Vanilla Attitudes

[theshire]

I'm a member of a couple of other forums on completely different subjects. A while back I decided to confess my fetish in a thread on one of those forums. I've never told anyone in real life about it, and I thought I could perhaps get it off my chest and help myself be more open about what I am. But I didn't know what to expect.

To my great surprise, everyone there was really supportive to me. Not one of them found it weird or strange, and stated that anyone who did think such things was someone not worth associating with. This was really shocking to me, because up to that point I thought that most vanillas would find it just too odd. But these people were so nice about it.

So after that I slightly reconsidered my position. I guessed that perhaps the majority of people would accept it if they found out. But do you think this is the case? I still haven't told anyone I have ever met face to face about this fetish, so I don't know how they would react.

So what do you think? Do you guys think that the majority of everyday people would accept or scorn you if you told them you have a tickling fetish? What does your own experience tell you? I'd be interested to hear your views.

 

[The_Laugher]

I have found over the years that when I am open and honest about my love of tickling with non-tickling people, that I have never had a really negative comment. At best they may say "That weems a bit odd or weird", but all in all, everyone I have talked to about it understands and accepts it. Some have even tried it.

 

[Dr. Bill Kobb]

I think that's terrific that your fetish was so readily accepted by the members of these other groups.

For better or worse, I think the Net has allowed people to see an almost impossible-to-imagine stew of human deviancy.

I also think that most everyone of us on the planet has some hang-up or other, even if it gets totally sublimated. Some folks may never ever even bother to ponder what their own personal greatest imaginable labidinal pleasure might be. Others actively explore themselves and what works for them with others from an early age, racking-up all sorts of crazy been-there, done-that notches on their belts, and still never finding that ideal.

I could be wrong about one, both, or neither of the above factors, but if you agree with `em and put `em together, our little fetish is seen as rather quaint and pedestrian by most standards. There's so many other stupid-human-sexual tricks being performed out there....

 

[ViperGTS]

Yeah, I've been called a wierdo, but thats about it, and it doesn't tend to screw up the relationship.

 

[ticklkitten]

I had a couple of bad experiences with telling people at first. Now, I don't know if I'm just more comfortable with myself or what but since I've officially reentered the "dating world" (and having a blast!!!) guys seem to be really cool with it. And I told my best girl... she thought it was pretty cool... she is SUPER ticklish...

So my experience for the moment is pretty positive. Yay!

 

[tickledorange]

I've only told a few of my friends, (you're supposed to tell your best friends everything anyway) and they've all been cool with it so far. They already thought I was wierd before I told them about tickling, so this didn't really change anything.

 

[lk70]

The closest I've come to telling anyone I know IRL (other than people from TMF that I know IRL) is to tell my best friend that I have a "sexual interest or proclivity" that some find unusual, that I used to think was odd and now I see there are so many others into it. I can't bring myself to state what the specific prolivity is to her, so far. Someday, I think I will because it's getting more and more difficult to keep to myself.

 

[steph]

I dunno~most people (vanilla or otherwise) who know me really well know me to be really kinky. Even my boss knows. I doubt anyone would be surprised if I told them outright about the "interest." I don't but if they figure it out, no big whoop...
XOXO

 

[cinnabar]

I've been met with positive and negative responses before. Though the positive have far outweighed the negative, and I've even converted a few to love tickling in the process.

 

[The Sean Man]

The Radio Guy Speaks

I live in a pretty conservative town, so I have to keep my tickling fetish 'in the closet', so to speak.
I've established myself in the past twelve years as the radio voice of my town, working with many charities, being friends with city council members and the movers and shakers in town, and building a "what a great guy" reputation.
As much of a open, honest, and sometimes blunt person that I try to be, this is something that would be attacked and misunderstood by knee-jerk types. I can't afford to lose everything I've worked so hard to build.
That f**king blows (Pardon my french).

 

[switchtickler]

Hmmm. . .

