But having the self-awareness to realize that I was perhaps biased, I took a moment and went over his points again in my head. And after doing so, I have to say that I agree with those points.

First off, neither he nor I are saying that FetLife shouldn’t exist, or that people should stop using it. I think that a lot of people read the title of his article/presentation, and immediately think that’s what he’s saying. So what is he saying? As I understand it:

1. FetLife is not safe, as far as protecting your identity. Sure, it’s better than sites that can be indexed by search engines, but by the same token anyone can create an account and see most of your stuff^[2], so it’s a false sense of security. Also it’s not safe in that plenty of people still get attacked on there for their lifestyle.
2. Because FetLife can’t be indexed by search engines, people who are new to the lifestyle and have specific questions are likely to do a Google search, and not find the answers provided on FetLife. This is the “insular” part.

Going one step further, he suggests that privacy controls should be top on the list for FetLife to implement. I agree with this — I would much rather see that than things like a live chat, at this point. Yet who knows if it’s even on their develpment radar?  Granted, something like that would likely require a fundamental re-working of much of the site.

So what’s the ideal state of FetLife?  I would say: being like a stripped-down version of Facebook which allows for the same level of privacy control, except also allows for posting of adult content.

That means that FetLife would be able to be indexed by search engines, but only the information people wanted publi would be public. Are you a sex blogger that wants people to be able to find your FetLife articles and so forth? Make it public. Search engines can now index it. Are you a teacher whose job would be ruined if someone read your FetLife blog? Make it private, so that only your friends can see it.

Some concerns with this:

1. If FetLife were to move in this direction, by default they should lock everything down so that the public cannot see any information. Then people can open things up to anonymous browsers (and also search engines), other FetLife users, and certain friend groups as they please.
2. This may make it such that people can more easily search for “18-22 year old female submissive living in Atlanta” via a search engine. If #1 were implemented, it would mitigate this greatly. If they further made it so that search engines could never see age/sex/orientation/location (which wouldn’t be very tough), that would pretty much eliminate this concern altogether.
3. Discussions and other “shared spaces” would be trickier. Let’s say Bob starts a discussion and makes it public. I want to comment on Bob’s discussion, but I don’t want it being public. What are the options here? Maybe allow a “Make public?” option with each response… but that makes the discussion seem pretty fractured. Perhaps for people who have set their privacy such to not allow the public to see their profies, then when said public sees their comments in discussions it simply comes up as “Anonymous.”

I have to say that I’ve wanted to be able to create friend groups on FetLife (as you can on Facebook) for some time now, but for a slightly different reason — as with Facebook, I have acquaintances, friends, and close friends among my contacts list. And some of the people I have as acquaintances can be quite… prolific, and tend to spam up my update list. I would really like to be able to see just the stuff from my friends, or close friends.

So overall, I have to say that I agree with Maymay’s critiques of FetLife, though I don’t agree that it’s outright “bad” for the community — just that it could be much, much better. For FetLife to be the Facebook of kink, it has to be the Facebook of kink, in a way that both allows granular privacy control, and allows the outside world in (where desired by the information poster) so that it can be a resource everyone can use. And because FetLife is a business, a bonus to them from this system would be extra web traffic coming in from searches — currently if someone uses Google to look for “BDSM sounding”, and there’s an awesome article about it on FetLife that everyone is linking to, it won’t show up on Google. It would behoove FetLife for it to show up.

Everybody wins. But I’m not holding my breath that it’ll happen.

[1] I do think he used some rather specific tech/software terminology when talking to a less-specialized audience here, causing the statement to be misleading. A monoculture — in software terms — is a group of computers all using the same software. So he means to say (I think) that FetLife is becoming so large that a lot of people only interact there, so it’s a bunch of users using only this one website to talk about kink. He did not mean monoculture in the general sense of the word, which is a prevailing culture marked by homogeneity (some definitions also include a lack of dissent).

[2] FetLife recently added privacy settings that allow you to only show certain pictures to people on your friends list. This is a good first step, but it’s a small one.

How necessary are safewords?

