SuicideGirls: Strong women with something to say and something to show

Before she took her clothes off, Pearl Suicide had a lot of work to do for her anti-Bush photoset. She met with the art director, then prepped the backdrop, and finally covered a coat with pins and bumper stickers critical of the current administration that she could focus attention on as she slowly removed it.

Pay $9 a month and SuicideGirls.com will provide you (and the other 500,000 unique visitors the site gets per week) thousands of hi-resolution images of what the site calls ?the hottest, cutest, sexiest goth, punk, and emo girls we can find.? Most are topless, and each begins her photoset clothed. With each photo, they end up less so.

SuicideGirls, and other sites like it on the web, are combining traditional forms of erotica with the aesthetics and philosophies of the punk and indie subcultures ? to create a vibe that some credit as modern female empowerment, and others pass off as indie burlesque. Its modern undertones stress a do-it-yourself attitude and appreciation for the individual, as well as the indie cachets of piercings and spiked hair. Founded in 2001 by a couple which call themselves Missy and Spooky Suicide, SuicideGirls aims to be smart, clean, female-friendly erotica, as well as a distinct and thriving community.

?The term ?Suicide Girls? was taken from the Chuck Palahniuk book Survivor,? explains Missy Suicide. ?There are no dark sinister undertones to it. If I had known the site would be so popular then I might have thought the name out a bit more.?

The term was lifted from the nickname Missy and her friends used to call the girls they saw in Portland, Oregon?s Pioneer Square: ?With skateboards in one hand, wearing a Minor Threat hoodie, listening to Ice Cube on their iPods while reading a book of Nick Cave?s poetry,? says Missy. ?They are girls who didn?t fit into any conventional subculture and didn?t define themselves based on musical taste like punk, metal, goth, etc. I think the only classifications right now people identify with are ?mainstream? and ?outside of mainstream.???

?We?re trying to take the same sort of feel as vintage Bunny Yeager and Bettie Page pin-up photos and the Alberto Vargas drawings and present them with a modern update,? she says. ?These are just the girls I personally find the sexiest. There?s no place else in the media to see girls that are tremendously smart and beautiful in their own way. Everywhere you look you just see the super-thin, super-tall, bleached-blonde Baywatch babe. There are a lot of people out there who want to see a different kind of beauty.?

With 24 million page views a month and over 2 million comments posted to the message boards in the last year, SuicideGirls has proven that there is an audience for girls outside the mainstream. Besides the 56,000 pictures of the almost 600 Suicide Girls, the site offers message boards, a news site, band and author interviews, groups, calendars, clothes, and even a burlesque tour currently touring internationally following sold out performances on the original national tour. Employees and models on the site tend to take ?Suicide? as their last name to preserve their anonymity, and to promote the sense of family that the site strives to provide.

But with the glut of free pictures of women all over the internet, what convinces SuicideGirls? 500,000 unique visitors a week to pay money to see pictures of punks? How can a movement like punk rock ? founded on thwarting conventional social standards in an ?outsider? subculture ? join hands with an industry designed to cater to conventional standards of beauty? For many, the appeal is tied to the girl-next-door aspect of the site. These are the girls that you see in coffee shops, at concerts, and in record stores. And now you get to see them naked.

This is the crux of the issue: Can the intent and execution of pictures such as those on SuicideGirls reclaim the respect and control that is usually lost in traditional pornography? By focusing on softcore pin-up photography and consciously keeping the site light and fun, Missy and her coworkers have attempted to create a community where feminism and a love for sex might peacefully coexist. By expanding the site to include message boards, profiles, journals, news, interviews, and much more, the team behind SuicideGirls is doing its best to make a ?contemporary lifestyle brand,? instead of just a pin-up site.

It seems to be working. Only 20 percent of SG traffic is to the pin-up photography; visitors spend the rest of their time in the community itself. As Pearl puts it: ?People may come for the payoff ? the pictures ? but they stay for the blogs and boards and community. I think that more than other sites, it?s not just about naked girls: It?s about nurturing the community that appreciates these kinds of shots.?

