The Paraphilia Episode

SEX! Now that we have your attention, this episode reviews some of the paraphilias that exist. More importantly, we try to understand with a compassionate and critical lens. Some paraphilias are simply different than what might be considered "normal" sexual behavior, but in which no one is hurt, or exploited, and everything is consensual. However, there are paraphilias that include lack of consent, expoitation, or harm. There is no black and white way to classify this, so we need nuance and critical thinking. 

Recommendations

• Abraham: Jurassic World: Rebirth (https://www.jurassicworld.com/)
• Shane: BK Adventure Tours (https://www.bkadventure.com/)

Holidays (7/30/2025):

• Father In Law Day
• Health Care Now! Medicare’s Birthday
• International Day of Friendship
• National Cheesecake Day
• National Chicken and Waffles Day
• National Support Public Education Day
• National Whistleblowers Appreciation Day
• Paperback Book Day
• Share a Hug Day
• World Day Against Trafficking in Persons
• World Snorkeling Day
• Hepatitis Awareness Week
• International Listening Association Week

Links and References

•  https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/books/NBK554425/2.
• https://www.psychologytoday.com/us/conditions/paraphilias3.
• https://www.merckmanuals.com/professional/psychiatric-disorders/paraphilias-and-paraphilic-disorders/overview-of-paraphilias-and-paraphilic-disorders4
• https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/abs/pii/S10564993183055225
• https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S00472352220010156
• https://emedicine.medscape.com/article/291419-overview7
• https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/26941021/8
• https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/abs/pii/S17436095153353239.
• https://www.nature.com/articles/s41443-024-00835-410
• https://www.researchgate.net/figure/Prevalence-of-Experience-at-Least-Once-in-Lifetime-With-Paraphilic-Behaviors-Among_tbl1_28936825411.
• https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/10.1177/1079063223119931812
• https://www.msdmanuals.com/professional/psychiatric-disorders/paraphilias-and-paraphilic-disorders/overview-of-paraphilias-and-paraphilic-disorders13.
• https://www.mentalhealth.com/library/introduction-to-sexual-disorders

Become a supporter of this podcast: https://www.spreaker.com/podcast/why-we-do-what-we-do--3419521/support.

Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:03):
You're listening to Why we Do what we Do. Welcome
to Why We Do what We Do. I am your
curiously explorative host, Abraham.

Speaker 2 (00:23):
And I'm your kinky host Shane.

Speaker 1 (00:26):
We are a psychology podcast. We talk about the things
that humans and non human animals do, and sometimes we
talk about the things that they do that are very
primary reinforcers. Yeah, and then maybe they have very specific
preferences around, which is to say, things that are biologically
relevant to the survival and continuity of our species.

Speaker 3 (00:46):
Yes, and so today we are going to talk about paraphilias,
which are going to be I think a fascinating discussion.
I don't think it'll be a very long discussion, yeah,
but hopefully it's going to be a little bit of
a mythbusting discussion where you walk away with this with
a little bit more information, a little bit more understanding,
in a little bit less judgment towards folks who particular paraphilias.

Speaker 1 (01:04):
Yeah. I think that people are going to have a
lot of pre fabricated ideas, thoughts, and values around what
is considered acceptable in this space. And I would definitely
think as a goal for our discussion today, we would
like people to leave feeling just more informed and I
think more or like maybe less judgmental about the sort

(01:25):
of moral direction that exists around this. If you will, yes,
one hundred percent awesome. All right, Well, if you are
joining us for the first time, then welcome. I hope
that you enjoy what you hear in this discussion today.
And if you are a returning listener, then welcome back.
We're really happy that you have continued to seek us
out and find us as a thing that you would
like to listen to. And if you would like to
support what we do and have us continue to make

(01:47):
more and more of these episodes. One way that you
can do that is by joining us on Patreon. You
can leave us a rating and review, like subscribe, tell
a friend. Honestly, getting the word out there is like
one of the best things that can happen. So and
just you know, sharing us with someone else we very
much appreciate. But no matter how you got here, no
matter your level of interest in supporting us, I would

(02:10):
just say, however it shook out for you, a happy
father in law day, because that's what day it is
on this July thirtieth.

Speaker 3 (02:17):
Yes, it's also healthcare now Medicare's birthday.

Speaker 1 (02:21):
Oh and death day.

Speaker 3 (02:22):
I was gonna say, I think we're gonna be celebrating
or you know, a celebration of life if you will
for Medicare soon.

Speaker 1 (02:28):
Yes, rip Medicare. Wow, so young, you know, I know,
h tragic. Happy International Day of Friendship, Yes, lovely.

Speaker 2 (02:41):
It's also National Cheesecake Day, which is delicious.

Speaker 1 (02:45):
It is National chicken and Waffles today. I have never
been a big fan of sweet and savory, so this
is not so much my speed. But I have had
pretty decent plant based versions of this that are okay.

Speaker 3 (02:56):
The best version I've had was in Vegas, Okay, a
place called The Vegan, which was like, it was just
unbelievably good. They also had really good coconut shrimp. Okay,
nice vegan coca coconut trimp. So shrimp made of coconuts. Yeah,
shrimp made of coconuts is wild time. It's a reversal
of expectations.

Speaker 2 (03:14):
You know.

Speaker 3 (03:15):
It is National Support Public Education Day again, re clebrating
that differently.

Speaker 1 (03:22):
Rip public education. Yeah yeah, rip education more broadly, I
guess yep, yeah.

Speaker 2 (03:29):
Yeah.

Speaker 1 (03:29):
It is National Whistleblowers Appreciation Day. We do appreciate whistle blowers.
Yeah we do, I mean we do. Yeah. Maybe also
another rip sort of thing.

Speaker 3 (03:39):
Yeah yeah, yeah yeah, also another rip thing. Uh, Happy
Paperback Book Day. Apparently like we're just in a dystopian
future here in the United States because paperback books are
probably gonna go the way of the buffalo soon if
this current administration has anything to do with it.

Speaker 1 (03:56):
Yeah, I mean they burn easy, you know, so you know, yeah, Okay,
it is a Share a Hug day. That's nice.

Speaker 3 (04:05):
That's something we desperately need right now. Apparently both of
the its are like so bummed out. It is World
Day against Trafficking in Persons.

Speaker 1 (04:13):
Yeah, and that is actually, interestingly a thing that we
might be seen a lot more of, is trafficking in persons. Yeah,
now we are this is World Day against that, And
of course that is just a weirdly long way of
saying human trafficking for some reason. Yeah, and we are
anti human trafficking broadly as a podcast and as a people. Yeah,
but that will be a thing that that is not rip. Unfortunately,

(04:34):
that'd be a thing I would love to be able
to slap an rip on. Yeah, but yeah, yeah, exactly
too many people in power who who that's their bread
and butter for daily entertainment. Yeah, it is world Snorkeling Day.
Well that's also very lovely and wholesome. I like that.
That's a lot of the wholesome levels here.

Speaker 3 (04:50):
Yeah, we gotta, we gotta, you know, sprinkle those in.
We need some sprinkles on the mountain.

Speaker 2 (04:55):
It's a Hepatitis Awareness Week.

Speaker 1 (04:58):
Oh well, yep, that's an the thing that under RFK
Junior's leadership, we might be able to see a tremendous resurgence,
or maybe of resurgence, but a tremendous epidemic level experience
of hepatizes.

Speaker 2 (05:10):
Yeah, I got a lot of disease.

Speaker 1 (05:12):
Put it in every home. Yeah, yeah, huge, every disease
in every home.

Speaker 2 (05:19):
Gross.

Speaker 1 (05:19):
Yeah. It is International Listening Association Week. So if you
are listening to this podcast, then you are already halfway there.
I think, good job. All right, Well, we don't just
make jokes about the holidays or list them. I'm not
sure how much of that was jokes. Most of it
was lamenting the state of things. But actually we talk

(05:42):
about things that are related to psychology, and one of
the things related to psychology is behavior, and one behavior
that most of us will do at some point in
some version has to do with reproductive activities. And so
before we dive into our topic at hand, we would
like to issue a few disclaimers just understanding the nature

(06:02):
of the topic we're going to be discussing. Now, this
is not intended in any way to be like exploitative
or titillating, or I mean even really like we make
a lot of jokes and we try to bring levity
to the discussions that we have on this podcast, even
when they are hard discussions. But we're really not doing
this to be like shock value or anything like that.

