The debate around Internet porn – its benefits, and negative impacts – has been raging for decades. However, much of the conversation is around people consuming porn, rather the people starring in it – like Mia Khalifa, who recently shared her regrets about working in the porn industry.
In a recent TikTok video, Khalifa – who is now a sports commentator, but worked as a high profile porn actress from 2014-2015 – revealed some of the traumatic experiences she had while working in adult entertainment.
“That hourly dissociative attack from remembering hundreds of millions of people’s only impression of you is solely based on the lowest, most toxic, most uncharacteristic 3 months of your life when you were 21,” Khalifa captioned the video.
It’s been less than a week since Khalifa posted the TikTok video but it has already racked up over 330,000 likes and over 5,000 comments. The video also sparked a heated debate on Twitter with some followers sharing their support for Khalifa, and others criticising her for speaking out against the porn industry.
To clarify her video, Khalifa tweeted that she’s not against sex work and didn’t want to tell people what to do with their bodies, “but I am telling you to never let anyone have ownership of your content. Ethical porn exists, support those sites, not the big production conglomerates.”
When another Twitter user expressed their support for Khalifa but mentioned the “harm she caused” by wearing a hijab in porn videos, Khalifa was quick to explain in a series of tweets.
She said that after porn videos of her wearing a hijab went viral, BangBros porn executive Jordan Sibbs convinced her to appear in a ‘Vogue’ photoshoot wearing the hijab and posing with guns. Khalifa said it was a lie and “weeks later, those photos ended up being used on the website BangBros created under my name.”
After porn star Abella Danger tweeted “I will never stop defending the porn industry,” and implored people to “stop trashing us for pity and clout,” Khalifa responded, “I feel bad for her living in such a deluded mindset to believe telling your own personal story and fighting for vulnerable women that don’t have a voice means you’re chasing clout.”
Later, Khalifa said she never spoke out about her experiences because “I was made to feel as though I couldn’t tell my story without being derided by the general public.”
Luckily, Khalifa now feels “safe” to speak her truth, and whilst it’s clear her experience isn’t shared by every porn actress, her story should still be heard and shines a troubling light on the adult entertainment industry. We owe it to the people working in the industry to dig deeper and truly understand what is going on behind the scenes.
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