Muscle worship
Encyclopedia
Muscle worship is a social behavior
, usually with a sexual aspect (a form of body worship
), in which a participant, the worshiper, touches the muscles of another participant, the dominator, in sexually arousing
ways, which can include rubbing, massaging, kissing, licking, "lift and carry", and various wrestling holds. The dominator is almost always either a bodybuilder
, a fitness competitor, or wrestler—an individual with a large body size and a high degree of visible muscle tone
. The worshiper is often, but not always, skinnier, smaller, and more out of shape. A worshiper fitting this stereotype is sometimes called a schmoe, usually referring to a man who worships a woman's muscles. Muscle worship can include participants of both sex
es and all sexual orientation
s.
The amount of forceful domination and pain used in muscle worship varies widely, depending on the desires of the participants. Sometimes, the dominator uses his or her size and strength to pin
a smaller worshiper, forcing the worshiper to praise his or her muscles, while in other cases, the worshiper simply feels and compliments the muscles of a flexing dominator.
Both male and female bodybuilders offer muscle worship sessions for a price in order to supplement their low or nonexistent income from bodybuilding competitions, although the lack of adequate funding is far more dire in female competitions. Paid sessions rarely involve sexual gratification, especially when well-known competitors are involved, they offer fans—both male and female—the rare chance to meet in person and touch a highly muscular man and especially a muscular woman.
The 2001 documentary film
Highway Amazon
chronicles the life of female bodybuilder Christine Fetzer
and shows several of her clients engaging in muscle worship. More recent documentaries covering the practice include the American Beauty segment of an HBO's Real Sports with Bryant Gumbel
#160, and Channel Five
's 2007 Muscle Worship documentary (part of their Real Lives series), profiling in depth the lives of female bodybuilders Lauren Powers
and Gayle Moher
. Muscle worship engenders a specific type of pornography
, often produced professionally, but also web cam sessions, an underground erotic literature
, and specific Internet
discussion fora like the #gaymuscle IRC channel. A (possibly fictional) account of muscle worship by H. A. Carson combines it with infantilism.
The entry for wrestling
in The Encyclopedia of Unusual Sex Practices lists sthenolagnia ("sexual arousal from displaying
strength or muscles") and cratolagnia ("arousal from strength") as paraphilia
s associated with the practice of wrestling for erotic purpose. There appear to be no studies about these proposed concepts; the 2008 comprehensive monograph
of Anil Aggrawal
does not go beyond defining the terms, with the same meaning, in a list of over 500 similarly terse definitions encountered in the scientific and lay literature. The British tabloid The Sun listed sthenolagnia second in the Top five freaky fetishes after doraphilia. The Sun describe it as a "condition" where men find "hugely sexually attractive [...] mega-bronzed muscle-bound ladies in those weird bodybuilding competitions", and who also "like to be wrestled, lifted up and even carried around by their big iron-pumping dreamgirls".
Social behavior
In physics, physiology and sociology, social behavior is behavior directed towards society, or taking place between, members of the same species. Behavior such as predation which involves members of different species is not social...
, usually with a sexual aspect (a form of body worship
Body worship
Body worship is any practice of physically reverencing a part of another person's body, and is usually done as a submissive act in the context of BDSM. Typical kinds of body worship are muscle worship, foot worship, penis worship, vagina worship, and ass worship...
), in which a participant, the worshiper, touches the muscles of another participant, the dominator, in sexually arousing
Sexual arousal
Sexual arousal, or sexual excitement, is the arousal of sexual desire, during or in anticipation of sexual activity. Things that precipitate human sexual arousal are called erotic stimuli, or colloquially known as turn-ons. There are many potential stimuli, both physical or mental, which can cause...
ways, which can include rubbing, massaging, kissing, licking, "lift and carry", and various wrestling holds. The dominator is almost always either a bodybuilder
Bodybuilding
Bodybuilding is a form of body modification involving intensive muscle hypertrophy. An individual who engages in this activity is referred to as a bodybuilder. In competitive and professional bodybuilding, bodybuilders display their physiques to a panel of judges, who assign points based on their...
