Here’s what I learnt about sex and pleasure from speaking to Australian porn star Angela White

“I care about passion, connection and chemistry. I don’t care what someone has between their legs. I care if they’re present with me in the moment.”

I first started watching porn because I read a response in the sealed section of a magazine about a girl masturbating with her pillow and I wanted to see how to do it. I typed in ‘girl masturbating with pillow’ into Google and found an entire world of female self-pleasure porn that sent me down a rabbit hole of uncharted sexual territory. 

From that day on, I was hooked. I was lucky that the porn I first stumbled upon was a category that centres around the female orgasm – female masturbation – because it introduced me to a world of visual pleasure, education and inspiration. Even to this day, they’re the videos that turn me on the most, as well as girl-on-girl scenes.

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For me, it was a natural progression from female self-pleasure to lesbian porn, because they kind of sit within the same category. Like female masturbation, girl-on-girl porn centres around female pleasure. It’s all about our sensitive bits – neck-kissing, nipple-pinching, clit-sucking, pussy eating etc – which can really work to transport you to those moments of climax in your own IRL experiences, whether it be solo or with a partner. 

Often lesbian scenes are a guarantee for me when it comes to being turned on via porn. According to research from PornHub, I’m not the only one. PornHub’s most recent data says that most lesbian porn is consumed by straight women, and that ‘lesbian’ is the top viewed category by female viewers across the board. 

This is super interesting to me. I’m pansexual (I’m attracted to people regardless of their sex or gender), so my being into girl-on-girl porn scenes isn’t surprising to me. I mean, I enjoy replicating them IRL! But according to this data, women across the board, regardless of sexuality, get off on lesbian porn. 

Porn star Angela White gets it. Having been one of the most successful stars for the past 20 years, and being open about her sexuality, she’s shot countless girl-on-girl scenes. And trust me, they hit differently.

“The communication is better with women than with men,” she tells me when we sit down for a chat in Melbourne. “Every time I do a scene with another woman, they’re never afraid to ask me what I need, what I want.

“As a woman, we know what it takes to get off. Every woman and person is different, so it’s hard to generalise but we all need certain things to get us to climax. As a woman, you know that fundamentally. So, you feel more comfortable to ask questions because you know what to ask. ‘Do you want it slower? Faster? Fingers inside of you? What do you need?’. Personally, I ask that of every partner regardless of gender.”

Angela is a sexually empowered exception to the rule. Having been the AVN’s first three-time winner of Female Performer of the Year and consistently using her real name throughout her career, she’s made an imprint on the porn industry and many viewers’ sexual liberation, including my own.

But in her girl-on-girl scenes, Angela finds that communication happens more organically. And so does the build-up. “In my experience shooting girl-on girl-porn, there’s a slower start,” she says. “There’s a focus on kissing and sensual touching, a lot more foreplay and a focus on the journey.”

Female pleasure is a journey, she tells me. For women, pleasure is so much more about all the things surrounding The Big O, than the climatic event itself. I know that for me, as someone who has sex with all gender identities, the most pleasurable experiences are the ones where I connect with the person I’m having sex with. It doesn’t need to be an intense emotional connection, but it’s more about finding a rhythm that feels right and going on the journey of someone else’s pleasure, too. 

“I don’t care about gender,” Angela agrees. “I care about passion, connection and chemistry. I don’t care what someone has between their legs. I care if they’re present with me in the moment. This is the case both in porn and in my personal life.”

I don’t know if all women are like Angela and me here, but I’d make an educated guess that there’s something to be said for connection over climax. People with vulvas have such a different relationship with cumming than those with a penis. It’s less final and structured. It’s much more layered, complex and mysterious.

But that’s part of the fun, right? Sex should be all about figuring ourselves and our sexual partners out. Our bodies are like these beautifully delicious jigsaw puzzles that don’t come with an instruction manual. We get to figure them out with our senses — like touch and smell and sight — paired with our natural human instinct. 

“Get out of your head and into your body” is Angela’s advice and mantra for great, connected sex. To me, this is the gateway to female pleasure.

“Really focus on the touch. If someone is touching your leg, think about that sensation and nothing else. How does it feel to you? Does it tickle? Feel calming? You can ask these questions, even if you’re using your own fingertips. Really be in that moment.

“Focus on the texture of the skin. Is it soft? Smooth? Warm? There’s so much clutter in our brains that can pull us out of the moment. But if we think about it almost like meditation, clearing our minds and focusing purely on the sensation we’re experiencing… That can really get us out of our minds and into our bodies.” And that’s where the real pleasure experience lives. 

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