April 23, 2021 - 10:20am
OnlyFans, an online subscription website in which (predominantly) women create and sell “adult” content, claims to be a meritocratic, risk-free, get-rich-quick scheme, but the reality is anything but. Despite the endless viral posts, like this week’s story of the “healthcare worker” who now makes one and a half times his annual salary in a month” or the “ex-teacher who earned £1million,” the truth is that the average earnings from OnlyFans are $180 a month, and most successful accounts are run by porn stars, influencers and celebrities.
For the vast majority of people, the risks are simply not worth the rewards. Because the marketplace is so crowded, most users promote their OnlyFans through their social media accounts, so it is hard to remain completely anonymous. There are numerous examples of women being outed as sex workers, fired, or even having their children kicked out of school. Women also report being stalked, harassed, hacked, and asked to engage in behaviours that make them feel uncomfortable like choking – and yet OnlyFans is still glamorised as a safe, sanitised form of sex work.
In fact, OnlyFans is so popular — with over 50 million registered users and 8000 new content creators a day — that it’s become something of a meme for young women to say they plan on starting an account once they turn 18. So many teenagers are gravitating towards the platform that there are calls to raise the eligibility age to 21, especially after rapper Bhad Bhabie made over $1million in six hours after ‘turning legal’.
Each success story is, in its own way, a type of grooming. These posts lure and mislead young people into believing that they can sell their sexuality online as a side hustle without the stigma, and that it is always empowering and never exploitative. They claim to give content creators control, but the only way to keep subscribers, and therefore make money, is to keep pushing boundaries.
I spoke to an 18-year-old girl who said she created an OnlyFans account after watching YouTubers her age “feed her a fantasy that it was a safe way to do sex work and be spoiled and taken care of.” She deleted the account after only two days; she said, “I realised that to make money I’d need to promote myself and even though I didn’t show my face, I was terrified people would discover my identity.” When I asked her if she had felt groomed, she said absolutely, but by women rather than men: “all the influencers on YouTube and Tumblr who are way too comfortable” with promoting young girls selling themselves.
Influencers like Lena the Plug may present OnlyFans as an economically viable alternative in a financially unstable time, but most people stand to lose far more than they gain.
Most accounts take home less than $145 a month, but in the process users are leaving sexual online footprints that could actually make their future employment prospects even more precarious.
OnlyFans is not financially, sexually or socially liberating. It’s mass grooming — effectively a sex work pyramid scheme. Many creators make money out of gaining sign-ups through referral codes and promising promotions — and a whole generation of young girls and boys are going to pay a heavy price; the internet is forever.
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SubscribeThe part I don’t understand is why would anyone pay for something that is available everywhere online for free. But then again, people never cease to surprise me…
What is the alternative for prostitutes that are determined or need to carry on in that profession?
I don’t think Only Fans is just a sex site.
It is a way of people getting payment for their content, so can extend to various celebrities, producers of music and art and other people who can create content that is of interest.
At the moment these people find it very difficult to make an income from You Tube, Social Media or Streaming – unless they are extremely popular.
Not sure why you got downvoted. It certainly has a predominant sexual element, but it can be used for other things too, as you suggest.
What is of interest is the mainstream media’s push to popularize OnlyFans. It must be very confusing to young woman who are told that sex is both an instrument of oppression and empowerment.
“Not sure why you got downvoted.”
That makes two of us. It seemed like a reasonable comment to me.
It isn’t a sex site. The author thinks it is. Lots of girls think it gives them easy money but that is their problem. I hadn’t heard of the site until I read this article. I’ve now joined so that I can investigate. There’s rap ‘singers’ trying to get noticed and cookery. -sandwich making – I suppose not everyone knows how they’re made!
“Each success story is, in its own way, a type of grooming. I spoke to an 18-year-old girl… I asked her if she had felt groomed, she said absolutely, but by women rather than men…”
As with “rape” the word “grooming” is now expanding wildly in its meaning. Look ladies (and I assume a few men also), if you post videos/pictures of yourself naked online, you are an idiot. Nobody made you do it, if you post things yourself online for what amounts to basically tips, you are whoring yourself out. Simple as that. You are not a victim, you are a prostitute. Young women are masters of this kind of so-called reasoning: “If I do something that I later regret, I must have been manipulated into doing it!”
Or… these ladies made a terrible decision and must own the consequences. Their grandmas or even their future children may just run into pictures/videos of them behaving indecently. And they only got a few bucks for it.
The only way that this is “grooming” is if the participants are not wholly adults, which is a really paternalistic way of thinking about women.
Sounds to me like “grooming” just means “this year’s teen fad” and is no different than miniskirts, rock and roll, or cordless phones, all things the “get off my lawn” adults worried would corrupt the kidz at different times in recent history.
Yes, feminism has some peculiar infantilizing strains these days. They may even be dominant at this point.
Sounds like the author is the modern equivelent of Mary Whitehouse. Please stop using ‘grooming’ for anything you dont like.
Your are right about the author’s misuse of words, but leave Mary out of this Ralph. She wouldn’t have called these girls groomed, she would have called them tarts (at the very least). Mrs Whitehouse was not into the business of denying people’s responsibility for their actions, on the contrary, she insisted that people take responsibility and act responsibly.
I’m almost surprised the author stopped at “grooming” and didn’t call it “rape.” By next year we’ll be willing to go that far I’m sure.