The Origins of Kink

Ah - plane flights are great for writing. The following is my brain's diarrhea on a topic I've been wanting to write about, finally putting fingers to keys...please forgive the chaotic train of thought.

"You're either born kinky or you're not"

This is a phrase that I hear come up in many conversations between fetishists, BDSM activists, edge players, and the like. We always ask questions among ourselves about our pasts and how we came to discover what we did, trying to find association with like-minded individuals and a confirmation that we're not so isolated and alone as we may have once thought we were.

First of all, I think most of what I'm going to write here will be relevant mostly to fetishism, not so much to edge players, sadists, masochists, etc. BDSMs are very much based on the physical, the sensations generated within themselves by applying a change to their physical state, which in some ways is similar to what fetishists experience but with fetishists their focus is on something external to themselves. This is the main difference between the two groups (internal vs. external stimuli). I don't like to differentiate - the similarities outnumber the differences (we are all stimulated by the five senses), but for the most part I am most familiar with fetishes and the sensations involved in focus on something external. I am not particularly learned on the psychological intensity involved with mindgames and such. I can only write about what I am most familiar with.

It seems that almost everyone who is into experimenting in their sex lives - questing for the ultimate intense sensation or being aroused by some strange activity, ritual, or inanimate object inevitably falls into a kink lifestyle, or at least dabbles in it from time to time. The commonality of fetishism is that it is primarily sexual in its response but the expression is only limited by the imagination of the perverted minds involved. Why do kinky people project their sexuality into something outside their basic sexual desires and equipment? Human sexuality is very complex, holy crap. In addition to the how and why of fetishism I would like to theorize on the when.

Everyone I've talked to over the years who is truly passionate about their 'non-traditional' sexual proclivities almost always started their interests in it when very young. During some formative period there was a timely event or sensation that occurred that we associated with pleasure, our budding sexualities, or a very emotionally intense moment.

What I find interesting is that there was this propensity for the association in the first place. Why did a boy find a visual of a man in a wetsuit or a leather jacket or speedos or tights so poignant? Why did this lead to further exploration of the activity associated with the visual and the wherewithal to initially buy that wetsuit/leather (insert item here)/lycra tights/speedos, and then associate the feeling of the item with their sexuality? What about those sexually aroused by superheroes, ballet dancers, transvestitism, furries/costumes/transformation? What about BDSM activists - torture, submission and humiliation, breathplay, or the rest of the ever-expanding list of -philias?

I truly do believe that the initial sensitivity to a converging stimulus at the right time, this urge to further investigate the arousing association and experiment with variations on the theme that is found to be so pleasurable, as well as an inquisitive personality are the factors that differentiate the kinky from the vanilla. You can't 'become' a fetishist or edge-player -- you are born that way!

So, what about straight vs. gay? There are many heterosexual fetishists out there - there certainly are as many straight men and women who enjoy BDSM, fetishism and the like, but I think that the ratio of homosexuals, particularly gay men that are perverted must be higher. Why? I can't base that assumption on any scientific numbers; I don't think there are any. However in studies of social psychology in school, you learn about the numerous coping skills of the human mind. Projection is something that I think of here.

My theory is that I think a lot of gay kids in repressive situations are forced to project their sexual urges into something other than normal sexual development because of the stigma attached to homosexuality in many cultures and because of their own interpretation of their situation.

Some may argue that gay men are more experimental by nature because of their sexual freedoms (ie, being able to try many different things with different people vs. heteros 'restricted' by long-term pair-bonding) and this would explain their early adopter roles in novel sexual activities, but I don't believe that is the reason. I believe there are almost if not as many kinky straight people -- they just may not be able to express themselves in their adult lives as openly because of the restrictions put on their hetero sexual lives (ironically, in a similar way that gay people are before they 'come out'!). It only 'appears' that the gay men are the sexual front-line. I'm not sure that's completely true.

