Winter/Spring Teaching!

I didn't get to do a lot of teaching last year, but this Winter/Spring I'm happy to have the time and opportunity to teach at three amazing events. Catch me there!

• WestCoastBound 2017 - Vancouver, BC - January 27-29, 2017
  I've been trying to get to WCB for a few years now and I was finally free to present at this year's event. I can't wait to experience this - I hear it's a wonderful weekend. I'll be presenting alongside amazing people like Laura Antoniou, Lew Rubens, Barkas & Addie, Midori, and Danarama - get tickets if you're on the west coast! I'm presenting on my personal favorite topics: Rope Torture, Humiliation/Degradation, and best of all, MOUTH PLAY! 

• Dark Odyssey Winter Fire 2017 - Washington, D.C. - February 17-20, 2017
  This will be my second Winter Fire and my third DO event and I am as excited as ever to be returning. This is my favorite hotel event in the U.S. - you can't beat it! I'll be presenting two bondage classes (Beautiful Boys, and Bondage for the Flexibly Challenged), and a class on Negotiation which has been a big success wherever it's been presented.
  
• Ropecraft Chicago - Chicago area - Memorial Day weekend (May 26-29, 2017)
  This is a big one for me because it's two "finally!" things in one con - I finally get to go to this event that everyone is talking about, and a rope event is finally replacing the now-defunct Shibaricon in Chicago on Memorial day weekend. Not sure yet which classes I'll be teaching, but the event is sure to be lots of fun!

There is no spoon

In a recent yoga class, while leading us through a particularly challenging sequence, the instructor told us to "let go of everything you do not need, right here, in this moment." I knew what she was talking about. I've done a lot of that kind of letting go in my life.

When I was 15 I was diagnosed with a gastrointestinal disease called Ulcerative Colitis. It’s not that uncommon (about 1 in 300 people have it), so you’ve probably heard of it. Mostly, my disease is manageable, and I’ve had 25 years of practice at coping with it. While nowadays I only have bad episodes a couple times a year, for a good 10+ years it was something I dealt with constantly – either the disease itself, or the side effects of one or another medication. As I’ve dealt with a really severe flare up this month, I’ve remembered what that was like, and I’ve seen myself coping in the same way I always have - I do as my yoga teacher suggested and “let go of everything I do not need, right here, in this moment.” I’ve realized that this practice of letting go not only of that which does not serve me, but that which I do not absolutely REQUIRE, is something I do all the time now, in general. And that maybe that's not the best thing for all the time.

I am realizing now how much having this chronic illness has contributed to how I interact with the world. Why am I writing about this in a forum intended for kinky people?  Because life with this disease has helped to re-shape me from who I was into who I am, and who I am affects how I kink. Also, I’ve not spoken about this to hardly anyone in the kink community ever, for reasons I’ll get into in a sec, and I think I need to do this now, as a way of unburdening myself a little. So here goes.

I don’t know what it’s like for other people with unseen physical diseases, but I am above all embarrassed about my disease. For one thing, I like to perceive myself as a strong person, and I like others to perceive me that way too, and having a disease which sometimes totally cripples me doesn’t really boost that perception. I know I’m strong for how I’ve handled myself, but other people might not perceive it that way. For another (and much more significant) thing, the symptoms of my disease are things which are not generally talked about in polite society. We are taught to hide what we do on the toilet, you know? So yeah, it’s hard to explain to people why I’m running to the bathroom all the time, or why I can’t suspend you because I can’t guarantee I won’t have to leave for 10 minutes all of a sudden, or why I turned around and went home after getting all the way to the club because I couldn’t find a bathroom in time and had to go crouch behind a dumpster in an alley or something and now I feel awful and have ruined my outfit.

Feeling embarrassed about my circumstance has led me to be pretty withdrawn about my personal nuances, in general. I clam up and it’s hard for me to talk about my weaknesses around new people. But then when I feel like I can trust someone to understand, I let it all out in a big ol’ word vomit and probably scare people off because they think I’m slightly unhinged. I may actually be slightly unhinged by this. My embarrassment has led me to feel a need for control over my circumstances that I didn't used to feel. It's part of why I am more a rigger than a bottom, now.

