Germany Just Released Its First-Ever State-Funded Porno!

Finally, my German broadcasting license fee is going towards something I’ll actually watch

If you live in Germany, you can’t escape the obligatory monthly 18 euro license fee that every household must contribute to finance the public broadcasting services. (Trust me, I’ve tried and it backfired). If you’re anything like me, and the hordes of other no-TV or radio-owning ex-pats who consume between none and hardly any public German media, you too have likely joined the huffing and puffing choir: Why must I pay this random fee for something I never use?

Well, yesterday my huffs and puffs were replaced by oooohs and hell-yeses when I learned that my payments helped create the first-ever publicly funded porno.

This, I can stand behind!

The piece of history was initiated by late-night talk show host Jan Böhmermann, who spent a recent episode of his satire show ZDF Magazin Royale discussing porn.

It’s 2022 and porn is everywhere, it’s as commonplace as chocolate and coffee, Böhmermann punctuates, and that’s why it has to be produced ethically!

I couldn’t agree more!

Equipped with age-restriction tick-boxes that aren’t doing much to prevent underage visitors from entering, porn is available at everyone’s fingertips in a matter of seconds. Jan makes a point out of this by having his young son come on the show to enter a tube site before he then goes on to address the many ways PornHub and other giants continuously fail to meet ethical standards and provide both diversity and quality.

With 130 million daily visitors worldwide, PornHub surpasses Netflix in Germany with over five million visits per month; 46.60 million and 41.03 million visits respectively. Germany’s state-funded broadcasting channel, ZDR, has 30.75, in comparison. Nowadays, up to 90% of teens have watched porn before they reach eighteen and several studies indicate that for teens and people in their twenties, pornography is their number one source of information about sex. (Internet Health Report, Live Science & The New York Magazine)

The answer to bad porn isn’t no porn, but to make better porn!

Böhmermann and his ZDF team clearly agree with sexologist and pornographer Annie Sprinkle (quote) that the solution is not to ban porn. In fact, he wasn’t just kicking up dust when he suggested making publicly funded ethical porn to show’em how it’s done. He rolled up his sleeves and went for it!

To get the job done, he commissioned none other than Berlin-based Paulita Pappel. In case you’re not familiar, Pappel is the intimacy coordinator, erotic producer, and director, behind the creator-centered porn platform Lustery. She’s one half of cinematic hardcore studio HardWerk, and a curator for the Pornfilmfestival Berlin. She’s also had several steamy performances in front of the camera and all of this before making it halfway through her thirties.

Epically titled FFMM Straight Queer Doggy BJ Oral Orgasm Squirting Royale (gebührenfinanziert)—presumably, to catch as many search keywords as possible—the short film portrays a steaming hot foursome starring renowned indie performers, Bishop Black, Lina Bembe, Holy Mother aka Mila Gold X, and Noir So.

Making safe sex sexy again

A major advantage of publicly funded porn is that content decisions can be made independently of what will sell best, Pappel explains on the late-night show. This is particularly relevant with regard to showing safer sex, which is widely regarded as unattractive to porn audiences and believed to decrease sales on the mainstream market. (Paraphrased from Lustery’s article by Madita Oeming)

You may know that I’ve been on a bit of a safe-sex crusade lately. Therefore, I’m especially thrilled to see Paulita and her cast show us just how sexy safe sex can be. Cute, pink latex gloves are centered along with condoms, which are used on everything—including on the vibrator which is frequently applied to provide extra clitoral stimulation. Especially noteworthy is the use of dental dams—something I’ve never seen in porn before. Demonstrating her cinematographic creativity, Pappel gives the viewer a vulva perspective with a mouth and lip seductively licking the back of the dental dam. (See header picture)

Obviously, this is still porn and not reality, with pro actors and crew doing their jobs. Therefore, no one should expect sex to look like this—at least not right off the bat. Nevertheless, the artistic short offers a poignant alternative with perspectives and scenarios hardly seen in mainstream porn. All of this— readily available, free, and uncensored—funded by a German government institution. How cool is that?

Here are a few other things I found noteworthy and would love to see more of:

Female pleasure and orgasms are centered and given (at least) equal attention to the men’s. Generous amounts of oral sex and the use of a vibrator take focus away from penetration as the main highlight.

Natural bodies. Sure, the performers are pros and they look great, but without adhering to the stereotypical porn look. There are no obviously fake attributes to be found and, instead, you can spot stretch marks, tattoos, healthy belly fat, pubes, and body hair. Refreshing!

Genuine male bisexuality. This is no trite MFFM with the Ms on either side of the Fs, barely touching. It’s a proper group mashup where it’s clear that the guys are joyously engaging with each other throughout.

Black and brown skin, without fetishizing either. No mention of, or categorization based on ethnicity.

Plenty of lube is used for manual sex, on toys, and for penetration.

Consent check-ins. If you pay attention, you’ll hear the cast confirming consent throughout: Is this good? You like this? etc. Followed by oh-yeses!!!, Sííííí, and yeah…like that is goooood!

Laughter, smiles, and fun. I adore how the cast appears to actually have a great time together.

There’s one scene that, in my opinion, captures the mood of the film in a nutshell: Gold X glances over her shoulder to catch Noir So pulling on a pair of gloves to express, laughingly: oh shit, that’s for me? Then they both giggle together before he proceeds…

Aftercare. How often do you see that in porn? Here the performers thank each other before sinking into a delicious cuddle puddle. Yes!

Artistry. Last but not least. There’s care, consideration, and purpose behind everything from lighting to colors because this is treated like art, as it should.

There are times when living in this bureaucracy-obsessed country drives me off the edge and into full-blown anxiety attacks, and when the infamous Berlin rudeness makes me want to punch a wall—especially at the far end of winter. But, not today.

Today, as my gritty city is budding and blooming into spring, I remember just how sexy she is. This capital where its people are impossible to shock, in a country where casual nudity is commonplace, where sex work is legal and protected, where vibrators are sold in convenience stores, etc, etc… And now, where the state funds ethical, feminist porn.

It would be lovely to make this a 10-piece series, says Pappel, and I concur. I hope this is the first of many more to come!

© Ena Dahl 2022

See the film here + read the article by public porn scholar Madita Oeming, here on Lustery.