- She was like, "What are you doing?"
And I was like, "Oh, I'm selling feet pics."
She was like, "What do you mean?"
I'm like, "Well, mom, I just take pics of my feet
and sell them for like $50."
She was shook.
- Hi, I'm Makayla, I'm 25.
I live in Minneapolis, Minnesota,
I create content on YouTube
and I'm also an OnlyFans creator.
- Hello. My name is Chase.
I am also an OnlyFans creator
and I started through TikTok, got a big following
and then that's why I went over
to OnlyFans and Instagram and stuff like that.
- Hi, I'm Mika, I'm from Las Vegas.
I started doing OnlyFans kind of last March
when I made a viral porno on Pornhub
with my boyfriend about COVID to spread awareness.
- Hi, my name is Zamara, I am 24 years old.
I have been in sex work for five years.
So I started OnlyFans a year ago, last February, 2020
and it's been a success ever since.
- Hi everyone, my name is Myra, a.k.a Mava.
I'm an OnlyFans constant creator.
My promotion, everything is mostly based off
of Twitter and I have a regular nine to five as well.
- Hey guys, my name is Asher, I'm 26.
I actually started OnlyFans
at the beginning of the pandemic
and ever since that's been what I've been relying on.
Government's failing us and I needed my money.
- [Interviewer] Influencers and celebrities
have ruined OnlyFans.
Let's start with Makayla.
- I said, somewhat agree.
- [Interviewer] Chase.
- Somewhat disagree.
- [Interviewer] Mika.
- Disagree.
- [Interviewer] Zamara.
- Strongly agree.
- [Interviewer] Myra.
- Somewhat agree.
- [Interviewer] Asher.
- Somewhat disagree.
- I truly feel
like celebrities have completely taken away the opportunity
of small content creators, basically relying
on a platform that they depend on for their whole income.
I feel like celebrities, you know,
already have the upper hand with being, having a title
of being rich, having a title of having money
and they are, like their own like ego of being a celebrity.
But to some of us, this is our lifestyle,
this is something that we depend on,
this is something that we use every single day
working full time to meet and reach our goals.
- There's like both pros and cons.
That's why I said somewhat disagree
because I understand your point of view.
But then I also seen that, like, they're bringing
more notice to the platform.
So they're bringing a lot more people to OnlyFans
because when I first started two years ago, there was not
a lot of audience on OnlyFans and not a lot
of people knew what it was.
And a lot of people thought it was like terrible.
- Celebrities caused temporary hiccups and issues.
So, you know, when we have those issues like Bella Thorne
and other celebrities just creating these profiles
intending that, you know, we're basically
want to bait and switch these people.
It causes a temporary problem 'cause you have that influx
of people coming in now just to see that one person.
So once a new person comes on
or new celebrity comes on, it's like, yeah,
now, don't forget about OnlyFans because, you know,
once you don't feel like paying $50 a month for, you know,
Trey Songz' (beep), you'll go pay for your $5, you know,
a month OnlyFans person
and that's when we start bringing it in,
so yeah, definitely with the awareness, because honestly
with sex work, almost any promotion is good promotion.
- A lot of the stories that we hear
from celebrities on OnlyFans tend to be
about scams or things that take away our credibility
as creators on OnlyFans
so then when people hear that we might be doing OnlyFans
they only think about those scandals and assume, oh
so you're just scamming people for money or something
and it's like, no, there are actually like really
authentic ways that we can build an audience
and earn income from it.
Like if you wanna make money
on this and you have your audience
like go for it, but do it correctly.
Like don't take advantage of people,
don't lie about what you're selling.
Like do it, right.
- [Interviewer] I make a lot of money.
Makayla.
- I said, strongly agree.
- [Interviewer] Chase.
- I said, somewhat agree.
- [Interviewer] Mika.
- Agree.
- [Interviewer] Zamara.
- Strongly agree.
- [Interviewer] Myra.
- Somewhat disagree.
- [Interviewer] Asher.
- Agree.
- I do this for fun
and that being said, I make more
than enough than I could ever imagine.
And I'm on track to retire in the next five years
so that's all I could ever want.
- Yeah, I wanted to bring up that OnlyFans is only one
of my 14 streams of revenue right now
and I wanna make sure that if something happens
to one of my streams of revenue, that I'm gonna be okay
which is why I try so hard to have so many.
