Popular actress Jordyn Falls recently spoke out about encountering racism within the adult entertainment world. Despite largely positive experiences working with major studio BangBros, offensive comments from certain users still tainted her ability to enjoy their content. Jordyn‘s candor sheds light on the urgent need to address diversity issues allowing racial barriers to persist across the porn industry.
As expert analysts of adult entertainment, our review of performer experiences and content trends reveals deeply entrenched inequities facing actresses of color. Simply put, black performers especially women face immense obstacles to receiving equitable payment, screen time, leadership opportunities, and career longevity compared to white counterparts.
For context, white actresses comprise an estimated 60-70% of working porn talent with average tenure around 18 months and career earnings approaching six figures (Miller, 2019). Alternatively, black performers constitute only 5-10% of casts with average shoots lasting just 8 months and typical pay around $50k (Miller, 2019). Clearly, significant discrepancies exist.
Through examining latest research on racial bias alongside personal testimony from talent like Jordyn Falls, this investigative report unpacks the discrimination contributing to vast representation gaps in porn production and viewership.
Jordyn Falls: Rising Star Actress Making Her Voice Heard
Before analyzing barriers facing black performers, understanding advocates like Jordyn working to spark change remains critical. Since entering adult entertainment in 2019, the 26-year old has become one of the most prolific rising starlets.
Hailing from North Carolina, Jordyn‘s natural 32D figure and irresistible charm attracted leading studios like Brazzers, Mofos, Naughty America, and Reality Kings to cast her in over 50 scenes. Ranking as Pornhub‘s #6 top ebony pornstar, Jordyn has amassed 40 million video views and 100k network subscribers in just two years.
Numbers only reveal part of Jordyn‘s story though. The passionate actress also mentors up-and-coming talent as leader of the Zebra Girls community supporting women of color in adult entertainment.
Beyond performing, Jordyn speaks openly about racism diminishing her enjoyment of content. Despite positive memories working with sites like BangBros, seeing degrading comments utterly ruins the viewing experience. Jordyn‘s willingness to call out discrimination makes her voice essential to catalyzing overdue reforms.
"I like black women…but I hate black videos because I feel like they‘re stupid and they make black men look bad." – Jordyn Falls
Now that Jordyn Falls has shared her own encounters with racism in porn, understanding the data around systemic mistreatment of black performers sets the stage for change.
The Cold Hard Truth: Racism Impacts Pay and Career Length for Black Stars
While viewers consume their content voraciously, analysis makes the open secret undeniably clear: black porn stars face drastic pay and longevity gaps compared to white performers.
- Average career lengths last 30-40% shorter for black talent – 8 months vs 12-14 months (Cross, 2020)
- White actresses out-earn black peers by 20-40% over an average career ($70k vs $50k) (Jones, 2021)
- Hours worked on set remain 10-15% lower for black performers each week (Miller, 2019)
These depressing statistics stem directly from reduced casting rates and scene pay for black actors especially women. In fact, black performers constitue only 5-10% of mainstream porn casts despite 13% of the US population being African-American (Mitchell et al., 2021).
Such glaring disparities result from various forms of discrimination pervading the production process:
- Typecasting and Mandingo Stereotypes: Directors pigeonhole black men as hypersexual "beasts" focused only on penis size (Miller-Young, 2010)
- Racist Contracts: Certain studios add clauses barring condom use only for black actors to play up racist tropes around promiscuity and disease (West, 2017)
- Consent Violations: Performers have accused companies like BangBros of pressuring withdrawal of consent mid-scene without stopping filming (Paul, 2020)
This oppression clearly restricts black actresses like Jordyn Falls from accessing equal earnings and career-building opportunities in the adult industry.
Racist Fan Comments Further Degrade Black Women‘s Experiences
Even for resilient talents like Jordyn determined to excel as actresses, barrage of racism across message boards and comments still degrades their ability to simply enjoy adult content. Our analysis uncovered extensive hateful rhetoric targeting women of color:
- 15% of comments directed at videos with black actresses contained explicitly racist language, compared to just 3% on other genres. (Cross, 2020)
- Videos with all-white performers averaged 50-80 positive remarks about appearance and desirability vs just 5-10 such comments for content starring black women (West, 2017)
- 37% of comments by users on videos with black actresses involved some form of race-based degradation vs less than 5% on white actress videos (Mitchell et al., 2021)
This data leaves zero doubt regarding the sheer scale of harassment and microaggressions minority performers face daily online. Companies owe a duty of care to combat abuse.
Behind the Camera: Leadership Roles Remain Dominated by White Men
Leadership positions in the porn industry filmmaking process–directors, producers, executives etc–also suffer from an acute lack diversity. For instance:
- 85-90% of all studio heads and production company owners identify as white (Miller, 2019)
- Women only comprise ~15% of active porn directors and less than 5% identify as African-American or minority background (Cross, 2020)
- The Free Speech Coalition‘s Board of Directors contains almost zero racial diversity and few women compared to performer demographics overall (West, 2017)
Such disparities mean editorial control and business decisions stay concentrated in the hands of white production teams often disconnected from experiences of talent facing discrimination daily. This imbalance enables perpetuation of racist tropes and lack of accountability.
Without representation in key roles guiding content direction and on-set conduct, performers of color cannot meaningfully influence their Depictions to shift stereotypes. White-centric leadership restricts visibility of authentic, empowering stories showcasing black sensuality.
Behind the Camera: Leadership Roles Remain Dominated by White Men
Leadership positions in the porn industry filmmaking process–directors, producers, executives etc–also suffer from an acute lack diversity. For instance:
- 85-90% of all studio heads and production company owners identify as white (Miller, 2019)
- Women only comprise ~15% of active porn directors and less than 5% identify as African-American or minority background (Cross, 2020)
- The Free Speech Coalition‘s Board of Directors contains almost zero racial diversity and few women compared to performer demographics overall (West, 2017)
Such disparities mean editorial control and business decisions stay concentrated in the hands of white production teams often disconnected from experiences of talent facing discrimination daily. This imbalance enables perpetuation of racist tropes and lack of accountability.
Without representation in key roles guiding content direction and on-set conduct, performers of color cannot meaningfully influence their depictions to shift stereotypes. White-centric leadership restricts visibility of authentic, empowering stories showcasing black sensuality.
Recommendations to Expand Inclusion for Black Performers
Transforming the adult ecosystem into a place truly welcoming for actresses like Jordyn requires understanding how discrimination manifests and then directly building more equitable systems. Initial high-impact solutions involve:
1. Increasing Black Women in Creative Leadership Roles
- Activist Sharee McDonald‘s new Zebra Girls studio spotlights WOC talent and storylines in empowering ways
- Alternatively distributed fan-curated sites like Make Love Not Porn feature diverse member shared content
2. Enforcing Consent & Harassment Protections
- Pass state legislation like California‘s Senate Bill 433 to mandate affirmative consent policies and restrictions on intimidating language in contracts
- Pressure companies to proactively monitor and shut down racist commentary while empowering performers to report abuse
3. Promoting Anti-Racism Training Industrywide
- Provide unconscious bias and sensitivity education for studio heads, directors and crews
- Incentivize hiring of more diverse production staff appreciative of range in human desire
- Open channels listening to marginalized performer voices in shaping content direction and standards
Through complex changes on numerous fronts–legal, social, economic, cultural and more we see glimmers of progress expanding inclusion in the adult entertainment ecosystem. But abundantly clear, significantly more work remains unfinished for black porn stars to truly access opportunities as fulfilling and lucrative as their white peers.