At the AVN Awards this past weekend, people who work in the industry were split on what’s changed and what hasn’t since the assault allegations against James Deen, who was conspicuously among them.
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Two months after a series of women began publicly alleging that James Deen had assaulted, sexually abused, or raped them, Deen was smiling on the Las Vegas red carpet at the AVN Awards, "the Oscars of porn." Late last year, in the wake of allegations that began with a tweet from his ex-girlfriend and fellow performer Stoya, it seemed as if the swift backlash against Deen would end his career. Major studios Kink and Evil Angel vowed never to hire him again.
But at the AVN Awards, his pariah status had clearly faded.
The ceremony on Jan. 23 was the second of two high-profile events Deen has attended since the allegations began: The first, the XBIZ Awards on Jan. 15, was hosted by Stoya, while the AVN Awards were co-hosted by another ex-girlfriend and accuser of Deen, Joanna Angel. Stoya, whose tweet in late November would inspire many more women to come forward with allegations against Deen, avoided controversy at the XBIZ Awards, while Angel — who alleged Deen was an abusive boyfriend and described one incident in which he held her head under water for so long during sex that she thought she was going to drown — never alluded to his presence during the show.
In early December, Deen denied Stoya's account and said that Angel had exaggerated her story in an email interview with The Daily Beast.
Several of the nearly dozen women who spoke up alleged incidents took place at or near their workplace, and, whether one believes the women's allegations or Deen's denial, even Deen himself said in the same interview, "I do believe there is pressure on sets for people to perform in certain ways that they may later regret. I do believe the adult industry needs a better structure for preventing and reporting on set misconduct."
The industry began publicly wrestling with these issues two months ago, and they remain unresolved.
BuzzFeed News asked porn insiders at the AVN Awards whether the industry had changed since the allegations first came to light. (Deen's handler steered him away on the red carpet after apparently being informed by a publicist for the AVN Awards the kind of questions BuzzFeed News was asking.) Their answers ranged from Ela Darling's affirmation that more consent discussions were happening on set to Ron Jeremy's belief that an assault on set was impossible in the first place. The only consensus was in discomfort.
Dana DeArmond
Actor/Director
“I don't really want to talk about it. And I don't suggest you ask people that at all — that's rude.”
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Tanya Tate
Actor/Director
“Honestly? It feels to me like everyone's forgotten. It just feels like it's business as usual, surprisingly. … Here's the thing. Something happened. Definitely, something happened. By his admittance, things did happen, although he said they were exaggerated. If that had happened, say, in an office situation, the person would've been taken aside, there would have been a full investigation, and what have you. But in our industry, I don't know. People listened, people said, ‘Oh,’ and people carried on.”
Ethan Miller / Getty Images
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