Zoosadism

The anti contact zoosadist flag

Zoosadism is an attraction towards nonhuman animals in a state of pain or distress. This attraction may be more focused on the pain, more focused on the animal, or focused on both equally.

This term is used here as a sexuality label and should not be conflated with an act of abuse towards animals or having intentions to commit such an act.

This article is a part of MAP Wiki articles on Other Paraphilias.

History of the term

The term "zoosadism" was coined by Ernest Borneman, a German psychoanalyst and crime writer.

Contemporary medical community defines zoosadism as "a paraphilia in which sexual arousal and satisfaction are obtained from torturing a nonhuman animal."

As an identity that refers to the attraction, separate from the acts of animal abuse, the concept of zoosadism dates back at least to autumn 2019 and creation of the anti contact zoosadist flag.

Statistics

It is unknown how many people in the general population are zoosadists. Zoosadists make up 10.2% of the online paraphila community.

According to a community survey of 20 zoosadists, 80% of zoosadists also have nonsadistic attractions towards animals, 75% are positive zoosadism is a component of their zoophilic attractions, 40% report their zoosadism includes romantic feelings.

Community

Due to pushback and harassment, the zoosadist community is still small and poorly organized, with few resources.

The community is probably most known for its flag (shown in the beginning of this page) and code letter: ξ. Both these symbols represent exclusively anti contact zoosadists. Guidelines proposed for the zoosadist community in 2022 also explicitly oppose animal abuse.

Discourse

The Twitter zoophile community has reacted to the existence of anti contact zoosadists with rejection since at least 2019. The rejection seems to stem from a belief in incompatibility of zoo activism with anti contact ethics.

Lyc, a zoo influencer and community organizer, has shared the following messages on his account Zoo-X-Perience (@zooxperience):

There is no place in our community for zoosadism!

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"Attraction ≠ Action" is often used as a cover for those who are acting on their harmful attractions, or networking after gaining access to zoo spaces, trying to shield themselves from accountability.

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Anti contact is anti zoo

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Acceptance of anti contact zoosadists in the zoo community is one of the purposes of the alef zoo identity, formed in late 2023.

In 2024-2025 the zoosadist identity has been subjected to renaming attempts, notably promoted by people who do not share this type of attraction and rejected by zoosadists themselves.