S2 EP5: Belle Delphine discusses selling her bathwater, dealing with stalkers and why she’s called ‘The Queen of the Simps’

31:16And then I think there are a lot of people who, I think everyone on the internet gets hate. Nothing I'm going through is different than anyone else. So, but you know, some things are more hurtful than others and then other things just fly over my head. So. I'm just thinking about, and I may have a skewed perspective because I did a story about the far right as it exists online and the followers of someone called Nicholas Fuentes, who came to fame recently, or I should say greater fame because he was associating with Kanye West. But really more than anything, what I got from him and his community was an antipathy, a real dislike or resentment of women.

31:58And they're constantly going about e-girls and just basically it was just a rampant misogyny. But it was very striking. It was a feeling that, and I think it's associated with the incel phenomenon, these so-called involuntary celibates and the idea that women have too much power and women need to be taken down and women shouldn't be allowed in our communities. Do you recognize any of that? Oh yeah, definitely. I think the first time where my address was leaked, it was because there's this whole very, I don't know whether to call it alt-right or whatever what it was, but it was definitely a misogynistic movement basically of men that were really angry about anyone who had OnlyFans because they were angry that they weren't paying tax which is untrue I definitely was um but they were saying all of these OnlyFans girls they don't pay tax they've got it so easy and then just basically tearing down any aspect of what we're doing we're all sluts and things like this and then one person who was a part of this movement came to my house and started regularly visiting it a day at night taking photos outside of it and I only became aware about it because he stuck a piece of paper on my door saying pay your taxes and my mum found it and she was like what is this and I was like oh my god and then because of that I saw the 4chan thread of course it's on 4chan where he was posting all of these photos outside my house so um very scary very unhinged photos of your house yeah outside of my house really yeah when you were still living with your mum this was yeah that must have been alarming Very disturbing.

33:39Yeah, it was because you're not quite sure what to do about that. So I went down the usual route, contacted the police, and obviously what can they do? So they blurred my house on Google Maps, which I feel like does the Barbra Streisand effect. So I feel like... Right, it's like if you want Belle Delphine's house, look for the blurred one. Blurred house, yeah. But I moved house pretty soon after that, and so did she. So it wasn't really an issue. Was it an organized group? Or was it just a sort of grassroots collection of 4chaners saying, oh, here's, we need to do this thing? It was this strange, relatively small group, I'd say maybe about 100 men or something.

34:20And it wasn't just me that they were harassing. They were harassing any girls. And they were going, a lot of them, because I'm UK-based, but most of them were American-based. So they're reporting all of these girls as business to the IRS and things like this to try and get the IRS to do investigations on these girls and things like that. But I'm in the UK and I also do pay my taxes. So I wasn't really bothered about it. Apart from, obviously, I didn't like him coming to my house. To what extent is it a concern that because you have this intense virtual relationship with fans that it could become something more troubling or dangerous or dark?

34:55This is a big fear I have. So a lot of other sex workers or cosplayers have a lot more experiences than me, the ones who have been doing it longer. And I've spoken to a few of them. And one thing that they do is they never speak about their experience because I feel like it's only a ripple effect. Once you speak about it, you're more likely to encourage like stalkers or harassment or anything like that. But it is worrying. and especially for example there was this one girl called Bianca Devins she was an e-girl and she posted similar content to me I think she was younger though and I on Instagram or which was Instagram yeah but and she wasn't sexual anything like that but Bianca was murdered Bianca Devins it was July 2019 she was 17 and she was murdered by Brandon Andrew Clark who thought he was in a relationship with Bianca.

35:49And when that came out, it was obviously big news, especially within my community because she was an e-girl and so many girls were like, you know, shocked by this, just people in general. And then there was a comment on a news article about this and the top comment was, oh, Belle Delphine should be next. And it had, I think, about a thousand likes on it. And that just, because I was on holiday at the time when all of this happened, and I think it just made me, it was like kind of a jolt of uncomfortability, someone commenting that I should be killed next on an article about a real girl who had just been murdered.

