Many of you know I’ve been keeping an eye on the censorship fobiles of Boing Boing’s coverage of Secure Computing, as I explained in my “Websluts, Powered by Google” post, the language and interpretation of online censorware is determined by the people who create and run the wares. But what I didn’t anticipate is that my sex research would once again intersect with Secure Computing, in a most unexpected and slightly disturbing way.
Not many people know, but I’m working on a book about sexual fetishes (Fetish Sex: An Erotic Guide for Couples; Daedalus Press, June). I’ve been doing all kinds of far-out research for this book, including research into human animal play, hair fetish and adult baby (AB) play.
Well, this morning I was scanning Google and came across this New York Times article, “Popular Web Site Falls Victim to a Content Filter” so I checked it out, and I saw a name that looked familiar: “Tomo Foote-Lennox, a director of filtering data for Secure Computing”. It’s an unusual name, so – thanks to a tip from Xeni Jardin – I plugged it into a few recent places I’d been doing research, namely Google Groups, and (creepily), Tomo Foote-Lennox came up in a pretty shocking place: alt.sex.diapers.
Is this the same Tomo Foote-Lennox that is the lead censor for Secure Computing? I have a hard time believing that this guy wouldn’t cover his tracks. I’ve lectured on panels with AB practitioners and pro-doms who specialize in AB play. This, however, is a particularly disturbing context for an AB fetishist. This is exactly the problem we’re facing; people like Lennox might be *dangerously* confusing fantasy with reality. The important thing to remember, though is that AB and diaper fetishists are typically not sexualizing babies, though it is a very, VERY extreme type of fetish play that you need to really be articulate about. In my strong opinion, it is not a fetish that someone who works for, or with, children should be doing; how can anyone ever know where fantasy and reality merge in their minds?
Look, I don’t think it’s anyone’s business what someone does to get off in their private lives. But it’s a HUGE red flag when the person aggressively “protecting children” is into AB play; I’d way rather have a medical fetishist or a human pony — something neutral. Or at least a dominatrix, who spends her professional time negotiating the differences between fantasy and reality (often explaining these distinctions to AB’s). Now no one can ever know if Lennox knows what it means to be a responsible adult (especially one who can keep a fetish on a low profile). Either way, AB’s have a very different way of seeing children and childhood than the rest of us. The key thing with most ABers is that they typically don’t sexualize children — the want to *be* children in the worst way, and it’s usually the mommy figure that’s sexualized. If you’re curious, here’s an excerpt from my upcoming book (June release) on ABs in the context of adult sexual fetishes:
“Age play fantasies involve one person in the role of regressed age (baby, child, teen) and another person in an adult role; though adult baby fetish, sometimes called infantilism, occupies the baby or infant end of this spectrum. The person playing the younger part is usually the helpless, toddler-end or age play fetish, and is often helpless and captive in many ways. Adult baby play (called AB by practitioners and DL for diaper lovers), spans all sexual orientations and genders in its manifestations. In most cases infant play only rarely involves sexual activity. The essence of an adult baby scenario is to create the experience of infancy and usually (though not always) the age period before toilet training. The adult figure can be nurse, mommy, daddy, babysitter, teen mother, adoptive parent, other authority figures or relatives or strangers.
AB fetish is one of the most marginalized fetishes in existence, because of the incest overtones, pedophiliac aspects, and distaste that many adults have when considering a masculine man or grown woman becoming aroused by being reduced to a helpless infant, soiling themselves in a diaper. AB’s break nearly every taboo in the book simply by what their fetish suggests to outsiders, but in reality AB fetish is a far cry from taboos one might associate with what is in essence intense (and often therapeutic) pampering experiences. People who wish to have sex with children or engage in incest do; they do not engage in consensual adult baby play with other adults.
(…)
But why would someone do this in the first place? Being a baby again is incredibly freeing for the adult tot. They no longer have to think for themselves, which can be a huge relief, even if it’s just for an hour. The AB gets the pampering, nurturing and obsessive love and intimate fussing-over they might need, in a short, concentrated dose. There might be a fetish for a certain feeling that comes with AB play, such as wearing diapers, and anything else only serves to heighten the feeling of comfort or arousal the AB gets from the experience. It’s also emotionally intimate and risky; the AB is emotionally exposed and vulnerable. Tension can be resolved by temper tantrums, or just a good hard cry. Here, the AB can do what responsible adults can’t, in a very straightforward, honest way: pout, cry, demasculinize (for men), whine, wear frilly things, enjoy passivity and helplessness, and trust someone unconditionally. Being an AB is all feeling and impulse. Maybe being “mommied” just feels good; for many, it’s carte blanche permission to just feel without being judged, a time to indulge mindlessly without feeling guilty — because if AB’s bad, they’ll get punished. The scenario of misbehavior, punishment, and forgiveness is often emotionally cathartic and rewarding for both participants.”
Bottom line: YIKES. Don’t trust your kids’ internet use to censorware, use smart parental blocks like Bumpercar.
Update: This post is included in coverage at Suicide Girls Newswire, “TECHNOLOGY: The Strange, Strange Saga of SmartFilter, BoingBoing, and Adult Babies” by Xeni’s close friend, Sean Bonner.
Update: I’ve received tons of mail and have read many comments about this post. Rather than clog up my blog (which won’t let me use the extended post function for some reason), I’ve posted my responses here. And yes, I responded to the fact that Valleywag, a Gawker site like Fleshbot, didn’t cite me as a source in their post about the topic.
Update: BoingBoing posted a summary, “SmartFilter, BoingBoing, and Adult Baby – Diaper Lovers.” In reading the comments on Joi Ito’s blog, it looks like a few people are very, very angry at Sean Bonner and myself for even talking about this. Meanwhile, I get sent the AB gangsign from eTech.
