Poorn

You once wrote that there is "nothing that doesn't get somebody off." What about poverty? I searched Google for pornography depicting the homeless or otherwise poverty-ridden as objects of lust, and found nothing. I have my own theories on why this is so, but I'd really just like to know if you've ever heard of anyone or anything into this?

Oh, and just to clarify, I found nothing depicting poor, foul-smelling bums and bag ladies as objects of lust. I found a few sites that specialized in homeless gay men, but these men were hygienic, in decent shape, and they were not portrayed in a poverty-stricken environment or state.

I'd appreciate your input.

-Harry

It's days like these, when I find myself typing in phrases like "foxy naked homeless ladies" into assorted search engines, that I really start to wonder about my life choices.

But, let's get down to the business at hand. As there are folks who consider dining on feces the ultimate erotic experience and still others who get off on jamming metal rods up their urethras, it's hardly shocking that there are those who find the desperately poor and/or the hopelessly (and homelessly) drug-addicted wank-worthy. Sigh. Don't these tragic types have enough problems without being turned into fodder for some control freak's masturbatory fantasies?

If you didn't find anything on the worldwide interweb, it's only because you're lazy and didn't look hard enough. One of the more "authentic" sites I discovered-www.hobosexual.com-didn't have the hygienic, muscular hotties you describe. No siree, far from it. The "smegmen" (their description, not mine) peppering this site were on the opposite end of the spectrum from the soot-smudged pretty boys you discovered. These guys appeared to be the real deal: of a certain age (though hard living can age a fella, so who knows), sporting crusty rolls of fat and unkempt clumps of back hair (no manscaping here!). Obviously my computer doesn't come equipped with odorama, but if looks could smell, I'm willing to bet their aroma was fairly funkified.

Since I didn't see any poverty-stricken pussy on any of the site's free pages (and wasn't about to enter my credit card info to dig deeper), I'm assuming this particular site caters to men who love men. So I set out to find something for the straight boys. (Not shockingly, I couldn't find a single example of this smut geared toward women, straight or gay. Probably because most of us have already dated musicians.)

I thought I'd hit pay dirt when I stumbled across a calendar featuring homeless dames, but it turned out to be a charity project for some church. (Save yourself the trouble-the ladies depicted were all fully clothed.) Most of what I was able to track down for the het set featured some variation on the "crack ho." Apparently skeletal broads with missing teeth and a penchant for anal are a niche market I hadn't really been aware of. According to the website www.crackwhoreconfessions.com, Linda, a self-professed proponent of the "stem fast diet" will "toss your salad, croutons and all." Yum. While Karen (who happens to be eight months pregnant) is a "full service whore, taking it in all three holes." Presumably including the one Junior is getting ready to pop out of.

Although I couldn't locate any magazines devoted to poverty porn, the video market has tapped into at least a variation on your theme. The extremely tasteful Bum Hunt and its sister project Bag Lady Beatings were two such releases (garnering their creators a permanent spot on the National Coalition for the Homeless's shit list). But these examples were more violent than uh, dirty. I dug through the stack of free crap that clutters every freelancer's desk, trying to find a porno DVD I used to own. I know it had "Crackwhore" in the title. . . alas, it's been tossed, but never mind. As I recall there was no coke-smoking in it anyway-just incoherent hippy gibberish trying to cash in on the crack-ho cachet.

Unlike you, I'm not at all surprised that there's a market for this brand of depravity. It's about control and power-a bit like BDSM, but with a class/socio-economic element that takes things to a completely different level. There's no "safe word" when you're dealing with someone who's trapped in an alley and is weak from hunger, shaking from the cold, or sick because she desperately needs to fix herself. It's the ultimate power play. In fact, I'm a little shocked it's not more popular.

So while I don't think there are many among us who would find actually being penniless and living on the streets very gratifying (there but for the grace of a rent-stabilized apartment go I), there are plenty who find having the upper hand the ultimate aphrodisiac.