The Swiss “Staiy” (36) is a successful opinion streamer on Twitch. In a recent stream, he spoke about the paid platform OnlyFans and the issues it creates.
What is OnlyFans anyway? At its core, OnlyFans is a social network. Users can create a profile and fill it with information, photos, and videos as they wish. The catch is that the content can be monetized.
The “fans” then have to pay to see the recordings. For additional money, they can also send private messages to the performers and request more content. This makes OnlyFans a popular website for providing erotic and pornographic content.
There is an interesting interface between the platforms Twitch and OnlyFans: Streamers like Kaitlyn “Amouranth” Siragusa use the streaming platform to turn viewers into paying customers.
Others also use Twitch for completely different purposes. For example, the German Twitch streamer Sandra Friedrichs wants to use her platform to address mental health in the gaming sector. Check out our interview with the streamer here:
Does OnlyFans contribute to the sexualization of female streamers?
How does Staiy come to this topic? The Twitch streamer expresses his concerns regarding the paid platform in a short segment of a longer stream. In the end, Staiy provocatively states, the problem is the man. However, he asks his viewers to let him finish first.
What is the problem? Staiy emphasizes that women are free to present themselves in revealing clothing, and no one should interfere with that. However, problems arise because an expectation is created among the consumers of this content:
What are the consequences? Some consumers would then assume that all women in a field – such as streaming – behave this way. As a result, female streamers often receive questions in their chats about whether they offer OnlyFans, where one can find erotic content from them – even if they do not present themselves sexually.
For Staiy, the question about OnlyFans is more or less an indirect question about nude pictures, which is invasive and has little to do with feminism and self-determination.
[The target audience] is not interested in perceiving people as people, but only as fleshly objects of desire.
Questions about OnlyFans or direct requests for nude pictures have become frighteningly normal, says the Twitch streamer. However, he also admits that as a man, he has more of an outside view on the topic: affected female streamers and YouTubers have to deal with it.
As an example, he cites the video of the successful YouTuber Gnu:
Staiy: “OnlyFans has normalized sex work”
Are there other problems? Staiy criticizes not only the indirect effects of platforms like OnlyFans. In his opinion, OnlyFans has managed to normalize sex work and sell it as “female empowerment,” almost as women’s power.
[OnlyFans] has managed to normalize sex work, although sex work in its reality is connected to human trafficking, slavery, crime, violence, and much worse things. OnlyFans conveys the impression that sex work is something completely normal: “You go, girl” [translated to German: “Keep it up, girl!”].
Platforms like OnlyFans have thus contributed to making the formerly taboo subject of prostitution almost socially acceptable, according to Staiy. However, while the models on OnlyFans are relatively protected, the “real world” often looks different. The somewhat terrible circumstances are thus relativized.
I have to say, that is an effect that is so ridiculous: People sit in their “safe space” around the internet, where they can create controlled conditions for themselves about what they show and what they do not show. And thereby relativize the criminal circumstances and the absolute absurdity and the disgusting exterior surrounding sex work—yeah, good job.
Sex workers are often satisfied with their work and sometimes feel it is an important part of their sexual self-determination.
However, such services are not always provided of their own free will: behind them, there can be need, coercion, and even human trafficking. The magazine “Die Zeit” addressed the complex issue in an article.
You can find the full video on Staiy’s YouTube channel, we have linked it for you here. The relevant part starts around minute 7.
The OnlyFans platform has a certain fascination, especially because some women earn incredibly large amounts of money with it. A German YouTuber therefore conducted an experiment and accompanied a Twitch streamer in his OnlyFans attempt:
