A recently advertised “opening” in a group of young women who sell sexualized images of themselves drew an astounding 12,000 applications from other Gen Zers hoping to engage in onscreen prostitution. The incident is a stark reminder that in the age of social media, youth is a product, sexuality is the price tag, and Gen Z influencers are building careers around sexualized branding, with platforms like OnlyFans blurring the line between influence and exploitation.
Gen Z’s appetite for quick, online sexual content may also be feeding an aversion to real-world intimacy. A 2021 UCLA study found that 38 percent of Californians ages 18-30 had no sexual partner in the last year, the highest level of sexual inactivity in a decade. The timing is clear: Instagram launched in 2010, and 10 years after, intimacy looks more like content than connection. Social media’s nonstop feeds are replacing real connection and making sex less common.
The profitability and cultural pull of this shift are also rooted in long-standing dynamics. As psychologist Jan Antfolk writes in the journal Evolutionary Psychology, “men — regardless of their age — have a preference for women in their 20s.” In the context of social media, this creates a built-in audience for young creators and fuels a predictable pipeline from early fame to sexualized monetization.
Born in 1997, Bella Thorne entered the public eye at just six weeks old. At 13, she landed the lead role on Disney Channel’s Shake It Up, launching her into mainstream fame. In 2020, at age 22, Thorne joined OnlyFans, becoming the first person to earn $1 million in 24 hours, and is widely regarded as the first Gen Z A-list celebrity on the platform. Her incredible success prompted OnlyFans to institute new payment caps and payout rules.
Sophie Rain, 20, who joined OnlyFans at 19, claims to have earned $76 million in just over a year. She co-founded the highly popular Bop House, a collective of barely-adult creators whose TikTok and Instagram content skirts explicitness while funneling followers to OnlyFans. Their audience skews young, making the group a high-earning example of the young leading the young into a hypersexualized industry.
The Bop House dynamic has already pulled in teenage influencers. Piper Rockelle, who turned 18 on Aug. 21, visited the Bop House and has filmed collaborations with its members. Social media was split between fans who saw the visit as harmless and those who viewed it as a dangerous blurring of boundaries. One commenter wrote, “Piper was absolutely failed. A minor should not be concerning herself or anywhere near p*rn stars this much.” Many fear that Rockelle will follow the same trajectory as other young viral stars who turned to sex-selling platforms soon after turning legal.
Lil Tay, who turned 18 at the end of July, began posting OnlyFans content less than a minute into her “adulthood.” She claims to have made $1 million in her first three hours on the platform and brands herself as the youngest creator on OnlyFans. Speaking to TMZ, she grouped herself with Sabrina Carpenter and Sydney Sweeney as the big three of Gen Z sexualized stardom. When asked about the planning behind her debut, she said, “I’ve been planning this since I was nine,” underscoring how her path to sexualized branding was mapped out during her earliest years of internet fame.
Another example of this trajectory is Bhad Bhabie. Danielle Bregoli, known online as Bhad Bhabie, celebrated her 18th birthday on March 26, 2021, and joined OnlyFans just six days later. Her social media career began at age 13 after a viral appearance on Dr. Phil, and in the years that followed she toured internationally as a rapper and built a large online following. That existing fame made her rapid shift into sexual content creation even more striking, reinforcing the concern that teen influencers can, and do, make the leap to on-screen prostitution quickly. In March 2025, Bregoli claimed that her four-year OnlyFans career had earned her $75 million.
From early fame to young adult sexualized branding, the path is becoming alarmingly predictable. Once influencers make the shift, platforms like OnlyFans generate instant payouts, and younger stars are preparing to follow.
Alannah Peters is a senior at the University of Florida. She is a freelance journalist working with the National Journalism Center this summer.
