Is AI Porn Liberation or Theft? Depends on Who’s Getting Off

As AI porn floods the internet, we must ask: are we witnessing a new age of erotica, or just another tech-fueled exploitation?

Let’s say you’re scrolling late at night, horny, sleepless, and hungry for something new. You stumble upon an AI-generated video featuring your favorite celebrity, or maybe your ex’s face, eerily pasted onto someone’s body mid-fuck. Does it turn you on? Or does your gut twist just slightly with the uncanny, unconsented wrongness of it all? Welcome to the disorienting boom of AI porn, where the floodgates of fantasy and ethics have blown wide the hell open.

What Is AI Porn, Anyway?

AI porn refers to sexually explicit content that’s been generated, altered, or manipulated using artificial intelligence. Most commonly, these are deepfakes; digitally modified videos or images where someone’s face (often a public figure’s, sometimes a private citizen’s) is superimposed onto a preexisting body. Think Photoshop on steroids doing bad things. Then there are full-AI creations of entirely fictional, hyperreal people.

Fun fact: In 2023, approximately 96% of deepfake content online was non-consensual pornography, with almost all of it targeting women.

And yes, that includes your favorite Twitch streamer, that wholesome Marvel actress, the Queen of Spain, and probably half your high school’s graduating class if you search hard enough on Reddit. AI porn is not just about sexual freedom or digital art. It’s also about who gets exploited, who gets controlled, and who gets off on what.

The Erotics of Control

One argument in defense of AI porn goes like this: “It’s just a fantasy. No one was physically touched. It’s fake.”

That reasoning is cute, but dangerously incomplete. Consent doesn’t evaporate just because a body wasn’t in the room. If we’re building erections on the faces of people who never said yes, we’re not innovating—we’re violating.

And let’s not forget who’s most often programmed into these fantasies: women, femme-presenting people, and the already-famous. Meaning that fame and femininity create passive vulnerability, a ‘swipeable’ menu of bodies for anonymous users to exploit. There’s nothing liberatory about that.

Culturally, AI porn is part of a legacy: new tech meets old fetishes. The printing press gave us erotic chapbooks. VHS tapes revolutionized home porn. Snapchat led to the golden age of leak culture. But with AI porn, what’s different is the disembodiment. It’s not just seeing someone naked; it’s wielding so much godlike digital control that you can make someone do anything.

On the Flip Side: Could AI Porn Be a Wankable Wonderland?

Okay, finger off the panic button for a second. There are positive, promise-filled corners of AI porn. Entire creators, sex workers, coders, and kinky little geniuses are designing synthetic pornstars from scratch. This means fresh, sizzling erotica based on no real person, with no exploitation baked in. It’s a realm of pure creativity: you want a six-tentacled bimbo made of stardust and French accents? Done.

There’s even ethical potential here. Disabled, isolated, or differently-abled individuals could use AI porn to simulate experiences they might otherwise be excluded from. Queer and trans creators can generate characters that mirror their fantasies without fearing industry typecasting.

Lawless, Clueless, and Horny: The Current Landscape

Are there laws around AI porn? Kind of. But mostly, no.

In the U.S., Arizona, Wyoming, Washington, Virginia, Utah, Texas, Tennessee, Rhode Island, Oklahoma, North Carolina, New York, New Jersey, Montana, Mississippi, Minnesota, Maryland, Maine, Louisiana, Kansas, Illinois, Hawaii, Florida, Connecticut, Colorado, California, and Arkansas have explicit laws banning non-consensual deepfake porn. But enforcement is tricky. The specifics of these laws vary, with some creating criminal penalties and others establishing a civil right of action for victims. Additionally, federal legislation, such as the bipartisan "Take It Down Act," has been passed to address both non-consensual deepfakes and "revenge porn" at a national level.

So, Liberation or Theft?

The answer is yes. AI porn is both liberation and theft, depending on who is doing the creating and who is being created. If it’s consensual, fictional, and imaginative, AI holds a radical, kaleidoscopic promise for how we explore pleasure. But when it’s non-consensual, misogynist, or exploitative, it’s just the same old violation wrapped in digital gloss. And until we’re able to build serious ethical frameworks, ones that center consent, identity, and creative agency, we’re going to keep spiraling between utopia and violation.

So, dear reader, the next time you see an AI-generated sex scene that makes your pants twitch or your spine chill, ask yourself this: Whose fantasy is this and who paid the price for it? Turned on? Turned off? Conflicted? Good. That means you’re still thinking—and that’s sexy.

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