I’m like Devistatingyet- really young, 6 or so, when I became sexual and driven by fantasies where I had no control, where I was exposed and vulnerable and involved with a bit of pain and degradation. There is really nothing much I can do about it, it’s just in me and I can no more change it than another person could what they fantasise about. BUT I am not here to defend BDSM. I know I have absorbed the sinister messages of society and that it has been a major influence.

Ok, people should be allowed to exercise their sexuality without fear of judgment… whatever. But you know what you SHOULD do? I keep that stuff to yourself. I don’t feel the need to go join a group and make a bid deal about it, as though people with dark fantasies are like gay people who need to fight for their rights, or something.

And why make vidoes of the stuff and plaster it all over the net (keeping in mind that I think all porn is inherently wrong)? Do you really *need* to? And if you don’t want to be ‘judged’ then don’t put yourself out there to be judged. Sheesh.

Now, being a person who has masochistic fantasies I will say that I think it is unhealthy. I don’t believe it comes from a good place and I think people who just blantantly defend BDSM are just uncomfortable with exploring their motivations. Especially guys- because they know that they would get into strife if they came out and said “You know what? I DO get off on the the idea of rape”.

Nine Deuce and I may disagree in that I think rough, dominating sex and respect can go together just fine, and she feels my kind of kink is problematic. But I’m guessing she’d agree with me that you don’t get a pass on your inability to treat your sexual partners with respect because kink “made” you that way. You are still responsible for yourself. If you can’t have that kind of sex and still respect women, don’t have it.

You’re a feminist Nine Deuce. Feminism doesn’t mean having to give woman-haters house room.

You don’t need to publish this, but this guy is making my skin crawl. He gets off on torturing and hurting women. He’s a danger to all of us and his self-justifications are what is commonly known as adding insult to injury.

Patriarchy is based on sadism and destruction of women. Aray is one of its stormtroopers.

Does nobody hear the screams of pain of the women he hurts or are they still being muffled in the name of liberal tolerance?

However I don’t want to make claims about how well this freedom was. Also I realize that it is limited in time (read: historical time) and space (read: social space) and if you want to see it as a law then it’s a law that gets broken all the time. For my point to be valid I need only assume that it is one of several common perceptions of how things are, were or should be and that this perceptions gets frequently molded into BDSM roleplay.

Hmmm I seem to have missed that one. Must have been asleep.

Also: I can’t speak for anyone into BDSM and I do not condone anything that people in the BDSM community do. But that can’t come as a surprise, does it?

——-

1. “BDSM is a (by)product of patriarchy”
Why some people include power dynamics in their sexuality is unknown. There are many explanations out there, but while some of them make more sense than others, to my knowledge none can claim to be more than an educated speculation. This includes the claim that patriarchy produces BDSM.
However – as for other possible explanations – there are valid reasons to think that patriarchy has a hand in it: For instance “feminization” is commonly used as a way to humiliate men in BDSM play, but the opposite is extremely rare. Also submissive men are often very specific and demanding about their sexual wishes which seems to contradict their role in the power dynamic.
But that’s just half the story: People of all genders and sexual orientations engage in BDSM play. Of course this can be interpreted as a reaction to patrarchicl structures, too. But anything can. If we leave scientifical reasoning aside an only search for possible connections between the facts and abstract concepts we will encounter the same problems that conspiracy theorists and religious fundamentalists do.
Also Many people engage in practices that mimic the traditional power of women over men. Yes such power structures exist, even though most power relations work in the opposite direction, of course. In this case the dominant woman will have her partner worship and adore her and only grant him the favor of being close to her in the “propper”, submissive way if at all. This reflects the traditional, socially enforced power of women to say “no” and to chose among admirers. Also chastity devices are common in femdom play – they playfully exploit the urgend sexual drive of men for the sake of controlling him and framing male-attributed sexuality as “weak”.
BDSM is obviously entwined with gender relations. But that doesn’t have to mean that patriarchy is the cause of BDSM. It seems more conclusive to me that people who engage in BDSM play mimic power relations in the “real world” and incorporate them into their play. This goes for gender relations as much as for victorian “educational” practices or for fantasies about prison, slavery and so on. Everyone who is into BDSM will go to a period of finding out what is different about them. Desires are vague and need palpable realities to materialize. Nobody is born with a hunger for cheeseburgers, the cheeseburger is just a materialization of your desire to eat something with fat, some proteins, salt and carbonhydrates. In a world full of violence and oppression people who desire erotic power on one or the other side will materialize their desires in the examples the find in this world. They will go through a lot of guilt stress for it. I did. At some point most of them will realize they don’t need to, beacause it can be a beautiful thing when it is experienced with a loved and like-minded human beeing.
Again: I cannot disprove that patriarchy causes BDSM, but this claim is just as speculative as many others. As for me, I don’t believe in it.
One last thought on this: Imagine a huge pile of shit that stinks up the whole place. That pile is patriarchy. Now imagine a beautiful flower growing on top of it. Some will say they like the flower, some will say they hate it because it smells like shit. The flower is BDSM and it’s up to anyone to like ore dislike it, but no one has the right do look down on others for doing so. I’d love to see the pile of shit disappear. We’ll just plant the flower elsewhere.