I was just thinking about them the other day, and how Red/Yellow/Green are pretty common. Why? I’ve seen two reasons cited:

1. It’s universal, so in public play people will recognize it, and if you’re playing with someone new you’re unlikely to forget those safewords.
2. Because “stop” or “a little lighter” generally don’t work; they ruin the magic.

Reason #1 I completely understand.  But reason #2 seems overplayed.  Granted, I have scened a lot where I pay no attention to things such as, “Daddy, stop!”  In fact, it gives me great pleasure to ignore such pleas when I’m in that headspace.  However, when I’m playing with someone for the first time, I do listen to “stop” and other such verbal feedback[1].  In fact, with people new to the lifestyle, sometimes they’ll get far enough into headspace where “red” and “yellow” don’t come naturally to them, but “oh fuck, lighter please” does.  (Of course, I’d make them give a “sir” at the end first!)

Also, if I know someone well enough to ignore cries of “ow, no, stop!” then I generally don’t need to play with safewords at all. They are nice to have in case I really badly misjudge a situation, but the better of a top you are and the better you can read your bottom[2], the less you need them.

And looking outside of myself, it’s uncommon — though I wouldn’t go so far as to say “rare” — that I witness scenes where “okay I’m done” would be ignored.

So I wonder if safewords are used more as a shield against the outside world, and perhaps for a sense of security.  ”See?  Our lifestyle is okay, if someone really wants something to stop they only have to say the word.”

[1] Unless it’s specifically negotiated that sort of forced sadomasochism is something they’re looking for.

[2] It’s a combination of the two.  You can be a world-class top, but something just isn’t clicking with the bottom, or their “no” reaction is the same as the “yes!” reaction of a sub you work with regularly, for example.

This past weekend, some friends came in from out of town for a goth/fetish club event. My friend, his wife, and their roommate came down and we went to a new-ish club space in Atlanta. On the downside, the dungeon/play area on the bottom floor had a salty, sewer-like smell to it. Ugh. On the upside, lots of my friends were there, and there were some fun scenes; a rigger friend started the night off right with a suspension scene.

My friend requested on behalf of his wife that I put her on the cross and beat her, and also their roommate. I’d played with both of them before at a goth event in Louisville several months ago, and I was very happy to see that they both enjoyed it and wanted more. I did check in after that first time and they had only good things to say, but you never know until they come back for a second helping. The wife in particular caused my sadist-sense to go off the previous time; she’s pretty reserved, but I could tell that she was really getting into it. The scene this night was also pretty basic, for a few reasons. For one, I had had a few drinks, not enough to be anywhere near drunk or inaccurate by any means, but enough that I felt restraint was in order since neither of them are in the lifestyle. Also, it was a club that I wasn’t familiar with, and I don’t generally do intense scenes in public — it triggers some people when a girl is crying and you keep on hitting her, for example.

Anyway, I used one of my favorite toys: the dragon’s tail. I love the versatility of that thing. Thuddy, stingy, biting, wrapping… it can do a lot. Also, I like that it takes more skill than a flogger — you can be very precise with a dragontail, which appeals to me. I explored a bit more with the girls this time, and learned that my friend’s wife prefers pain on the back, whereas the roommate prefers it on the ass. Both of them are pretty shy and tentative about giving feedback, so I was very glad to see that they were being more communicative of what they like.

I also played with another friend after I was done with those two, and after all that I was ready for a break, so luckily my friend Blue was there to give me a beating with the dragon tail, and my other friend (the first girl’s husband) ready to give some rough body play. He is not really in the scene, but is good at that and seems to enjoy it.

In retrospect my switching that night made me think about my different headspaces.

My top headspace is very high-energy. I feel on top of the world, charged, radiant and aggressive. The more I let the chains loose on the beast, the more aggressive I get. Riding that edge has provided for some of the most awesome scenes, but I have very rarely done that since it’s still a place I’m a little afraid of. If I ever did something to someone that ended up harming them (especially emotionally), it would kill me. But at the same time, I really like hurting people badly. (Note the difference between harm and hurt. Pain is good. Injury is bad.) After a good scene as a top, I feel like I want to go run, or wrestle, or something. I’m jazzed, and the world is sharply in focus.

