Fetish theory of sexuality, reprint
This is a post I wrote on Alas back in April of 2003. I post it here because a discussion about radical feminist analysis of BDSM practice and desire that I just entered on Alas made me think of it, and I discovered the google cache was its only remaining home.
Since Amp has brought up my fetish theory of sexuality, I thought I would try to explain a bit more clearly (or at least extensively) what my theory consists of. I view sexual orientation as being very far from a binary opposition between straight and gay, or even a gay-bi-straight continuum. For me, sexual orientation is a gross simplification of the specific sexualities of individuals. I think that at an innate level people have raw sexual energy (in varying amounts) which they channel, focus and control by restricting and specifying the scope of situations in which and types of people with whom they will express that energy. I have no idea what governs how people do this restricting, although I think that very few people do it consciously and most do it very early in life. I have no idea how much of that focusing happens by nature and how much by nurture, but I am doubtful that the part that has to do with whether you like the same sex or the opposite sex happens in a completely different way than all the rest anyone's sexuality. I consider all of the ways in which people channel and focus their sexual energy, so that it doesn't spill out into all of their relations with other people, so that it is restricted to a limit set of circumstances, to be a fetish.
In response to Amp's post, Amy expressed disbelief at the idea that attraction to things people aren't born with (say shoes) could be lumped with attraction to genitalia. Kip pointed out that there are plenty of fetish focuses that are bodily traits, so it can't really be reduced to body vs non-body. Kip's clarification fits very much with my thinking. In terms of things that most people think of as fetishes, feet are also something that almost all of us are born with and only a few of us become sexually interested in. Genitalia are something that almost all of us are born with and many of us become sexually interested in. Some of us become interested in one type of genitalia, some of us become interested in another type of genitalia, some of us become actively interested in (simplifying slightly) both types of genitalia, and some of us don't become particularly sexually interested in genitalia as a focus of attraction.
I also think that there are people who are attracted to one sex or the other without being attracted particularly to genitalia per se. There are people who are strongly attracted to a particular set of gender characteristics, for example only being attracted to short, willowy women with long hair who tend to wear skirts and like cooking. Such a person is obviously a gynophile, whether or not they are particularly sexually aroused specifically by female genitalia (obviously, if they are specifically squicked by female genitalia, this is likely to prevent them from being a gynophile, and will severely restrict their ability to find a satisfactory sexual partner).
I think that bisexuality is not (within this theory) a single thing. Instead, it is a combination two different sorts of sexualities. I think that some people who would be described as bisexual don't require that their partner have either sort of genitalia (the "just don't care" camp who would be capable of being sexually aroused by someone who had been neutered or was born intersexed) while others are specifically attracted to both sorts of genitalia (the "like both" camp who might not be aroused at all by someone with genitalia that didn't meet their preferences). Bisexuals can also have either different fetishes for different sexes, or can have the same fetishes for both sexes.
Fetishes are often talked about as being things required for sexual arousal, but I think that many people are not exclusive in their fetishes. Instead, they have a large number of things which are a plus, but which are not required for arousal. I think that for some bisexual people either sex is a plus and for other bisexual people neither sex is a plus, and other things govern their arousal. Likewise, I think that, for some, squicks may be as important as fetishes in describing their sexuality. I think that some people's sexuality is as much defined by who they would NEVER have sex with as it is by who they would like to have sex with.
The fact that sex is generally fairly focused on genitalia muddles the issue of attraction. I think that one can prefer strongly genitally focused sex without being attracted to any particular sort of genitalia, or even particularly attracted to genitalia at all.
To my mind, attempting to divide out and elevate as the all important preference the sex/binary gender/genitalia component from all the other components of attraction, desire and arousal is not the most productive way to think about sexual attraction, particularly since it combines several different aspects into one in ways that I think can be more confusing than less. Are people who are strongly genitally focused in their attraction more like each other in the nature of their sexuality than people who are body shape focused or emotional bond focused or social role focused, or are the members of each of those groups really divided first and foremost into those who like the same sex and those who like the opposite sex, with the particular nature and focus of that attraction only a secondary division within the two blocks? I think that viewing sexual attraction as a matter of a set of positive and negative factors in which partner sex is one characteristic among many allows for a much more nuanced and productive understanding of sexuality than the het-bi-gay continuum.
On the old nature-nurture question, I am not really sure that declaring sexuality to be entirely composed of fetish really provides any guidance. I think that many people experience some aspects of their sexuality as being unchanging and other aspects as being more malleable, but I am not confident that everyone experiences the same aspects as being malleable or unchanging, nor am I confident that unchanging equals nature and malleable equals nurture. Some feel they can determine where their sexual preferences came from, while others know only when they started (and this holds true for both the classical fetishes and sexual orientation). What I am confident of is that sexuality is far too rich, complicated and culture bound to be usefully described as having a simple genetic control. On the other hand, the question of why heterosexuality is a far more common set of fetishes than homosexuality remains an open question, and could conceivably have a genetic answer.
