Skinly's XXXTra Hot Video Store. Is their material still raunchy enough to rate three X's?

It's Hard To Keep Up With Rigid Pornography Standards

ALONG THE STRIP-- Providing adult entertainment for fickle film viewers isn't an easy task. Constantly changing attitudes towards pornography can make it hard for vendors to keep up with the rigid standards today's users of adult material expect. A hard-core, full-fisted, f*ck flick that may have been raunchy and offensive ten years ago could now be considered tamer than a topless cooking show.

F.I.S.T. (Film Industry Standards Tribunal), the sex industry regulatory board which regulates the pornographic credit rating of adult video stores, adult accessory outlets, and peep show parlours, has been reclassifying several sex shops as a result of stronger explicity standards.

Sex shops that can't demonstrate that their adult material shocks or offends can no longer advertise or promote their material as triple-X.

According to sex industry standards, the X-Rating system is in place to protect the integrity of pornographic producers and honest purveyors of smut. Each "X" represents the degree of sexually explicit content, where one X may include moderate penetration and the top rating of XXX describes material that would make Ron Jeremy blush.

No one is more aware of this rating depreciation than the proprietors of Skinly's XXXtra Hot Adult Video Store, a family-owned adult entertainment business nestled in between Spike's Discount Chopper Shop and Grandma Sue's Country Bakery And Tattoo Parlour.

Skinly's 'XXX' rating has been downgraded to XX after failing to meet hard-core standards. But Skinly thinks he's getting the shaft.

"When we first opened in 1985 we wanted to try and flesh out the [pornographic] market," said Skinly, an amateur gang-banger, a fan of independent foreign free-for-all orgy videos, and an active member of his local church. "Business swelled for the first ten years when video came out on top, but I guess we peaked when virgin sacrificing became acceptable viewing material. I guess lately our adult-oriented products just haven't been able to keep up to retain the XXX rating. Thrusting this XX on us is going to make our sales sag more than Linda Lovelace's withered old tits."

Skinly is planning on appealing the flaccid rating. He says that stiff competition among perverted pornography producers is constantly pushing the raunch factor--and what makes porn XXX--past previous levels.

"They should create a XXXX or 5X rating," said Skinly. "Because it's hard for small local operators like ourselves to keep abreast of trends in porno films. Really, it's just as easy to masturbate to a wholesome Emanuelle film as it is to a dirty double-anal dogf*ck flick."

"Our coin-operated peep shows are just as dirty and sexually overpowering as anyone else's," continued Skinly. "If they knew how often I had to clean those booths, they'd be thinking twice about reducing my store's rating. In my opinion, they should be creating some new letters."

Skinly's hard-core customers aren't concerned. Jim Cummins has been a cumming regularly for years. "Often these ratings are based on the cover of the video box," said Mr. Cummins, "but we all know it's what inside that counts. At least that's what they say about the diesel-powered female sex toys."