(06:24):
We are talking about sex things, So as a first disclaimer,
we're going to be talking about sexual arousal and interest.
So it's possible that this content is not suitable for
younger audiences or sensitive audiences, So just bear that in
mind as you go through it. As I said, we're
treating this as professionals. There's really no intention whatsoever for
this to be something where we're like, let's talk about

(06:45):
genitles TIHIHI.

Speaker 2 (06:46):
Right.

Speaker 1 (06:46):
It is meant to be like a scientific discussion that's
also easily understood. But that being the case, you still
may not want to listen to that or have people
who are with you listening to that, so no know
that going into it.

Speaker 3 (06:57):
Yeah, yeah, we're professionals here, folks, if you hadn't picked
it up, even if we giggle a lot, even if
we giggle so much. Disclaimer two is that we are
also going to talk about sexual behavior across a wide spectrum,
so there may be some distressing topics that emerge, so
please listen at your own discretion. You do not have
to listen to the episode. If you don't want to,
you can turn it off as you need to, but
like it. We want to kind of approach this from

(07:20):
an objective, scientific manner, so we have to talk about
this wide spectrum. And I think the third thing that
I really want to point out to and I wrote
this before Abraham had a chance to read this, so
you can certainly discredit me as I say this, but okay,
I believe that our podcast takes a sex positive approach
to understanding sexual behavior in general. Agree people like what
they like, they should be able to as long as

(07:41):
there's no harm that comes to others. And we want
to talk about this particular topic because we felt like
it would be good, a good opportunity to destigmatize.

Speaker 2 (07:49):
Something that people often misunderstand.

Speaker 3 (07:51):
So we are coming at this from a sex positive
bias as a primary kind of like viewpoint.

Speaker 1 (07:56):
As we look at this, you implied something in there
that we have said in other times that we have
covered topics related to sex, but that is that consent
is everything here. It is everything. We cannot advocate for
or provide any kind of moral support for any kind
of sexual behavior where you don't have consent among the
participants of that thing. And that being said, as long

(08:17):
as you have that, then we can move forward with
a discussion understanding that we're all on the same page
about that. And we also take that to mean that
there are parties that cannot consent because they do not
have the prerequisite sort of foundation necessary for being able
to have informed consent, because consent is not consent if
it is not informed, and that means that children cannot consent.

(08:41):
Children are off the table as far as a discussion
about what entails appropriate sexual behavior because they cannot consent.
It also means that like people who are otherwise coerced
in any way cannot have consent. It also means that
animals cannot provide consent. So just to make sure we're
very clear. Consent is extremely important in all of this,

(09:01):
and I'm sure we'll talk more about those sorts of
things in this discussion and others. But like people I
think always want to try and jump to, oh, you're
advocating for all these gross things that people should be
able to do, and what they mean is stuff like
pedophilia and bestiality, and sure, no we are not, because
it is consent, consent, consent, consent.

Speaker 3 (09:19):
I do appreciate your new take on like detractor voice,
Like I do like that you're doing that the last
like this episode you've already done twice. You'll be like, well,
like it's like very like it feels like a Simpsons character.

Speaker 2 (09:31):
Well it's like, oh, appreciate that. Excuse me, Like so
I very appreciate I very much. I appreciate that.

Speaker 1 (09:36):
Thanks. You know, it just kind of came to me
on the fly. It was. It was not rehearsed at all.
So yeah, maybe it will evolve, maybe it will stay
the same, but that's this current current detractor voice.

Speaker 2 (09:47):
I really do appreciate it.

Speaker 3 (09:48):
So Okay, well, if we're if we're ready to go,
let's go ahead and dive into a couple definitions. A
little bit background of this, because I think it's important
to kind of talk about the origin of the term
paraphilia now I'm ready comes from the Greek meaning beside
and aside and philos means loving, so paraphilos paraphilia I

(10:08):
kind of see how that might show up. But the
current term paraphilia was further developed from the German paraphili
or paraphilee periphilia coined by Frederick Solomon Krauss in nineteen
oh three.

Speaker 1 (10:21):
Just as a sort of a quick side note on Kraus,
he himself was a sexologist whose most famous publication was
a work called anthropofeychch Fitia. I'm gonna get Anthroprofytia. I'm
gonna say, yes, yeah, oh those tia, So maybe it's
in you know, we do that sometimes in English. This
was a collection of published works from nineteen oh four

(10:42):
to nineteen thirteen that focused on erotic and sexual folklore.
Because of this work, he was arrested and charged as
a pornographer in Berlin.

Speaker 3 (10:52):
Yes, so you're gonna find that happens a lot with
sexologists over the last like century or so, is that
they're doing action research and then they get arrested for
being obscene when they're actually just doing research or collecting,
you know, documents and stuff like that. So that actually
happened with I just watched the documentary with on pee
Wee Herman, Paul Rubins pee Wee Herman, and he was

(11:14):
arrested for having like erotic art that was considered obscene,
that was like old erotic art. So that happened in
the nineties. So like this, this continues to happen.

Speaker 2 (11:24):
Yeah, as we go forward. Anyway, that's just quick aside.

Speaker 3 (11:27):
So a paraphilia, by definition, is a reoccurring or intense
sexual arousal and or gratification related to objects, places, situations, fantasies, behaviors,
or individuals. Now, that seems like a pretty broad definition.
We'll unpack that a little bit. But paraphilias may also
include examples of sexual interest in anything or anyone who
is not a legally consenting partner, which is where pedophilia

(11:48):
comes in. Right, So pedophilia is a subset of paraphilias,
but not all paraphilias include what could possibly be a
legal or risky behavior.

Speaker 1 (11:58):
Right, Yeah, So I think that that definition is really important.
Is essentially understanding that it is this sort of idiosyncratic
sexual preference for these specific types of situations and things,
and that because paraphilia is in a broad sort of
umbrella term, that that does include non consensual things. And
we're not sort of when you came into this talking

(12:18):
about like when we're trying to shed more information on
paraphilias and saying that like consent is everything, not all
paraphilas and tail consent, and therefore we would stand against
those as things that people do. We'll be talking about
that as we go.

Speaker 3 (12:32):
And I think you bring up a great point. It's
you're talking about things that people do, but paraphilias are
not necessarily actions. It's arousal related to these circumstances or
these variables. Right, So just because somebody has a particular
paraphilia does not mean they're engaging in the legal behavior.

Speaker 2 (12:48):
And I want that to be really clear as we
go forward.

Speaker 1 (12:51):
To Yes, good, and do you think there are people
who have paraphilias for ads?

Speaker 2 (12:55):
Oh for sure, John Watson had to.

Speaker 1 (12:57):
Have Okay, we're back. We are starting to we have
unpacked the definition of periaphilia. We are starting expanding on
understanding what this category entails because the definition is one thing,
but like what that means is something that can be

(13:20):
helpful to have also discussed. So we're sort of doing
that right now. And we said, I'm just going to
recap this definition really quick, because I do think it's
really important to hold on to and worth repeating as
that as recurring or intense sexual arousal and or gratification
related to objects, places, situations, fantasy's behaviors, or individuals. Okay,
so that's where we're starting from.

Speaker 3 (13:39):
Yes, And so in many cases, paraphilias are defined in
contrast to normophilic or quote unquote normal sexual interest or desires. Now,
I want to point this out. This is something that
came up in a lot of the research. This is
not something that we are specifically saying. It's important to
note that the contrast is here because what is considered
typical or normal may shift or vary depending on urging

(14:00):
social norms or cultural shift. So, like what you're going
to find is that something that we may find a
barrent today or like problematic today as part of perophilia
may actually emerge as something that is more socially accepted
later on. So a lot of times periphilias are just
contrasted with what is currently considered normal or quote unquote
typical as far as desires go, and that can vary

(14:20):
based on culture and stuff like that too, right, So,
like I think there's some complexities around that as well.

Speaker 1 (14:26):
I'm actually throwing a quick example right here of what
I think of an example a version of this might
look like that is a real from real world things,
which is that I think historically it has been when
you have what you might call a heterosexual couple, it
has been very common for as a part of a
sexual act, the female partner to where like sexy clothing

(14:48):
or lingerie.

Speaker 2 (14:48):
Yes, and I.

