New York Fashion Week's normalising of Pornhub isn't a feminist statement – it's a massive regression

New York Fashion Week kicked off on Monday, marking the beginning of a month-long event where designers showcase their latest creations in four different cities. Where London is known for its celebration of emerging designers and Paris for its grandeur, New York is revered for its progressive values: its catwalks are often home to bold political statements, promoting diversity and body positivity along the way. Given this reputation, the news that Pornhub stars will walk the runway this Sunday in what has been deemed a “feminist statement” is puzzling.

Modelling for Berlin-based fashion label Namila, several adult film actors will showcase a collection named “Herotica”, alongside Pornhub’s ambassador Asa Akira. Nan Li, one of the designers behind the collection, aims to challenge the porn industry’s exclusive focus on men’s entertainment: “Porn isn’t something existentially male. Most women just have been excluded from determining the narrative.”

Although the idea of resisting pornographic tropes is compelling, the label’s hope to reclaim women’s agency fell flat when it chose to collaborate with a website that distributes footage made as a result of female exploitation. In yet another case of femvertising that claims to champion women while profiting from their mistreatment, the fashion venture is an insult to women who are trafficked, sexually abused and filmed in secret for Pornhub videos. Although the site encourages its users to report illegal content, as a hosting platform it takes no legal responsibility for the videos that are uploaded, making it a hotbed for illegal photos and videos.

It’d be an understatement to call New York Fashion Week’s decision tone deaf, especially given that just last week, Victoria’s Secret came under fire for sexual harassment claims. Sunday’s show is such a regression from the likes of fashion designer Prabal Gurung’s political catwalk last year, in which models walked hand in hand holding white flowers to show unity for the #MeToo movement, with its founder, Tarana Burke, sitting in his front row.

The fashion industry needs to examine its own feminist values before trying to reshape the narrative of porn, while considering its responsibility in working with a website that hosts such troubling content.

Despite Pornhub asserting that illegal videos are removed swiftly when flagged, investigations into the site prove otherwise. After the owners of US independent film label Girls Do Porn were charged with federal sex trafficking in October last year, the only action Pornhub took was to remove the company’s official page from its website (which took three days), while videos by the film label still exist on Pornhub via unofficial uploaders. An investigation by The Sunday Times the following month found that Pornhub is flooded with secretly filmed “creepshots” of UK schoolgirls, hosting clips of men performing sex acts in front of teenagers on buses and indecent images of children as young as three.

How then does a host to such dangerous footage find itself supported by an organisation as progressive as New York Fashion Week? This isn’t Pornhub’s first rodeo when it comes to mainstream advertising. Since 2014, the site has been marketing itself extensively as a brand that goes beyond adult entertainment, jumping on the back of social activism to bolster its cause; whether that’s saving trees, bees or the ocean. And in an attempt to cater to female users, recent marketing has sold Pornhub as a space for women to enjoy and explore porn, including one campaign encouraging women to masturbate while on their period (like we ever needed permission from a porn site to orgasm). But this latest collaboration peddling female empowerment is the most troubling yet, given the website’s associations with the abuse of women and children.

A brand that hides behind the guise of feminism is even more dangerous than one that overtly rejects it.

Since its pursuit of the mainstream, Pornhub has secured high-profile advertisement deals, which have come under fire following investigations into the content it hosts. Dollar Shave Club, a men’s grooming company owned by global consumer giant Unilever, ran a campaign on Pornhub last year, promoting its razor subscription service. Following the Sunday Times’ investigation, Unilever vowed that none of its brands would advertise on Pornhub again, labelling the illegal content the website hosts as “deeply troubling”, but the response from the shaving company’s creative director, Matt Knapp, is far more telling.

Addressing the partnership between Pornhub and Dollar Shave Club, Knapp said the decision was made because Pornhub “had guys’ backs”. What about having women’s backs? The victims of rape, revenge porn and non-consensual filming who feature on Pornhub for male entertainment? It seems that some companies are willing to profit from a website that distributes illegal content if it means dudes can stick together. A service that often comes at the cost of women’s safety is no big deal because... guys need razors.

At surface level, a catwalk show full of porn actors may seem harmless; at a push, tasteless. But legitimising a site that refuses to protect the women it profits from only works to further entrench the fundamental pillar of patriarchy – power, and the abuse of it.