That's kind of why I love OnlyFans because it does allow
that financial freedom to take a big portion of income
and be able to use that to help further your future
whether you're investing into a project property
or even just like the stock market.
It kind of allows us to push ourselves
into the next step in our later years in life
and really look out for each other, which I really like.
- I put strongly agree
because I've never had money like this in my life
as a 24 year old woman.
I was making like 16 an hour at Trader Joe's a year ago
and I have made over like, I made six figures
but like a lot of six figures
and I just don't know any other field
of work that would pay me that type of money.
You gotta be patient with yourself.
I think with stuff like this
it takes a lot of time, patience and consistency
and it you're just not gonna make an OnlyFans,
post a video or a photo of yourself and make six figures.
It just doesn't work like that.
It's taking me five long
hard working years to say that like I have the
things that I do and I work hard for them.
- That's why I think with OnlyFans or just working online
in general and for yourself, the cap is off.
You can make as much as want to make
if you really try and you put
in the strides and the efforts to make that much money.
A lot of people ask me if they should do OnlyFans
and I'm like, "It's really relative to you."
And like, let's say you have a hundred followers
on Instagram and that's all you have,
you probably won't make much money
because OnlyFans doesn't really promote you that much.
Like you mainly get promotion from your other websites
and your other socials or other, whatever you do.
So like, it depends on
if you think you could get your followers
following you to actually follow you
and actually like pay money for your content
then you can make a lot of money.
- You just can't expect things to happen out from nothing.
And I think that's a big misconception when it comes
to OnlyFans.
Everybody thinks that we basically like sit
on our ass all day and don't do anything
like we're editing videos, we're editing photos.
We're picking out times to drop this video and that
and you know, those things take time.
Even with my nine to five, it's
like I have to work a eight hour shift
and then go beat my face and get ready
and put on lingerie to take pictures and sweat.
We don't talk enough about the work that goes into it,
everybody just knows the benefits
and that's, you know, that's where we get (beep).
- [Interviewer] My family knows
that I'm an OnlyFans creator.
Makayla.
- I chose agree.
- [Interviewer] Chase.
- I chose strongly agree.
- [Interviewer] Mika.
- Strongly agree.
- [Interviewer] Zamara.
- Strongly agree.
- [Interviewer] Myra.
- Strongly agree.
- [Interviewer] Asher.
- Agree.
I first told my mom one day when we were actually
at the lake and I was taking feet picks and she was like,
"What are you doing?"
And I was like, "Oh, I'm selling feet picks."
And she was like, "What do you mean?"
I'm like, "Well, mom, I just take pics of my feet
and sell them for like $50."
She was shook.
As for my grandparents,
they always ask me if I found a job yet
'cause I told them I lost my job at the beginning
of the pandemic.
And I'm like, "Don't worry about me. I got you."
They would have a heart attack, I think.
- One of my cousins sent a text
to my brother after probably seeing a YouTube video
and told him like your sister's doing porn
and then he showed that to my mom
and she kind of confronted me about it,
and you know, I kind of had to like talk them off the ledge
of being like, okay, well let's define porn here
and telling them exactly, not exactly
but kind of explaining how I was earning money
what I was posting and my limits because you know
I think we all have boundaries
with ourselves as to what we post
or what we choose not to share on that platform
and a big misconception,
I think when people hear that you do do OnlyFans is
that you automatically might post X, Y
and Z when maybe you only post X
and Y but not Z and et cetera.
- I initially just outwardly told my mom, but I waited
until I made over a thousand dollars on OnlyFans
so I can justify me doing this bull (beep).
However, my father found out by,
he saw me Pornhub.
When I finally moved
from Virginia to Philadelphia, my dad came
and helped me move out and we basically had the heart
to heart and he was like, you know,
"I was doing the same (beep)
you were doing in the nineties with a cam quarter
so be safe,
you know, I love you."
And he was like, "And you get it honest,"
and he was like, "But I know anything that you do
you do it exceptionally well."
- I basically had the same experience as Myra with her mom.
I just told my parents what I was doing
because I had to tell them somehow
because I was making this money,
they could see my bank account
at the time because I was like connected through theirs.
