I am starting to feel that having a fetish is a way of dehumanizing a person because a boy (or girl) feels overwhelmed by the beauty of another person. If a boy were to sit with beauty and not jealously want to covet that beauty, most likely, the fetish would not develop in the first place. Fetishes reduce beauty into something tangible. They reduce personhood to the level of an object or a thing. It’s important to know how this works before one can really go beyond it.

The energy of fetishes can definitely be transferred to respect. It takes determination and a genuine wish and vow not to act on the dehumanizing energies of the fetish. Rather than reduce a woman to an object, I can learn to respect her by seeing her, and extending respect to all women.

How this is done? It’s quite simply to learn to relax with women without getting so emotionally attached to the appearance. Using better narratives can be helpful. Rather than looking at the image below and saying to myself “Oh, she’s so beautiful, and I MUST be with her because of her beautiful socks”, I can substitute a better narrative: She has a very pretty appearance and great socks too. I wish her the best. In other words, I learn to appreciate her rather than wanting to possess her beauty in some way. Learning to let the appearance be without a sense of attaching to it is an important skill to learn which helps me let go of the ego. I can also learn to respect the fact that if I am reducing her to an object, I need to repent and wish her happiness, which does not have anything to do with satisfying my ego and lusts.

 So far, I have been using this blog to try to get over a sock fetish and simply shift to an appreciation of socks. So far..it’s not working very well! Why not? I would like to explore the conditions for a successful sock narrative that does not devolve into a fetish.

The most important qualification is that the sock narrative should not seduce the reader into wanting to get more and more involved in socks. How is it possible not to be seduced? Perhaps there is no way of doing so. Perhaps the best way is simply to refrain from looking at socks altogether or even talking about them.  In that case, the best narrative is simply no narrative whatsoever.

If this is still not possible, another way is to try to reverse the tendency for socks to become something that one approaches. How is that possible? Again, it’s not easy to do. I have suggested at the beginning of this blog that the focus should be on boys wearing socks, not going into girls wearing them. This is so because I think boys wearing socks can mitigate desire while allowing men to symbolically acknowledge and appreciate the comforts of socks.

Sadly, it doesn’t work that way. I have found that all these approaches only create more and more desire. I don’t know if this experiment truly succeeded and I am about to abandon it altogether, since it isn’t quite working. But I haven’t given up hope. I have some more ideas:

a) A blog that de-genders socks by making them completely about the pure sensation of socks themselves without any mention of gender.

b) A blog that renders socks boring by only describing their physical characteristics and dimensions? ( kind of logical atomism?)

c) A blog that equalizes people by showing that they are all the same, there are no genders, there are only bodies?

I have recently been inspired by Tibetan practices by the idea that one should dedicate what they like to others rather than trying to possess what they like. Non-possessive appreciation is a very good way to lessen attachment and not to cultivate bitterness at what we don’t have.

Why can I not simply appreciate that women enjoy wearing socks, or sometimes not wearing them at all? In other words, there are two steps to this process:

1. The first is to acknowledge that I am going to be okay if I don’t “own” the things I enjoy looking at. In fact, there is not even a need for me to “sexualize” what I enjoy or admire.
2. I can dedicate the things I like to others, rather than cultivating a grasping attitude of wanting to have it for myself.
3. I can let go of the things I crave by fully giving them to others to enjoy.

The advantage of this approach is that it allows me to give away what I crave while acknowledging that I have a possessive and unhealthy relationship to it. It’s also allowing me to create a space of equanimity around what I crave the most.

Different narratives can be used to explore and overcome a sock fetish. I would like to look at one model, called the PAC model, derived from Harris’ I’m OK You’re OK.

When narratives about socks take on the connotations of an old child/parent script, they tend to reinforce compulsive behavior. If I am continually reminded in these narratives that I am a helpless, powerless being with no dignity or resources of my own, I am more compelled to escape into compulsive behaviors. If one analyzes the different narratives that one habitually goes to when there is a fetish, one can replace these narratives with healthier ones. Such kinds of narratives can curb the tendency toward infantile sexual compulsions.

It’s important to remember this: the power of a fetish does not lie in the object itself, but in the narratives we create around them. For example, if my narrative comes from a child, it might take the form of indulging or eroticizing the fetish. I am no longer an adult; instead, I am simply following my own compulsions without any sense of boundaries. I don’t realize that not having any boundaries creates suffering for me, because the desire for pleasure has no limits. It’s like a child without an adult to guide him in life or establish healthy boundaries and relationships.

