I Watched Porn With My Friends And It Changed Our Lives For The Better

Ever had a sex or dating question you were too nervous to ask even your BFF? Don’t worry, we’ve got you. In Elite Daily’s monthly Don’t Make It Weird series, our Dating team will unpack an awkward topic to give you the shame-free answers you need.

Summer camp should go down in history as the horniest place on Earth, for campers and counselors alike. When I was 17, my friends and I were all staff members together. One night that summer, my three best friends and I sat on the floor of the kitchen, passing around a tub of vanilla ice cream that we stole from the freezer. We were laughing about our turn-ons and going through our list of potential love interests to see if someone gave us fanny flutters — the new counselor, the cute lifeguard, the sexy sports specialist — when my friend Miriam made a suggestion: “What if we just… watched porn?”

I had certainly been getting myself off plenty that summer, and I even watched porn a few times when other people weren’t in the cabin. But I had never told my friends. That is, until Miriam popped the cherry. We each admitted that not only did we watch porn, but that we liked it… a lot. Instantly, we knew that there would be nothing sillier and more scandalous than if we watched it together. While we were not going to do a group masturbation sesh, we figured a little X-rated viewing could be just what we needed. We texted our guy friends that by no means could they enter the staff kitchen and pulled up an incognito browser.

We landed on a threesome video that had a little something for all of us, and we sat eagerly, making commentary, laughing at cringeworthy moments, and pointing out positions we wanted to try. The next day, our guy friends asked what we’d been up to. In a panic, we said that we were making a “naked music video.” Because, for some reason, that seemed less embarrassing. As young women, it felt more acceptable to sexualize ourselves than admit we were being sexual for ourselves.

Once we broke the ice, we were hooked. We went to a sex shop, bought our first vibrators together, and texted reviews to each other immediately after our first use. In our group chat, we swapped masturbation strategies, traded links to enticing videos, and debated our favorite categories (justice for step-sibling porn!).

Our friendships became spaces where we could celebrate our own sexual pleasure and serve as listening ears for each other, free of judgment or shame. For my friend Miriam, now 21, it was that same sense of empowerment that helped her navigate her own sexuality. “I had always felt an attraction to women, but I felt so much shame for it,” she says. “The sex positivity that we had in our group rid me of so much sexual shame that in turn, I was able to feel more confident and comfortable with my bisexuality.”

We didn’t just discover a new shared hobby — we stumbled across a shared sense of liberation. Most freeing of all was that, with each other’s help, we could begin to unlearn the shame associated with masturbation, with watching porn, and with being a sexual woman.

Watching Porn Strips Away Shame

Shame is a complicated game, run by the narrative that tells women they have to be “good girls” by jerking off the patriarchy but never themselves. Even today, our society perpetuates the idea that women should remain “pure” or “innocent,” and many religious communities still enforce the notion that women should refrain from premarital sex as not to “tarnish” themselves for their future husbands. (Because, of course, marriage is expected and cis-heterosexuality is the norm. Sure.) Women’s pleasure continues to be treated as taboo.

In June 2019, Dame, a sex toy company buzzed about helping women achieve orgasm, filed a lawsuit against New York City’s mass transit system over allegedly discriminatory advertising practices after it rejected the company’s sex toy ads — even though it had no problem with a Hims campaign that featured penis-shaped cacti to sell erectile dysfunction treatment. Apparently, female pleasure crossed the line. Ultimately, the ads were approved in November 2021.

Shame isn’t just written on the subway walls. It’s also internalized by many women. Dr. Kate Balestrieri, licensed psychologist, certified sex therapist and founder of Modern Intimacy explains that some women feel shame associated with their own sexual pleasure because they see their role in sex as simply to serve the other person.

“Women and girls are given the message that their relationship to sex is only OK if it's in relationship with their partner,” Balestrieri tells Elite Daily. “That creates this implicit message that my sex is for somebody else, and if I enjoy it for me, then that means something about me that's not OK.”

