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For many people, their experience of porn involves watching two (or more) naked people fucking and slamming their laptops shut when they hear their mum coming up the stairs. However, there is a new type of porn that is considerably less explicit. It is called an autonomous sensory meridian response, ASMR or for simplicity- whisper porn. If you haven’t heard about it, well, things are about to get weird.
The whole purpose of ASMR is to relax people and the phenomenon involves listening to gentle audio recordings, whispers, white noise, lip-smacking, tapping on hard surfaces and such. Apparently, it sends the listener into an almost trance-like state of relaxation and believe it or not, its big fucking business, especially on the internet.
If you want proof, just head over to YouTube and type ASMR and be prepared for the onslaught of videos, mostly women, doing stuff like pretending to give you a massage or brushing over a microphone. One of the major triggers for ASMR is personal attention hence the popularity of haircut videos.
If you still doubt the popularity of this niche, YouTuber ASMR Darling has over a million subscribers, the same as Gentle Whispering ASMR. One of the ASMR videos involves a woman eating pickles and has garnered 5 million views! In short, ASMR Porn is a hit and it’s clearly not a niche fetish for the oddballs in the dark corners of the internet. It has actually been likened to a mind orgasm!
Well known triggers of ASMR
Mary Ellen Wells, Ph.D., director and assistant professor at the Neurodiagnostics and Sleep Science University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill and the University of North Carolina at Charlotte describes ASMR as a ’tingling’ sensation often on the scalp, neck, and sometimes spreading to the back and limbs, with feelings of positive emotion (almost euphoric) and relaxation.”
The sensations are triggered by some sort of sensory stimulation (visual, auditory, touch) otherwise referred to as triggers. They include:
Visual: by watching someone concentrate on a task, for instance, folding the laundry.
Auditory: involves listening to soft and soothing voices like whispering and brushing.
Touch: ASMR can be triggered by gentle touching, for example, getting hair brushed or having a manicure.
It certainly is a huge departure from the low budget POV porn that involves women in harsh lighting, uncomfortably spreading their legs and telling you how much they are craving to suck your cock. ASMR is a more interactive and intimate experience that is supposed to trigger braingasms as opposed to helping you bust a nut.
Sexual stimulation
The tingling sensation can be hard to explain if you don’t experience it. It can be likened to the goosebumps you feel when listening to some epic piece of music or an inspirational speech. However, only 5% of the millions who search for ASMR online do it for sexual stimulation. According to psychologists, this can be attributed to people’s varying ‘flow states’; people get natural highs from various activities including but not limited to exercise, sex, and violence. Members of the ASMR community get their sexual stimulation from these soothing audio stimulations.
Other researchers have likened this stimulation to a desire of being groomed. This means that people deriving sexual pleasure from these YouTube videos may not only be getting off seeing young pretty girls speaking softly, but their brains are also actually converting the soothing sounds into a physical feeling.
Erotic ASMR
While many ASMRtists have not attached any sexual significance to their videos, some are trying to inject a certain level of eroticism for maximum effect. One of the videos I watched involves Nica Noelle, a veteran porn director and performer turned ASMRtist. In the video, the former pornstar dons a half-buttoned pastel pink cardigan, which fits tightly around her large breasts. Gazing at the camera, she starts unbuttoning her shirt, just enough to expose the top of her nipples. Then she starts massaging her breasts as she whispers “As you can see it’s a very pastel kind of color”.
“Erotic ASMR is a special kind of porn that promotes a feeling of relaxation and of being nurtured and cared for,” says Nica. “It’s not the harsh, impersonal stimulation of traditional POV porn. There’s no dirty trash talk or harsh imagery; I’m telling you I love you and that you’re beautiful [and I’m] talking to you about sweet, gentle things.”
Unlike POV, erotic ASMR intends to make the relationship between the viewer and performer more intimate; to make them feel nurtured, cared for, needed. “ASMR to me really has to do with love and positive attention and positive feelings,” Nica says. “I think porn needs those things.”
However, erotic ASMRtists have faced backlash with critics arguing that erotic ASMR work makes mainstream ASMR-artists look bad or invites male viewers to give them unwanted sexual attention. However, Nica argues that if an ASMRtists doesn’t want to add a sexual angle to their videos, it’s up to them.
“Many ASMRtists are already on the defensive about being viewed as doing something dirty or creepy when actually they feel ASMR is a pure, almost childlike artistic expression; the antithesis of porn,” she said. “I can see why someone who makes videos of themselves clipping coupons or shining shoes doesn’t want to be viewed as a pornographer.”
Finally
Do you want to test if you can have a braingasm? Find an ASMR video online and put your headphones on because it’s best triggered by sensitive microphones and high-quality audio. Enjoy the new experience.