In the kink community in particular, I’ve also noticed that I feel lesser than with this particular illness. Why? A lot of it is because of butt stuff. Butt stuff is really, really bad for me. I know this because I have tried and it is not a good idea at all. I now basically have a doctor’s note that says “no butt stuff.” But it’s so popular! It’s encouraged so widely! Everyone wants to have things in their butt and/or to put their things in a partner’s butt, and I can’t participate in the receiving end of that. It’s such a prevalent desire among kinky people, and so important to so many of them, and so widely talked about, that I feel I am an undesirable partner for lots of folks I’d like to have sexytimes with. And therefore I sort of feel like an undesirable person, in a community where so much of a person's perceived worth comes from their worth as a potential partner. And then there’s that whole previously mentioned issue about not really being able to control my bowels sometimes. It’s hard to gauge whether someone is going to be cool when I say “sometimes when I orgasm really hard I become incontinent” or whether they’ll deal with it like my college boyfriend did the first time it happened, by being so horrified that he yelled at me and left me crying in the shower. And no, that wasn’t a consensual humiliation scene.

Feeling lesser than because of my condition has led me to be very, very shy about pursuing new sexual partners, especially male sexual partners. I don’t want to become invested in liking someone only to find out that I’m undesirable to them because of my physical limitations. I’m shy, so I feel left out. But remember, I’m someone who wants to be seen as strong. So like most people who are shy but don’t want to be seen as shy, I just put up a wall that makes me seem unapproachable, rather than afraid to approach people.

Finally, my disease can be time-consuming, energy-consuming, and physically, mentally, and emotionally taxing. When I’m sick, I can’t do much except be sick. Getting to work in the morning, eating meals, getting home, keeping the house clean, interacting with people – these are sometimes things I don’t have enough spoons to do. So I do that thing of letting go of all the things I do not need right then, in that moment, to get through to the next moment. It turns out I can and do let go of everything except: my breath, my body awareness that little voice in my head that tells me I can do this because I have no other choice, and my dignity. A lesser - but still very important - requirement is company from people who I really trust to care for me, and around whom I feel secure being fragile. Apart from those things, I let it all go. The problem is, because I’ve spent so much time having to let go of what I don’t absolutely need “right now” that I don’t know how to invite in the things I really need "not necessarily right now" for my happiness, like having close friends and being good to them, and being able to relax around people in general. I need to have a larger support network than the extremely small handful of people I rely on when I’m really sick. It’s not fair to them and it’s not healthy for me.

This has been long and if you’ve read to here I think you’re neat. I don’t have a conclusion other than to say it’s been good to realize these things and get them down on “paper” and into the world where they’re not just held inside me. Maybe I should wrap all my realizations up in a nice bow here but I’m not going to. I hope maybe somebody who is interested in having it has a better understanding of what’s below the surface.

Hysteriarectomy

How does one know when one is overreacting? This is something I think about all the damn time. 

It's sort of messed up that with all my thinking, writing, reading, and talking about feminism, I should be susceptible to internal voices like...

...maybe that email isn't really so creepy after all. Am I overreacting?
_____________

So I'm RSVP'd maybe to an event, right? It's the same day as another event at a later time that I'm running, so I'm really not sure the logistics of going, and I haven't really thought about it in awhile. I'm also RSVP'd to a couple of other events this month, and am a member of a few groups which hold events semi-regularly, etc. I'm not good at keeping track of my maybes.

I get this email out of the blue from a dude who I don't know from Adam. He notices, he tells me, that I'm RSVP'd maybe to the event on [date/s redacted*]. He hopes I can make it. He wants to meet the "mastermind" behind my profile. He states that I'm "talented" and posits that it's "in more ways than one."

My first reaction is to be like, "What event on [date/s redacted]? What group is this dude an organizer of? He doesn't seem familiar to me." I look on my events. The event he was speaking of was an event for which I know the organizer well. This dude is NOT representing the event. But - **and I say this as an event organizer** - based on this guy's words:

"I see you're down as a maybe for the event on [date/s redacted]; I hope you can make it."

...I am led to believe that he is representing the event. And then that awful "I'm sure you're talented in more ways than one" pickup line! Gross. 

So, I was on the fence about the event, due to scheduling issues. This email - which I knew for a fact was NOT from the event organizer, who I reiterate is a friend of mine - this email made me decide not to go to the event. How so? Because I knew if I went, even with a partner, this guy would creep on me. And I am not about to pay for the privilege of having to keep my guard up at a kink event. Despite the fact that I kinda wanted to go. Was I overreacting? Maybe, I thought, but better safe than sorry.

Then I thought to myself: MrsB, you should really email the event organizer and tell him about this. I bold the Him in that previous sentence because the sex of the organizer really did factor into my decision as to whether or not to bring it to his attention. Despite the fact that this organizer is my friend, and one whom I know takes the safety and comfort of all his guests seriously. But I have been told by every single man I know in my personal life that, at one time or another, I am overreacting to something I perceive as sexist or threatening. 

