My Octopus Girlfriend: On erotophobia

October 27, 2022 7:24 AM

Are octopuses floods, or are they reservoirs? Are they two-thirds water, like us, or do they explode the body–environment boundary? To be in the (even virtual) presence of an octopus is closely akin to an acid trip, I feel: a hot flood, a visitation of humility, of xenohospitable love, divine trust, comradely fearlessness.

These are vantage points from which the anxious hubris of one’s usual subjectivity feels viscerally and philosophically amusing. To be touched, tongued, by the octopus—to be fucked by the universe the octopus-molecule discloses, dense with history, electric with laughter and tears—seems like it would be the end of oneself, in a good way. Nothing could be scarier, except perhaps good sex. Octopuses look like our own spilled viscera, billowing large—our very souls, uncaged by any shell. Such an intimate alien’s touch might roil the tissue of received reality.

posted by jshttnbm (17 comments total)

But you fuck ONE sheep [without getting a terminal degree]...
posted by kingdead at 7:40 AM on October 27, 2022 [4 favorites]

... you can be prime minister?
posted by seanmpuckett at 8:02 AM on October 27, 2022 [6 favorites]

Drugs are a hell of a drug.
posted by adamrice at 9:03 AM on October 27, 2022 [4 favorites]

Of course, to an octopus, you are merely something good to eat.
posted by SPrintF at 9:04 AM on October 27, 2022 [2 favorites]

This was sooo good! Thank you for posting it. It's frankly rare at 48 for a person who reads a lot to read something that feels fresh. I welcome Sophie Lewis' tentacles re-arranging my queer brains.
posted by latkes at 10:32 AM on October 27, 2022 [4 favorites]

The thing that struck me most about My Octopus Fuck Buddy was that, along with the obvious eroticism/romanticism, the human protagonists wife's notable absence. (I only learned from this article her name is Swati Thiyagarajan). Like this dude seemed to be a very annoying husband who spends all day every day under water. Who is doing the laundry in this house? Does he show any of this romantic energy toward the person he is raising a child with? The empty space of where the human relationship might be was so loud to me. I feel like The Shape of Water is the anti-Octopus Teacher in a very lovely way. The weirdness of the creature is explicitly instead of implicitly eroticized and the obsession is welcomed and nurtured instead of suppressed.
posted by latkes at 10:44 AM on October 27, 2022 [2 favorites]

I'm still betting on everything becoming crabs.
posted by Splunge at 11:03 AM on October 27, 2022

The Horror of Humanity's Hubris.
posted by Pyrogenesis at 11:12 AM on October 27, 2022

Sophie Lewis is certainly getting her day today on MetaFilter.
posted by y2karl at 11:28 AM on October 27, 2022 [2 favorites]

The Deep would understand
posted by chavenet at 12:06 PM on October 27, 2022 [2 favorites]

Worth reading, if only for the parenthetical (just kidding, virginity is a fascist concept). towards the end. I’m being glib; there’s a lot worth reading here. Enough so that I’m going to shelve my bucket of grump and encourage you to read it, too.
posted by GenjiandProust at 12:33 PM on October 27, 2022 [4 favorites]

I am reminded of an occasion, watching the climax of Dirty Dancing with another user, when we both remarked (because we knew) that we were then Jerry Orbach, but then we both realized and also said that we were at the same time Patrick Swayze.
posted by grobstein at 2:07 PM on October 27, 2022

Anyway I was not on LSD when I watched My Octopus Teacher (Octoteach), and I believe it is not necessary to be. I like this piece but I want to encourage you to see the movie even though it "shies away awkwardly from being the paradigm-shattering interpersonal memoir and honest interrogation of love it nevertheless claims to be." I don't think there's anything else like it. The missed opportunities diagnosed by Lewis are possibilities that open up only because the movie succeeded so much already. They are shadows we see behind what Lewis diagnoses as repression. It is a different document but it is still very good.
posted by grobstein at 2:19 PM on October 27, 2022 [2 favorites]

I always find this type of content a bit... disturbing. I'm staying far away from the octopus-fucker, thanks.
posted by wandering zinnia at 2:29 AM on October 29, 2022

I cycled through three thoughts reading this:
1. This person's writing is captivating! alien and sticky like an octopus
2. This person has a sex and drugs superiority complex
3. This person has terminal boundary issues
posted by dmh at 7:05 AM on October 29, 2022

This is hilarious and I want to go on trips with the author. Or just read their write-ups, they're also great.
posted by pulposus at 3:52 PM on October 29, 2022

I like to think I would not be so presumptuous as to write about octopuses and their suitors were I not lysergically enhanced.

You and me, buddy, you.and me

And man, lysergically enhanced.TMI is like TMI TMI¹⁰. Yikes!
posted by y2karl at 8:55 AM on October 30, 2022