BBC suggests Only Fans is 'empowering'

[ArabellaScott]

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/articles/cwygdzn4dw4o

What a very depressing article.

Female singer promoting Only Fans:

'it's bit of a punk protest as a woman to take control of my body and sell it' - Kate Nash

'Musicians could follow a lead from people who earn a living from selling sexual content on sites like OnlyFans, she suggested.
...
"Where can we learn from the sex workers? Maybe we can learn something from this industry. How do we get empowered as artists and take a bit more control?"'

That link goes to another article pushing Only Fans as a great way for women to make money. Also mentioned is Lily Allen, selling foot pics on Only Fans.

Absolutely no comment on any potential issues with this. No counter balance.

What is going on?

What guff, OF is today's soft porn.

Razzle anyone?

All prostitutes are trafficked women. All prostitution is rape.

If prostitution is so empowering then where are all the middle class professional parents urging their daughters to choose it as a career? Where are all the initiatives to encourage young women into careers in prostition like we encourage them into careers in STEM?

Why is that all prostitutes are vulnerable, traumatised, sick women struggling with abuse, violence, addiction?

Shame on the BBC for propagating this stupid, complacant, spoiled, luxury viewpoint.

I gave up on the BBC well over a decade ago when I finally realised it has no interest in exploring the real lives of working class people, and propagates nothing but nepotism and luxury beliefs.

Everytime I see something like this, I'm pleased once again with my decision.

Don't you realise, @GiveMeSpanakopita , prostitution is only OK for other people's daughters? 😡Just how morally bankrupt do you have to be to propound something like that? And the BBC are far from the only ones plugging this line.

@GiveMeSpanakopita complacent is a very good term. It ties in with the topic of luxury beliefs and that it happens to other people. They also mix up not judging women who do this as last resort with saying it's ok for everyone, nothing to see here, no problematic structures behind that.

The criticism here is not about an individual in a problematic situation, it is criticism of the system as such, about how women as a group are perceived, how people are fed into the system as material and about exactly fighting what you and @duc748 mention, that the normalization could make this a reality one day as a suggestion at the employment office.
And that is why celebrities taking part is a problem, as they can be role models for people.

Yes, exactly this, it is complacant to say how wonderful sex positivity is and sex work is work. It'll get posh media types plenty of brownie points on the North London dinner party circuit.

They can afford to luxuriate and feel smug in their faux liberalism because they are confident that their money, education and social capital will mean that the horrors of prostitution will never touch them.

@unclebuck you nailed it. I don't believe anyone would pay for photos of Kerry Katona or Katie Price, although they are very likely plumbing some low depths to sell anything. I think it's very likely that OF are paying them to claim they're earning thousands a month so younger attractive women think they're in with a chance.

Plus who owns the data? I doubt the users at given many rights over their images

You say this but plenty of vile men pay for OF pics of Danniella Westbrook, who is extremely unwell and now severely disfigured from her years of drug addiction.

Some men like prostitutes to look as dissipated, unwell and desperate as possible. They feel disgust and the disgust is part of the erotic high they get. Because they KNOW that prostitution is a form of degradation and abuse and THAT is what turns them on from it.

It is disgusting to use and abuse sick, vulnerable women like this and yet that is at the core of why men like to use prostitutes. And that is why sex work will NEVER be positive because it rests on implicit assumptions of power, and of men's god-given right to degrade women.

THAT is what the BBC (our state broadcaster? HA!) is promoting!

The BBC are full of people who embrace paedos and porn. It is a disgusting anti women organisation.

They feel disgust and the disgust is part of the erotic high they get

I had not realised this before. Thank you for your insight.

@GiveMeSpanakopita @ScrollingLeaves

Very good point! That's why "customers" can never be allies, even the "decent" ones - there are sometimes discussions about how self-employed "sex workers" who have higher "prices" screen better and can choose "nicer men" and that this would at least be better than trafficked / desperate women - but the power imbalance never goes away.