, a fitness competitor, or wrestler—an individual with a large body size and a high degree of visible muscle tone
Muscle tone
In physiology, medicine, and anatomy, muscle tone is the continuous and passive partial contraction of the muscles, or the muscle’s resistance to passive stretch during resting state. It helps maintain posture, and it declines during REM sleep.-Purpose:Unconscious nerve impulses maintain the...
. The worshiper is often, but not always, skinnier, smaller, and more out of shape. A worshiper fitting this stereotype is sometimes called a schmoe, usually referring to a man who worships a woman's muscles. Muscle worship can include participants of both sex
Sex
In biology, sex is a process of combining and mixing genetic traits, often resulting in the specialization of organisms into a male or female variety . Sexual reproduction involves combining specialized cells to form offspring that inherit traits from both parents...
es and all sexual orientation
Sexual orientation
Sexual orientation describes a pattern of emotional, romantic, or sexual attractions to the opposite sex, the same sex, both, or neither, and the genders that accompany them. By the convention of organized researchers, these attractions are subsumed under heterosexuality, homosexuality,...
s.
The amount of forceful domination and pain used in muscle worship varies widely, depending on the desires of the participants. Sometimes, the dominator uses his or her size and strength to pin
Pin (wrestling)
A pinfall, a pin, or a fall is a victory condition in various forms of professional wrestling that is met by holding an opponent's shoulders on the wrestling mat for a prescribed period of time...
a smaller worshiper, forcing the worshiper to praise his or her muscles, while in other cases, the worshiper simply feels and compliments the muscles of a flexing dominator.
Both male and female bodybuilders offer muscle worship sessions for a price in order to supplement their low or nonexistent income from bodybuilding competitions, although the lack of adequate funding is far more dire in female competitions. Paid sessions rarely involve sexual gratification, especially when well-known competitors are involved, they offer fans—both male and female—the rare chance to meet in person and touch a highly muscular man and especially a muscular woman.
The 2001 documentary film
Documentary film
Documentary films constitute a broad category of nonfictional motion pictures intended to document some aspect of reality, primarily for the purposes of instruction or maintaining a historical record...
Highway Amazon
Highway Amazon
Highway Amazon is a 2001 documentary film directed by Ronnie Cramer. It chronicles the life of body builder Christine Fetzer, as she travels across the USA wrestling men in hotel rooms...
chronicles the life of female bodybuilder Christine Fetzer
Christine Fetzer
Christine Fetzer is an American bodybuilder, model and wrestler known professionally as Christine Rocks.Fetzer has won several body building competitions, including her first, the 1995 Virginia Classic...
and shows several of her clients engaging in muscle worship. More recent documentaries covering the practice include the American Beauty segment of an HBO's Real Sports with Bryant Gumbel
Real Sports with Bryant Gumbel
Real Sports with Bryant Gumbel is a monthly sports newsmagazine on HBO that debuted on April 2, 1995. The show was "spawned by the fact that sports have changed dramatically, that it's no longer just fun and games, and that what happens off the field, beyond the scores, is worthy of some serious...
#160, and Channel Five
Channel Five
Channel 5 is a television network that broadcasts in the United Kingdom. Launched in 1997, it was the fifth and final national terrestrial analogue network to launch. The station was branded as Five between 2002 and 2010...
's 2007 Muscle Worship documentary (part of their Real Lives series), profiling in depth the lives of female bodybuilders Lauren Powers
Lauren Powers
Lauren Powers is an American actress, amateur bodybuilder, and former firefighter.-Early life and education:Powers was born in 1961 in Los Angeles, California. She graduated valedictorian from Huntington Beach High School. She owned and operated a surfing academy on Maui while in college...
and Gayle Moher
Gayle Moher
Gayle Moher is a professional female bodybuilder, now living in Scottsdale, Arizona.-Biography:Gayle was born in London, England. As a teenager she competed in several beauty pageants. She took up bodybuilding in 1990 after visiting the United States of America. She earned her pro card by winning...
