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RESULTS
Table 1
As we may see from table 1, the great majority of the total sample (n = 111) is composed by heterosexuals, but only seven (6,3 %) respondents are female, being four (4) officially married and three (3) single. The number of people who have partners and practice the same sexual fantasies, 36,1%, was larger than expected.
It is interesting to point out that in sexual practices involving Submission and Masochism (43,3%) only six (6) are heterosexual women, while the rest of the group are males, regardless of sexual orientation. Catholic religion (53,2%) has more representatives (which reflects Brazil’s religious proportions). The education level is high, 70,3 being graduated and 13,5% post-graduated.
CONCLUSION
We will quote below excerpts from some reports for illustrating the qualitative part of the study, in which respondents talk about how they feel regarding their sexual experiences and the topics that were approached in the questionnaire they answered.
– SS, post-graduated, fetishist, 35, married: “When I was about five years old, I remember getting aroused by wearing satin gowns, I liked to urinate on them and feel the smell of urine for many days… Since I was a child I realized I had “different” desires, but I was only able to understand that in fact these fetishes are not an “aberration of nature” three years ago, with the Internet… on the net I saw, talked to and knew there are people with the same tastes”.
– S., enterprise administrator, masochist, 34, married, remembers: “There was this game of police and thieves and the girls were always the police and the boys were the thieves. Girls ran after, caught and arrested the boys. I remember that when I was arrested, I always asked to be tied up, or I would run away; so I developed, unnoticing, my instinct of submission to females… A fantasy that impressed me in my child and teen years was “Catwoman” from the Batman series… Today, seeing it again with experienced eyes, I can perceive a very explicit fetishist citation. Catwoman was beautiful, that latex suit tight on her body… Whenever she captured the heroes, they were tied up and were at her feet… She was always shown, in her hideout, sitting on a throne on a pedestal, and her helpers sat on the floor at her feet… sometimes she found a way to step on a helper… pure fetish”.
– Fbond, importer, bondage fetishist, 31, married: “I take bondage and fetishism very seriously, I don’t like anything that causes pain, but I like the seduction allied to bondage, underwear, insinuating clothes (but not vulgar), I am cultured… I found out I was a fetishist at age 8 watching a Jerry Lewis movie and now I have more than 150 tapes of that kind… I consider myself a very friendly person, so I think it’s absurd that a fetishist should be put in the class of “abnormals”. Maybe there are even cases like that, but it’s not the majority”.
– Al Z, dominator, post-graduated in System Analysis, 38, married, reports: “Since I was a child, I appreciated scenes with bound or spanked women (generally in movies), when I knew nothing about sex… I think it was instinctive… I awoke to my fantasies five or six years ago, when I accidentally entered a site… at that time, I was 32 or 33 and that fact totally changed my life… Bondage and spanking (female buttocks) arouse me a lot, and also other forms of physical and psychological domination like, for example, transforming my partner into a dog, putting on her a collar and a leash… My relationship with my spouse is “standard”, that is, it follows religious and social rules for marriage… She doesn’t know about my incursions into the virtual world, not even that I look for someone to make my fantasies come true in the “real”. I feel like an absolutely normal person… What I think is that society is really afraid to admit that who likes BDSM (within the erotic context, of course) is a normal human being. People always look forward to living with more pleasure and BDSM is one more alternative form of reaching it fully… I never opened up to someone as much as I’m doing to you now, but I feel very good, because it was suffocating me”.
– J., System Analyst, submissive, 32, single: “I feel perfectly normal and even – why not – privileged, for knowing how to explore my sexuality in a different and much more intense way than most people do. I’m very happy to have enough capacity to understand my fetish and to enjoy it in a healthy, safe and very peculiar way”.
– N., administrative assistant, bondager, 26, single: “I like to be bound and completely immobilized, to feel completely vulnerable in the hands of my partner, not being passive but struggling because I was tied up, as if I was forced to be in that situation, not accepting passively that the other ties me up, but trying to “escape”, to get free, and end up being “defeated” by his strength and technique… the deprivation of senses, like vision and speech… this way they become sharper, but not knowing what the other person is going to do is an incomparable sensation… being gagged is an indescribable sensation… Putting all that together is an inexplainable sensation… Sincerely, I feel more normal than other people, I accept myself. I think what is abnormal is people neglecting themselves, or even living a faÁade relationship and looking beyond for the fulfillment of their fantasies… I believe that people can only be totally happy when they look for a relationship that fulfills them totally… (that is) difficult, but living a double life is still more difficult… in one of them you will be acting out… The society in which we live in is hypocrite… everyone has fantasies, but to fit the “normal” standard, they don’t recognize it and even criticize and get shocked with other people’s opinion. I believe that each one owns their life and owe no explanation to others about what they like or dislike within four walls; better yet, I think we must be free to live out our fantasies and other quotidian things too; of course, respecting the other’s limits and space. For me, BDSM is a form of pleasure, it is a vast world with many branches and each person chooses among those what really gives them pleasure… I chose mine and I am not bothered by the fact that society does not accept it or thinks I am an aberration… I feel more normal than everyone, for I am sincere with myself, I recognize and accept myself like that and it makes me happy…”
– M.H., dentist, crossdresser, submissive, 39, married: “I am married and my wife takes part in everything and has dominated me for over one year… As you may see, I’m a submissive crossdresser and I behave accordingly. I’m my wife’s sissy. I dress as a woman everytime I can, do all housework and I’m a woman for my wife. I’m totally passive and she is active… I often get spanked and humiliated, and I love it… I found out that what I felt and did was in tune with the BDSM universe when I was 18. But not knowing it was a BDSM attitude, ever since I can remember… since 6 or 7… I loved to play house with my cousins and I was always the housemaid, always working and humiliated. This was the role I chose. It gave me pleasure and, in my point of view, it fits BDSM. When I was 10 I came for the first time, when putting on an aunt’s skirt… I came without even touching myself. Since then I was always out of standards, but at 16 I noticed I was “different”. Would I be gay? But how would I be gay if I never had interest in men? But if I wasn’t gay, why would I fantasize myself in the female role?… Unfortunately, people live in a standard, hipocritely proposed by this machist and repressive society we live in.”