Of course, I am not sure that my concept of sexuality as an amalgam of fetishes really leads to Amp's:
Thinking of it this way makes it particularly bizarre to hear right-wing types calling for anti-gay laws in marriage, child rearing, or whatever. "Your desire to have sex with people of the opposite genitals is just a damn fetish, straight people! Get over it!"
Amp seems to view some of the classical fetishes (BDSM etc.) with disapproval, so I'm not sure why he thinks that declaring homosexuality (and heterosexuality) fetishes automatically means that neither one can be disapproved of, nor that approving of one means you have to approve of the other. I am sure that there are plenty of people who think that heterosexuals who get off on being tied up in ropes shouldn't be allowed to adopt children.
I suppose that the fetish theory of sexuality does have the aspect of dethroning heterosexuality, which might make it seem to weaken heterosexist positions. On the other hand, by making sexuality into a complex and contested construction, it actually allows those who morally favor heterosexuality to feel justified in working to prevent those conditions which they fear might lead to the formation of sexual fetishes that don't fit within heterosexuality.
If one views (as I guess most people do) fetishes as a sickness, then one could decide that the fetish theory of sexuality privileges vanilla bisexuality of the "just don't care" variety as the right and moral sexuality, if one believes that fetishization of sexuality is a bad thing (perhaps on the basis that fetishization is tied to the objectification of one's partners and a transformation of sex from a mutual sharing of pleasure between two people into a ritual act intended to placate some personal demon). However, to my mind any sexuality beyond a purely and constantly masturbatory one must necessarily involve both squicks (since turn offs are necessary to ensure that arousal never occurs under most circumstances) and positive fetishization (since turn ons are required to focus ones sexuality off of the simple, direct pleasure of arousal and orgasm). So even vanilla bisexuality still involves fetishization.
Admittedly, defining a term so broadly that it encompasses an entire field (sexuality=fetish) is generally a poor idea, since it actually ends up defining nothing and generally hampers discourse. In this case, however, I think it is fruitful specifically because it hampers a certain type of discourse in which the sexuality we don't like is treated as an aberration from the natural and correct development of the sexuality we do like. This does not mean that you can't object to a particular sexuality, it just attacks the idea of a natural sexuality which does not need to be questioned and thought through.
Since Amp has brought up my fetish theory of sexuality, I thought I would try to explain a bit more clearly (or at least extensively) what my theory consists of. I view sexual orientation as being very far from a binary opposition between straight and gay, or even a gay-bi-straight continuum. For me, sexual orientation is a gross simplification of the specific sexualities of individuals. I think that at an innate level people have raw sexual energy (in varying amounts) which they channel, focus and control by restricting and specifying the scope of situations in which and types of people with whom they will express that energy. I have no idea what governs how people do this restricting, although I think that very few people do it consciously and most do it very early in life. I have no idea how much of that focusing happens by nature and how much by nurture, but I am doubtful that the part that has to do with whether you like the same sex or the opposite sex happens in a completely different way than all the rest anyone's sexuality. I consider all of the ways in which people channel and focus their sexual energy, so that it doesn't spill out into all of their relations with other people, so that it is restricted to a limit set of circumstances, to be a fetish.
In response to Amp's post, Amy expressed disbelief at the idea that attraction to things people aren't born with (say shoes) could be lumped with attraction to genitalia. Kip pointed out that there are plenty of fetish focuses that are bodily traits, so it can't really be reduced to body vs non-body. Kip's clarification fits very much with my thinking. In terms of things that most people think of as fetishes, feet are also something that almost all of us are born with and only a few of us become sexually interested in. Genitalia are something that almost all of us are born with and many of us become sexually interested in. Some of us become interested in one type of genitalia, some of us become interested in another type of genitalia, some of us become actively interested in (simplifying slightly) both types of genitalia, and some of us don't become particularly sexually interested in genitalia as a focus of attraction.
I also think that there are people who are attracted to one sex or the other without being attracted particularly to genitalia per se. There are people who are strongly attracted to a particular set of gender characteristics, for example only being attracted to short, willowy women with long hair who tend to wear skirts and like cooking. Such a person is obviously a gynophile, whether or not they are particularly sexually aroused specifically by female genitalia (obviously, if they are specifically squicked by female genitalia, this is likely to prevent them from being a gynophile, and will severely restrict their ability to find a satisfactory sexual partner).