36:28It just felt a bit more real than any other comment and I didn't like how many so many people were liking it, casually agreeing with that statement. Well, I'm not surprised. Yeah, it's quite upsetting. I would imagine. How did you process that? How did you kind of just... I was just disturbed. I mean, what can I do? I can't take down that comment or reply to them being like, hey, this is not nice. What can I do? There's nothing I can do. I think it just hit different because anyone on the Internet gets, you know, death threats and things like this. But this is all just standard of the Internet.

37:03It doesn't mean anything. I think the one things that I've really kept a lookout are not violent comments like that, more so disturbing comments, things that are quite bizarre, that don't make sense and are consistent. So I like to leave all my messages open. So on Instagram and Twitter, my DMs are open. So you are free to message me and I've got my email public as well. So you can message me because I want people to message me because I want to kind of have a grasp on if anyone is obsessed with me in a way that I should be aware of. And that has actually helped me with people who have been obsessed with me.

37:47I had to, there was this one guy in the UK who I didn't take it to court or pursue anything like that because he had mental health issues. And I didn't think that the court process would help anything like that so it's just a constant barragement of taking his very erratic strange messages and emails and letters and posts and all of these things claiming that he knew who I was and that I was a 30 year old woman and that we were in love and that he met me many times and that we had this whole relationship and he'd rewrite the same handwritten letter hundreds of times and send me really sad gifts for example like Lilo and Stitch merch and Care Bears and things that made me feel really upset because obviously this guy has mental issues in it it's just really upsetting that he wanted to send me something sweet like that and I just feel really sad it makes me feel really sad I'm not angry at him at all which is why I like keeping things like this open because I like keeping tabs in case I do get a weird guy like a real bad weird guy one day you know right yeah so what did you do about that uh well he actually also sent me his birth certificate his passport and all of his credit cards which is when I first contacted the police because I was like this guy it's not mentally stable and now he sent me all of his credit cards, his documents, and a receipt from a doctor's appointment or something like this with his psych report.

39:24And it was just, I was like, okay, he needs to get all of this back. So that's when I contacted the police about it. But I mean, what do you do? What do you do about something like that? Well, I think you do what you did, which is notify the police, don't take his money and then the lilo and stitch merchandise is a gray area yeah i've put them all in one big box i haven't opened any of it because i don't really feels quite uncomfortable i don't really want this a sweet teddy with this weird connotation so i've kept them all in a box in case anything strange does happen because with stalker cases you have to prove repeated behavior yeah so that's something that i've kept in mind in case documented that's one day yeah and the thing is with online things is a lot of people can believe that they are in love with you and that is a difficult part on the other side to deal with because at the same time this is my business I do want people to be admired by me I suppose because that's I suppose where I own my money but at the same time I think at the end of it I don't care about money that much so if someone is getting to the point of obsession.

40:39I have blocked people before. It's tricky because you are, I think you've said selling a girlfriend experience. Is that the term? Yeah. So you can see how there's a scope for a level of, it's not ambiguity as such, but there's a sort of a consensual fiction that's in place. They know that you're not, hopefully they know you're not their girlfriend, but you're both pretending a little bit? I suppose in a way I speak to a lot of these people one-to-one and it's not like anything I'm saying is fake because a lot of these people as I said are normal people and I actually do enjoy their conversations and a lot of them ask me about my hobbies I ask them about their hobbies I'm quite open sexually as well so it's quite fun being openly sexual with them as well i quite enjoy that personally myself they pay a bit extra for one-to-one slightly yeah your baseline on only fans is 35 a month subscription yes that's right which is i only know a little bit about only fans because i saw i did a program a couple of years ago my recollection is 35 is on the higher end it is yeah but it's working for you it is i think one thing that I'm not going to do is I'm not going to falter on the price I think it is what it is and I'm very confident in what I produce on there I think I like being a little bit on the higher end I think it adds to maybe the exclusivity of it feeling of it and it is expensive though it is a little bit expensive.

