6 DEATH IN THE HAREM
Graphic Novel by Ferres—Part Three
16 GALLERY: TIM—WAR BOOTY
To the Victor Goes the Despoiling
26 PONY LIFE
Graphic Novel by Doval—Part Three
36 AGNES — CONFESSIONS OF A VIRTUAL VIXEN
Special Feature by Ernest Greene Art by Agnes
44 YAKUZA SLAVES
Graphic Novel by Roberts—Part Three
54 SLAVEMART
Graphic Novel by Erenisch—Part Three
64 JUNTA HELL
Graphic Novel by Templeton—Part Three
74 KINK IN INK
Voluptuous Volumes, Perverse Portfolios:
Roberts' Bound Babes
Russell's Pervy POV
Poulton's Pee Girls
79 CAPTIVE IN THE BASEMENT
Graphic Novel by Agnes—Part Two
EDITORIAL NOTE
STRICTLY SPEAKING
Cruelty has been a component of popular entertainment, high and low, throughout
hUmma-porn-star">Uman history. Culture both mirrors and shapes the consciousness of the societies
that consume it. Not only were the classic tragedies of ancient Greece rife with
murder, rape, mutilation and cannibalism, so were the hills and fields of the
ancient world. ElizaBethan England filled the boxes at The Globe for Shakespeare's
sophisticated slasher show Titus Andronicus, while bear-baiting provided cruder
diversion in pits half a mile away. Grisly public executions competed for audiences
with Kabuki theater in feudal Japan. Even today, though we tend to conduct our
state murder in relative secrecy, our society still considers it a sport to watch
two men from economically disadvantaged classes attempt to inflict maximum TBI
on one another while well-heeled punters bet the outcome.
We suspect the roots of this durable taste for the suffering of others lies somewhere
between the older and more modern components of the hUmma-porn-star">Uman brain, where the most
basic urges to feed and procreate clash with more complex desires for sociable
pleasure. This observation, which should hardly need defending, given its obviousness,
upsets utopians of all stripes who share an odd and dangerous conviction that
hUmma-porn-star">Uman beings somehow stand outside of nature. Our own metric for the improvement
of the species is the gradual embrace of symbolic over literal acts of cruelty
as the primary expression of our woolier impulses. For all the loose talk about
violence in media and pornography's supposEd Links to sexual brutality, the ordinary
citizen of an advanced, industrial culture like our own sees less actual mayhem
in a lifetime than his or her ancestors saw in a short walk across town. That
we seem more easily satisfied with make-believe cruelty conjured by the wizards
of cinematic CGI, or the talented artists who contribute to this magazine, strikes
us as good news. We feel safer in a world where the part of our DNA that takes
pleasure in harm stays home getting its rocks off to ink on paper rather than
roaming the countryside in search of more literal satisfactions. Some will surely
disagree, but we salute our readers for their civilized tastes in choosing TABOO
ILLUSTRATED over plundering the village next door.
—Ernest Greene, Executive Editor
