The weird world of sex can be bewildering, even for an expert.
Dr. Mark Griffiths is a social psychologist who studies paraphilia, a sexual trait known colloquially as a fetish. In a new article for the Conversation, Griffiths, a professor of behavioral addiction at Nottingham Trent University, revealed the five most shocking sexual obsessions he’s ever come across in his research.
“[Paraphilias] are typically accompanied by intense sexual arousal to unconventional or non-sexual stimuli such as enemas (klismaphilia), statues (agalmatophilia), teeth (odontophilia) and vomit (emetophilia),” wrote Griffiths, whose new book “Sexual Perversions and Paraphilias: An A-Z” is available now for preorder.
“To many people paraphilias may seem bizarre or socially unacceptable, representing the extreme end of the sexual continuum – and in some cases, such as zoophilia (having sex with animals) and necrophilia (having sex with dead people), may be illegal.”
In spite of the taboo, sexual fantasies, however strange, are “fundamental” to human experience, and there’s a “pressing need” for more research into fetish.
“Researching paraphilias, even the most distasteful or criminal, is essential to help safeguard vulnerable groups,” Griffiths said. “Research can also help minimize the discrimination faced by those with uncommon sexual interests, helping ensure their access to sexual health care and psychological support, which can be lacking.”
The 5 most bizarre fetishes are, according to Griffiths:
Vorarephilia
Perhaps one of the most high-profile examples of vorarephilia to date would be actor Armie Hammer, who in 2021 was accused by an ex-girlfriend of harboring cannibalism fantasies. However, rumors about the “Call Me By Your Name” star’s most debased proclivities pale in comparison to Armin Meiwes and Bernd Jürgen Brandes, a pair of real-life Vorarephiliacs from Germany, per Griffiths’ account.
Meiwes posted around 60 online advertisements seeking someone who would agree to be eaten before meeting Bernd Jürgen Brandes in March 2002, who allowed Meiwes to bite off the tip of his penis so the two of them could eat the flesh together before stabbing Brandes to death — all of which they videotaped. Meiwes was sentenced to murder and is currently serving a life sentence.
Eproctophilia
Griffiths claims to have published the first case study on eproctophiles, those turned on by flatulence. The 22-year-old American from Illinois recalled his crush on a girl who farted in school, telling Griffiths, “This blew my mind [I] knew by simple biology that girls farted, but hearing that the girl I had been fawning over was capable of such a thing sparked a strange interest in me.”
His attraction to farts wasn’t limited to women, he learned as a teenager, after he and a male friend agreed to settle regular bets by allowing the winner to fart in the loser’s face. “He continued to lose such bets once every few weeks for about two years,” Griffiths wrote.
Apotemnophilia
Both real and imagined amputation are involved in apotemnophilia. Some apotemnophiles need only to fantasize about being amputated or engaging in sex with someone who is. A few, however, have gone so far as to attempt to trick surgeons into cutting off a limb, according to Griffiths.
“This might seem like a type of masochism, but case studies suggest that there is no eroticization of pain — only of the healed amputated stump.”
Dacryphilia
Dacryphiliacs are turned on by tears. Griffiths has found three sub-types of people who fetishize crying. Compassionate types are aroused by empathy; dominant/submissive types may induce or experience crying amid power-play; and “curled lip” dacryphiles, whose focus is specifically on the subject’s protruding lower lip.
Salirophilia
Getting down and dirty is the aim of salirophiles, who are aroused by the sight of filth and unkempt bedmates.
Griffiths wrote of one case study, a 58-year-old Australian man, who frequently masturbated in dusty or grimy places, such as a garage or under furniture, as an adolescent. As he got older, his obsession with muck grew to partners, though he found it “difficult to find like-minded women.”
His fetish was not limited to strictly sexual contexts, confessing he was also aroused by the gross-out reality competition show, “Fear Factor,” in which contestants perform disgusting stunts for money. “I just find the defilement of an attractive woman’s body erotic,” he told Griffiths.