Let me repeat that.

At one time or another Every. Single. Solitary. Man. I. Know. has accused me of overreacting to something I perceive as sexist or threatening.

So I thought to myself - will I be accused of overreacting? *AM I*, in fact, overreacting? The first couple lines of the email, where he seems to be representing the event, could have just been a mishap of phrasing. Surely someone not representing an event would not reach out to me, pretending to represent that event? [Note: In light of how this has played out, I believe that to have truly been the case.] The second part of the email, with the pickup line: that's creepy, isn't it? Or is it just lame? How much of the benefit of the doubt do I give this guy? 

I went through this song and dance with myself for several hours before I took a chance on my friend, the organizer, and texted him about it. And because he's a good organizer who, as I said, takes the safety and comfort of all his guests seriously, he read my concerns, validated them, suggested that he might take action about it, and when I said that'd be good, he did so. AND he thanked me for bringing it to his attention. 

It was a great big relief that it played out like that. I was really surprised at how much it felt like a relief to have that happen. Because so often it doesn't. It truly did feel like a gamble to reach out to this person. IT SHOULD NOT FEEL LIKE THAT.

This isn't a note about how event organizers should be more responsive. I believe organizers are becoming more responsive every single week and every single event. Rather this is a note about how it shouldn't feel like a gamble to bring this stuff up. It felt like a gamble simply because this person was a man, and so often I am told by men that I'm overreacting to stuff like this. (I get told this sometimes by women too, and that's a whole 'nother journal entry.) I'm told so often that I'm overreacting to stuff like this that I question my own perceptions on a regular basis. 

Guys, the amount of energy I spend questioning my own perceptions about things I see as sexist or threatening is fucking exhausting and I'm tired of it. I spend enough time questioning whether I'm reacting logically to totally legit stuff I might not be reacting to logically, like whether my frustration with the lady ahead of me in line at the grocery store is justified, or whether my snapping at my husband about not cleaning the peanut butter off the spoon was maybe a little harsh. I'm no longer interested in spending energy in deciding whether or not my own perception of whether something seems sexist or threatening to me as a woman is right. But as long as people continue to question my perception about that like half the time, I guess I'll continue wasting my energy that way. 

I'm glad there was a step in the right direction today. 

Absorbing my first camp – meditations in no particular order on Dark Odyssey SummerFest

I’m a summer camp kid from way back. I didn’t know what to expect at my first camp, and although I tried to keep my expectations to a minimum, I did allow myself to imagine I’d feel some sense of connection to my younger and less jaded self from my camp counselor days. The DOSF community made me feel utterly welcome and included and that means so much to me. I felt like I was living out a camp fantasy I’d never had the imagination to dream up before.

We were like a giant civilization of unsupervised kids – dirty, sweaty, naked, showing off for each other, sharing with each other, watching one another without judgement, letting ourselves be watched without self-consciousness, role-playing, fucking each other, beating one another up, peeing on things, playing the most imaginative games we could conceive, sometimes sexy, sometimes silly, sometimes serious, and always done with truth. It felt like living with the Lost Boys in Never-Never Land, but with more sex.

I got to use my sexuality in a way I’d not done in years. I hadn’t realized, but I’d been holding it in check for various reasons, and I was less of myself for it. My sexuality is who I am, and I hadn’t been completely myself, and now I feel more me than I was before camp.

There was so much sincerity, all around me, from others, and within me. That level of realness is magical.

I love getting positive feedback from people who take my classes. It makes me feel useful.

I wished I’d been able to feel a little more vulnerable, but in my heart I am a guarded person and this was my first time around 90% of the people I interacted with. I do know that I want to interact with many of them more in the future – I want to really *know* them, in the sense that we become intimately familiar with one another. That makes me hopeful, which is such a nice way to feel. I hope I’ve successfully expressed to those people who they are in a way that makes sense to them, but I’m a little afraid I might not have.

Compersion still does not come naturally to me, but I keep trying.

I’m not sure my inner animals necessarily want to come out right now, but the Paws-for-All class did get me thinking about what they need even if they decide to stay hidden, and I’m grateful – thanks, @MaestroStephanos and @SilverSenta.

Being able to casually refer to someone your Stunt Cock/Penis-in-Residence makes a person feel pretty baller.

