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Member FDIC. From

0:28

The New York Times, this is the interview.

0:31

I'm David Marchese. To

0:35

be influential online today is to

0:37

be bombarded with all sorts of

0:39

difficult questions about self-presentation, public judgment,

0:42

freedom of speech, personal power, and

0:44

money. Over the last decade

0:46

or so, Mia Khalifa has been forced

0:48

to try to find some answers. In

0:51

2014, when Khalifa, who was born in

0:53

Lebanon and raised Catholic in the D.C.

0:55

area, was 21 years old, she

0:58

made a decision that changed the rest of her life. Khalifa

1:01

was working in the adult film industry and

1:04

performed in an explicit scene while

1:06

wearing a hijab. The

1:08

video went viral and the response was harsh.

1:10

She even got death threats, including a

1:13

photoshopped image of her being beheaded by

1:15

the Islamic State. The

1:17

vitriol was part of what led Khalifa to leave

1:19

the adult film industry and try to go back to

1:21

anonymity. She couldn't. So

1:23

a few years ago, she decided that

1:26

rather than try to pretend her past didn't exist,

1:28

she could try to own it. She

1:30

gradually turned herself into a massively

1:33

popular social media influencer, one

1:35

with a lingering aura of transgression. Khalifa

1:38

now has millions following her on X,

1:40

TikTok, and Instagram, and she's also built

1:42

a big audience on OnlyFans, which is

1:44

an online platform where subscribers can directly

1:47

pay performers for all kinds of content,

1:49

some of which is fairly innocuous, and

1:52

much of which, including Khalifa's, is, let's

1:54

say, risque. I'd

1:56

been dimly aware of the controversy surrounding Khalifa

1:58

back in 2014. and

2:01

was surprised in recent years to see her still popping

2:03

up here and there, on

2:05

unofficial lists of top-only fans earners, on

2:07

the great Hulu show, Rami, and

2:09

in passing coverage of her jewelry brand, Shaitan.

2:12

Then last year, I saw her name come up again,

2:15

after she posted inflammatory tweets following

2:17

Hamas' terrorist attack in Israel on

2:20

October 7th. How

2:22

did the person I'd heard about a decade ago turn

2:24

into this person, an apparently still

2:27

controversial influencer with a

2:29

multi-platform following in the tens of millions? I

2:32

suspected that the answers might have something to say

2:34

about the wider world of being famous

2:36

online. I'd been curious about the

2:38

influencer corner of the internet for some time,

2:41

how these people build and rebuild their

2:43

personal brands, how they handle controversies, and

2:46

the potential cost to someone's head and heart

2:48

of choosing to live such a public life. Here's

2:52

my conversation with Mia Khalifa. How

2:58

do you feel about your brand? To

3:02

start, I've seen you online

3:05

or in other interviews talk about the idea that

3:07

you're kind of in the middle of a rebranding,

3:11

but the thing that I haven't seen you talk

3:13

about is what you think

3:16

your brand was and

3:18

what you want your brand to be now. So

3:21

can you sort of fill that story in

3:23

for me? I

3:25

feel like my brand

3:27

at the beginning wasn't something that

3:30

was very much in my control. It happened. I

3:33

kind of became infamous by accident. I entered

3:36

the adult industry in October

3:39

of 2014, and

3:42

very, very quickly I was pressured

3:44

to perform in a

3:46

video where the context

3:49

was that I was an Arab

3:51

failed woman, and

3:53

that was it. The intent was to

3:56

exploit the fact that I was Arabic and spoke Arabic.

