Pornography and feminism aren't the most obvious bedfellows. The vast majority of explicit material is made for a male audience; at best, it is degrading, and at worst it is often physically harmful to the women featured in it. But for the women making feminist porn, the answer is not to try to beat the porn industry, but to join it and give a voice to women's sexuality. British porn director (and former parliamentary candidate) Anna Arrowsmith considers her work part of the fight for women's rights – specifically, “women's right to female sexual expression and consumption.” It's not news that women use pornography.

In 2003, Neilsen Netratings recorded that 28 per cent of visitors to explicit websites were female. However, it's still relatively rare for explicit material to be made for a female audience – especially in Australia, where strict legislation (it is illegal to make an explicit film outside of the ACT) means that even the mainstream industry is small. The FPAs, founded by Toronto sex shop manager Chanelle Gallant, were created to showcase people “making porn in a feminist way and help to expose them to a greater audience”. The ideas of the [feminist] filmmakers have been constructed by mainstream pornography, so they don't come from somewhere completely different Now “the longest running celebration of erotica focused on women and marginalised people”, the awards have gained more mainstream media attention (not all of it positive) and a longer nominee list, every year.

The event itself has grown from a one-night party for 250 people to a three-day program attended by over 1000. "We have also grown in terms of sponsorship," says Alison Lee, the awards' director. "Which I think is really good," adds Lush, who first became interested in pornography while freelancing for Australian Women's Forum, the magazine described as “the female answer to Penthouse”, in the 1990s. "It shows that there is a movement to try to do something more positive." For Lush, the most important feature of feminist porn is that films are made "ethically". "It's about having respect for your performers, treating them well, consulting with them about what they want to do, and obviously paying them properly," she argues. "And it's also really about trying to capture diversity and authenticity when it comes to sexuality, so that it's not just the old clichéd fake boobs sort of stuff – that male-dominated idea of what porn is."

Anna Brownfield, a Melburnian film-maker whose film The Band won Hottest Feature at last year's FPAs, believes that female directors “who are trying to reinvent or reimage the adult genre tend to treat their staff in a completely different manner” from traditional pornographers. But for her, the key element is content: “creating films which are sex-positive, and which promote female sexuality in a positive light.” But content is where things get complicated. Lush admits she finds some hardcore films unpleasant viewing. “I've reviewed a lot of films,” she says. “I've watched stuff going, oh my god, that's horrible.”

She's adamant, though, that depicting hardcore acts is fine, as long as all involved have given consent. “Whereas I've seen things online which would be similar but you don't know how it was created." However, many commentators are still adamant that no pornography can break away from a male-orientated view of sex. “The ideas of the [feminist] filmmakers have been constructed by mainstream pornography, so they don't come from somewhere completely different,” argues Sheila Jeffreys, a professor of Political Science at the University of Melbourne. “And the culture pornography creates is a culture of violence against women.

"It's a culture where women are grabbed in nightclubs and thrust up against the wall, it's a culture in which women are shouted at in the street, in which gang-bangs are ordinary in the Australian football league. "I can absolutely see that in the middle of that culture, some women are saying, god, there must be something better than this. "But when I first became involved in anti-pornography work in London in 1977, women began saying to us, oh, but there is feminist pornography. Oh, but there's feminist erotica. Oh, but there's something else. And the fact is, thirty-five years on or whatever, I haven't seen the something else that is completely different.” In part, Lush rejects the criticism that porn objectifies women. “When you go through the supermarket, you 'objectify' the person who is putting your groceries through the scanner. They're just this person who is getting a job done. You don't care about them.”

But she's clearly still concerned about how women are represented, arguing that Australia's tiny sex industry - "a cottage industry", in Brownfield's words - could play a positive role.