New Partisan

Like the interviews with Regan Starr and Mike South run recently in this space, this interview with Gen Padova was done for an article I recently wrote on the adult industry. As in the previous interviews I have edited myself out of the transcript so as to emphasize Ms. Padova’s voice

Everybody that’s known me for the last several years has seen me as a shy girl who was highly academic in school. A girl of many thoughts and plans running through her mind who never took the time to have fun as a child. I spent a lot of my free time doing homework and secluded myself by doing my own thing such as reading, painting, etc. Although people didn’t know I constantly had these sexual thoughts running through my mind like any other teenager. I came off very prude and appalled by anything mentioned in a sexual manner. It was my insecurity getting in the way at the time.  And being that I had reached puberty, obviously that was something that did come to mind a lot. I did have access to the internet with my own personal computer in my very own bedroom, so whenever everyone was in bed sleeping I would snoop around the internet and look at pictures and go to nasty websites.  The more I did that, the more curious I got and the more desires I started to develop.

Even after I finished high school and went to college I never dated anybody. I was too shy, yet at the same time I wished I was that slutty girl in high school that had all the fun.  Halfway through college I met this one guy that I worked with. He and I became friends and we ended up dating. First love, you know how that is. We experimented with each other a lot when we were together. And our sexual endeavors without intercourse was the best ever. We both ended up losing our virginity with each other towards the end of the relationship. The lesson and experience will never be a regret.

Shortly after I was diagnosed with cancer, and was told that I might only have 3-4yrs left to live. That was one of the main things that got me up on my feet towards the adult industry. At that point in my life I automatically had no shame, not a drop of it. My outlook on life at that time was “My life has been shortened greatly compared to whatever’s possible, I’m gonna go out and do everything I’ve always wanted. I’m not about to let my worries, fears and insecurities get in the way of that. No one is going to stop me…”

First I started with a digital camera, taking pictures of myself and getting familiar with my body, getting in touch with my own sexuality, masturbating, talking to people as much as I could when I got the opportunity. After about six months I had all of these photographs that I had nothing to do with. So I started going to websites and putting them up there, and then got in contact with webmasters who wanted to buy the content from me. I even built a few cheesy sites myself along with a Yahoo! Group that still exists. A year after that I finally started getting in contact with photographers.  At the time, being so naïve, I didn’t really know that you could actually make decent money modeling and taking your clothes off. I thought that was something everybody did for fun. Which is pretty hilarious to go back and remember those days.

To make a long story short, I got in contact with two different Photographers doing a lot of photo shoots. I ended up getting paid $300 for my very first photo shoot. I had no idea there was money involved that day. Ha ha. Even though that was awesome it didn’t keep me from doing a lot of free photo shoots with amateur photographers and doing a wide variety of different kinds of modeling, as much as I could, to get used to the art of posing.

From meeting these photographers they got me in contact with the right people and that’s how I ended up showing face to World Modeling like almost everyone else then doing adult films. One thing led to another I started doing solo girl videos, girl-girl videos, even the material got a little more rough and explicit each time. My curiosities could only hold back for so long and then I’d have to try something I hadn’t done before. Basically my entire sex life has been on camera.  Everything that I have done for the first time is on camera other than losing my virginity and giving head. I had sex twice and each time didn’t last longer than, I kid you not, two minutes. It was only shortly later that I ended up doing adult movies.

I truly believe, had I never got in front of the camera, I wouldn’t be as optimistic as I am today. I’ve been confident in my body as time proceeds, gaining a little more self esteem, knowing when is the right time to care about others and myself by building a degree of social status in my life. Things like that, that make a person. It also helped me pay my medical bills and find hope to keep fighting.

The worst thing that I ever did to myself was distance myself from other people other than my family. My parents would always try to get me to go out with the very few friends that I had.  When I was around 16, my mom would always wonder, “Why isn’t my daughter going out fooling around with her boyfriend, coming home crying because he broke her heart, and I can act on the duty as a mother to comfort her?” I’m just like, “Mom, what’s the point of that?  I’m not going get anything out of it,” and she’d say, “You’ve just got to try dating, you’d at least understand the experience when you’re older.”  Sometimes I do wish that I’d actually listened to my mom.

