Why do people have fetishes? (32)

This may sound like a daft question, but I'm putting together some theatre research proposals concerning fetish and I'd be interested in hearing the opinions of fellow fetishists (as opposed, say, to the opinions of long-dead psychologists in books).

So why do we have fetishes? Evidently a major outcome is a source of pleasure, but what do our fetishes do for us that other objects, ideas and actions don't? Why, for example, does one person fetishise feet and another car engines? What's the underlying mechanic joining the two?

Furthermore, in your opinion, is it possible to artificially induce a fetish in another person - or in oneself? Or indeed, to strip a fetish away? Obviously, there's a lot of moral and ethical issues to be contended with here - but if it were possible, would you do it?

Or in fact, are these the wrong questions to ask? As I said, I'm really interested in your ideas, and I'm looking forward to hearing any.

Much appreciated! Buceph

NB Whilst this is for research it's extremely unlikely anything will be reproduced, and only then with the author's consent.

You might suppose that fetishes are caused by something that has happened in the past like a childhood experience?

I have a specific fetish for a certain type of medical procedure. I am certain this is the result of an experience I had as a child. I was put through some quite embarrassing procedures carried out by the mother (Nurse) of the girl who lived next door.

For years after that the girl next door and I used to re-enact what happened with each other over and over in various ways as part of our playing together. This has resulted in a life long fascination and has eroticized these certain medical procedures for me in a big way. But now I am more interested in being the one carrying them out instead of having them done to me.

On the other hand, I have always had a strong fetish for spanking but I was never really spanked as a child. So this one doesn't seem to have been caused by anything in my childhood at all. It feels like I was born with this it. Maybe spanking is more general and I can imagine that it has certain primal and other reasons for being such a turn on for many.

I think there may be quite a few different reasons why certain scenarios or objects can become sexualized or fetishized for some people. It's wonderful that people are all so very different in such surprising ways.

Interested to see what others think.

er, I doubt that as a pragmatic statement. A fetish being a requirement for the involvement of 'something' for sexual gratification or arousal can really only detract from ones ability to gain sexual pleasure, as compared with the norm, ie that the 'something' isn't needed.

We misuse this word in the kink community to mean that we have a predilection for something.

And all men kill the thing they love, By all let this be heard, Some do it with a bitter look, Some with a flattering word, The coward does it with a kiss, The brave man with a sword!

If we are all ice cream (to draw on the metaphor from which the term apparently comes, I believe?) then most of us, in very truth, are actually of a range of different 'flavours', according to which 'register' of our lives (to borrow a semanticists' and sociologists' term a little here, if I may) we find ourselves in. How 'vanilla' or 'flavoured' (or 'kinky', if you prefer) we allow ourselves to be, or to be seen to be, will depend on where we are, and with whom. Only in what we take to be a 'safe' community and/or with like-minded people, or esp with playmates and partners (provided we feel we can be sure that we have the same sort of 'fetishes' in common, of course) do even we, I think, take off the supposed 'vanilla' mask completely - and even so, there may be odd occasions when we didn't get it right (in terms of what we both really wanted?) - but that, of course, can and does happen all the time in all human relationships, anyway. Do you not think so?

As I have argued on that thread, 'average Joe' or 'average Josephine' are probably, in reality, a fiction anyway (with their, equally fictitious 'two point four' children as well, of course; no doubt - lol!) - and at best a suit of acceptable 'respectability' (for want of a better term) which we all find it expedient to wear in certain circumstances and in certain (but not usually all) companies.

As to the 'ethical and moral' ramifications? Well, as I've also argued on that thread, so long as we are not actually doing anything illegal - or destructive of families and societies ... well, read my little anecdote there from the late life of Freud - and no, there's no 'pschyo-spiel' at all in my post - promise!!

- bluemagic

"When the bottom falls out of your world - Take 'Andrew's' (liver salts) and, instead ... Let the world fall out of your bottom. "

They make the sexual experience more intense, and therefore more likely to produce fine children.

Sorry to seem flippant, but I firmly believe that pursuit of the Life Imperative is far simpler and less politically-correct than some people would like.

That's another question altogether; do you know anyone that has a fetish for car engines?

As far as I've been able to gether, fetishes get programmed when we're quite young, I'd say between the ages of about 1 and 3, though I can think of one I have that didn't get added til I was about 11.

Theoretically yes, it'd take some painstaking research and a carefully designed porgramme and presumably a child, and i'm not comfortable with the ethics of the idea, but I think it's feasible.

