Meredith, so much of your criticism of AW sounds like after-the-fact regret and bitterness to me, rather than a genuine negative experience. When you describe your actual experience with the company and the staff, you say you were treated with respect and made to feel comfortable, and that you “believed the company acted in an honourable way”. If you are the person who is listed as Meredith on the site, you very clearly were not pressured to do anything you weren’t totally comfortable with at the time, because the shots are all very innocent nude shots of a girl undressing in an open field with a big smile on her face, no sexual tone whatsoever – and this is what you signed up for in the first place: “tasteful nude photographic work.” It seems there are a few reasons you no longer believe the company to have acted honourably (i.e. true to their pro-female, self-expression manifesto). –If you’re not the same Meredith please say so, because as it is this is all we readers have to go on.–

(1) You decided after the fact that you weren’t comfortable having posed for nude shots. Either this alone made you decide you had been exploited, or you wanted AW to remove your shoot and weren’t happy with the conditions of this (paying a lot of money).

(2) You think it dishonourable that AW advertise for models in a way that targets 18-year-olds, 18-to-24-year-olds, and young women for whom the money that AW pay is a lot. This is kind of ridiculous. The niche that this porn company occupies is one where the models are women in this age range. In and of itself this is not exploitative or unethical. Being young and not having a lot of financial security sort of go hand in hand. Just because the money is an influential factor for a lot of the models does not make their decision any less autonomous or real.

(3) I see the following stance in practically all of the posts objecting to AW, not just Meredith’s: “Garion Hall deceives his staff and customers about the existence of Abby and is generally not a likeable or honest person, therefore Abby Winters as a company has deceived its models about being pro-female etc.” But if the staff, the women – largely ex-models – who interact with the models and film and photograph them make them feel comfortable, dignified, beautiful, and in control of their own bodies… well… isn’t that what’s important? That the experience of being a model is one that makes you feel good about yourself? Sure, some people like Meredith might later decide they regret their decision, but even she readily admits that the experience itself was positive. And if the staff themselves (people like Marigold, Suzie, Chloe B, Sue-Ann) are genuinely passionate and respectful and pro-woman, does it really make a huge difference that the CEO is a sleazy, dishonest piece of work? A little thought experiment: imagine a porn company that produced totally conventional, photoshopped, plastic girl-on-girl porn. The orgasms seem fake, the idea that the women are genuinely into each other seems fake. What is known of the staff is that they are pushy, sleazy men. But the company is owned by a woman, a woman who for all intents and purposes is pro-woman, pro-self expression etc etc. Do you think this would mitigate the sleazy exploitative nature of the interaction between staff and models? I don’t, and nor do I think that Garion Hall’s questionable personal ethics mean that Abby Winters the company is not what it claims to be. The facts that there so many (as in dozens and dozens) return models, that a large proportion of these seem to be lesbian or genuinely bisexual, and that quite a few have gone on to become staff members just bolsters my position.

While I have no desire to see a Liberal government, and a return to the Howard years, we can hope for a shift in the balance of power, such that this policy will remain “under review” until such time as it can be abandoned as unworkable, which it always was.

I decided to write a bogus complaint to the Advertising Standards people to see what the response was… I even used the ridiculous notion of sexual violence connotations becasue the younger generation actually used ‘I want to smash her…’ in reference to sexual conquest.

Anyways the rebuttal from the advertiser responsible was provided to me and was a rational and clearly stated objection to my hysterical interpritation of the AD.

The sad thing is if I sent off 100 such bogus complaints from 100 fake emails the AD would probably be banned!

I would love to post the rebuttal as it is interesting but I don’t know the legal ramifications… Could someone help me?

The censorship issue seems to be the new idological divide.

For the Record: Energy drinks are allowed to have 80mg of Caffeine per 250ml of drink. This a food Standards code and roughly the same as a cup of coffee. To remain consitent with their proposed energy drink ban are they going to limit people to one latte at a cafe too? I think not! Just becaue some idiot morons choose to drink 10 red bulls and get sick, the Nanny State decides every Adult in the country is not responsible enough to drink 1 or 2?

Anyone can buy a packet of 12 100mg caffeine tablets in the form of No Doze. I even found a food ingredient shop selling 440grams of PURE caffeine powder for $60! Golly The Nanny State will have kiniption when she finds out!