Sex workers are wary after OnlyFans reverses ban on porn and other explicit content

Less than a week after announcing it would ban sexually explicit content on Oct. 1, OnlyFans has changed its mind.

In an early morning tweet on Wednesday, the company said it would no longer make the policy change. But sex workers, who make up a sizable percentage of the site’s content creators, were skeptical about the sincerity of the announcement.

“We have secured assurances necessary to support our diverse creator community and have suspended the planned October 1 policy change. OnlyFans stands for inclusion, and we will continue to provide a home for all creators,” the company wrote.

That would imply that it had cleared up the unspecified issues with banks. Founder and CEO Tim Stokely told the Financial Times on Aug. 24 that three major banks—Bank of New York Mellon, Metro Bank, and JPMorgan Chase—refused to offer service to the platform because of “reputational risk.”

But use of the word “suspended” in OnlyFans’ announcement instead of something more permanent like “scrapped” has been a red flag for some adult content creators. Many suspect the decision was made after users began to abandon the platform and creators moved their content over to sites like Justfor.fans, OnlyFans’ chief competitor, which was founded by and is staffed by sex workers and adult entertainment industry veterans.

i don’t trust this.
please explain “suspend”.
refer to us as sex workers or adult content creators. stop hiding us in a closet.
figure this out, you’re traumatizing people with this roller coaster.
— jessica drake (@thejessicadrake) August 25, 2021

You literally ditch us and told us to f*ck off and now you want us back. Apparently now you remember WE made you, this looks like a drunk 3 AM text from your toxic ex 💀
— Vivi ✨💖 (@ViviTarantino_) August 25, 2021

Something about the special way you ✨gaslight and manipulate✨ us is starting to make me feel like this account is run by my one of my ex boyfriends
— Savannah Solo (@savannah_solo) August 25, 2021

https://twitter.com/LanaWolf1872/status/1430504043546398724

After this emotional roller coaster you put us all through you’re going to have to do A LOT more than a vague tweet to earn ANY level of trust back. Reduce our fees and hire actual SWers on your team to assist NSFW creators and also PROMOTE SWers. Until then I don’t believe you.
— Neptuneexplainsitall (@urwaifuneptune) August 25, 2021

Some sex workers noted that they have seen their subscriber numbers drop dramatically since the announcement and called for the company to lower its fees on a temporary basis. (The site collects 20% of all model income.)

OnlyFans had net revenue of $375 million last year and expects $1.2 billion this year, per a pitch deck obtained by Axios. It claims to have over 7 million paying “fans” per month and to have shelled out $3.2 billion to its creators since the company’s launch.