Poverty porn is a strategic tactic which often reveals itself in the form of photographs and videos in order to drum up support (often financial) and draw sympathy/interest from the public. The promotional material from charitable organisations often cause feelings of immense guilt and an urgent desire to help.
Pictures of starving children with their ribcages poking through their skin, dilapidated houses that appear one breath away from tumbling to the ground, well-dressed men and women entering poor neighbourhoods that are drowning in poverty to bring hope by the way of cash or kind are all examples of poverty porn that I am sure most of us have come across.
The constant argument of why it continues to thrive is often met with the rebuttal that it is in fact a tool used to shock and motivate others into action. While one can see and acknowledge the temporary knock-on effect from applying poverty porn, what is often evaded is the long-term damage it creates. What is often ignored is the way the picture of poverty is carefully curated whilst simultaneously removing how it intersects life in a multifaceted way. What is disregarded is how poverty is fetishized in order to drive sympathy or bolster the ego. For instance, a nurse even though employed and receiving a month salary but having to cope with the rising cost of living can find himself/herself in the same position as a fisherman who is temporarily out of work due to low catches.
The photographs and videos shoved in our face constantly also desensitises us and makes us thick skinned and unfeeling towards social ills, thus manufacturing disposable outrage. The impact and effects of poverty porn are many, but I have found the following to be the most damaging personally:
The band aid effect
Poverty porn rarely attacks the problem at the root. If we look at the many countries where ‘the West’ arrived with its golden carriages loaded with “gifts” like food and medicine, we can see many are still in the same state of poverty. The capitalistic nature of such help is hardly ever to lift people out of poverty, but rather to make them permanent dependents while emboldening power dynamics. A band-aid doesn’t heal an infected wound. The wound must be cleaned and dressed appropriately. In the same way, solutions out of poverty must be arrived at through long-term policy and advocacy because it is a complex system to unravel.
Power dynamic smiles
Of course there is also the argument that those who smile for the photographs have consented to show their gratitude. However, consent in extremely vulnerable moments when the socially and economically weaker party is cornered, is hardly ever authentic. What the photographs and video accomplish in these instances is stripping those who are desperately in need of their agency and autonomy while emboldening the dominance of those who are privileged or in positions of power.
Poor schooling
Poverty porn also, sadly, leaves poor people open to abuse and blame for their circumstances, when in reality they are struggling to survive in a system not designed for them to get further. It creates stereotypes and opens them to ridicule for even wanting to access services or products that many would view as luxury for them. Clean parks, extracurricular activities, salon trips are things we are all worthy of, but poverty porn leaves an incredible amount of room for ridiculing people and circumstances as it over-simplifies how poverty can be addressed.
It leaves people open to ridicule over how and why they couldn’t manage what they were openly given without considering how those things simply don’t change their everyday circumstances and reality.
As inflation continues to become the common reality for most countries and the divide between the rich and the poor widens, if we are inclined to give from a place of good, let us remain cognizant of the way we perpetuate and participate in poverty porn.