Those of us that are 'born' kinky had that susceptibility to grasp the 'defining moment' in the first place, and not just let it slip by unnoticed, unremarked. If the statistical numbers existed, I would postulate that as gay people become 'normalized' in society, the rate of fetishism in the gay population will decrease as the young are able to sexually develop in a more normal psychologically healthy fashion.

I also believe fetishism does have certain genetic component to it; if it was totally genetic than those rates should not change. I believe the right situational trigger has to occur at the right time for that person who is susceptible to the non-standard 'projection' in order for it to flourish in them, so that makes perversion also partly environmental. That defends the argument that those numbers would change over a long period of time. Straight people do not have those cultural stigma attached to their sexuality so I would gather that the number of hetero perverts has stayed and will remain pretty constant over time.

That is ignoring the reality that our societies are much more permissive and open than they were fifty years ago of course. Also that our media and communication systems are not what they were (or weren't) even ten years ago. The relaxation of sexual mores and the implications of the Internet as examples have certainly increased the numbers of fetishists achieving their potential. That would be a variable in the experiment that would need to be controlled in order for the theory to be tested, which ultimately makes the testing impossible! But then, these variables should also not be that different between straight and gay individuals; we have generally all been exposed to the same things.

...

In my own experience, I believe this is how my own development came to pass. In my local Western Canadian puritanical culture, until the mid-1990s being gay was associated with so many negatives. I couldn't even convince myself that being gay might be a possibility back then. To me, it was associated with immorality, subversiveness, AIDS and family destruction. I wouldn't even acknowledge the possibility I was gay even though I never dated nor had any interest in girls as a teenager despite being pretty dateable back then, IMHO.

I look back on college as being a wasted developmental opportunity for me because I still held on to those unfounded beliefs, yet my fetishisms grew more and more intense and varied as I experimented in what I believe now was a projection coping mechanism. Of course the point came when I couldn't live with the denial and double life (always thinking up the excuses, faking interest in women...and faking interest in straight porn. Yeesh. I mean, other than watching the (generally gross) men...I really should have come to my senses earlier than I did), and the rest is history. By then my fetishism was permanently forged and will be with me for the rest of my life.

Why the fetishes and interests I have now? I recall being a 'self-repressed' gay boy back then that visuals of masculine form were very strong for me. There were the men on television, especially the superheroes and science fiction heroes. There were those very early images of Rudolf Nureyev and Mikhail Barishnykov that were extremely pervasive -- particular to my ballet fetishism, would it still have the esthetic appeal to me if I hadn't had those encyclopedia and magazine pictures and CBC TV shows available to me when I was a boy in the early 70s? The International Male catalogs and men's fitness magazines in the 80s? And the sport heroes, especially the Olympians every two years (yes, the winter ones were particularly bountiful for images of muscular men in full skintight regalia!). It was the definition of the male form under skintight clothing that I found alluring back then, moreso than even the naked male form. The budding homosexual desires and arousal then being tied into the skintight clothing and the subsequent trying on of these clothes and the sensations afterwards moved the fetish from visual to sensual at that point.

I still vividly remember my first nylon red speedo (and masturbation while wearing them) in the early 80s as I was finishing my qualifying for a lifeguard. Then the evolution to pantyhose and tights shortly afterwards which led to lycra shorts and tights on the track team in high school, which led to the skinsuits for speedskating in university which led to the skinsuits for cycling today. The rubber fetish started in junior high school with an affinity for condoms, which led to surgical gloves and bathing caps in university which led to my first rubber suits four years ago or so. Whew! The evolution is amazing yet oddly predictable.

I'm sure a lot of you can relate to a similar evolution, in fact.

...

The more senses you involve in your fetish, the stronger it becomes. With latex, for instance, there are those that became fascinated with it by any of the senses individually -- it has visual, tactile, olfactory, auditory and gustatory elements that could all be the formative trigger to urge further investigation of rubber. Once the investigation begins, interest in how latex stimulates the other senses would intensify the latex fetish. Most latex fetishists are very serious and hardcore about that which is the object of their desire. It stimulates all of their senses at a most actualized level, thus becomes very all-encompassing in its effect on that person. I think this partly explains the scale of leather and rubber fetishism, even moreso that lycra or PVC which do not fulfill all five 'sensory requirements'.

