I’m convinced this platform is used for money laundering, by someone; not accusing Radvinsky, but if you wanted to create an opaque money transmission system, you’d design it close to what OF is.
I have zero love for OF, but shouldn't your reasoning also apply to Patreon, Gofundme, and so on? They all let you collect small fees for completely unverifiable services.
Bought a service (2018) and changed the model to one where it was collecting compromising adult-oriented content from random people. That content can be used to try to shame them into avoiding the limelight later in life. I guess with Epstein out of the way (2019) they needed something else for blackmail material.
Made billions from OnlyFans and then made a large donation to AIPAC. Wouldn't admit it.
The Reuters story linked is substantially the same as this one but omits the AIPAC link. I wonder why.
Everything that touches on the adult industry is controversial, sometimes rightfully so, but it also responds to a need, like it or not. Regulation can make it more or less open, but it always here.
Out of everything in the adult industry, to me, OnlyFans is one of the most sane. That is encouraging independent performers to get payed directly by their fans, taking only a reasonable commission. It doesn't mean there is no exploitation, but at least, it offers a way for those who want to do this kind of work to do it on their own terms.
The flip side is that if you make a thing smooth, profitable, and safe-feeling, you get more of it, as any economist can tell you. Also, as any sociologist can tell you, when you make a fringe thing feel normal among young people, you get a LOT more of it.
So your defense of OF only real works if you think that an explosion of commercialized sex has no negative effect on our culture, or if you (stupidly) believe that the rate of sex work is an immutable constant, impervious to laws, technology, or social contagion.
Personal responsibility has to enter the picture somewhere. If a family is ripped apart because a member is using OnlyFans then that's that family member bears responsibility. OnlyFans didn't invent pornography. And on the model side, it allows cutting out a whole industry of truly skeezy, immoral middlemen distributors.
I do dislike the effect OnlyFans has had on society but I think it's a symptom, not a cause.
The family of the OF user is not the only family affected by this general decay. Indeed, when you normalize sex work, some families never even form. There's such a thing as a social fabric.
Libertarianism is willful ignorance, and taken this far, it's a brain disease.
> cutting out a whole industry of truly skeezy, immoral middlemen distributors
This argument only makes sense if you blindly model the amount of degrading dreck as a constant, unaffected by technology and opportunities. Again, brain disease.
Oh, and before OF, Radvinsky was facilitating child porn and bestiality. Were the children and animals being empowered, too? Should they have taken responsibility?
He provided a way for many people to earn a living from the comfort of their homes and saved them from people that can exploit sexual workers (economically and worse).
If you find sexual work a despicable thing it's your right, but the people that are doing it through Onlyfans have it better than in other ways.
Does OnlyFans have an extensive anti-trafficking program to prevent one typical method of exploitation? If not, it's just proving a platform for the traffickers to make money from the comfort of a safe jurisdiction.
Made billions from OnlyFans and then made a large donation to AIPAC. Wouldn't admit it.
The Reuters story linked is substantially the same as this one but omits the AIPAC link. I wonder why.
[0] https://www.hindustantimes.com/world-news/us-news/leonid-rad...
Out of everything in the adult industry, to me, OnlyFans is one of the most sane. That is encouraging independent performers to get payed directly by their fans, taking only a reasonable commission. It doesn't mean there is no exploitation, but at least, it offers a way for those who want to do this kind of work to do it on their own terms.
So your defense of OF only real works if you think that an explosion of commercialized sex has no negative effect on our culture, or if you (stupidly) believe that the rate of sex work is an immutable constant, impervious to laws, technology, or social contagion.
I do dislike the effect OnlyFans has had on society but I think it's a symptom, not a cause.
Libertarianism is willful ignorance, and taken this far, it's a brain disease.
> cutting out a whole industry of truly skeezy, immoral middlemen distributors
This argument only makes sense if you blindly model the amount of degrading dreck as a constant, unaffected by technology and opportunities. Again, brain disease.
Oh, and before OF, Radvinsky was facilitating child porn and bestiality. Were the children and animals being empowered, too? Should they have taken responsibility?
If you find sexual work a despicable thing it's your right, but the people that are doing it through Onlyfans have it better than in other ways.