On the other hand, if my narratives come on as “Parent”, I am condemning or shaming myself for having the fetish. I might start to chide myself for being immature, or I might diminish myself or disrespect myself for having such emotions. This actually has the effect of increasing compulsive acting out. Why? Because when I am continually told that I am wrong or bad for having these feelings, I start to internalize the idea that I am helpless and in need of someone else to determine my worth. I go to a place of retreat into a primal relationship, which only reinforces my compulsive behavior more.

Adult narratives do something different. They acknowledge the feelings that I have and also create healthy boundaries so that the desire is contained. Adult narratives also acknowledge the importance of staying with frustration rather than trying to kill frustration through indulging desire in a limitless way. That is, they lean into frustration rather than trying to “remove” frustration. Yet, here’s the tricky part: leaning into frustration requires a healthy sense of self. If I just say, “well, you should enjoy frustration”, that can be a kind of veiled masochism that reinforces the compulsive fetish.

Adult perspectives also acknowledge the possibility of outgrowing a fetish. I don’t want to be a slave to it anymore, and as an adult, I can choose not to be. I can redirect my attention in different ways that are more constructive and reasonable. And I can still appreciate socks in a more dispassionate, friendly way that is not eroticized. In other wordss, I can talk back to the fetish in a way that it is not eroticized.

Socks are just what you wear on your feet, but a lot of boys like me misunderstand. I would have to say this makes me a very dumb boy, because I give into my weaknesses and end up lusting after girls. Let’s face it: this is not a pure attitude, and it’s a waste of time to go any further.

The solution to this problem is to stop indulging in such an overt objectification of women, and start to replace it with genuine, selfless respect and humility. It’s admitting first and foremost when one’s thoughts about someone else are not pure and are entirely based on greed and lust. Boys who give into those lusts are only falling onto their own proverbial swords. They need to seek refuge in a spiritual practice that allows them to see women as women, not as objects of desire.

Throughout my blog, I refer to “male” and “female” in relation to socks. Isn’t this rather strange, you might think? In talking so frankly about the way socks take on a gender that a male either loves or fears, one can see how socks can become sexualized. Is it good to sexualize socks? In fact, as I have noted before, it’s a real source of anxiety.

Even the idea of “celebrating boys in socks”, now what does this mean? Why boys? Isn’t the expression itself a term of endearment that is often uttered by women? Again, even in speaking of a boy, there is an implied onlooker. Socks are not yet uncoupled from an early mother-son bond, so we have this kind of experimentation on how the rapprochement of mother and son is achieved symbolically through the softness of socks.

If one really wants to go beyond the gendered element of socks, they would need to see socks as functioning to provide warmth to one’s feet, without all the symbolic trappings one has related to them. When I stop associating socks with all these loaded, gendered meanings, they quickly cease to be sexualized, because I am no longer seeing the fantasy of a male/female relationship in the form of socks. Is a person ready to take such a step? Well, only if they can learn to empathize or take the narrative of someone who simply has not invested any gendered meaning around wearing socks. This is the real challenge, and perhaps the only way to go beyond a fetish: that is, to start re-narrating socks as objects that are not in the least bit related to the desire of men and women or even sexual desire. This requires a powerful counter narrative. You can see how this evolves in later entries.

Oscar Wilde’s Salome is a kind of archetype for the explorations I am making. I have decided to look at this short play in some detail, while relating it to the theme of boysocks318! I hope you can enjoy some observations, where I have taken quotes from the Project Gutenberg version of Salome

The beginning of the play starts with a conversation between a Young Syrian and a Page of Herodias, both observing the princess Salome from a far. She appears to be quite strange on an evening like this. Remarks the page of Herodias:

Look at the moon! How strange the moon seems! She is like a woman rising from a tomb. She is like a dead woman. You would fancy she was looking for dead things.

Why would Salome be interested in dead things? This is a question that foreshadows the main action of the play, which culminates in the climax of Salome dancing with the head of Jokannan. But the moon symbolism also suggests that Salome represents a dark, unseen or forbidden kind of eroticism which never sees the light of day. It’s certainly not the subject of romantic comedies, because it is considered unconducive to the perpetuation of human beings, even a bit perverse. Do all “perversions” relate to the inanimate? I leave this question for you to explore on your own.