And they actually found it very
like humorous and interesting, but they were very worried
it may affect,
'cause my mom at that point still wanted me to go
to med school 'cause she's in the medical field.
But then once I talked to her
about how I want to take the path of social media and not go
to school right now, or at least take a break from school
she was kind of on the fence about that
and very worried like, 'cause they're pretty old
so like they're not like aware
that you can make money in so many different ways nowadays.
So it took her a while,
it took both of them a while to wrap their head around it
but once they came around,
they were actually very supportive.
- [Interviewer] I'm paranoid about protecting my privacy.
Makayla, what answer did you choose?
- I said, strongly agree.
- [Interviewer] Chase.
- I put somewhat agree.
- [Interviewer] Mika.
- Somewhat agree.
- [Interviewer] Zamara.
- Disagree.
- [Interviewer] Myra.
- Somewhat disagree.
- [Interviewer] Asher.
- Somewhat agree.
- So the first thing I remember
is someone hacked my Snapchat
and found my cell phone number
my email address and a ton of private photos,
not necessarily explicit, just
like my personal life on there
then I occasionally unfortunately get people
commenting my address on my YouTube videos.
Just I got this one, like in the middle of the night
from this troll being like, "Wow, like, do you live here,"
with my full home address where my parents and family live.
I've learned a lot
through this last year to try to become even more private
with my information 'cause unfortunately, you know,
it's just so public, online, it's been really tricky
and I've like even started therapy again this year
because my anxiety has become so high
with every notification that I get on my phone.
So it just sucks that there are people out there
not really looking out for anyone's good intentions
and taking advantage of people's platforms or their privacy.
I just had a lot of experiences this year with that.
- Not during sex work.
Before I started sex work
I had a stalker, which kind of made me question
whether or not this is like a good line to go
into because of how public everything is.
I mean, I'm in a super secure neighborhood,
I'm in, like we have a gun,
I can protect myself if I need to,
my boyfriend's a great shot too
but there's always like in my mind and like, well
worst case something could happen.
I think I'm more worried
for my family than I am for myself though.
I go under a stage name,
I just keep my privacy private.
- [Interviewer] I am insecure about my body.
Let's start with Makayla.
- Disagree.
- [Interviewer] Chase.
- Somewhat agree.
- [Interviewer] Mika.
- Disagree.
- [Interviewer] Zamara.
- Somewhat agree.
- [Interviewer] Myra.
- Disagree
- [Interviewer] Asher.
- Somewhat disagree.
- I feel like personally,
well I've been diagnosed with like body dysmorphia.
So that may make me biased about this prompt.
When I first went to college
I lived in the dorms and so we got the meal plan
and I would go to like the cafeteria to get the foods
and I would just like, couldn't eat.
Not because the food didn't look good,
like obviously it was school food
so it was still kind of (beep),
but like I would like not eat
for the fact that I wanted to keep my abs,
I wanted to keep this, keep this, this and that
and I would like tell myself and like talk
to my parents when they saw me like look
in the mirror and like talk about these things.
They'd be like, "What is wrong with you?"
And like I said, my mom's in the medical field.
So she brought me into the actual office.
So it was like a special type of body dysmorphia
like a muscular dysmorphia.
Like I never feel like I'm muscular enough or lean enough.
So it's like, I don't feel I'm
as defined as I always should be.
Even though from their point of view,
they're like, you're crazy, like you look fine.
- Like two, almost three years ago,
I was diagnosed with anorexia nervosa.
I had a severe eating disorder.
It started in the strip club that I worked
in like 2018, 2017.
I think the pressure
from seeing other people go on stage and you know
make more money than me, having different body types
than me really made me feel insecure about myself.
So I kind of had to take a step back
from that and really like take a break from that.
I have to take care of myself,
do what makes me happy and love myself because I do believe
like being hard on yourself really does reflect your content
and show in your content,
you know, the work you do put out.
And I just think that's one important note to
always remember is to love yourself
and you come first and you know, health is wealth, truly.
- And I love that.
And that's definitely what you have to realize, but I know
especially like it exemplifies like the hardness you put
on yourself because you're on stage,
like this is your job,
everyone's looking at you, you know?
And I'm glad you shared that.
Thank you.
- Of course.
- I have, of course spent years of not loving myself.
I've been fat and black
so it's really hard as a fat black woman to make your way
in the sex industry, without being completely fetishized,
completely demoralized, to be completely honest.