My mother knew I was modeling in general and she knew what my intentions were which she was happy with. I wanted to wait for the perfect time to tell her details because her and I are so close, I was unsure how she’d handle the details. One day she was at work and clicked a link in her email, and porn pop-ups showed up everywhere and one of the girls happened to be her little girl. She almost shit her pants calling her best friend frantically without any additional options. Well later that day, she told me what happened, I explained what it was from and she had only shed some tears in joy because she knew this was something I’ve always felt was necessary to do to inch me off my feet.

A lot of women need quick money these days. One way they accomplish that is by doing a quick scene or photo shoot. Half of those women have a hard time admitting they did it because they know deep down inside they could take a chance in losing respect from loved one, etc. Or feel insecure about the lack of moral standards. Then there are others who don’t really care what anyone else thinks when it comes to morality. Everyone has their own opinion on what morals are but I think that’s one of the main reasons why I truly believe there’s very few people in this industry enjoying it. Importantly, lately I’ve been watching 18yr olds walking into the industry doing double anal scenes let alone a straight anal scene or a boy/girl, even gang bangs. It must be the pure rush of knowing they can make thousands of dollars in a short amount of time. That worries me!

A union is very desirable and I do find it very possible. It’s just a matter of the right people at the right time making that happen. If anybody right now I think that [Adult Industry Medical] Health Care should branch more or add more to their foundation by creating a union, or even the [Adult Video News] should consider doing something like that.  Not only would it be a great benefit for performers, producers and directors, but it would also show the government that we take this a little more seriously than they think we do. Especially with the HIV drama that’s going on right now, the government is definitely looking at us a lot closer than they have been the last five years, and any minute the government wants to they can just step right in and take over and tell AIM to go kiss their own asses. I think that one of these days if someone does step forward and try to make a union, it would definitely make the government see that we do take this seriously, just like Hollywood does with SAG and AFTRA.

A union should have a payroll system where all of the companies in the adult business can be registered with them. That way, performers could get all of their checks through one place instead of having to drive all over the place or expecting various checks coming through the mail. It could be a lot more reliable, because there are some companies out there where you’ll have to wait a whole month to see your check. That’s illegal, but it does happen. By having that payroll system with the union there should be an option of health insurance by taking a portion out of your paycheck that you receive through the union, and also programs such as counseling, but making it a mandatory thing that you go to a certain amount of classes over a certain period of time and you’re actually there in order to continue on working in the adult business.  Because there’s people in this industry who just don’t know anything, and they’re just not emotionally stable.  They don’t know anything about STDs and the possibility that anything could happen to them, and because they don’t know anything, if something happens to them they lose their livelihood and they hold it against themselves. I definitely think that could make a whole lot of changes for the adult business in a positive way.

To only a certain degree should the government be involved in the adult industry by making our mandatory HIV/AIDs and additional STD testing an actual law. I know there would be many obstacles in trying to approach that but it’d be great in the work place. As an industry, as a community, everybody makes it mandatory because they know that they are getting themselves involved in a little more safe sex.  But if the government was involved, ideally they would make that an actual law. If anybody were to forge a test and were caught they would be put in jail or have to pay a hefty fine.  And I think that would help a lot in eliminating dishonest people.

There was a guy in the industry who would go once every month to get his HIV/AIDS test and every two weeks he would go in to get his chlamydia and gonorrhea test done. He would go in on the first of the month and got his STDs done and come out clear.  Two weeks later he would go in to get his STD test and if he came out positive he would take his medication but use his older chlamydia/gonorrhea test result paper to show that he was clean so that he could continue to do a scene even though he was on medication, so he was still exposing chlamydia and gonorrhea to other people. That first test he took that showed he was clean was still valid for another two weeks, because it’s good for an entire month. It happens very rarely, but every once in a while we get idiots who make the rest have to deal with his/her stupidity.

