Rubber fetish

What is a rubber fetish?

A rubber fetish is a sexual preference for people in latex or rubber clothing, or sometimes for the clothing itself. It falls under the clothing fetishes, and with that under the wider paraphilia. The pull usually sits in the shine, the smell, and the tight feel of the material. Rubber fetish and latex fetish mean almost the same thing.

Where the pull comes from

The draw sits in the material itself. The encyclopedia describes rubber fetishism as “the fetishistic attraction to people wearing latex clothing or other natural or synthetic rubber garments, or, in certain cases, to the garments themselves”, and notes that rubber has long counted as a sensual material “because of its unique look, smell and feel”. Latex closes around the body like a second skin, shines under light, and has a smell of its own, and it is that combination that is the core for many people. In the large-scale study by Scorolli and colleagues on the relative prevalence of fetishes, a preference for materials such as rubber shows up, though fetishes for body parts and for objects connected to the body are still more common.

Why people love it

The pull is partly sensory and partly a matter of transformation. For the person wearing it, latex turns the body into something smooth and shiny, which can give a feeling of power or, just as easily, of surrender. For the person watching or touching, the arousal sits in the shine, the smell, and the tight surface. What it is not: a disorder. A fetish is a preference, and only when it causes suffering or coercion does the paraphilia come into view as something to address. That said, latex has practical sides, from heat to a possible latex allergy, that you are better off knowing beforehand.

Where this fits on my site

If you want to let latex play a part during a date once, that is open to discussion, provided it is right for you and we agree on it beforehand. How such a meeting goes and what is talked through in advance, you read on the page about the BDSM date. If you are unsure whether it suits you, just ask; that commits you to nothing.

Sources

• Latex and PVC fetishism. Wikipedia. Provides the definition of rubber fetishism as the fetishistic attraction to people in latex or rubber clothing or to that clothing itself, and the observation that rubber has long counted as a sensual material for its unique look, smell, and feel.
• Relative prevalence of different fetishes. C. Scorolli, S. Ghirlanda, M. Enquist, S. Zattoni & E. A. Jannini, International Journal of Impotence Research 19(4), 432-437, 2007. Provides that a preference for materials such as rubber shows up in a large-scale survey of fetish preferences, and that fetishes for body parts and body-related objects are more common.

Related terms

A rubber fetish is a form of paraphilia, focused on the material latex.

• Latex. The material itself: vulcanized natural rubber, with the shine and the allergy included.
• Fetish. The wider concept a rubber fetish is a specific example of.
• BDSM. The scene in which latex clothing often plays a part.