42:19I think you probably will not tell me how many subscribers you have. It constantly changes. Does it? Yeah, it does. It fluctuates quite a lot month to month. It seems like the figure that's commonly given out in terms of revenue, sorry, it's a bit crass to talk about money. It's okay. Nevertheless, it's sort of come up, hasn't it? Is, have I got this right about a million pounds a month yeah does it sound about right yeah

42:51which is a good living as they say and this isn't by i don't i'm not trying to this isn't an expose and we can choose to gloss over this if you like obviously there's a degree of management that goes on on only fans accounts just wouldn't be realistic for you notionally you're available around the clock right are you able to talk about that would you prefer not to go too far into that i'm fine so quite evidently if you've got say 15 000 only fan subscribers and they're all hoping to get individualized content or daily photos you are not going to be able to do that one person it's physically impossible for one person my messages are way too much for me to message everyone well how in terms of management help how does that work in terms of managing the account So this is the one problem.

43:39I can't message everyone. It is just me, but I'm quite picky. So I do have like a bunch of people that I speak to, maybe 50 different people, maybe 100 people who are either high tippers or people who are maybe medium range tippers, but I personally like who have been subscribed to me for a while. So I just can't message everyone. it's not something that I think you should expect that's a lot for you too I mean look people are going to be listening to this and saying it's better than working in a factory Louis like she's making a million a month like why wouldn't she work hard for it like but I do think in terms of your headspace and that level of intimacy spread across so many people I just think psychologically that's quite complicated it is quite strange on self-reflection I think speaking sexual so much of the day, not every of my conversation is sexual with people, but a lot of them are.

44:43And that's okay. So I think it is quite strange being so much in a sexual mind state. And I think that's quite strange to manage internally. Some days I won't. And then some days I'm feeling it. So I think it fluctuates, you know. You said between 50 and 100, right? Yeah. But not daily. Not daily. No, I won't message them every day. But I mean, it's quite, I'm a very fast typer. So I can have around 15 conversations all at the same time. And as soon as I've sent one message, I'm going back up to the top and I'm replying to the other person. That sounds, I'm sorry, that really sounds crazy making.

45:27That would drive me bonkers. Not that people are queuing up to ask for it from me. But you know all these people. It's like if you're on Facebook and you're messaging like five of your mates at the same time. It's kind of like. And you're saying like, oh, wow, you're making me really hot. Next one. Oh, you're making me. You know what I mean? Like it must get. No, it's more. Sexting is different to casual sexual conversations. So casual sexual conversations really just go over my head. It's like normal conversations to me. I wouldn't be able to sex that many people at the same time. For sexting, things like that, it's very one-on-one.

46:04Got you. Yeah, I didn't mean to confuse sexting with casual sexual conversations. Should we talk a little bit about where you came from? I know you grew up in South Africa, in Cape Town, is that right? Yeah. Your dad was a... He worked in making adverts and movies and production, things like that. And your mum had gone over as a model, is that right? Yeah. that's how they met it sounds like it was complicated it was complicated i think they were very young and i think they were looking back now being the same age as my mother when she had me i can look back now and reflect upon that and be like wow 23 that is i think so yeah 23 yeah that is young yeah it's very young so she went over there for work they met each other there and they were pressurized to get married because her visa ran out at the same time that she got pregnant with me only a year into knowing each other so maybe a controversial thing to say but i don't think my dad was i think some people aren't meant to be parents and i think that's okay and i think i knew that on very early on i don't hold you know that there was no aspect of raising children that he seemed to enjoy.

47:23My childhood was very much tiptoeing around my dad. And I think that was the main thing that I sort of thought about him was just, he's going to shout at me if I do something. And for example, he wouldn't hold my school bag because it was pink and, you know, real silly things like that. There was no interest in anything I was interested in. I was very embarrassed about liking the things that I liked, like childish things because I was a child. he would make fun of that I think I could tell he's got no interest in me so I think you have no relationship with your dad is that right no I don't any interest in attempting to change that I did try so I reached out to him and this was at the beginning when I bought my first house so I felt like I was rooted in England work was going quite well how long ago was this This was early 2019.