My mind was completely blown by the Radical Body Acceptance practiced 100% of the time at camp. I was reminded there is no “normal” kind of body. Every single person’s body is unique and it’s theirs and at camp they all seemed to really own that, and I found that beautiful and affirming, and it will stay with me.

The most important things to me remain: to feel loved, useful, and welcome.

My tying is better when I do pick-up play and not planned scenes. This is a thing I get to explore and learn about myself now.

I found myself feeling genuinely intoxicated by joy on more than one occasion.

I feel so incredibly grateful to have been at this event. I cannot thank Dark Odysssey for having me out to teach, and I really hope I get to experience another. There is more to process to be sure but this is a reasonable start for someone who needs about 18 consecutive hours of sleep!

Dark Odyssey Summerfest 2015: Links for Presenter Feedback Forms

Hi sexy people!

If you took one of my classes at Dark Odyssey Summerfest 2015 and would like to provide feedback for me, links are posted below.

I appreciate the time and effort you take to provide feedback that will help me better serve our communities as an educator, and I hope you had a great time in class!

If you took: Yes &: Positive Negotiation for More Satisfying Play, class feedback form is here:
http://ropegirlschicago.polldaddy.com/s/class-feedback-yes-positive-negotiation-for-more-satisfying-play-dosf15

If you took: Beautiful Boys: Tying the Male Form, class feedback form is here:
http://ropegirlschicago.polldaddy.com/s/beautiful-boys-tying-male-form-class-feedback-dosf2015

If you took: Confident Submission: Finding Your Power Before the Exchange, class feedback form is here:
http://ropegirlschicago.polldaddy.com/s/confident-submission-finding-your-power-before-exchange-dosf15

If you took: The Feminist Pervert, class feedback form is here:
http://ropegirlschicago.polldaddy.com/s/the-feminist-pervert-class-feedback-form-dosf15

Shibaricon Write Up 2015!

SHIBARICON WRITE UP 2015

Thursday

I arrived early and got to catch up with some people and meet a few new ones outside the coffee shop. Nobody knew where the initial presenter meeting was supposed to take place, so I headed up to the lobby with MonkeyFetish, Zamil, and Andra, Dov, and Solatus to see what we could see. The other presenters were gradually drawn to us and gathered around, because everyone knows that experienced presenters give off a special presenter pheromone which attracts other presenters to them. There we were, a small flock of lost inflated egos, waiting for our shepherd to guide us to our meeting, when lo and behold Psychokitty and Pendragon led us to our room where SirC awaited us with gift bags. Hallelujah!

Afterwards I went to the meet & greet where I paid $8 for a bottle of beer and caught up with more people. It was nice. I used my extra sharp nails to scratch the shit out of gingerkitty’s  arm, right where TK wraps go, so she’d have a little gift to start the weekend right. I met _MrBrightSide_, who was planning to be a demo bottom for my class the next day, and I met Dorian, who has nice shoulders and likes to have his cock and balls in rope, and so naturally I asked him to demo bottom for me as well ;) The husband and I did some edge play wherein over the course of an hour or so, he kept asking if I was ready to go home. I kept saying no, but eventually I said yes. He didn’t respect my boundary! Violator! I allegate against you sir! I am an alligator!

FRIDAY

Hedwig’s Freestyle Floorwork class was a really nice way to start the con. Gingerkitty and I practiced switching off with one another. We got moving and had some fun, and I got a few nice pointers about how to move your bottom around more effectively . Hedwig is like a love child resulting from a threesome between Pokémon, Betty Boop, and an adorable, fluffy white ferret.

I went to Strange Things on the Chest next. The things weren’t particularly strange, but I did learn a nice karada harness for suspension. I tied luceyed, who was wearing this super hot denim jumpsuit which I got to incorporate into the tie. She got all floopy in my rope which was pretty cool. I also almost dropped her – luceyed totally saved the situation with her lighting fast reflexes. I was mortified and thoroughly shaken up and apologized probably ten times. I made a resolution to be more mindful of safety first for the weekend which served me well. Luceyed was super cool about everything.

The last class that day was Strangelove and sansumi’s Honnawa class, promising rope around the neck and discomfort – yes! Hubby came and made a Very Special Appearance at the con by actively participating in a class, something not seen in this decade, and we got to spend an uninterrupted 90 minutes together at Shibaricon, something also not seen in this decade. Yay! He tied rope around my neck and caused me physical discomfort. It was nice.