4:00

I went through with it and not very long after, I

4:02

would say like maybe a couple

4:04

hours after it premiered, the avalanche started

4:07

and every news outlet picked it up

4:09

and everybody had an opinion

4:11

on it and felt like from there on

4:13

my fate was sealed. And all

4:15

of a sudden I was completely out

4:18

of control of my image,

4:20

my reputation, my intentions. Every

4:22

single thing about me was being misunderstood. I feel

4:25

like a lot of people have slutty

4:28

phases when they're 20, 21,

4:30

like in college and unfortunately

4:32

mine was in

4:34

4k. So how

4:37

did it become clear to you that like

4:39

you couldn't really go back to normal life in

4:41

the way that you wanted? I was

4:44

working at a law office and

4:48

I started to feel like a distraction

4:50

in the office. Anyone who would come in, there

4:54

would be whispers in the waiting room and

4:56

if other attorneys came to visit from other

4:58

firms, there would be whispers within that and

5:01

I just started to feel very much like

5:03

a distraction and

5:05

uncomfortable. And that's when I

5:07

realized like this isn't going to

5:09

change, this isn't going to go anywhere, this isn't going to

5:11

get better. I don't like feeling this

5:13

way, I don't like you know the

5:16

women that I work with looking at me a certain

5:18

way and I especially don't like the

5:20

men looking at me a certain way because

5:22

it's a bit of like

5:24

a zoo animal. It's that type of fascination

5:26

and those type of whispers, not necessarily to

5:29

say that it was abusive or disrespectful but

5:31

it was just like that's

5:33

not something that I wanted to keep dealing with. So

5:36

I reopened social media and I decided

5:38

to actually try to be

5:40

an influencer and to be someone who was

5:42

a public person if that was the fate

5:44

that I had sealed for myself. So

5:47

in that sense when we talk about what

5:49

your brand was, really we just

5:51

mean how people

5:53

knew you. Yes, the brand that they

5:55

formed in their head because there was no intention, there

6:00

was no purposeful intention behind that

6:02

brand. And I think

6:04

that where I am now

6:07

mentally, emotionally, just on every

6:09

level is a complete

6:11

180 from who I was. I

6:15

want my brand to represent being

6:18

a contradiction. That's my brand,

6:20

just evolution. I

6:23

think you have somewhere in the neighborhood

6:25

of 6 million followers on X, 26

6:28

million people follow you on Instagram. I

6:31

think 38 million follow you on TikTok.

6:33

So how do you sort of reinforce

6:36

your brand on each

6:38

of those platforms? And how is it different on each

6:40

of those platforms? That's such a good question because you're

6:43

not going to succeed if you are the same

6:45

across all platforms. Not to say that you have

6:47

to be different, but you have to show different

6:49

sides of you. We're all multifaceted. And TikTok is

6:51

more for like my skincare

6:53

and like fun music and silly

6:56

videos. And then my Twitter

6:58

is, well, Twitter is my favorite app

7:00

in general. It's where I get all of

7:02

my news. It's very much about

7:06

activism and jokes and

7:08

just what Twitter was made for. So

7:11

I'm trying to find that balance of

7:14

hoping that my

7:18

grand intention gets across on all of

7:20

them while still being true

7:22

to what each platform is kind

7:24

of for. But my

7:27

assumption, tell me if I'm wrong, is

7:29

that your money maker is only fans

7:31

where you're also extremely popular. I mean,

7:33

I've seen in interviews, I

7:36

think someone once asked you, do you make $10,000

7:38

a day? And I don't remember if

7:40

you said yes, but I think you're like, it's in the

7:42

neighborhood of that. Or I've seen stories that suggested like $6

7:44

million a month. Like just really,

7:46

is that not? Oh my God, no,

7:48

that's insane. No, that's like Googling

7:50

someone's network. That's never accurate. Those

7:53

aren't true? No. Oh no. No.

7:57

But do you feel like there's any... tension

8:00

or anything to

8:02

reconcile in the fact that you

8:05

make your money on this one

8:07

platform that I assume is

8:09

predominantly men. And

8:11

it seems like sort of your followers on these other

8:13

platforms are women and just like

8:16

content wise, there are ways

8:18

in which they're not in alignment with the stuff

8:20

that's on OnlyFans. Like, does that feel

8:22

like something that you have to reconcile

8:24

in some way or how do you understand that gap?

8:28

It's not necessarily that because I feel like

8:30

the way that I'm on the platform is

8:32

a way that is very true to myself

8:34

and makes me feel comfortable

8:36

with being on it. I do not

8:39

like catering to the male audience, even though

8:41

it might seem like I do. Just

8:46

because I look a certain

8:48

way in a bikini does not necessarily mean it's not for

8:50

the girls. Like if anyone who

8:52

goes on my OnlyFans and asks for something

8:55

crude or something something past

8:57

my boundaries, like I don't do nudity

8:59

past what I've done in a fashion

9:01

magazine, which is like a see-through shirt

9:03

or something like that. So I

9:06

feel very, very secure. And

9:08

the audience that I've cultivated on that

9:10

platform also knows what they're in

9:12

for. So

9:15

I don't have trouble with that. I have more

9:17

trouble with

9:21

making sure that I'm

9:23

not promoting it as a platform

9:25

that is an answer to women who

9:27

are looking for quick money or

9:29

easy money or the life of an

9:32

influencer that they might see me live.

9:34

I feel like I have a responsibility to not

9:38

promote it as something that young women

9:40

or any woman should join unless they've

9:44

already been in the sex work industry, unless

9:47

they're over 25 and

9:49

their frontal cortex is formed, unless they're coming

9:51

at it from a place that is

9:55

not, I don't want to use

9:57

the word desperate, but just

10:00

from a place of clarity and from

10:02

a place of good intentions. An agency

10:04

maybe? Yeah, yeah, exactly. Thank you for

10:06

that. From a place of agency and

10:08

bodily autonomy. Not from a place

10:11

of, oh, I need to do this because

10:13

I want to live this lifestyle. Because that's

10:15

not the case. I am very much an

10:17

outlier. The reason that I'm able to be

10:19

so successful on that platform is because I'm

10:22

extremely fortunate. But

10:24

I've also paid the price with a lot

10:26

of misfortune. So me

10:29

going onto that platform felt like a

10:31

reclamation. Rather than, oh, I want

10:35

to do this so that I can live like this. And

10:37

maybe it would just be helpful to pull back for

10:40

a little and give some broader context

10:43

about how you got to that reclamation.

10:45

So there was the experience in the

10:48

adult film industry that you talked about. When

10:51

did the decision come to

10:54

give OnlyFans a try? So

10:57

initially I was on a platform called Patreon.