I am most intrigued by the subsequent line. spoken by the Young Syrian:

She has a strange look. She is like a little princess who wears a yellow veil, and whose feet are of silver. She is like a princess who has little white doves for feet. You would fancy she was dancing.

Small, white feet symbolize a strange gracefulness, almost angelic. Does this remind me of the feeling I get when I wear white socks, I wonder? I certainly feel that way when I am wearing them. It is as though my feet were clad in a soft angelic cloud which takes me above the ground and allows me to float upwards in the air: a kind of angel with doves for feet. How embarrassing I feel, however, to tiptoe in my white socks, for fear that I am appropriating angelic qualities that don’t belong to me. It doesn’t suit my personality, or my identity as a human who struggles to be a person in this world. And boys “don’t do that”; they need to be tough.

Notice how the males in this play are simply onlookers, marveling at the strangeness and mystery of Salome, who is so far away. It reminds me that when we elevate a being to the status of an angel, we are really pushing away some part of us that we appreciate, yet must reject at the same time. Boys (males in general) are somehow not allowed to own these angelic, satin qualities, because their feet need to be firmly planted on the ground for battle. A boy can only enjoy the soft, angelic qualities of his white socks in the privacy of his bed, if any. He can only dance in the darkness of his solitary room. Subsequently, this forbidden quality is seen in a mysterious dark “other”, a woman of the moon and the darkness who takes on an exotic, oversexed form. This creates a hyper state of desire which can be very disgusting at times. It is terrible for women also, who are burdened with the greedy desires of male onlookers: men who cannot own up to the soft angelic qualities inside themselves. Why do women have to take that kind of abuse from men?

It’s interesting how there is then an ensuing sound and a discussion between two soliders about religious quarrels:

FIRST SOLDIER

Why do they dispute about their religion?

SECOND SOLDIER

I cannot tell. They are always doing it. The Pharisees, for instance, say that there are angels, and the Sadducees declare that angels do not exist.

The question of whether angels exist or “don’t exist” is really the heart of the dilemma I am facing in this entry. If angels “exist out there” then I am not owning their qualities as a part of my being. I forever see the angels as the embodiment of an other who cannot be in my heart or mind. If the angels “don’t exist” on the other hand, as the Sadducees suggest, then I run the danger of denying that these special qualities even exist, and then my religion becomes one of suppression or repression. It’s a dilemma that happens with many spiritual practices. It raises the question, how is angelic (spiritual) energy handled when it is not a part of one’s daily life of strife or struggle? How is it incorporated? Failure to incorporate those angelic qualities can result in all sorts of perverse activities. It means denying the “doves for feet” or even eroticizing them in a way that gives them a dark power over oneself. This latter point gives rise to the dark female who represents the other who the male wants to deny in himself.

All quotes taken from Oscar Wilde, “Salome”. The Project Gutenberg Ebook. https://www.gutenberg.org/files/42704/42704-h/42704-h.htm

  In order to truly enjoy socks, a boy must reflect on his vulnerability. He needs to embrace his vulnerability to rejection, rather than try to pretend he doesn’t care or even try to hide in a religious attitude. Such kind of hiding only represses the inner woman who is prone to take down the boy’s fragile ego time and again. A boy needs to be in stocking feet without giving into the powers of lust, which is the expression of a premature rejection of painful emotions. He must truly and feel the pain of unreciprocated desire, and to know that such desire is really a form of attachment and greed. It’s only when he really and truly mourns the inability to satisfy his ego and lusts through a woman that a boy can maure into true selflessness and generosity.

   A lot of this reflection is symbolized in that Wilde’s “Salome”s story. But I want to go further with this observation and talk about the kinds of reversals and transformations that a boy needs to make in his life in order to mature.

   The first is that a boy needs to allow girls and women in his life to be powerful, without trying to control that power. He needs to learn to properly respect the power of women rather than suppressing women or rejecting their power in a state of jealousy. If he chooses not to take this on, he will suffer the sense of threat and domination by women, because he gets his ego involved time and again. In failing to separate his real nature from his ego, he will feel the revenge of a woman, who will not stand to be imprisoned by men’s expectations or insecurity. He must learn to celebrate the power and intelligene of a woman, which has nothing to do with satisfying his ego and lusts. Then he can allow women to be allies in his life rather than threats to his ego and greed for sensations.

