WATCH: Step into the bedrooms of the young men who make a living in the kinky world of “findom”

In this day and age, you can’t really blame people for doing what they’ve got to do to make a buck. And, hey, just being fair: You can’t really blame them for how they spend it either!

As social media has advanced and the internet has become intrinsic to almost every facet of our lives, the kink known as “findom” has proliferated, a.k.a. the act of financial domination.

While the fetish lifestyle can take many forms, it involves, at its core, a submissive giving money or gifts at the demand of a dominant. The more frugal among us may have trouble wrapping our heads around it, but we won’t judge or kink shame—people have their reasons!

However, a new documentary short provides a fascinating insight into the other side of the equation, welcoming audiences into the lives of young men who make a living (and then some) through findom on OnlyFans.

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Directed by Enrique Pedráza-Botero and Faye Tsakas, “Alpha Kings” is a real eye-opener. Its subjects are four friends—all legal adults in their late teens—living in a Houston, Texas suburb, who are straight but offer their “services” as financial dominants to an audience of anonymous subs.

As the film shows us, they all spend a lot of time in front of a camera—often shirtless, sometimes flexing or showing their feet, though mostly just getting paid for existing, interacting with their clients, and occasionally offering up some good old-fashioned verbal abuse.

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“Had a guy offer me 800 a week for a platonic month of just being there with him.”

“Tip me a f*cking twenty right now, okay?,” one of them demands of his viewers. He calls out one of the client who just sent in money, saying he’s “a f*cking example for all of you f*cking betas. You should all be doing what he is doing and serving us”

What makes “Alpha Kings” so interesting is that none of these guys are necessarily trying to hide who they are or what they do—in fact, they frequently gloat about selling feet pics for a living. One even laughs about the fact that he makes more than his mom, who works eight-to-twelve hour days at a nuclear plant.

Speaking with The New Yorker, co-director Faye Tsakas shares what the filmmakers were hoping to explore with the doc:

“What was fascinating to us is how these kids felt, given the current economic climate, given the rapid shrinking of the middle class, that this was genuinely the best opportunity for them to achieve the trajectory of the American Dream that isn’t really possible for Gen Z in the way it used to be,” they said. “We were also interested in the fact that it was a group of boys who all did this together, in a kind of social-bonding way.”

One thing they can’t seem to agree, however, is whether or not this constitutes sex work. Like any great doc, “Alpha Kings” doesn’t provide a concrete answer on that either—it just shows you the world as it exists and lets you decide for yourself.

Which you can do, by the way, since the has been made available, in full, on YouTube thanks to The New Yorker‘s shorts program. At just over 15 minutes, “alpha Kings” is well worth your time—check it out below:

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