11:00

And it was so much work. It

11:02

was so much production. It was really,

11:04

really difficult to keep up because most

11:06

people who were on Patreon are doing

11:08

podcasts. And my tears are like, oh,

11:11

if you're on this tier, then you get this photoshoot. And

11:15

if you're on this tier, you get one

11:17

livestream of me cooking a week. And it started to

11:19

feel like I wasn't cut

11:21

out to be a streamer. And that's what it

11:23

started to feel like. It started to feel like I had

11:25

to host a podcast or do something to

11:27

make it worthwhile for Patreon members. And

11:30

then in 2020, I decided

11:33

to join OnlyFans after the Beirut

11:35

blast. And I made the

11:37

decision to join OnlyFans and

11:39

donate. If I was able to

11:41

make one hundred thousand dollars, I am donating one hundred

11:44

thousand dollars. And that's why I'm joining this platform. And

11:46

I was able to do that. And

11:49

after that, I realized

11:51

the community there isn't necessarily as negative

11:56

as I kind of had written it off to be

11:58

in my head. I

12:00

was able to reach that goal and I've

12:02

been on there ever since and I love

12:05

it. And you

12:07

have obviously had pretty

12:11

negative experiences in, I

12:13

guess we call it the sex work

12:16

industry. And I mean,

12:18

is it fair to categorize only

12:20

fans of sex work also? Technically it is.

12:22

And I feel like people who get

12:24

insulted by that feel ashamed of being

12:26

lumped in with sex workers, but no,

12:29

that is the definition, the adult industry, the sex

12:31

work industry. And so

12:33

on only fans, your experience in that industry

12:35

has been much more positive and it's one

12:38

of agency and sort of you're

12:40

in control. And you've

12:42

also spoken out pretty

12:45

candidly about what you see

12:47

as the dangers of the sex

12:49

work industry. Do you

12:51

find it difficult at all to kind of thread

12:54

the needle between talking

12:57

about what the potential harms of that industry

12:59

are while also

13:01

not further stigmatizing people

13:03

who work in that industry?

13:06

It seems like it could be a

13:09

very difficult needle to thread. Very.

13:12

I get a lot of backlash from women in the

13:14

industry for that reason actually. But to

13:16

be honest, I care more about the young

13:18

girls who haven't entered the industry yet and

13:21

see me and they're like, Oh

13:24

my God, I love her outfits. She's always traveling.

13:26

I want that life. And they don't like that.

13:29

That's my number one priority. I don't

13:31

care if another girl is getting mad at

13:33

me because I'm stigmatizing something. I feel like

13:35

someone's always going to get mad at you

13:37

about something. And I

13:40

don't care. It

13:45

is very contradictory of me to be on something and

13:47

tell other people, no, don't

13:49

join, but I'm not saying don't join.

13:51

I'm saying, I'm saying don't, don't,

13:56

don't join on, don't

13:59

join. Don't join us

14:01

like your first entryway into something.

14:03

Don't join as like as

14:06

it being an answer to all of

14:08

your problems because it's so difficult to

14:10

build an audience on there. It's so

14:12

hard. And it could

14:14

cut like you could just

14:16

don't do something you could regret. The

14:20

internet is forever. Your digital footprint,

14:22

especially this day and age is

14:25

so important. And I wish

14:27

I took that so much more seriously 10 years ago. And

14:31

you know, the subject of shame

14:34

is a complicated one. It's

14:36

the most powerful human emotion. And I

14:39

think it's complicated because particularly

14:41

from the outside looking at your experience, it

14:43

can feel like such a cliche and very

14:45

easy to go like, oh, you went through

14:47

these things. Like they were shameful things, you

14:49

know. But

14:53

sex work doesn't have to

14:55

be shameful. It's not inherently

14:57

shameful. I'm just

14:59

wondering if you can talk

15:01

through as much as you

15:03

can like what your relationship with shame is

15:06

now and sort

15:08

of if you feel like you've gotten past it

15:10

or maybe on some level like we all never

15:12

get past it. Oh, no, no, I hope not. You

15:15

call people shameless as a negative, like in a derogatory

15:17

way for a reason. Like I hope that I still

15:19

have a little bit of shame in me. I feel

15:21

like they're in

15:24

small doses. It's pretty healthy.

15:28

Why is it healthy? Well, I feel

15:30

like shame just stops you from being a

15:32

complete asshole sometimes, you know? Like it

15:35

stops you from just being completely

15:37

disrespectful and completely rude. Like have

15:39

you no shame? That's something that

15:41

like you gotta ask yourself once

15:43

in a while. So there

15:46

is a healthy amount, but then, you know, there's also

15:48

the other side of shame where even Pixar was like,

15:50

oh, for Inside Out 2, we wanted that to be

15:52

one of the emotions, but everybody

15:54

got too depressed. It was too sad. Like

15:57

shame is powerful. Shame can drive

15:59

you to... to make decisions that

16:01

are terrible and look at yourself in a

16:03

way that is so negative and talk

16:06

to yourself in a way that just buries

16:08

you so deep that you feel like you

16:11

can't crawl out of it. It's so heavy.

