the event. “I think there was a strong commitment made to distance this event from the ‘trashiness’ people generally associate with sex toys and the like,” she says, “and I think [calling the event] ‘upscale’ would be about on par.” The event was full of retailers, with female owned and run companies having a major presence, and small, independent businesses overrunning the floor.
The mainstream adult industry is unfortunately characterized by faceless corporations or male leadership that would make anyone want to hide behind the anonymity of the typical adult transaction, but the small companies represented at Love LA take a different approach entirely.
Olivia reports that, “I felt like this event was really more about networking, brand awareness, and education… I wouldn’t say there were a ton of actual products sold. A lot of swag was given away and much networking was done, and I think that was more the point than to sell stuff, which I feel is more often the motivation behind other trade shows.”
The absence of porn seems to have affected the demographic of the attendees – Ian says that of the 1000 people who bought tickets, about 65% were female, and about half of those brought their partners with them. Olivia confirms this and says that, “There were lots of young couples, queer female couples (of all gender expressions…not just the lipstick lesbians that LA is known for), older couples that seemed a little shy, single people milling about…The only demographic I didn’t really get the sense that this event attracted were gay men.”
The questions Love LA asked were: can so-called “adult” businesses attract attention and enthusiasm if porn stars are cut out of the picture? Will consumers still know what they’re looking at without those words that make Ian go “ew”?
Overwhelmingly, the event answered both of these questions with a big yes. People who want to get sexy aren’t stupid, they don’t need to be talked down to or always have their basest desires appealed to.
But for this avowed pornographer and shameless smut watcher, eliminating the porn isn’t the best and only answer. Certainly it made planning easier, but hopefully with a little education and the positive example of the non-porn part of the biz, pornographers with their heads and hearts in the right place will be welcome in the future. The foundation is laid, and the potential is proven – it is possible to make sexy entertainment fun and welcoming without losing the mojo.
Click here to check out pictures from Love LA!
Audacia Ray
LiveGirlReview.com
WakingVixen.com
Check out her directorial debut, The Bi Apple!
All photo credits: Metis Black, founder of Tantus.
