Major Porn Companies Cut Ties With James Deen
Kink.com and Evil Angel distance themselves from the performer, who stands accused of sexual assault
Source: Vocativ.com.
USA – Porn company Evil Angel, which has distributed nearly 100 films starring Deen, told Vocativ that it has decided to stop selling new scenes featuring the performer, at least for the time being. “In light of the recent accusations against James Deen, Evil Angel today has decided not to sell any newly created scenes featuring Deen,” the company’s president John Stagliano said in a statement. “While our company presents what is consensual and exploratory about aggressive and rough sex, these accusations are of a nature so contrary to our company values that we feel it necessary to suspend the sales until more information is available.”
This article was originally published on November 30, 2014 at 4:45 p.m.
Following accusations of sexual assault against porn star James Deen, Kink.com has decided to end its relationship with the performer. In a statement to Vocativ, Kink.com CEO Peter Acworth said, “For the Kink.com community, as well as the larger BDSM community, consent is sacrosanct. Effective immediately, Kink.com will cease all ties with James Deen, both as a performer and a producer.” Deen was a frequent performer in Kink’s Public Disgrace and Bound Gangbang series, which are no longer in production, and appeared in hundreds of the company’s films.
Kink, the most prominent producer of BDSM films in the U.S., is the first porn company to officially blacklist Deen following the accusations. The company is known for emphasizing consent in its films, some of which feature fantasies of non-consent, and which often include post-scene interviews in which performers make it clear that they were willing participants. NSFW cartoonist Erika Moen has also removed from her website all ads and affiliate links to Deen’s site. Today, Deen voluntarily resigned from his role at Adult Performer Advocacy Committee.
On Saturday, Deen’s ex-girlfriend Stoya, a fellow porn performer, made public her accusation of sexual assault. “James Deen held me down and fucked me while I said no, stop, used my safeword. I just can’t nod and smile when people bring him up anymore,” she wrote on Twitter. In the days that followed, two more women have come forward with allegations.
Ashley Fires told The Daily Beast that Deen sexually assaulted her while she was at Kink.com’s headquarters in San Francisco. “Later on that night, I was getting out of the shower of the communal bathroom at Kink, I reach for my towel to dry off, and he comes up from behind me and pushes himself and his erection into my butt,” she said. “He pushes me against the sink and starts grabbing on me and I was like, ‘No, no, no James, no,’ and he released me from his grasp.”
In a personal essay, performer Tori Lux wrote that Deen physically assaulted her while on a porn set. “He raised his hand high above his head, swinging it down and hitting me in the face and head with an open palm,” she wrote. “He did this five or six times—hard—before finally getting off of me.”
Acworth told Vocativ that as a result of the accusations, Kink will review its Model Bill of Rights to “strengthen rights of performers off-set” and “work with the larger industry to help performers who have been assaulted to more easily come forward.” He added, “Our performers deserve not only safe sets, but the ability to work without fear of assault. Rape or sexual assault, with or without a safe-word, off-set or on, should never be accepted as a hazard of adult production.”
See larger photo: www.vocativ.com.