Kelly, 21, grew up with this narrative deeply ingrained in herself. “For a while, I just never thought sex was for me,” she says. She believed sex was only for person with the penis to enjoy. That is, until she and I watched porn together, just weeks after I indulged with Miriam and a few other pals for the first time.

“I had never seen porn before, and I had talked about how I didn't think that I had ever masturbated either,” she says. “And you were like, ‘OK, sit down. I'm going to pull up videos that we're going to try out.” From there, we sampled different types of porn, seeing if any category scratched Kelly’s itch. “Then you told me how you masturbate,” Kelly says. (My go-to strategy was to grind on a rolled up blanket until I got my O. This was all BVE: Before my Vibrator Era.) “I had never talked to anyone ever about masturbation, so that honestly changed everything for me,” she says.

After learning more about female pleasure from friends, Kelly’s sexual experiences went from unfullfilling to totally satisfying. Balestrieri explains why: “When our friend group normalizes the experience of talking about sex in a way that feels positive, accessible, and non-shaming… all of those normalized experiences are then generalizable to sexual partners.” By chatting openly with friends about what we like and don’t like when getting down and dirty, we’re treating it as something that is for us. It’s a low-pressure way to talk about sex outside the bedroom — so when you’re in a steamy moment with a partner, it’ll feel like second nature.

Porn Is A Gateway To Learning More About Sex

I’ve always envied the fact that men get to “jerk off.” Of course, women get to masturbate too, but we don’t have fun slang that makes masturbation sound less like a formal procedure and more like a chill afternoon activity. For many men, masturbation can be a casual endeavor, whether they’re experimenting alone or sharing information at their first sleepover. According to the TENGA 2019 Self-Pleasure report, men start to masturbate more than two years earlier than women on average, and they’re also twice as likely to learn about masturbation from a friend.

So, how can we close this gap and have more women swap knowledge about solo play? We have to destigmatize female pleasure. Watching porn with friends could do just that. While porn is certainly not a legitimate form of sex education (if anything, it can promote misinformation around sex), watching with friends can create an open dialogue. Not only can you talk about how many miles per hour James Deen’s tongue can move, but also about everything from masturbation to kinks to consent.

“I think the most promising part of it all is being able to watch the porn and comment with each other on what you're seeing and talk about whether or not it's similar to the experiences you've had or want to have,” Balestrieri says.

My friends aren’t the only group who have given sexy movie nights a try. Anna*, 21, first watched porn with friends when she was 18. While she’s since decided she’s more of a sexy literature fan herself, she found it super helpful to watch with friends who would keep it real and assure her that, don’t worry, no one’s moans are that sexy, or no one’s vagina is actually razor-burn-free.

“That was a fun experience just being able to, I don't want to say, critique it, but laugh at how silly it was,” Anna says. “And this was before I had sex for the first time, so watching [porn] with people who had had sex and were like, ‘This is completely not real,’ really shattered that illusion in a positive way.”

Not all friends will necessarily have the tools to fact-check porn for you, especially given that each person has their own internalized misogyny to work through. But Anna’s squad is just one example of how watching porn as a group can allow your friends to serve as a sex-positive panel, providing real data about women’s sexual experiences.

How To Pop The Question To Your Pals

If you want to give watching porn with your friends a try and aren’t sure how to kickstart that convo, Balestrieri suggests telling your pals, “‘Hey, this is not just for the guys. We have every right to this material, and not only that, it’s kind of our own personal ethical obligation to know what we like sexually.’” A “rallying the troops” mentality can hype up your friends.

That being said, she also emphasizes that no one should feel forced or pressured to watch porn, and consent is always key.

But if you do get everyone on board, Balestrieri says to make a whole thing of it: Research some female and ethically-produced porn (like Lust Cinema, Bellesa, and PinkLabel), pop some popcorn, and see who can count the most orgasms — or whatever your crew desires to make it a fun and accessible event. And most of all, take comfort in knowing that watching porn no longer has to feel like a shameful, dirty little secret. Let’s bring it out into the light.

*Name was changed

Expert:

Dr. Kate Balestrieri, licensed psychologist, certified sex therapist and founder of Modern Intimacy