Lady Sophia Chase has never been so ravenous for BDSM. The local sex worker and professional dominatrix has been clientless for more than two months and is hungry to get her hands on someone again.
Chase went years without advertising herself because she is established in the industry, but in April, she started doing sex phone calls, webcamming, and selling fetish items online, though it’s not as lucrative as in-person work. On March 30, she started using the content subscription site OnlyFans and is now in the top 6.6 percent of creators on the website. “And that doesn’t even cover my rent. So that means [94 percent] of creators are making less than me,” she says.
SWOP Chicago, the local chapter of the nationwide grassroots organization Sex Workers Outreach Project (which is behind many country-wide mutual aid efforts), began a virtual Sex Worker Support Group and is helping sex workers from all over the U.S. get access to economic aid by groups such as the National Employment Law Project.
The lack of government support not only makes sex workers like Feist feel personally discriminated against, but it highlights the longstanding marginalization of sex workers in the U.S. that is only heightened during the pandemic. Feist wants the public to see that sex work is not just a side hustle or something “fun”—it’s a business that involves digital communication, marketing, and financial skills, just like any other career.
