I think a major part of a lot of kinks is just the instinctive emotions they evoke that don't have a lot of reason. Like it's hard to articulate accurately with words alone. Though maybe that's cope and I'm just not aware or self introspective enough.
it's partly true but not entirely. Eg I can say that when it comes to porn I seek much more hardcore, degenerate stuff than I consider acceptable IRL. It's simply because to evoke stong emotions from simple videos/pictures on the screen I need to see something extreme. Apart from degeneracy, another thing that can evoke strong emotions in me, as I discovered a few months ago, is stories that evoke jeliousy. IRL I'm quite jelious person so it works for me even with fictional characters, if they are well written. So, two things that get me going are:
1) degeneracy (as in - breaking moral norms, doing something that is considered perverted)
2) jeliousy
Swinging/hotwifing have both. Cuckquean - mostly degeneracy (the fact that your gf/wife is a perv is hot on itself). Light NTR - mostly jeliousy, tho some degeneracy too. Femdom - degeneracy (as the moral norm is that the man should be dominant)
But I don't like it when someone suffers, especially emotionally. Physical pain, if moderate, can be hot, but emotional is rather not. So Hard NTR and cuckoldry are not my things.