People Have a Problem with Kink-shaming
Content Verification
📝 Key Points in a Nutshell 📝
- 📣 Kink-shaming is a common issue, but it's all about consent and communication! ✨
- 🔒 Embrace your kinks with confidence, and don’t let shame hold you back. 🦋
- 💬 Conversations around consent are the key to healthy kink. Let's talk about it! 💭
💡 Key Advice & Tips from Our Experts 💡
- 🎯 Be open, honest, and kind in your communication about boundaries and desires. 🔑
- 🛑 Respect each other's limits — kink should always be fun and safe! 🛡️
- ❤️ Consent is sexy — it's the foundation of every great experience. 💋
Kink shaming is the criticizing of someone's sexual fantasies and fetishes. Kink shaming kills relationships and self-confidence.
It is normal for a sexually active person to have a sexual fetish. The ultimate relationship fantasy is to be able to at least speak about your sexual fantasy and fetish and not be judged for it. Unfortunately, some people cannot speak about their fantasies because they fear being judged or criticized. It's worse for those who have ever been rejected for showing interest in something different. People need to be in relationships that allow them to be open about their deepest desires and maybe even get a chance to explore them. Below are the reasons why people who support the freedom to express themselves have a problem with kink-shaming.
Kink Shaming Kills Relationships
Almost everyone has had a fetish for a certain kink. Some are developing more kinks depending on how their partners react. Having a kink is normal. It kills desires when a person expresses their desires towards a certain kink and is confident enough to express it to their partner and the response is not only negative but surrounded by some kink-shaming. The next time a person is required to share a kink they have, they may want to share. However, the shame the kinky partner faced in the past for revealing what they like may stop them from being open about what they like. They may never want to venture into a fetish while with a partner that put them down, and in so far as they are with that partner, the shame they suffered killed their fetish. They may have a fetish for licking toes, but they were shamed for it, which killed their sexual fetish, making them reluctant to share any sexual desire they may have. Not being able to be free in your relationship will create a gap that you want to fill. A relationship should give you a chance to be free to speak about what you want and like, but you may not speak in your relationship if you cannot get that. You will yearn for a relationship that allows you to speak freely about your kink. When you get a person who gives you the space to be free about your kink, that person will seem like your soul-mate, and that's how the relationship that did not allow you to be free about your sexual desires will die.
Kink Shaming Kills Self-Confidence
According to McNeil et al. (2012), kink-shaming can result in low confidence because it pushes you into shame and regret. It makes you feel guilty about what you like. You are supposed to be free enough to talk about everything, especially among people who should understand you without fear, but that's what kink-shaming will do to you. You will fear sharing your kink among your peers because you do not want to be judged. You are not self-confident if there are things you cannot talk about with people whom you probably share your body with. You should be able to talk about things you like or do not like openly without being judged when you are self-confident, but that's the one thing you will not get from a relationship that forces you to only speak about conventional bedroom activities.
Kink Shaming Can Cause Misunderstandings
You are probably a gay person, but you love watching straight people have sex, and you wouldn't mind being involved in a heterosexual threesome. You could be misunderstood. People may think you are conveniently gay, meaning that you aren't gay. People would live and let live without giving labels in an ideal world. Whatever turns you on should stand so long as you are happy.
Kink Shaming Can Turn You Into A Prude
Suppose you always talk about things you'd like to do in the bedroom, but you find yourself in an environment where you no longer can be open about your bedroom activities. You'll gradually find yourself turning into a prude. It will be your turn to judge and shame others into being prudes like you. According to Meyer (2016), being shamed into a prude turns you into a bully, and that is why people are against kink-shaming because people want more people to be free about their bedroom fantasies, and the last thing people want in this world is more people that want to bully others into being prudes. We do not want modesty in the bedroom. People want people who can speak about things they want and desires.
Kink Shaming Creates Gender-Focus Phobias
In the past, if your child was gay, you condemned your child while society condemned you and your child. There's nothing wrong with a child being gay. There's nothing wrong with same-sex relationships. It doesn't concern anyone else besides the gay person. Some people have fetishes that involve same-sex attractions or trans-women or non-binary people, as Långström & Zucker (2005) stated. Kink shaming that targets genders takes the whole world back to when individual freedoms were not respected by society. It is possible to have a fetish toward same-gender sex and still be heterosexual, and even if you are not heterosexual, it should not matter to a partner who respects your fetish. Society needs to label you based on your sexual preferences and desires. It's not society's business to decide how and whom you should have sex with.
Kink Shaming Makes People Fear Judgment
Kink shaming will make you die with your fetish because you do not want anyone to judge you for the fetish that you may have, as Ortmann (2012) noted. You probably yearn to be treated in a certain way in the bedroom, but you fear what your partner would think about it, so you stay silent. You fear what other people may think if they were to find out what about your sexual desires. It should not be like that.
Conclusion
Sometimes the kink-shaming starts within us when we are afraid about what people may think about our desires. Getting out of the self-guilt is the first step toward accepting and tolerating other people's sexual desires and fetishes. You must know that there's nothing wrong with having sexual desires, and when you realize that, you will be open to other people's fetishes. No one should especially be worried about how their partners will view them. People need to communicate honestly to their partners, knowing that they will accept them as they are.
References
Långström, N., & Zucker, K. J. (2005). Transvestic Fetishism In The General Population. Journal Of Sex & Marital Therapy, 31(2), 87-95.
Mcneil, J., Bailey, L., Ellis, S., Morton, J., & Regan, M. (2012). Trans Mental Health Study 2012. Scottish Transgender Alliance. Available At: Http://Www. Scottish Trans. Org/Wp-Content/Uploads/2013/03/Trans_Mh_Study. Pdf [Accessed: 14 July 2016].
Meyer, S. (2016). Combatting" Slut" Shaming. The Rosen Publishing Group, Inc.Ortmann, D. M., & Sprott, R. A. (2012). Sexual Outsiders: Understanding BDSM Sexualities And Communities. Rowman & Littlefield Publishers.