BDSM Weblog

I am a very accepting person — my philosophy is, “If it makes you happy and is done with the informed consent of everyone involved, then wonderful!”  However, there are some things that I think are flat-out wrong even if they make one happy.  One of these things is some people’s idea of the ideal master/slave relationship.

On various online BDSM forums, there are discussions about what it is to be a slave.  Like all things, I think that some people take it too lightly, and some people take it way too far.   To whit: there seems to be a philosophy among some that “the only need a ‘true slave’ has is the happiness of their master.”  I think this is utter bullshit, personally.  It’s fantasy, not reality.

To take an extreme example: a master decides to put their slave in a hole for the rest of their life with absolutely no human contact (not even with the master), and only the barest essentials necessary to live.   But could someone truly be happy in this situation? I don’t think so, and if it were possible, there would be something seriously, seriously abnormal (read: broken) in the slave’s brain chemistry.

Everyone has emotional needs.  Any master that enters into a relationship wherein he only considers his own needs and desires, and not those of his property, is an abusive person and not a master, period.  I don’t care if that’s what the slave wants — the slave is psychologically damaged, and that does not excuse the master’s abuse, any more than “consent” excuses the behavior of the Craigslist Cannibal (which I find simultaneously mind-boggling, and hilarious).

I realize that this is a dangerous line to tread.  Similar justifications have been used in the legal arena to make all BDSM activities illegal, even though they are between consenting adults.  The argument goes: if they consent to that sort of thing, then they’re obviously not in their right mind, and therefore cannot legally give consent.  But most of us in this lifestyle are perfectly rational, non-traumatized individuals capable of giving informed consent.  In fact, I’ve read about independent studies that show that your average BDSM practitioner is actually more psychologically healthy than your average ‘nilla.  However, I think that anyone who consents to the level of abuse I’m talking about above is not at all mentally healthy, and I would challenge anyone to prove otherwise.

Filed under: Rants by Sammael