Romance fiction is porn, but it’s a particular type of women-oriented feminist porn with a telos, or narrative goal. Romance fiction is teleological, building and driving toward this climax of the narrative. This narrative goal, I argue, is the happily-ever-after moment best encapsulated in the hero’s declaration of love. In other words, the moment where one most sees romantic fiction as pornography is, paradoxically, not in the sex scenes themselves… Instead, one sees romantic fiction as porn in the happily-ever-after ending, especially in that key moment of climax when the hero declares his love.

Catherine M. Roach (Happily Ever After, pg 101)

only those for whom a sexual fantasy ‘works,’ that is, those who are aroused by it, have a chance of telling us to what particular set of conditions that fantasy speaks, and can analyze how and why it works and for whom. Sexual fantasy materials are like icebergs; the one-tenth that shows about the surface is no reliable indicator of the size or significance of the whole thing. Sexual fantasy that doesn’t arouse is boring, funny, or repellent, and unsympathetic outsiders trying to decode these fantasies (or any others) will make all sorts of mistakes.

Joanna Russ, “Pornography By Women For Women, With Love,” 89

one important conclusion we can draw from these stories is that sexual fantasy can’t be taken at face value. Another is that no sexual cues are morally privileged (though some kinds of sexual behavior certainly are) since sexualizing any kind of behavior drastically changes the meaning of that behavior.

Joanna Russ, “Pornography By Women For Women, With Love,” 88