“Girls just wanna have fun”: Does Only Fans empower women or exploit them?
Sex work has existed for thousands of years, so why has the rise of Only Fans sparked such an intense debate on the ethics of ‘paying for sexual content’?
This post is a guest submission by a current Cambridge student. The opinions expressed do not necessarily reflect those of the CASE committee. If you wish to submit a response or post on a different topic around sexual exploitation, follow the link at the end of the article.
The 21st century has become a rapid era of digitalisation. This has impacted most aspects of society, including controversially, the sex industry, leading to an explosive expansion of pornography.
In the early 20th century, pornography was distributed via mediums like posters and magazines. As technology progressed, so did the distribution process, culminating in the rise of video pornography. Nowadays, with the use of digital applications, distributing resources has become easier than ever. Pornography is abundant, with sites like PornHub offering millions of videos only a click away.
With this evolution of technology the demand for pornography has seen a massive quantifiable increase- leading to more women entering the industry. Is this a positive change for women’s sexual liberation? Or does it curtail women’s rights by exposing a higher percentage of women to exploitation?
Along these lines, one of the more recent “social media platforms” to rise to the forefront of popularity is OnlyFans. Founded in November 2016, the membership-based platform was designed to enable ‘performers’ to monetize on their own content creation. This could range from comedy sketches to cooking manuals. However, this quickly spiralled and now OnlyFans has become synonymous with one thing: pornography.
It’s not a huge surprise that the platform would be used for this purpose. Humans have been seeking sex since the dawn of civilization. Sexwork evolved in parallel with the development of mediums of communication; and now in the age of social media, we have the pay to play Only Fans.
As established, sex work has existed for thousands of years, so why has the rise of Only Fans sparked such an intense debate on the ethics of ‘paying for sexual content’?
Firstly, there’s the feminist angle. Historically, the majority of clients for sex work have been men. Women often went into sex work out of necessity; there were limited options for financial independence outside of marriage. A woman’s body could be sold just as easily as any commodity, and the market was always in demand. So what’s changed with OnlyFans?
One very important factor distinguishes this form of sex work- there is no middleman or ‘pimp’. Traditionally, female sex workers were forced to rely on male ‘pimps’ in order to procure their services, either to promote themselves to new clientele, or have physical protection. These arrangements could spiral into harmful relationships where the pimp would take a significant portion of her earnings. Through OnlyFans, this narrative has, in principle, changed. Women are now their own managers and owners of their content. Yes, the platform takes 20% of their earnings, but this does not change the fact that women no longer have to rely on ‘pimps’ for protection in sex work. In theory, all profit goes directly to the performer.
And speaking of profit- let’s talk about how insanely profitable OnlyFans can be. In 2024, the top earning Only Fans Model, Sophie Rain, made $43 million.. The model, only 20 years old, speaks about how life changing the platform was for her, transforming her from a fast food worker to a millionaire. Commenting on her success on the platform, she said "I'm glad that I'm making this much because all I wanted to do was help my family. I watched them growing up, very poor, struggling to pay bills, living paycheck to paycheck. So that is what motivates me as well, my parents struggling”.1
While Sophie’s story is commendable, she is a unique case. According to the statistics released by the platform, the average OF creator makes about $150-180 dollars monthly, nowhere near the kind of numbers Sophie is raking in.2 With this in mind, one wonders, is it worth selling this content for $150 dollars a month? Ultimately the decision comes down to individual creators, but the wide gap between the earnings of top models on OF compared to the average model opens up an opportunity for exploitation.
Enter the “OF managers”. Remember how OF was marketed as ‘feminist’ for eliminating the need for ‘pimps’? This isn’t necessarily true. In theory one can manage their own content on the platform, and claim the profit for themselves. However, sex work is ultimately, a business, and to be successful you need to market yourself to reach a wide audience. Many models struggle to promote their OnlyFans as social media platforms like Instagram widely censor explicit material. To overcome this, they partner with “OF managers”, who utilise their resources to secure clients in exchange for a cut of the profit. Essentially, as sex work has digitised, so have pimps.
