Oriana Small is a gross girl. Picture a feisty Kathy Acker heroine peeing standing up with white knee-high socks, pigtails, and a smart mouth on a painfully beautiful face.
It’s possible that I first met Oriana Small at Literary Death Match in Los Angeles, where she was my favorite sarcastic judge—so mesmerizing, she made me lose interest in the competing writers. It’s also possible that I first met Oriana Small when I drew the blood of porn stars at AIM Healthcare Foundation, the clinic that used to cater to the adult industry. But, neither of us remembered each other from that time. She was on coke. I was depressed.
After Literary Death Match, we spoke about her porno memoir Girlvert, and I was dying to interview her about it. The tone of her book is frenzied with a dead aura like a Boogie Nights orgy with Philip Glass’s “Powaqqatsi” playing loudly in the background. Girlvert is not only a journey into Ori Small’s eroticized grossness as porn actor Ashley Blue. Sure, we see Ashley Blue suck. We see Ashley Blue fuck. We see ass-rupturing and fist-swallowing. But the most glamorous thing about Girlvert is Oriana Small’s unbreakable hopefulness in the face of sketchy circumstances. Small writes, after nearly being choked to death, “I am capable of being wrong and naïve and savagely hopeful over and over.”
And I think, Fuck. Kathy Acker would have loved Oriana Small.
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The Rumpus: While reading Girlvert, I kept wondering about your childhood. For instance, how did you feel growing up as a little girl in your family? Were you aching to be seen? Why do you think little Ori was so eager to please? Why was she so hungry to be grossed out, and how did that transfer into eroticism? What did little Ori want more than anything?
Oriana Small: I didn’t want to dwell on my childhood because it would have taken away from the real story, the stuff I did as an adult. The chapter in my book about my mother includes both gnarly and nice things about her. I did learn the “fuck you” attitude from her, and I’m grateful that she was a rebellious teenager, even one that never grew up. What I wanted so badly was to be free and different—special, artistic somehow. I figured out that I couldn’t be a painter, because I didn’t like being broke all the time. That transferred into eroticism because I could live recklessly as a sexual circus performer, no problem.
I was never sexually molested. I like to be challenged and gross myself out, so that I come back for more, to see if I can raise the bar. I smashed bugs as a kid. I read Henry Miller as a teenager. It was my idea to try anal sex with a guy, way before I had ever seen it done in a porno. The first porn flick I ever watched was called Bridgette the Midget: Mighty Migdet. I think I just have an advanced sensual palate, or my mind has always been a blown-out mess.
Rumpus: The reason I never got into porn was because you can never hide. It’s out there for everyone to see: nieces, nephews, brothers and moms. I was always blown away by the courage porn stars had—to be revealed in such a permanent way. At the same time, I always wondered how it played out in families. Like, what happens if your brother or mom is alerted to your acting on the Internet? In Girlvert, you negotiate that moment with your mom and it made me cringe. Tell us about the phone call from your mom and the creepy boyfriend moment.
Small: My mom called and said she’d just seen me on the Internet with a “mouthful of cock.” Her boyfriend had shown her. I decided never to speak to her again, until Tyler forced me to call her a month later. We went over to her boyfriend’s house to see her, where Leon [Small’s mom’s boyfriend] proceeded to ask for help getting into porn. I said no.
Rumpus: Sexual power is a drug. While reading Girlvert, there’s something about losing it and reclaiming it. Losing it looked like disassociating while performing painful sex in scenes, leading a double life and the degradation you experienced—like the dry ass rape. But the part that made me ache the most was the love story between Tyler and you. He acted as a relentless and manipulative vehicle to drive you darker into your most primal erotic desires: to feel totally controlled. At the same time, you often wanted to control Tyler. Tell me about your relationship to power and pain.
Small: I feel powerful when I can take the pain. It’s just like when you can fist your own ass, which is a chapter in the book. With Tyler, I thought that going through pain would mean that we could be happier—drug happy, Ecstasy happy. There were moments of excruciating agony that seemed like the end of the world, and wanting to die. But I let him control me because I loved that excitement. I felt like I was living my life to the extreme, emotionally and otherwise.
Even though he was irresponsible and bad with money, I felt like he was rescuing me from being boring and ordinary. I let him make all the decisions, and at the same time, protected him from things that I knew he would completely handle the wrong way. For example, my first box cover shoot ended up an unwanted anal penetration, but I could never tell Tyler. He was too impulsive and passionate, therefore wouldn’t understand how I would just act like nothing happened. The things I loved about him were also the things I wanted to protect him from.
