By David Futrelle
An anonymous fellow recently turned to Yahoo Answers with a plaintive question: Ladies, why won’t you let me love your sexy feet?
More specifically, he asked: “Why do some women try to make their feet look attractive, but think a foot fetish is weird?” Apparently he was a little miffed that these women continue to tease him with their toes.
Females why do you go to extremes to make your feet look good, cute, sexy, attractive and just plain beautiful but when a guy with a foot fetish likes you for your feet you think its weird? When you tell yourself you want your feet to look good, why are you doing that, whats the purpose?
There are some girls that go to extremes to have the sexiest looking feet, you walk around in high heel shoes, or open toed shoes showing off your feet, but these same girls think that a foot fetish is weird, so how the hell are you going to go to extremes to make your feet look sexy and show off in public but think that the very people that are obsessed with the very thing you tried so hard to make sexy is weird?
Foot Dude, just listen to yourself a little more carefully. Because the answer is hidden in plain sight in your questions. For example, right here:
when a guy with a foot fetish likes you for your feet
No one, not even a woman who has a foot fetish herself, wants to be reduced to a body part. Women don’t object to people who think their feet look good; they object to people who like a certain body part better than they like the person with this body part.
And think a bit more about this line as well:
the very people that are obsessed with the very thing you tried so hard to make sexy
There’s nothing wrong with having a foot fetish. There is something wrong if you rush to tell every woman with “sexy feet” how sexy you think their feet are, how obsessed with feet you are, and, even if only by implication, how horny their feet make you.
Foot fetishists have a reputation for leading with their fetish, and the wording of the question here suggests that you, Foot Dude, may be one of these men. Women really don’t like it when men they don’t know, or with whom they have only a platonic relationship, show up on their doorstep (real or viritual) babbling about how hot their feet are.
They would have a similar reaction if someone showed up babbling about their lips, their ears, or their asses. The body part isn’t the problem. The problem, Foot Dude, is the unwanted intrusion of your sexual thoughts into their lives. Would you like it if, say, an ear fetishist came up to you and started babbling about how much your ears turn them on? No one wants that.
For some reason, foot fetishists seem to have more difficulty than most in remembering this basic tenet of sexual etiquette. I don’t know if they’re actually worse about this, or if it’s just that people notice it more from them because their particular fetish seems weirder than, say, the more common fetish of someone who likes big butts and can not lie.
But if you ever take a stroll through the CreepyPMs subreddit, filled with screenshots of creepy, unsolicited private messages that women (mostly) get from men (mostly), you’ll notice that a strikingly large number of them involve feet.
Here are a a couple of cringeworthy examples of this particular genre of creepy PM that I plucked from the subreddit because I think they help to make all this a little more understandable. Also, they’re sort of hilarious. (Click on the pics to see the original posts.)
If you have a foot fetish, and the person you’re asking for “a feet” pic knows you have a foot fetish — and if you’re asking them for foot pics, they know — asking for foot pics isn’t somehow less creepy than asking for pictures of their genitals. They know you get off on feet, so it’s as brazenly a sexual come-on as if you asked for a pic of them goatse-ing themselves.
Foot Dude, there are women online who will be happy to sell you their foot pics. It’s not hard to recognize them because their online profiles say things like “I sell foot pics” or “DM me for foot pics.” Go to them rather than bothering random women or, equally bad, women you know.
Hell, doing research for this post I ran across a variety of subreddits devoted to free foot pics of all sorts, including one in which foot exhibitionists display their feet with one sock on, and one sock off for the pleasure of Foot Dudes just like you. I had no idea that was even a thing.
Now let’s go back to a slightly different sort of creepy foot PM:
The problem here, Foot Dude, isn’t that this poor man is being discriminated against by a woman who’s maybe a little squicked out by the idea of someone huffing her feet. She has every right to be squicked out if she is.
And even if she’s actually into this particular fetish, she has a right to be annoyed. Because the real problem is that he’s trying to pull her into a sexual conversation — and one that is 100% turning him on as he thumb-types out his comments — without her consent.
It’s basically the foot fetishist equivalent of sending an unsolicited dic pic, or pulling your dick out in public, flasher-style. Even women who are huge fans of dicks don’t like it when dudes they don’t know drop pics of their particular dicks into their DMs unsolicited.
It really doesn’t matter why some women “go to extremes to make [their] feet look good.” Some do it because they like to look put-together in general; some do it because they like the ritual; some like the feeling of cleanliness and smooth skin; some even do it because it makes them feel sexy. And I’m sure there are all sorts of other reasons.
