VICE VISITS: The Australian Adult Industry Awards

On a sweaty Wednesday evening sometime in October, the Ivy Ballroom, the inimitable embodiment of Sydney faux-glamour, was illuminated by cool purple light. The aroma of lilies flooded the woozy space and white-gloved attendants scurried across the black-carpeted hall, carrying boxes loaded with tinkling wine glasses, filling ice buckets with booze, surreptitiously conversing with their managers. A huge powerpoint dominated the stage. At startlingly random intervals a cheesy pop song would screech out from unseen speakers as the DJ fucked about with the knobs. 

I’m at the Australian Adult Industry Choice Awards: the annual glamour evening where the finest members of the erotic industry are celebrated, nominated, awarded and showered with free booze and a three-course meal. Nominations include titillating titles like “Best Anal”, “Best Cum Shot” and “Best Dinner Date Companion”, as well as awards for excellence in community building in an industry so often pushed to the margins of society: industry leaders, mentors, service providers for disability needs, LGBTQIA+ advocates… The list appeared limitless.

What seemed like hundreds of white-clothed tables filled the gaping room, bedecked with expectant champagne flutes, flower arrangements and surreptitious black goodie bags, their sheen matching the metal chairs rimming each setting. Soon, the room would be filled with the stars of Australia’s Adult Industry, flown in from all edges of the country.

Australia’s Adult Industry is booming. With OnlyFans’ meteoric rise working to normalise the industry, and recent moves towards decriminalisation in Queensland and Victoria, one might assume the musty stigma around sex work might be nearing its end. But Australia is a long way off.

The paradox at the centre of legislation around sex work is that just because we have decriminalisation, it doesn’t mean life is any easier for sex workers. And when it comes to fixing sex work legalisation, Australian politicians are too cowardly to touch it.

While decriminalisation has been put into effect, sex work still isn’t properly legalised in all jurisdictions. Until we have sex workers, or at least people who give a fuck about them, making policy for themselves, we won’t have proper liberation. The limbo placed upon sex workers is that they need to operate as a business – paying taxes, operating as sole traders, ensuring occupational health and safety – but in doing so are placed at the whim of stigma, prejudice and fear that is encouraged by much of mainstream society. From state to state, the industry is mired with numerous inane roadblocks: legal tangles from intractable laws left unchanged since it was illegal for women to fuck outside of marriage. Even running a porn production company is against the law in most states.

VICE asked the awards’ organiser, Sebastian, [“just Sebastian”'], whether there would be any porn production companies in attendance, a la the Las Vegas AVN Stars award show, America’s biggest adult industry awards. 

“It’s illegal in Australia,” Sebastian replied.

“That’s the thing. You’re able to solo produce, but porn production companies are illegal under Australian law.”

And that is true. In NSW, it is an offence under section 15 of the Summary Offences Act (NSW) “to live wholly or in part on the earnings of ‘prostitution’, unless the earnings are derived from working, managing or owning a brothel.” The charge carries a maximum penalty of 12 months in jail. 

Further to that, producing porn films in Australia is a nightmare conjured by the Australian Classifications Board. Any film released must be classified, lest the distributor gets smacked with heavy fines. If it ends up being “Refused Classification” – which it can on a variety of grounds ranging from fair enough to prudish, including “body piercing, application of substances such as candle wax, ‘golden showers’, bondage, spanking or fisting” or “incest fantasies or other fantasies which are offensive or abhorrent.” 

Basically, no wonder OnlyFans is popular in Australia. Producing porn any other way is a logistical nightmare. It’s just one of numerous legislation flops in Australia that only seem to be useful in making sex workers’ lives difficult.

Queensland announced this year it would remove a slew of laws that actively infringe on workers’ ability to work safely – it was previously illegal for sex workers to work in pairs, employ a secretary, or text other workers to let them know they were safe before and after a booking. We have a long way to go. 

The room had become silent: DJ had figured it out. The attendants were still; waiting, hands clasped, at drinks stations edging the room. I was eagerly awaiting a free champagne, but there wasn’t time. The guests were here.

We moved towards the red carpet and media wall that topped a sweeping marble staircase at the ballroom’s entrance. A photographer from the Daily Mail stood waiting, cold fluorescent lights casting a haunting glow across his face as he examined the gigantic flash bulb on his camera. Another videographer busied himself with the dials on his own equipment. 

At the foot of the staircase, people had begun to file in. Sequins, diamantes, stilettos, the most beautiful women in the world… and dudes in tuxedos.

It was time. 

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Read more from VICE Australia.