But is the flower bad in itself? I’ll explore that in the following paragraphs.

2. “BDSM is degrading to women”
Actually some BDSM people refer to things they do as degrading, humiliating etc. But to them this is something good. They do not mean the same thing as people who are not receptive of the intimate and erotic implications in power dynamics mean, when they feel that BDSM is degrading to women. Of course if one assumes that BDSM sets an example of how people should act on one another in all kinds of situations that would make it degrading (to people of any gender for that matter). But that would obviously mean taking it out of context.
People exist, however few they are, who claim that women’s sexual submission is natural. This is degrading of course, but in my personal experience BDSM people tend to be less prone to express this kind of view than those outside the community. And even if the opposite were true that would make those people in particular being wrong and not BDSM in general.
I realize that BDSM play that mimics gender opression and other real world suffering is offensive to many, especially the victims of real violence. I strongly suggest that BDSM people should respect this by not confronting people with details of their fantasies who do not wish to hear/see it. However it suggest that they shouldn’t repress or deny their desires either or hide pretending they weren’t there. If you want to be offended you’ll always finde a reason – my take is to stop looking and use one’s energy to make the world better instead of wasting it on the actions of others that do not affect anyone who does not seek offense.

3. “BDSM perpetuates patriarchy”
I think that BDSM as any medium has both the potential to perpetuate and undermine gender relations. BDSM is clearly about power and control, but it is also about beeing free to choose your identity independently of your sex and gender and about limiting your choices to a individually defined context. BDSM isn’t wrong, there are rights and wrongs within BDSM as there are outside of it.

4. “Hurting people is wrong”
Well yes and no. I would say “deliberately harming people is wrong”, because hurting is to ambiguous a word in the context of BDSM. I define harming someone as making that person worse off, that includes harming someone who wants to be harmed. Clearly even this is oversimplified as failing to make someone better off and making somebody worse off is merely defined by convention, but that’s not my point here.
Harming in this sense would include selling crack to an addict. The addict wants the drugs, but both seller and buyer know the crack harms the person. However this is an extreme case and most of the time we are left to suppose wether something is going to do a person good or not. It is usually the best guess, that if a person is feeling positive about something and clearly states the she or he wants it that this person will be better off with than without it. My own experience is that in the overwhelming majority of cases people experience BDSM as gratifying – regardless of their gender, BDSM-role or sexual orientation and the last thing they want is getting rid of it. There are exeptions indeed and those people do need help. They need help to distinguish their healthy desires from desires that have proven to be unhealthy to them. This can be achieved through therapy. However, contrary to what some people here have guessed, it is NOT possible to this day to make BDSM fantasies go away nor is it necessary. People have problems with their sexual orientation, too, but the problem is not the orientation in itself.
Labeling BDSM activities as abuse, torture and the like means to understand it from an outside perspective only, which isn’t really understanding at all, but instead imposing moral absolutes on people who just happen to be different.
But isn’t it sad to be into BDSM, to need all this pain and distress to get intimate and aroused? No it’s not. BDSM clearly is ambivalent, but ridding it from this ambivalence would be like skipping movie straight to the happy ending und cutting out all the “unnecessary” drama, and pain. The ambivalence makes it all the more enjoyable and intense; it’s part of the thrill and not just a necessary evil.

5. “Someone who enjoys inflicting or suffering pain should seek out a psychotherapist”
I think this falls apart when you’re with me on the other points. Why would someone who is happy about her or his desires try to have them removed which is impossible anyway?
However therapy may help those who are distressed by outside judgment, guilt, shame and unrealistic fear and I would encourage anyone to seek therapy who thinks that he or she might benefit from it.