Yes, there's been research into this - a psychiatrist experimented with sleep deprivation, starvation, induced vomiting in order to turn a man against his kink, and he claimed some success. I've forgotten his name.

Such torture aside, I think one could probably damage someone's psyche sufficiently, just within the confines of a relationship, to turn them off something very badly, if one really put one's mind to it.

Ye gods, what a question.

People do all sorts of unethical things in pursuit of really great sex, including getting others into stuff they'd not previously considered by sometimes less than honest tactics.

'If it were possible' - I'm sure that many people would lose all sorts of scruples if a sufficiently big orgasm were up for grabs and the price just a little scruple.

I don't know - I think they're good questions, but as to their faciltiy, that really does depend on what you want the answers to acheive.

Burns Night is on Jan 28th - at a secret professional dungeon location right in the very middle of Central London!
http://www.the-firm.org/burnsadvert.htm

Much sense in the above statements.

In the strictest sense of the word I'm not sure I have any fetishes, however certain BDSM practices will greatly enhance my sexual experience, and many of them are fairly recently discovered and cannot be related to childhood experiences as far as I can gather. I mention this as I believe the recieved wisdom links fetishes to early childhood experiences.

Maybe I'm just not a fetishist (in the strictest sense), however I am able to fetishise certain things fairly easily (in the more commonly used sense of being able to obtain sexual pleasure from a practice or object).

The most obvious example for me is needle-play. I have no childhood experiences to trace this back to, indeed I would have described myself as a little needle-phobic, yet now needles fascinate me, and give me immense pleasure. And it's not just having them put into me, now that I know how much I enjoy them, I am able to enjoy pictures of others using them as well. I suspect that watching film of people enjoying needles in the way I do could become quite effective porn for me!

Needles aren't a fetish for me in the sense that I need them to enjoy a sexual experience, in fact good vanilla sex works for me still, but they very definitely enhance any sexual experience in a way I don't fully understand. I would guess I have fetishised needle-play, simply because of the endorphin rush they give me, the way I sub-space from them, and the sense of intimacy they give me with the person who is inserting them.

I suppose the fact that I can have pain orgasms as they are inserted helps. That depends on who does it, how and where they are inserted, but with or without those I will enjoy any subsequent sexual activity more than if I hadn't played with needles first. I would suggest this is probably due to the endorphins, and the pain, but there is also an element of it that is due to the interplay between me and the person inserting the needles.

So, have I fetshised needle-play, or is it that I have a prediliction for pain of the type I get from needles? I would suggest it is more complicated than a prediliction, but is isn't a fetsh in the true strict sense. However, I am sure I have fetishised needles and having them inserted into my flesh.

Edited 15 Jan 12, 4:06 AM by Monkey_Wench

Never drive faster than your angels can fly

lp

................bitie bitie...................

I had to lie down for a while after reading this.

Another way to look at it is why aren't "normal" "fetishes" considered to be "kinky" "fetishes"? Take standard everyday porn as an example. Why do people find that hot? Why are "lads mags" continuing to sell? Why do "romance novels" sell? Why is the standard of beauty so uniform in music videos?

For a great deal of things, mainly those that are considered "normal", there is an unwritten rule that these things are sexually attractive. And most people, not having much creativity and leading dull lives without books, will accept that. So they wank off to women with big breasts and small waists or some story about a "throbbing member". They did it once and it worked, so why not do it again?

How is what we do any different? I think a number of things considered "kinky" "fetishes" are simply an acceptance that these things can be sexual and therefore work (in the biological imperative fashion). "Ooh, that story about the handcuffs and whipped cream was pretty hot... let's do that again." "Ooh, she's pretty hot in that leather catsuit... let's do that again." Those interests are therefore "normal". At least in how they are created.

It's the other means of creation of a "fetish" that are often spoken of by psychologists and the like. "Billy was forced to wear women's dresses as a child, now he's a transvestite." Or as above, (which can also apply to myself) "I used to be a bit needle-phobic, but now I think they're pretty hot." Those are different in creation.

It gets confusing in certain fetishes. For example, is spanking a "fetish" because they were spanked as a child and want to recreate that experience, or were they not spanked as a child but felt they should be, or was it because they read a really hot spanking story/porn and thought they'd do it again? All three are possibilities, and in all three the results are the same - they like being spanked.

There are no simple answers across the board.

The only thing we have to fear is fear itself.