My masochist headspace is much more of a calm place. When I’m experiencing good pain, the world melts away. In fact, witnesses to my first singletailing scene (wherein my back got torn up pretty good) remarked how relaxed I was, as if I was about to fall asleep. The pain becomes punctuations between moments of stillness. Stingy pain is like a shooting star in a black sky. Punches from rough body play are like an aggressive massage. Afterward, I feel serene, like I want to snuggle up and doze off. I melt, and the world becomes fuzzy.

I also had the always-fun experience of another person from the scene coming up to me after that with an amazed/surprised expression saying, “Man, I thought you were a top!” To which I happily replied, “I am. I’m also a masochist. So really, I’m a dominant sadomasochist.” He identifies as a Master, but proceeded to tell me how he likes pain sometimes too. I honestly can’t remember the details — I was drifting at that point, not really able to hold a conversation.

At some point while I was doing all of this, a friend of mine used his new paddle on my girl. They both had quite a good time, and she was very positive about his spanking technique — he’s new to it, but apparently has a good feel for it (pun intended). I was pleased to see that the next day he followed up with me making sure that everything was all right, and making sure that I was still okay, reassuring me that he didn’t have any designs on my girl or anything. It wasn’t really necessary — I consider him a good friend and wouldn’t have okayed it if I thought anything funny was going on — but it was a very nice gesture.

Some other friends from New York came down for a grappling tournament last weekend as well. Unfortunately their schedule was packed so we didn’t get any play in, but I did enjoy a nice breakfast with them Sunday morning before they left. I’m very seriously considering starting a kinky grappling group here in the Atlanta area.

For some reason, that feels a bit hard for me to admit openly to the BDSM community. It seems like it’s almost expected that people be into it — I mean hell, it’s the first letter in BDSM!

I’ve heard others say that they like bondage because it puts the partner completely at their whim. I like having my partner completely at my whim without having to rely on her being tied up to do it. I love struggle play. It’s much, much more fun for me to wrestle my partner to the ground and pin her so that I can do what I want even as she struggles, than to immobilize her so that she is incapable of fighting back. Some tops aren’t strong enough, or well-trained enough (martially speaking), to utterly physically dominate someone in this way — or at least, not without the other person losing the struggle on purpose, anyway. And I can completely understand that for those people, bondage is their only option when it comes to physically dominating someone.

But me, I want her to be able to (try to) fight back. I want her to feel, viscerally, that I am dominating her and there is nothing she can do to stop it*. I want to see that realization wash over her, and for her to try denying it even as she knows it, and then eventually give in. And then I want to put her in more pain, different pain, to where she forgets all over again and tries to struggle again.

That is the sort of domination that gets me off.

What I don’t like is the idea of taking 15 minutes to tie a girl down while she sits there cooperating. I love how shibari looks as an art form, but I guess the part of my brain that is into BDSM doesn’t have the patience for it.

Cuffs I’m okay with, but if we’re just talking about my enjoyment, I still prefer not to use them. But that said, it seems like lots and lots of people are into bondage (rope and otherwise). So I feel compelled to at the very least learn and become expert at some basic ties that are quick to put on. I realize that, from a psychological perspective, some people need to be tied down to feel completely powerless. And I definitely do want my partner to be enjoying herself too.

Also, I realize there are some situations where it’s not possible to personally physically restrain someone while having a scene. For instance, I can’t hold someone down and hit them with a 6-foot bullwhip at the same time (not unless I hit them with the handle, anyway). In those cases I still prefer my partner to be free of bonds, but if I’m going to go so hard that they need support to continue standing, I’m fine with cuffing them.

If you’re a bondage aficionado, what do you get from it? The art/aesthetic pleasure? The immobilization/power factor? Something else altogether?

* Other than calling red, of course.

So, where is the line between BDSM and abuse? What it really boils down to is the intent of the top. If the top has the wellbeing of the bottom in mind, then it is not abuse. If the top really couldn’t give a shit about the bottom or hir safety, then they are being abusive. While we might roleplay degradation, if the so-called top really doesn’t care about the bottom then it’s not BDSM, period. Even in a TPE situation the master should care for their slave — if the slave is property, they should be a prized possession, to be cherished and taken good care of. In regards to abuse, I heard the sentiment expressed, “That (abusive) guy cared more for his car than for his girlfriend.”