Absolutely, and as they can be influential towards other men, everyone who gets it can help breaking up this system. But it's also true that we have to still be aware of their other goals and beliefs.

Yep empowering is such bullshit, let's call it what it is.. giving sleazy disgusting men what they want and normalising women being objects.
I just want to cry at the thought of young women thinking taking their clothes off or letting a man grunt away on top of her is empowering..

Amala Ekpunobi discussing what happened with Lily Philips (and OF generally), she makes some good points:

Yes. This is true and is how these men's minds work. This also helps explain the phenomenon of AGP, and why men with that disorder tend to dress as cheap prostitutes - fishnets, short skirts, caked on make up. They are not trying to resemble 'ordinary' middle aged women, at all. They get their erotic charge from the disgust and humiliation they feel dressed up as a sexual object which they desire and also despise and revile. This is why men with this disorder are especially dangerous to women.

The BBC didn't suggest it was empowering. They interviewed somebody who said it was.

And presented no argument to the contrary, or questioning the statement.

They didn't have to interview her though and give OF a platform? Makes a change from their obsession with drag queens I suppose.

@GiveMeSpanakopita God men are so fucked up (not all I know) so many "philias"
So many tastes and obsessions
And how messed up to desire something they despise.

Toseland · 23/11/2024 13:56

"A bit of a punk protest" ?! Fuck off!
Selling your body is prostitution not punk. You are normalising that shit to your young fans and the BBC are fucking pimps promoting it.

They've obviously never heard of Honeybane, who wrote the song "Porno Grows," to protest about pornography and the sex trade:

Spot on. These men's sexual desire is so warped, it's vile.

I remember about 10 years ago some awful MP seemed to suggest prostitution should be promoted as a career choice. Ofc it's always for other people's daughters...

@GiveMeSpanakopita I've been wondering about the dress choices of many TW; "live like a woman" often seems to be a very small range of clothes/style choices; while women dress very variedly, or rather there are so many clothes styles all over the world. Many seem to choose western going out / party clothes, but then exaggerate and twist it to make it look like a character from a comic or someone who dressed in the dark. This is also totally at odds with the intent to "pass", as the more someone looks like the pictures collected on reduxx, the lower the likelihood that others won't notice (both other men and women).

It just doesn't make sense, or rather, now that you pointed it out, it does make more sense.

I've read a couple of interesting articles and books recently which suggest that hypersexuality is linked to adhd, childhood trauma and bipolar disorder (The Body Keeps the Score if anyone is interested). The way I'm starting to see OF and a lot of women who participate in risky behaviour are that they are vulnerable to begin.

Men who participate by having sex with these women aren't usually the nicest people - they come with their own issues and exploit their vulnerability - it adds another layer of trauma to an already complex person.

It seems to be that in OF there's a common theme of "my choice" and "I'm in control" but the truth is different because actually she might not be as in control as she thinks.

Surely OF is just another example of, 'if you build it, they will come'. Supply creates (or encourages) demand.

Feeling like a right old Jeremiah, but I think the bonds and ties of civilised behaviour are falling by the wayside. People look around, and see crooks and chancers like Donald Trump and Boris Johnson in the highest office, incompetency and corruption seem worse than ever (the Post Office scandal?), 'influencers' on SM earning big money, in a few cases, for doing fuck all. Nobody seems to be looking beyond where the next buck is coming from. The threat to our schools is still there, from people whose stock-in-trade is blurring and demolishing boundaries. None of this encourages people towards civilised behaviour.

The music industry is not forcing anyone to pay to play by selling images of themselves for strangers to w### over. Think of all the mid level male artists, no one is going to want to look at their bum!

I think this is one part publicity stunt. I've also seen Kate Nash's documentary on Netflix. It's excellent but my takeaway back then was, this girl is not good with money and she needs to run her 'business' better.

OF is not going to help the plight of female artists who already struggle to be taken seriously and deal with harassment.