Terms of Service: Lynn Comella

On this episode we speak to Lynn Comella, Professor of Gender and Sexuality Studies and Department Chair of Interdisciplinary, Gender and Ethnic Studies at the University of Nevada, Las Vegas. Her research on “the business of pleasure and the politics of sex” has been featured nationally and internationally in the New York Times, Washington Post, The Atlantic, Rolling Stone, Playboy, among other outlets. Her book, Vibrator Nation: How Feminist Sex-Toy Stores Changed the Business of Pleasure, showcases a feminist side of the adult industry that many have ignored. We talk about obscenity’s long and windy history in American law, the new war on pornography, and how attacks on porn become attacks on gender, sexuality, and freedom at large. Terms of Service is a Pornhub podcast on censorship and the politics of free speech co-hosted by Asa Akira, a Pornhub brand ambassador and renowned performer, and Alex Kekesi, Pornhub’s Head of Brand and Community. With guests from the arts, film and fashion alongside sex work advocates, porn stars and academics, Terms of Service discusses the diverse, and often overlooked, aspects of censorship including deplatforming, cancellation, and shadowbanning, banking and financial discrimination, and the uneven treatment of adult performers on social media.