Speaker 1 (14:50):
Think if you went back maybe fifty years or less,
maybe twenty years, the version of that was still basically
the case. But there has been a develop being industry
around male lingerie like a version of that as well.
And so now it could be the case that, like
if we went back in time, men were in lingerie
may have been considered a paraphilia, whereas now that is

(15:13):
becoming essentially something that is just part of and it's
not I don't know how popular it is, but like
that that is part of what is available as an
option for people and would probably not be regarded as
a paraphilia as it's just sort of considered something that
you could do as part of that act.

Speaker 2 (15:30):
Yeah, absolutely cool.

Speaker 1 (15:31):
I just made that. I mean I just pulled that
one out because I was like, I know that this
is like I was trying to specifically think of like
where trends like have gone, and I was like, I'm
aware that this is one that currently exists and shows
what I think would be pretty different from like a
nineteen sixties or seventies couples preferences versus today.

Speaker 3 (15:49):
Yeah, it's critically important. I think we we have to
have those examples because I think, you know, for those
of you who are uninitiated to this world, you might
not have like, you know, salient examples that kind of
show what that might look like. I mean, another one too,
could be considered like you can talk about homosexuality is
like considered at some point in time considered abnormal or
not part of like the normal philic sexual desire process.

(16:10):
And then so like homosexuality could have been at one
point considered a paraphilia. Yeah, by understanding how like those
cultural norms might.

Speaker 1 (16:16):
Shift also a good example.

Speaker 3 (16:18):
Yeah, Yeah, So another important point here that we want
to make is para filures are considered part of a
larger group of sexual disorders. Sexual disorders include things like
changes in sexual functioning like erectile dysfunction and orgasmic disorders,
which just means that you can't have an organism where
you have difficulty having an organism and changes in sexual
desire or pain related to sexual behavior. So paraphilias are

(16:39):
kind of lumped into sexual disorders under psychological services.

Speaker 1 (16:43):
You know, this is really not the space for this,
but that change in sexual desire is actually an interesting
topic that might be worth coming back to at some
point in the future, because I think that a lot
of people like the label of sexual preferences as a static,
immutable characteristic right of people, but it is very much
a dynamic spectrum that can shift and does for a

(17:03):
lot of people, where they might early in life have
one particular preference, later in life have that preference shift completely,
and then later in life still have it maybe be
a blend between the two or shift back to the
original preference. They're just not fixed patterns to continue on
that for sure. Yeah, So anyway, getting into as as
you were just talking about here, with the fact that

(17:24):
there are what we might call sexual quote unquote disorders
and it's actually not quote unquote they do have like
a diagnosable feature and so quote they like by per
the definition of the fact that they're labeled to diagnoses,
I think makes them a disorder to an extent, although
we could argue about that as well. But according to
the DSM five tr perophilias are sometimes classified under paraphilic disorders.

(17:48):
So let's unpack with those criteria. Look like, here's an
example of voyeuristic disorder. So there's sort of three main
points here. The patient experiences recurrent and intent sexual arousal
manifested by fantasies, urges, or behaviors involving the act of
observing an unsuspecting person who is naked, in the process

(18:09):
of disrobing, or engaging in sexual activity. Symptoms must be
present for at least six months for them to qualify.

Speaker 3 (18:16):
Yeah, the patient must also experience significant distress or impairment
in social, occupational, or other important areas of functioning because
the fantasies of the or the urges or behaviors because
of those, I should say, because of the fantasies, the
urges or behaviors, or the patient has acted on the
sexual urges.

Speaker 1 (18:33):
And the individual experiencing arousal or acting on the urges
as aged at least eighteen years, so you have to
be like legally an.

Speaker 3 (18:39):
Adult, right, So I think it's critically important here that
like they're saying, like they may have acted on this,
but they're again a legal behavior hasn't happened just yet,
but they do have the fantasy or the urge that
or like maybe they have like precursor behaviors that lead
to that.

Speaker 1 (18:55):
So ultimately we're just going to sort of summarize this again.
The criteria for a periophilia is effect actively that a
the person experiences recurrent or sexual arousal related to objects
of circumstances. B they experience significant distrust as a result
of the urges, and see that they consider acting or
having acted on the paraphilia. And so the one we

(19:15):
give with the example of the voyeurism as a specific type,
but when we're talking about a sexual disorder broadly, those
are sort of the three main criteria you'll see.

Speaker 3 (19:24):
Right, And this is kind of the challenge with this, right,
Patients are apprehensive to report experiencing paraphilic ideations or actions
for lots of different reasons. For instance, the US is
notoriously anti sex, espousing hyperconservative views on sexuality and sexual behavior.
Even basic sex ed is reduced to abstinence training because
of the religious right, and anything that deviates from missionary

(19:47):
position is going to come under greater scrutiny. So if
we're not talking about missionary then we are already getting
into a space where people are like, oh, I don't know,
and in anything that is considered even beyond that into
the paraphilic world is very, very taboo.

Speaker 1 (20:01):
Yeah, and there are other countries that have like a
sort of similar level of hyperconservativism around sexuality, but I'd say,
more broadly speaking, the level of fear around sexuality is
very high in the United States relative to like your
average other country if you will, Yeah, yeah, Okay. Now,

(20:22):
further research on paraphilic behaviors and sexuality in general is
pretty limited, often centered around self reports and surveys, and
that's unfortunate for a lot of reasons, because we can,
i think, appreciate the fact that generally, understanding some topic
scientifically is going to have us have a much better
appreciation for what the scope of that topic might entail

(20:45):
from the problematic to the perfectly acceptable. But without those data,
we have just our feelings to guide us and our
knee jerk reactions to things and things that might surprise us,
even though if we think about it for two seconds
longer than we realize, oh okay, I can sort of
see why it's not that big a deal or that
is much worse than it seems like it should be.
But if we ask the question, why is it the

(21:07):
case that we are struggling to get good research around
these topics? Imagine going to a board of reviewers. So
there are these specific boards. A lot of people who
listen to this podcast know this. They're called an IRB.
They are a board of people who look at research
and they evaluate the sort of ethical implications and in

(21:28):
many cases, and I think pretty universally now, like how
effectively will this research be able to answer the question
that it's asking. And so imagine you go to this
IRB board of people and you say, I want to
teach someone how to masturbate safely, or we need to
observe a partnered couple having sex to measure x whatever
thing we want to measure. It's difficult to imagine that

(21:50):
the IRB will approve research on the grounds that sexuality
is a generally sensitive topic, at least in the United States,
and that there I think there is rightfully in appreciation
from concern around exploitation, yes, and coercion, and that is
something that you want to be extremely careful about when
you're doing research. But it's also not impossible to find

(22:12):
consensual couples on whatever they are on the spectrum, or
maybe more than maybe threebles or something, but like, yeah,
finding consensual sexual partners with whom you can do research.
It's but there's going to be some resistance around this
with people who evaluate things ethically because they can. I
think there is concern that if they approve a study

(22:35):
that then the public interprets in a sort of lascivious manner,
if you will, that then the IRB is now under
scrutiny for not really doing their job. And so I
think they sort of tend to fall in line with
this conservative view of like, canon, should we approve this thing.

Speaker 3 (22:53):
I have had the pleasure of being a reviewer, like
an invited reviewer, for dissertation that was about ethical nominogamy
and the amount of hoops that we had to go
through with the IRB to like make sure that this
study was able to be done was kind of I mean, again,
for the right reasons, you've got protections in place, but

(23:15):
a lot of times the concerns that the IRB would
bring up were kind of unfounded because everybody was so
nervous about the topic of sexuality. So it took a
long time to get the IRB to approve the even
just the interviews in like how to get the surveys
out for this particular population, because that's all it was
a survey and interview style. But it was one of
those things where because it involved the topic that was

(23:38):
inside of sexuality, specifically ethical nominogamy, it was a really
complex process just to get that done.

Speaker 1 (23:45):
Sure, I think what you really need to help sort
of educate them in a way to have them understand
the value of the project is to put together a
nice comprehensive ad. We are back. Let's talk statistics, because

(24:08):
you know you want if you listen to a podcast,
you know you want numbers in there somewhere.

Speaker 3 (24:12):
I was gonna say, nothing makes you hornier than a
couple p values, right, So thankfully, I think Wow. The
world of sexology and sexuality has dedicated journals and research
that allows us to get some insight into this world.
So there is some research on this, and I think
it's important to kind of share a couple things about
specific paraphilias and paraphilic behavior. So allers and friends in

(24:34):
twenty eleven and friends, I love that.

