Not registering on the site, so I can’t read the article, but the reason seems obvious enough. For most people, just looking to watch sex, it really doesn’t matter if one of the actors starts a scene by saying, “Step brother, what are you doing?” For people who are into incest stuff, for whatever reason, they’re going to be happy about it. It’s a situation that doesn’t cost extra money, all they need is a regular room in a regular house. So there’s little downside for the porn studios, with likely bigger upsides.
I can tell you this: they know what people click - if it wasn’t selling, they wouldn’t do it.
You’re welcome.
Okay, that article is bullshit. It’s popular because it appeals to the loses in our meritocracy and liberal democracy. How does he know this? He doesn’t, there’s zero data to back it up.
That’s the thing about 99% of philosophy and media theory. It’s not about data.
Use an ad blocker
Can confirm, can see the site just fine with uBlock Origin.
Yup, that’s what I’ve always used and never had any issues.
Not my jam, but it probably has to do with it being taboo but not illegal or violent. That or whoever is in charge of the scene is into that type of thing.
I thought the author took the analysis to a whole other level than that
I think everybody is overthinking it, honestly. This is probably a UX problem. At some point some of these taboo reasons led to a relatively minor trend of roleplaying that situation, that made “step” a SEO bonus, and since you can claim any porn fits the genre, even retroactively, it also became the default way to label a porn video in algorithmically served free porn sites. And now it’s probably just convention, or tradition or whatever.
Yea. Bringing up meritocracy and incels to it, was way overthinking everything.
It’s one of the few narrative devices left in porn nowadays. It doesn’t take as long to setup, like all of the old porn narratives. The cable/TV/plumber has been crowed about for so long it breaks the mood.
Plus you can fit a quick taboo in small 8-10 minutes that works for online porn. It’s less about some big zeitgeist moment that shows some secret about our society, and more about how it is a lot easier to produce.
It’s both corporatism and enshitification all in one.
I know a lot of it is getting made, but I’m not sure it’s actually popular. It’s porn so a lot of people probably mute it and ignore the weird storylines
Porn has sound?
I mean, I only use the sound.
Believe it or not, people aren’t deathly silent during sex.
“Babe, are you enjoying yourself? You’ve barely made a noise.”
“mhmm.”
“What?”
^^“mhmm”
“WHAT? Please, can you give me any feedback at all?”
…
“You know what, your brother was right about you.”
I would bet money that it’s popular enough that it is worth adding those stupid, unrelated titles to videos. I bet pornhub models see increased views, and then title every video that way. You gotta play the game, and unfortunately the game is step sibs now.
I’m not doubting you can get more views, but I am doubting that many people specifically seek that out. It’s kind of like an “add on feature” that you can ignore if it’s not your thing. These are just people having sex, and the story is made up so it’s ignorable
If it gets more views then someone is seeking it out.
No one denied that. Many > some
I watch is but only because it is literally in almost everything. I don’t want to watch it but I am basically forced to at this point.
It’s risky and taboo, and it instantly explains how the two people know each other. Literally don’t need to have a plot.
How many people actually watch it for the plot?
Most probably just look for something with good camera angles, nice looking people, and the specific kink they want.
Everyone knows those two are not actually related. And the terrible acting certainly doesn’t help to sell the theme.
I have seen one siblings porn where the acting was actually so fucking good that it felt real and I had to turn that shit off.
I think it is due to it being a easy/lazy setup for writing the story. First locational and setup, you can use a house or apartment easily and explain why these two people are in proximity of each other in this setting. Second the taboo-ness gives a reason why these attractive people have not acted on their basic impulses yet, thus creating conflict (storywise) that they have to resolve, que the banging. It is taboo-ish socially wise but not legally wise, like many other genres.
I think it’s just a joke that went too far.
The question remains: why did it manage to go that far? Why did it gain so much traction?
I remember reading an article that “strange” things get attention and clicks (as long as they’re not too objectionable) because they set themselves apart from the flood of regular “hot girl loves huge dick” kind of titles. And once momentum starts building then everyone starts jumping on till it becomes an odd self sustaining trend. I can’t find the article now. Now the data shows everyone is clicking step-porn and your chances of getting a click on “normal” porn are much lower, so this is what everyone makes now.