16:14

And you really just have

16:16

to think about why

16:19

do I feel ashamed of this? Do I feel ashamed of

16:21

it because it goes against my

16:23

fundamental beliefs, like my core beliefs,

16:25

or am I feeling ashamed because

16:28

people are laughing? Because if that's the case,

16:30

then you're not ashamed, you're embarrassed. And embarrassed

16:32

is a completely different emotion and

16:34

it requires a completely different set of tools to

16:36

work through. So

16:38

do you have a vision of what

16:41

an ethical adult film industry

16:45

would look like or would be? What

16:47

needs to change in that world? I think

16:49

that the predatory contracts need to change.

16:51

I think that the production companies who

16:53

are given impunity to enforce

16:55

these contracts, no matter the circumstances, like

16:57

even if a girl was,

17:00

let's say, drugged or under

17:02

the influence or trafficked

17:04

or all of

17:06

these awful, awful circumstances, that

17:10

does not matter to them. And there's

17:12

nobody to enforce anything. And

17:15

that is a big monster to fight.

17:18

You know, I was just watching

17:22

the other day, there was a talk you

17:24

gave at the Oxford

17:26

Union, not that long ago. And

17:29

during the sort of audience question and answer portion,

17:32

a young woman stood up and she prefaced

17:35

her question to you with, you know, I'm

17:37

paraphrasing, so maybe I'm not getting the terminology

17:39

exactly right, but she referred to you as

17:41

a feminist icon. Can

17:45

you talk about sort of

17:47

how feminism manifests

17:49

itself in

17:51

your work? That's a

17:53

really good question because I feel so

17:56

much imposter syndrome around being called that.

17:58

Why? I had so much internalized

18:01

misogyny that I had to work through. And I feel

18:03

like that didn't start until I started my therapy journey

18:05

at 26. Like I

18:09

am so ashamed of the things that

18:11

I've said and thought about myself and

18:13

allowed others to say and jokes

18:15

that I went along with and contributed

18:18

to about myself or about other women

18:20

or anything like that. I'm extremely ashamed

18:22

of that, which is why I say

18:24

there is no being here unless there

18:26

was change. So it's been

18:28

an evolution. But on

18:30

the OnlyFans platform, it's

18:33

my boundaries. It's the way I enforce them.

18:35

It's the way that if someone says a

18:37

word or describes a body

18:40

part in a way that's more crude than

18:42

I'll accept, they get

18:44

blocked. On Twitter, on Instagram,

18:46

on TikTok, all of those platforms, I feel

18:48

like I hope that it manifests in the

18:50

work that I do, the

18:52

people that I platform, the things

18:55

that I talk about in spotlight

18:57

like women's reproductive rights and anti-human

19:00

and sex trafficking efforts and all of these

19:02

things. I really, really hope that they come

19:04

across on those platforms. You

19:07

referred to internalized

19:10

misogyny. I mean, really, I

19:13

think in some ways you're talking about your background

19:15

and how you grew up. Can

19:18

you just talk

19:20

to me about sort of what you feel

19:22

like we're the most

19:24

formative aspects of your growing

19:26

up and like what are things

19:28

from your youth or

19:31

the culture you were raised in or your family that

19:34

you feel like you're still trying

19:37

to work through? The

19:41

internalized misogyny actually came more

19:43

from the American influences. It

19:46

was, I don't even

19:49

wanna platform the comedians, but it

19:52

was not being comfortable

19:54

as a woman in public, brown

19:57

skin and not being comfortable as an Arab woman. I

19:59

grew up in D.C. in a post 9-11 world. And

20:02

there was a lot of just blatant

20:05

racism. And I

20:07

started to hate myself and I started to

20:10

very, very much try and, you

20:12

know, fit myself

20:14

into the white category. Like, no,

20:17

I'm wearing Brooks Brothers and spares. What do

20:19

you mean? I'm not brown, I'm not Arab.

20:21

Like, I would join in on jokes like

20:23

that. I would join in on

20:25

jokes against women. I would put myself down

20:28

to hope that I can fit into to

20:30

places I shouldn't even have been trying to

20:32

fit into. And

20:35

I carry a lot of shame about that. But growing

20:37

up culturally as an Arab

20:39

woman, the formative things that kind of

20:41

like messed me up

20:43

psychologically was more so the

20:46

guilt, the expectate Catholic guilt,

20:48

the expectations, all of those

20:50

things. And

20:53

this is maybe connected, maybe

20:55

it's not, but you were

20:58

estranged from your family for a while,

21:00

but have recently reconciled or come

21:02

close to reconciling. So can you tell me about why

21:05

the estrangement happened and how you've been able

21:07

to heal that? Everyone

21:10

healed through shame. I

21:12

don't talk about my family a lot

21:15

for their privacy. They did not choose

21:17

the life in the public eye. And

21:20

out of respect for them, I do

21:22

not talk about them. But I will say that there

21:26

was a lot of radical empathy

21:28

that was practiced within the family

21:30

that made that possible. And

21:33

I'm really, really, really grateful for that.