I think that bisexuality is not (within this theory) a single thing. Instead, it is a combination two different sorts of sexualities. I think that some people who would be described as bisexual don't require that their partner have either sort of genitalia (the "just don't care" camp who would be capable of being sexually aroused by someone who had been neutered or was born intersexed) while others are specifically attracted to both sorts of genitalia (the "like both" camp who might not be aroused at all by someone with genitalia that didn't meet their preferences). Bisexuals can also have either different fetishes for different sexes, or can have the same fetishes for both sexes.
Fetishes are often talked about as being things required for sexual arousal, but I think that many people are not exclusive in their fetishes. Instead, they have a large number of things which are a plus, but which are not required for arousal. I think that for some bisexual people either sex is a plus and for other bisexual people neither sex is a plus, and other things govern their arousal. Likewise, I think that, for some, squicks may be as important as fetishes in describing their sexuality. I think that some people's sexuality is as much defined by who they would NEVER have sex with as it is by who they would like to have sex with.
The fact that sex is generally fairly focused on genitalia muddles the issue of attraction. I think that one can prefer strongly genitally focused sex without being attracted to any particular sort of genitalia, or even particularly attracted to genitalia at all.
To my mind, attempting to divide out and elevate as the all important preference the sex/binary gender/genitalia component from all the other components of attraction, desire and arousal is not the most productive way to think about sexual attraction, particularly since it combines several different aspects into one in ways that I think can be more confusing than less. Are people who are strongly genitally focused in their attraction more like each other in the nature of their sexuality than people who are body shape focused or emotional bond focused or social role focused, or are the members of each of those groups really divided first and foremost into those who like the same sex and those who like the opposite sex, with the particular nature and focus of that attraction only a secondary division within the two blocks? I think that viewing sexual attraction as a matter of a set of positive and negative factors in which partner sex is one characteristic among many allows for a much more nuanced and productive understanding of sexuality than the het-bi-gay continuum.
On the old nature-nurture question, I am not really sure that declaring sexuality to be entirely composed of fetish really provides any guidance. I think that many people experience some aspects of their sexuality as being unchanging and other aspects as being more malleable, but I am not confident that everyone experiences the same aspects as being malleable or unchanging, nor am I confident that unchanging equals nature and malleable equals nurture. Some feel they can determine where their sexual preferences came from, while others know only when they started (and this holds true for both the classical fetishes and sexual orientation). What I am confident of is that sexuality is far too rich, complicated and culture bound to be usefully described as having a simple genetic control. On the other hand, the question of why heterosexuality is a far more common set of fetishes than homosexuality remains an open question, and could conceivably have a genetic answer.
Of course, I am not sure that my concept of sexuality as an amalgam of fetishes really leads to Amp's:
Thinking of it this way makes it particularly bizarre to hear right-wing types calling for anti-gay laws in marriage, child rearing, or whatever. "Your desire to have sex with people of the opposite genitals is just a damn fetish, straight people! Get over it!"
Amp seems to view some of the classical fetishes (BDSM etc.) with disapproval, so I'm not sure why he thinks that declaring homosexuality (and heterosexuality) fetishes automatically means that neither one can be disapproved of, nor that approving of one means you have to approve of the other. I am sure that there are plenty of people who think that heterosexuals who get off on being tied up in ropes shouldn't be allowed to adopt children.
I suppose that the fetish theory of sexuality does have the aspect of dethroning heterosexuality, which might make it seem to weaken heterosexist positions. On the other hand, by making sexuality into a complex and contested construction, it actually allows those who morally favor heterosexuality to feel justified in working to prevent those conditions which they fear might lead to the formation of sexual fetishes that don't fit within heterosexuality.
If one views (as I guess most people do) fetishes as a sickness, then one could decide that the fetish theory of sexuality privileges vanilla bisexuality of the "just don't care" variety as the right and moral sexuality, if one believes that fetishization of sexuality is a bad thing (perhaps on the basis that fetishization is tied to the objectification of one's partners and a transformation of sex from a mutual sharing of pleasure between two people into a ritual act intended to placate some personal demon). However, to my mind any sexuality beyond a purely and constantly masturbatory one must necessarily involve both squicks (since turn offs are necessary to ensure that arousal never occurs under most circumstances) and positive fetishization (since turn ons are required to focus ones sexuality off of the simple, direct pleasure of arousal and orgasm). So even vanilla bisexuality still involves fetishization.
Admittedly, defining a term so broadly that it encompasses an entire field (sexuality=fetish) is generally a poor idea, since it actually ends up defining nothing and generally hampers discourse. In this case, however, I think it is fruitful specifically because it hampers a certain type of discourse in which the sexuality we don't like is treated as an aberration from the natural and correct development of the sexuality we do like. This does not mean that you can't object to a particular sexuality, it just attacks the idea of a natural sexuality which does not need to be questioned and thought through.