My, my obscene comic

Or: how I learned the hard way that the internet killed porn

I got stuck for awhile, not sure how to do this newsletter. At first, I thought I’d write it as a series of listicles, but that bored me to tears. Then I thought maybe The Reverse Cowgirl newsletter isn’t The New York Times of sex, as I’d claimed, but The Wall Street Journal of sex, because the beat I covered on my Forbes blog was “the business of sex,” but that idea didn’t get me anywhere either. Last week, I spent some time casting about for ideas of what to write about, after several weeks of not writing anything. For some reason, it occurred to me that an X-rated comic I created some years ago didn’t exist online (althought you can buy it in print form in this anthology). Well, maybe I’ll publish the comic in my newsletter, I thought. But then I started to wonder if doing so would get me banned from Substack. “We don’t allow porn or sexually exploitative content on Substack,” read their Content Guidlines, although “We do allow depictions of nudity for artistic, journalistic, or related purposes, as well as erotic literature.” So, I wasn’t sure. Then I thought, maybe I’ll turn it into a PDF and sell it on Gumroad. On Gumroad: “We define pornography as photos or videos depicting one (or more) real human adults engaging in sexual activities,” although, they note: “Animations, illustrations, audiobooks and audio products do not count as pornography.” So, I wasn’t sure. Then I thought—well, let’s be honest, I knew I couldn’t post it on Instagram because: “We don’t allow nudity on Instagram, with some exceptions, like photos of post-mastectomy scarring and women actively breastfeeding,” although “Nudity in photos of paintings and sculptures is OK, too.” So, yeah, no. Then I thought, well, maybe I’ll post it on my website, which is hosted by Squarespace. But their Acceptable Use Policy informed me: “Don’t publish sexually explicit or obscene material.” So, um, ok. Then I thought, well, fuck it, I’ll post it on Twitter, where, FYI, “You can now label individual posts on Twitter as 'sensitive,' saving your whole account from getting flagged.” But by this point, I was exhausted and felt like a leper at a pajama party. So I ended up making the miniature version of my obscene comic that you can see at the bottom of this post. Since the name of my comic contains a dirty word, I won’t mention it here because maybe that would get this newsletter sent to your spam folder, care of Google or whatever email provider you use. Anyway, here’s the kicker. Around the same time I was trying to figure out how to post my X-rated comic online, I got on the phone and talked to this pornographer that I’ve known for a long time. (Business is great, he related.) He told me that the chokeholds of digital platforms and payment processors have “tamified porn.” When he said that, I didn’t believe him. Suffice to say, now I believe him. I hope you’re not offended. Are you?

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