Speaker 1 (24:40):
I do think we should start using that. Yeah, for
those of you who are unfamiliar, and a lot of
citations for scientific studies. It uses Latin at all, et
space al period it means essentially and others. So making
the joke and friends, which I really like. So anyway,
sorry to interrupt. Yeah, that was really that caught me
off guard. That was very good, So let's continue.

Speaker 2 (25:01):
Yeah, yeah, I like that. I like that. So so
Ollers and friends.

Speaker 3 (25:04):
In twenty eleven, they conducted a study where they surveyed
paraphilic arousal patterns and men and found that about sixty
two percent of men reported having at least one paraphilic interest.

Speaker 1 (25:14):
How interesting.

Speaker 2 (25:15):
Yeah, I thought that was really interesting.

Speaker 3 (25:17):
And when we talk about like some of the different
types of paraphilias that are out there, that will probably
feel like less of a huge number just because like
I think you'll you'll see what we mean. However, only
one point seven in those participants reported that their interest
caused distress. So you've got a pretty wide range of
people that express an interest and very few of them
that are saying like, hey, this is a concern, like

(25:37):
they're not really worried about it.

Speaker 1 (25:39):
A couple things to note really quick is always thinking
about who what's the profile of the person who was
willing to participate in the study? Yes, like, how was
this study delivered out to people? Like did it inadvertently
select a group of people that are going to report
one way or another just by inviting those people to
participate and not others? And those will always be really
really really import data that are almost never never gathered

(26:02):
because logistically it's almost impossible to gather those data. But
to understand how we then interpret the data that are collected. Nevertheless,
I think we can take this and at least say,
at least in the population survey, this is what they found.
What that necessarily says about us broadly as a species
is unclear, But they did find this pattern where they
looked for it. Yeah, exactly, According to Joiel and Carpentia

(26:25):
Carpenteer in twenty seventeen. Paraphilic sexual interests appear to be
more common than we might think. About fifty percent of
participants expressed interest and at least one paraphilic description or category,
and thirty three percent had expressed interest with an identified paraphilia,
So the majority of people if you put those all together.

(26:47):
But yeah, otherwise you have like about half or to
a third of people with some kind of paraphilic interest.

Speaker 3 (26:54):
And again that's contextual, right, Like what we consider paraphilic
is basically just what is you know, the definition of
normal quote unquote normal in this space, So like they
may be identifying something that is a particular interest of
theirs and that is classified as paraphilic, and it might
not actually be in like even five years. So yeah,
the goalpost changes.

Speaker 1 (27:11):
I actually wonder if like something like someone who's like
I just really love it when my partner wears perfume,
or I really love it when my partner wears a
specific type of cologne, and like, yeah, that that is
the thing that gets them like all ready to go, yeah,
and that might then be considered a paraphilia, even though
like all it is is like a contextual feature of

(27:33):
that setting that they most prefer right and that they
find arousing. And it's like when you compare that to
some of the other things understanding that, like they're all
in the same category. It helps illustrate how diverse and
dynamic this can exist, I think among people. And again,
as you said, like how we determine that culturally right
now versus in the past versus in the future.

Speaker 2 (27:53):
Yeah. Absolutely.

Speaker 3 (27:54):
Now as far as this this this reason the joyl
article goes, they also found a couple other points that
we want to point out. First, fifteen point nine percent
of the sample were found to be statistically significant in
their preferences identifying a potential for a diagnosable paraphilic disorder.
So even though they expressed an interest, we had a
small portion that could be diagnosable because there may be

(28:16):
reporting some distress, which is a little bitffer than the
one point seven that we saw on twenty eleven. So
that could also be a cultural shift around people having
more conversations about sexuality.

Speaker 2 (28:25):
There's lots of other factors that they they've attributed to this.

Speaker 1 (28:28):
One thing that I think is really interesting is that
they found that there were no differences between men and
women in the study specifically as it related to fetishism
and masochism in their sexual interests. And I think a
lot of people would think it goes one way or another,
but it does seem like, at least in this study,
they were split fairly evenly.

Speaker 3 (28:46):
Yeah, something that comes as a shock to nobody is
that men reported a higher satisfaction of the with their
own sexual life.

Speaker 1 (28:53):
Yeah. I've heard this in other places as well.

Speaker 3 (28:54):
I've heard this plenty of times too, Like it's just
one of those things where it's like, sure, okay, But
I will also say too, I think really important to
note that a lot of the sexuality research has been
primarily focused on men for across lots of different spaces,
and that is like, you know, they talked about like
like arousal research specifically, it took ten years for somebody
to go, we should probably look at female arousal arousal

(29:17):
at this At some point in time after the first
like male arousal study came out, they were like, oh,
we should probably look at this other you know, this
other large group of people that may also experience arousal. So,
you know, research on women in sexuality is not really
caught up at all at this point.

Speaker 1 (29:32):
Yeah, that that is woefully behind in a lot of
ways from like a lot of as far as how
research allocation has been, it has been largely male dominated.
So that's a really good point. Yeah, all right, dare
I try and pronounce this name?

Speaker 2 (29:45):
I can do it?

Speaker 3 (29:46):
Okay, all right, So Ken dearly O, Glue and friends.

Speaker 1 (29:51):
Nice, all right.

Speaker 3 (29:53):
I was practicing it a whole bunch okay today, So
that's good, So and Friends in twenty twenty three, so
it's more recent than which I think is cool. They
conducted a study that looked at information related to men
convicted of sex offenses in Turkey. Now you'll find that
there is quite a lot of sexuality research in other
countries as well, which I think is important. Yeah, And
here's what they found among the one hundred men in

(30:13):
a sample. So these are one hundred men who are
convicted and incarcerated for sex offenses in Turkey. First, they
found that thirty nine percent were drug users, thirty six
percent were alcohol users, and forty two percent committed crimes
in their own house.

Speaker 1 (30:28):
WHOA.

Speaker 2 (30:29):
Yeah.

Speaker 1 (30:29):
Of these, pedophilia was the most common, with fifty nine
percent of the men convicted of a crime related to
like a sexual crime related to pedophilia specifically, and they
were unable to evaluate the effects that childhood trauma may
have had very effectively because the lack of research in
this area in Turkey, so they couldn't necessarily speak to

(30:50):
how did they get to be like this, But I
do think that it as one area we would consider
probably a very relevant variable in understanding how these preferences developed.

Speaker 3 (31:01):
Yeah, and I want to be clear, it's something about
this too, Like, so like this study specifically focused on
people who were incarcerated and committed crimes. It's very likely
that you're gonna like and that's why you see such
a high level of pedophilia in that space, I would imagine,
because it's very unlikely that you're going to get arrested
for liking somebody's shoes, right, Yeah, So just kind of
like for perspective, if that number was shocking for you, like,

(31:22):
keep in mind the population sample is more likely to
have a higher rate of pedophilia as a result of
the nature of what they're studying, which is criminal behavior.

Speaker 1 (31:30):
Right, specifically prisoners that are in prison because they did
something illegal, and that's something they did illegal had to
do with sexual sexuality and.

Speaker 3 (31:38):
Some sort exactly now, at the time of this recording.
In this episode, there are roughly five hundred and forty
seven unique identified paraphilic interests that have been categorized because
humans love categorizing things we do, which I think is fine.
As a scientist, I love categories like That's one of
my favorite things to do is categorize everything. My books

(31:59):
are categorized, my albums and my CDs. Love.

Speaker 2 (32:03):
I love a good organization. Okay, I get that now.

Speaker 3 (32:07):
For context though, talking about the shifting continuum of sexuality
and paraphilias, we only had about forty identified paraphilic interests
in nineteen ninety three, the year the Jurassic Park ended
up in the movie theaters. We only had forty paraphilic
interests and none of them were related to dinosaurs.

Speaker 1 (32:23):
So just so you have that, So that's more than
twelve times more thirty years later.

Speaker 2 (32:28):
Yeah, exactly, that's a lot. It's a lot. It's huge, right.

Speaker 3 (32:31):
So to help eliminate the wide scope of paraphilic disorders,
here are a few that are currently studied, and we
bring these up to point out that paraphilic disorders range
in their focus of interest. We're not talking about these
to judge or to make fun of, or to create
biases around these paraphilic disorders. We just want you to
know that there is a wide scope of what somebody

(32:51):
could be attracted to or experience arousal towards inside of
this space. So the first one is besiophilia, which is
an attraction to people who who have impaired mobility, and
a crodomophilia, which is people who have amputations attraction to
people with amputations.