I pride myself in like not, you know, entertaining that,
like I would never call myself a cow,
you wouldn't hear me saying that I'm about to get bread,
none of that.
I feel like the sex work industry has really
helped me develop, you know, for sure,
self confidence where now when I walk on the street, I feel
like I can bag any man that I want.
Of course we all have our days where we feel
like we are just not up to part but more often than not,
I feel good about myself,
I love myself and I like showing the world myself.
So that's my opinion on it.
- What's awesome about OnlyFans too is
that there are so many different accounts and varieties
of like shapes and sizes and kinks and what people are into.
So your body, or like whoever you are in there
like your brand might be, somebody's like perfect type
and yet someone that you feel insecure compared
to might not be what they're into.
So there's just like this almost infinite platform
of audiences where it's like
you are somebody's perfect type,
even if you don't look
like someone that you wish you looked like.
- Yeah, I really think Makayla nailed it on the head.
Someone is going to be into what you post.
Like no matter the kink, no matter what it is
they're not gonna see the same flaws that you see,
they're gonna be horny,
let's go.
- [Interviewer] I would rather have another job.
Makayla.
- Strongly disagree.
- [Interviewer] Chase.
- Disagree.
- [Interviewer] Mika.
- Strongly disagree.
- [Interviewer] Zamara.
- Disagree.
- [Interviewer] Myra.
- Disagree.
- [Interviewer] Asher.
- Somewhat agree.
- I did the whole by the book type of like career path.
I went to college, I got a bachelor's in communication
and I felt like I was following something that I knew
that wasn't for me.
I feel like being into sex work now
and like fully like making it
my full-time job has like helped me fall
into who I am more and build like my confidence more.
I feel like it's just something I'm so comfortable with,
especially with the fact
of like how much money that, you know,
that you can make on something like this.
If anything, with the money that I do make now
I just wanna invest in myself and build my own company
and continue to grow that way and just be always
under my own, like, name, my own boss, my own title.
- I never see myself working
under anyone ever again in my life.
Like that's not something I want to do,
that's something I've learned from OnlyFans
but I would love to branch out from OnlyFans
and be doing other things in music or anything like that.
I think it would be really cool to have like
like Madonna has like, she has the sex book
and like later down the lines, it's like, oh yeah
go look back at Asher (beep) sex book.
- I am not a full time sex worker.
I have a full time nine to five job.
OnlyFans is really given me
the freedom to, you know, live the life I wanna live,
I'm happy doing things that I'm doing.
However, it would be really foolish
of me as I am to, you know
get rid of my job because this is my legitimacy.
And you know, I don't have jobs that would really,
I'm not the spokesperson for that company.
So it doesn't matter
if I am sucking (beep) on the internet, they don't care.
They're not looking for Myra.
You know, nobody's Googling me and be like,
"Oh, you are the one that helped me."
- I did not do the whole college thing.
I got some college credits
under my belt if I really wanna ever go back.
But even just the one year of doing school
it accumulated so much that, which thanks
to OnlyFans I've paid off.
My boyfriend and I just got a Tesla,
we're planning on doing road trips,
camping in the Tesla, going around filming content in it
and I would never be able to do that
with just a basic nine to five.
I think if I wasn't doing sex work
I would probably still just be
like a stay at home girlfriend, cleaning, cooking.
- That's the life.
You don't necessarily have to be sucking (beep) OnlyFans,
you can bake a cake OnlyFans.
Like it's what you make it
and you know, just being a content creator in this day
and age, it's really a blessing that OnlyFans is here
because it's actually been a lifeboat for millions of people
in this pandemic.
If you wanna be real, there's no way, like,
I've never heard of anything like this, you know,
where people have been put in such a situation where
our own government is not helping us
and we are all hustlers at, you know, at one time.
- I think, yeah.
I think these conversations are really
important to erase the stigma
around sex work and to normalize sex in general.
Also I'm so thankful
for OnlyFans allowing us to express ourselves sexually
while Instagram or TikTok or anything
like that is constantly shutting down
and censoring voices of LGBT, or anything of that sort.
And I think it's also important to, for us
as a community of creators or anything to stand
against the internet regulations that people
or the government is going to put
on the internet and things like that.
(all chattering)