As a new Channel 4 documentary delves into the shocking real world of Bonnie Blue, mirror writer Ellie Fry argues that the viral adult star’s dark influence over young men and women is painfully ignored
Sat in a cosy cinema room packed full of press, Bonnie Blue, real name Tia Billinger, seems to be in her element.
As her famous face and bright blonde curls pop up on the big screen, us viewers have no idea what’s in store as we sit down to watch one of the biggest adult stars in the world appear in a brand new Channel 4 documentary, which promises to deliver full access to the real life of Bonnie Blue.
But sitting there alongside her “proud” mum, other family members and small team, Bonnie knows all too well that the extreme sex empire she’s painstakingly crafted is about to become even more mainstream, as the broadcaster has spared no blushes in its fly-on-the-wall hour-long show, titled “1000 Men and Me: The Bonnie Blue Story”.
Her life behind the scenes and the inner workings of her multi-million pound businesss have been shrouded in mystery until now.
But one thing Bonnie’s always been desperate to promote are her extreme sex challenges. The star’s troubling social media strategy, where she posts aggressively across platforms like Instagram and TikTok, means that everyone – including young girls and boys – can easily stumble across a glimpse of her explicit content, where she boasts about sleeping with married men and being “helpless” as men “take her”.
Sadly, Channel 4’s deep dive does little to hold Bonnie accountable for the undeniable responsibilities she has as a world famous adult star promoting potentially dangerous sex stunts on social media.
Our online landscape is already teeming with violent porn and unhealthy perceptions of sex, and in this bleak attention economy of viral videos and views, it seems as though there’s no limit to how far Bonnie will push herself.
Chillingly, the star’s whole business model centres around sleeping with ‘normal’ men in amateur videos.
What struck me watching the film is the horrifying juxtaposition of going to such extreme, unrealistic measures with everyday members of the public.
Bonnie positions herself as somewhat of a saviour – relishing in giving the average man a chance to sleep with a porn star, or “teaching barely legal” virgins how to perform in the bedroom.
She says in the doc: “I found my purpose in porn. I found the niche I want to focus on. And it’s not just because I’m obsessed with 18-year-olds, it was such a bigger picture in terms of teaching them how to have sex; watching their face light up as they lost their virginity. I really love that.”
But while these gritty, ‘homemade’ scenes may seem real – and earn Bonnie millions of pounds – the relatability ends at the amateurs involved. The star’s extreme stunts – from sleeping with 1,057 men in a day and planning to cage herself in a glass box in a sex ‘petting zoo’ – are merely perpetuating dangerous myths about what women need to do for their partners – and what men should expect in the bedroom.
In a bid to brush away her critics, who have questioned the ethics and power dynamic in her content, Bonnie says that she talks about consent until she’s blue in the face, insisting that every participant has to sign a consent form and show ID before taking part.
But I can’t help but notice her thirst for control over the participants she chooses – notably people who are not in the porn industry, or have never filmed such extreme content before – and wonder where that stems from.
It seems as though she deliberately profits from the vulnerability and innocence of the young men and women who agree to appear in her films. And this connection to the everyday public is exactly where that danger lies – it feels so within reach, despite being so extreme.
The star’s ex husband Oliver Davidson, who appears fleetingly in the film, explains her strategy perfectly. “She really connects with the fans,” he says. “Most people, if they do porn, they seem out of reach. You’re never going to meet them. You’re never going to be able to film with them. Whereas Bonnie puts a location online, and then obviously her fans can actually film with her. It’s like a defining moment in porn, where she’s completely changed the game.”
But the normalisation of such severe porn will soon seep into the psyche of young people being fed the content by the giants at Meta and TikTok. And this marketing strategy puts Bonnie at risk too. The star admits in the film that she hasn’t left the house alone in the last six months, and fears being attacked by acid on the street.
