LOS ANGELES — In an exclusive interview with Aurora Snow of The Daily Beast, James Deen has broken his silence on sexual assault allegations that Stoya and eight other women have levied against him.
On Nov. 28, Stoya tweeted that Deen "held me down and fucked me while I said no, stop, used my safeword," leading other women to share their own accounts of sexual assault experiences, including Ashley Fires and most recently Farrah Abraham from MTV's "Teen Mom" reality show.
Deen told Snow he is "shocked" and "completely baffled" by Stoya's claim, which he believes may stem from the fact that she found out "my current girlfriend and I are moving in together." He also suggested she could be "trying to drive traffic to her website," but that ultimately he "can’t speak to her reasoning or motivations."
In response to Tori Lux stating that Deen pinned her down and struck her with an open palm five or six times, he explained, "I can safely say that did not happen."
He pointed out that many of the allegations involved "either ex-girlfriends or events that happened on set," characterizing most of the claims as "descriptions of things on BDSM or rough sex sets" for which he has "no desire to blame people who consider themselves victims or throw stones."
Deen affirmed he always tried to respect limits, safe words and established boundaries, and that there "are third parties and supervision" who will stop the scene when an adult film actress expresses discomfort.
He further lamented that "it seems as if things are being distorted by the press or are inaccurate."
Snow then inquired about issues of consent amongst porn performers, to which Deen replied, "It’s not that people are entitled to each other’s bodies, there is just a certain comfort level that is consistent." He added, "You don’t get to do whatever you want but at the same time you need to accept a certain level of sexual interaction with almost everyone you encounter on set, until you express that you do not desire it."
When Snow brought up the fact that major companies like Kink, Evil Angel and Doc Johnson have severed or suspended relations with Deen, he said, "I hate to throw stones but at this point, fuck it. I fired Evil Angel over a year ago. I had to have my lawyer contact them multiple times to stop them from distributing my product. The idea that they stopped doing anything is ridiculous. As far as Kink.com goes, there are plenty of issues there that have been well-documented in the media."
He said that he is not being sued, is not under criminal investigation and currently has no plans to file defamation suits against the accusers.
To read the interview in its entirety, click here.
