‘It gets a Little Dicey on the Home Page’: Articulations of Desire and Disgust on Aggregate Porn Sites

Aggregate porn sites remain one of the most popular methods to view porn today. Despite this, aggregate sites are subjected to considerable controversy because they rely on user-uploaded material that can be poorly moderated. As pornographic content becomes more expansive and varied, aggregate sites host an enormous panoply of pornographic content that meets a whole range of pornographic tastes. This article draws upon focus group/interview data from 18 young adults who use aggregate sites, and it explores the ways in which incidental and unplanned exposure to particular video pornographies facilitate feelings of desire and disgust based on the users’ sexual likes and dislikes. The findings highlight that incidental exposure to uncurated material can (re)affirm and (re)consolidate people’s sexual boundaries and dis/likes just as much as it can enable forms of sexual expression and experimentation. While aggregate sites may afford productive possibilities for some porn users, the article argues that the business model underpinning aggregate sites is unethical, and greater attention to the distribution and display of pornography is warranted.