Hey lee' n' lers,
Well, lately I have been making a return to all the things I should be doing, going to church, reading my Bible, etc. I know that the Bible says that is is sinful to lust after the flesh, and in the back of my mind I've always know that, but I guess I'm just now making an upfront connection between that and the foot tickling fetish I have nurtured for so many years. So, there seems to be a major confliction there. I just cannot imagine turning my back on this part of me, to deny it as something shameful. Are there any other christians out here that have gone through or are going through this same thing? Just looking for some input, from anybody really.
Thank you for raising such a question. When I was a teenager, I went through the same problem. And what you say reminds me of the most painful and guiltful period in my life. I'd like to share a few memories and thoughts.
I've been raised in Protestantism, spending most of the time in a congregation where many activities were proposed (as a youth group, holiday camps), and being taught about lust, masturbation, sex in general, many things that made me feel painfully guilty then. This congregation belonged to French Protestant Federation, and was "remote controlled" by Presbyterian Church of America, a few "missionaries" from which had been sent to France in order to trigger french people's faith and found new congregations.
When I gradually discovered I had a tickle fetish and, as a teenager, began to fantasize about tickling girls and to masturbate thinking of it, I felt guilty, felt like I was a hypocrit and went through hard moments that threw a sad shadow on my adolescence. There are many people (relatives, ministers, members of the congregation, even mates) I still find difficult to forgive for being as irresponsible (and much more hypocrit as I actually was) as they were then : "just do as I say, don't do as I do", as Phil Collins used to sing. Some of my mates were clever enough to play the good pupil's role in front of our ministers and do whatever they wanted with girls behind their back : I wasn't good at it, feeling more and more guilty over years, uncomfortable at church. I felt like I was going to burst out.
So, my adolescence was ruined and I almost remained impotent : it took many years to make things get better and, though being soon 40, now divorced, and being the father of a 11 years old son, I never completely recovered from this period's wounds. For somebody sincere, hearing such bullshit as "masturbation is a sin", "you mustn't have sex (nor even kiss a woman) till you get married", "God chose only one woman on Earth for you" "having sex is only a duty one a christian has to do in order to have children", "sex can barely be a pleasure for men only, and is a pain for women", yes, hearing such bullshit is terrible. And it's much more terrible whan one realizes it comes from adults who took a good time when they were younger, from ministers who cheat with their wife or who keep on pawing them in front of many people in the middle of a hotel dining room...
Something even more sad is the way this education perverted my taste for tickling during those times (fortunately, it's been brought back to something much more light, happy and playful since then). Yes, when I was a teenager, tickling appeared to be a comfortable and hypocrit "ersatz", a substitute for sex, amongst these people I lived with most of the time. And I used it as such a thing myself. First, I happen to explain the increase of my foot fetish as being a result of guilt : one doesn't have the right to watch women's ass or breasts, so he watches what hasn't been clearly prohibited. Second, I attended many protestant holiday camps, first as a camper, then as a camp counselor. What I lived in such circumstances now appears to me as one of the most hypocrit and unhealthy situations one can imagine. I can remember all these teenagers - and I was one of them - burning with desire, but never daring to go out with a girl (though some did it very discreetly, as I previously said), because they'd been told any "flirt" would be regarded as "impure". So, what did we do? We spent most of our free time trying to get girls, pin down girls, tie girls up to beds in dormitories, take their shoes and socks off and gangtickle them, just before going and masturbating thinking of what we'd done (a substitute for a rape sex drive?). Most of us were pathetically frustrated teenagers, finding each way they could to have a physical contact with girls. Girls pretended not to like to get captured and tickled but, in fact, never really tried to escape our attacks much, teased us, even telling us where their most ticklish spots were, and what the best way to drive them nuts was. Relationships had eventually got perverted by the irresponsible behaviour lessons we were taught. I now think tickling was then a way of hiding a huge hypocrisy. The camp's directors, the ministers who got involved in these camps never blamed us for tickling girls, though they knew how often it happened and which way tickling sessions took place, never blamed girls for playing tickle games with boys. But - you know - I think that, in their hypocrit minds in the hypocrit minds they'd learned us to have, tickling was a "safe", "clean" way to deal with sex matters, a comfortable way of getting round the interdicts. Tickling didn't go too far, was only considered playful, not sexual, whereas a kiss, a flirting, a sexual relationship should have been considered "impure". Who'll trust that? Either everything had to be blamed, or nothing (though I know the question of wondering if tickling could be not sexual at all has often been debated on TMF). And with regard to masturbation, this was theoretically forbidden, though the "guardians of our souls" perfectly knew all of the teenagers we were then used to do it (but, you know, this couldn't be seen much, hidden in the secret of our beds at night, so people could let it go).
Well, as many have said in this thread, many words that are supposed to be God's words are human words, sometimes coming from neurotic and/or irresponsible people, from inconsequent and hypocrit people, from people who did whatever they wanted during their youth and as young adults and then became converted to what they think is the truth and purity...
I'm not much of a believer now, though I still happen to hope God has a wider view on what some of his ministers fiercely pretend to be a pure behaviour, and a greater sense of humour. I'm not very proud thinking back of this period, not because I tickled and got tickled, but because of the hypocrit way tickling was then used, probably so as to get round an unbearable contradiction, because of the way tickling was then perverted. I don't think tickling has to be considered a "pure" and tolerable substitute for sex, coming from young people who did not yet get the right to have a sexual relationship : this is a healthy (playful and/or sexual) enjoyable pleasure for consenting people of all ages, such as having sex can be in the same conditions. But I think religion can turn healthy human things as desire and sexual relationships into hypocrit practices.
So, madpipertn, I don't think tou have to feel guilty and "in confliction" with the rules you want to obey because you're a christian tickler/ticklee (though I can perfectly undersand you feel so, for having experimented it myself). It doesn't hurt anybody consenting to it more than being a video games addict does, whether it is a sexual turn on or not. This can be a passion among many others (are christian compulsive chess players are blamed?). Why would there be a specificity for sex in what religions use to call "sin", though I know Paul writes "body is the holy ghost's temple" or "better getting married than burning with desire" (there would be many things to say about Paul's words about sex and women...). Who can exactly interprete such words, which - some other members are right - come from a human mind? I think one of the things I now hate the most is some ministers of God's incredible spiritual arrogance.
Don't let such a happy, funny and positively exciting thing as tickling get spoilt and ruined. You can be sincerely faithful, though having a taste for ticking.
Why wouldn't there be a place for tickling in heaven?