Why conservative men may be attracted to cuckolding, according to a researcher who studies the kink

• Cuckolding is a sexual fetish where a person likes to watch or listen while their partner has sex with someone else.
• The term recently cropped up in mainstream media when former Liberty University President Jerry Falwell, Jr. resigned from his role over reports he had partaken in the fetish.
• According to researcher and sex therapist David Ley, conservative men might be sexually drawn to cuckolding because it's something they were told is forbidden or wrong.

Cuckolding, a sexual fetish where a man enjoys watching or listening his partner have sex with someone else, cropped up in mainstream media after Reuters reported former Liberty University President Jerry Falwell, Jr. had partaken in the act.

Liberty University officials have since sued Falwell, saying he "led a scheme to cover up the illicit conduct" while getting a salary raise during his tenure at the university.

Falwell's former business partner Giancarlo Granda told Reuters that Falwell "enjoyed watching from the corner of the room" while Granda and Falwell's wife Becki were "intimate."

Falwell denied this, and said only his wife was involved. But the news gained national attention, as Falwell was heading the ultra-conservative and evangelical Liberty University at the time. Students there are forbidden from having extramarital sex and same-sex relationships, Insider previously reported.

According to researcher and sex therapist David Ley, cuckolding is a common sexual fantasy for old-fashioned types.

Why men are drawn to cuckolding

Ley spent a year researching cuckolding for his book "Insatiable Wives," because he could only find one study on the kink and wanted to learn more. In interviewing various heterosexual couples about their experiences with cuckolding, Ley learned those who were married and in their 40s were most likely to partake.

Ley, who discussed his findings on sex researcher Justin Lehmiller's podcast Sex & Psychology, said men typically initiate cuckolding in their relationships, and they tend to do so for two reasons.

First, some men find the personal aspect of cuckolding more erotic than porn. According to Ley, some men think: "I'd rather watch my wife have sex with other people than watch some stranger in pornography," because it's more real.

Cuckolding might also appeal to someone who wants to experience "vicarious bisexuality," as Ley calls it.

"There are men who really would like to engage in sexual activity with other men but they have a lot or moral or social prohibitions against it, and they can use their wife's body, basically as a vehicle to have sex with other men," Ley said.

Research suggests politically conservative men have more cuckolding fantasies than liberal men

Lehmiller, who conducted his own sexual-fantasy research for his book "Tell Me What You Want," found politically conservative men cite cuckolding as a sexual fantasy more often than their liberal counterparts, despite the fact men often use "cuck" as a derogatory term for a weak man or sellout.

According to Ley, conservative men might be drawn to cuckolding due to cognitive dissonance.

"The more taboo something is, the more condemned it is, for some people, the more sexually charged and exciting it becomes," Ley told Lehmiller.

Ley gave the example of a man who identified as a white Nazi and wrote a letter to him. He told Ley his greatest sexual fantasy would be his wife cheating on him with a Jewish person or person of color, because it was something he was taught to hate and fear.

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