However, intent is an internal thing — looking at a situation from the outside (or even as the potential victim), it can be nearly impossible to decipher. So personally, I like to use the distinction of hurt vs. harm. Hurt is what we do in BDSM play — be it pain of a physical nature like that of the singletailed wihp, or pain of a mental nature such as humiliation and degradation play. However, this is pain of a temporary nature. If the top is doing something that causes the bottom harm, then it’s abuse.

So what is harm? When I say harm here, I mean making a person weaker. Physically, making them disabled (e.g. purposefully wrenching their arm out of its socket, causing a permanent physical disability). Mentally, making them less able to successfully interact with the world at large (e.g. robbing them of their sense of self-esteem and self-worth). I’d even go further to say that any good top should seek to make their bottom stronger as a person — stretching their limits, helping them overcome fear and anxiety, making them better able to cope with the world.

If you think a friend is the victim of abuse, my advice is to not step in directly, but to continue to be there for them, even if they say they don’t want you around. Abusers often cut off their victims from their friends, so if it is an abusive situation, then you could be their only lifeline. However, taking direct action like calling the police on the abuser has often ended in tragedy for the victim. The abuser goes to jail for a few weeks or months, gets out, and takes revenge on the victim. Not a pretty story.

As a closing note, I’d like to take a moment to point out that mental abuse is far more insidious, and (from what I’ve seen) common, than physical abuse.

Being young does not mean that one is immature; it means that one is more likely to be immature. Conversely, neither does being older mean that one is mature. There are plenty of 40-somethings out there with the mentality of teenagers.

I’m young, and I apparently look even younger than I am*. I’m sure I’ve been the subject of age discrimination in the lifestyle, but I honestly have no problem with that. I am very forthright in what my level of experience is, and in that I am always looking to learn more — and I will be learning more so long as I draw breath. I think that respect should be earned, and I have no qualms with earning it from others, given a chance.

But to again flip the coin over, I also do not extend automatic respect just because someone has been in the lifestyle for several decades. I do tend to give a more leeway to those in the leather lifestyle that have earned the title of master, but I liken that to someone with the title of master in martial arts. At the very least, they (ostensibly) have a lot of experience. But someone not in the leather lifestyle who introduces themselves as “Master Suchandsuch” does tend to turn me off immediately. Sort of like those I mentioned in my last post, the dominants/masters online who use capital letters when referring to themselves (e.g. “I am a twue master, and My slaves all know it and bow before Me”).

* At the first munch I went to, asking my age was one of the first questions out of several people’s mouths. My response was always, “Guess first, and then I’ll tell you.” The numbers that most guessed were about 7 years too young.

In a lot of the more serious dungeons, there is no alcohol allowed. The secondary issue with that is that would require a liquor license in most places too, but nonetheless, most serious lifestylers agree that drinking and BDSM don’t go together.

I’d thought that most, in fact, were teetotalers when it came to drinking and playing.  And while some definitely are, the more I talked to people in the community, the more I found out that this wasn’t true. A friend of (who is an experienced dominant) had a few drinks when we were at dinner before playing in the dungeon, and I was a bit surprised. She told me, “A drink or two helps me to loosen up some.” She’s deadly accurate with a singletail whip (or with two at once!), and who am I to question her judgment?

And the more I paid attention, the more I saw this philosophy in other experienced players. Now, it was generally when they were playing with someone they were already experienced with, which is important to note.  And that also brings me to a…

Caveat! I am not saying that you should drink and kink. I am saying that from my personal experience, one needn’t be of the philosophy “if you’ve had a single drop of alcohol then you can’t play for the night!” I myself have played when I was too close to that edge, and better safe than sorry as they say.

In fact, my “too close to the edge” incident happened recently. It was at a gothy event that had some BDSM on the side, and with my girl not there and me without my equipment, I wasn’t planning on playing, so I had a few drinks. Then an opportunity planted itself firmly in my lap. There was a girl at the event that I’d wanted to play with for some time, but the timing was never right. Speaking with her there, it seemed that she had wanted to play with me as well. A guy standing next to us offered his flogger. I’m a pretty good self-judge, and I knew I hadn’t had enough drinks in me to lose accuracy. And the flogger, like the girl, was very well put together. So I couldn’t resist.

