Try taking a gander at what porn performers wear at the annual porn convention in Las Vegas, where the highlight is an industry-backslapping event known as the "porn awards." Make all the "Golden Globes" jokes you want, but the self-referenced "Porn Oscars" are a several hours long ceremony, complete with Hollywood-style red carpet paparazzi walk, and halftime dance segment. Yes, there's a halftime dance segment. I still don't know anyone who's lived through one to fully describe it, but I've heard that it's at least as real as Stormy Daniels' breasts.

I was invited this year, as in the past, but have never willingly undergone a root canal or a 6-hour porn star awards ceremony. (One year while covering the expo for Fleshbot.com, I happily drank those valuable hours away in a nearby bar with Joel Johnson, who probably should have been doing something for Gizmodo.) But even though I didn't attend this year -- I had to stay at home and pound finish nails into my gums -- I still did not miss the fashion highlights and lowlights of porn's red carpet awards march.

The experience is like watching porn and thinking certain porn stars might look better with their clothes on. And then, you realize you were wrong.

Watching the porny red carpet is enough to make fashion people self-administer a Thorazine dart, the kind they use on elephants who turn on their trainers. Not always; most of porn's Neu Wave don't look like they got in a knockdown drag out fight over the sale rack at the Stripper Barn; some do indeed dress up in pretty hot haute couture.

Take a look at the full gallery of photos here.

Take for instance, this year's sublime plum strapless selection on Sasha Grey: it's elegant and somehow reassuring, as if to remind us that Grey is crazy-hot, is in an upcoming Soderbergh film, but doesn't need to wrap herself in a "top shelf" Fredericks' of Hollywood cling film getup that screams, "hey bitches, I got my first award at age 18 for Best Three-Way Sex Scene in 'F--- Slaves.'" No, Grey is always understated and sophisticated: she's so damn naturally beautiful and smouldering she could show up somewhere in a deflated Sara Palin blow-up doll held together with hot glued Gummi Boobs and pull it off.

Then there was Gianna Lynn, who did indeed win an award in 2007 for a scene with Arnold Schwartzenpecker (I am not making this up). But her Wikipedia photo should probably be updated after seeing her new breastial flotation devices on display at this year's red carpet. Not to mention the mystery restraining strap that could have been a forgotten security strip, or actually required to keep her girls from desperately trying to escape the hours of suffocating torture that lie ahead. Perhaps that strap was a warning for the other breast, in case it had any thoughts of tunneling for escape, or perhaps leaping to its death. I'm pretty sure the pre-award stroll conversation in Lynn's Venetian suite went like this:

Lynn: Dude, does this dress make my tits look big?

Dude: What do you mean by "big?"

Lynn: Does this dress make my tits look big enough?

Dude: How much is "enough?"

Lynn: This explains your retarded stage name.

Dude: You look like you got attacked by a rabid ferret with a faux-python fetish. Is that your purse strap, or an extra mouth made of pleather on your titty?

Lynn: MY BREASTS COST MORE THAN THIS DRESS.

No one could miss the be-ruffled Penny Flame, whom I love. But it looked like she selected her outfit with an almost vengeful anti-establishment attitude against the slutty prom dress parade (read: Bree Olsen). As if to say, "no I have not lost my mind, but when I win for my performance in POV C- Suckers #7, you better believe I'm yodeling my acceptance speech because when Penny Flame opens her mouth she BRINGS IT."

But if there's one person we can count on, it's Mary Carey. In the race for California governor she lost to the actual Arnold by a fistful of hair extensions and quite possibly the fart heard round the world. But the good news about Carey is that we can always count on her to elicit the response, "Oh, Mary." For example, this year's fascinating rainbow tie-dye attempt at a cocktail dress. Or maybe, it was a collection of knotted-together rainbow flag headscarves stolen from each and every GayVN booth which later she could unravel to use as a clever emergency escape ladder when Zak Sabbath and Mandy Moore's angsty Hot Topic styled boredom has them hastily smoking and ditching cigs in the bathroom -- miraculously making Carey the only porn star to make it out of the awards show alive. All that was missing from the colorful muu-muu was a unicorn or a granola energy bar. But Mary Carey is truly La Carey: and nothing clashes with La Carey because she is Pure Clash. Still, just looking at her hugely bright waist-hiding (baby bump? carbs? excess methane supply?) hippie dress is making me hungry for a sandwich from the Castro.

When you're a porn star, you actually don't have to dress like one. Unless you want to be Bai Ling when you grow up. Few got the memo, as usual. Yet for taste, pure win came in the form of Faith Leon, whose black and white dress was lightly sexy and formal. As was the gorgeous, dirty-purity expressed in Kimberly Kane's clean lines, lack of excess flesh and seamlessly stylish hair. But Leon and Kane only made life harder for Teagan Presley, whose intentions were good though she should have been gently told that ruched metallic green is a lot to ask of anyone. Especially when it's a gherkin-green shade, which then just looks wrinkled on accident and totally non-microwaveable, but could actually save her from having carnitas smeared across her back and being folded and served at the Venetian's $1.99 Kosher Mexi-Deli Buffet.

There was one thing the porn red carpets didn't count on this year: San Francisco's brat pack, tongues firmly in butch dyke and femme porn star cheeks (take that any way you wish.) Flaunting not just our San Francisco Values in the ballrooms and brunch lines, "Champion" star Syd Blakovich and feminist porn star/gallery owner Madison Young decided that yes, indeed the whole red carpet march was its own bit of performance art. The pair dressed "as San Francisco" as possible. Lest Porn Valley forget who's inheriting the future of porn. Young wore a gold gown that looked off the pages of Paris Vogue and her entire ensemble was of entirely organic materials. Meanwhile, Blakovich flaunted steampunk style with butch flair -- because when you know you already don't fit the mold at a kooky awards show (but outsell the competition) you sex it up with some much-needed fresh style.

In other words, they represented.

Sincere thanks, inspiration and photo credit go to Lux Alptraum (boinkology.com), who is the editor of Fleshbot.com. See more images and comment on her "Dispatches From The Red Carpet: The Best (And Worst) AVN Awards Fashion" post and tell her what you think.

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Violet Blue is author and editor of nearly two dozen sexual health books and erotica collections. She is a professional sex educator, lecturer, podcaster, blogger, vlogger, porn/erotica reviewer and machine artist. She has written for outlets ranging from Forbes.com to O, The Oprah Magazine.

Violet is also a fetish model, a member of Survival Research Labs, a Laughing Squid guest blogger, GETV reporter, fun to follow on Twitter, a San Francisco native and a Forbes Web Celeb. Her tech site is Techyum; her audio and e-books are at Digita Publications.

For more information and links to Web sites discussed in Open Source Sex, go to Violet Blue's Web site, tinynibbles.com.