I honestly think that John Ashcroft is going a little too far.  If you want to speak in general terms, I believe that there are a lot more things that the government needs to take care of before they seriously start getting on the adult industry’s case, especially with Extreme Associates, which I would have to say is one of the least harmful companies out there.  It was the first company I worked for, and you’re talking someone that didn’t have much sexual experience, and didn’t know what deep throating was. For the government to go after Extreme for obscenity just because of the content of some of the movies that they choose to produce is ridiculous. Yeah, they’re extreme. It says so in the company’s name.  What do you expect? The person in Pennsylvania that made these claims should have known better; I mean God forbid he’s an adult.

Mainstream Hollywood movies out there are just as bad. The only difference is they don’t show full nudity, they don’t show details of what rape is like, they don’t show details of what murder is really like, because if they did it would have to be rated X. Extreme shows full nudity, full penetration, they show a little more detail than Hollywood does, but it’s basically the same idea.  That’s why its rated X. Mainstream can only show the rated R or NC-17 but if you think about it, technically its really isn’t that different, and for the government to be making a big deal about it is absolutely ridiculous.  Why should they just only go after porn companies? Just because it’s rated X and people out there are having sex for money? Rape, violence, hate, verbal abuse, emotional abuse, physical abuse are all part of life and it’s not necessary and it should never be done, but there will never be a point in any person’s life where that will be completely eliminated, and there will never be a point in time where mainstream Hollywood or television will not make a movie that doesn’t involve any form of violence.

Say there’s a job that I got an offer for and I go there and it’s a choking fetish. Lots of choking, hair pulling, slapping maybe some peeing or whatever. I sign that model release, and I’m not forced to do anything that I don’t want to do.  Violence is only taking place when a physical body is forced to do something that inflicts pain or any form of abuse or mistreatment.  If a person is willing and enjoying and they don’t mind it then that’s not violence, and that’s not abuse. For example, There are people that love the feeling of pain. There are people that love to be abused during sex. Therefore it is not violence and it’s not obscene, because if that person enjoyed it and they want it than how can somebody say that’s wrong if that’s what they want?  I may come off as a very extremely sweet person and very straightforward with people, but when it comes to my own private life and having sex with someone that I love, not only do I make love to them but sometimes if I’m in the mood I like it when he calls me a dirty whore. I like it when he pulls my hair and wants me to choke on his dick. I don’t mind that. I like that.  It turns me on.  And some people out there don’t do it because they don’t approve, and they would definitely call it violence, but it really isn’t because I am not a physical body that is being forced to do something that I don’t like.

Which is why I believe that the government is going a little too far, because I bet you if the government going after Extreme for those movies sat down with each one of those girls in those five movies and asked them, “Did you really enjoy this? Were you forced to do this? Did you like it when he did that to you? Did it bother you that they had to use all this blood to make it look like you were brutally raped?” I bet you not a single girl in there is going to say, “You know what, they forced me to do it,” because every company that I’ve worked for specifically tells you exactly what the scene is going to be like. They specifically tell you if there’s going to be blood involved, fake blood or whatever, and if you don’t like it than you don’t do it and they’re fine with it. They don’t harass you for it. So why should the government have a right to go after a company who is responsible enough to warn the girls what they’re about to do in order to make some money?  And if they agreed with it, then great. Now if a girl said, “OK, I’m fine with doing that,” and she’s in the middle of a scene and doesn’t like it, she needs to stop because it’s freaking her out, of course they’re going to stop. They can’t keep on going, because that gives her the opportunity to sue the company and production companies know better than that, so of course they’re going to listen to the girl. If they have to stop, then they have to stop, and they’ll have to redo it with somebody else. That’s how it works.

That’s why I don’t understand why the government would waste all their time and money on trying to go after someone that does this when they should be out there solving all those unsolved mysteries, finding all these missing children that have been missing for five, ten, fifteen years. Spend the money creating better foster homes for kids that don’t even have a home, and make sure that they’re actually clean and they’re not having to take a bath in old dirty water that some other kid had to take a shower in. Use that extra money to find cures for cancers that they haven’t been able to find because they don’t have enough money. I mean, it’s ridiculous. Everybody out there has the right to make money in any way that they want to, and they should be entitled to do exactly just that.