21:37

I'm really glad you've gotten there

21:39

with them. Thank you. And

21:43

to your Lebanese. Yeah, I am. This

21:46

is a very difficult moment

21:48

for Lebanese people. The

21:52

violence there is escalating. Do you have

21:55

friends there? Do you have family there? I do,

21:57

I do. Thankfully, they're... Thankfully,

22:00

they're in the position where they're taking in

22:02

refugees and people who aren't

22:04

able to cross the borders right now, or at least having

22:06

to flee their homes. They're able

22:08

to open their doors and give them a place to stay. And

22:12

that's the best you can hope for the situation

22:14

in Lebanon right now. I

22:18

saw you say in

22:20

a relatively

22:23

recent interview that you're

22:26

talking about the idea of politics and what your

22:28

platform is. And you've

22:31

also talked in this context,

22:33

or just to be specific, like the

22:35

context of politics and political

22:38

beliefs about wanting

22:40

to make a difference in some way. So

22:43

how do you think

22:45

you're able to make a difference or how might you be able

22:47

to make a difference? It's

22:52

really just normalizing it,

22:55

making people see that it's not taboo

22:57

to talk about it. It's not to talk

22:59

about what? To talk about ending

23:01

the genocide, to talk about a ceasefire,

23:03

to talk about anti-abortion, to

23:09

talk about any of these things. It's not

23:11

taboo. It's not a, oh, you're an influencer, just

23:13

do your job. Oh, you're an athlete, keep politics

23:16

out. Oh, you're this. No, stick

23:18

to that. It's not taboo to have an

23:20

opinion. In fact, you're an

23:22

NPC if you don't have an opinion. You're

23:24

a non-playable character. You

23:27

literally do not exist. If

23:30

you have no interest in contributing

23:32

to the fight for human rights or basic

23:35

rights domestically or

23:38

internationally, what

23:40

are you good for? What are you good for? Like

23:43

Pharrell coming out and saying, I don't

23:45

think celebrities should have opinions on politics.

23:48

Please. This

23:51

is obviously a very

23:53

difficult subject or set

23:55

of subjects to talk about. I

23:57

don't feel like my role here is to... you

24:01

can condone ideas that you might have about

24:03

it or to rebut them. Her points of view are

24:05

not mine. I want to be clear about that from

24:07

the outset. And here I'm

24:09

thinking about, I think it was either on

24:11

October 7th of last year or maybe right after

24:13

October 7th. Like two days after. Right, you know

24:16

what I'm going to ask you. Yeah,

24:18

of course. Right, so

24:20

you posted on X,

24:23

there was one

24:25

post that was, I'm

24:28

going to paraphrase it, but you

24:30

were suggesting

24:32

the freedom fighters in Gaza

24:34

should flip their phones to horizontal in

24:36

order to better film it. And then there was another

24:39

post, I think it was on X,

24:41

probably right around the same time where

24:43

there were, it's hard

24:45

to know for sure, but it looks

24:48

like there were Hamas militants shooting into

24:50

an Israeli police car. As

24:53

a result of those posts, some companies that you were

24:55

in business with decided to stop doing business with you.

24:59

And I also want to add, you've said

25:01

while you're anti-Zionist, you're in no way

25:03

anti-Judaism. No, and

25:06

it's very important to not say

25:08

Jewish people when talking about Zionists.

25:12

But to my mind, those posts

25:16

didn't meet

25:18

the moral tenor of the moment. And

25:23

I'm not asking you to like defend

25:25

or explain those posts, but the

25:27

question I have is, whether

25:30

your experience with those

25:32

posts and the reaction that they

25:34

engendered made you think

25:37

differently about the

25:39

kinds of posts you want to make

25:42

about Gaza or

25:44

about politics, or sort of

25:46

really what the value and

25:48

use that you can bring

25:50

to these conversations might be. Of

25:53

course. So if

25:56

you'll allow me, I would like a chance to talk

25:58

about those tweets. So the

26:01

first one was not, the

26:03

reason I had said that was because there was a scene

26:07

that was really poetic and

26:11

symbolic and beautiful. And it was, a fence

26:13

was being broken down and it was

26:15

civilians, it was children. It felt

26:20

like the Berlin wall coming down. And

26:23

that's what I was talking about. And that's

26:25

why I said freedom fighters because every Palestinian

26:28

who still has a will

26:30

to live is a freedom fighter. So

26:33

that's what it was in reference to. And

26:36

the other one, the photo,

26:38

it just felt so baroque. Are

26:44

you referred to it as looking like a Renaissance painting? Yes, exactly.

26:46

Like there was, the composition,

26:48

everything about it. And I

26:50

feel like that's not, at

26:53

the time it was too soon but

26:55

I feel like that's not

26:58

a radical thing to say about something that

27:00

looks so, I mean, it really

27:03

did. It looked crazy. But

27:07

yeah, the timing was

27:09

not, it was too soon.

27:11

And that's

27:14

where I stand on that. And

27:16

all of the business that I

27:18

lost because of it was

27:21

extremely welcomed because if we really

27:23

disagree at that level, we

27:25

shouldn't be working together in the first

27:27

place. So I'm not angry about it.

