Maybe this is self delusional, maybe, like most people, I have the knack for making my actions and thoughts seem more benign and normal than they actually are.
I don't really hide my erotic book collection or medical instruments - I just keep them amongst the other myriad shelves of books and magazines I have and everything is in plain sight, though often 'lost' among all the other things. So when every now and then friends and acquaintances do notice these things, it seems like I am easily identified and labelled as a being just too obsessive about my interests.
But then, I too hear gossip or stories about these same friends and acquaintances, about their sexual escapades and misadventures and then I am the one who is amazed and flabbergasted beyond measure at what they all get up to in private, without any outward signs or portents of their behavior. And this includes some very serious stuff too that has ended up in divorces and even suicide. And then I have to ponder about my relatively harmless interest in medfet that goes no further than imagining and collecting and participating in forums like this one here.
I know they think me obsessed, but that is only because I don't really hide it. But then the other prim and proper types who engage in their private longings and desires, seem to be able to do so out of sight. Maybe I'm naive and don't see or notice, but still - there just doesn't really seem to be an identifier or outward characteristic that allows us to be easily pegged or identified.
And you're right about how shocked I sometimes am at how callous and egoistically perverted some people really are in private.