Euphoria‘s Sydney Sweeney is causing major online discourse.
Sam Levinson’s controversial series Euphoria has returned for its third and final season after a four-year hiatus, and it’s already making headlines, but for all the wrong reasons. The HBO series has an incredible cast, including Zendaya, Sweeney, Jacob Elordi, Hunter Schafer, and Alexa Demie. However, Sweeney has been the one in the headlines, but for all the wrong reasons.
Sweeney’s character, Cassie Howard, has been shown in season 3 exploring career options, including being an OnlyFans model, with her making content such as posing as a dog, dressing as a baby with pigtails, and using her housekeeper, Juana, to capture the content before Demie’s character, Maddy, took over as her manager. Real OnlyFans creators have felt that the depiction has caused them to be subject to mockery due to their line of work.
Variety has received statements from some OnlyFans creators regarding the ongoing series, as they feel the way that the work is being shown is not true to how it really is on the platform. Sydney Leathers, who has been an OnlyFans model since 2017, stated that:
“There’s just a lot that’s ridiculous and cartoonish about it. There’s so much that they have her doing that is not even allowed on OnlyFans, and that alone is infuriating: the age-play stuff where she’s dressed as a baby in a diaper, for example. Credit card processors have very strict rules that you have to abide by, and the rules are getting stricter all the time.
Sex workers in general, myself included, tend to be hyper-sensitive about the way Hollywood portrays us because it’s almost never nice. It’s always absurd or depressing and rarely ever on point. When you’re part of a marginalized community, it’s easy to get upset about certain portrayals of it.”
The current rules and regulations regarding age-play, which Sweeney depicts in the series, are not accepted on the platform and could result in accounts being deactivated. Another creator, Maitland Ward, who is at the top of her field and has appeared in White Chicks and Boy Meets World, is furious with the way OnlyFans is being exploited on the series:
“In the climate we’re in, that they dressed her up as a baby to make pornographic OnlyFans content was beyond troubling and again serves to perpetuate stereotypes that sex workers have no moral compass and that they will do anything for money. And there’s always this untrue stigma that somehow sex work is synonymous with sex trafficking and abuse. And they just said, let’s make a joke of it. That is so funny. I’m not laughing.”
Levinson did respond to the OnlyFans storyline now used for Sweeney’s character in an interview with The Hollywood Reporter and stated that “[Cassie] has got her dog house and her little dog ears and the nose, and that has its own humor, but what makes the scene is the fact that her housekeeper is the one filming it.” However, Ward is stating that that’s the reason why the platform is being used so it won’t be “taken seriously.“
Sweeney’s character is being used as a “humor” tactic and has proven to not only have very few humorous moments but has managed to offend people from all walks of life, including those who are currently working on OnlyFans. Hollywood’s portrayal of sex workers has consistently remained dicey, and there is never a “nice” depiction of the people in front of the camera. Unfortunately,<em>Euphoria </em> proves it’s not going away any time soon.
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