The Complex Realities of Modern Day Sex Workers

STORY BY

JOEY HARVEY

We’re all working online now. But working online as a sex worker is not as simple as it seems.

SEX work is one of the oldest professions, yet our society’s preconceived notions and stigmas subject sex workers to a life of dehumanization. Support, stability and safety are assumed for most professions, but these are considered privileges for many sex workers. As a result, censorship and the saturation of virtual spaces by celebrities are obstacles for many sex workers. Being criminalized just for doing their job can be a shared struggle among the community.

For two years, Long Beach local Aria Summers has been a sex worker distributing virtual content to the paid subscription-based social media site, Only Fans. The London-based site allows its creators to distribute content to followers, aka “fans.” Creators can monetize their content, collecting 80% of their earnings while Only Fans collects the remaining 20%. The platform has become a safer space for sex workers to hold an income that is both flexible and, in some cases, consistent. But for some sex workers, it’s not as consistent.

Before the pandemic, Summers worked as a hairstylist and modeled on the side, but due to the stay-at-home order Summers shifted to Only Fans for her primary income. Though she collected funds through unemployment, she had more time to commit to her Only Fans platform.

However, Summers soon learned that the amount of time that goes into creating content is consuming and the payoffs would be minimal.

“It’s an all-day thing. Like eight hours. But not only that, I will spend one maybe two days where I do my hair and makeup, take pictures, videos, footage, all this stuff,” Summers said. “I mean, it is real, it’s time-consuming.”

Photo courtesy of Aria Summers

Ultimately, the payoff is in the subscribers’ hands, and how one finds subscribers is a complication within itself.

In addition to creating content for these fans, there comes a demand.

“If you don’t post every day, three times a day. Or even post anything remotely nude. You lose subscribers,” Summers said.

Ultimately, the payoff is in the subscribers’ hands, and how one finds subscribers is a complication within itself. Because of community guidelines that social media platforms such as Instagram, Twitter, Facebook and Snapchat enact on users, Summers and other sex workers find it challenging to essentially promote themselves and their content.

Censorship on these platforms is almost unavoidable.

“I promote on Instagram, Twitter and Snapchat, but then my account got deleted on Snapchat. So you have to use a third-party link to promote. And if you try to promote on Instagram, they’ll shadowban you, where your followers won’t see your posts,” Summers said.

In addition to being shadowbanned, Summers had three of her Instagram accounts deleted for posting information related to her Only Fans account.

“Sex sells. They make that 100% relevant with movies, commercials,” Summers said.

“Everything is sexualized, but they don’t want us to profit on it?”

The likelihood of posting anything that is considered too sensitive by most social media community guidelines is quite common among most sex workers. Some content creators wonder why specific posts and accounts are restricted, but others are not.

Los Angeles native Latoya Rawlins, also known as Ms. Thighlicious, was, like Summers, censored through her social media platforms.

“We get a lot of our posts taken down and to go further, it’s not even just sex workers. It’s also body-positive pages, pages that are like activists, and it seems to be very specific,” Rawlins said.

Rawlins has been involved with virtual sex work through Only Fans for four years. Being involved in the Black sex-worker community, Rawlins and other sex workers who don’t fit into the mold of Eurocentric beauty standards experience this censorship and rejection from most social media platforms.

Photo courtesy of Latoya Rawlins

“The bigger you are, the more that they will come down on you. It’s just very frustrating to me, and that is something that I have been dealing with for the last year or so — trying to stay motivated to create, to do what I do,” Rawlins said. ”So much time goes into doing these looks, and then you post them, and they’ll only show it to like, I have 30k followers, and maybe Instagram will show my stuff to maybe 500 of them.”

For many sex workers who rely on ways to advertise themselves through these media, the censorship affects their income and overall means of support.

“I’m privileged in the sense that I’ve gone to school and gotten an education, you know? I’m a nurse. Yeah, I always have that career to fall back on, so my bills will be paid. I’m very lucky in that way. For those of us who don’t have that privilege, [they] are fighting to be seen and make sales,” Rawlins said.

