Ethical Sex Work: Moral agency in OnlyFans Adult Content Work

• In Event: Eros and Agency

Abstract

This study explores moral agency in adult content work on and around OnlyFans by analyzing the varied ethical principles that creators uphold in their work practices. The point of departure is the assumed authenticity between subscribers and creators, which has facilitated the dramatic growth of the OnlyFans market since 2020. The shifting culture in the sex industry that increasingly values intimate emotional connections and the structural conjunctures — unprecedented social isolation, labor insecurity, and social media-centered self-branding — led to the emergence of one of the largest platforms in the industry, one that foregrounds moral and relational value over straightforward sexual exchange.
Previous research tends to treat morality mainly as oppressive normative codes and rarely brings it in as part of sex workers' own subjectivation. This study suggests a more sophisticated analysis of moral agency reflected in creators' ethical subjectivation through work. This framework intervenes in longstanding feminist debates over sex work by moving beyond the binary of exploitation and empowerment, offering instead an analytics of how creators actively constitute themselves as ethical subjects within, and not simply against, the moral landscape of sexuality.
Drawing on digital ethnography and interviews conducted since 2020, I distinguish morals from ethics in Foucauldian terms and conceptualize "ethical sex work" as practices that organize conflicting moral codes into coherent ethics reflecting one's sense of self and the self one aspires to become. My findings coalesce around four characteristics: creators synthesize moral codes to construct their own ethical practice; they use ethical sex work to draw moral distinctions between themselves and less ethical market actors; their ethical claims at times invite heightened platform surveillance; and the very conditions that constitute ethical sex work make it less profitable, revealing an inherent tension between ethical self-constitution and market optimization.

Author

• Changhye Ahn, Rutgers University-New Brunswick