Speaker 1 (33:08):
There's also belly fetishism, which, as you might imagine, focuses
on the mid drift or the belly. There's capnolognia lognia,
and this is people who are aroused by and a
focus on smoking as related to their sexual preferences.

Speaker 3 (33:25):
Yeah, there's a cremasd stophelia. There's We're gonna have a
lot of these folks, So just bear with us while
we stumble over these words because it's just a lot
of a lot of a lot of consonants. And alias
cremas stofphilia is a sexual interest in being robbed or
being held up. So it's like a context in a
particular situation, right, and then coleophilia, not to be confused

(33:47):
with colorrophobia.

Speaker 2 (33:48):
One of our episodes that we did the opposite. Colorophilia
is an attraction to clowns.

Speaker 1 (33:54):
There's dendrophilia. This is having interest in arousal as it
relates to trees and tophelia, which is for those of
us who are around fields where we're used to the
word emesis, you might recognize the prefix there. This is
sexual interest as it relates to things like vomit.

Speaker 3 (34:12):
Yes, there's fraudism, which is the act of rubbing against
a non consenting person, So this might happen in public places,
tight quarters, stuff like that. There's hoplophilia, which is related
to firearms or guns.

Speaker 1 (34:23):
Oh, which you know if you can find that in
the United States.

Speaker 3 (34:27):
Yeah, yeah, I can't wait to get a letter from
the NRA about this episode. And then there's robophilia, which
is an interesting humanoid robots. Right, So you can see
how this ranges from you know, a person's ability, a
person's physical features, acts and behaviors, you know, things that
are not even human, right, trees and stuff. So you're
gonna see kind of like a wide spectrum of these

(34:47):
types of interest for folks with different paraphilias.

Speaker 1 (34:51):
Yeah, that was that was an incomplete list. As we
said the forty seven, we listed a few from a
few of the letters of the alphabet, and there's just
there's just so many more. So I think probably people
are asking the question and wondering, like, okay, but how
why does this happen? Why does this develop in some people?
Or maybe, as we've seen in some of these numbers,

(35:11):
a lot of people. Here are some ads for some
affilias of sorts. Okay, we're back from those those ads
that maybe tickled your fancy, but let's talk about the
development of this as it occurs for for us as

(35:34):
a species.

Speaker 2 (35:35):
Yeah.

Speaker 3 (35:35):
So I think it's really important to preface this by like,
I don't know, and maybe this is something we can
kind of like talk about a little bit, like I
personally grew up thinking that, you know, and this is
probably something that was like embedded in me, like people
kind of just the way that people talk about this
is that people will go, something must have happened right
for this person to like this, something must have happened somewhere,

(35:57):
And that's not entirely wrong, but I do think it's
more complex than that. So I think It's really important
to remember that we are talking about experience and biology
and neurology and all these things that come together to
create the unique human that you are and your unique preferences.

Speaker 1 (36:12):
So, yeah, the better way of saying it is something
could have happened.

Speaker 3 (36:15):
Something could have happened, but also other things, like you know, like,
for example, like I could have had a particular experience
with pickles growing up, right. I bring that up because
like my taste buds do not allow me to like pickles.

Speaker 2 (36:30):
I can't stand pickles, right, So like.

Speaker 3 (36:33):
There, I have a particular biology that predisposes me to
dislike this thing. But I could have had experience. So
it's one of those things to understand that, like your
biology plays a role, your experience plays a role. All
of these play a role. And we know that as
a podcast. This is the four hundred and thirtieth episode
at this point in time, so you know, we know,
we all know that it's biology and nature and all
the things that go along with it. But yeah, in
nineteen ninety three we had some ideas, so money in

(36:56):
Panzeroni in nineteen ninety three they argued that pair Aphelias
maybe agin as a dream an ideation or a fantasy, right,
So a thought, and it's not something that is caused
by a what's called social contagion like pornography, but instead
induced by noxious child rearing, non sexual and sexual so.

Speaker 2 (37:16):
Interesting things.

Speaker 3 (37:16):
So it starts as an idea, it's not influenced by pornography,
as what they're arguing, But it's really paraphilias show up
as a problem of just bad parenting, it sounds like,
is what they're making the argument. As far as like
nineteen ninety three.

Speaker 1 (37:31):
Goes, I would speculate that if I were to unpack
what I understand about behavior and superimpose that on their
arguments here, I would say they're like Maybee a quarter
if that's correct. Yeah, I think that in the sense that, like,
I actually don't think paraphilias necessarily start as a dream

(37:52):
ideation or fantasy. I think they start somewhere else and
they can then turn into and a dream ideation or
fantasy that can then turn into a paraphilia. Because that
would imply that, having no knowledge of anything in the
world whatsoever, you dreamed it up and then you turned
that into a sexual fantasy. Yeah, that would be the

(38:12):
implication of it. Starting in a place like a dream,
Like you had to have had some contact with some
features of this somewhere for it to then be have
the ability to be associated with it in a fantasy,
Like if I had describe something to you you've never
heard of and never seen, how could you that have
arisen as a fantasy for you when it doesn't exist?

Speaker 3 (38:31):
You know, Yeah, you gotta have contact with it first.
But I think they're about as right as like calling
a chicken a dinosaur. Like it's like close right, Like
it's like they're like there's seeds of like something that
could be there, but like we need more information and
like it's just it's just off the mark enough to
kind of like not quite be right.

Speaker 1 (38:48):
Yeah. Yeah, it's like I could see how you got
there kind of, but I think you're missing some important steps.

Speaker 2 (38:53):
Yeah.

Speaker 1 (38:53):
And also the part here about it like being the
child ring process, I'm like that probably does have an effect, Like,
but I don't think it is going to be like
bad child rearing or like noxious as they said. Sure
that could be a variable that could be a situation
when that arises, but you could also have it arise
as an outcome of parenting where there was nothing noxious

(39:14):
or coercive or weird about it. It was just like
this was the common context in which these things were
exposed or exactly where around It's like whenever parents were
getting busy, they always locked the door and put a
bunch of sental candles around the house. Hence to like
keep like people distracted with other things, or maybe they
put on TV or whatever. It's like then you start
to like have this association of like romantic time also

(39:37):
equals candles and TV. Sure, and like that just becomes
a thing that you're sort of exposed to. And they
didn't do anything wrong in that particular situation. It's just
like that association is created, and therefore it sort of
becomes the memory you have of that. So I think
they go too far by having it be problematic parenting
that results in a paraphilia.

Speaker 3 (39:55):
Well, and to that point too, like just what you
described is I think a common example that people might
go but that by itself does not necessarily make it
a paraphilia. Like that leads to an association that creates
a preference. It might not cause distress for somebody, It
may not actually fall into those pair of like paraphilic
categories so like, I think that's also important too, is
like when you're a child and you're a learner or like,

(40:16):
you're exposed to certain situations and you create those associations,
it doesn't necessarily mean that you have now suddenly gotten
a paraphilia, like all of a sudden, you're not like
romost Okay, well I guess I like that. So now
I'm this like, that's not really what happens, Like it's
not quite that black and white or that like linear.

Speaker 1 (40:32):
Right. No, yeah, you're exactly right. So just to sort
of summarize real quick, is that I think it could
be the case that problematic parenting does influence the direction
of the development of paraphilias, But it also could be
the case that parenting that had that was not problematic
could also move it in that direction. So it doesn't
necessarily have to be noxious. And the last part I'll

(40:53):
comment on here is that it could not be caused
by pornography. I think it is unlikely to be caused
by pornography, but I wouldn't go so to say it
cannot be caused by pornography or is not. I think
that there are going to be situations where someone's exposed
to that in a particular circumstance, which it does begin
to develop as like a very specific preference they might
not have otherwise developed. Yeah, have they not had that exposure. Yeah,

(41:15):
So I don't think that is a guarantee by any stretch.
A matter of fact, I think there are people will
might learn what the preferences they do not have by
exposure to Yeah, some pornographies, but they I could be
the case that someone could from their sort of go
down the a particular path of direction that is something
they might not have otherwise found themselves on.

Speaker 2 (41:35):
Yeah.