Dinner was at some confusing suburban restaurant with my husband, cuddleswithteeth, Dorian, and Ropeguyjin. I have never laughed so much at a dinner ever in my life. I have absolutely no recollection of what we talked about but we were hilarious. Also bonus: we apparently missed the fire alarm fiasco? I’m told the DJ for the prom on the lower level was using a fog machine and ruined everyone’s night. Ah, prom.

I made a small but still grand entrance into the dungeon in my fave lacy black bodysuit/teddy thing and some super maneater heels. There was an audible “ooh-aah” effect from Hedwig & co. which was pretty fucking awesome and confidence-inspiring. There was a lot of nice stuff to check out in the dungeon; for the first night of the con, it was pretty great to see such good ropework going on already. I did I tiny bit of practice/show and tell with _MrBrightSide_ so he’d know what to expect for the next day.

Dorian came up to me and gave me some serious puppydog eyes and asked to play because he hadn’t bottomed for rope in a long time, and I was more than happy to oblige because his opening line to me the previous night was “You should know three things about me: I’m a masochist, I’m not shy, and I’m not small.” How can a girl say no to that? I tied him up and suspended him and tied his package to his leg and gagged him and nibbled daintily [translation: viciously] on his toes. It was fun.

SATURDAY

My day started out with my Beautiful Boys class – it was so fun to teach! I could not believe there were so many people in the class, opposite people like Nawashi Kanna, Lee Harrington, Scott Smith, -EM-, and Lani DV8. I got to rip some chest hair off of Jin, manipulate _MrBrightSide_’s body with my armor tie, tie Dorian’s cock&balls to his leg in a partial, and turn Chemical Ouch into an Avenger. I hope the attendees had as much fun as I did! Appropriately, the Hitchin’ Bitches lunch followed and it was really great to meet all those women from around North America who are part of a HB group. It’s always a nice moment when you can finally put a face to a name!

I spent the afternoon taking classes from Ben Hart (who is really a good, solid teacher – more from him please!) and from EbiMcKnotty. Cuddleswithteeth was my bottom for Ben Hart’s class, and she was outrageously late in arriving because, being the incredibly lovable derp she is, she’d gone out to lunch and returned to the wrong Hyatt. Derptastic!  Jin was my class bottom for Ebi’s class, which I really was excited to take since I am an Ebi fangirl club member. Ever since this class, Jin has been walking up to me, looking me in the face, and saying “Evil!” every time he’s seen me, so I think I picked up something useful in that class ;-) Thanks, Ebi! I had a nice dinner in the hotel bar catching up with Roughinamorato, and partaking of a little digestif he’d brought from home. Then off to the second play party!

I could not remember the last time I’d truly bottomed for a rope scene – it had been perhaps two years, maybe more. So who better to ask to shove me all at once back into the deep end of the pool than BlueRisk? He had saved a slot on his dance card for me, and this was the time. He asked me what I was looking for and I told him I liked to be bent in weird ways and surprised. He was like “I can work with that” and then he tied me up and his ropes made me feel first calm, then sexy, then challenged. He pushed me right to the edge of my ability, which was exactly as far as I wanted to go. Then after I reached that point, some super-hot untying happened, and it took a reverse trajectory to the tying – challenging, sexy, then calm. Two thumbs up, Murphy!

Next came my long-awaited scene with cuddleswithteeth. She had been a play partner of my husband’s for a good while, so I know what she’s about pretty well – she is a heavy masochist, a humiliation bottom, all the fun edgy stuff. Also she is soft and cuddly, and is simultaneously totally gracious and totally inelegant at all times. We played at COPE last year and it was pretty fucking sweet; I got to hurt her as much as I wanted to and she totally loved it! Win win! So naturally we were going to do it again. I honestly don’t remember how I tied her other than it was in some super-weird and awkward position with a futo on one leg. I poked at her and bit her and stood on her and scratched her with my claws and hit her and punched and kicked her, and I used some of the fun tips about body positioning and breath and tempo I’d picked up from classes. I had her gagged with a scold’s mask so she could scream with relative impunity and I couldn’t see her any of her face except her nose and eyes, and her eyes kept changing from “WHAT THE FUCK ARE YOU DOING TO ME” to “OMG KEEP DOING IT”. It was great.

My favorite part of the scene was a completely happy accident. Total masochist/bottom though she may be, cuddleswithteeth has this lizard-brain response to her vagina being exposed to the world, especially during a violent scene. So here I was, in the middle of the dungeon, trying to peel her legs apart for a cunt-kick, when I noticed that a couple of little teensy flecks of toilet paper had gotten stuck in that moist valley between her labia majora and minora. This, my friends, is a sadistic humiliation top’s dream come true. She has gone to all this trouble to shave her bits for the weekend, to look nice for the scene, to take all my torture so very well, and then she does the porn equivalent of leaving the stall with toilet paper stuck to your shoe. Of course I very loudly pointed this out to her and she was utterly mortified. WIN!