Rumpus: Your one-liners are poised and sharp. For instance, “I wanted to be the most beautiful thing that ever fucked.” While your toughness felt guarded, your insecurity and people-pleasing made you a flawed, sympathetic narrator that I wanted to root for. Do you think your people-pleasing and codependency made you an easy target for sociopaths in the porn industry? Do you think that sexism is more rampant in the porn industry than in other work places? Was it a relief to find your physical and emotional limits? When you drew the line in the sand at gangbangs and heroin usage, did you feel liberated?
Small: Thank you. I didn’t want to come off like a self-righteous victim or saint. I hate that more than anything! The easy target was an adornment I wore with pride. It was a stamp of youth that faded in time. It goes hand in hand with non-cellulite thighs and collagen. These are all things that I wish I could keep forever. I’ll always cherish and glorify that deer-in-the-headlights age. Not giving a fuck really worked for me, career-wise, but I never thought like that. I truly didn’t want to know about the world besides my boyfriend, porn, and partying. Someone back then asked me who the Vice President was and I didn’t know. I truly didn’t have enough room in my clouded brain to be concerned with politics.
Besides, I was experiencing the opposite of what sexism in the workplace was for everyone else. I was being paid four times as much as the men in the same movies as me. When I refused to do a bukkake and was fired from my movie contract, I felt extremely liberated.
Rumpus: One admirable thing about Girlvert are your unromantic descriptions throughout the book, especially the psychological disconnect that happens when our bodies are doing things our minds are catching up with. You embody that so well when you write, “My racing mind shut off, and my body came alive.” I loved your discoveries about yourself. It seemed like Pro Trusion and other horrid creeps were out to hammer out that innocence, but there it remained, even after you were choked out. Is it still there? Where is it now?
Small: I’m pretty jaded now. No one person has the credit of taking my innocence, certainly not Pro Trusion. I learned a lot about myself from the experience of being choked out by an ugly guy. There are creepy people in society everywhere, not just porn. Pro Trusion was a good place to practice how I could deal with other bad situations throughout the rest of my life.
Porn is very honest and “in your face.” It’s a safe place to just be yourself and confront disgusting personalities. As for my innocence, it looks like the butterfly tattoo I got when I was fifteen. Faded into something unrecognizable, but technically still in existence.
Rumpus: Although I could see you perform the acts of your porn and love life in a cinematic frenzy, I wanted to know the heart of Oriana Small. What did you learn about humanity in your decade debut of porn? How did it transform you as a person?
Small: I learned tremendously from my decade working in porn. I am still fascinated by everyone. The human experience within porn is so fucking interesting. I’m on a quest for more. I’m now writing for Hustler Magazine and reviewing for AVN. Porno people inspire me to write and connect to the raw, raunchy, and specific details of life. My mind is open. If not for being part of pornography, I would be such a scared and powerless woman. Embracing sex gave me the reason to reject the life of limitation and ignorance that I was born into. Not everyone needs to be in porn to realize this, but this was my education. I needed those experiences to grow.
Rumpus: I loved the part about AIM Healthcare foundation and Sharon. I worked there with Chloe, Laurie Holmes, Paul Pardo, Helen, and Karim. Maybe we met there. I was trying to stay out of the sex industry but got pulled back into doing private “shows” with some pilled-out funny girl. But my intention was to help the adult industry folks stay clean, and I really liked the people I met. Do you think we should pass the condom law? Where is the adult industry going? Are actors still being paid well? How has the porn industry changed over time?
Small: The condom law is a bullshit reason for the Christians to finally shut down porn in Los Angeles. It’s disguised as the “Safe Sex” law, but it is a final blow to strike down this industry. The AHF [AIDS Healthcare Foundation] people and church activists worked really hard to close AIM, and they accomplished that a couple years ago. AIM kept all the testing in one place and was the only thing performers could really rely on. Now it is between different labs, and there is less of a sense of community than there was at AIM. The next step is to move the producers out of California. It’s really bad for business to enforce condoms on porn performers. No one will want to buy the product, since it is legal to shoot non-condom in other places (Florida, Arizona, Nevada). A lot of regular people are going to lose their jobs, too, not just the actors that are fucking. Office workers, graphic designers, warehouse workers, etc. will lose, as well.
Rumpus: I know this was no feminist manifesto 2.0, but how has your book been received by sex workers and other pro-porn feminists?
Small: My book has been well received by feminists, more than I could have ever hoped. I’m very happy about the praise it’s received from women inside and outside porn. I’m very lucky to have my book published by Barnacle Books. I didn’t have to change my voice at all, or seek some phony redemption in the end. I hope that this book is empowering to anyone who reads it.
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First author photograph © 2012 by Dennis McGrath.
Second author photograph © 2012 by Dave Naz.