Speaker 3 (41:36):
And I think for context too, thinking about nineteen ninety three,
remember like this is the time where you have got
boards of people Tipper Gore showing up and like put
slapping like parental labels on everything. This is where like
video game rating systems are showing up, movie rating systems
are getting more strict, Like you're starting to see censorship
a little bit more, and you're starting to kind of
like at this time people are believing that video games

(41:57):
are causing more violence. This is like the time that
Mortal Kombats showing up and like stuff like this too.
So like the idea of social contagion. I think was
around where it was like media influences everybody adversely, and
so I think what they were trying to argue was like, no,
not necessarily, and pornography is not going to be the
thing that makes somebody a pedophile, right, Like that's not

(42:17):
what they I think that's kind of what they were saying.
But yeah, that's also you can't overgeneralize that too, because
people getting exposed to stuff are going to have different
experiences with that.

Speaker 1 (42:28):
Yeah. So and to that point, I think you're exactly right.
Is that I do think that they're they're mostly right
in saying this is probably not caused by quote unquote
social contagion. But it's not that it wouldn't ever happen.
It just seems like it's not very likely to happen. Yeah, Okay,
so we've kind of talked now about how it doesn't develop.
We also have Fisher and Marwij twenty twenty three have

(42:49):
more updated information on this, thankfully thirty years later. First,
there is no actual, like confirmed cause of paraphilic disorders.
So if you're waiting for us to viel the smoking gun,
there isn't one. I'm serious, Yeah, there is not but
current models suggests there is a combination of neurobiological, interpersonal,
and cognitive processes as you might imagine because humans are

(43:11):
complex and they have all of those things going on
that are involved in all aspects of our being and
in particular aspects of our sexual behaviors. We do have
a brain when we have sex, we do have an
interpersonal relationship with the when we have sex, and we
do have cognitive processes when we have sex. So like,
those factors will be involved, which means those factors are
involved in the development of behaviors related to that broadly topic.

(43:34):
So simply put, nature and nurture something something, behavioral models, something, something,
learning theory, something something, learning histories.

Speaker 3 (43:42):
YadA YadA, Yeah, exactly, Like that's just like the thing
the things we say like that, Why do we do?

Speaker 2 (43:47):
It?

Speaker 3 (43:47):
Comes back to the essential question that we have asked
from the beginning of the show, why do we do
what we do?

Speaker 2 (43:52):
All of it?

Speaker 3 (43:55):
That's because of the things, Because of the things, obviously, folks,
that's been the answer for all of these episodes. Now
there is like some interesting stuff as far as genetics go, though,
and I think it's important to know this. So there
have been some studies that have argued that your kinks
and your fetishes and your paraphilias are passed down from
your parents, which means that if you have a certain

(44:15):
predilection for something, then maybe your parents have it too,
which you're welcome, by the way, for us giving you
that image of whatever paraphilia you've got thinking about your
parents doing the same thing. But here's what this is
really getting at right. Genetic factors and neurology actually play
an important role in this because neurotransmission and folks with
specifically child related paraphilias indicate a potential disturbance in how

(44:38):
dopamine is produced and received, as well as discrepancies with
now regulated regulation related.

Speaker 2 (44:43):
Cognitive functions and how they work.

Speaker 3 (44:45):
So basically this is saying is like dopamine and receptors
and all the neurotransmitters that are involved aren't quite doing
what they're supposed to do. What they're found in like,
specifically people with pedophilia is they have increased levels of
serotonin and no repinephrine as well as decreased levels of DOPAK,
which is the result of dopamine being broken down. So

(45:06):
basically they've got all these increased levels of stuff. They've
got dopamine being broken down instead of received, and it's
creating some neurological I don't want to say confusion, but
just some kind of unique discrepancies that exist among people
that have child related paraphilias versus people that don't. So
they did identify that there is some neurological differences across
these folks.

Speaker 1 (45:27):
I will go ahead and expand a little bit on
my YadA YadA neurobiology, YadA YadA, learn theory, et cetera. Yeah,
by saying that, I think, as we understand behavior to
develop and be shaped by our learning histories and experiences,
and that is true all of the time for all
of our behaviors, and of course there is a neurological
and biological component. Those are absolutely going to be there,

(45:49):
and like you need things like opportunity and context for
those those behaviors and preferences to begin to take shape
and become what they will become. Which is to say
that a lot of these, all of these to some extent,
had to do with some kind of exposure to a
context where there was also a sexual component, and the

(46:10):
context probably in addition to that, was not necessarily inherently sexual, right,
and started to take on that function for the observer
or the participant in that way because of those association
that was created in the moment where that experience took place,
and that could happen repeatedly. It could also be that
like that does not necessarily look overtly sexual to an observer,

(46:32):
Like we might see something and not necessarily think this
has a sexual element to it, but someone else who
for whatever reason, is having a sexual experience in the nature,
And let's just say that hypothetically, we had someone who
just happens to be aroused. That there are a few
of us where at moments throughout the day, for reasons
that do not seem clear to us, our biology has

(46:54):
all of the signs and experiences of arousal. And then
we noticed the con text we're in and we start
to have a pairing of the things around us and
that arousal, and the arousal was kind of an involuntary
biological thing that happened that just shows up for people
sometimes in a way that we can't really predict when
that took place, but it was some kind of reflex

(47:15):
let's say, yeah, and then that just happened to be
the case that they were around let's just say, a
bunch of trees. We'll go to the dendrophilia one yea.
And so they're sort of like, hm, I am particularly
aroused all of a sudden, and I find myself around
a bunch of trees. And then in the future they're like, hmm,
I maybe go check out some trees. Let's see what happens.
And like, again, for us, we don't observe anything. We

(47:38):
see someone who's around some trees, and then in the
future that are around trees a lot more, and yeah,
it just happened to be the case that the biology
and the circumstance just aligned that way, just through sheer
dumb luck. And that's not going to be all paraphilias.
Some of those exposures are going to be more deliberate.
Some of them may have been introduced by a particular
partner who had a sort of fetish, who then influenced

(47:59):
the sexual preferences for that other person who didn't previously
have that fetish but now is coming into a sexual
situation where they might become that fetish. And there are
a variety of ways that it can develop. But we
do know that it develops, and that it develops as
a part of learning, history, exposure, experiences, and the context
of those like sexual reals that happens a place where
it then becomes extremely aversive and you want to escape.

(48:21):
It might then create that context as a condition where
you are not sexually aroused in the future and has
become a pretty powerful turn off for you in fact.

Speaker 2 (48:30):
Yeah, so that.

Speaker 1 (48:31):
I think I just wanted to expand on that more broadly,
thinking about the steps that gets you there when understanding
like a lot of these that are quirky, you know
what I mean.

Speaker 3 (48:43):
Yeah, and those same steps can get you away from
there too, because again, it is not static. It is
a continuum. It is flexible, it is nebulous. It will
continue to change over time, it will evolve, it will emerge.
Like all sorts of things happen, You're gonna discover new
things about yourself. And the more where honest your communication
is about your own sexuality and your own preferences and

(49:04):
all these things, the more likely you're going to discover
new elements and new things that might influence your arouse
on and actually might improve your sex.

Speaker 1 (49:12):
Life very much. So, So I guess you know, we
never really unpack a topic without not never, but we
obviously have some values around this, and we take a
very humanist perspective in here, and we try and take
one where we see that people should have freedoms and
they should have certain liberties and sort of inalienable rights

(49:36):
as the old people like to say, and all of
that's very important as we go into this next part.
So I think we'll want to do our best to
impart this scientifically while also sharing where we think we'll
use the should language of like what we sort of
consider where there's a line to be drawn on what

(49:57):
that line is. After some ads play.

Speaker 2 (50:00):
Yeah, sounds good.

Speaker 1 (50:08):
Okay, so let's get back to this. And I think
we really are at the point now of just trying
to unpack sort of our big take home summary of
our thoughts and understanding around things like paraphilias.

Speaker 2 (50:19):
Yeah.

Speaker 3 (50:19):
So, I think the general landing point for me is
that paraphilias are generally harmless to people on.

Speaker 2 (50:26):
A day to day basis.