27:29

I'm actually grateful for it. Unfortunately, it

27:32

had to play out like that. Unfortunately,

27:34

very, like this was the part that

27:37

I regret the most. And it

27:39

was my intention being so misconstrued

27:42

that people who were close to

27:44

me reached

27:46

out and were

27:49

deeply, deeply hurt by what I had

27:51

said. How did they explain they're

27:53

hurt? What were they? The

27:55

same as other people, I cannot believe that

27:57

you would say something this violently.

28:00

fueled, like I can't then and having to go

28:02

back and explaining to them my intention

28:06

and apologizing

28:10

for hurting them and really really

28:12

just just making sure that they understand who

28:14

I am as a person. And

28:17

did that experience incur

28:20

any changes about perhaps how

28:22

you think about what to post or when

28:24

to post it? Yes completely.

28:26

Completely because that

28:30

was a distraction. That

28:32

was not my intention.

28:36

That's not how I want any of

28:38

my activism to be. I don't want

28:40

it... that focused it on me

28:42

not about... and also as

28:46

people of color we...

28:49

and I'm talking about whether we're fighting for

28:51

Black Lives Matter here stateside

28:53

or a free Palestine or a free Congo

28:55

whatever it may be. We

28:59

have no room for error. We

29:01

are given no grace. So

29:03

it takes a lot more... I personally...

29:09

I can only speak for myself. I have to put a

29:11

lot more thought into what

29:14

I say and I have to make

29:16

sure that context is always there now. I

29:19

do move differently with the things I say online and

29:21

it's not in a way to censor myself it's in

29:23

a way to make sure that anything

29:25

I'm doing isn't deterring from the big picture.

29:28

You know on your platforms the

29:30

content can be so... just

29:35

different is the term. You know you can post

29:38

like sort of a playful food video

29:40

on TikTok and then have you know

29:42

a pretty strident set

29:44

of tweets about

29:47

Gaza. Like how do you think the

29:50

people who follow you across these platforms

29:53

take in those disparate types

29:55

of content? Like do you have a

29:58

sense of whether or not... The

30:00

person who is following you on

30:02

TikTok because they like your dance videos

30:04

or food videos is like paying

30:07

attention to the political tweets

30:09

or are they seeing one and

30:11

ignoring the other? Is it like a mishmash in people's head?

30:14

Is it a mishmash in your head? Like how do you...

30:16

it seems so... Yeah,

30:19

it just seems like such sort of a... like

30:21

it would induce almost like

30:24

psychological vertigo. Oh my god, thank you so

30:26

much for being able to

30:28

see that that is very representative of the

30:30

chaos in my head. It's pure... like it's

30:32

absolutely chaos. Is

30:35

it sort of just like yelling into the

30:38

void or is it useful? But then I run into people

30:40

on the street and they're like, thank you so much for sharing that.

30:42

And I was like... Uh-huh. Like

30:44

that... it really hits me

30:46

that these things do have

30:48

impact and they are reaching

30:50

people. And if other people

30:53

see it and feel the same way I did, then that is the

30:55

best that I can hope for. Do

30:57

you feel like there are things that you don't want to talk

31:00

about or feel like, you know,

31:02

it could be too dangerous

31:05

to the brand if you talked about like how

31:07

do you think of... Oh no, I'm so, so,

31:09

so grateful that my brand

31:14

as, you know, a public figure is

31:16

completely different from my actual brand as

31:18

a business owner and a designer. Is

31:20

it though? Aren't they kind of wanting

31:22

the same? It's, it's,

31:25

it's blended, but at the

31:27

same time, it is, it is very, the

31:29

lines are very blurred. Me

31:31

as a brand is the

31:33

same person as me as a person. Of

31:35

course, you know, I, it's, it's a lot

31:38

more glamorous and all of that, but me

31:41

as a brand, actually, no, no,

31:46

it's, it's not. That

31:48

question, the more I tried to answer it,

31:50

the more my own mind changed about it

31:52

because that's actually something I'm very, very, very

31:55

proud of. My, my brand

31:58

Chetan is first and foremost... a

32:00

jewelry brand and then a body wear brand. And

32:03

the thing that I love about

32:05

it so much is that we have no

32:07

investors. It's all me. It's self-funded, which means

32:10

I answer to nobody. If I

32:12

want to donate a portion of proceeds to wherever

32:14

I want to donate, no one is going to

32:16

tell me no. No one is going to

32:18

take it away from me because they disagree with my opinions. And

32:22

same with the production company that I've started.

32:24

People can choose not to work with me.

32:27

That's everybody's right. But no one

32:29

can take it away from me because they disagree with

32:31

my opinions. What

32:33

kind of stuff is the production company going to work on?

32:36

Well, for now, unscripted. But

32:38

I'm not against entering

32:41

the world of scripted. I've kind of dabbled in it

32:43

a little bit with a show called... You were in

32:45

Rami. I was. Yeah. Yeah.

