To Boldly Toe…
After a detailed conversation about it, I decided to read up on foot fetishism more in-depth. Wikipedia’s entry is interesting and surprisingly well-cited, though many references are ‘news’ articles backing up claims of certain celebrities’ foot-thusiasm.
“Foot fetish[ism] has been defined as a pronounced sexual interest in the feet or footwear. Freud considered foot binding as a form of fetishism.[3] For a foot fetishist, points of attraction include the shape and size of the foot and toes (i.e., long toes, short toes, pointed toes, high arches, slender soles, fat toes, long toenails, short toenails, small feet, toenail color), jewelry, toe rings, ankle bracelets, treatments e.g.: french pedicure, state of dress (i.e., barefoot, flip flops, or clad in socks or nylons), odor, and any form of sensory interaction, e.g. licking, sucking, tickling, people giving foot jobs.[3]“
Sure, we can all likely accept this definition without question. According to this entry, foot fetishism is the most common; so we all know someone who gets off on pedjoyment. I’ve actually caught a couple men giving my high-heeled feet the stare down, it’s fascinatingly flattering, considering I find my feet unsightly. I’d rather a strange man silently stare at my feet than scan my whole body with prodding eyes. 
Then ‘Treatment’ enters the Wiki scene a few points down in the entry. Wait- what?! Excluding extremism and delusional necessity, why would one need treatment for healthy sexual enjoyment of another human’s (or his/her own) body part beyond what is more typically associated with pleasure? Like most fetishes, sexual enjoyment of feet does not hurt anyone and, in fact, it does quite the opposite for said ped-thusiasts. Claiming the necessity of ‘treatment’ for bodily enjoyment is like saying a screen door needs to be blocked to disallow the cool summer breeze from grazing my face. And for what? Because it’s abnormal? That cool summer breeze may have smelled like peppermint instead of wildflowers, but that doesn’t make it feel any less wonderful.
I’ve long stood by my personal quote of “normal is just a stereotype of the status quo”, which in this case means: “enjoy your genitals and missionary position 2.5x a week”. Deviation of this to more fully enjoy sensory fulfillment is apparently a cry for a prescription.
More surprising is much of the wording in this entry: indicating that finding pleasure in feet is a choice. The article’s section entitled ‘Relationships to Health and Disease’, suggests that people chose to mix sex with feet as a safe alternative when gonorrhea was rampant among other STIs. (What about Scatplay’s relationship to health and disease?) This is like suggesting I chose to find that chick’s ass to be sexy or that guy’s smile to be alluring as opposed to the reality of me just accepting my interests and perhaps running with them. While Ms. Sandwiches respects and has deeply studied much psychological research, she calls bullshit on one’s sexual enjoyment being a choice. I highly suspect those people who were a bit wary of the outbreaks simply got creative with their bodies and realized there is a whole new world of enjoyment within their very own beautiful bodies, then passed on this information for others to try and discover for themselves. People don’t decide one day to just ‘like’ being rimmed or having their cocks footjobbed, they decide to try it and then possibly realize they love it. We are creatures of variety, it’s only natural to have a plethora of outlets for this.
Breaking News: Jerry and Sandra Watkins end 17yr relationship on grounds that Jerry pampered her feet and bought her gorgeous shoes too much, Jerry is now digging into his childhood to save his marriage and banish his enjoyment of his beloved’s feet. Crumpled up passages of biblical footwashing found in glove compartment of Mr. Watkins’ car.
Beautifully articulated. Sound argument. Nice turn of phrase. A+
Thank you, my dearest Mr. Topping; you are a true gem.
I find my feet rather unsightly, but necessary for structural integrity, so I never really understood the foot fetish thing either.
What you said makes perfect sense. Before I started having sex, I developed a rather odd fixation on the backs of guy’s necks (not the fleshy/tracheal/arterial front part that vampires seem fond of), particularly when covered up with the collar of a nice button-down shirt. I used to sit in my desk at school and stare at the guy who sat in front of me, hoping to catch a glimpse of that top vertebra that would poke out if he stretched his neck forward or slumped over his desk. I’d wonder what it would be like to run my tongue along the surface and feel the hard bones as the skin and muscle slid above.
Anyway, the point is, this was back before I could engage in sex, so I take it that this was part of my sexuality forming itself. How I could sort of express attraction since it was not “appropriate” for me to be sexual until I had a reliable means to prevent pregnancy and disease.
While this fixation has sort of faded to the background of more “conventional” sex, I still can appreciate a well-formed set of vertebra (and set of scapula if the guy is shirtless).
What can I say? I was a strange little girl.
V.
Thank you for such an awesome and thorough reply! I always love your candidness both in textual and conversational format. Your talk of necks reminds me of the intense fondness I still wield for smiles. I’m a firm believer that a genuine smile can automatically make anyone more attractive. I used to get really enthralled by smiles throughout high school, there were a couple people in particular that secretly made me melt because of that smile… I suspect that’s what may have motivated me to derive such deep satisfaction from them and why I still do, beyond the fact that; for that brief moment- a smile is a snapshot of someone’s enjoyment.
I agree. A great smile makes everything better. This one guy I knew back in high school seemed to have a halo when he smiled. Then again, he usually sat next to the window, smiled and laughed a lot, so it might have just been fortuitous lighting.
Still, he was very adorable in a sort of innocent way that I could never pull off. I seriously felt dirty looking at him like that. To rip off a hard-boiled detective, noir-style writing: “It was a smile that reminded demons why they wish they could still go to heaven.”