48:22You had already bought your first house early 2019? Yeah. With Patreon money? Yeah. Wow. So I try to rekindle something there because I think when you get older, I've always been understanding. He had a very tough upbringing, so I can kind of see why he is the way. And I feel like I have a lot of empathy and sadness for that. so I tried to rekindle it but it did not go well because he didn't I knew I couldn't tell him he was the only person I couldn't tell about what I do because I'm open everyone else in my family knows I never wanted it to be a secret thing because everyone always finds out eventually but he was the one person that I knew wouldn't accept it and he didn't and I didn't really know how to how to go on from that because I already tried to get over my own childhood issues that I had with him because it's quite sad never knowing your father and if he dies and not being able to say anything but I think after that I was like there's no way that I'm ever gonna have a normal or even vaguely normal relationship with him he's just tides apart from everything and it would just be negative.

49:35Wow. When was the last time you saw him? 2019. You went there or he came over here? He came over and he came over to my house, met my partner for the first time. It all went well. And then obviously he saw that I owned a house and was like, how has she done this sort of thing like that? And obviously, I guess, Googled me straight afterwards. And then I think it was That evening or the next day, he just went wild, went crazy. It was just so, just the messages he was writing, it was horrible. But he's always been like that, so it's not something that I wouldn't have not expected. So it's just very in character.

50:17I'm not sure what I was expecting. I'm not sure if I was expecting him not to find out. But I guess I was just trying. it was all I could do to I don't know well yeah I mean I think it's good that you did try I guess I always would have wondered if I didn't he was a drinker I think no my mum was oh well they both were but my mum was was that part of the toxicity of the relationship yes yeah I think because he had bad anger issues and she had a drinking problem which was got quite bad and I don't think he knew how to deal with it because she was going through her own thing I mean everyone's just faulted troubled people I think with problems like that and I think when you've got two troubled people trying to look after each other it's just not gonna work no so so you're okay now with not having a relationship with your dad you feel like that's okay yeah I don't really know what having one's like so I guess I've never really mourned not having it it's not like I had a great father and then he passed away and now I really feel that emptiness I don't feel any emptiness which is a good thing I think I don't have that negative scared feeling anymore so obviously it's a big step to put naked pictures of yourself put sex acts of yourself on the internet do you suppose if you're relationship with your parents had been in a better place I'm thinking mainly of your dad that might have held you back I wouldn't have done it you wouldn't have I already know that if and it seems so typical like oh you've got daddy's issues or whatever but I really do feel like that is the reason I feel like my father issues have stemmed through a lot of aspects of my life For example, when I look for a partner, I look for someone who's older and will be a father figure to me in a way.

52:21And that goes into a lot of different aspects in my life, sexual relationship. I think it can't not affect someone growing up. Right. And so in your relationships, it's someone, not a provider, because you're really the provider. Yeah. But someone who feels like they can look after you in some sense? Who's like a daddy, yeah. What does that mean, they're like a daddy? Like someone who will look after you, you feel safe around, who takes control over situations, who you can fall back on, who is there to help and provide for you. Not monetarily, but in all other aspects where I feel like I'm unable to fill those roles for myself and look after myself in certain ways I struggle with.

53:10Solid and stable and dependable and practical and emotionally mature and consistent. I know you've got a significant other, a man friend, a boyfriend. Partner. partner who's been with you the whole time you've been in the public eye that's right isn't it he likes to remain in the background I think yes I think uh we both think it's probably the best thing um but he comes along and on all my journeys and it's quite fun and it's great to have I need a person supporting me I wouldn't be able to do all this I mean there's so much behind the scenes and everything's so complicated so I kind of need a buddy.