Most sex workers who have platforms, on sites like Only Fans fight for visibility to make a profit and build a following. That fight becomes more difficult when these spaces become saturated by celebrities and media moguls.

Bella Thorne is one example. According to Only Fans, the former Disney Channel actress made $2 million in one week after joining the platform this past summer. However, her biggest controversy from joining stemmed from her charging an additional $200 on top of her $17.99 a month subscription for exclusive content called pay per view. Tweets circulated that the actress claimed that her pay-per-view content included nude photos. However, when fans purchased the exclusive content, the images they received weren’t what she promised.

“What does bother me is that they’ll come into this space, and they’ll gladly take the money. But then they don’t do anything to shine a light on the people who are struggling on the platform who can’t make you know, at least $1,000 a month. Who, you know, are doing it for survival,” Rawlins said. “If you want to be a part of the community, then be a part of the community and use your status and your voice to shine light on those who are struggling.”

Because of Thorne’s actions, many of her Only Fans patrons requested refunds. Shortly thereafter, the site began capping prices for how much creators could charge for pay-per-view content and how much fans could tip. Only Fans denied that this was a result of Thorne’s controversy.

Sex workers who do not use platforms such as Only Fans faced their own complications when the pandemic hit. Many had to choose between not working or taking the risks of infection in order to maintain an income.

Long Beach native Gage Marshall kept working early on, when the severity of the pandemic was still uncertain, but as hospitals continued to reach capacity and death tolls increased, Marshall stopped working entirely.

Photo courtesy of Gage Marshall

“If you want to be a part of the community, then be a part of the community and use your status and your voice to shine light on those who are struggling.”

Photo courtesy of Gage Marshall

For many sex workers, the work becomes more than a hustle. It’s also a battle to be visible and respected among those who discredit the profession.

“If I’m going to create this crew of people, [like] my roommates and a couple of friends, [as] my COVID-19 crew, I don’t want to be the reason that they get fucked over [and] get sick,” Marshall said. “I couldn’t handle that. If it happens to me, you know, whatever, but I couldn’t let that happen for them.”

Though he is receiving funds through unemployment, Marshall still met up with clients in order to make up for lost income. It’s a calculated risk he needs to take.

“Things are talked about before, like, ‘Hey, when were you last tested? Are you safe?’ I mean, these are the kinds of things that I feel like gay people are more prepared with anyway,” Marshall said. “You know it’s a calculated risk and asking those types of questions are not as weird to us because we’ve been doing it for a long time.”

In addition to having these transparent conversations, Marshall gets tested for COVID-19 regularly and maintains a clean workspace when meeting with clients.

For many sex workers, the work becomes more than a hustle. It’s also a battle to be visible and respected among those who discredit the profession. Part of that battle means being subjected to forms of censorship, violence, policing or criminalization, but it’s a reality.

In the same way, the benefits that most people receive from an employer in their workplace do not translate to sex workers.

“The same protections that you would expect for yourself while you’re working, and the same safety measures that you would like to have while you’re working, you know, give it to us as well,” Rawlins said. “The same respect that you give to anybody who’s working, give it to us as well. And know, at the end of the day, that sex work is work, and we’re still people.”

With little to no reference in pop culture, there’s a barrier that prevents society from having a more informed understanding of sex work, which leads to stigmas that become further embedded into the narratives of sex workers.

“The representation is usually still done in a very, ‘this poor kid,’ [or] ‘help him’ [perspective]. Which in a lot of ways, yes, we do need to, but there is an empowering side to it,” Marshall said. ”Knowing that, hey, if I have nothing else, I have this to offer. You know? And I think that if we change that perception, we’ll start looking at the safety part of it, like getting condoms available to people [and] getting people on PReP. Those things won’t be so stigmatized.”

With reframing the narrative of sex workers, another focus is addressing how liberated and diligent many of them are with their work.

“I would love for people to understand how much time actually goes into this and how much free time you’re giving this and that we’re not getting paid what we deserve,” Summers said. “We have to work harder and smarter and hustle. And that takes a lot more than just going and working at a corporation.”