We feminists have a dirty little secret. Whether admitted or not, all of us think we know better than most women. After all, feminism claims to speak for all women, yet most women are not feminists.
This conundrum popped into my head on Monday as I attempted to explain to a room full of legislators why they had a duty to disregard the sex industry performers who claim to be empowered by what they do. What can we say, asked a thoughtful and engaged peer at the APPG on Women’s Rights, to the Only Fans performer who insists she loves her work?
In a word, nothing. Because, to misquote Upton Sinclair, it is difficult to get a woman to understand something when her salary depends on her not understanding it. All the more so when her sense of self depends on it too.
And yet government, police and regulators continue to consult representatives from “adult services”-enabling sites like Vivastreet, alongside individual OnlyFans performers, as though they were neutral stakeholders rather than beneficiaries of a system that destroys lives.
Consent is a flimsy concept that carries a heavy burden. Saying “yes” to being strangled during sex does not lessen the risk of unconsciousness, stroke or death. When it comes to acts that harm us, “consent” merely salves consciences, reducing the responsibility we owe one another to a tick box.
People consent to harm for all sorts of reasons. My co-author, Robert Jessel, told the room how he prostituted himself at university after abuse at school. In the grip of a breakdown, self-medicating with alcohol, drugs and self-injury, Jessel turned to prostitution more in despair than anything else. Some of his “clients”, he says, revelled in his obvious psychological vulnerability.
For a while, being exploited made him feel like he had worth. Abusive sex was familiar to him. Had he sat in front of parliamentarians twenty-five years ago, he would have told them that sex work was work and that it paid well. And after all, he was an adult and capable of giving consent.
His experience is the norm, not the exception. The link between trauma and prostitution is well known. Indeed, a 2024 Swedish study into pornography performers found 88 per cent had suffered abuse as children.
The comforting belief that consent obviates harm leads to some dark places. The trajectory of OnlyFans performer Tiffany Wisconsin is one such story that deserves light. After failing to earn much as an influencer, she turned to explicit content for income. Within a few years she had carved out a niche producing increasingly extreme material, culminating in “challenges” involving multiple men.
After anal reconstructive surgery, following one such stunt, she filmed herself from her hospital bed, reassuring followers she would soon return to work. In any other context we would recognise this immediately for what it is: self-harm, performed for an audience and monetised. She consented, as did the men who caused her such horrific injuries. But her apparent enthusiasm isn’t enough to absolve them of guilt, and nor does it allow the rest of us to turn away.
Of course, it is unfashionable to say that women like Wisconsin are shaped by internalised misogyny, or that her actions are a response to trauma. The progressive approach, and indeed the one taken by our own elected representatives, is to respect her choice to risk permanent damage over an extreme sex stunt — not to judge her. Similarly, we are supposed to believe that when Tia Billinger (aka Bonnie Blue) invites men to “destroy” and “rearrange my insides” this is a statement of empowered sexuality.
The real question is what happens when we normalise individual choices. Violence repackaged as liberation is still violence, degradation reframed as agency is still degradation, and injuries presented as “content” are still injuries. But accepting people’s “choice” to be subjected to them reshapes expectations, standards, and ultimately, society.
This is the dilemma at the heart of any political movement: what do you do when the people you claim to represent appear to embrace what harms them? You can retreat into platitudes about choice. Or you can say, plainly, that not all choices are benign, and not all consent is meaningful.
So yes, I am content to say it. I know better than Bonnie Blue. I know better than Tiffany Wisconsin. I know better than those who are too scared to seem judgemental. Not because I am morally superior, but because I am willing to follow the logic to its conclusion. Legislators shouldn’t be liaising with anyone in the sex trade, no matter how empowered they claim to be. Because if we accept the industry’s vision of liberation, society as a whole is f**ked.
