It’s cheaper to make. No need for fancy sets, costumes, make up etc. Just need a set that looks like a household room ($200/day on Airbnb) and the stars to say every now and then step-bro/sis

I think it triggers a sort of relation and familiarity with what’s on the screen. It helps people project their id into the sex act and feel arousal more easily.

I can’t believe I’m suggesting this, but it’s possible that LLM-AI chat bots might be useful for this author’s research.

There may be some confirmation bias happening around the specific pornography that the author is referring to; namely what they’re finding on PornHub. Maybe I’m an old and jaded Internet weirdo, but the sort of kink that ends up being turned into filmed porn is going to be the most broad, edges-rounded-off version of whatever it is you’re seeking. It’s divining causation from a median; it’s not going to give you the whole story.

Go check out the LLM chatbot platforms. Their most popular content is littered with incest porn, and not the nerfed step-incest variety. The narratives are remarkably diverse, considerably more so than the blackmail/coercion scenario that’s the author describes seeing again and again. If you want to see what people want, look at what they’re making for themselves. It’s a drink from the firehose to be sure, and often unfiltered, so prepare to be horrified.

Maybe their theory does bare out. I don’t know enough about the kink to say one way or another. But I think their examination would be greatly helped by taking in a wider array of samples, specifically from sources with lower barriers to initial entry. After all, a talented prompt engineer can bang out a new porn bot in a few hours. And they don’t even have to look like a porn star.

Part of what drives popular porn is a sense of taboo, enough to make something more exciting without going so far as to become repulsive. An easy way to do that is to take a normal, relatable situation, and sexify it. That’s why Step-Incest porn is so popular right now.

Back in the day, this was the service worker / payment trope, done so extensively that it’s cliche now. Plenty of people will hire a plumber to do some work in their home. Normal, relatable, but what if that then leads to sex with some lines about “cleaning pipes”? Suddenly this mundane thing that people can relate to becomes sexy. How about ordering a pizza, but you discover you don’t have any cash, so you offer to pay with sex! Another normal situation made progressively more exciting. It all edges close to prostitution, paying someone for sex or exchanging sex for goods or services, but it neatly skirts around that somewhat more taboo, and certainly at the time objectionable concept.

Now, it’s step-incest. Lots of people have step-siblings, it’s very relatable, but most of us wouldn’t really consider sex with them. That takes the relatable situation and makes it more taboo, more sexy. This stops short of the real taboo though, actual incest. It’s almost always Step siblings, because that gets close enough to the forbidden to be more thrilling, without really triggering that ingrained repulsion in enough people to make it worth making.

Step-incest porn is popular because having step siblings is relatable, but something most people wouldn’t normally relate to sex, while allowing porn to edge closer to the forbidden taboo of actual incest without actually crossing that line.

I watch is but only because it is literally in almost everything. I don’t want to watch it but I am basically forced to at this point.