The weird point being made in this article as a backlash to “meritocracy” doesn’t really make sense to me.
Part of what drives popular porn is a sense of taboo, enough to make something more exciting without going so far as to become repulsive. An easy way to do that is to take a normal, relatable situation, and sexify it. That’s why Step-Incest porn is so popular right now.
Back in the day, this was the service worker / payment trope, done so extensively that it’s cliche now. Plenty of people will hire a plumber to do some work in their home. Normal, relatable, but what if that then leads to sex with some lines about “cleaning pipes”? Suddenly this mundane thing that people can relate to becomes sexy. How about ordering a pizza, but you discover you don’t have any cash, so you offer to pay with sex! Another normal situation made progressively more exciting. It all edges close to prostitution, paying someone for sex or exchanging sex for goods or services, but it neatly skirts around that somewhat more taboo, and certainly at the time objectionable concept.
Now, it’s step-incest. Lots of people have step-siblings, it’s very relatable, but most of us wouldn’t really consider sex with them. That takes the relatable situation and makes it more taboo, more sexy. This stops short of the real taboo though, actual incest. It’s almost always Step siblings, because that gets close enough to the forbidden to be more thrilling, without really triggering that ingrained repulsion in enough people to make it worth making.
Step-incest porn is popular because having step siblings is relatable, but something most people wouldn’t normally relate to sex, while allowing porn to edge closer to the forbidden taboo of actual incest without actually crossing that line.
It’s cheaper to make. No need for fancy sets, costumes, make up etc. Just need a set that looks like a household room ($200/day on Airbnb) and the stars to say every now and then step-bro/sis
While true, you also need nothing fancy to have the neighbour come over. There is obviously a preference for it being more taboo. My guess is they figured they could cover both the incest fetish and vanilla porn with the same film as long as they didn’t offend people enough to turn them off watching. So it sounds like most are willing to just ignore the parts they don’t care about.
I can’t believe I’m suggesting this, but it’s possible that LLM-AI chat bots might be useful for this author’s research.
There may be some confirmation bias happening around the specific pornography that the author is referring to; namely what they’re finding on PornHub. Maybe I’m an old and jaded Internet weirdo, but the sort of kink that ends up being turned into filmed porn is going to be the most broad, edges-rounded-off version of whatever it is you’re seeking. It’s divining causation from a median; it’s not going to give you the whole story.
Go check out the LLM chatbot platforms. Their most popular content is littered with incest porn, and not the nerfed step-incest variety. The narratives are remarkably diverse, considerably more so than the blackmail/coercion scenario that’s the author describes seeing again and again. If you want to see what people want, look at what they’re making for themselves. It’s a drink from the firehose to be sure, and often unfiltered, so prepare to be horrified.
Maybe their theory does bare out. I don’t know enough about the kink to say one way or another. But I think their examination would be greatly helped by taking in a wider array of samples, specifically from sources with lower barriers to initial entry. After all, a talented prompt engineer can bang out a new porn bot in a few hours. And they don’t even have to look like a porn star.
I think it triggers a sort of relation and familiarity with what’s on the screen. It helps people project their id into the sex act and feel arousal more easily.
I think that’s what the author is getting at, just in many more words. The concerning part, per the author, is “why are people identifying so much with the lazy high white kid?” As opposed to other taboo topics, like the plumbers of yesteryear
Pretty sure it’s for porn sites to get around places that make incest porn illegal or banned. It gives them a grey area to say it’s not really incest if they aren’t portrayed as genetic relatives.
That only explains the “step” part, not the explosive growth of the genre overall
That’s true and most of the article I think is more about incest porn and not necessarily step incest porn, but I think it’s important if we’re going to make the distinction we should also mention the difference and legal loopholes that may affect why the step part of it is so much more frequent used. For example a few years ago many porn sites replaced titles with words like mother, son, etc with m, s, etc as an obfuscation tactic and then a while later many were updated or reposted with step instead even if the actual content makes no reference to step.
Why do people start smoking cigarettes? Taboo is sexy. People tell you no because they wanna keep shit for themselves, so naturally we expect the same to apply for other things.
You know how your cats love whatever it is you shoo them away from?