?I like the DIY [Do-It-Yourself] aesthetic of it,? said Drama grad student and SuicideGirls member Mike Scotto.?The women on SuicideGirls just seem more real people, not airbrushed.?

Others question whether a medium that focuses on women as sex objects can effectively escape the mold of patriarchal pornography. The second-wave feminists who take a staunchly anti-pornography stance might see SuicideGirls as yet another degrading site devoted to men?s pleasure and women?s exploitation, but to SuicideGirls members, models, and founders, it?s third-wave feminism in action. This could explain the site?s popularity with women ? women account for roughly half of the site?s members, and their participation and love for the site proves that SuicideGirls.com isn?t just a site devoted to crass nudie pictures. It?s a new chapter in a feminist debate that Lynn Chancer, author of Reconcilable Differences: Confronting Beauty, Pornography, and the Future of Feminism, has pondered for years.

?It depends on whether they?re just repeating objectification or doing something new,? Chancer says of alterna-porn in general. ?It seems these sites are mimicking, or reiterating, larger feminist sex-versus-sexism debates over whether beauty norms are really so repressive. It?s hard to entirely avoid the influences and images with which one has been burdened from birth on, but it?s possible that there?s a little more freedom on a site where women are trying to appropriate objectification for their own purposes.?

That?s the point that Missy and her girls reiterate with a passion. The women are given an unusual amount of control over their photosets and allowed to show as much or as little as they want. There is some lesbian petting on the site, Missy admits, but no men. The site provides the sets and the photographers, and sometimes art direction, but the models are responsible for everything else.

Although SuicideGirls doesn?t like to say how much they pay per photoset, the general estimate is that Suicide Girls are paid around the industry standard of $200 an hour. Look further through the site and you?ll find fervent music-geek discussion boards and tour info, and lots of journal postings where, for instance, one model endearingly worries about her recent kidney checkup. SuicideGirls starts to look less like regular porn, and more like ? well, more like porn for people who cry to The Smiths but ain?t about to let that get in the way of a little somethin? somethin?.

A more essential criticism, however, remains: Does the fact that the women control their photo shoots make any difference to the basic, problematic relationship between viewer and viewed within all pornography? In an essay titled ?The Ethics of Porn on the Net,? published in the book Remote Control: New Media, New Ethics, sociologist Kath Albury explores the differences between professional, cottage-industry, and amateur pornography on the ?Net. ?Porn?s opponents have argued that pornographic producers, performers, and consumers perpetuate an oppressive male fantasy of female sexuality,? writes Albury. ?Certainly the bulk of professionally produced pornography contains images of fairly conventional pornographic beauty.... However, the relative accessibility of the technologies that allow ?publication? on the Internet has allowed a wide range of atypical [author?s italics] pornographic beauties to present themselves to an extremely appreciative audience.... Internet pornography offers a unique opportunity for those with unconventional sexual tastes and appearances to interact in ways that are taken for granted by those with ?normal? interests.?

?The way SuicideGirls is run resists the traditional objectification of women by allowing us to choose how we?re portrayed,? says Pearl. ?For instance, I don?t do frontal shots, and that?s my choice. It?s interesting that I?ve been able to reclaim control over my sexuality. Yes, I?m nude, but you can have it on my terms. It?s helped me take away that mythos on my body that it?s not cool for me to act or be a certain way. I can do what I want, and I should have that respect no matter how I pose or what I wear or if I say something you don?t like. If I?m a Suicide Girl, you might not agree with my opinions, but since I?m the one taking my clothes off I get to say what I want.?

SuicideGirls prides itself on being nurturing and protective of its women and giving them opportunities to display their personality. ?This girl with all the piercings and the ink flipping you off is beautiful,? says Pearl. ?Even now, women in many cultures would be punished for being sexual or exhibiting their personality, and SuicideGirls is about celebrating our freedom.?