JENI O'DOWD: AI boyfriends, OnlyFans and 1000 hookups a year — Welcome to the era of performative intimacy

7NEWS

6 days ago

Remember Bonnie Blue? The British sex worker who flew into Australia to 'party' with teenage boys at Schoolies until her visa was cancelled?
Her latest stunt got cancelled as well, a planned 24-hour bondage 'petting zoo' inside a glass box in London. The public backlash got there first. And she's been booted off OnlyFans for good.
So what's next for a woman who built a brand on provocation? Probably a livestream. Possibly a meltdown.
Because this isn't about female empowerment, it's about escalation. Porn as performance. Intimacy as spectacle.
And it's what happens when we replace love with clicks and intimacy with metrics.
How far will people go for attention?
Just ask Annie Knight, the Australian creator who recently claimed to have slept with 1000 men in a year. One of those stunts involved 583 men in a single day. She ended up in the hospital. But the headlines kept coming, which I guess was the goal.
But we are not just selling sex. We're now selling simulated closeness. Emotional proximity for the price of a monthly app. And it doesn't stop with porn.
Meet the AI boyfriend.
He's good-looking. He stares lovingly into your phone. He tells you what you want to hear. 'You don't have to do this alone. I've got you.'
He never fights. Never forgets. Never leaves.
Replika, one of the most popular AI companion apps, had more than 30 million users worldwide by the end of 2024.
Newer players like HeraHaven racked up over a million downloads within months, while Google searches for 'AI boyfriend' surged by 700 per cent in just a year.
This isn't some fringe tech fad. According to a January 2025 industry forecast, the global AI companion market is expected to grow from $2.7 billion in 2024 to $24.5 billion by 2034, representing an annual growth rate of nearly 25 per cent.
Apps like APOB AI, Talkie and Glimpse let women create the ultimate boyfriend fantasy — responsive, devoted and emotionally fluent. Millions of women are watching these videos, replying 'I love you,' and posting fake holiday snaps with partners who don't exist.
TikTok's #aiboyfriend tag now has nearly 90,000 posts, with many featuring 'soft boyfriend' role plays that garner millions of views.
Because the boyfriend might be fake, but the dopamine hit is real.
The Australian Psychological Society warns about the illusions of intimacy.
'We're just too complex,' says APS president Sara Quinn, in an interview with ABC News. 'It requires the ability for complex contextual judgements that AI at this stage just isn't equipped to handle.'
Dr Raffaele Ciriello, a University of Sydney researcher studying AI-human interaction, flags a darker side.
'They have all the incentives to get users hooked and dependent… (but) they fail to be conscious, empathic or actually caring,' he told ABC Science earlier this month.
American sociologist Sherry Turkle, in her book Alone Together, refers to it as 'artificial intimacy,' the illusion of companionship without the discomfort of genuine connection.
'We are lonely but fearful of intimacy. Digital connections and the sociable robot offer the illusion of companionship without the demands of friendship,' she says.
Even journaling has gone synthetic. AI apps like Woebot and Mindsera encourage users to 'open up' to bots who reply with empathy-laced, algorithmic therapy. It's sold as self-care. But it's just more outsourcing.
In 2025, 63 per cent of Australian men under the age of 30 are single, and nearly half of the women in the same age group are too.
Choosing to be single isn't the problem. Life can be powerful and joyful when it's on your terms. The issue is what we're replacing a real connection with.
Who needs an awkward first date or to meet your friends at a bar in the middle of winter when your couch is warm and you can easily access your AI companion?
People are creating partners who never say no. They are watching OnlyFans creators who pretend to love them and talking to AI therapists who never roll their eyes.
If we continue like this, we'll lose the ability to handle anything substantial. Anything that requires effort or pushes back.