The answer to "people shouldn't Do A Sex in public" + "some people kink on nonsexual stuff"

ISN'T "then that stuff is inherently sexual and shouldn't be allowed in public" or "then those people shouldn't be in public"

The theoretical existence of a middle manager with a necktie fetish shouldn't change company dress code

The problem is that when you KNOW your middle manager has a necktie fetish, it's typically because they've sexually harassed someone.

(So that becomes normies' idea of a person with a kink - because of, and in turn cyclically reinforcing, childhood sex shaming and the lack of comprehensive sex education.)

Put another way, if it's socially unacceptable to discuss kink anywhere, then - as with drug use - we become overrepresented by people acting socially unacceptable in other ways

We fight back by representing ourselves (but also, first, by having good boundaries around that.)

Also, the KNOWLEDGE ITSELF doesn't constitute sexual harassment!

Sharing that knowledge in an inappropriate time and place is sometimes (but is sometimes just a gaffe)

But direct acts of harassment often incidentally reveal the harasser's preferences. https://mobile.twitter.com/outliersgeorg/status/1327197752669868033

People can be friends in the workplace. People can post personal things about themselves to social media in a non-directed way, and can drop or mute each other's social media accounts to avoid that.

None of that is harassment (although harassers sometimes use it for deniability)

But taking our theoretical case - a person who almost certainly exists somewhere, though I have not heard from them - if they were always reaching over to adjust their employees' neckties, making excuses to stand and stare, you'd know.

And if they weren't, you largely wouldn't.

Now, let's take another case: let's say that manager is a regular ol' het dude who likes breasts.

Should he refuse to hire people with breasts? Obviously no! That's discrimination.

And he should avoid remarking on, or staring at, his employees' breasts. Again pretty obvious.

Very few people would say it's harassment for this milquetoast fellow to post publicly about his fondness for tiddy, as long as it's not specifically targeting his employees, as long as he hasn't Been Weird at their tiddies in particular.

OK. But now think of Necktie Liker.

Necktie Liker posts a shy, generic expression of fondness for neckties - maybe a pic of Matt Bomer - and all hell breaks loose. Everyone is Uncomfortable; someone raises concern with HR, citing the post.

Why?

(Spoiler: it's heteronormativity, EVEN IF Necktie Liker isn't a guy.)

Some rules of heteronormativity:

1) "Men" want, "women" are wanted.

2) The default settings for "socially acceptable sexual interest" are derived from these categories.

Just like patriarchy punishes GNC men, heteronormativity punishes category breakage even in hets.

People with tiddies, from a heteronormative culture, understand that their tiddies will be regarded as desirable; they may have mixed relationships to that desirability, but they've *thought* about it before, they've dealt with it.

People wearing neckties?

Have not.

Experiencing your body as a locus of desire is a vulnerable feeling.

The thoughts you don't expect about that are more vulnerable than the ones you're braced for.

(And in some ways, cis men can be highly fragile to this, because they've barely braced for ANYTHING.)

Sometimes people conflate that vulnerable feeling with being aggressed or transgressed on.

It might take real misbehavior to make them feel that vulnerable from an *expected* direction, one they've braced for.

So vulnerability-through-unexpectedness feels to them like harm.

You walk into the office every day knowing that someone could like your tiddies and that it's the responsibility of the tiddy likers around you to keep a lid on it & stay professional.

Finding out that a guy is a tiddy liker is not a game changer for this.

Finding out a woman is a tiddy liker might be a surprise (gestures at heteronormativity again). Lots of women react w/ homophobia and rethink all their interactions.

Finding out that ANYONE is a necktie liker is almost always a surprise (gestures at heteronormativity again!!)

So even when someone whose desires violate norms has interacted strictly professionally - knowledge of their desires is itself regarded as suspect.

The only solution is comprehensive sex education.

And when I say comprehensive, I mean: teach that people can be into ANYTHING.

The knowledge that "kinks exist and can be absolutely anything" also protects children against exploitation, by the way.

Lack of knowledge makes it easy for predators to coerce kids into ostensibly non-sexual activities: (cw: CSA) https://www.news.com.au/lifestyle/parenting/kids/can-you-do-a-stretching-video-paedophile-rings-using-terrifying-trick-to-prey-on-children-on-youtube/news-story/4b252704e29a7b2a48ebc6446ae6727c

To the extent that teen purity culture HAS fulfilled a function - which every cult does in the lives of its victims or it couldn't recruit - it's a whisper network where kids tell each other about specific fetishes because sex education has failed them. But it fails at this too.

Aside from the abuse IN that culture, relying on a short list of examples is like telling kids not to get into a white van: it means they'll trust the predator driving a red Camry, but get unnecessarily scared when their friend's mom arrives to pick them up for soccer practice.

Comprehensive sex education is not only a list of facts and bulletins, but a framework in which to understand them - a framework that doesn't penalize thoughts and feelings but provides an understanding of how to set safe boundaries around them.

Good night and good luck.