You know what ASMR is: softcore porn for audiophile Quakers. âItâs not sexual,â every ASMR fan tells you, even as they moan at your lip smacking and shirt crinkles. I donât blame you for trying to pull this con, ear-freaks — I once tried to convince my boss that anime was about more than just panties, but he still wouldnât let me watch it at work. Maybe thatâs why ASMR has given up on playing coy, and its major YouTube channels are now one errant camera pan away from switching to PornHub. Theyâre all about âASMR roleplayâ these days, and yes, it is definitely sexual⌠albeit in a deeply lame, deeply upsetting way.
Hereâs how your typical ASMR video starts:
And right off, thereâs a problem. If this isnât pornography, why are all of the big stars either cute young girls or terrifying middle-aged men doing everything they can to secure a spot beside the cute young girls?
Sheâs doing âfinger fluttersâ by way of hello — wiggling her fingers in front of her microphones so you can hear the sound that flesh makes. We are zero seconds in and this is where I would quit watching if you werenât paying me to. I hate it instantly. It sounds like gelatin corduroy. It sounds like parasitic moths trying to wiggle their way past your protective earmuffs. It sounds like lotion feels in your belly button.
ASMR Girl goes right from those saucy little finger-scrapes into a whispered ad for NordVPN. Hope youâve always wanted to watch an average girl talk quietly about server capacity and — actually, most of you do want nothing more than that. Well, enjoy the next three straight minutes:
No joke: Three minutes of amplified whisper commercials for secure porn browsing. Is this foreplay for a creature I can never understand? Peter Thiel isnât this hard for capitalism and privacy, and his only goal in life is to start an island society where they donât prosecute sex crimes.
Only once youâve explored every orifice of NordVPNâs excellent deals do you get to your low-stimulation pornography:
Yes, itâs alien play. Softcore quiet alien play. Like the third naughtiest fantasy of an extremely sheltered librarian.
The saddest part of these ASMR videos is how ubiquitous nitrile gloves are. Like it would just spoil the average viewerâs suspension of disbelief if it looked like a woman was willing to touch them with her bare hands. Theyâre so far gone from actual human contact that it canât even be a part of their fantasies anymore. ASMR fans go soft the moment they see cuticles. Right now some poor noble nurse is catching COVID-19 because MRS. ASMR outbid the hospital on the last box of Kleenguards.
Iâm not even through one video and I already feel bad about making fun of the people who watch these.
Every one ends with the woman begrudgingly admitting that she likes you — not loves you, not wants you, just tolerates. Thatâs the lowest bar for a fetish this side of Limboner play, which is exactly what it sounds like, but somehow lower.
Hereâs the same girl demonstrating that sheâs willing to get hit by every obstacle in the nerdâs fetish gauntlet.
Yes, itâs ASMR Shrek Roleplay, in case you were looking for the exact sequence of words to say out loud to get your parents to stop loving you. Itâs like a phonetic hack, Snow Crash-style, designed to kill the human brainâs capacity for respect. She does twenty minutes of ânon-eroticâ whispering in a terrible accent that veers between Scottish, Russian, and drunk Jamaican. It is more than enough time to prove that improv is not her strong suit.
We dive off into several long tangents about the real estate agent that sold her the swamp-shack, and how you might want to invest in swamp property yourself, and who the fictional real estate agent is married to, and all the while her audience is just waiting for her to whisper âmoistâ so they can close this incognito tab.
Please notice, even here, the gloves. ASMR fans will tell you itâs nothing dirty — itâs just to augment the noises the fingers make, and then theyâll run a wet tongue over their dry lips and start rubbing the dirty swatch of burlap in their pocket.
There you go: if what you need to finish is a disinterested 22 year-old wearing green makeup and a vest made out of towels whispering you off to lyrics by Smash Mouth, please clean yourself up before you go back on stage at the Douglas County Fair, Smash Mouth.
âCranial nerve exam pornâ sounds like something so hardcore you can only film it in the most Russian parts of Russia. But no, this shit is like the schoolgirl fantasy of ASMR Roleplay: So commonplace itâs barely considered deviant. These videos are as omnipresent as they are perplexing…
Itâs always the same — an attractive female doctor gently inquiring if you have something wrong with your brain. It is the single most attainable fantasy for ASMR fans, who could make this a reality by taking two steps: Making a doctorâs appointment, and admitting to why they made that doctorâs appointment.
Hereâs a âgang-nerve exam,â which is something I thought I made up for my Shadowrun fan fiction.
Never tell me this isnât pornography. Look at those usernames: Maybe âSeafoamâ can pass for a crystal hippy, but âMatty Tinglesâ is a man for whom the San Fernando Valley is a way of life.
You all need to be more careful about what gets you off. What if you head out to ick on some poor doctor and they actually find something wrong? Now youâve tied a fetish to a diagnosis. Ask any James Spader movie why thatâs a bad idea.
Hereâs Lice Inspection ASMR Roleplay:
Finally, a sexual fantasy for the Deep Nerds that involves precisely zero stretches of the imagination.
And these are the ones that pretend at respectability! Theyâre the Showtime of the ASMR world. Hereâs the Cinemax:
Yes, this is an ASMR video. Yes, it is a Misery-style porn roleplay about lumberjacks. No, donât look it up even if you think youâd be into that kind of thing. Making an ASMR video doesnât guarantee youâve got a good voice, or any acting ability whatsoever. This one is like listening to your dentist do low-confidence bondage.
What if youâre as into furplay as you are out of dignity? Have some âWerewolf has you tied up ASMR Roleplay.â
Listen to six minutes of a guy doing a subpar Skyrim NPC impression about erotic maulings. Try not to laugh as he tells you his werewolf name is âMaurice.â Fail when he fucks up the syntax and accidentally rhymes during his climax line, âI think it is high time to embrace you in the night with just one bite.â
Or hey, if youâve found that the slow dissolution of the civilized world has made you unspeakably horny:
No teasing here. Rest assured, suicidal whisper perverts, you will quietly fingerbang the coronavirus before this is done.