32:48

I love Rami so much. The work that he does is also

32:51

so inspirational and so incredible. And

32:54

just that show alone, oh my God, it makes me want

32:56

to cry thinking about it. If I had had a show

32:58

like that when I was a teenager growing up, I

33:01

really think that things would have been different. It's

33:04

really hard not to see yourself

33:08

in people and

33:11

having someone that you identify with,

33:13

having representation in seats

33:15

at tables that you never thought were possible makes

33:17

such a big difference, which is why it's

33:20

important to put myself in those positions

33:22

because people need

33:25

representation. And I'm not

33:27

just talking about about Arab girls. I'm talking about

33:30

I'm talking about girls who have made decisions that they

33:32

regret that the world might have written them off for.

33:41

After the break, Mia shares how she

33:43

handles the emotional ups and downs of

33:45

life online. I feel like I'm really

33:47

good at compartmentalizing, like I'm having this

33:49

beautiful conversation with you, but I

33:52

have Al Jazeera muted with my eyes

33:54

glued to it. I have two more

33:56

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33:58

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35:12

Hey, Mia.

35:15

How are you? I'm

35:20

good. How are you, David? Just

35:23

as a point of clarification,

35:27

for people who might not be familiar

35:29

with all the platforms that we're talking

35:31

about, can you explain what's different

35:33

from a business standpoint about

35:36

being a creator on OnlyFans as opposed

35:39

to being

35:41

an adult industry performer in a more traditional

35:43

way? No

35:47

contract. You own all of your

35:49

own content, which is imperative and

35:51

so important. The reason that I

35:54

am in the situation

35:56

that I'm in is because I have no

35:58

legal standing whatsoever. to any

36:00

of the content that was created during

36:02

the time with a production company. They

36:05

own all of that. They own the rights. They

36:07

own everything. It's

36:10

such an exploitative,

36:12

standard contract that gets put in front of

36:15

every single girl that steps foot into those offices.

36:18

And I, yeah,

36:20

that's the difference. That's the reason why I, if

36:24

someone is joining the sex work industry,

36:26

I implore them to do it on

36:28

a site like OnlyFans where if they

36:31

actually want to go off, they can delete

36:33

all of their content. Granted, people leaking it

36:36

and people redistributing it, but

36:39

it's watermarked. The metadata is

36:41

there and you have

36:44

full control over your

36:47

page. If you want to take it down,

36:49

OnlyFans has no claim whatsoever to any of

36:51

that content. You

36:54

know, a big recurring

36:56

theme in some of the

36:58

things you've talked about is sort

37:01

of agency and autonomy,

37:03

and that includes bodily

37:05

autonomy. And you've

37:08

been open online about sort of

37:11

having surgery to augment your appearance

37:13

and being on Ozempic. And

37:16

do the choices to do those types

37:19

of things also feel like they're coming

37:21

from a place of agency and bodily

37:23

autonomy? Or do you feel

37:26

pressure to have made those choices? Like,

37:28

is there any internal conflict there? Not

37:31

at all. And the reason

37:33

that I talk about it is because I kind

37:36

of like showing the dichotomy behind changing

37:38

yourself. When I got

37:40

my rhinoplasty, I needed

37:42

to make a point

37:45

of making sure that my nose stays

37:47

ethnic. I want to tweak what I

37:49

don't like about it, but I still

37:51

want like a strong, beautiful Arabic nose.

37:54

And it took me a long time

37:56

to find the right surgeon who understood

37:58

the nuance of that. and understood that

38:00

plastic surgery isn't about changing yourself.

38:03

It's about improving what you want to

38:05

improve. Same with my breast augmentation.

38:07

I had lost 60, 75 pounds very

38:10

naturally when I was

38:12

in my early 20s. And

38:14

my breasts completely changed. I didn't feel like a

38:16

young woman. I felt, it

38:19

was just a lot of excess skin. I had to have a lift

38:22

before I could even have my implants

38:24

put in. So that was my reasoning

38:27

behind that. And then ozempic was, honestly,

38:30

it was such a big trend and I wanted to try

38:32

it. And then it completely took so much pressure off of

38:34

me when I was traveling. And

38:37

the food options were ordering Uber Eats at 11

38:39

o'clock at night and then feeling bloated for a

38:41

shoot the next day and all of these things.

38:44

And going on it, it

38:46

also changed my relationship with a

38:48

lot of things. Just

38:51

my negative mindset

38:54

and outlook and relationship with food, it

38:56

completely changed that. And then I was

38:58

able to eat anything I wanted

39:00

to but it would just fill me up

39:02

faster. So I started to

39:04

speak openly about that because I was

39:07

getting a lot of compliments about how

39:09

good I looked and my workout routine.

