On 1 November, the Washington Post reported that Twitter — under the new stewardship of Elon Musk — was circulating an internal email describing the imminent implementation of “Paywalled Video”. On a mock-up of the feature seen by the Washington Post, it was described as: 

Mock-ups of the feature viewed by The Post show a tweet with four images. Three are immediately viewable, whilst the fourth is obscured, with a lock icon and the message “view for $1.” Paying that amount would unlock the video, with the creator receiving money via Stripe whilst Twitter takes an unspecified amount. Users who haven’t paid would not be able to see the video but could like or retweet the tweet.

If this feature is rolled out as described, it is likely that it would apply to various different “types” of content. Most notably, there is already an acute awareness that this could potentially be a boon for “adult content creators”, in the same vein as websites such as OnlyFans. This, to put it bluntly, would risk opening the floodgates to a deluge of monetised illegal and nightmarish content, including child sexual abuse and other forms of sexual violence such as rape and sexual assaults. 

The links between the monetisation of pornography and a consequent surge in illegal, sexually violent and abusive photos and videos was highlighted only two months ago in this very publication. Earlier this year a leaked memo revealed that Twitter was already planning to introduce paywalled content, geared towards creating a new revenue stream from adult content creators. 

It is not a tech problem. It is a porn problem

However, Twitter’s own investigation found: “Allowing creators to begin putting their content behind a paywall would mean that even more illegal material would make its way to Twitter — and more of it would slip out of view. Twitter had few effective tools available to find it.”

The question must be posed to Musk et al: what does he think has changed in the ensuing period of time that would mean this would no longer be a risk? The previous article covering this issue goes in-depth as to how the porn industry fundamentally drives a proliferation of child sexual abuse material (CSAM), but it would behove Musk and whomever is ultimately hired to oversee Twitter’s overhauled functionality to get to grips with understanding why this is such a problem. 

There is a danger that Musk may be blinded by hubris when it comes to understanding the prevalence of CSAM, illegal content and sexually violent material on Twitter. After all, it is undeniable that Musk is a tech savant. This is where the danger lies; it is not a problem that can be solved merely by introducing “more tech”. Fundamentally, it is not a tech problem. It is a porn problem. 

This is not to be overly reductive about the issue; it is undeniable that the explosion of digital technology in the last twenty years has aided the proliferation of porn in a way few could fathom in the dark, pre-internet age. The technology aspect is merely a catalyst for what porn itself creates, however. 

The entire industry has become a free-for-all market where, due to an explosion of content availability and accessibility, the fees that performers can charge have been driven down, and the only way to earn more is to engage in increasingly degrading scenes. Just look at OnlyFans to see how this is playing out in real time, and how it should act as a warning for Twitter executives, who are considering opening up paywalled porn as a new revenue stream. 

Sexual violence and abuse is mainstream porn

For example, 22-year old Jess doesn’t show her face on OnlyFans as she’s worried about the impact it might have on her if people found out. She earns approximately £100 per month from the site — or £1.90 per hour.

She states: “I do get lots of messages asking to show my face. It’s a bit of a struggle because there’s a massive market where girls do. If someone offered quite a significant amount then maybe I would consider it … It’s horrible when people demand you to do something so flat-out … Obviously you don’t want to be treated as an object, but at the same time it’s what you’re signing yourself up for.”

The rapid descent into hyper-objectification and boundary-breaking demands from users is typical of an industry that instils a sense of sexual entitlement and a disregard for consent in those who watch porn. The economic foundation of the industry itself is what drives this descent into increasingly dehumanising, degrading and debasing content creation. 

A landmark report from 2020 found that on average, across three mainstream sites, one in eight video titles described sexual activity that constituted sexual violence. The sexual violence spanned acts and behaviour including:

 … sexual activity between family members (“When Mom’s Mad, Dad Goes To His Daughter”); physical aggression and sexual assault (“Crying blonde bitch takes rough c*** drilling”); image-based sexual abuse (terms such as “hidden”, “spy” and “leaked”); and coercion and exploitation (“Chubby Spanish Teen Needs The Cash”).

The report clearly shows that sexual violence and abuse is mainstream porn, bearing in mind that this is just an analysis of the titles. The actual footage comprises numerous quantifiable instances of sexually violent acts. Of course, videos that may not be labelled as such may also contain sexually violent images or acts.

The report concluded: 

Given our findings, this directs our attention to the role of the mainstream porn sites in producing and reproducing what Nicola Gavey (2004) calls the “cultural scaffolding of rape”, namely the construction of cultural norms and practices that support rape or set up its preconditions [ … ] Instead of these acts of sexual violence being clearly labelled as such, it was much more common for descriptions of even the most serious sexual offences to be positioned as ordinary or even humorous. It is here that the positioning of sexual violence as a normative sexual script is most apparent.

Musk et al must get to grips with this when considering the impact that paywalling “adult content” will have. It is all well and good to have naïve aspirations about putting in safety checks in an effort to combat such illegal and abusive material, but this is a fool’s errand. By introducing paywalled adult content, Twitter would be making a rod for its own back. The material that would necessitate said “combatting” would not exist — or at the very least, it would be vastly reduced — were it not for the introduction of paywalled content in the first place. 

Musk wields enormous power since his purchase of Twitter. As he states, it has become the de facto “town square”, and with its purchase comes enormous responsibility. Whether he likes it or not, the choices he makes will have an immense effect, felt around the world. He must ask himself, is the sexual exploitation of women and children something that he places below that of “profit” in overhauling this town square? You would like to think not, but only time will tell.