Perversion

Hehe. Now that I have your attention...

According to my dictionary widget:

perversion (not gonna type the pronunciation because I don't know how to make my letters do those things)

noun

-the alteration of something from it's original course, meaning, or state to a distortion or corruption of what was first intended

-sexual behavior or desire that is considered abnormal or unacceptable

Origin late Middle English: from Latin perversio(n-), from the verb pervertere - 'turn around'

(or another source says it means 'to corrupt').

I keep wishing I'd taken Latin.

From The Bald-Headed Hermit and the Artichoke - An Erotic Thesaurus, I found these euphemisms - though it's funny, pervert/perversion is not really a word that's generated a lot of them - maybe because the word itself is not one that is considered perverted.

abnormal, bent, creepy, crud, defective (just a wee bit judgmental?), degenerate, depraved, deviant, dirty, dissolute, freakish, fucked, gooner (?), grody, gross, grotesque, into a particular scene, into kink, into sick shit, kinky, marv (ha!), odd, off, otway (? ?), panty thief (hmmm, maybe Blogger is, for taking Alison's Panty Parade blog), peculiar, perv(y), pervie, pervo, prevert (always a favorite), queer, rotten, rough, secko, sick, sid, sinful, smarmy, strange, twisted, twisty, unhealthy, unnatural, viscious (think it's supposed to be vicious), warped, watson (I really wonder at the origin of this one), wicked

Personally, I don't think most of these fall under the definition of euphemism - other than maybe gooner, panty thief, or watson (I was not able to find an explanation of that one in a few minutes googling - now I'm really curious). Many of the words seem judgmental (I know, I know - many people are) - and I'm sure that the continuum has folks considered kinky by some thinking someone else is really into sick shit and that person thinks another is even more warped.

At the somewhat recent eroticist's dinner, it struck me that as "normal" as we all seemed, many many many people would consider us perverts. I think we'd all wear that badge with pride. Maybe it's because we've thought about it so much while writing that we're more sure of ourselves (in other words, we don't think we're unhealthy) and more aware of the great variations in what turns one on and pops one's cork (yeah, more euphemisms).

Guess we're all just twisted.