I think I liked audio porn before I ever liked visual porn. And I don’t think this is an uncommon experience, particularly for women.
It makes sense. Much like some people prefer novels over their movie adaptations, sometimes you want to be able to visualize and fantasize inside your own head while consuming a piece of media, rather than having the visuals spelled out very literally for you.
But there are other reasons I still, to this day, often prefer audio porn over the traditional, cinematic variety. Namely:
1. Words are hot. There is not nearly enough dirty talk in most mainstream porn for my personal tastes, especially from men and masculine people, who are often nearly silent, I guess to keep from grossing out their cis-het male viewers?! As someone whose sex life has been 70%+ phone sex for the past few years, and who has spent her life writing about sex, I’m perhaps more attuned to the eroticism of words than the average porn consumer. Generally I’d rather listen to someone describing cunnilingus than watch them perform it, for example – in part because it’s a sex act where, if you’re doing it right, often nothing all that interesting will be visually apparent from the outside.
2. Sounds are hot. Moans, quickening breaths, the animalistic sound of someone desperately stroking their cock – these things are often the most exciting parts of porn to me, to the point that if a clip has been muted, or has poor sound quality, I tend to close that tab and move on to the next. In audio porn, obviously the auditory elements of eroticism are played up and focused upon, plus they tend to be rendered in higher quality because of the performers’ proximity to their (often) fancy, ASMR-quality mics.
3. It makes me less insecure and self-critical. While I reject the notion that female porn stars aren’t “real women,” because obviously they are, they tend to be a lot more conventionally gorgeous than me, which can bring up uncomfortable feelings while I’m just trying to turn myself on and get off. Some audio porn describes the characters therein, but much of it is created to be intentionally vague, so that the listener can slot themselves into any fantasy they want without having to compare themselves to the preexisting people in that fantasy.
4. It’s physically easier to consume. I didn’t always care about this, but now that I’m chronically ill, there are some days when the effort of holding up my iPad to watch porn – or orienting myself in bed so that I can comfortably see the screen – is just too much, especially if I want to have energy left over afterward for masturbation or sex. I like that with audio porn, I can put my headphones on, hit “play,” and stay perfectly still in whatever position feels comfy while I listen.
5. It’s often in the second person. I know some people hate this about audio erotica, and would be comfier if it only ever described third-person scenarios (“She took his cock into her mouth,” etc.) rather than being in the second person (“You’re going to take my cock into your mouth now, pretty girl”). But I like the second-person ones, and especially enjoyed them when I was in my early 20s and had only just admitted to myself that I might be kinky. (LOL. What an understatement.) Hearing kinky dirty talk that was from a stranger, but that still felt like it was aimed directly at me, helped me become comfortable taking on a submissive role before I ever actually acted out those fantasies with real-life partners.
6. It’s comforting. I don’t know if I’m quite an “ASMR person,” in that I don’t often experience the characteristic “brain tingles” reported by those folks upon hearing certain sounds or encountering situations that trigger them. But I do find it oddly calming to be talked through a sexy scenario by a kind-hearted stranger who requires absolutely nothing from me, in terms of participation or prettiness. It’s like the grown-up version of when you stay home sick from school and a loving parent reads aloud to you from a fantasy novel.
Have you listened to much audio porn? What are your thoughts on it?
This post was sponsored by the folks at Sofia Sins, the cool new audio-porn platform from Sofia Gray. Check ’em out if sexy audio turns you on! As always, all writing and opinions here are my own.