The New York Magazine has an article on the well worn subject of nature versus nurture in the context of fetish and kink. It’s a discursive piece, heavy on anecdotes and light on hard data. It comes down firmly on the side of nurture, although it also admits there’s no simple way to divide up such a complex set of influences and interests.
Personally I wonder if, outside of scientific curiosity, the debate is even one worth having. Unless they identify a very clear genetic cause, which seems unlikely given the current research, the discussion isn’t going to result in anything actionable. Nobody is going to be able to come up with a set of guidelines for bringing up a child with “normal” sexual interests. The cause and effect is far too complex and unique for each individual.
It also seems odd that people are so interested in tracking down the basis for kinky sexual preferences, but seem happy to accept all the other preferences people exhibit without question. If somebody says they don’t like carrots, nobody starts wondering if they had a traumatic experience as a child while watching a Bugs Bunny cartoon. Wine lovers don’t feel the need to tie their interest back to early experiences with a sippy cup and purple grape drink. Even in the sexual and relationship realm we let vanilla preferences slide without comment. A serial dater of blonde women just has a ‘type’. Nobody wonders if it’s because he watched one too many Marilyn Monroe movies while sitting on his mother’s knee. Yet say he likes dominant blonde women, and suddenly there’s an urge to wheel out old Sigmund to try and figure out why the hell he’s so damn weird.
Given this posts focus on the development of sexual preferences, it seems appropriate to finish with this image – ‘School of Bondage’ by zblabla. The classroom can certainly be a powerful influence on sexual development, but it’s not typically this overt.
” Yet say he likes dominant blonde women, and suddenly there’s an urge to wheel out old Sigmund to try and figure out why the hell he’s so damn weird.”
Strangely, this post echoes one that I found on one of your listed femdom blogs, in which a domme was wondering aloud whether her urges were the result of unfortunate and unhappy encounters with men in childhood and adolescence, encounters about which she still obviously feels deep resentment.
I have to say that I did succumb to the temptation to trot out something from Uncle Sigmund because, although he was wrong about all sorts of things, he did have a talent for hitting the nail on the head in matters concerning ‘Civilization and its Discontents’.
He writes:
“As regards the sexually individual, the choice of an object is restricted [by societal pressure] to the opposite sex, and most extra-genital satisfactions are forbidden as perversions. The requirement, demonstrated in these prohibitions that there shall be a single kind of sexual life for everyone, disregards the dissimilarities, whether innate or acquired, in the sexual constitution of human beings; it cuts off a fair number of them from sexual enjoyment, and so becomes the source of serious injustice.”
In short, what needs explaining is not kink, because we’re all born kinky (or ‘polymorphously perverse’ as he calls it), but how we are forced by societal pressure, i.e. nurture, to become straight, and the toll that this exacts on our psyche.
Your comment about the domme whose urges may stem from unhappy childhood/adolescent encounters leads into the much more complex and potentially more significant question about the value of kink. Arguing about what makes someone a certain way might be interesting from an intellectual viewpoint, but doesn’t do much to change matters. Arguing if there actions are healthy or reinforcing existing negative feelings is much more relevant to someone’s life. That’s a big complex area.
I really should read up more on Freud. I’ve digested a number of articles on him over the years, but never really dug into a proper book either by him or on him. I really should fix that. Thanks for the prompt.
-paltego
I always find this topic intriguing which is why I have the page “Sexual Wiring Fact or Fiction” on my blog. I believe we are all born with some genetic wiring in place and then life comes along and either strengthens, messes with, damages or twists that wiring in many ways.
I had a very vanilla up bringing with nothing to point to that would explain my strong sexual desires etc. Dominance and strong sexual desires seem to run in my family. Been dominant since childhood.
I’ve settle on the answer that in the history of mankind it has always been the ‘few’ trying to control the ‘many’ through ignorance of what they can not comprehend. The ‘few’ don’t bother me anymore. I’m having too much fun being me, living in the freedom of my life. I see the sadness of their narrows ways. They alone have boxed themselves in.
~ Vista
Hi Vista,
I subscribe to your view on genetic wiring that gets messed with by life. I guess the question is how much wiring we start off with and how much messing happens. Is it mostly wired a certain way already, or is it mostly the messing/twisting/strengthening that makes the difference? Or is it completely different for different people? Do some people have wiring that’s easier to mess with? Too many questions 🙂
I also think your approach to life and fun is entirely the right one!
-paltego
Hi, paltego!
Provocative post! I think the (pre?)disposition towards kink/sadomasochism/fetishes is a fascinating topic. I myself don’t really consider it to be a debate, as I don’t think BDSM is a genetic orientation such as homosexuality, though others disagree with that. As you say, without findings from good peer-reviewed research, my guess is frankly as good as the next.
I think that the discussion is worth having because it is only natural for curious human beings to seek to examine that which is currently unexplained.
