Well, what do you expect from a sexually segregated society?
This will happen and they will always find a way around it even if the government comes up with some regulations and actually enforces them.
**** In The U.S.A. - 60 Minutes - CBS News
**** In The U.S.A.
Steve Kroft Reports On A $10 Billion Industry
(CBS)
Selling sex is one of the oldest businesses in the world, and right now, business has never been better.
One of the biggest cultural changes in the United States over the past 25 years has been the widespread acceptance of sexually explicit material - pornography.
In the space of a generation, a product that once was available in the back alleys of big cities has gone corporate, delivered now directly into homes and hotel rooms by some of the biggest companies in the United States.
It is estimated that Americans now spend somewhere around $10 billion a year on adult entertainment, which is as much as they spend attending professional sporting events, buying music or going out to the movies.
Consumer demand is so strong that it has seduced some of America's biggest brand names, and companies like General Motors, Marriott and Time Warner are now making millions selling erotica to America. Last November, Correspondent Steve Kroft reported on this billion-dollar industry. The best place to see it is at the industry's annual convention in Las Vegas, where more than 200 adult entertainment companies gather under one roof to network, schmooze and show off their latest wares.
Presiding over it all is Paul Fishbein, the founder and president of Adult Video News, the industry's trade publication, which sponsors the expo.
Who’s out there? “Manufacturers of adult products, distributors, suppliers, retail store owners, wholesalers, distributors, cable TV buyers, foreign buyers,” says Fishbein. “They're all here to do business, and then you have the fans.”
The fans came from all over the country, stood in line for hours, and paid $40 to get into what was essentially an X-rated trade show. From appearances, you might find the same crowd at the boat show.
According to Fishbein, there are well over 800 million rentals of adult videotapes and DVDs in video stores across the country. “And I don't think that it's 800 guys renting a million tapes each,” he says. Suffice it to say, there was something available for every sexual demographic - even material aimed at the 60 Minutes crowd.
In Fishbein's words, all of this is performed and produced by consenting adults, for the use of consenting adults in the privacy of their own homes. The industry also has its own major studios.
“Here you have two of the leading companies in the business, VCA and Vivid,” says Fishbein. “They're known for the biggest-budget top movies in the industry, along with Wicked Pictures.”
The industry also has its own major stars, like Jenna Jameson, a teen beauty queen, turned showgirl, turned **** actress. With the approval of her family, she reportedly earned more than a million dollars last year performing sex for money.
“The way I look at it is, this is kind of an art to me. I'm performing. I'm not doing it for the gratification of another man,” says Jameson. “I'm doing it because this is my job and I'm entertaining the masses. So it's just like being Julia Roberts, but just a little bit further, one step further.”The **** world now has all the trappings of a legitimate industry with considerable economic clout. Besides its own convention and trade publication, it holds marketing and legal seminars. It even has its own lobbyist.
“It employs in excess of 12,000 people in California. And in California alone, we pay over $36 million in taxes every year. So it's a very sizeable industry,” says Bill Lyon, a former lobbyist for the defense industry.
When 60 Minutes first spoke to Lyon, he was running the free speech coalition, a trade organization that represents 900 companies in the **** business.
“I was rather shocked to find that these are pretty bright business people who are in it to make a profit. And that is what it's about,” says Lyon.
What kind of reaction does he expect to get when he tells legislators all over the country that he’s a lobbyist for the adult entertainment business?
“Initially, I think there's a degree of shock. But when you explain to them the size and the scope of the business, they realize, as all politicians do, that it's votes and money that we're talking about,” adds Lyon, who says there are reputable companies traded on the New York Stock Exchange that are involved in the business. “Corporations are in business to make money. This is an extremely large business and there's a great opportunity for profits in it.”
**** In The U.S.A. - 60 Minutes - CBS News