If anything, boys need to enjoy the comfort of socks without longing for the ego comforts of women. He must learn to comfort himself and not rely on women for such comforts. He must turn his lusts into respect for women.

   Boys, like girls, can always return to the gentleness and softness of socks. But why stop there? It’s a reflection of a gentle and sweet approach to life where people don’t feel that they are fighting each other to get what they need. Instead, they are happy and content in the present with who they are. It’s important that boys can feel the nurturing power that socks can represent.

   Sometimes–and it’s unfortunate- boys are nurtured into a world where they are socialized to “fight or flight”. Don’t ask me why, but somehow Western culture associates toughness and the ability to “fight well” with the survival of men. Men are also seen as “predators” who need to be tamed. When a boy grows up feeling that respect has to be earned and is not a given (“don’t be so spoiled”), a boy often feels unable to comfort himself when things don’t turn out so well. The ability to self-soothe is missing in a lot of boys precisely because our society fears that too much mollycoddling will spoil one’s manhood. This is such a limiting way of looking at males. It also leads to a perpetuation of a myth that men should suffer in silence rather than express their emotions in a vulnerable way.

In light of all this, it’s not much wonder that males might struggle with stocking feet since the soft feel of socks does not make one feel “tough” or “macho” at all. Sometimes it might even evoke a time when children were protected and cuddled a lot.  For men, getting too close to this stage of childhood might feel threatening to their sense of identity as males, unless they can find little ways to challenge what they think their maleness represents. Could learning to simply “be” in one’s socks be a good way to challenge such rigid views of maleness?

Have you ever heard the expression, to “kiss one’s feet”? It’s very standard in a lot of romances that a person shows that they are lower than their loved one by kissing their feet. I believe that a lot of the sexualization of stockings goes back to this idea of self-immolation in front of a loved one. In fact, there is something around being able to dare oneself to kiss the less savory parts of a loved one’s body in order to prove their undying love for the other. Unfortunately, this tendency to prostate oneself in front of another has lead to all sorts of sexual dynamics that lead to psychological suffering.

Love is not about abasing oneself in the name of desire. It’s about respecting another person completely and about two people seeing each other as equals in an adult relationship. Unfortunately, if a person is in an abusive situation, they might start to pick up on the idea that “proving” one’s love involves somehow abasing oneself. Conversely, the person in the sadistic position savors the idea of being able to submit their partner to all sorts of  degrading punishments, after which their partner “proves” their undying love for them. In both the sadist and the masochist’s position, love is seen as a “test” as well as a form of self-abasement. Never can love in this situation be seen as something between two equal people, since the sadomasochistic relationship equates love with the total erasure of self/identity. 

An example might take the form of fantasizing about smelling a partner’s dirty socks or stockings. How did this fantasy ever come about, and why? For the person who dreams about smelling socks, the internalized belief is that the partner is someone they need to completely abase themselves in front of in order to truly show their love. When I perform this act, I am telling myself that I am ‘unworthy’ of being treated any higher than a foul smelling article of clothing that is snugly wrapped around the foot. But the other point of this fantasy is that the other is also reduced to an object that can be disposed of or labelled as dirty. What I am essentially doing is reducing the act of attraction to something that is forever dirty.

This kind of fantasy is a sign of a low self-esteem, but it’s also a fantasy that is incapable of ascending higher than self-abasement. The more I indulge in it, the more I convince myself that I am never truly worthy of self-respect, and I am even a hostage to all the judgments, fancies or feelings of those around me, since in my fantasy, I am nothing more than a doormat for someone’s feet. Such kinds of fantasies play into the misleading idea that abasing oneself will always necessarily lead to a redemption of the self, whether it takes the form of pity or a realization of my “humanity”. In fact, I have found in my own life that the more one abases themselves, the more others will see that as a cue to walk over them. Self-disrespect breeds disrespect all around. That is why the only way to deal with these fantasies is to recognize the need to respect oneself and others.

The way out of this self-immolation is to turn away from the idea that socks symbolize the abasement of oneself before another. I must completely reject such an idea even if it risks labeling me as uptight, too serious, etc. Socks can be represented as clothes that keep my feet warm, and nothing more. Can it be done? Can a fetish symbolism fade? One should try.