6. “Consent doesn’t work in the BDSM context”
There is some truth to it. Usually it does work very well. There is quite some discussion about this in the BDSM communities. There is a danger of slipping into an abusive relationship in analogy to slipping in dependency of a cult. The person takes little steps one at a time that makes him or her incresingly dependent of the cult or in this case of his or her partner. Any one step seems relatively harmless, but anyone who fails to see the big picture is in danger. It’s a trap.
This is a rare, but real problem. However this problem is already beeing addressed withing BDSM communities in order to make people more sensitive to it. People who see the big pictures grow aware of the small steps.
Similar problems include people finding themselves emotionally unable to utter a safeword or to resist a top pushing them too far. These things are considered problems in the communities and they are beeing cautioned about. It doesn’t mean that these things can’t happen, but don’t people get pushed too far or driven into dependency in the non-BDSM-world? Do people outside the BDSM-communities adress those problems as much as people inside of it do? This is not BDSM-specific, but at least BDSM folks try to do something about it.

7. “BDSM is dangerous”
I have just adressed some psychological and social dangers. In addition to that there are physical dangers, too. In general I would consider BDSM play more dangerous than crossing the street and far less dangerous than riding a car. Also the vast majority of people seem to be much more aware of the dangers of BDSM play than the dangers of driving. One of the most risky activities within BDSM might well be protected anal intercourse, which is probably not even more common inside than outside the BDSM communities.
Also the decision one faces is not wether to engage in BDSM or not, but also in what kind of practices one wishes to engage and with whom and under what conditions. Depending on your choices you might do BDSM that makes crossing the street look like an expedition to the north pole naked.
There are accidents in BDSM sometimes. Sadly there have also been lethal accidents. While most people don’t like to talk about it, when they were involved, others actually researchs them in order to better educate and inform others. All lethal and near-lethal accidents I have ever heard about were clearly due to violation of the most basic safety rules.
It’s anyones choice. Rock climbing is fun, but doing it without even basic knoledge about safety is stupid. So is engaging in sexual activities without any clue on STD’s. People who don’t bother to get basic information are idiots. People have the information and don’t act on it – well it’s their choice. But anyone pointing to the dangers of BDSM from the outside is simply preaching to the choir and implicitly comparing it to a fictious safe outside world.

8. “BDSM leads to real crime”
Then why don’t we here about BDSM people acting out real torture and rape all the time? I know that some (very few) cases exist – but I think most people here know how disgustingly common real rape and abuse are. BDSM, too, is very common – shouldn’t there be a lot of overlap?
Shure, rapists probably fantacise about rape before commiting it, but why did only a negligeable, tiny fraction of them ever join the BDSM community? I don`t have any statistics about that, but I repeat: Why aren’t we hearing about it? Is there a big BDSM-conspiracy undercutting the media?
I think the obvious explanation is that people who desire true rape know this from early on. They don’t join BDSM communities, because they don’t get off on living their fantasies consensually. Some of them might enjoy BDSM porn, but they’ll see it with different eyes. I’ve said it and I’ll say it again: You have to understand from within (,too) or you won’t understand at all. And when the perspective from within is the same than from outside, that’s when alarm bells should ring.

The bottom line: Everything is dangerous, if you do it in a certain manner. Everything is disgusting if you frame it in the fitting context. Everything is wrong if the costs outweigh the benefits. Everything corrupts society if we reduce it to its presumed essence and assume that it will spread like a disease.
We don’t live in a world in which some high priest decides what makes you go to heaven and what makes you go to hell and I am grateful for that. The downside is that we have to make our own judgements and unfortunately not all people are good at that. But should we protect them from those judgments? Can we? If one can do anything it is to help educate people, but if you want anyone to take you seriously, you should consider what they already know and not tell it to them all over again. Also you’d have to do it in an respectful non-judgmental fashion, that acknowledges that what they do is not intrinsically worse than others.
I for one will go on to address the possible dangers and downsides (including sexism) or opportunities within the BDSM community as many others do and will not start to lecture people in other communities about things they probably already know better just out of my first impression and one-sided information.

Thanks for reading – I’m eager to read any intelligent comments!

Get your head on straight, or stop engaging in BDSM. Not all women want kinky sex, and those who do still deserve your respect. If you can’t treat someone with the basic respect their humanity should afford them, you should not fuck them.