...yikes

When I was first starting out on the internet, about 13 years old, I knew that I wasn’t welcome in porn communities. I knew I wasn’t the intended audience and therefore had no say in what was and wasn’t okay. I knew that the moment I lied about my age on a website, I was putting myself at risk of seeing things I didn’t like. And I saw plenty of things I didn’t like. But instead of me, a child, being like “you can’t draw this! It makes me uncomfortable!” I just closed the tab and didn’t return. Maybe I blocked a user so I wouldn’t see their content anymore. But either way, I kept my mouth shut because I knew that I was not invited to this space.

Porn communities don’t exist solely for adults to jerk each other off. And I didn’t understand this as a child. I thought people drew porn because they wanted to get off. But people draw porn because it helps them escape. I know this now, as an adult who draws porn, that porn is often a reflection of a personal experience or, the extremely kinky shit, is often an outlet for some sort of negative emotion harboring inside of them that they’re letting out through art. Porn communities of all kinds is filled with people who use porn to draw themselves away from harsh realities, to explore things they’ve been through, or even just to vent. And I did not know this as a child. Because I was not ready for this information.

If you’re a minor and you decide to enter a porn community, it’s on you to keep yourself safe from harmful material. It isn’t the job of adults coping with traumas and emotions. It isn’t the job of the website to pass judgment on what should and shouldn’t be on the website. And it isn’t the job of other users to comfort you either. You decided to turn off safe search. You decided to go into the porn tag. You decided you were ready to look at something that was never made for you, that was never for you to look at. You decided you were ready to grow up. And part of growing up is knowing that some people indulge in harmful things through harmless methods. This goes for art, writing, pornography, and personal lives. Adults do things to make themselves feel better that minors don’t have access to for a reason. And that reason is, you’re not ready. You don’t have the proper mindset to indulge in things like this.

Anyway, TL;DR: minors aren’t welcome to NSFW spaces, so stop acting like you have a say in what adults should be doing.

best friends can make out for no reason right