I ended the scene by pinching the inner-middle part of her ear really hard with my fingernails, and the “WTF are you doing” look reached its maximum level and I laughed like the sadistic maniac I am, and the couple wrapping up a scene next to us looked over at me with a look that was either “WTF” or “Kudos”, which either way I’ll take as a compliment. Then I gave her aftercare by offering her an apple, getting her to bite down on said (sweet, juicy Pink Lady) apple, and eating the apple out from her mouth as the peel dug deeper and deeper into her gums. A favorite trick taught to me by this awesome priest I know. I went home early so I could get some sleep before my morning class.

SUNDAY

I pulled myself out of bed at 8 on Sunday morning to teach my very most favorite discussion class, The Feminist Pervert. We had a really great group of people and as always the discussion was lively and nonstop. We even came up with a new hashtag for when people hear the words “male gaze” or “patriarchy”: #maleglaze. There’s never enough time for this class – we could go on for hours! I’m so glad Shibaricon asked me to lead it again.

Next it was off to the single best class I’ve ever taken at any Con, ever: Strangelove and sansumi’s Sadistic Connective Rope. Strangelove is like a cross between a lion and a bear, and sansumi is the delicate deer he preys on – they’re a brilliant team. I was super privileged to tie the resilient, generous, and gorgeous Molly_V for the class. As soon as Strangelove said something about wanting to push to people’s limits not to break them, but to “find the state of mind of the limit” as a place for ongoing suffering, I knew I’d come to the right place. I must have been grinning like the biggest idiot. I knew where I’d been trying to go; this class highlighted a path I might want to take to get there. Molly suffered for me beautifully for 90 minutes (her eyes were like these deep blue pools of torment), and the surrounding couples were super friendly – the subs sort of banded together as a team to stay strong. I cannot speak highly enough of the class, and I’m so grateful to the marvelous instructors!

After lunch it was off to Pedro’s Jazz Shibari class (into which cuddleswithteeth made a grand ungainly entrance complete with prat-fall in front of the whole class), followed by AndraPoloutropon’s Fucking About with Rope, which was exactly what it said on the box: he explained some concepts for all levels of riggers (at least a couple of which were very useful to me) and then for a good while he let us fuck around and apply those concepts in rope practice. I got to tie gingerkitty again for that, which is nice because she’s really bendy and I can hurt her if I want (which, when do I not?).

I had a lovely and romantic dinner with my husband, and then back to the dungeon! Husband went off to play with cuddleswithteeth, while I went to play with rope. I was waiting for a couple of pre-arranged play dates to show up and chatting with groundbird when she said “well if you want to kill some time while you’re waiting and tie me…” and I didn’t even let her finish the sentence to say “Yes. Let’s do it right now” because I had tied her at COPE at the end of the weekend and we were both exhausted and I wanted to do a more awake job. She likes to be challenged and I like to challenge! I had a wonderful time tying her and hurting her and watching her process what I was asking of her body. She’s so sweet and soft! It was a lovely time.

Then came AndraPoloutropon. I have a confession to make: I’d had my eye on tying with him prior to the con, for reasons I cannot quite explain, perhaps because his class was called Fucking About with Rope, which sort of tickled me. Then I’d met him at the beginning of the weekend, and we’d been chatting a bunch, plus I had watched him tie on Friday night and it was pretty hot, so I asked him if he wanted to tie me up and, being a man who knows a good opportunity when he sees it, he said yes. (Yes, I am totally awesome.) So anyway we found a frame and he tied me and it was hot and there was a lot of eye contact and touching and feeling sexy and almost kissing (which is really super fun in a rope scene because it builds tension along with the rope) followed by sexy hot untying (it’s the latest craze) and some honest-to-goodness cuddling and smooching afterwards which looked an awful lot like aftercare but of course I am too hardcore for aftercare so it was not aftercare at all, just nice times winding down from a sexy scene.

