The Footies

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"Everyone is a moon and has a dark side which he never shows to anybody."
~ Mark Twain

I have a unique friend. He called himself a strange because he had a fetish. There are three most common body part fetishes namely feet, hands, and hair. The feet fetishes reported as the most common fetishes between those three fetishes. My friend has this feet fetish. Talking about sexual desire is a sensitive topic and often not discussed. In society, fetishes stigmatized as negative personal information but may be crucial that they are disclosed at the right time [1]. He did it, and I really appreciate him. He asked me to write an article about him. I hope you can look deeper into yourself and decide that you are normal.

What are fetishes? “Fetishism or a paraphilic sexual disorder is characterized by recurrent intense sexual urges and sexually arousing fantasies involving specific objects over at least six months [2].” While another source said that “fetishism is characterized by recurrent and intense sexual urges or behaviors that involve inanimate objects and are accompanied by stress or functional impairment [3]. So, foot fetishes are arousing fantasies because foot of women or men as object. The footies usually interested in the size of foot, the shapes, the adornments such as jewelry, embellishments such as pedicure or tattoos, non-visual sensory such as smell, touch, and the most important is the type of interaction such as touching, massaging or more than that [4]. Another article said that the fetish is a sexual disorder, a psychiatric illness. This why people with fetishes often labeled as negative personal in society.

However, let us see, are they normal or not?It is interesting question because my friend always said that he is abnormal, strange, which is related to adverse situations. And you have to trust me that you are not strange at all my friend, you are unique and you are normal. Maybe millions of people have this fetish. Unfortunately they didn’t show himself. The research reported that 62,4% of 367 young men had fetishes [1]. So, it’s the most normal, if you can control it. It’s normal to have desire for beautiful things. Nevertheless, then normal or not depends on their level of fetish.

According to a thread in kaskus [5], there are five levels of fetish, namely desires, cravers, middle fetishes, high fetishes, and fetishistic murderers. I explained for foot fetishes example. Desires are the lower level, which means if he wants a beautiful girl with nice feet, got fantasies and roused by this, but this fetish doesn’t disturb his mind even if he with another woman who has no nice feet he will be okay. The cravers, really want a woman with nice feet, he will be lost his sexual desire if his fetish doesn’t fulfill. Middle fetishes, he will do everything to fulfill his desire including kidnapping the girls or even men, torturing, hurting, and other sadistic things. Their sexual desire only will be fulfilled if he got the nice foot of women even men. High fetishes, this is more dangerous level than sadistic, he only wants feet; he totally doesn’t care about the women. He only wants her feet. It is very horrible. The highest level is fetishistic murderers; he willing to kill, mutilate in order to get the fetish he wants. So, based on our discussion I have concluded that my friend is at the desired level, means you are on normal level. Trust me, footie.

How about their relationship? A research found that the fetishes can be distressing for an individual seeking an intimate relationship, so the best outcome for them is to find a partner who is willing to accept the fetish into the relationship. Finding a partner may not come easily who feels as though he or she is keeping a “weird” or “dark” secret. Having an understanding, uncritical partner, supporting partner, will help the footies or fetishes and possibly lead to its extinction [1]. I think it's not easy to find a partner who totally accepts your dark or weird side. So, if you found the right partner, hold his/her hand and don’t let them go. This why I love to use term of supporting spouse rather then only a spouse to spend the rest of life with because a supporting partner has so much dealt with weaknesses, explore strengths or good things to focus on achieving goals and dreams together.

So, for you my friend and also for the fetishes in the world, we all need to look into our dark side. Then see that we all have the dark side, the dark secret. Of course including me. "You must be willing to examine and explore your dark side. You must acknowledge how bad you can be and how horribly unloving you can behave. When you know how deep and dark your dark side is, it helps you stand a little taller in the light" (Iyanla Vanzant).

"A pessimist sees only the dark side of the clouds and mopes; a philosopher sees both sides and shrugs; an optimist doesn't see the clouds at all - he's/she’s walking on them" (Leonard Louis Levinson). Finally, for you to know my friend, there is no dark side to friendship and love because we are the optimists. Honestly, I found you as a funny and very good personality rather than scared one.



References
[1]      B. L. Gramlich, K. G. Alderson, and M. A. Boyce, “The Perceived Effect of Fetishes on Young People’s Relationships,” BAOJ Psychol., vol. 1, no. 1, pp. 1–11, 2016.
[2]      M. Zarei and R. Bidaki, “Female foot fetishism disorder in childhood,” J. Res. Med. Sci., vol. 18, no. 2, p. 170, 2013.
[3]      C. L. Dozier, B. A. Iwata, and A. S. Worsdell, “Assessment and Treatment of Foot—Shoe Fetish Displayed By a Man With Autism,” J. Appl. Behav. Anal., vol. 44, no. 1, pp. 133–137, 2011.
[4]      M. D. Griffiths, “In Feet First A brief overview of foot fetishism,” 2014. [Online]. Available: https://www.psychologytoday.com/us/blog/in-excess/201405/in-feet-first. [Accessed: 22-Oct-2019].
[5]      https://www.kaskus.co.id/thread/5a101c9954c07a2b448b4568/fetishism/

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