Cannibalism is a subject that has always fascinated me. My views are unique regarding the subject, and that might be because my obsession started at a young age. But I only recently discovered vore. What a complex rabbit hole I fell into!
How I Became Fascinated By Cannibalism
Born with an overly enthusiastic relationship with horror, I started watching movies in the genre as a child. I would observe the story and dissect the subject or plot without knowing. After finishing my Goosebumps phase, I jumped into Stephen King‘s novels.
However, despite the paranormal and demonic remaining my favourite genre in horror, something caught my eye, and it was cannibalism. Young, I thought cannibalism wasn’t real, but my grandfather told me it was.
My grandfather shared the story of an amateur Uruguayan rugby team flying to Chile but crashed in the Andes. The team players and some other passengers had no choice but to turn to cannibalism to survive.
WARNING: Mature | 18+ | Cannibalism | Rape | Murder Lust | Mental Disorder | Anthropomorphic Animals | Gore | Digestion | Sex | Masochism | Sadism | Autassassinapholia.
Later on, I also discovered that some indigenous tribes and groups of people, over centuries to recently, still practised cannibalism. However, that form of cannibalism has a link to a spiritual ritual, unlike in horror movies.
The idea of cannibalism fascinated me because of how taboo the subject is. Most people are so uncomfortable with the idea, and because of that, it has me hooked to understand and learn more.
Discovering A New Metal Band Taught Me A New Term
Watching a video on the Alex Heffner channel where the host reacts to the British band Sleep Token‘s Vore song made me stop and listen. I learned of Sleep Token through another of his videos and fell in love with the band. But listening to the lyrics of Vore, I thought they sang about cannibalism.
I let out that I had to write an article about the subject for GBM. So, here we are! When I looked at the word ‘vore’ I discovered it was a short version of vorarephilia. At first, I thought it was a kind of subgenre of cannibalism. I had a reason!
Years back, in Toronto, Ontario, a group of cannibals surfaced in the media. However, that cannibal group had a complex hierarchy from master chefs to pigs. The master chefs were cannibals with experience teaching sous-chefs, the ones who tasted but didn’t prepare human flesh, and training chefs who wanted to become cannibals. The ‘meat’ was called pigs. Those ‘pigs’ were volunteers. Those people wanted to become a meal for other humans to consume.
Was that story real? Only in parts, as it seemed half fantasy and maybe had some truth. Why am I saying it had accurate details to it? Because there are small groups of cannibals and volunteer humans. So, that group could have been part fantasy and part real, depending on who the ringmaster was. In certain circumstances, cannibalism is a mental illness, and the desire to be eaten alive is a paraphilia. I added two plus two, thinking that’s what it was. I was wrong, or perhaps not entirely wrong.
What Is Vorarephilia, And Who Is The Target Audience?
From then on, I will refer to vorarephilia as vore for short. As mentioned above, vore is a paraphilia. In other words, intense sexual arousal to atypical objects, behaviours, and individuals. Most importantly, the human partner doesn’t have to be consensual.
However, vore paraphilia revolves around the extreme erotic fantasy of becoming a cannibal’s or creature’s meal. They are most attracted to the action of eating and what it involves.
The participation of a cannibal realistically would be impossible as the vore itself means to be swallowed whole. The ‘food’ desire to become one bite or inhaled in one shot by the eater. After all, the word’s etymology combines the Latin word ‘vorare,’ meaning ‘swallow,’ and the Ancient Greek word ‘philía’ meaning love.
Practising vore is impossible, but the vorarephile fantasizers find their satisfaction through manga, anime, online stories, or commissioned art. But they made their fantasies real, but more on that later. They have terminology for their fantasies, too. The eater’s proper identification is predator or ‘pred,’ and the victim is prey.
What Do Vores Do To Satisfy Their Desires?
Other than specifically commissioned art, anime, manga, and online stories, shorts and video games are accessible. Some find satisfaction with dragons, giant snakes, and animals capable of inhaling humans in one gulp. They can easily achieve pleasure as some vorarephiles aren’t looking for cannibalism.
Even those attracted to the cannibalistic genre, which tends to crossover to macrophilia, are achievable. Macrophilia is the sexual attraction to giants and, most precisely, giantesses or objects. So far, this fantasy is associated with males as the smaller part. Why is it easily achieved? Giganta and Dr. Psycho are examples, and Giganta alone satisfies this branch of paraphilia.
Another effortless crossing with vore is BDSM, where a dominant figure is obliged to the submissive one to comply with their commands. Another is pregnancy fetishism, where pregnancy is a sexualisation from development to lactation and birth. And there are the anthropomorphised animals, giving human features to animals like walking on two legs or being capable of the same language.
Of course, the most popular one remains the sexual cannibalism practice. While a human can’t inhale another human, eating a piece of human flesh remains its most popular fantasy. There are groups of people or individuals practising sexual cannibalism and aren’t vorarephiles.