39:11

I felt very guilty perpetuating or

39:14

selling something that wasn't real,

39:16

even though it's kind of

39:19

weird to promote

39:21

something that's for diabetes

39:23

that people don't have access to. So I struggled

39:25

with talking about it a little bit but at

39:27

the end of the day, there

39:30

was a teenage girl who I knew who messaged

39:32

me and was like, oh my God, what's your

39:34

workout routine? I had to tell her, no, no,

39:36

no, no, no, no, no. That was

39:38

what made me be more open about that. And

39:41

are generally people supportive

39:44

when you sort of pull the curtain back

39:46

on these sorts of things or are people

39:49

critical? What's the response been? Honestly,

39:52

I don't know. I

39:55

don't really care. I'm open about it because I

39:58

feel a sense of guilt. about

40:00

getting complimented when it's

40:02

not a natural thing. I

40:06

think gatekeeping or lying about

40:08

what you've had done is the

40:10

biggest sign of maybe you shouldn't have

40:13

that procedure. And

40:16

I think it's a normal sort

40:19

of human experience with

40:22

technology to, you get

40:25

older and then you just start feeling

40:27

like you don't have a natural aptitude

40:30

or facility with different technologies or

40:32

social media platforms. Like I'm

40:35

not on TikTok. It's not, I

40:37

don't feel like I would really

40:39

enjoy being on TikTok. I might just be like, oh, this is not

40:41

for me. Like I missed my window. Do

40:44

you have any of

40:46

those concerns for yourself? Like your livelihood is

40:48

tied to social media. Do you

40:50

ever think, oh, well, maybe some new thing will come and I

40:53

won't quite know how to adapt to it? Oh,

40:55

completely, Be Real. That was

40:58

the worst three months of my entire life.

41:00

I hated Be Real.

41:03

Wait, I'm not gonna pretend to know what Be Real is.

41:06

Oh my God, Be Real was this app that

41:08

came out where you would get two notifications

41:10

a day and you had three minutes to

41:12

open the app and take a photo and

41:14

you only get three chances to take the

41:16

photo and it takes a photo with your

41:18

front facing camera and the back camera at

41:20

the same time. So people, like it

41:23

was the only way to organic flex, if

41:26

that makes sense. Like obviously Instagram, you

41:29

can post old photos, you

41:32

can edit things. This was the test to

41:34

like prove that you're actually cool and out

41:36

and doing things and I hated

41:39

that app. And

41:42

do you ever feel with sort of

41:45

creating content about

41:49

avoiding burnout? And what

41:51

does that mean? Well, I'm thinking of like

41:53

where you feel like, oh, I just have to constantly

41:55

be making stuff because if I go away for a

41:57

week, like it's gonna be fun.

42:00

to hurt me in the algorithm? Not

42:02

at all. My mental health is more important

42:05

than anything. Like I, I'm never going to

42:07

push myself to do things that

42:09

I don't want to ever again. And

42:12

how, how does

42:14

your mental health feel now? Like, do you

42:16

feel like you're in a good, sustainable place

42:18

with what you're doing? I

42:21

feel like I'm really good at compartmentalizing,

42:23

like I'm having this beautiful conversation with

42:25

you and, and my, my tone is

42:28

light, but I have Al Jazeera muted

42:30

with my eyes glued to it. And

42:32

I was late to this call, honestly,

42:34

because I was checking in with, with

42:36

my friends and all of this is

42:38

playing out in real time. But I

42:40

just, I've learned to compartmentalize. Like I

42:42

have two more meetings after this today

42:44

and then I'm allowed my allotted time

42:46

to cry. Shame

42:49

is another thing that's come up a couple

42:51

of times in the conversation. Do

42:53

you have any advice for people about how

42:56

to deal with shame? Oh

42:58

my God, everybody is so different. But

43:01

my, my best piece of advice

43:03

is, is to be kind to yourself and

43:05

be compassionate to yourself and give yourself the same

43:07

grace that you would give a friend that you're

43:09

talking to because you're never going to tell them

43:13

grow up, you know, be stronger. Like

43:16

you're never going to talk to someone that you love that way.

43:19

So if you talk to yourself, the same grace

43:21

that you would give other people that, that

43:24

starts to go a long way. It's

43:26

also very much easier said than done. Completely,

43:29

completely. And my

43:32

second piece of advice is, is fine, is paying someone to do

43:34

that for you once a week. A

43:38

therapist. Because that's really how it works. Exactly.

43:56

That's Mia Khalifa. This

43:58

conversation was produced by Wyatt

44:00

Orm. It was edited by Annabelle

44:02

Bacon, mixing by Ephim Shapiro. Original

44:05

music by Dan Powell and Marion Lozano.

44:07

Photography by Philip Montgomery. Our

44:10

senior booker is Priya Matthew and Seth Kelly

44:12

is our senior producer. Our executive

44:14

producer is Allison Benedict. Special

44:17

thanks to Rory Walsh, Renan Barelli,

44:19

Jeffrey Miranda, Nick Pittman, Maddie Masiello,

44:21

Jake Silverstein, Paula Schumann, and Sam

44:23

Dolnick. If you like what

44:26

you're hearing, follow or subscribe to the interview wherever

44:28

you get your podcasts. And to read

44:30

or listen to any of our conversations,

44:32

you can always go to nytimes.com/the interview.

44:34

And you can email us anytime at

44:36

the interview at nytimes.com.

44:40

Next week, Lulu talks with Senator

44:42

John Federman. You

44:44

said that Trump has a special connection

44:46

with the people of Pennsylvania. Why?

44:49

There's a difference between not understanding,

44:51

but also acknowledging that it exists.

44:54

And it's like something very special

44:57

exists there. And that doesn't mean that

44:59

I admire it. It's just like it's,

45:02

it's real. I'm

45:04

David Marchese, and this is the interview from the

45:06

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