What I didn’t account for was that the flogger was weighted very differently than I was used to — it had longer falls, and a longer handle. My floggers are generally balanced right around the neck, this one was balanced further down the handle. So there were a few times that I wrapped. Which grates on my nerves like fingernails across a chalkboard. It screams amateur, and I am better than that.

The girl graciously told me afterward that she hardly noticed, and that it was a great scene. But you see, I’m a self-perfectionist. Also, what if I had had more drinks? Would I have passed up the opportunity in favor of caution? I think I would have, but I can’t really say.

This weekend I will be attending Frolicon, where there will lots of alcohol, and lots of play going on. I generally only make a mistake once, and I won’t be making that one again.

And though I talk about this from the perspective of a top, the same is true of the other side. If you feel worthless unless you have someone to serve, that is not healthy. While the lifestyle provides a good outlet for filling that void, it can also be used as a band-aid to cover up deeper issues that need direct attention (and possibly even therapy).

Just to make it clear, I’m not saying that if you don’t feel complete without dominance/submission being part of your life then there’s something wrong with you, or you have no self-esteem.  I’m saying that if you measure your worth (consciously or subconsciously) by the presence of someone filling that role in your life, then you should ask yourself if your use of BDSM is feeding  the problem rather than solving it. I strongly believe BDSM is a healthy way for many people to work through issues, but that’s not to say that all people engage in it in a healthy manner.

Of course, the same is true in the vanilla world. Again, self-esteem that is absent without the love/affection/attention/approval of another isn’t self-esteem at all. And here I would like to say that you, dear reader, are a worthwhile individual of your own accord, with or without a partner, in the BDSM world or otherwise.

What I engage in is really more of “oxygen play” than breath play — coming from a martial arts background, I know a variety of chokes, and in martial arts they are split into two categories: blood chokes and air chokes. Blood chokes (like the sleeper hold, also known as the rear naked choke) cut off the flow of blood to the brain, whereas air chokes cut off the air supply to the lungs (which eventually cuts off the supply of oxygen to the brain). Blood chokes are far and away my favorite, for a couple of reasons.

First, blood chokes are much safer. Air chokes, which generally put pressure on the trachea, can cause damage to the trachea if there is too much struggling or if you apply the choke too hard. With blood chokes, unless you’re incredibly strong and using all of your strength, it’s unlikely that you’ll cause any damage even if you put the choke on very hard (assuming you let go once the other person goes limp).  According to Knight’s book Forensic Pathology, there is an expert consensus that it takes a minimum of four to six minutes to start to do permanent brain damage with a completely effective choke hold. So when you’re talking about 10 seconds or less, you should be well within the safe zone.

Second, the effect of a blood choke is almost immediate – you can choke someone to unconsciousness in easily under 10 seconds, whereas with an air choke it could take a minute or more. This can be good and bad, depending on what you’re going for. With an air choke, that leaves more time for panic (if that’s what you’re going for), but also more time for struggling, and more opportunities for an accident to occur. I don’t care how bad a girl she’s been; crushing her trachea is not appropriate punishment!

A note about blood chokes and unconsciousness: there are several levels of unconsciousness, and a properly applied blood choke will put someone into a basic level of unconsciousness quickly. So quickly and easily that you might think they’re faking. Trust me, they’re not. And while you can safely apply the choke for a while longer after this — maybe an extra 5-10 seconds — their body will reflexively go into panic mode, and even though they’re unconscious, they will thrash about. While this isn’t particularly dangerous for them if you have them secured (and assuming you don’t apply the choke for a long time after that), it will cause them to come back to consciousness more panicked, and generally with a splitting headache to boot. I’ve made this mistake before, so please learn from my mistakes!

Also, choking to the point of unconsciousness is (of course) not the only option, nor one I necessarily recommend. It takes a huge level of trust from the bottom, and a fair amount of knowledge from the top, to safely do that. Engaging in carotid chokes that do not end in unconsciousness (i.e. are only applied for a second or two) also gives that feeling of power exchange, the moment of panic, the building of trust.