53:56And how is your relationship with your mum? It's getting better. It's gotten a lot better. She's okay with the sex work? Yeah. She wasn't at first, which I don't blame her at all. It's not a good thing for your child to do. I wouldn't want my children to do it. Well, look, we have to be conscious that there's a lot of people out there listening who may be in sex work and perhaps doing it in a healthy way, right? Well, and you're doing it now, would you say, in a healthy way? Yeah, yeah, I think so. But I still think it's not something that you dream for your children to do. So I understand why she was contentious about it at the beginning.

54:30Well, the quote you gave that I've written down is, I don't think sex work should be normalized so much. I don't think it should be such an easy job to get into. Yeah. Do you stand by that? I do, yeah. Why? One thing that I don't think people think about that much is, It really, really is true. Whatever you post on the internet stays on the internet. You know that. But I think when it comes into terms of sexual things, for example, I think it's quite uncomfortable and will be quite uncomfortable for when I turn 30 or 35, knowing that there's nude photos of me when I'm 18 on the internet. and maybe when I have my own daughter of myself reflecting when she turns my age I think um it's just quite uncomfortable I'm not against sex work at all obviously but I don't like how easy it now is to get into because it's accessible you can do it from your house and I think it is such a personal job and for example there's so many things you don't think about that you can now realize I mean I've been lucky for example that I've stayed with my partner and I think it will be a long time thing for the rest of my life but what about if you shoot content with a partner and maybe things go quite sour where's the line where you shot content with your ex-girlfriend right and now you've got a new partner everything's going great do you still keep reselling this video of you and your ex-partner to people because it makes you money where is this line here's another thing i haven't personally had this but other people have where relatives buy your only fans how do you deal with your uncle purchasing your only fans you know people for whom that was the case people have spoken about it yeah and it's very normal for old school friends who knew you as a child when they were also a child who subscribed to you there's just yeah there's a lot of weird things that happen.

56:25I get the feeling you've got mixed feelings about being involved in this work. Completely it's definitely a fun job I like doing it I've always been quite a sexual person even growing up when I was younger it's quite fun and exciting but at the same time sex has a lot of complexities more than any other subjects I feel like because sex can be hot and then it can be strange and then it's uncomfortable and there's so many different elements to it and consent is so big in this and sometimes you consent to putting something out on the internet and you've done that at the time but then looking back on it you wish you might not have done that but now it's you can't take it back but you basically you were offered too much money to turn down like the money that was offered in the sense you were you became aware that there were tens of millions of pounds on offer if you were prepared to do this thing yeah and you thought well i'd be crazy not to i think it's interesting because a lot of people maybe say you're given a hypothetical and it's like if you do this one weird thing you can get this pot of gold and you'll be like oh yeah I'll do it or no I won't do it but I think it really changes this hypothetical question when you're like if I do this I know 100 % I will get at least this and that even being a thing really changes the way that you think about what will people do for money like how far will people go because I never thought I'd go this far at the beginning I only thought I'd do lingerie and then I said I would only do implied nudity and then I was like I'll only do nudity and then it's I'll only do solo must can I say that masturbation thing and then just before I knew it I was like I know that if I post this I will be able to buy my house my dream house and I did it and now I've got my dream house that was the full contact full intercourse that was when I was at my peak and I knew that I had the most eyes on me on the internet and I was right.

58:38That was the time I had the most eyes on me. And I was like, we're talking late 2020. Yeah. When you had just you'd done many of your stunts. And what was in the background, you were doing your podcasts. You were just I get what you were just aware that that's why I did all those podcasts was because I knew I was the biggest I was ever going to be. I needed all eyes on me then to really push this video that I was going to sell and even though I regret how it came out because I don't think it was that good thing is I was is it still on your OnlyFans it is yeah but I'm very inexperienced in it I wish I could have changed it but do I regret it no you think the production values could have been higher it was just quite shit quite awkward It was quite shit.