One also has to look at personality traits. Further to the conversation about openness to accept sensory cues to follow, I think I have always had an 'alternative' bend in me. Those things considered 'normal' never really ever fascinated me beyond basic acknowledgement. I was always interested in the outliers on the curve. The team that were the underdogs. The music and books no one else was listening to or reading. The sports that everyone else weren't interested in.

Finding out more about all the variations on a theme, rather than simply being satisfied that accepting the norm was all that I needed to know and really not desiring to know anymore. This is part of this essential desire for investigation and experimentation that is required in order for a potential pervert to flourish.

More about this later...

So, so far in summary, perverts are:

Who? Those with the susceptibility to pick up on the cue, find arousal and/or interest in it, and have the propensity and particular personality to investigate and experiment further with it.
What? Whatever that cue at the point of susceptibility was during those formative periods. Most likely it would have to be some item/material that affected multiple senses, possibly all of them, to have a strong, lasting effect.
Why? Possible projection of repressed sexual urges? Some intrinsic unfulfilled predisposition for things non-standard? This is the point I would like to hear the most different viewpoints on, as I have my own ideas on this, but I'm sure there are many other supported or potentially substantiated reasons/theories.
How? Initially one or maybe two senses pick up on the cues and relates these cues to something sexual, and as the 'who' continues to investigate and experiment, the rest of the senses may become involved, which will inevitably intensify the 'projection'.
When? For almost everyone I've talked to the foundations were laid in childhood or early adolescence when comprehension of sexuality was in its formative periods. There is a 'situational convergence' that occurs that fires the perverted spark.

So, a question.

With the when, do you know of anyone who became a perverted fetishist later in life? I know of many, even today, when they see me in rubber or whatever will say, "Holy shit, that's sexy. You know what? I find that really, really fascinating, but it's something I've never even really considered before as being sexual for people".

This would immediately indicate to me that they never had that formative moment that opened them up to the possibilites of a sexual association to whatever perversion they are witnessing for the 'first time'. I don't know if these people could become real perverts. But further than that, I'm not sure they have the personality to support being a pervert. They undoubtedly must have had some exposure to a visual, for instance, of that with which they are now exposed, but there wasn't any spark at those moments in the past that made them say, "Wow!". There was no light bulb that came on that triggered a need to contemplate that they might be sexually aroused by something other than another human!

I believe these people are the ones that can appreciate the esthetic but most likely nothing further. Aptly these people are like the porn stars that wear fetish gear at the beginning of the scene, but then find it 'in the way' when the real action starts and have to take it off to continue. But then for most of us true fetishists by my definition, the development of the fetish/activity has been evolutionary, not something that happened all of a sudden in a eureka moment. So then, I guess it is possible that eventually they may appreciate the fetish in question. Maybe they have the same individual/social/cultural hangups about the fetish as I did with my own homosexuality. Or those who don't come out of the closet until they're in their thirties, forties or fifties. The same could apply to those that are just discovering their fetish potential at a later age. Even though the possibility is remote, I concede that it is possible for the 'light to go on' towards fetish at a later age. I just find it hard to believe that these people would have missed the queues when they were younger or dabbled in it but didn't continue; most likely they just repressed it because due to their socialization it scared them to death or they don't have the personality to sustain the fetish's incubation period.

So that is my insight into the origin of one's fetish. I find that my story follows this one quite closely as does the story of most that I talk to and that is why I am basing some of my theories on my personal experiences. The fact that there is so much similarity in the when and howamong so many of us strongly indicates to me that there is a biological predisposition for fetishism; there has to be - how could a child create such a strong association of an object with sexual arousal? Our brain's wiring is so complex and convoluted, there may never be a definitive way to understand it in our lifetimes, but I believe that the nature vs. nurture coincidence is too strong to ignore.

What do you think?