*    *    *

The other night, I talked some with my girl about breath play, trying to find out what she gets from it. I highly recommend that you talk with your partner about these sorts of things, by the way — not just breath play, but your SM relationship in general. Getting a peek into your partner’s head helps you know them better, which strengthens the bond, and also makes play more fun. Knowledge is power, after all. *grin*

For her, there are several elements. There is the element of struggle, which is enjoyable for her. She is physically strong, and also grew up with two brothers, so she’s used to wrestling. She also has dated far more women than men, and even the men she’s dated she’s been able to physically best them in such situations for the most part. So she’s used to winning. For me (a skinny guy) to be able to physically overpower her when she’s really trying gives a certain edge to it; she’s not roleplaying and pretending to let me take control over her, I am physically taking control of her in a very real way.

There is the physical element as well. Breath play makes orgasms more intense. This is no doubt why so many deaths from auto-erotic asphyxiation occur. I’m not sure how much of this is purely physical, and how much psychological. I can say that even clasping a hand around a partner’s throat and applying light pressure has seemed to make their orgasms more intense. Note that this experience is always with people who welcomed it though — it’s absolutely not the sort of thing you do without discussing it first. But I don’t need to tell you that. You are all negotiating before scenes, and all you tops that want to engage in breath play are asking if it’s okay, right? Good, I thought so!

But the biggest aspect is trust. Once I lock in a choke, there is the moment of panic. She knows that she is completely powerless, at my whim. And though there is that survival instinct screaming in her brain, she also knows that she is in no danger. It’s exciting; it’s a rush of adrenaline; it both requires trust and strengthens it.

And then when she comes to, there is that split second where she doesn’t know where she is, what’s going on, or what just happened. Fear. Confusion. But she sees my face, feels me against her, and she is immediately at ease. The contrast from one extreme to the other makes it all the more significant.

From my end, it’s the exact same from the other side of the coin. It is an amazing feeling of control, and it feels good knowing that someone trusts you to that extent. You can see it, and feel it. In this day and age of emotional repression and distancing, it is beautiful to be able to form a bond that close, and in doing this sort of thing, you experience how deep of a bond it really is.

Though all SM activities require trust, I think that breath play, and especially breath play involving carotid choking to the point of unconsciousness, requires a different level of trust. If the top were to do something wrong, by accident or on purpose, it could more easily and quickly result in death than with any other SM activity that immediately comes to mind.  The worst-case scenario, no matter how unlikely, is still pretty extreme. Perhaps this is one of the reasons that Jay Wiseman is against it.

For me, the risks are acceptable; my girl is more likely to be injured or killed out driving than while in my arms’ crushing caress. It’s a risk that each person involved has to weigh, but some people see it as unquestionably too dangerous to engage in, and I personally disagree vehemently with that notion.

Of course, I’m not the only one that struggles with this, and it’s not limited by any means to males or sadists.  My own bottom feels guilty for asking for pain.  My friend Clarisse went through guilt and horror and shame when she realized that she was into BDSM. For bottoms, there is the stigma that only crazy people want pain, and for female bottoms there are additional stigma — you’re reinforcing an abusive stereotype, you’re going against everything feminists have worked to give you, etc. Man, don’t get me started on that feminist one. Feminism is about equality and women having the same choices men do, so maybe not all women want to be doctors and corporate raiders, dig? Damnit, I got started. Okay, reeling it in.

In any case, I find that this often is a barrier to play at home. As if leading busy lives with often-conflicting schedules weren’t enough (which is worthy of a post on its own), she feels like she’s bugging me if she asks for a spanking, and I feel like an Evil Guy (in a bad way) if I tell her I want to give her one.

But in the dungeon, or at a club, that’s not the case.  Maybe part of it is that in those places I’m more in uniform.  Maybe it’s just that I associate BDSM activities with those places, so it’s easier to get into my headspace.  Maybe it’s less of a jump than it is at home — the difference between transitioning from watching television to spanking, versus leading her to a bench and bending her over it.

My mentor has made a few suggestions to overcome this, and we’re trying some things to see what works for us (for example, “I think I’m going to go to bed early,” usually equals, “I want to play (or have sex); follow me if you do too.”).