The documentary is radically uncensored in its depiction of Bonnie’s work and shows explicit sex scenes, something Channel 4 says is “editorially justified” and “presented in a non-gratuitous manner”.
Seeing what happens behind the scenes is no doubt shocking, but it’s the lesser known ‘challenges’ involving young women that are more disturbing to me.
In the show, the more viral Bonnie gets, the further she leans into these extreme sex acts, as she begins relying on the use of young girls in her content.
One scene shows Bonnie filming a sex tape with multiple other young female OnlyFans creators and a male porn star. Interviewing the women who have been recruited to take part in the stunt, filmed in a school classroom, the documentary’s director reveals that the creators aren’t being paid to take part.
One young woman, who profits on OnlyFans with solo work and content with her partner, tells the camera that she’s never done anything this “adventurous” and looks visibly nervous.
Another timidly admits that the only time she’s ever seen live sex is in Amsterdam in the red light district. A third creator, a 21-year-old woman, admits her subscribers love her content because she looks so much younger than she is.
In an admission that makes my stomach churn, Bonnie says of the classroom stunt: “The fact that they are so nervous actually works in my favour, because their reactions are going to be more realistic.”
Bonnie seems to relish in stamping out the innocence of her participants. Yes, they’ve all consented. But the undercurrent of exploitation, in a classroom full of young women who have never filmed porn before, never mind extreme content, feels palpable. What message does that send out to young boys watching her videos, whose perceptions of consent and power are being shaped by such content?
To me, the star appears to hide behind the guise of empowerment – both of herself and virgins, young content creators and ‘normal’ men – when in reality she is profiting from their vulnerability and glorifying rape culture with her ‘challenges’.
Her petting zoo stunt, that got cancelled after OnlyFans decided to permanently ban her from its platform at the final hour, would have seen Bonnie “tied down” in a glass box in a house in London, where strangers would come and do “whatever they wanted”. Bonnie bragged in the documentary: “I am going to be completely helpless, tied down, gagged, choked”.
Alarmingly, a recent government review found porn involving non-fatal strangulation (NFS) was “rife” and that its prevalence online was contributing to choking becoming commonplace in some people’s sex lives – particularly among young people.
Even more disturbingly, the UK courts have seen an alarming rise in women’s lives ending after what those accused of their deaths say were ‘sex games gone wrong’.
To the feminists who challenge her behaviour, Bonnie hits back, saying in the doc: “You fought for women’s rights for years and years. You’ve fought for us to have control over our body and be empowered by that. I’m now living by that.
“And suddenly you want me to shut up, have a couple of kids, get married and stay quiet, but I don’t want that. If anything, I’m an image of what you’ve just been asking for for years and years. And suddenly you see it, and you’re now thinking, f***, we don’t want this woman to speak proudly of sex.”
As a woman who openly brags about using rage-bait as the cornerstone of her business model, spamming multiple TikTok and Instagram accounts a day with content designed to outrage, it’s hard to take anything Bonnie says seriously.
But she certainly refuses to take any responsibility for the influence she may have over the younger generation. When asked how she feels about young teenagers coming across her content, Bonnie admits she “forgets” to think of it from that point of view.
She then says bluntly: “There’s also a parent’s responsibility to say, hey, there’s people in the world that do mass murders. [It] doesn’t mean you do that.”
Even if it’s not Bonnie’s job to educate young people on safe and healthy sex, there’s something sinister in wanting to profit from those who may be vulnerable. In one part of the show, she admits: “I really want to do a disabled gang bang”. Rage-bait or not, where do we draw the line at accepting such statements? And who is being “empowered” here?
Channel 4 failed to press Bonnie on that vile remark. It’s a show that leaves more questions than answers, and feels more like an advert than a documentary.
It’s too early to say just how much of an impact this new trend of extreme sex stunts will have on young people, but it feels like a nightmare waiting to happen – and, as the show does thankfully note, Bonnie clearly has no interest in taking accountability for the fallout.