WED., MAY 31, 2006

Porn isn’t for everyone, but apparently it does the trick (if only temporarily) for millions of people across the globe. If you believe what you read on the Internet (on those rare occasions when you’re not surfing porn), the gross revenues of the porn industry worldwide are somewhere around $57 billion per year, $12 billion in the U.S. alone. That’s more than the combined revenues of all professional football, baseball, and basketball franchises. Clearly ballin’ is big business, and, as it turns out, the most popular ballin’ doesn’t require a uniform or a lot of equipment (unless you’re into that kind of thing). Sports are fun to watch, but they lack a crucial element: interactivity. It’s exciting watching the players on the TV score, but with porn you can score on the players on the TV … you just might want to keep a box of Kleenex handy to wipe off the screen. Interactivity is important, but it’s not the only reason more than 72 million people per year visit porn Web sites. Convenience is a big factor too. Having to get out of the easy chair and drive down to the dingy XXX video store to rent “Slutty Soccer Moms” can ruin anyone’s fluff, but Googling same on a laptop brings up a dizzying pornucopia of onanistic opportunity. Blame it on societal repression, animalistic imperative, or the impending arrival of the apocalypse, but statistics show that more and more people are into porn, and increasingly those people are women. Nearly 30% of visitors to adult Web sites are women, even though they’re less likely to admit it. This Tuesday, feminist porn writer Liz Belile helps bring some of those women out of the closet by showcasing their work from her Gynomite “Breaking the Cherry” erotica writing and performance workshop. First-time gynoeroticists will read their best porn pieces in front of anyone willing to fork over a 10-spot, but it’s not about the money.