Republicans fantasise about infidelity and Democrats like BDSM, new sexual fantasy study shows

Democrats’ sexual fantasies are dominated by BDSM scenarios, whereas Republicans tend to fantasies about infidelity, a new study shows.

Justin Lehmiller, a researcher fellow at the Kinsey Institute, revealed that despite the differences in content, both sides fantasise about things that are taboo, or socially forbidden to their party.

Lehmiller surveyed 4,175 adult Americans from all 50 states and published his findings in a book called 'Tell Me What You Want'.

Writing for Politico, he cites data from the "largest and most comprehensive survey of sexual fantasies ever conducted in the United States".

While both political sides engage in fantasising several times a week, their content differs along party lines.

Republicans prefer to fantasise about sex outside of marriage and modern-day swinging.

Lehmiller wrote:

Things like infidelity, orgies and partner swapping, from 70s-style ‘key parties’ to modern-day forms of swinging. Republicans also reported more fantasies with voyeuristic themes, including visiting strip clubs and practising something known as 'cuckolding', which involves watching one’s partner have sex with someone else.

Democrats, on the other hand, tend to fantasise about engaging in a variety of BDSM acts:

From bondage to spanking to dominance-submission play. The largest Democrat-Republican divide on the BDSM spectrum was in masochism, which involves deriving pleasure from the experience of pain.

In order to explain why there are these correlations between sexual fantasies and political leaning, Lehmiller looked at the parties’ values. Sexual fantasies represent that which a person can’t have. In the case of Republicans, who celebrate the nuclear family, marriage and monogamy, it would stand to reason that their fantasies would be the opposite of that.

Lehmiller argues that for Democrats who value equality, “playing with power differentials” is the fantasy.

There was also a bit of mixing. One in ten participants reported fantasising about a politician, and of those, 17 per cent of Republicans fantasied about a Democrat, whilst 27 per cent of Democrats fantasied about a Republican.

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