. Muscle worship engenders a specific type of pornography
Pornography
Pornography or porn is the explicit portrayal of sexual subject matter for the purposes of sexual arousal and erotic satisfaction.Pornography may use any of a variety of media, ranging from books, magazines, postcards, photos, sculpture, drawing, painting, animation, sound recording, film, video,...
, often produced professionally, but also web cam sessions, an underground erotic literature
Erotic literature
Erotic literature comprises fictional and factual stories and accounts of human sexual relationships which have the power to or are intended to arouse the reader sexually. Such erotica takes the form of novels, short stories, poetry, true-life memoirs, and sex manuals...
, and specific Internet
Internet
The Internet is a global system of interconnected computer networks that use the standard Internet protocol suite to serve billions of users worldwide...
discussion fora like the #gaymuscle IRC channel. A (possibly fictional) account of muscle worship by H. A. Carson combines it with infantilism.
The entry for wrestling
Wrestling
Wrestling is a form of grappling type techniques such as clinch fighting, throws and takedowns, joint locks, pins and other grappling holds. A wrestling bout is a physical competition, between two competitors or sparring partners, who attempt to gain and maintain a superior position...
in The Encyclopedia of Unusual Sex Practices lists sthenolagnia ("sexual arousal from displaying
Display (zoology)
Display is a form of animal behaviour, linked to survival of the species in various ways. One example of display used by some species can be found in the form of courtship, with the male usually having a striking feature that is distinguished by colour, shape or size, used to attract a female...
strength or muscles") and cratolagnia ("arousal from strength") as paraphilia
Paraphilia
Paraphilia is a biomedical term used to describe sexual arousal to objects, situations, or individuals that are not part of normative stimulation and that may cause distress or serious problems for the paraphiliac or persons associated with him or her...
s associated with the practice of wrestling for erotic purpose. There appear to be no studies about these proposed concepts; the 2008 comprehensive monograph
Monograph
A monograph is a work of writing upon a single subject, usually by a single author.It is often a scholarly essay or learned treatise, and may be released in the manner of a book or journal article. It is by definition a single document that forms a complete text in itself...
of Anil Aggrawal
Anil Aggrawal
Anil Aggrawal M.D. is a professor of forensic medicine at the Maulana Azad Medical College, New Delhi, India. He is known chiefly as the Editor-in-Chief of the Internet Journal of Forensic Medicine and Toxicology.-Early life:Dr...
does not go beyond defining the terms, with the same meaning, in a list of over 500 similarly terse definitions encountered in the scientific and lay literature. The British tabloid The Sun listed sthenolagnia second in the Top five freaky fetishes after doraphilia. The Sun describe it as a "condition" where men find "hugely sexually attractive [...] mega-bronzed muscle-bound ladies in those weird bodybuilding competitions", and who also "like to be wrestled, lifted up and even carried around by their big iron-pumping dreamgirls".
See also
- Session wrestlerSession wrestlerSession wrestlers, also known as "private wrestlers", wrestle an opponent as a service, for money, in a private setting. Typically, the service provider is a professional wrestler, amateur wrestler, or bodybuilder...
- TomboyTomboyA tomboy is a girl who exhibits characteristics or behaviors considered typical of the gender role of a boy, including the wearing of typically masculine-oriented clothes and engaging in games and activities that are often physical in nature, and which are considered in many cultures to be the...
and sissy boy - Handicap principleHandicap principleThe handicap principle is a hypothesis originally proposed in 1975 by biologist Amotz Zahavi to explain how evolution may lead to "honest" or reliable signaling between animals who have an obvious motivation to bluff or deceive each other...
- Joe Schmoe
- Foxy boxingFoxy boxingFoxy boxing is a sports entertainment which involves two or more women boxing in a sexualized context as a form of erotic entertainment. The participants are typically dressed in revealing clothing such as bikinis or skintight leotards, while the actual fight usually focuses on the beauty of the...