Then, my friends, I managed to pull off the ultimate Switch score: I rallied, and topped someone again after having bottomed! I had promised Dhyana a scene and she would get one, dammit. I made the call to do only floorwork, just in case the post-rope-bottom derp struck unexpectedly. Dhyana was looking smokin’ hot and innocent as always in her lacy lingerie getup, plus she looked afraid of me which of course makes it 100 times hotter. We found a nice corner of the room and I tied her up super tightly and all sexy-like and shifted her into distressing positions. I tied her tongue with some twine and weighted it with a couple of carabiners, which I then strung around the back of her neck and hooked to her chest rope. Her tongue looked like a weird purple slug and she looked deliciously awkward. She told me afterwards that she sort of forgot for awhile that the slug-thing partially gagging her was her own tongue. HOT.

Then I tortured her nicely pedicured little toes with pokey things and bottlecaps, and she wriggled around so much that the tongue twine got pulled off (ouch!), so I decided to start untying (which I hate doing, so I make it as horrible for my bottoms as possible). I stuck the bottlecaps down her bra for safekeeping in case I needed them later. I gave her a final hit to her tension-crushed calf and she started to cry. Tears, YES! (Dhyana says that she tried really hard not to cry, and as soon as she did she thought to herself “Oh shit – sadist food!”) So of course I smacked her there lots more. It was ridiculously hot; she is SUPER pretty when she cries. I untied her in my most brutal fashion, and ever so gently forced her down for some spooning to decompress (figuratively and literally; her ribcage had been compressed for well over half an hour).

Dhyana declared herself exhausted and went to her room to crash; I made my final rounds in the dungeons saying hellos and goodbyes and went home. The next morning when I woke up I had this text from Dhyana: “Oh my. Apparently the bottle caps were still in my bra when I feel asleep!”

MONDAYI dragged my way to the con space so I could attend Tifereth’s class on Improv Bondage, and discovered sadly that my class bottom had had to attend to a work issue, which was sad because she’s hot and I’d been looking forward to tying her. But like a willing angel descended from rope heaven, I saw Resa sitting in the social area alone and just like that I had a class bottom yay! The class was nice and chill and I got to tie Resa and hurt them enough that they stopped chatting and started laughing, which you know means Resa is in a good bottom-space. A nice way to have my last tie of the con.

Closing ceremonies was sweet and there were hugs and minor cuddling and the exchanging of the business cards, plus I got to eat an apple out of Tifereth’s mouth so that was cool. Sadistic switches sharing tricks with sadistic switches. And Red Bar was such a great way to close out the con. Before I left, an old friend celebrated his birthday by buying MonkeyFetish, gingerkitty, and I tequila shots; I chatted with several old friends and new ones;  I hugged everyone at least once; I got a chance to meet and chat with Hebari, who is a really fricking down to earth, warm-hearted guy; and I got to make out with a cute rigger. Then off to my husband at home and a nice little wind-down gathering at Monkeyfetish’s, where I further tortured feel_e and ChemicalOuch.

TL;DR, here are the bullet points:

• #femmeriggerproblems
• #maleglaze
• Pointy gel manicures are the best thing to happen to riggers ever – they help with hooking technique SO DAMNED MUCH, plus you can hurt people with them so easily. We should all get them on our dominant index fingers. I tied all weekend and I neither split a nail nor chipped my polish at all. Pointy index nails = the new kilts 2015.
• It is totally worth the time to make plans for class partners in advance. 
• It was totally worth it to put in all the practice time I did so I could feel more confident in my rigging.
• It was totally worth it to get over my shyness and ask people to play.
• Strangelove is a sadistic rope genius.
• My friends are obscenely perverted and awesome.
• I love tying more than ever.
• I am actually a bigger sadist that even I realized.
• This was an overwhelmingly positive Con for me and I’m so glad to have been a part of it

Miss Manners

"Freedom without rules doesn’t work" – Judith Martin (Miss Manners)

"Etiquette is the science of living." – Emily Post

I am a timid person.

It’s difficult to explain this to people who often see me in front of a group of strangers, smiling, loud, sometimes naked, even. But an audience is a different animal than an individual; when speaking to an audience, I can be relatively certain that they *want* to appreciate what I have to offer (or else they wouldn’t be there). Crowds can be fickle, but it’s not that difficult to lead a crew which has come to you looking for a captain. I know my role in a crowd.

Individuals, on the other hand, present a much more intimidating prospect. There are so many opportunities with unfamiliar people! And so few assumptions one can make about the outcome of a conversation with one! Few things make me feel more timid than needing to speak to a stranger in a social situation – particularly if I want to make a nice impression. Walking up to a stranger and talking to them feels to me like a combination of stepping out onto a tightrope and cold calling. I don’t know my role in a situation like this.

