OnlyFans, the British platform that hosts primarily erotic content made by its own users, has begun to sponsor high-performance Spanish athletes in minority disciplines. The objective is to clean up the image of a business with questionable fame, taking advantage of the fact that sponsorships are essential for these athletes to continue competing professionally. A situation of dependency (mutual, although it is clear who handles the money here) that has raised the first suspicions.
What OnlyFans has done. The paddle tennis player Vero Virseda, the boxer Jennifer Miranda and the surfer Alazne Aurrekoetxea now wear the platform’s logo on their kits, in a movement that the journalist and popularizer Mara Mariño described in an investigation for Article14 as part of a calculated normalization strategy. Mariño describes the strategy as “a masterful marketing maneuver” that seeks to reposition itself in sectors with massive reach and a good image such as sports and fitness.
How he does it. The operation has a double aspect: on the one hand, it pays them to display the platform’s logo on their kits and where they compete; On the other hand, it offers them the possibility of opening personal accounts where they can monetize exclusive content showing workouts, sports routines, nutrition advice or aspects of your personal life. This hybrid formula also allows OnlyFans to present itself as a general content platform, not exclusively erotic.
It gets complicated. Mariño warns in Article14 about the unforeseen consequences of this normalization: “When athletes display an OnlyFans sticker on their surfboard, they are legitimizing for youth audiences a platform that can attract young girls without awareness of the risks.” In 2022, Spain also approved the General Law 13/2022 on Audiovisual Communicationwhich forces video sharing platforms with pornographic content to implement effective age verification systems. At the moment the thing is in testing phase.
Other European countries are also strengthening this restrictive trend. In 2024, France gave its regulator Arcom the ability to block pornographic sites that do not verify the age of their visitors. Germany blocked access to Pornhub and RedTube after determining that their parent company Aylo “prioritized its own financial interests over the goal of protecting minors.” A legislative tightening that contrasts with OnlyFans’ strategy of gaining legitimacy through sports sponsorship: just now that access to adult content platforms is facing the greatest regulatory restrictions in its history.
International context. The phenomenon of athletes turning to OnlyFans has global reach and reveals the economic gap faced by high-level athletes in less high-profile disciplines. In Brazil, volleyball player Key Alves, who plays for the Osasco club, has publicly declared that her income on the platform multiply by fifty what you perceive as a professional athlete.
Another striking case: the Canadian pole vaulter Alysha Newmanbronze medalist in Paris 2024, who has a turnover of approximately one million euros annually through OnlyFans. During the last Olympic Games they also talked about the topic the British diver Jack Laugher, the New Zealand rower Robbie Manson and the Mexican diver Diego Balleza. OnlyFabs has come to sponsor, in fact, complete sports teams, such as the American Racing Team in the second category of the Motorcycle World Championship.
To whiten. The arrival of OnlyFans to the world of sports responds to a business need: transform its public image to attract investors. According to Bloombergthe platform has begun talks to obtain financing, seeking a valuation of more than $1 billion. But potential investors demand as a fundamental condition that they distance themselves from pornographic content that currently represents 50% of its creators’ profiles. Already in 2021, CEO Tim Stokely declared that “sportsmen and athletes are a field in which we are seeing great growth.”
Some obstacles. This image-washing operation has encountered some significant institutional resistance. The International Cycling Union (UCI), for example, prevented Scottish cyclist Lewis Buchanan from participating in official competitions in April 2023. if it displayed OnlyFans advertising on his helmet, taking advantage of its regulations that prohibit showing advertisements of pornographic content.
He sportwashing. What OnlyFans does bears similarities to this term coined in 2015 (in response to the European Games in Azerbaijan, which were used to divert attention from the country’s government’s human rights violations), which describes how countries with problematic histories use sport to whitewash their reputations. OnlyFans would be taking advantage of the prestige and visibility of sport to dilute its association with pornography. As sponsored tennis player Alexandre Müller said“OnlyFans wants to change its image, it’s not just about erotic things. That’s why they sponsor me.”
Header | Alazne Aurrekoetxea
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