by Rich Moreland, January 2016
In this segment of our interview, Natasha talks frankly about sex work and how it is perceived. All photos are from her social media. Watermarks identify photographers or studios.
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Returning in 2015
In the adult film business, the average career is short. Estimates vary, but most people agree anywhere from six to eighteen months is the norm. That doesn’t take into account the “one and done” girl who gives the business a shot or two then retreats home to pursue other interests.
For Natasha Nice, a real career is already on the ledger. Entering in 2006, she took a hiatus in 2013 to fill in the blanks on the college education she decided against right out of high school.
“I chose to pause and focus on school for a bit and now I’m ready to move forward. I don’t know if anyone sees me as a ‘MILF’ yet, and I don’t feel like one, but I would like to shoot scenes where the woman is more in charge.”
What appeals to her are roles like “boss, teacher, Domme, and rich bitch in Beverly Hills.”
She explains her thinking.
“I am older now. It’s not just about whatever I can play to get work, it’s about exploring various aspects of my more mature personality.”
In late 2015, the sensuous brunette returned to adult with one film and signed with LA Direct Models where her model profile lists girl/girl, anal, and interracial among her offerings.
Make Sure to Take Care of Yourself
Before we pick up her thoughts on consent discussed earlier, I asked Natasha about how age has changed her career.
“I had already played the young girl for so long and I’d been shooting boy/girl (no anal) for about six years. I felt it was time to evolve [as a performer].”
That put anal on her agenda.
“I shot my first anal two days ago and it was really enjoyable,” she beams.
Natasha reminds any girl contemplating backdoor sex to loosen up and take it easy during the scene and prepare because inconveniences can arise.
“Had I not prepped myself beforehand and relaxed, I would have hurt myself. It is really enjoyable if you make sure to take care of yourself.”
Natasha’s advice gets us back to consent. I mentioned that some industry people and many in the public think of porn girls as trash. How does this play into consent?
Not Ashamed
“I think a lot of people look at us like people who don’t respect ourselves, who are dirty, dumb, and untrustworthy,” Natasha begins. She admits that may true for some of her fellow performers. After all, “what industry doesn’t have bad seeds?”
But she quickly counters that sex work doesn’t make a girl trash.
“We sex workers really have to work hard to prove ourselves because sex is still looked at as something that women should not have too much of and men should only have a certain kind of. So sex workers are stigmatized as not being respectable because we’re doing this wrong thing and we’re doing it publicly and for money.”
In fact, Natasha believes that “sex workers are brave and interesting.”
But that doesn’t moderate popular view.
“It’s not easy to challenge social conventions and be looked down on by people, sometimes even your family,” she states, before delving further to make her point.
“There is no correlation between character and sexual behavior. People think they know you because of your sexual practices.”
Natasha elaborates that “non-traditional sex lives, people who do things differently, are usually labeled mental defectives. At the very least, we are not considered respectable.”
Then she gets personal.
When she got into the business, Natasha didn’t consider that having sex on camera was wrong. Actually, she thought of it as “liberating.” She throws aside any conclusions others might reach about how she probably had an awful childhood that caused her to not love herself.
“I’m not ashamed of my body or my sex drive” is how this French native describes her attitude.
As a clarification, Natasha draws the line between legal and illegal sex work because often people assume that porn girls are hookers.
“If you don’t separate it [legal sex work from the illegal] you’re insinuating that all porn stars, who have the right to be porn stars, are also willing to break the law. Just because you do porn doesn’t mean you’re willing to be a criminal, [it] doesn’t mean you’re untrustworthy.”
Dismantle the Belief System
My next question to Natasha concerned pornography and self-respect.
“It helps to eliminate the belief that porn stars don’t deserve respect or the ‘I’m a whore, nobody cares what I have to say syndrome,'” she responds.
Conjecturing that for some girls, “it may be true that they don’t care what you have to say [about them], but they’re wrong.” A performer “actually matters and has something to say,” she insists.
“We’ve all been raised in a world where women are less than [equal] and openly sexual women and even less [so]. Everywhere you go, that belief inhabits people’s minds.”
Sex workers, in Natasha’s opinion, “have a duty to dismantle that belief system by being equal, not just by hating the fact that we’re currently seen as not equal. Does that make sense?”
To me? Absolutely, I authored a book about feminism in the adult industry and I couldn’t agree more!
“Yes” Should Never be Assumed
Returning to the main issue of our interview, Natasha Nice imparts a final thought that strikes at the heart of adult entertainment and any performer caught up in a James Deen/Stoya type controversy.
She believes “no” means “no,” as do other industry girls with whom I’ve talked. Being “off the porn set” does not change the rules. In other words, assumptions about a girl’s personal sex life cannot be made.
“The absence of ‘no’ does not mean ‘yes.’ If you don’t say ‘no’ that doesn’t mean you’ve said ‘yes,'” Natasha reminds us, then adds a dose of bitter truth. Without a ‘yes’ from any girl, porn or civilian, forcing sex on her is rape.
So, where does this leave us?
“Consent isn’t just about people respecting your boundaries,” Natasha believes, “it’s also about setting them.”
And setting boundaries conquers shame and creates an equality that rectifies the misrepresentation of what the sex worker image is all about.
Within the industry, it’s a shot across the bow for every performer, director, crew, agent, and studio who ignores what happens on the set or pushes girls into doing what they would rather avoid.
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