But, Foot Dude, they’re not doing it for you in particular, and if you want to appreciate the “sexy feet” of women you see out walking around in the world, do it discreetly. If you want to talk about your foot fetish, find some other foot fetishists to talk about it with. Google is your friend.
Now, if you want to find a woman who appreciates your foot fetish as much as you appreciate her feet, and you don’t want to pay them for the privilege, well, that’s probably going to take a little more work. No one ever said that love was easy. In the meantime, refrain from pestering women you don’t know about their feet, no matter how sexy you think they are.
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@Scanisaurus
I did not, which made your repeated use of “women who sell sex” confusing to me. Could you please explain why you need a word for specifically women who sell sex to discuss sex trafficking, or are you saying it was unintentional to word it that way? I’m very confused as to what you’re trying to say and just asking you to clarify, but I’m getting met with hostility.
@kupo
It wasn’t my intention to exclusively focus on women, I initially used the term “prostitute”, but when Catalpa pointed out that it might be offensive I switced to reffering to them as “women who sell sex” instead. I suppose I should have clarified that I wasn’t exclusively referring to women, and I admit I phrased myself wrong.
It’s just hard to speak on the issue if there isn’t any non-offensive word specifically referring to people selling sex.
@Hugh Jardon, your nym sounds like something an edgy 14 year old might use. But stuff like that has never been edgy, just silly.
You do realise that a bunch of us who post here are white men, right?
@Hugh Jardon
LMAO, if you think things like the concept of privilege and being aware of the bad shit we did in the past are hating on people, you should see some of the hate women/PoC/LGBTQ+ people get just for existing.
Sex worker.
@Scanisaurus
Well, that’s good to know. But FYI, that word doesn’t equate to “woman who sells sex.” It’s any gender of person, and it’s really denigrating in English. As for what to use instead, Ariblester beat me to it.
@tim gueguen
Yeah, but we’re “cucks,” so we don’t count.
@Hugh Jardon
Yeah and all the guys who have ever hurt me or abused me in my life have been white guys so what’s your point?
@Hugh Jardon – I just… Look. Someone told you that you benefit from systemic privileges, and you don’t like the way that makes you feel. You worked hard for what you have, no one gave it to you! And what you have isn’t super great! (I imagine, if you’re in the same boat as the rest of the 99%.)
Think of it this way: You’re playing in ‘normal’ mode in the game. Not easy, because nothing in this world is ‘easy’. But ‘Hard’? That’s someone with more things working against them than a (presumably) cishet white dude.
Or, y’know, keep blaming your white supremacist rhetoric on the very concept of ‘privilege’. *shrug* Your choice.
@Rhuu
That makes me think — I’m not a gamer, but has anyone ever actually designed a computer game that has those settings? Making it through a normal day might be too dull, but — on the easy setting, you’re a white guy, so you can just pick up a gun and kill the baddies, then everyone cheers and gives you a medal, hard setting you’re not white and if you do that the cops show up and shoot you?
That might be an interesting indie game! I like the idea of finishing the game, then going to new game +, and before you start it have it go “this is the hard mode, are you sure?”
And then your encounter with the cops goes the way many PoC are worried it will.
@Ariblester
I’ve already said it, sex worker is too broad of a term since it also refers to strippers, camgirls and lots of other people who doesn’t sell sex, and I think lumping them all together only serves to create confusion as to what I’m trying to say.
I feel all arguing about semantics just serves to shut down and derail the discussion whilst no one has actually come up with any good counterargument to when I say that having sex with strangers for money should’t be treated as just any other job, and doing that will only harm all countless vulnerable people who are forced into it.
Why do you need a specific term for a sex worker who provides physical services as opposed to a sex worker who only performs visually? What is the purpose of distinguishing the two in this discussion?
No, it won’t entirely solve the problem. But the terms we use do have power. For some people, hearing the term “black person” is going to conjure up negative stereotypes no matter what, since racism is prevalent in our culture. But that doesn’t mean that using the n-word to describe black people isn’t worse than just calling them black. There’s a whole lot more baggage associated with the one term over the other.
Ah, I missed your previous post.
Uhhh… it certainly shouldn’t be treated as any other job across the board, I’ll grant you. Our bodies are very personal things and bodily autonomy is something that should be protected. Sex is a very intimate and personal thing for many.
