Humpjones

The Actual Business of Porno, Part One

Posted Mar 22, 2007 4 comments

Journalists are lazy, stupid and mostly worthless.  I realize that’s a blanket statement, but after less than a year doing actual research over at Brainsturbator, I’ve rapidly come to realize that journalism is little more than gossip with footnotes, and footnotes don’t mean shit.  A prime example of this would be the constantly repeated “fact” that the US porno business makes over $10 billion dollars a year. 

This is one of those lies that everyone wants to believe, so everyone just repeats it without taking the time to verify it—like how O.J. Simpson was the father of Anna Nicole Smith’s baby, how Saddam Hussian financed 9-11, or how Scarlett Johannsen will sleep with anyone who takes her out to dinner.  (Tried that twice, now I owe my label $4000 and my wife won’t return my calls. I would urge you to learn from my experience.)

Finding precise figures is slippery, but very rewarding.  I realize that reads like the setup for the Worst Pun Ever, but I promise to skip the usual winks and nudges—after all, that’s something a journalist would do.  Journalists like Frank Rich, who wrote a downright giddy article for New York Times Magazine about the “Adult Entertainment Industry” and claimed that it makes $10 to $14 billion a year.

The great thing about the Internets is that it’s full of people who are neither lazy nor stupid, and a lot of them have been calling Bullshit on Frank Rich’s story ever since.  Forbes Magazine waded into the debate and claimed the real figure was “between $2.6 billion and $3.9 billion”—which is still a great deal of money, especially considering most of it is being poured directly into the cocaine business.

This ain’t moral indignation—if you really want to talk about wasting money, I’m a lot more concerned about Pfizer or Lockheed Martin, you know? 

MyStroke Murdoch and Real Smut Kings

Urban legends are generally rooted in truth, only the truth is way less easy to explain, and not nearly as entertaining at parties.  AT&T and General Motors are both huge, normal American corporations who were both, very quietly, tapping into the large market for jiggling titties on a TV screen.  They also both got caught, and due to pressure from Christian activist groups, they both dropped their holdings in the titties jiggling business. 

Do you take for granted that Christians are ignorant?  It can be easy to do, since most “Christians” don’t even recognize quotes from their own scripture, and will often claim that they need to consult some Reverend or Pastor about the solution to whatever questions or contradications you bring up.  But these people are merely poodles. Don’t ever confuse them with actual Christians.

Every single “group” you can think of, aside from just being a human abstraction, is generally composed of at least two parts. A small core of very capable and intelligent people who have thought their beliefs through, surrounded by much larger group of poodles, who merely claim to be a member of the group.  This is true for music scenes, political parties, the New Age movement and anything else you want to plug into it.

Fox News, for instance, is surrounded by a massive protective layer of truly delusional humans.  But don’t get smug...that’s camouflage, baby. For this precise reason it’s easy to forget about just how intelligent and capable that small core is.  Fox has no problem being involved with the weirdest shows on TV, just like it has no problem being involved with the porn industry, because it has all bases covered.  They don’t need lobbyists, they have stores in airports, they work for the White House and the Pentagon. When AT&T got the heat turned up, they went belly-up and started naming names:

The Hot Network is offered by many of our competitors and other cable companies, including General Motors’ DirecTV national satellite service, Cox Communications, Comcast Corporation, Cablevision Systems, Charter Communications, MediaOne, Insight Communications, and video services operated by telephone companies such as GTE, SNET, and U S WEST. The Dish Network, owned by Echo Star, offers similar and even more explicit programming services.

Since that letter was written, a lot of those companies flaked out like little sissy girly-men, and so there were a bunch of people dropping their holdings in porn.  Rupert Murdoch was there to pick them up.  His News Corporation could be getting smaller in the future—it’s Hump Jones, we have to gravitate towards sex:

Anna insisted on a guarantee about the future of their three offspring, Elisabeth, Lachlan and James, within News Corporation - a condition Murdoch would hardly contest...when Murdoch’s estranged wife learnt about his relationship with 32-year-old Wendi Deng several months later, any hope of an early settlement evaporated. The pair now appear to be bunkering down for a long war of attrition. Anna Murdoch wants Rupert Murdoch to pay.

The Invisible Hand of Cable Porn

Ah, Wendy, you work so well on so many levels.  One of them is being a distraction from the real juicy stuff that gets buried in the bottom of the articles:

To any outsider, Murdoch’s wealth has transcended the normal meaning of the word; far beyond the simple calculation of the number of dollars at his command. There is the power that comes with the sheer weight of money. And as a media baron, his aura of influence has extended well beyond that of any of his super-rich peers.

But what hasn’t been known is that, for decades, Murdoch has owned next to nothing.

The fabulous wealth accumulated during a lifetime of ruthless determination and daring risk has been salted away in an intricate network of trusts and private companies in which, technically and legally, he has no involvement.

Meanwhile, Rupert has conquered the world.  Or something.  No, Rupert, you’re going to die and every single day from now until then, that young wife of yours will hate you a little more.  Each morning, that little black pit in her heart will get a little denser, a little colder, and soon enough she won’t even be looking at you, old man.  Not because she hates you, not because she can’t bear to look, but because she’s thinking of me.

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