When plus-size model Rosie Jean sat down to film herself eating a rack of ribs, a pound of sausage and two sides, she knew her life had to change.
“I developed diabetes and could barely walk. I was very sick, nauseous and dizzy all the time,” she tells DailyMail.com.
Her health was ruined by constant overeating fueled by one of the most dangerous sexual fetishes to hit the Internet so far.
RosieThe 32-year-old Florida native had been sucked into the dark world of “feederism,” a terrifying phenomenon that was gaining popularity. Like thousands of young women around the world, she was selling videos of herself compulsively eating men on the Internet.
The results are too predictable.
Plus-size model Rosie Jean, 32, from Florida, was drawn into the dark world of “feederism”, a terrifying phenomenon that is exploding in popularity – and has now escaped and is campaigning to help other women who may be drawn into the vicious cycle.
“They’re setting themselves up for weight gain and chronic disease,” said Dr. Mike Fenster, a professor at the University of Montana’s College of Health Professions.
“They have an accelerated risk of developing diabetes, which opens the door to heart and kidney disease,” he says.
“It’s a horrible perversion of a basic element of humanity, where we feed off each other. It’s like these people are indulging in a slow poison.”
The feeders, the men who pay for these feats of consumption, don’t always see it that way.
“For me, it’s about deep affection, respect and intimacy,” one man from Canada told The Mail.
“Gluttony turns me on. A girl eating too much as part of a sexual relationship is the ultimate intimacy.”
This man, who views feeder content online, says he has been attracted to “fat women” since elementary school.
“I have a belly fetish and I think it would be incredibly erotic and intimate – as part of lovemaking – to encourage her to eat, caress her fat and declare my true love for her fat,” he says.
One feed recipient said they enjoy creating content for the feed and sharing it online.
A woman films herself eating large quantities through a funnel, including a litre of heavy cream which she poured into her mouth.
Another feeder, a 74-year-old man from Connecticut, is equally frank: “The idea of girls getting fat and being happy about it, so happy that they put getting fat before anything else, is appealing.”
The man, who did not want to reveal his name, tells The Mail he is among thousands of people who have paid to share content, and once requested a personalised video of two girls eating a large pizza together.
Today, the global demand for sexualized food content has grown so much that there are at least 30,000 food-related accounts on OnlyFans alone, according to search analytics site FansMetrics.
So-called “feeders” (mostly, though not exclusively, men) flock to online platforms like Reddit, Feabie, and FantasyFeeder to find “feedees” (mostly women) willing to eat massive amounts of food on camera or in person.
Feabie alone has more than 97,000 users.
The women involved can make thousands of dollars selling their “content” to men desperate for sexual gratification.
These ‘feeder’ videos have a simple, consistent theme: women post videos of themselves eating, usually with lots of loud biting and chewing noises.
They often perform naked or in revealing clothing. Sometimes they feed or are fed by another person.
There’s no doubting the excitement of male voyeurs, but for the “fed” ones, too, the experience can be intoxicating (even validating) and lucrative.
“They treated me like a goddess because I weighed 500 pounds,” says Rosie, who made thousands of dollars selling videos.
He once made $600 from a single person over a weekend. And, he says, that’s a typical payout for a popular user.
‘It turned my eating disorder from a shame cycle to a pleasure cycle, where you sexualize the act of gorging and you have these people worshipping you.’
Feeders and feedees flock to social media sites like OnlyFans and Reddit to find content, as well as niche sites like Feabie, which has over 97,000 members.
Feeders also share explicit content in chat rooms, sharing videos and comments.
One feedee, who uses the name ContrASS to share her content, where she films herself eating large quantities from a funnel, said she does it for “business and pleasure.”
“I feel empowered by having complete control of the production process and I enjoy sharing what I find sexy with an audience that responds to my messages,” she told The Mail.
An OnlyFans account run by a 24-year-old from Southern California charges $19.99 a month for what she describes online as “nude, lingerie, meals, stuffing.”
Another account seen by The Mail charges $11.99 a month for daily nude photos with captions such as: ‘My women’s clothes are getting smaller by the minute with all the calories I’m putting into my body… Soon I won’t be able to walk!’
Men subscribed to such accounts – the followers – can often order videos tailored to their desires, choosing what food they would like to see consumed and how.
Some feeders and feds take the fetish to extremes and aim, for example, to gain so much weight that they become immobile or even die: a subcategory of the fetish known as “death feeding.”
“After hitting 400 pounds, I’ve found myself increasingly turned on by death feederism,” one woman posted on Reddit.
‘I keep imagining my last steps, the last time I can move my arms, my last breath. If someone wanted to make me so big that I don’t make it to 30, we should talk about it.’
Another wrote: ‘I’m a 21 year old 250lb female looking for a male feeder to fill up on.’
She wanted to find someone who could help her “become immobile” and explained that “destroying my body uncontrollably with weight gain has been very attractive to me.”
Rosie Jean has now escaped feederism and is sharing her weight loss experience on YouTube in an attempt to help other women in her situation.
Some in the feeding community go beyond the food itself and engage in something called “inflation” – blowing air into their stomachs with a pump to expand them and appear fatter.
This is a particularly dangerous activity and could even be fatal, notes Dr. Fenster, who teaches culinary medicine, a practical discipline that seeks to address health conditions through diet.
“Depending on how they do it, something could break. That can be life-threatening.”
The damage and destruction goes beyond the health of consumers, says leading nutritionist Dr. Lisa Young.
“Paying someone to eat loads of junk food in front of a camera promotes unhealthy behaviour, glorifies overeating and can contribute to the normalisation of bad eating habits,” she tells The Mail.
‘This can have a negative influence on viewers, especially those who may already have eating-related issues.’
In Southeast Asia, interest in extreme overeating has spawned its own viral trend known as Mukbang videos, where creators consume huge amounts of food in a short amount of time on camera.
In Southeast Asia, the interest in overeating has spawned its own viral trend known as Mukbang videos, where creators eat as much as they can in a short amount of time, such as Hungry Fatchick (pictured).
The viral trend has sparked thousands of videos of people overeating.
Chinese authorities have recently banned this practice.
Back in Florida, Rosie stopped creating feeder content and now tries to highlight the dangers on her YouTube channel.
“I implore and beg you not to (become a feedee),” she warns any woman who might be tempted by this darkly destructive online world.
‘There’s nothing that makes it worthwhile, it’s just the short-term validation of artificial affection and the short-term dopamine hit of a binge.
“The money won’t be worth it when you’re in debt to the hospital for terminal health complications.”
“I wish I’d never heard of feederism.”