Mechanophilia (or mechaphiliaCeilán, Cynthia (2008). Weirdly BelovedTales of Strange Bedfellows, Odd Couplings, and Love Gone Bad. Guilford, Connecticut: Lyons Press. .) is a paraphilia involving a sexual attraction to machines such as bicycles, motorcycles,Alleyne, Richard (26 October 2007). "Man Who Had Sex with Bike in Court". The Daily Telegraph. Retrieved 18 February 2012. cars, helicopters,Staff (21 May 2008). "Man Admits Having Sex with 1,000 CarsA Man Who Claims To Have Had Sex with 1,000 Cars Has Defended His 'Romantic' Feelings Towards Vehicles". The Daily Telegraph. Retrieved 18 February 2012. and airplanes.Browne, Ray Broadus (c. 1981). Objects of Special DevotionFetishism in Popular Culture. Bowling Green, Ohio: Bowling Green State University Popular Press. .

Mechanophilia is treated as a crime in some nations with perpetrators being placed on a sex-offenders' register after prosecution.Hickey, Eric W. (2005). Sex Crimes and Paraphilia. Prentice Hall. p. 91. . Motorcycles are often portrayed as sexualized fetish objects to those who desire them.Thompson, Steven L. (January 2000). "The Arts of the Motorcycle: Biology, Culture, and Aesthetics in Technological Choice". Technology and Culture. Volume 41, Number 1. pp. 99–115. See also Milimechanophilia for attraction specifically to military vehicles.

Art, culture and design

Mechanophilia has been used to describe important works of the early modernists, including in the Eccentric Manifesto (1922), written by Leonid Trauberg, Sergei Yutkevich, Grigori Kozintsev and othersMishra, Michael (2008). A Shostakovich Companion. Westport, Connecticut: Praeger. p. 446. .Kolocotroni, Vassiliki; Goldman, Jane; Taxidou, Olga (1998). ModernismAn Anthology of Sources and Documents. Chicago, Illinois: University of Chicago Press. .members of the Factory of the Eccentric Actor, a modernist avant-garde movement that spanned Russian futurism and constructivism.

The term has entered into the realms of science fiction and popular fiction.Broderick, Damien (2009). Unleashing the StrangeTwenty-First Century Science Fiction Literature, part of the I. O. Evans Studies in the Philosophy & Criticism of Literature, Number 47. San Bernardino, California: Borgo Press. .

Scientifically, in BiophiliaThe Human Bond with Other Species by Edward O. Wilson, Wilson is quoted describing mechanophilia, the love of machines, as "a special case of biophilia",Castricano, Jodey (2008). Animal SubjectsAn Ethical Reader in a Posthuman World, part of Cultural Studies, 8. Waterloo, Ontario: Wilfrid Laurier University Press. . whereas psychologists such as Erich Fromm would see it as a form of necrophilia.Miller, Alan (1999). Environmental Problem SolvingPsychosocial Barriers to Adaptive Change, part of the Springer Series on Environmental Management. New York City: Springer. .

Designers such as Francis Picabia and Filippo Tommaso Marinetti have been said to have exploited the sexual attraction of automobiles.McDonagh, Deana; et al. (2004). Design and Emotion The Experience of Everyday Things. London: Taylor & Francis. .

Culturally, critics have described it as "all-pervading" within contemporary Western society and that it seems to overwhelm our society and all too often our better judgment.Heller, Steven; Meggs, Philip B. (2001). Texts on TypeCritical Writings on Typography. Allworth Press. . Although not all such uses are sexual in intent, the terms are also used for specifically erotogenic fixation on machineryRoberts, Mark S. (Autumn 1996). "WiredSchreber as Machine, Technophobe, and Virtualist". TDRThe Drama Review. Vol. 40. No. 3. pp. 31–46. . . and taken to its extreme in hardcore pornography as Fucking Machines.Berger, Arthur Asa (1997). The Postmodern PresenceReadings on Postmodernism in American Culture and Society. Walnut Creek, California; London: AltaMira Press. . This mainly involves women being sexually penetrated by machines for male consumption,Bonik, M.; Schaale, A. (2005). The Naked TruthInternet Eroticism. Institute of Network Culture. which are seen as being the limits of current sexual biopolitics.Loza, Susana (October 2001). "Sampling (Hetero)sexualityDiva-ness and Discipline in Electronic Dance Music". Popular Music. Cambridge University Press. Volume 20. Number 3. pp. 349–357. . .

Arse Elektronika, an annual conference organized by the Austrian arts-and-philosophy collective monochrom, has propagated a DIY/feminist approach to sex machines.

Authors have drawn a connection between mechanophilia and masculine militarisation, citing the works of animator Yasuo Ōtsuka and Studio Ghibli.Lamarre, Thomas (2009). The Anime Machine: A Media Theory of Animation. Minneapolis, Minnesota: University of Minnesota Press. .

The 1973 French film La Grande Bouffe includes a scene of a man and a car copulating, to fatal effect.

David Cronenberg's 1996 film Crash concerns a cult of people fascinated by car crashes.

The 2021 French film and Palme d'Or winner Titane depicts scenes of a mechanophilic woman having sex with cars.

Incidents In 2015 a man in Thailand was caught on CCTV masturbating himself on the front end of a Porsche.

In 2008, an American man named Edward Smith admitted to 'having sex' with 1000 cars, and the helicopter used in the television show Airwolf.

Documentaries My Car Is My Lover (2008)

See also Gynoid Object sexuality I'm in Love with My Car Sex robot

References

Further reading Aggrawal, Anil (2009). Forensic and Medico-Legal Aspects of Sexual Crimes and Unusual Sexual Practices. Boca Raton, Florida: CRC Press. p. 376. . Wilson Edward O. (1984). BiophiliaThe Human Bond with Other Species. Cambridge, Massachusetts: Harvard University Press. p. 116. .