LOS ANGELES – In explaining his company’s choice to purchase billboard advertising space in Times Square and on the Sunset Strip in Hollywood, Pornhub Vice President Corey Price told the Los Angeles Times the billboards were part of an effort to push adult entertainment “into the mainstream consciousness and away from what most people conceive as being a taboo subject.”
In a word, I’d describe Price’s explanation as bullshit.
Don’t get me wrong: It’s plausible bullshit, and it’s bullshit that sounds OK in print as a rationalization for what amounts to a fairly tame porn industry publicity stunt, but it’s still bullshit.
The reason for Pornhub taking out billboards in two of the country’s most highly-trafficked areas is simple: to increase awareness of the Pornhub brand.
To that end, Pornhub’s campaign probably has been effective, at least to some extent. More important than the billboards themselves was that the international media took notice of the promotion and dedicated column-inches to people’s shock, dismay, indifference and assorted other reactions to the minimalist “All You Need is Hand” message.
Predictably, many people wrung their hands and clucked their tongues over what it all means “for the children”—just as Pornhub knew they would.
“You walk up my ramp, and the billboard stares straight at you,” complained the restaurateur over whose establishment the Sunset Strip version of the billboard was displayed. “If you’re going to do something like that, put it in a strip club. Kids were asking their parents about it.”
This brings us to the rub of the Pornhub campaign: However much they might have benefited Pornhub’s brand in terms of increased consumer mind-share, the billboards also potentially serve as Exhibit A in an ongoing public indictment of porn industry marketing techniques.
Critics of the porn industry are fond of claiming (among other negative things) that the industry actively seeks to “recruit” as viewers people who are not old enough to watch porn legally. As evidence, these critics cite how easy it is to stumble across porn online when searching using non-porn terms (something that has been largely untrue since search engines adopted more sophisticated algorithms more than 10 year ago). They also object to the phenomenon of “cartoon porn,” porn parodies of movies and television shows originally aimed at a youthful audience (like Avengers XXX and Wolverine XXX: An Axel Braun Parody ) and just about anything else they can shoehorn into the category of “appealing to minors.”
While it’s pretty easy to explain how a movie like Avengers XXX is not intended to appeal to children (among other things, plenty of adults watched and enjoyed the mainstream version it spoofs), it’s a whole lot harder to argue that a billboard displayed on Sunset fucking Blvd. isn’t inevitably going to catch the eye of children (and parents) who pass by.
In other words, the billboards accomplish what Pornhub wants—more attention for its brand—at the expense of what the company claims the billboards are all about: making the public more accepting of porn.
Speaking of which, is there anybody left on the planet who doesn’t believe porn is more socially acceptable now than it was 25 years ago? Isn’t it pretty clear porn has already been pushed “into the mainstream consciousness?”
I don’t really have a big problem with what Pornhub did in putting up the billboards. I don’t find the ads clever, or even particularly interesting, but so far as generating attention goes, clearly the billboards have achieved their purpose. What I do have problem with is Price pissing on my loafers from on high, then telling me it’s raining.
Pornhub, go ahead and pull all the publicity stunts you see fit and claim whatever justification for them you like. That’s just fine. You can dig up a famous dead woman, cast her corpse alongside James Deen and market it as an attempt to reduce the stigma associated with necrophilia, for all I care.
Just don’t do your level-best to stoke the flames of public anger at the porn industry, then try to sell it to me as something you did for the benefit of the industry at large or society at large, because I ain’t buying it—and neither will anybody else.
