‘Would you rather?’ Weirdness and affect in reaction videos to porn

Abstract

Reaction videos to porn are popular forms of memetic media that circulate widely on YouTube and TikTok. However, analysis remains limited and little attention has been paid to how they mediate porn. This research seeks to understand and clarify the range of reaction videos to porn on YouTube, and analyses how they expose the mutable and shifting cultures of pornographic spectatorship, from being ostensibly private and sexual to affecting and inherently public. Through a content analysis of 276 videos, this study seeks to clarify how reaction videos to porn can be understood as memes and broadly conceptualises the range of content-reactors, as well as distinct patterns in their perspective and overall purpose. This paper argues that reaction videos mediate porn as possessing a weirdly affective power, shaped by participatory logics of the Internet ‘built for porn’ where it seems as if anything can be watched by anyone, with anyone.

Reaction Media: Archeology of an Intermedium

“…Vernacular reactions are captured in the surprise and joy of reactions to pregnancy announcements to the banal humor of teenagers filming their parents' and grandparents' reactions to explicit music videos or porn films. Extending the intimacy and inward-looking nature of family self-representation, family reactions can transgress taboos around sex, death, and privacy (Bliss 2022). Examples include reaction videos of parents and children looking through each other's phones ("Siblings look through each others phones" YouTube 2021b), or reactions to a family members' illness, dying or death ("Dad's death and spirit orb ascends" YouTube 2018).…”

“…Reaction videos have also been commonly associated with online pornography, especially as a result of the infamous 2007 trailer to the Brazilian scat fetish film, Two girls, One cup , which generated thousands of reaction videos on YouTube that featured shocked and retching viewers (Bliss 2022). This phenomenon has led some scholars to argue that reaction videos are a genre that can be defined by the exhibition of bodily reactions to transgressive content, and that the origins of reaction videos are in reactions to online porn (Cardoso 2017).…”

Yeni Medya Araştırmaları: Dil, İmaj, Fenomenler, Teknoloji, Dezenformasyon

“…Çünkü milyarlarca etkileşim alan bu tuhaf katılım alt-kültürü öylesine gariptir ki YouTube ve TikTok'ta pornografik memé'ler (capsler) olarak yaygınlaşan ilk örneklerinin hemen ardından artık tüm dünyayı saran bir yeniden temsil (re-representasyon) alanını kapsamaktadır. İnsanlar bu temsil sisteminde duygularını ve olaylara bakış açılarını yönlendirecek arayışlara girmektedir (Bliss, 2022). İnsanların dünyaya, kültürlere, içeriklere, diğer insanlara, tarihe ve hatta kendilerine/özlerine nasıl tepki/reaksiyon göstereceklerini yönlendiren bu garip alt-kültür deneyimi, kârlı olmasının yanı sıra alternatif ekonomi/mübadele değerlerini de üretmesi bakımından önemlidir.…”