13 responses
This is a really great interview. Oriana I can’t wait to read your book.
i second what shannon said and will add that i’m sorry the condom initiative passed in california – i voted against it. i would rather have had the measure passed that would label foods using GMOs. sigh.
Great interview. Oriana’s response to the condom initiative should have been required reading on the voting line.
I disagree with the statement that porn is honest and in your face.
I do agree with the nicely turned phrase “sexual circus preformer”.
I think (contemporary) porn is sexism amplified . Amplified to the point of distortion.
I would like to build on Harry’s statement. Porn distorts our natural sexual desires just to make money and Ashley Blue is a hand-maiden to the power and greed of this myopic industry. Come on both of you, get real. Would the feminists who support the kind of porn that Ashley Blue engages in please step forward? Here is a relevant passage from a feminist of note, “We cannot talk about changing the types of images offered us in the mass media without acknowledging the extent to which the vast majority of the images we see are created from a patriarchal standpoint. These images will not change until patriarchal thinking and perspectives change. Individual women and men who do not see themselves as victims of patriarchal power find it difficult to take seriously the need to challenge and change patriarchal thinking. … Naturally, anyone socialized to think this way would be more interested in and stimulated by scenes of domination and violence rather than by scenes of love and care.†p. 96-7 “All About Love†by bell hooks. These statements, in my view challenge a lot of the substance of what you are saying here. Or we can get specific and consider anal sex as portrayed in pornos. So young Johnny is jerking off as he watches Ashley Blue enjoy some “ass-rupturing†sex. And then the next time Johnny’s with his girlfriend Barbie … and they are having vaginal sex… well its not going to be enough is it? But then Barbie will want to subordinate herself to Johnny’s desires to feel wanted. And I am no authority on this subject, but from what little I know, there are plenty of women who really don’t like anal sex. I do know that Pattie (mentioned in interview of a John) said, “how would you feel if you had to take up the ass to pay your billsâ€. From that remark, I take it she was not fond of anal sex. So what messages do pornos send? What redeeming value is there in these hours of porno you have helped create? I would argue that Joe Biden (he’s the current vice president of the United States) accomplishes more for the benefit to society in one year than all the years of the entire porno industry. If you would just be honest, you do porn to make money (and have fun). But please don’t invoke feminist principles to justify your own greed.
The comments above are telling: the top three comments are positive and from women. The two above are from men poking fun and trying to discredit Oriana.
It’s important to have people like Oriana Small out there with a progressive feminist voice. She boldly told her story and took full responsibility for her actions. She’s put this important book out there for other people to understand and learn from.
It’s so much easier to be the victim and blame others.
It’s always people like Mike that try to control women. His ramblings are condescending and bizarre.
Mike, your comment reeks of an addict fired up to fight the war on drugs when what you really need is a 12-step program and a brutal spanking. I was amazed that you somehow managed to appropriate the innovative and joyful feminist principles of Bell Hooks to exacerbate your own victim hood and sound like a jerk. If you read the same Bell Hooks that I read, you would have demonstrated some reverence and respect for Oriana Small for writing about her sexual journey through adult industry as a young woman pushing against her own physical and emotional boundaries to find her limits. She made the decision to do porn and enjoyed the hell out of it and that is her feminist manifesto. Her book does not romanticize the industry. It’s very frank. Her book does not deny the chauvinism she confronts as a female performer. Her book is as empowering and sexually embodied as a book about a woman can be. I remember a daily rumpus that Stephen wrote last year about sex work and I think it’s the best thing I have ever read on the topic. He wrote: I said there’s an assumption that a woman can never get into sex work of her own volition; she must always be manipulated, tricked, or forced by a man. I think that’s a sexist position. And it doesn’t jive with my own experience, and the people I know in the sex work community. And I know lots of people in the sex work community, almost all of them consider themselves feminists. It is true that the customer is usually a man, though that’s changing quite a bit. It’s also true that more and more women are owning the companies and directing the movies. At Kink.com, for example, at least two, and maybe three, of the seven directors are women. At least one of the directors is transgender. But the owner is a man, which is a problem/reality of capitalism. The owners of the basketball teams are not basketball players. There’s a tenuous connection, at best, between labor and ownership. Capitalism is exploitative, by definition. The question should be, if you are taking a stand against sex work, how is sex work exploitative in a way that other labor jobs are not? Some answers might include that doing sex work will hurt your prospects of finding a different job later, a job that more closely resembles a career, but that’s not a problem of sex work, that’s a problem of discrimination. That’s like being against black people moving into your neighborhood because housing prices might fall. You might not think you’re being discriminatory; you might think it’s not you, it’s your neighbors, without realizing your own contribution to the discussion. I wonder, for example, when someone says that sex work is humiliating, how is sex work more humiliating than working at Wal-Mart? There are people that work at Wal-Mart for years, encouraged by their employers to apply for medical assistance from the state, payed subsistence wages, forced to wear funny smocks and buttons, warned against taking over-long breaks and docked for “time theft.”