Also, people are fascinated by sadomasochism because it is, statistically speaking, not normal. I myself do not believe it to be either good or bad or indicative of one’s state of mental health. Nor do I believe it to be something someone “has or they don’t.” It’s a huge spectrum. Picking scabs and biting nails till they bleed is masochism, for instance.
I could ruminate about this topic for years, but time is short and this isn’t my blog and I don’t have any answers anyway. I CAN say that I have encountered enough truly unique kinky/wacky/fetish-y stuff in my dungeon to make me wonder, “How in the heck did this person COME UP with this?”
I love to ask clients that. Usually I can’t, because it’s none of my business and it would be rude and inappropriate for me to ask them. Regulars with whom I have developed a personal connection and who enjoy talking…I often ask (an a lot of them like to talk about it, because they don’t get to share with others in their life). Many of them know, or think that they know, where they get their kink from. The answers are fascinating to me.
Sorry for the discursive comment! Just thinking out loud.
Thanks again for your great blog. I enjoy reading it!
Hey Miss Margo,
I think when it comes to orientation it really depends on how you define orientation (as I touched on here)
I do think it’d be fascinating to do a decent size and properly controlled survey on kinky people and see exactly how the breakdown of origins and formative events stacks up.
i.e. How many can clearly attribute to specific events, how many have an inkling of what affected them, and how many it’s a complete mystery to.
But I suspect as usual we’ll have to muddle along with anecdotal evidence and not much else.
-paltego
I think a lot of kinky tendencies come from insecurity in early adolescence. That time in life when the hormones are changing but we are socially and emotionally insecure. It’s easy to fall into fantasies of either being in total control (Dom) or total helplessness (Sub) either of which gives us the license to ignore the insecurity.
What happens next is more about Pavlov than sex. We start regularly fantasizing and masturbating to these fantasies. Over time we become more secure, comfortable with sex and our own sexuality, perhaps marry. We no longer need the kinky fantasies/behaviors as a crutch BUT they still exist as powerful triggers.
I think for some people there is ONE major event they can identify in early adolescence that “triggers” and for others there is just a slow, steady migration into the fantasy life.
I honestly believe (and this can be painful for some to admit) that those with emotional or physical problems in adolescence have longer and deeper periods of insecurity that increase the likelyhood of developing kinks. Personally I had a very emotionally dominant mother who made me feel powerless. I was also fat as a teen. I’ve long ago overcome both of those issues, married with a beautiful family – but the Kink triggers remain.
I can remember one particular trigger but it was just the start – It was a movie that I have searched for fruitlessly ever since. It was a very bad B grade horror movie that my parents went to see at a drive-in in the early ’60’s. It had a scene in it that I’m sure they would have covered my eyes – except that I had gone to the snack bar when it came on. It was in the villain’s dark stone dungeon where he was doing his experiments. In the background, two teenage girls were chained to the wall, hands over their heads, topless in tight bluejeans. They were not in the plot, they were not mentioned in the scene, they were just part of the set decoration. And to this day, the sexiest thing my wife can wear is a pair of tight blue jeans (and nothing else :-).
Miss Margo also mentioned “Normal” When someone mentions what’s ‘normal’ or ‘abnormal’ I like to remember what that term actually means. It’s a math term derived from the ‘norm’. I’m sure a mathematician in the group can explain it better than I but . . . I think of a bell curve of say average shoe sizes in america. The middle of the bell curve for men are size 8 to 11 – those basketball players that wear size 15 are ‘abnormal’. Well, if you believe most sex research, people who like to tie each other up in the bedroom are completely ‘normal’. Those that like to be hung from their thumbs while needles are pushed through their testicles are probably ‘abnormal’ or pretty far out on the long tail of the bell curve.
But ‘abnormal’ does not = insane or sick. ‘Abnormal is just a statistical term that means we aren’t like the majority of the population :-).
Thanks for that lengthy and interesting comment Budman. It actually triggered another post on the topic, which should be on the front page now.
For me adolescence was certainly the time when my kinky sexuality really emerged – although it didn’t really have anywhere to go at the time!. And there was certainly a degree of insecurity that was simplified by thinking about dom/sub type scenarios. Much easier if the girl the just took over rather than leaving it for me to figure out :). But as I said in the latest post, for me adolescence was more of a fitting things together – an ‘Aha!’ moment – rather than a time when I created my kinks. I’ve heard others make similar comments to yours, and it’s clearly the case that there’s no single route to kink.
I’ll keep an eye out for chained naked women in blue jeans. I always like a cheesy horror movie. If I ever spot it I’ll let you know :).
As for normal – I think it originally comes from the latin normalis, meaning in conformity with the rules (I love word etymology). But your general point is still a good and true one. There’s a distribution of behavior and being towards the edge isn’t wrong or sick, it’s just a little further out there than some people are 🙂
-paltego