Locktober, the month of locked-up males

Every week in "Les 400 Culs" , Agnès Giard, an anthropologist attached to the University of Paris-Nanterre and a specialist in Japan, examines contemporary sexual discourses and practices with a skeptical and detached analysis, informed by the latest research in the human and social sciences.

For more than three weeks, some men around you have been wearing chastity cages. Would you recognize them? Modeled after the Dry January movement (not drinking alcohol in January), the Locktober challenge invites followers to abstain from erections for the entire month of October. The trend, whose beginnings were covered by Libération, is taking on the appearance of a massive movement this year: "In 2025, chastity is number 1 in the Fetish of the Year ranking ," announces Clips4Sale, a leading kink platform, which reveals some astounding figures; since 2020, cage production has increased by 193%, setting sales records.

By putting their penises into forced rest, Locktober followers effectively sequester the organ in the