Isn't erotica porn?

In recent list discussions, it's become apparent again that many people who don't read the many genres of sensual and erotic romance and erotica have no clue what the terms mean. Some still believe that erotica IS porn. Some are screaming for the rating scales that the indie publishers have already been using for the last several years. It's a mess. So, I'm off on explanations again.

To someone who's read erotica and sensual romance, since I was a young woman...half my life, now..."erotica" does not have a negative connotation, as those calling for a new term without the negativity seem to feel it does.

Porn does. I fully see the negative connotations of the word "porn," though I don't deny that there is a use for porn. It fills a want some people have, and having seen some of it, even I admit that some porn is higher end work that appeals to a cross-over audience of erotica lovers.

IMO, the main problem some people face is the fact that there are readers who think porn and erotica are the same thing. They aren't and never have been. There are authors/publishers who mislabel porn as erotica. I can't stop that, but that's been happening since the beginning of time (bait and switch in publishing). The best advice I can give readers new to the genres is to find a company that actually sells erotica or erotic romance and not porn and start there, with books you know are labeled correctly.

At the same time, "erotic" itself means (definitions from the dictionary): relating to expressive love, especially sexual love, and desire; tending to arouse sexual desire. Now, the DEFINITION of erotic contains the word "love" twice. The root of the word "erotic" is eros, an ancient Greek word that specifically means "sexual love." Eros is one of the major types of Greek love, also including storge (familial love, affection as one feels for a brother or child), philia (brotherly love--not for a blood brother but others you deem your close confidants, neighbor to neighbor, loyalty, friendship) and agape (love, the abiding love of marriage, content in a relationship...some people tie this to divine love, as well). It's in good company.

OTOH, the definitions of "pornography" include: sexually explicit pictures, writing, or other material whose primary purpose is to cause sexual arousal; lurid or sensational material; prurient and possessing of no redeeming qualities. Hmmm... No mention of love in there. No mention of anything beyond sexual stimulation, at its basest level, to boot. "Porn/pornography" takes it's roots from LATE Greek (later than eros, by far...after contact with Europeans), meaning "writing about prostitutes." No, I'm not kidding. That was what the word translated as, according to the dictionary I'm using.

Now, this is not me saying the readers new to the genre's ideas are "wrong." Opinions are admittedly of those who hold them and not necessarily going to match anyone else's. This is me saying that someone who reads the genre and knows what the words mean has no reason to see a negative connotation to them.

As I said earlier, the term erotica does not have a negative connotation for me. Even its definition is positive. It's roots are positive. The only negative connotations I see are in the minds of people who HAVE confused the two terms (erotica and porn).