Reader's Request #3: Foot Fetish

Hi friends,

One of the reader requested I write about feet, or in other words foot fetish. For sure no one wants to read a biological article about a foot and the skeletal structure, do they? Foot Fetish is such a topic that can easily become sexual by nature. I will try to stay away from using sexual words and references as much as I can, but since fascination of feet is based on man's desire for sex, I will have to mention it. *** So, if you are uncomfortable with reading about sexual stuff, you can leave. Warning, you will not find anything there that would excite you, or arouse you-- if you are one of those kind of readers, there are other places on the web to go to! My talk here will be strictly academic in nature!***

Fetish for Foot

Three feet from the same family!

Big feet, small feet, old feet, young feet, smooth feet, rough feet....We all have feet, each with one big toe and four small fingers. We all use our feet to walk, run, play sports with. A foot is one of the most used body part. The foot is a biological structure found in many animals that is used for locomotion. Imagine what it would be like if you did not have a foot, or both feet? Having no feet would restrict us from being effectively mobile. So, in short, feet are very important parts of our human body, something that we take for granted each day we get out of bed.

Now, over the course of history, man (man is a generic term referring to both man and woman) has been fascinated with feet. What is it about a foot that attracts them? What is it about a foot that makes one a fetishist? On one hand, enjoying the look of pretty feet and good pedicure as well as caressing the partner's feet is normal human behavior, as long as the interest in his/her whole personality persists.

On the other hand, a sexual nature persists in fascination of feet. The official definition for a foot fetishist is "...a pronounced fetishistic sexual interest in human feet. It is also one of the most common fetishistic interests among humans. A foot fetishist can be male or female (although males account for over 70%)." There are four common theories for this sexual interest in feet. They are:

1. One explanation, advanced by neurologist Vilayanur S. Ramachandran, highlights the fact that the feet and the private parts occupy adjacent areas of the sensory cortex, possibly entailing some neural crosstalk between the two.

2. An alternate hypothesis is that in many cultures, an infant's experience of its mother may involve crawling around her feet. If sexual/behavioral imprinting occurs during this time, this might lead to the feet becoming the primary object of sexual arousal.

3. Another theory is that the shape of the human foot is distinctly phallic from certain angles and replicates the shape of either male private parts (explaining homosexual attraction to male feet), or the curves of the female body (again explaining the tendency of heterosexual foot fetishists to be men).

4. Yet another theory proposes that visually, the feet and private parts occupy the same space within the sexual visual field that a male sees of a female, when the legs are raised for sex, and that some males are genetically brain imprinted to find parts of the body within that field as erotic.

So while there have been some scientific theories in trying to explain foot fetish, I myself have personally no answer for why people are fascinated with feet. However, I do believe that you can tell a lot of a person by looking at their feet. I look at them. If there are badly cut nails, foot odor, rough/ cracked heels, that tells me the person doesn't take care of themselves well. A foot well maintained would mean the person takes care of themselves.

I could branch off from here and talk about a lot of other things as well, like the shapes and sizes of feet, the shoe-wear that accompanies feet and so on. What I have written here is a basic definition for foot fetish. I hope this answers to the particular reader who had requested for this article. I have never written anything like this before, but I guess we all can learn new things. Next time you meet someone who breathes heavily while looking at your feet, you can thank me for informing you of what's going on in that person's mind. You can then use your mighty foot to kick him in the you-know-where!

Kicking-myself-out-of-this-topic-now,

Mansur

(All my sources were used from Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia)