Those tied up are often suspended above the ground and left to hang, and the act is often carried out in front of crowds of onlookers. For a non-pornographic example, check out 2016’s The Handmaiden. Vore became a topic of pop culture debate in 2017 when it was theorized that a popular Disney-Pixar Tumblr called Constable+Frozen had been using the fetish in sneaky ways. At its core, vore is about sexualizing consumption, but it doesn’t have to involve gore or pain.

A 2013 study in Archives of Sexual Behavior concluded by interviewing voreaphilliacs that the fetish is often tied to masochism or loneliness.

In some ways, it’s about wanting to merge with someone so completely that you are never alone again.