Dig back far enough into the history of any word and you'll find something sinister. Take "cute". Nowadays it means pretty, lovable or charming, albeit perhaps with an undertone of mistrust or contempt, as in the phrase "that's a cute observation, Edwin". But the word originally evolved from "acute", which very broadly means sharp or intense. "Acute" was once a Middle English word for a short-lived fever - it's related to "ague", a word you've likely come across in a medieval fantasy RPG somewhere, which refers to fits of sweating and shivering. The word "cute", then, is secretly diseased, and so, perhaps, is the experience of cuteness. There's a psychological phenomenon called "cute aggression" which refers to the desire to physically envelop, dominate and even abuse the thing you find cute - "I just want to squeeze you till you pop".