The Levels Of Vore In Fantasies Are Precise
The softest form of fantasy in vore is the oral inhalation of the human. Once the human is inside the human or creature’s stomach, they are safe, and the name for it is endo vore. The predator can decide to regurgitate the human to let it live. If digested, the prey is dead, but somehow, through magic, it returns to life.
Another form of the vore fantasy, a little more hardcore, comprises the chewing of the human by the predator. Usually, the prey is torn apart limb from limb in a gruesome way and digested realistically. The human, in this scenario, dies. The imagery is often gruesome and detailed.
The size of the predator and its prey plays an important part. Unlike the example I gave with DC Comics characters of Giganta and Dr. Psycho, those are vore fantasies. However, the same sizes on both parts remain the most attractive to vorarephiles because the size of the belly changes as the predator eats its prey, and the fantasy is now about its size.
The subcategories of vore are pretty important, too. The subcategories often revolve around how the ingestion of humans happens. It doesn’t always have to be oral. Usually, there is a penis and or a vagina inhalation referred to as cock vore achieved through the urethral opening and shown as erected and unbirth. There are also anal and breast ingestions. Basically, it mainly involves openings in the body.
Are There Research About Vorarephilia?
A study on the subject referred to vorarephilia as a form of sexual masochism. The fundamental desire behind the sexualisation of the action is the merge of a weaker being with an overly powerful one. It even spoke of being a way of terminating one’s loneliness.
There is no treatment for vorarephiles as they often feel quite comfortable with their sexuality. Psychologists at the Toronto’s Centre for Addiction and Mental Health suggest adjusting the fantasy rather than suppressing it. In extreme cases, libido reduction medication is required.
What About Vore Becoming Reality?
We are entering quite a rabbit hole now! I mentioned earlier that some vorarephiles make their fantasies come true. It is true, and often they do so with role play. Vorarephiles are often furries, people dressed as typical monsters or animal predators.
Some vorarephiles don’t need the prey to be a human, and it could be an animal, so the role play can involve a dragon going after a rabbit. If using giants and the prey is a human, we have cannibalistic sexualisation. Although not happening in most cases, sometimes consensual action is a possibility.
Most vorarephiles fall into the erotophonophilia category, meaning they have a secondary paraphilia, an obsessive focus on murder. However, it is essential to note that vorarephiles aren’t murderers but suffer from the condition without action.
While most vorarephiles are about fantasy, not action, sexual cannibalism remains a vivid subject. A rare and small portion of vorarephiles is into cannibalism as long as it is consensual, as I talked about in the Toronto case. The practice often consumes a tiny part of the prey’s body, a piece of flesh, and nothing more.
NOTE: Cannibals and erotophonophiles aren’t vorarephiles, while vorarephiles can share the characteristics. Do not assume those are mutually exclusive.
Is Vore Purely Erotic?
No. Not entirely unlike my fascination for cannibalism—I have no sexual arousal. It is only a curiosity to me—vorarephiles, like erotophonophilia, have a fascination with what vore implies. While many vorarephiles may get sexual satisfaction through vore doesn’t mean it stops at sexualisation of the inhalation or digestion.
Sexual or nonsexual sadism is common among vorarephiles. Vore comprises the entire procession of prey consumption through one swallow and the digestive process it infers from start to finish. Each person experiences vore individually in their own way. Some can only achieve orgasms through pain, while others are well beyond that physical factor.
Associations with autassassinophilia are sexual arousal at the idea of being killed. Most people with this paraphilia achieve orgasm or euphoria with fantasies or role play. Another is food play, which is relatively straightforward, achieving sexual arousal through playing or watching someone play with food.
But the difference remains that vore is complex, and vorarephiles have many layers to their obsession. While it has sexual connotations to it. It also brings them on a journey with other fascinations, such as cannibalism and erotophonophilia. It’s not about the ending but the journey with vorarephiles.
Why Haven’t I Heard Of Vore Before?
That is simple. There are no big conventions of them out there. Also, their attraction is taboo and looked down upon by society. I might not be into vore, but I am odd, so I should know!
Besides, even if there are more vorarephiles out there than we expect, those that are into: teacher and student fantasy, priest and nun fantasy, 50 Shades conventions, and so on would drown them. Those who are odd are stuck in the shadows of the masses. Especially if they are into taboo subjects where society cannot dissociate fantasy from reality.
Suppose one’s fantasy is to be raped, most likely. In that case, the population will never know of it because the separation of fantasy of fight and rough sex has no separation from the actual criminal act. Vorarephiles aren’t cannibals or murderers. They are fantasising about the idea.
In this era that we are in, one must be careful with every single word used because it would be easy to say someone into vore is insensitive to victims of the mass shooting of x,y,z. But it isn’t the case, yet most people do not see past the wording.
Vore is a peculiar fantasy, but a fantasy nonetheless, and a consensual one when practised. Do not look for them to insult them or make fun of their fantasies.
We’re all mad here.
© Gothic Bite Magazine 