Piper Rockelle says she wasn't abused or exploited—and now that she’s 18, you have to believe her.

By River Page

01.21.26 —

Culture and Ideas

“You can’t be boring,” said Piper Rockelle. “You have to get people to talk. This industry is about being relevant.”

And if Rockelle knows anything, it’s how to get people to talk. The 18-year-old spent her childhood amassing millions of followers on TikTok, YouTube, and Instagram under the tutelage of her controversial stage mother, Tiffany Smith. Most of the content revolved around Rockelle’s day-to-day life and her “squad”: Think Real Housewives, but everyone is in the ninth grade.

Now that she’s officially an adult, Rockelle is amping it up. On New Year’s Day, just months after her 18th birthday, she joined OnlyFans. “Everyone told me not to do this but here we are. . . time to take it ALL OFF for you bbys,” her OnlyFans profile reads. Her page largely consists of pictures of her posing seductively around her house in skimpy lingerie, but her pinned posts says that nude content can be purchased by tipping $150.

“a lot of u have been messaging me saying ‘how can i see ur nudies content’ ‘how can i get a custom’ ‘how can i get priority messaging?’ ” Rockelle writes on the site. “sooo i decided to launch my VIP EXPERIENCE.”

Rockelle was quick to defend her decision to join the subscription platform mainly known for its pornographic content.

“OnlyFans is a huge market and not everyone’s doing it because this work is definitely not for everybody, but it is for me,” she said. “I love making content. It’s one of my favorite things ever, just creating and making interesting things for people.”

She posted on X that she’d earned more than $1 million in under an hour on the subscription platform. But after fellow creators disputed the number, Rockelle admitted that she did “tweak” the screenshot of her earnings. (She’s since deleted the doctored post.)

“I know that sounds terrible, but guess what? I am a content creator and you have to do things that normal people might not be willing to do,” she told me on a video call from her Los Angeles home. Rockelle was wearing a black tank and leopard pants and straightening her hair while we spoke.

Rockelle, who stands not an inch over five feet tall, has been an online creator since she was eight. She started on Musically, the platform now known as TikTok, before moving on to YouTube, where she created semi-scripted videos. At its peak, her YouTube account had more than 12 million subscribers and was generating six figures a month, per Cosmopolitan.

But in 2022, 11 members of the squad featured on Rockelle’s account sued Rockelle’s mother, Smith, and her producer/boyfriend Hunter Hill. In the lawsuit, the members said they helped boost Rockelle’s channel to their “physical, emotional, and financial detriment.” They also said they suffered “emotional, verbal, physical, and at times, sexual abuse” by Smith. The lawsuit said Smith would instruct male cast members to “take their shirts off,” because “sex sells.” Other cast members said they were encouraged by Smith to dress and pose provocatively. Smith was also accused in the suit of encouraging the children to use recreational drugs.

The case was settled out of court in October 2024 for $1.85 million, just months before Netflix released a docuseries on the case called Bad Influence: The Dark Side of Kidfluencing, which detailed the allegations against Smith and Hill. In the documentary, Rockelle was portrayed as a victim as well.

Parents of squad members said Smith would mail her daughter’s used panties and training bras to an “old man” in exchange for gifts and money—an allegation also detailed in the lawsuit. They also spoke about the “parent managed” account Smith set up for Rockelle on BrandArmy, a subscription site similar to OnlyFans that doesn’t allow nudity, but does allow adult users to request and pay for “custom content” created by children. BrandArmy content shown in the documentary featured Rockelle dancing in a bikini.

Rockelle said she hasn’t spoken to anyone, including extended family members, who participated in the documentary.

“I think if I ever did that, I would be sick and you’d have to take me to a doctor,” she said, flipping her hair. Then she added a caveat: “In the nicest way possible, I want them to thrive in their life. But we don’t need to see each other ever again.”

Smith and Hill have repeatedly denied the allegations against them. Rockelle has stood by her mother.

“I had a really great childhood throughout the whole entire thing,” Rockelle told me. “My family helped me and I was just one of the lucky ones.”

Before the lawsuit, the Los Angeles Times reported that Rockelle was making between $4.2 million and $7.5 million per year. Following the allegations, YouTube demonetized her channel, costing Rockelle between $300,000 and $500,000 a month, according to court records obtained by the LA Times. “I was in debt because of the lawyers. I had to keep my family safe,” Rockelle said.

With her fresh flow of income from OnlyFans, Rockelle is ready to focus on her future. She wants to set up a cat rescue and start a bathing suit line, she told me.

“Throughout my whole entire life nobody has wanted to kind of put any money into me. So now that I kind of have my own chunk of money, I can fund things myself,” Rockelle said, adding that she can “invest” in herself. “At the end of the day, all I need to tell people is nobody’s going to do it for you. You have to do it yourself.”

Rockelle also has a word for the people who insist she’s been exploited and abused by her mother.

“I’m still in my house. I’m with my family every single day. My family is everything to me.”

Rockelle crossed her arms.

“When I was younger, I couldn’t say, like, ‘Hey guys, I’m okay.’ ‘Hey guys, I’m not being exploited,’ because they wouldn’t believe me,” she said, referring to the scores of concerned fans who spent years flooding her comments section to ask if she needed help.

“I’m 18. Now, they have no choice but to believe me.”

(http://www.autoadmit.com/thread.php?thread_id=5824638&forum_id=2Elisa#49606377)

"She was literally groomed and exploited by her own mother and her mother's boyfriend.

This is your brain on Jews.

(http://www.autoadmit.com/thread.php?thread_id=5824638&forum_id=2Elisa#49606395)

The first word you're presented with is "Shalom"

(http://www.autoadmit.com/thread.php?thread_id=5824638&forum_id=2Elisa#49606414)

“She posted on X that she’d earned more than $1 million in under an hour on the subscription platform. But after fellow creators disputed the number, Rockelle admitted that she did “tweak” the screenshot of her earnings. (She’s since deleted the doctored post.)”

(http://www.autoadmit.com/thread.php?thread_id=5824638&forum_id=2Elisa#49606443)