The human rights organisation CARE has highlighted how widespread this form of e-prostitution has become. Dr Stevenson, a policy officer at CARE comments that “OnlyFans is being used by criminals to exploit women. Expert analysis has highlighted ‘e-pimping’ and women forced into situations that would be categorised as modern slavery.”3 Men are recruiting OF models to expand their “management” businesses. One notorious example being Andrew Tate, a self-proclaimed millionaire who earned his fortune by running a webcam business. He describes recruiting 75 models to perform sex work online and consequently earning close to $600,000 monthly.
“What’s wrong with this?” you might say. If both parties are entering a consensual business relationship, then surely there’s no issue. The problem with this assumption is that the online sex industry, and OF, is loosely regulated. This leaves women vulnerable to sexual and financial exploitation. Referring back to Andrew Tate, he admitted to abusing the women he managed. In a deleted post on his website, he stated his job was to “meet a girl, go on a few dates, sleep with her, test if she's quality, get her to fall in love with me to where she'd do anything I say and then get her on webcam”.4 He is currently charged in Romania with sex trafficking, forcing women to produce this sexual content and then pocketing the profits.
This exploitation also happens in a domestic setting, as shown by the case of Austin Koeckeritz, currently serving a 20 year prison sentence after pleading guilty to exploiting his ex-girlfriend. Speaking with police, the woman explained how Austin would force her to record sex acts on OF each night and take the income for himself.5 Finally, even women who choose to post sexual content on Only Fans are lured into exploitation by ‘managers’. One woman, using the name ‘Ari’ found herself in this situation. After gaining some success on OF, raking in $3000 a month, she was messaged by another model who recommended a manager named Johnson, claiming he could increase her monthly profit to $100,000. Ari signed with Johnson, and at first he delivered, with her making $75,000. But this soon spiraled, and Ari realized Johnson was pocketing a significant portion of her profits for ‘advertising purposes’. When asked for proof of these expenses, Johnson refused to provide any invoices, citing ‘company secrets’.6
So, with this in mind, are platforms like OnlyFans ultimately empowering for women, or do the risks outweigh these benefits? The majority of female content creators do not profit significantly from the platform, and the ones who do either employ ‘managers’, or build upon a pre-existing brand, like actress turned OnlyFans model Bella Thorne.
One angle, presented under the guise of a ‘feminist argument’ would have us believing that OnlyFans is a medium for women to profit off of their own sexuality, which ultimately empowers them to have financial autonomy. However the fact of the matter is that the platform has become a breeding ground for online human trafficking. Cases like Austin Koeckeritz and Johnson show us how women are being forced by e-pimps and partners to churn out sexual content for online clientele. Not only is this damaging for the women themselves, but it’s damaging to the way society views women. If we normalize online sex work under the guise of it being ‘empowering’, aren’t we feeding into this idea that women’s greatest value is their sexual appeal?
With all of this in mind, as much as one can support the sexual autonomy of women, the fact of the matter is that it’s ultimately men making the majority of profit on Only Fans and by extension profiting off of women themselves. The platform has become a digital medium for trafficking, enabling predators like Andrew Tate to groom women into sexual exploitation. So, we have to ask ourselves: Does OnlyFans actually empower women?
OnlyFans CEO Amrapali Gan has recently claimed the platform has evolved positively to prevent this abuse from infiltrating the platform, explaining how they work with police to ensure they are “truly the safest and most inclusive social media platform.” We can applaud Ms. Gan’s initiative for making some initial steps to try to self-regulate content, but without an Internationally recognized legal structure to properly regulate and enforce an agreed set of standards, the exploitation of OF Models will become just one more evolution of the Pimp / Hooker relationship. Her efforts haven’t changed the dynamic of the sex industry, just widened the distribution and profitability.
- Adriana Midkiff (Magdalene College, History and Politics)
https://people.com/onlyfans-model-made-43-million-last-year-to-her-it-doesnt-conflict-with-christian-v alues-exclusive-8758383
https://social-rise.com/blog/average-onlyfans-income
https://care.org.uk/news/2023/11/onlyfans-fuelling-sexual-exploitation-modern-slavery
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-64125045
https://www.reuters.com/investigates/special-report/onlyfans-sex-trafficking/
https://www.rollingstone.com/culture/culture-features/onlyfans-model-management-industry-exploitati on-1073615/