Has the rise of Onlyfans reduced sex work stigma?

[Guest lydiahardwood]

Some of you may have seen that a University student from the UK has written a dissertation on Onlyfans and how they're treated on Twitter. Full article here - https://thetab.com/uk/leeds/2020/05/22/this-leeds-student-wrote-her-dissertation-on-onlyfans-and-were-here-for-it-51712

It's got us thinking, do you think that the rise in Onlyfans popularity has reduced stigma around sex work? Or made it worse?

[Guest]

  In my opinion, no.

  The app is relatively new. Was created 4 years ago, but only started to get popular in the past year. The membership verification process and pay system, simply makes it more private than Twitter and other social media platforms. It doesn't change the stigma, it only hides it a bit better.

   As the popularity will grow, more people will try to hack the content and leak it on websites and other platforms. The success and safety will rest in the hands of the app owner.

[OldandNerdy 1304]

When you start seeing *thousands* of high school and college age girls signing up for an account because they've read some posts about how "easy" it is to make money on it, and then spamming every social media account and platform they can think of in an attempt to drive traffic to their new "business venture ", I believe it stigmatizes the platform itself and by an extension the actual legitimate providers who are using it to expand their offerings. 

 

As to GT's point about hacking, it's pretty trivial to gain access to someone's account if they don't have experience in protecting their identity, which will lead to more "hacking" stories about the platform, when it should be focused on inexperienced people not understanding risks.

 

 

[SarahAlexxx 2025]

I voted on Twitter, anyone who wants to read my responce can find it on the Twitter poll. 

[Guest lydiahardwood]

Both interesting points, thank you. I agree Oldandnerdy, I've seen a lot of somewhat naive young women setting up an account thinking it would be "easy money", which I think makes the stigma around sex work worse. Sex workers, whether they're cam models, escorts, foot pic sellers, whatever, put a tonne of effort into their work and building their brand and don't get the recognition they deserve for it. I think OF only makes that worse.

But on the other hand I feel like I've seen an increase in people talking about how paying for sexual content is more ethical than watching free porn, so I'd like to think awareness is being raised in that way at least. 

[Guest lydiahardwood]

Just now, SarahAlexxx said:

I voted on Twitter, anyone who wants to read my responce can find it on the Twitter poll. 

Here's our original Twitter poll with SarahAlexxx's response: 

 

 

 

[SarahAlexxx 2025]

31 minutes ago, lydiahardwood said:

Here's our original Twitter poll with SarahAlexxx's response: 

 

 

 

I was gunna make them do the hard work of finding it. 😉

[Jasmine Rain 23126]

It is making it hard on escorts since they can not advertise in person sexual services on platforms like Twitter. 
 

Escorts have had their accounts closed because of it. Which I don't get. It is on another platform completely. 
 

I would be able to advertise any and all business on one platform without risk of banning on another. 
 

Another reason I created my own fan based site so I don't have deal with restrictive rules like that. 

[Phaedrus 209521]

On 5/24/2020 at 12:15 PM, lydiahardwood said:

 I've seen a lot of somewhat naive young women setting up an account thinking it would be "easy money", which I think makes the stigma around sex work worse. Sex workers, whether they're cam models, escorts, foot pic sellers, whatever, put a tonne of effort into their work and building their brand and don't get the recognition they deserve for it. I think OF only makes that worse.

But hasn't sex work *always* been like this, to some extent?

And it's not just sex work. How many wannabe social influencers are there these days?

[OldandNerdy 1304]

14 hours ago, Phaedrus said:

But hasn't sex work *always* been like this, to some extent?

And it's not just sex work. How many wannabe social influencers are there these days?

It has, but having a service like OF available which, from my understanding, make onboarding a new provider quite easy as compared to previous methods of selling your personal product & services. 

 

If you make it very easy, and social media messaging infers that everyone doing it is getting rich, then the platform gets saturated with people who dont really want to put the work into it and create a brand for themselves.  They just want to take some pics and have the $$ start flowing in.

Same thing has happened with SM influencers, like you mentioned. It's getting to the point that a cute girl with 1000 followers calls herself an influencer and demands ridiculous amounts to feature your products to her followers.  

When the marketplace is saturated with spam, it becomes less desirable for the consumer to wade through it to find the quality. 

[ScotianSingle85 22]

I noticed that the local Global TV news site (Halifax) posted a story about local Onlyfans creators seeing an increase in traffic due to the pandemic. It may be too early to say if it will contribute to reducing stigma but it is certainly giving broader exposure to online sex work and different varieties of sex worker.

[Andee 220524]

Since it’s a non physical contact medium, perhaps it has reduced stigma in some ways but increased stigma in other ways - that it’s very accessible as some would describe as a quick cash grab not understanding that in order to retain fans, one must be continually adding content. From the feedback I’ve heard from clients, there are very few who can maintain the momentum and allure. Because it’s not my bag, I won’t criticize anyone who has given it a shot especially recently during covid.

But knowing a very well established provider who has literally taken years to build a loyal and consistent following, it’s Not as easy as it seems to cultivate a steady stream of income.