What's the Difference Between a Sex Tape and a Porno?

Farrah Abraham, former star of MTV’s Teen Mom has been insisting for the past month that she did not shoot a porno, but rather, a “personal video” or “sex tape” to “celebrate [her] feminine side.” Vivid finally released it yesterday as Farrah Superstar Backdoor Teen Mom and it is totally a porno—no ifs, ands, or buts about it. (Well, actually, there is one butt about it, hence the whole “backdoor” thing.) Here, we explain the difference between “porno” and “sex tape” and why the former applies.

Technically, all celebrity “sex tapes” are pornography, as they feature real sex and other “obscene” imagery intended to arouse the viewer. But colloquially, there are some differences between what constitutes “sex tapes” and “pornos.” Generally speaking, “sex tapes” are amateur videos, typically shot by one person or a couple, with no intention for later distribution or sale.

Here’s is what sex tapes are not:

• Filmed by a third party
• Produced with a budget
• Multi-angled
• Well lit
• Well mic-ed
• Blocked
• Starring professional adult film stars who were paid for their appearances
• Artfully edited, with scene transitions
• Zooming in during action
• Well-focused, crystal-clear, extreme closeups of squirting vaginas in which you can actually easily tell the difference between the labia minora and labia majora

Farrah’s porno is all these things, and then some. (Link NSFW, obvs.)

But let’s let her explain, in her own words—as told to Dr. Phil—why she doesn’t believe that this is a porno:

This is not a porn tape. A porn tape is when you are a porn star and you wanna be naked and wanna wear crazy other stuff. And that’s what’s really hard for me to even deal with. I’m not ok with that and that’s not what this is.

Dr. Phil pointed out that their interview would “look really silly” when her video finally came out. And he’s right! But it also looked really silly two weeks ago when it first aired. Here’s a sampling of how this woman speaks, transcribed verbatim.

On why she made the video:

I’m celebrating my body and I’m celebrating my feminine side. This is something that never should’ve been talked about publicly. This is something that I wanted for when i’m older because I want those sexy photos of me on my best year. This is my year to celebrate that to me. This was for me and just like how I represent things for myself. This was for me to see. And also just so you know some women feel sexy in different lingerie or like whatever they feel sexiest in so I like also sexy photos done.

Um, WHUT.

On why she hired someone to fuck her in her “private video”:

I think showing your feminine side, like showing how beautiful you are, is also having someone else there to compliment that. It feels more sexy. So I just wanted to show more of my sexier side.

It would seem that by “feminine side” she literally means “vagina” and that “having someone else there to compliment that” she literally means having James Deen compliment how good her vagina looks with a glass dildo in it while she masturbates in the backseat of what appears to be a Lincoln Town Car.

On why considering selling the video, as though that weren’t the entire reason that it was produced to begin with:

I don’t know the ramifications of people being like whoa! I don’t know the ramifications, like my legal team and my personal advisors are like, “Well what will happen if you do this? Yes if there is a certain amout of income you can take care of your life and support it and do your other endeavors that you want to do.”

And then she just rambles about being a professional:

I’m always about my work. I’m a professional and I’m about creating more things for this world so that it’s a better place than how I found it. And that’s what i’m working hard at. I’m a great mother, I’m a great individual and I don’t need things produced in a drama way or construted [sic] to be in a different light being a negative on me because I’m my own person without those things.