While casual wear ascended to popularity amongst men and women in the latter half of the 20th century, the sneaker qua sneaker has become an object tied to male athletic performance, wealth, and prestige. Similar to how the combat or work boot is an erotic symbol of authority, power, and rugged masculinity, the sneaker is associated with masculine personas like the skater, the sports star, and the rapper. And since the explosive rise of the sneaker in the 80s and 90s, the shoe has arguably become the male equivalent of the high heel in terms of status, price, and desirability.

Like a pair of Louboutins, high-end sneakers are meant to be collected, seen, and adored. Some of the most expensive, sought-after sneakers are rarely worn and in this sense are no more functional than $700 stilettos. Unless you're wealthy enough to rarely be on your feet and to have backup pairs available when they inevitably get scuffed, they'll likely spend most of their time in a box.

Sneakers, then, straddle the line between the practical combat boot and the ornamental pump. In this sense they’ve shifted away from the image of the physically dynamic wearer they began with, now occupying more ambiguous ground. And they're footwear with a charged history, culminating in the early 1990s panics around “sneaker killings,” which often conspicuously targeted prominent black celebrities like Michael Jordan and Spike Lee for their purported role in instigating violence over sought-after brands.

So it would seem wrong, to assume that sneaker porn is a straightforwardly masculine fetish and leave it at that—to do so would be to ignore the strata of meanings heaped upon by sneakers over the past several decades. And these meanings are always being excavated and reappropriated by subcultural elements in much the same way as historical accoutrements of torture and slavery have been taken up by queer sadomasochism.

Of course, in attending to the symbolic we shouldn't completely eschew the physical. The complex tactile pleasures of leather have been well-documented by theorists of sadomasochism and those pleasures are at play with sneakers as well. It's easy enough to recognize the visual beauty of footwear, which after all is the primary criteria of value in high-end and celebrity-branded sneakers. But to touch the soft leather, the careful stitching, to slide one's foot into a plush enclosure reveals another kind of beauty. So why should it be any surprise that people find pleasure in touching, rubbing, smelling, licking, and even fucking them? As one self-described sneaker fetishist puts it, "It feels pretty good, especially if the sneakers are more narrow like Shox, adidas Racers, or Puma Speedcats.”