That said, for some people, yeah, it just is like any other job. It’s a job with significant risks- primarily due to the stigma against sex workers in our culture and laws which force sex workers to operate on the margins of society, but it is a job that some people choose.
Are there others who are trafficked or otherwise coerced into the sex trade? Yes, absolutely. A staggering and painful number of them. And I by no means intend to minimize the suffering that is inflicted on these people. But trafficked people and sex workers are not synonymous.
That said, sex work, even sex work specifically involving intercourse, is not a job choice that is inherently more exploitative than any other job, even though the current attitudes within our culture generally make it notably exploitative. Even leaving all the extra baggage aside though, is it still exploitative? Yeah. Capitalism is an inherently exploitative system, as it necessitates people to sell their labor in order to survive, and as such all of us are under duress. Without the looming threat of homelessness, hunger, and destitution, are there many sex workers who wouldn’t choose to continue with their jobs? I’m sure there are. There are also many farm laborers or janitors or customer service staff who also would not continue with the frankly abusive situations they often need to contend with, either, though.
Thanks for belatedly clearing up my confusion over what was initially described as “the Das Boot TV series”, which I took to mean the six-part extended TV cut of the 1981 feature film that’s been around for decades – I watched it on BBC2 back in the 1980s and couldn’t recall anything like that rape scene, so wondered if (a) my memory was at fault or (b), more alarmingly, whether I had watched the scene in question but somehow rationalised that it was no big deal and not worth remembering.
So it was something of a relief to discover that it was a completely different production altogether.
On the subject of foot fetishism, I remember a discussion between two British film censors in a mid-1990s documentary about how to classify a video that consisted of nothing more than close-ups of feet, sometimes with stockings, sometimes bare, sometimes with stockings being applied or removed. They agreed that in terms of actual content there was nothing in it that would warrant anything stronger than a PG, but were mindful of the fact that it would be displayed on sex-shop shelves where literally every other title was rated 18 – although sadly I forget how they resolved the issue. But it’s an interesting example of how context (in this case the obvious target market) can completely transform something that is outwardly completely innocuous.
The people who are forced into it are sexually exploited persons. This is made quite clear in the Wikipedia article I linked to:
@Catalpa
I think it’s important to distinguish people like strippers, phone sex operators and camgirls from people selling sex because with the former group, they can operate from within the safety of their own home or on a stage where bouncers/security guards can protect them, whereas with people physically selling sex the majority of clients will demand that they do the acts in a private place, and the murder/assault statistics are drastically lower among phone sex operators than sex sellers for this very reason.
Also, as someone who’s been struggling to find a job for a long time, people saying “sex work is just like any other job” or suggesting sex work is a great way to pay for college and so on makes my stomach turn, because the implication is that it should be OK to let people be forced into sex work to pay the bills, and it shouldn’t ever be. In Stockholm there is a housing crisis, and there has recently been reports in the newspapers on male landlords trying to pressure young women into sex in exchange for housing, and that stuff happens exactly because of the mindset that buying sex is just like any other transaction.
And comparing it to working at call centers or janitors is ignoring that as tiresome and abusive those jobs are, you aren’t forced to intimate sexual contact with strangers at those jobs, and to compare the two is just as bad as comparing car theft to rape, because sure, car theft is a bad crime, but it’s nowhere near as traumatic to the victim as rape.
Where I live social security only goes so far and after a while you’re more or less forced to take whatever work the job center offers you or you loose your allowance. Could you honestly say that you’d want prostitution to be one of those jobs and that you’d want people to be forced to choose between that or to end up on the street? Because that’s what would happen if the idea that “prostitution is just any job” was taken to it’s logical conclusion and treated as just any job.
@Wetherby
I’m glad you could put your mind at ease knowing that it was a different production, the series I’m complaining about certainly wasn’t made in the 1980’s.
However, upon re-watching several movies I’ve myself have been alarmed at how many of my childhood classics contained implied rape or attempted rape, such as this scene in Pirates of the Caribbean where Elizabeth is almost raped before Will rescues her, and so many other movies, and I’ve also realized just how many kid’s movies feature plotlines where villains want to marry or otherwise force himself on the heroine, the only difference from adult movies is that the threats aren’t explicit and the heroine is always rescued, but all the rapey implications and misogyny is still there.
I’m genuinely frightened at the thought on just how ubiquitous this stuff is, and how it normalizes women being sexually violated to the point it’s just background noise and people barely even think about it or question why it’s there.