People talk often about how people arrive at sex work. Sometimes sex workers grew up in abusive homes. I was a sex worker and I grew up in an abusive home. But sex work is not the abusive home and not every sex worker was abused.
To have a real conversation about sex work you have to step outside the platitudes regarding exploitation and labor; you have to find ideas that won’t apply in any other context. For me, the deeper idea is why do people react so strongly against sex work? What in our past provokes us to recoil? The thing about humans that separates us from apes is we rationalize how we feel. The feelings come first and then the explanations for why we feel the way we do follow. It’s hard to see, in our justifications, the source of our emotion. Where does it spring?â€
Hi Antonia. What a riveting and raw interview. It’s refreshing to see someone like Oriana be able to own her story and shamelessly share it with others. That’s just the kind of empowering material readers over at Venus Blogs would love. Stop by if you get a chance. I get the feeling that you and Dori Hartley who is the managing editor, just might be literary kindred spirits: http://venusblogs.com/the-vagina-whisperer/.
I just finished reading Girlvert. And as a fellow sexworker and addict, I thought it was honest and inspiring. One of the hardest realization for some women in this business is getting old and not having skills to cope with ordinary life. But who wants to be ordinary anyway! Oriana shows that there is hope for a creative full life for women who have traveled down the same fast lane of sex and drugs.
Mike, I don’t even know where to begin. (Antonia, well-said.)
So, to work in the sex industry is not a feminist choice, but a choice based on greed? Interesting. And are you saying that it’s more correct to portray sex in a strictly “loving and caring” fashion? Here’s a little tidbit for you, and I’ll tell you who I am just so you know who you’re offending with your broad generalizations. I’m a vanilla soccer mom. I drive a minivan. I go to PTA meetings. I vote, I protest, I am certainly a feminist. But guess what – I LOOOOOVE jerking-off to porn. In fact, during one of my pregnancies I masturbated daily to women’s wrestling matches in which the loser gets fucked with a strap-on. Vile, right? Well, Mike, that’s what got me off back then (I’ve moved on to ball-gags as of late). Should I be ashamed of myself? Should I be aroused by the correct kind of sex – that which is loving and caring? I don’t believe in rape, but I do fantasize being taken. It happens to be a common fantasy among those of us who are strong, confident women in life. This is not to say I don’t having tender, loving sex with my husband. But who are you to say what I should and shouldn’t be watching on my screen while I beat off?
Furthermore, little Johnny shouldn’t be watching porn, should he? I don’t think anyone would argue that young impressionable minds should be exposed to pornography, do you?? But grown women and men with freedom of choice in the highly subjective matter of what gets us off, I honestly don’t think we need policing. The industry thrives because of vanilla people like me. Delve deeper into your own sexual fantasies, Mike, and you might find you’re just as dirty as the rest of us. Same goes for you, Harry.
Well, that’s fascinating.
I’m a sick bastard and I love her work, and it’s cool to hear her talk about it. I applaud her bravery and her willingness to share her outlook on the biz. I’ve skated around my limits too and there is a way to be a sick bastard like me and still a good person with high self worth.
I cant help but saying that i just loove this woman in a certain way.
Very very sharp and intelligent.
The raw honest and unrelentless way in which she describes the true reality of the pornindustry really grabbed my heart.
On several ocassions in the article just verbally accurately hitting the nail right on the head when it comes to describing intricate issues and feelings which are related to the ultimate decision to step into the world of porn, which most of the time are far away from the ploughed-out platitudes that people consider to be the only reasons for making that decision [sexual abuse, daddy issues, we,re only in it for the money, bla bla bla].
So… really great, learned a lot from it.
Altough i do not really agree with the end conclusions of the piece.
Also i make the observation that when it comes to defending doing some porn or sexwork? in general as mostly a pro-feminist choice people tend to use a lot of logical flaws and thinking errors.
I feel that everyone should have the kind of sex that they love, butt anal has gotten out of control in my opinion. I was married to a man that would not leave anal alone, I tried it, did it to make HIM happy, butt had to divorce him, because he was obsessed with anal porn vids. Having a very high sex drive I looked out for some casual affairs. Every man wanted anal, to the point of being aggressive. So I posted an add stated that I didn’t care for anal. I actually got death and rape threats because I do not like anal !!! Needless to say I am celibate for the first time in my life. I am 50 btw, men were not like these 20 years ago. Thanks Oriana !
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