Speaker 3 (50:27):
People experience things, they have preferences for things I say
generally harmless, and I specifically mean to like people in
the community. Most people paraphilias don't always act on their
paraphilias it may cause them. For the person experience in
the paraphilia or the paraphilic idiations, there may be some
significant distress related to this. There may be some shame,

(50:47):
some worry, some concern, they feel like they're at a
greater risk they are. There's lots of complications and complicated
feelings and thoughts around this. So what I generally recommend
if you're having an experience around this where you're struggling with,
you know, some paraphilic thought, you know, and you haven't
acted on it, then I recommend talking to a sex
positive therapist. And I want to be really clear about this,

(51:08):
Like you're going to go to a therapist at some
point in time, and that person may not be supportive
of what you need. They may not be sex positive.
I had a friend who went to a super conservative
therapist and like walked into the office and they had a.

Speaker 2 (51:19):
Picture of George W. Bush on the wall.

Speaker 3 (51:21):
If that tells you anything, So like it was a
kind of like a not a very welcoming space for
maybe something like this.

Speaker 2 (51:26):
Yeah, even though it's not, it's supposed to be more welcoming.

Speaker 3 (51:29):
So just a thought like when if you are somebody
who's experiencing this type of distress or this concern, talk
to a sex positive therapist who can help support you
through your distress and kind of find out how to
navigate that and also not shame you, because I think
it's really important to remember that, Like in the United
States at least, a lot of times, discussions around sexuality
and preferences come with a lot of shame and a

(51:49):
lot of guilt and a lot of complex feelings that
come from other places that are completely unrelated. So it's
important to be in a space where you can kind
of talk about those freely and talk about those safely
as long as you're not hurting anybody.

Speaker 1 (52:02):
Yes, that's exactly the main summary I think is like,
as we talked about before, it all comes down to consent,
and like if someone's getting hurt like that, obviously is
there's a line to be drawn there as people getting hurt.
And of course, you know, without going into the fact
that there are some people who they have some sexual
preferences and arousal around like some implementation of pain, and again,

(52:26):
where you have consent, it is what it is. And
again we're not really advocating for anything here. Except I
think so insofar as to try and leave you with
the understanding that it's just a thing that happens for people,
and there's like a lot of shame and judgment. And
I do think like for some people it's possible that
their arousal may have be in conflict with their values. Yeah,

(52:47):
and if that is a thing that is problematic for you,
then as you said, like going to see a therapist
about this might be an important step in helping you
find some reconciliation around this. And it's not impossible either
for those preferences to shift and change. They had to
develop in the first place, which means other ones can
develop as well, and it's not always easy to do
it the second time, but sometimes it is. So it's like,

(53:08):
you know, I don't think that people should necessarily change
unless they're experiencing distress. And I don't think that we
there's just no point in trying to govern and regulate
people's sexual preferences as long as everyone's consenting and no
one's getting hurt. There's just no point, Like we just
don't need to do that, Like it's such a waste
of time and energy to worry about, Like what someone's

(53:30):
preferences are when everybody who's involved is consenting with informed
consent and nobody's getting hurt, right, that's just not our business,
Like it's just not so like that's essentially where I
come from with this is like where I take what
I consider like the sort of liberty angle, if you will,
is that like we just don't need to be regulating
this for other people as long as everybody is consenting

(53:52):
and informed and nobody's getting hurt.

Speaker 2 (53:55):
Nailed it, absolutely, nailed it.

Speaker 1 (53:58):
Great? All right, Well, then, I think that we have
said we have to say about paraphilias unless there's anything
that you'd like to add, and.

Speaker 2 (54:05):
I don't think any.

Speaker 3 (54:06):
I mean, we'd love to hear your feedback, Like I mean,
if you are out there and you're a sexologist or
a sex therapist or like somebody who works in the space, like,
we love to hear your feedback because I think that
this is like a topic that's going to be an
ongoing discussion as a general rule, so like it's something
that we are continuing to explore. And so if you
have feedback, reach out to us.

Speaker 1 (54:23):
We'd love to hear you, yes, And you can email
us directly at info at WWDWWD podcast dot com, or
you can reach us on the social media platforms, and
we look forward to hearing from you whatever your feedback
may be. Yeah, before we transition to our other things,
we should do some credits, and then we are going
to recommend some things. I'm gonna throw in a quick
bonus recommend. That's not my recommendation, but because it's on

(54:45):
topic with what we're discussing. Is the book Bonk by
Mary Roach, which I think you and I have both
recommended at some point.

Speaker 2 (54:52):
I am. I just started it this week.

Speaker 1 (54:55):
Oh okay, great, that is That is definitely a book
that is I've recommended. I read it. I don't know,
but that is a book that I think for people
who are interested at all in just sex research broadly.
That book is not inherently about paraphilas, and I think
they're only sort of briefly mentioned. It's really mostly just
about sex research. Really really well written take on this,

(55:18):
and Mary Roach is such a readable author. I mean,
she's just so accessible, she's funny and communicates clearly, and
she's succinct, so great author Shong bonus recommend there, But
after we get through the credits. We're going to have
a fun listener mail, and then we have some recommendations
that are unrelated to our topic at hand. Yeah, but
first I would like to say that, as I mentioned

(55:39):
at the top, if you like to support us, one
way that you can do that is by joining our
cool club of people who do not have to listen
to ads and episodes, and in addition to that, they
get other bonus content, and that's over on Patreon. If
you go to patreon dot com slash WWDWWD podcast and
sign up for various membership tears, you might get access
to things like early episodes, all the episodes that we

(55:59):
post our ad free. There's also behind the scenes content
and other things like that. We also have a community
discord where people can chat with one another. And maybe
the favorite thing that all people are really here for
is that I will probably not but I will read
the names of all of the people who currently support
us at the end of each of our full length discussions.
So major thanks to Mike, m Meghan, Mike t, Justin,

(56:22):
Kim Brad, Stephanie, Brian, Ashley, Kiara and Charlie. Y'all just
really appreciate you continue to be with us, support us
and community. Yes. Absolutely. In addition writing in fact checking
from Shane and myself, thank you for all your work
on this one, Shane, and for recording with me today.

Speaker 2 (56:41):
Hey, thank you. I appreciate it.

Speaker 1 (56:43):
Our social media coordinator is Emma Wilson, and our audio
engineered sound person is Justin who does all the good sounds.

Speaker 2 (56:51):
Yes, he's our engineer, Dajore Djure.

Speaker 1 (56:56):
Sounds like he's going to go away, you know. Okay,
every got it? So awesome. Well, we do have some
really good listener male, so let's go ahead and transition
to that. Yeah, okay, So this comes from this is
actually a social media post, which is a perfectly acceptable

(57:18):
way to reach out to us. But we got some
feedback on our episode on makeup, and this comes from
someone whose name on here is an Amelia. I think
I'm saying that right, and so's She asked if she
could give some feedback and I said yes, please, and
she said the main thing is how much you emphasize
individual choice, which as a person who values freedom, I appreciated.

(57:39):
But one thing you did not address is how individual
choices create and challenge societal norms and the interaction between
the individual and culture. For instance, I can say and
believe I wear makeup for myself for my own individual expression.
But even if that's true, my use of makeup affects
other people. If eighty percent of women choose, for whatever reason,
to wear makeup, that has an effect on the twenty

(58:00):
percent that choose not to. Individual choices shape the choice
landscape for others. In fact, buying, applying, and wearing makeup
imposes significant costs on me and anyone who wears it,
but many of us pay those costs because the cost
of not wearing makeup. Those costs are perceived to outweigh
the costs of wearing it, for example, and getting a
job or being promoted. Therefore, by supporting the cultural norm

(58:23):
of wearing makeup, we make it harder for others who
would prefer not to. She also notes that we threw
off the odd side, like quote unquote, neao, polish color
has no meaning. She says this is true but also
not true, because the cosmetics we wear do send signals
to others, whether we are aware of it or not.
Sometimes people deliberately and consciously send signals, for example, sports
team face paint or religious tattoos, but even if you

(58:43):
don't intend a meaning, what you display on your outside
likely will be interpreted by others as having some kind
of salience. It seems like your intention was to give
people permission to do whatever they like, which of course
they have. But just because you don't think about how
it will be seen by others doesn't mean that it
won't have an effect on anybody. Choices made within a
society have societal effects. And she goes on to add,
this is not a moral point, just an observation of

(59:04):
how human societies work. It's an interesting aspect of how
they work. And I would like to have heard you
address it. And I think all of those are great points.
I think completely agree with all of that, and thinking
about like, yes, I think I don't remember what comment
I made about nail polish, but what I think what
I meant was colors inherently don't carry any meaning, but
societally they do. I mean, if you imagine someone who

