The Piece About The Complicated Sex and Dating Lives of Gay Male Porn Stars

Finding love isn’t nearly as hard as holding onto it, especially when being hard is your job. And while folks of all stripes inevitably face the difficult choice between relationships and career, for some gay male porn stars, unique professional circumstances make dating a tricky business.

Like many jobs, porn is a demanding line of work that may result in long nights at work and long-distance travel, meaning more time away from a significant other. But for those working in the adult film industry, stigma surrounding the work they do can put a remarkable amount of extra stress on a relationship, since the job entails having sex with people outside of one’s primary romantic and/or sexual relationships.

This means that the life of a porn star can be a lonely one, sometimes devoid of romance due to a lack of understanding around the nature of their work. In a YouTube video, gay porn performer Blake Mitchell compared dating while working in porn to being in a one-sided open relationship that often feels unfair to the partner who doesn’t engage in sex work.

“There are people who think that they can deal with it… and then the months go by and I’m leaving every month to go and film and then those scenes come out,” Mitchell explained. “It becomes gradually more and more difficult and then they realize, ‘Oh, this is maybe not the right decision for them.’”

Even after leaving the industry, many still have to deal with the unique kind of fame that gay porn stars experience. As a result of this fame, Mitchell, who has more than 200,000 followers on Instagram, has had quite a few awkward run-ins with his admirers.

“I’ve been out to the bars before and people will say things to me that, because I am a sex worker, they think it is acceptable to say to a total stranger — complimenting my… size, or my body, making sexual remarks to me, etc.,” he writes in the video’s description. “Besides making me uncomfortable, if I am with someone who I am interested in, this can be a little embarrassing.”

At first glance, the most obvious option to many would be to date within the industry, but dating another porn actor can be a struggle of its own. Michael DelRay is a gay porn performer who works for companies like Next Door Studios and CockyBoys, and he feels that dating within and outside of the adult film industry are equally difficult.

“When you’re dating within the industry, yes, there’s a lot more understanding, but there are a lot of idiosyncrasies that are real pains in the ass, like, ‘Oh, you got to fuck my boyfriend,’ and ‘I’m a bigger star than you, I have a bigger following here,’” he says. “There’s just a lot of little jealousies and a lot of bickering inside the industry.”

Problems like these can cause many to avoid dating within the industry altogether. But being a single porn star can come with its own set of complications too, especially when it comes to having an independent sex life. DelRay mentions that the fear of testing positive for sexually transmitted infections (STIs) is one factor that may deter people from having sex outside of filming, as positive results can jeopardize a person’s income.

“[The STI testing cycle is] a really, really elaborate system that’s meant to keep performers safe,” DelRay says. “And if you test positive for anything, you’re not able to shoot at all.”

DeAngelo Jackson, a gay porn performer who appears in Noir Male films, says that he rarely has sex outside of filming. He has only been in one long-term relationship during his 10-year career, and he admits that fear of STIs keeps him from pursuing casual sex. For many porn stars, this concern stems from the idea that they need to be ready to perform at all times.

“I don’t have a sex life outside of filming. I’m just so afraid of catching something,” Jackson says. “I can’t even recall the last time that I had sex off-camera, and even that sex is such a performance it doesn’t even feel like sex — it’s so mechanical.”

Deangelo Jackson in a NoirMale scene

Although some actors might forego casual sex, some claim that when they do indulge, the job helps to make for an interesting encounter.

“Because of porn, I’ve learned many things,” says Dante Colle, who has filmed around 80 scenes in the past year and has worked with studios like Men.com and Falcon. “[I’ve learned about] being open with my sexuality, knowing my body better, what works and what doesn’t — and that can make for some crazy sex.”

For Jackson, however, having as much sex as he does for work can lead to avoiding sex with his long-term romantic partner.

“It’s a lot of hard work. It’s so much hard work that I don’t even want to do it off-camera ‘cause I’m tired. It reminds me too much of work,” he says. “My ex was always the one who had to pull it out of me.”

Jackson adds that although he rarely has enjoyable sex while filming, performances still deplete him of his sex drive off-camera. But while some actors decide to put relationships on hold while staying active in the industry, others have the opposite impulse.

Ezra Michaels worked for Helix Studios as a gay porn actor up until a few months ago. He began dating his partner around the same time he filmed his first scene, and found that the required traveling, combined with the actual work, proved to be too much of a hurdle for him and his partner to overcome.

“[Filming porn is] just something that makes me uncomfortable and it’s something that I know [my partner is] not comfortable with,” he says. “It’s just not something that’s super conducive to the kind of relationship that we have.”

Ezra Michaels

Even though he says sex work was “just a paycheck,” he still felt as though it was negatively impacting his relationship. This ultimately led Michaels to quit porn, finding it too much of a burden on himself and his relationship. Michaels and his partner are now happily engaged and plan to marry this year.

Dating in any stressful career isn’t easy, but the particular stigma surrounding sex work can complicate matters for some. As for the performers I’ve spoken to, none of them said they have any regrets regarding the decisions they’ve made in their personal romantic and sex lives. Jackson says that if it’s truly meant to be, love will just have to wait until after he retires.

“I’m not gonna be able to have that kind of happiness until I’m out of the game. It is what it is and it’s the life we lead,” he says. “But it’ll all come in due time, when I’m ready.”

[This was originally published on Them]