59:25It was quite awkward, yeah. There's one thing, posting your first porn video. And there's another thing, posting your first porn video, knowing millions of people are going to see it. And the pressure of that was too much for me. And that ended up making a worse video. So if I had none of that pressure, it would have been better. How much money did you make on it? Around, around 5 million. Really? Yeah. For real? Yeah. You've said, I'll do everything and then I'll leave. Right? Yeah. So what does that look like? Have you already got an exit plan? No, I don't. I think at the moment, I'm not doing any stunts on the internet.

1:00:07I found it all consuming. When I was doing that all during 2019, 2020, it was my entire life. It was all that I could think about. I didn't hang out with friends. I didn't see my family. I feel like my relationship was getting quite strained because of how work-orientated and focused I'd become. I was very much on the machine and I was not going to quit until I made the choice to where I thought, okay, now I'm going to take the break and cash out. So now I don't feel pressured to really try and make a lot of money because I'm in a fortunate position where I've bought my house now. Don't have to stress about that.

1:00:41Is it huge? It's a country house. How many How many bedrooms? Eight. How many bathrooms? Seven. Wow. But one poor guy doesn't get a bathroom in his bedroom. It's a sad story. Very sad. But I'm in a good place now. I'm just doing what I enjoy. Would you still like to have an internet presence? like would you still like to have even if it's a kind of a more vanilla kind of content would that be fun or that you see that i wish i wish there was a way to kill me on the internet and just like somehow delete everything or just kind of die in a sense and uh just move on i like chapters really yeah i think just like to disappear would be a nice yeah maybe maybe close the chapter but there's no way to do that which is fine well what you can do is just as we were saying disappear stop doing anything maybe what you're saying is like rather than fizzle out and have a kind of lower rated non-adult content social media account you'd prefer just to be completely gone i'm not interested in the fame aspect of it so there would be nothing really holding me on at that point and I think once it's run its course just leave it

1:02:36hi me again louis through just to remind you you're listening to the louis through podcast and now back to my conversation with belle delphine

1:02:49so i think we're pretty good you know do you feel all right yeah that was awesome okay i'm really glad you say that i felt like i was trying to translate the internet from someone who just derived from 1756 and was only you know just getting their head around movable type and newspapers and there's me going like and a simp is and youtube is and only fans is you've got a good understanding though thank you very grounded being the king of tiktok comes with its perks

1:03:40Okay, so there it was, me talking to Belle Delphine. And since that was recorded, she's actually disappeared back behind the veil of anonymity that OnlyFans affords her. That is to say, she's still doing stuff on OnlyFans, but on no other platforms. she's not done any other interviews i found it a fascinating chat and in a weird way sort of well i've interviewed sex workers on tv but i think it's a podcast first for me and i feel like um despite my kind of boomer qualities i think i appreciate what she brings to the table right the sort of strange artistry that she has infused in her various internet outings and And I mean, whether that's still happening, I suppose in a weird way, maybe I sense some ambivalence on her part about doing the sex work.

1:04:39Well, quite clearly, she says she doesn't really recommend it. And it feels conflicted about working in that industry and thinks that maybe we put too much as a culture. Well, it's not that it's not stigmatized. you know is probably unfairly stigmatized but it's also monetized massively and bell was completely open and forthright about her feeling that this was something that perhaps needed to have a degree of judgment attached to it which i wasn't really expecting it was also sort of an insight i thought the stuff around andrew tate and the idea that she kind of understands his tactics and that a lot of the controversy that attaches to both her and to Andrew Tate is kind of deliberate, that there's a provocation and a trolling in order to intrigue and draw eyeballs with a view to then converting those eyeballs into coin.

1:05:39Sorry for that weird image. Regarding stalkers, we'll put some information on where to get help in the show notes and you can also go to spotify.com slash resources. so good luck to Bell if you're listening a big thank you to you Credits produced by Millie Chu the assistant producer was Man Al-Yazri the production manager was Francesca Bassett and the executive producer is Aaron Fellows the music in this series is by Miguel de Oliveira this is a Mindhouse production for Spotify

1:06:19Thank you.