In a plot twist that may surprise many, Pornhub’s former “it girl” Lana Rhoades says she no longer supports the porn industry.
Rhoades—real name Amara Maple—has been Pornhub’s most-searched-for porn star for the last three years, and she’s been on the top 20 list for longer than that. Her changed views mean she’s joining with the likes of Riley Reid and Mia Khalifa who have spoken out against the industry even as they still rank high on Pornhub’s most-searched-for porn star lists.
In a recent podcast interview, Rhoades reflected on her time in porn and revealed she is now “against” the adult industry after being “taken advantage of” while doing porn. She spoke very critically about her time in porn, emphasizing the damaging nature of the commercial sex industry as a whole.
“I just didn’t have a great experience [in porn] and I don’t think that it’s great for other women, or even men,” Rhoades said. “I myself am against pornography now from my own experiences… Everyone can do what they want, I just don’t think that they’re making the best decision for themselves going into that.”
She added, “I don’t think that having sexual relations with people that you hardly know is good for your mental health or your heart.”
The pressure to “people-please”
Rhoades also spoke about how she first got into porn at the age of 18, and detailed the regret she now feels for her “people-pleasing” attitude during her time in the industry.
“Being an 18 or 19-year-old girl, you just don’t know how to say no. You want to make everyone happy and I was very much a people-pleaser,” she admitted.
“When I first decided to get into pornography I didn’t think that people would think I was good enough looking or that I would be like any good at anything because I was so inexperienced,” she said. “But somehow I became number one in that field, shockingly. I only did that for like eight months of my life when I was 19.”
She continued, “I just had quite a few bad experiences…There were times when I was doing scenes that I really didn’t want to do with people that I really didn’t want to let touch my body in that way.”
When asked, “So why did you do it?” her response was, “I just felt like I had already signed up for this. There’s also a lot of pressure. So the agents…that’s where the pressure to do things that you don’t want to do comes from…I just wanted to make my agent happy, I wanted to make the fans happy, I wanted to make all the directors love me. So I felt pressured and I felt like I couldn’t say no in a lot of situations.”
Social media as an exit strategy
Rhoades quit doing porn in 2017, and said it was only when she developed a presence on Instagram that she became popular in the industry. She skyrocketed to number one very quickly.
“I actually became the number one porn star from expanding my Instagram. So I focused on growing my Instagram. I would post every single day. The algorithm really picked me up. It made me number one on Pornhub,” she said.
With over 16 million followers on Instagram, Rhoades has since launched a new career away from porn as an influencer. She said it all started when she had a conversation with a guy who made a living off of Instagram and YouTube.
She said, “I had never shot content with him but he was telling me ‘I’m making $15,000 to do an Instagram post for this YouTube ad’, and I was like, well I’m getting paid $1,200 to do this scene, how is this fair?”
“I sort of realized that I was being taken advantage of doing sex work for an amount that people were getting paid way more to just post a picture on Instagram.”
Rhoades now says she’s making “more money than she ever did” from porn, and that she’s become a multi-millionaire since leaving the industry.
She also says there’s no amount of money that could make her ditch her “self-respect” and go back to it.
The 25-year-old became a first-time mother January 2022 with the birth of her son Milo, and she continues to warn others about the risks of being attracted to the glamorous and rich lifestyle the porn industry entices people with—especially young women. “That’s what I warn girls, it’s not all that glamorous, it’s not even well-paid.”
She said her exit from porn was “less than friendly” and that people have been quick to remind her that while she openly slams the industry, it should be credited as the source of her success. “Everyone’s like, ‘how are you going to s— on porn? It gave you everything. But you never know in this day and age, you can do anything on social media.’”
The porn industry isn’t what it seems
The porn industry markets itself as a champion of sexual liberation and female empowerment, but time and time again, proves to inflict the opposite.
According to ex-porn star Mia Khalifa, who is continually one of Pornhub’s most-searched for porn stars even though her career lasted three months in 2015, the porn industry is predatory.
“I was approached at a very vulnerable point in my life,” Khalifa previously said in an interview. “I went back and shot a scene, and it was terrifying and temporarily validating, but afterwards I felt a little empty. Though I still had that pit in my stomach where I wanted to chase that validation again… I think what made me go back and do it again was that the attention I was receiving, I was afraid it would go away if I didn’t do what I was asked to do.”
She later left the mainstream industry because she realized just how much she didn’t want to be involved with porn anymore.
“[Porn] corporations prey on callow young women and trap them legally into contracts when they’re vulnerable,” Mia said.
And for Riley Reid, another one of the mainstream porn industry’s most-searched for peformers, she has spoken out about how difficult porn has made her life.
“A lot of times when people ask me if they should do porn, I tell them no,” Reid said. “It makes life really hard—it makes dating really hard, it makes your family life really hard, it makes intimacy hard. You’re putting yourself out there and the world is now judging you. You have to be OK with being shamed for every day of your life…it’s a lot and it takes a toll on you emotionally.”
Exploitation in the industry
Force, fraud, and coercion are defined elements of sex trafficking—and daily practices in the mainstream porn industry.
Lana is yet another top-searched for porn star for years running that has spoken out against the industry and its predatory practices. Her story is a wake up call that there’s often so much more going on behind the scenes.
Some performers want to get out but don’t know how, and many who do break free vow they’ll never go back. In fact, once safely on the other side, they often publicly reveal just how dark and harmful the reality of life within the industry can be.
People like Lana are treated as less than human by those inside and outside of the industry. But no matter who treats her as a product to be exploited, or as someone less than human who deserves shaming and judgment, it’s not acceptable.
If Lana’s was the only story of exploitation in the industry, it would be one too many, but unfortunately, there are many others who carry the figurative and sometimes literal scars their time in porn left behind.
Sexual exploitation is not entertainment, and people are not products. To learn more about how the porn industry is connected to exploitation and trafficking, click here.
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