What is Gooning? Let's Delve Into the Latest Kink Obsession
- Filip
- Aug 9
- 3 min read
The internet’s latest kink obsession is called gooning—and it’s a whole new beast. No, it’s not just edging (though people often use them like they’re the same). Gooning is masturbation reimagined as a trance, a ritual, a sensory highway to nowhere. It's primal, repetitive, and weirdly communal.
Gooning Explained: From Edging to the Goon State
Technically, gooning is an extreme form of edging: masturbating for hours while watching porn, staying at the edge of orgasm, and sustaining a hyper-focused, trance-like state. You might drool. Your eyes cross. Porn loops become meditative. Eventually you stop even aiming to cum. You just want to be that sensation. That’s the goon state.
Buts here’s the key: all gooning is edging, but not all edging is gooning. Gooning is about losing yourself — a slow burn into sensory surrender.
A Brief History: From Internet Ya-hyena to Meme Carbonite
Origins trace back to early 2000s fetish forums. By 2018, Mel Magazine called it “masturbating into a trance,” describing its transformation from subculture to performative ritual.
TikTok and Gen Z slang gave it new life—now “goon” can mean someone obsessing over fantasy, a chaotic fan, or even just someone horny as hell.
Online subcultures formed in Discord servers, subreddits like r/GOONED, and FetLife threads where participants texted each other live while gooning. It's weird, it's ritual, it's mirrored performance.
Body, Mind, and Trance: Why People Goon
Gooning delivers sensory overload: porn becomes hypnotic, the body turns passive, and thoughts dissolve. Reddit users report merging with their penises—"the goon becomes the dick.
There’s ego loss, surrender, pure sensation. For some, it's catharsis. For others, it's addiction dressed as ritual.
The Dark Side: Experts Warn About Damage
Multiple sex therapists and addiction experts have raised eyebrows at the rising popularity of gooning:
Erectile dysfunction, due to needing porn-quality stimulation to climax.
Desensitization to human touch and intimacy.
Porn-induced anxiety, mood crashes, and compulsion cycles.
These issues are hitting real people — “I can’t arouse with a partner unless there's screens involved” is a common refrain.
Goon Culture: Why It's So Social
Gooning isn’t a solo act. It's fully networked: users share porn loops, shout encouragement mid-session, and compete in stamina challenges. Some describe full sessions in Discord or porn bake-off threads like transit rites to a shared microverse of lust and haze.
It’s performative, communal, and ultimately self-erasing.
Gooning vs. Edging: What Actually Sets Them Apart
Feature | Edging | Gooning |
Purpose | Heighten eventual climax | Prolong arousal indefinitely |
Cognitive State | Clear focus, controlled | Trance, dissociation, blur |
Duration | Minutes to tens of minutes | Hours of sensory immersion |
Community Practice | Often solo | Often shared via platforms or chatrooms |
Reddit users clarify: "Edge until you cum, goon until you don't know you’re alive."
Final Thought: Ritual, Risk, and Resonance
Gooning is kink reimagined as ritual. It’s communal yet isolating. It’s trance-like yet leaves you ghosted. It’s sex—but without sex. And for that, it's tapped a growing generation that consumes pleasure like a drug, loops it, and lets reality fade away.
If curiosity turns to compulsion, experts suggest a break from porn, journaling, cold showers, or therapy. No judgment. Just awareness.
Breaking it Down
Gooning = edging to the edge of eternity. It's not about the cum—it’s about chasing the sensation. Enter at your own risk, set boundaries, and remember: even the deepest trance can snap you out when you least expect it.