I'll start by giving y'all the disclaimer that I am a native californian, and therefore don't have to live with a lot of the uptightness that the rest of the country apparently suffers from (except, of course, uptighness about eating meat or having religious convictions. We got that ) . . . but I digresss. I am convinced that the attitude of the teller has alot to do with how this will be received. Make it a big scary deal, and the listener can be forgiven for assuming that you must use it in some really deviant way. Against people's will? with children? Igg! But in and of itself, tickling is not a scary thing, for most people. It requires no special outfits, no extra-thick lube, no expensive therapy for your 'victims'. You can do it in public and not get arrested. You don't even have to take your clothes off! There is nothing intrinsically bad or shameful about tickling (although by all means keep the shame if it makes the tickling hotter) It's a normal activity that everyone can understand, just done in a sexy way. And it's hard for most people to talk about what they like to do in bed. Rather than mumbling something about how you like to tie people down and torture them with feathers, you can try talking about how you're a very sensual person and you like to touch,caress and tickle your partners until they feel like they are going to explode. Doesn't that sound hot? I mean, sign me up! Where is my tickle partner, anyway? Scuse me. . .

 

[HisFlyinFingers]

I'm growing more and more comfortable with it every time I tell someone -- partly because the reactions are so universally either positive or indifferent. I was wildly surprized, especially at first, how many of my friends reacted with an "Oh, okay . . . is that wierd or something?" Most people don't much care, especially given the relatively low-key sexual nature of it. Ladies I tickle are generally glad to have my attention lavished on them, especially when they know that it's my quirky little way of indicating just how sexy I find them to be!

 

[tickledorange]

There's a lot of people I know - I don't know about anyone else - that don't need to know about it one way or the other. It won't affect them in any way by knowing and they probably could care less that it is going on in the first place. They'd probably shrug their shoulders and say, "OK.....so?" about the whole situation.

 

[GoForTheLaugh]

To date, I have told seven people of various sexual orientations and sexes. Not a single one is into tickling, but no one took it badly. Of course, I also chose carefully which people I told; the only exception was a friend of a friend, but I was assured that she would be fascinated and react well. Indeed, she was floored and asked many questions, and I may have paved the way for some straight guy to be tickled by her in the future. (That story appears elsewhere on this board.)

With three people, however, there seemed to be some nervousness until I said (fairly quickly after telling them) that I would never tickle someone who was not O.K. with it. Too many had had bad tickling experiences while growing up.

If you choose very, very carefully which people to confide in, you'll be all right.

 

[Knox The Hatter]

It all depends on how you present it. If you tell someone about it, like it's the most natural thing in the world to have this interest, and you yourself are cool enough about it (in other words, displaying absolutely no shame about it), the people you care about, and who care about you, will think it's the greatest thing in the world as well, simply because they associate this with you.

Now, I have not mastered this yet...but I do find it hard to believe that I have made it this far. There was once a time when I was scared to death of having anyone know about me.

However, what I have found is that people like me for who I am, not for what I'm interested in. I figure, with a little bit of work, I can get my best friend to not worry about it so much if I told him about me, but I also think it's better if he didn't know. I'm gonna be 44 in a couple of weeks, and I figure that in some cases, it's better to just let sleeping dogs lie.

They might say..."oh, he's just a bit strange...he likes to tickle people." Nine times out of ten, they're gonna say it with a wink in their eye, along with a certain fondness. I hope that y'all get to this point.

 

[GoForTheLaugh]

That's a good point, Knox. It is fine not to tell someone yet still be close to that person.

As for me: I have only come to terms with this fetish this year, but I told my best friend (and only him) back in 1999, when I found Jack's Rack on line. We talked about it then, but have not said all that much about it again until recently, when I showed him this site and he was very, very amused.

Although not into it at all, he makes me feel very comfortable by cracking jokes about it. As I posted a month or so ago, I almost fell into the water laughing when we were walking along the shore and he started doing imitations of what our old ivory tower college professors would be like tied down and tickled. It was positively hilarious, and he captured each of them in his imitations.

Every now and then, out of the blue, when I point out someone I find attractive, he'll lean over and say something like: "Yeah, we know what you want. You wanna tie him up and tickle him." Sometimes he does this when I am feeling down, as he knows I will grin ear to ear despite myself at the mere mention of tickling such a handsome specimen.