(59:26):
shows up with black fingernail polish, some people might read
that and assigned meaning to it. They might say, oh,
that must be a goth person or a person who's
trying to be edgy, or something like that. Versus if
you show up with some sort of muted blue color
fingernail polish, they might think nothing of it. There's like, oh,
this is a person who likes to look nice, or
maybe not even go that far. So I do think
you're absolutely right that there are going to be people

(59:48):
who have an interpretation of that, even if the colors
themselves don't carry any inherent meaning. That's not to say
they don't carry any societal cultural meaning, which is absolutely
the case. And it's all also absolutely correct to point
out that the effects of us choosing to present ourselves
in a particular way affect those who choose to present

(01:00:09):
themselves in a particular way, for example, in this discussion
with or without augmentations in the form of makeup. But
you could also expand that to things like what kind
of shirts you wear, what kind of glasses you choose
to wear, and what color or style your hair is,
what other jewelry you wear, how much of your skin
you expose, like all of those are things that are

(01:00:29):
going to have an effect on those around you, and
vice versa, like the things that other people do will
have that effect as well. Like some people just want
to stand out, So if they were normally someone who
wears pajamas all the time, and then all of a
sudden everyone wears pajamas. That person might elect to go
the opposite direction if their main intention with their clothing
choices was to be stand was for their clothing to

(01:00:50):
stand out amongst the noise, if you will. So all
of that is to say that all these are great points.
I appreciate the thoughtful feedback on this because I agree completely.
Yeah one PC, all right, those kind of a long
listener mail, but it was really good, so I wanted
to get into it. Are we ready for Do you
have more to add to to any comments? For you wishing?

Speaker 3 (01:01:09):
You know, like I wish I wish that we had
more time in the week to cover all the things
that we want to cover in the episodes too, like
and it's just like it's you know, by the nature
of the format doesn't allow us to cover as much as.

Speaker 2 (01:01:21):
We want, or sometimes we miss things.

Speaker 3 (01:01:22):
So like we appreciate this feedback because like maybe we
missed an angle that we didn't think about, or you know,
maybe we missed out at points, or or we cut
it for time, right, So like, please continue to reach
out to us and give us that feedback because it's
incredibly helpful.

Speaker 1 (01:01:35):
Yeah, yeah, absolutely, all right, then let's recommend some things.

Speaker 3 (01:01:39):
Yeah, we recommendations.

Speaker 1 (01:01:49):
I am recommending a recent movie. I believe that the
time of this recording it will still be in theaters.
This is the new Jurassic World movie called Jurassic World Rebirth.
It is a starline Scarlett Johansson and Herschela Ali and
a bunch of other really fantastic The cast is really
good in this. I will say like, I don't think
this is the best dinosaur movie ever made, but given

(01:02:12):
the trend that, like the Jurassic movies had been on recently,
I actually really appreciate the approach they took to this one.
It felt like it was more grounded. They had Essentially,
you kind of have a smaller group with a specific
objective that doesn't feel like it's always necessarily end of
the world or whatever. So there were a couple of

(01:02:33):
tropes in there that I didn't necessarily feel like I needed.
But honestly, I thought the movie worked really well. They
had some homages to the very first Jurassic Park movie,
which were good, and I think that they did a
good job of writing a just a cohesive, digestible narrative
that made sense all the way through, and I thought
was fine. And so it's not the best movie you'll
ever see, but if you want to go see dinosaurs

(01:02:55):
on the big screen again, like they did a good job.
Like I do think this is one of the better
ones of all the sort of sequels and remakes and
whatnot that have been coming out.

Speaker 2 (01:03:03):
I backed this. I completely agree.

Speaker 3 (01:03:06):
It was it was just a fun It was a
fun jaunt into a deadly dinosaur island.

Speaker 1 (01:03:12):
Yeah, and like I actually really enjoy the absurdity of
all of the Godzilla and like King Kong movies, they're
absolutely absurd, And I think I mostly like this better
than some of those movies like those were those are
a lot of fun and they're like a good turn
off your brain and just sort of like enjoy the
spectacle type thing. This one, actually, I think even worked

(01:03:34):
a little bit better from like a movie storytelling perspective.
So yeah, I recommend going out and checking it out.
It's it's it was pretty good from my perspective at least.

Speaker 3 (01:03:42):
Plus, you can't go wrong with Carl Johansson and marschal
Ali like great cast in this one.

Speaker 1 (01:03:48):
Yeah, so good.

Speaker 3 (01:03:49):
All right, I'm gonna recommend an adventure tour. Speaking of
Jurassic Park. So I live in Florida, which is, you know,
in and of itself kind of like its.

Speaker 2 (01:03:57):
Own Jurassic Park.

Speaker 3 (01:03:59):
But there is about an hour south of where I
live is a tour booking company called BK Adventure Tours.
I probably recommended them before because a couple of years
ago I had done a thing with them. And so
over the summer they do these like guided tours, these
kayak tours or raft tours, and they take you out
into the inner coastal waters and they take you into
like some of the mangroves and stuff. And right now

(01:04:21):
is like a beautiful time for it because it is
the biolumin essence blooms.

Speaker 1 (01:04:26):
Oh so cool.

Speaker 3 (01:04:28):
Last night I got to go into a I got
to do a kayak tour and a clear kayak, a
glass bottom kayak. Got to go out into the inner
coastal and it was so bright blue, it's like it's
it was one of those things where it looked like
it was fake, like it looked like it couldn't be real.

Speaker 1 (01:04:42):
Wow.

Speaker 3 (01:04:43):
And because it takes place in a state park, there's
very little light pollution, except for you can see lights
from Kennedy Space Center, so like, you know, sometimes you
can do these tours and go out when there's like
rocket launches too, which is really cool. Yeah, but you know,
you go out and it's like pitch black. You see
the you know, blinking lights from the tour guides and stuff.
So you can also see you know, all the stars

(01:05:04):
in the universe right in front of you.

Speaker 1 (01:05:06):
Wow, all of them.

Speaker 3 (01:05:07):
That's every single one of them, right, which is like wild.
Like that's that's why this tour is like pretty good, right,
But like where we're at, there's enough, there's such limited
light pollution. You can actually see like some of the
bands in the Milky Way as well, Like you can
see some of the dust particles and the clouds that
exist in the Milky Way. You can see that across
the sky. So it's a very cool experience. Stars in
the water, stars in the air. It's really really cool.

(01:05:29):
So strong recommend if you're ever in Florida during the
summer and you get to do this.

Speaker 1 (01:05:33):
That sounds super fun. I'm assuming you're not going through
the snake infested waters where they have nine hundred foot pythons. Uh, sure,
Well that a harder the swallow yeaheah No.

Speaker 3 (01:05:47):
It's uh, it's brackish water, so like they don't like
to hang out in a lot of the brackish water
they tend to hang out and like and it's not
near the everglades, like the the giant pythons are down
in the everglades, so there are there's always the risk
of animals and nature and stuff like that. But where
is that is like more unlikely. It's not likely that
an alligator is going to be in that water because
it's brackish.

Speaker 2 (01:06:05):
So but there's sea life.

Speaker 3 (01:06:06):
I mean, there were crabs like swimming and they were
lighting it, which was cool because the crabs were swimming
through the water and they were lighting up because the
biolumin essence, so it was like a blue It looked
like Malana like you know, except for like Florida.

Speaker 2 (01:06:17):
So it's like crabs and like weird birds and stuff.

Speaker 1 (01:06:19):
So okay, that sounds really fun and it sounds like
something that I would like to do, but very very
good to know. Cool, all right, So that is Jurassic
World Rebirth the movie and BK Adventure tours for going
out and doing super dangerous stuff with animals down in Florida.
But those that is what we have to say about
paraphilias and the things that we recommended. So as I said,

(01:06:40):
please reach out to us, we'd love to hear from you.
Consider supporting us by leaving us a rating and review,
like in subscribing, telling a friend, joining us on Patreon,
or picking up some merch at our merch store. Once
I got our merch store working again, I think that
is it, so I would get to sign off here.

Speaker 2 (01:06:54):
I feel good.

Speaker 1 (01:06:55):
Thank you all for listening. This is Abraham and this
is Shane. We're out.

Speaker 3 (01:06:58):
So yeah, you've been listening to Why we do what
we do. You can learn more about this and other
episodes by going to WWDWWD podcast dot com. Thanks for listening,
and we hope you have an awesome day