Kink vs. fetish & a touch of necrophilia
The spookier it gets, the more important to know the difference 💀
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This is a weekly newsletter from me, Dani Faith Leonard , a comedy writer, film producer, and performer. It’s an extension of the live comedy show ADULT SEX ED that I’ve hosted since 2018. The show is about plugging the holes in our education as adults, so I’ll be doing just that (if you want to know more about this newsletter, here’s a description on substack). Ready to get a little smarter? Okay, let’s go!
Ok, I have something to confess. No, not necrophilia. I have to confess that I’ve been guilty of using the words kink and fetish interchangeably. I even wrote about spectrophilia (a sexual fascination or attraction to ghosts) a couple of weeks ago and didn’t really make a clear distinction. You can read that post here:
A kink is a sexually unconventional practice, fantasy, or concept that you use by yourself or with a partner. What’s considered kinky is subjective; the word kink is derived from the idea of a “bend” in your sexuality and some people bend more than others.
The main distinction that many professionals make between a kink and a fetish is that a fetish is something that has to be present in order for someone to get off. A fetish is not considered to be a disorder, unless it causes a lot of distress (or like, you have to commit crimes to do it).
In a medical setting, a kink or fetish may be referred to as a paraphilia. Here’s an example: Urophilia is the traditional name for what is colloquially known as a golden shower or watersports. If someone likes playing with or fantasizing about urine sexually, it is a kink. If they need to pee or be peed on, it’s a fetish.
I know it’s not just me; these words have been used interchangeably by many people, but it’s important to know the distinction. ESPECIALLY when we talk about kinks or fetishes that are extra taboo, like fetishes that involve blood or even death.
It makes me think of a very specific time in recent history when the public (or at least celebrity-focused media) was fascinated by a kink, but had a very limited understanding. In the early aughts, Angelina Jolie and Billy Bob Thornton were the horniest couple on any red carpet. There’s this famous red carpet interview at the premiere of Gone In 60 Seconds when the couple admits to fucking in the car on the way there. But that didn’t get as much attention as the couple’s interest in blood play, even wearing vials of each other’s blood around their necks. Public conversations about kink were extremely limited at the time, so their play time was depicted as full-blown destructive vampirism.
The late 90’s/early aughts were when we were deep in purity culture, so that may have been what made their public display of the hornies seem so extreme. I’ve written about the era of virginity pledges here:
Blood play falls under the kink umbrella and, let’s face it, playing with blood (or even an attraction to it), sounds super taboo. Hematolagnia, the technical term, can involve play with real or fake blood, or even period blood. So, just like with all kink or fetish, there is a big range of commitment level!
Another public horny couple of the early aughts, Carmen Electra and Dave Navarro, had a reality show about planning their wedding. They were positioned by MTV as the polar opposite of the virginal Jessica Simpson and Nick Lachey. In the first episode, they famously posed for photos stripped naked and posing dead in a morgue. I remember the overreaction to these images. Like….are they into necrophilia? Whoa.
Necrophilia is sexual attraction or acts involving corpses, so like other kinks or fetishes there is a BIG RANGE of acts that one can commit. Since some necrophiliacs commit heinous crimes, there is actually a classification system. Someone who has a touch of necrophilia (Class I) might get aroused when role-playing that their partner is dead during sexual activity. Like most people with a kink, these individuals do not necessarily suffer from any pathological condition. (Some of us like to pretend that we’re dead when things aren’t going well, which is a different thing altogether). Then there’s the other end of the fetish spectrum: Jeffrey Dahmer.
If there’s one thing I want you to take away from this newsletter it’s that a kink or fetish isn’t inherently bad and all kinks have range. If there’s a second thing I want you to take away, it’s this crazy fact: Necrophilia (having sex with an actual dead body) is only a misdemeanor in New York. 😳
I hear Greenwood Cemetery is beautiful this time of year.
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It’s great that you slip a super funny line in, like this: Some of us like to pretend that we’re dead when things aren’t going well, which is a different thing altogether. Very funny and very true.😂