You’re equating forced sex work with voluntary sex work, which is not the same thing.
People who engage in voluntary sex work are not forced into intimate sexual contact with strangers. They choose to engage in sexual acts in exchange for money. What people choose to do with their own bodies should always be left to their discretion.
And I feel like calling me a rape apologist for pointing out the fact that voluntary sex work exists is pretty out of line.
Literally the first paragraph I wrote said that sex work shouldn’t be considered the same as other jobs for the vast majority of people. I don’t know why you’re asking me this question.
No. This happens because people are taking advantage of a desperate person, not someone who is a sex worker, as sex work is (as Arbilester pointed out above)
(emphasis mine)
VOLUNTARY. You are, once again, describing *exploitation* and trying to equate it with all sex work.
Am I saying that anyone should be *forced* into sex work? (A, no, because that removes the ‘voluntary’ aspect.) So, obviously, no.
But also, I’m not saying that you *must* be a janitor, or you *must* work customer service, or you *must* wait tables. All of those are things one does, perhaps because they enjoy some aspects of the job, but also because they *need to make money*.
Welcome to late stage capitalism.
Clearly sex work is not for you. It’s not for me, either. But for those who have managed to find a way to support themselves using their bodies, good on them.
If they were bakers instead, would you have a problem with them?
Also, I don’t know if you noticed, but you are *again* focusing on women.
@Catalpa
@Rhuu
I’m sorry if I phrased myself badly or the things I wrote came out badly. I’ve had a lot of stressful stuff to deal with lately and have had a hard time thinking straight and not feeling in control over my life.
If you think I’ve been focusing too much on women, it’s because these issues disproportionately affect cis- and transwomen, but that doesn’t mean that I think it’s any less bad when it happens to men and non-binary people and I’ll try and avoid further gendered language on this point.
However, I still think buying sex shouldn’t have any place in a civilized society and I’m a staunch proponent in the Nordic model for the following reasons;
I’m aware there are people out there who want to sell sex, but because having one’s bodily orifices penetrated could be incredibly painful if done wrong, a great deal of humans find it stressful to commit sexual acts with persons they aren’t attracted to and a job that requires the workers to be alone with their clients will always pose a certain physical risk, the number of people who’d want to sell sex without coercion will always be a very small percentage of any given population even if you could remove the social stigma attached.
And in a society where buying sex isn’t illegal or even considered particularly immoral, the demand for buying sex will always be a lot higher than what could be covered by volunteers alone, and not just to their small number but also because even the people who would volunteer would have sex acts they wouldn’t want to do and limits to how many clients they could serve at any given time. And so, in places where buying sex is legal, the number of victims of trafficking, coercion and abuse goes up, and it’s been shown time and time again that the vast majority of clients don’t care weather the people they are buying sex from chose it, or they are willfully ignorant of the abuse, and with sex purchase being legal it’s much harder to prosecute those who rape trafficking victims since they could claim that they thought their victim entered the sex trade willingly and that it was a perfectly legal transaction.
Therefore, I believe that whilst normalizing buying sex could make it easier for volunteers to ply their trade, it would be to the cost of increased abuse of vulnerable people, and therefore it’s wrong, and as for those who truly do sell sex out of their own free will, if they aren’t doing it out of coercion or financial desperation then they should be able switch to other forms of sex work like stripping or phone/online services if they still want to rely on their sexuality for money.
I also linked to these two articles before, but I’ll post them here again:
https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/0/violence-drugs-sexual-diseases-managed-zones-prostitution-failing/
https://www.independent.co.uk/voices/prostitution-decriminalisation-new-zealand-holland-abuse-harm-commercialisation-a7878586.html
Please take a look at the comments policy on sex workers. Thanks.
Particularly this bit:
@kupo
@Jesalin
That sentence was on people buying sex, not selling it. Did you miss the part where I mentioned the nordic model?
I whish people would read my full comment before replying rather than take things out of context and willfully misinterpret them. I don’t see how I’m breaking the policy just for pointing out that de-criminalizing sex purchase leads to increased trafficking and abuse, and I provided links to articles supporting my point.
That’s disingenuous bullshit, and I highly doubt you don’t know it.
It’s attacking selling by the back door, as if there were no buyers there would obviously be no sellers in short order.
Also, Canada uses the Nordic model, it’s bullshit and only serves to make life more dangerous for sex workers.
You called it uncivilized (or heavily implied it). I’ll ask David for a ruling.