THREE ESSAYS ON SEXUALITY THE SEXUAL ABERRATIONS using her tooth-brush, though there are no grounds for suppos- which are constantly appearing in these practices, seem, as ng that his own oral cavity, for which he feels no disgust, is it were to be claiming that they should themselves be re any cleaner than the girls. Here, then, our attention is drawn garded and treated as genitals. We shall learn later that th to the factor of disgust, which interferes with the libidinal over claim is justified by the history of the development of the sexual valuation of the sexual object but can in turn be overric idden by instinct and that it is fulfilled in the symptomatology of certain libido. Disgust seems to be one of the forces which have led to a thological states restriction of the sexual aim. These forces do not as a rule extend to the genitals themselves. But there is no doubt that the genitals UNSUITABLE SUB- There are some cases which are quite of the opposite sex can in themselves be an object of disgust and STITUTES FOR THE specially remarkable-those in which the that such an attitude is one of the characteristics of all hysterics SEXUAL OBJECT- normal sexual object is replaced by an and especially of hysterical women. The sexual instinct in its FETISHISM other which bears somc relation to it, bu strength enjoys overriding this disgust. ( See below [p 22f. ] is entirely unsuited to serve the normal sexual aim. From the point of view of classification, we should SEXUAL USE OF THE Where the anus is concerned it be no doubt have done better to have mentioned this highly inter- ANAL ORIFICE omes still clearer that it is disgust which of abt the stamps that sexual aim as a perversion deviations in respect of the sexual object. But we have postponed I hope, however, I shall not be accused of partisanship when their mention till we could become acquainted with the factor I assert that people who try to account for this disgust by saying of sexual overvaluation, on which these phenomena, being con- that the organ in question serves the function of excretion and nected with an abandonment of the sexual aim, are dependent comes in contact with excrement-a thing which is disgusting What is substituted for the sexual object is some part of the in itself--are not much more to the point than hysterical girls body(such as the foot or hair)which is in general very in who account for their disgust at the male genital by saying that appropriate for sexual purposes, or some inanimate object which it serves to void urine bears an assignable relation to the person whom it replaces and The playing of a sexual part by the mucous membrane of the preferably to that person's sexuality(e.g. a piece of clothing or anus is by no means limited to intercourse between men: pre- underlinen). Such substitutes are with some justice likened to the fetishes in which savages believe that their gods are ontrary, it seems that paedicalio with a male owes its origin to embodied an analogy with a similar act performed with a woman; while A transition to those cases of fetishism in which the sexual mutual masturbation is the sexual aim most often found in aim, whether normal or perverse, is entirely abandoned is intercourse between inverts afforded by other cases in which the sexual object is required to fulfil a fetishistic condition--such as the possession of some parti- sIGNIFICANCE The extension of sexual interest to other re- cular hair-colouring or clothing, or even some bodily defect- OF OTHE gions of the body, with all its variations, offers if the sexual aim is to be attained. No other variation of the REGIONS OF us nothing that is new in principle; it adds sexual instinct that borders on the pathological can lay so much THE BODY nothing to our knowledge of the sexual instine claim to our interest as this one, such is the peculiarity of which merely proclaims its intention in this way the phenomena to which it gives rise. Some degree of diminu- of getting possession of the sexual object in every possible tion in the urge towards the normal sexual aim(an executive direction. But these anatomical extensions inform us that, be- weakness of the sexual apparatus)seems to be a necessary pre ides sexual overvaluation, there is a second factor at work ondition in every case. The point of contact with the normal which is strange to popular knowledge. Certain regions of the footnote added 1915: This weakness would represent the constitutional body such as the mucous membrane of the nouth and anus precondition Psycho-analysis has found that the phenomenon can also