Not knowing my role in a given situation – and therefore not knowing the rules of engagement in a given situation – gives me the howling fantods. When given a chance to learn the rules of engagement, I learn them, and I thrive.

BDSM should be a fantastic place for someone with such a requirement. Is not protocol a huge thing in the D/s community? It is, but protocol can be so formal, and I don’t want all that pomp. Does not every dungeon, munch, and social gathering have its code of conduct? They do, but while those rules are useful and necessary, they don’t provide much help in simply navigating the social waters of a conversation with someone new.

What’s missing in my life, I think, is good, solid etiquette. That bag of pretty tricks to pull from when you and the person opposite you try to speak at the exact same time, or when that cute girl’s got broccoli in her smile, or when that one guy is making everyone else uncomfortable. The WD-40 that makes the social gears run smoothly.

I’m not talking about some sort of fetishized etiquette, necessarily; I don’t have a lot of interest in Victorian households, or D/s protocols, or how to use which fork properly, or in delving deeply into someone else’s idea relationship etiquette. The active etiquette groups here on FetLife are (understandably) focused on lifestyle etiquette. None of these are what I’m looking for.

I am interested in the kind of etiquette that begins simply with the intention of being nice and not awkward to people, which I have and which makes me want to learn to be more polite. I want to learn good manners, and I want to arm myself with the etiquette which governs how those manners are to be properly used. But where can I learn? I was (figuratively) raised in something of a barn with regards to manners, and since nobody stands on ceremony anymore, I’ve found it difficult to learn them through observation.  I need a Mrs. Higgins to my Eliza Doolittle!*

Am I the only one who feels this way? Do we need a finishing school for kinksters? I welcome your (kind) thoughts!

*Don’t any of you dare correct me and say Henry Higgins was the one who taught Eliza the rules of etiquette, I will cut you.

Honing my Female Gaze

I want to learn to objectify men more. Yeah, it's totally anti-feminist of me or whatever. I do not care. I cannot beat them, so I may as well join them. But I will join them in my own way, not by also objectifying women, like 99.9% of everything in public (billboards, TV, movies, magazines for both men & women, dudes on the bus, chicks in your work bathroom, etc, etc, ad nauseam) - but by objectifying men. 

Yes, women are pretty. I generally find them prettier than boys, personally. Yes, women have boobs, and shape their eyebrows, and paint their nails and stuff (so do some boys). But men can be beautiful and sexy and interesting, and look good in clothes, and look good without clothes as well, and have curves that can be appreciated. 

So. I've got this [Tumblr][http://mrsbshi.tumblr.com/] account, see? I am trying to fill my feed and my own blog with lots of pictures of objectified and/or tied up and/or sexualized men. I want to see if I can undo 37 years of being taught that women are to be gazed upon, by learning that men can be equally gazed upon. And also learning that my gaze, and my own opinion of what I look like, might free me somewhat from caring so much what men think I look like. 

 Are you with me? If so, and you want to send pictures of men for my consumption, please feel free :)

Public vs Private

What I say I want: 

• ·         To have friends who care about me and want to spend time with me
• ·         To have lots of sex
• ·         To play more often
• ·         To have a dog
• ·         To manage my emotions a more smoothly
• ·         To have more work in my chosen career

What I really want:

• ·         To have just a few hours each day when I’m actually happy and at peace with myself and my life 
• ·         <REDACTED>
• ·         Barring the above, to find a great, experienced, grounded Dom or switch and we fall mutually in love and/or deeply respectful and sexy friendship.
• ·         For <REDACTED>  kissing and making out.
• ·         To find a couple of really great friends who I can really like talking with and not have to hide my career or my kink from
• ·         To not constantly be afraid that I’m fucking up or making people dislike me.
• ·         To be OK being alone more often.
• ·         To be able to play as often as I wanted with people I like.
• ·         To be a more well-known kink educator who gets to go to cons and meet lots of other kinky people and share meaningful &/or hot, &/or kinky experiences with.
• ·         To have people calling me with amazing job offers because they think I’m super talented and want to work with me
• ·         To be able to work at home in Chicago more often
• ·         To have enough money to pay my bills and still have some left over for savings and fun.

What I'm About

I often hear from those close to me People think things about me. Here are some of the recurring things I am told They think/say:

• MrsB is awesome
• People worship MrsB
• MrsB is aloof/cold
• MrsB is hot
• MrsB is scary
• MrsB is smart
• MrsB is dumb
• MrsB has a ton of friends
• MrsB thinks she’s superior
• MrsB is intimidating
• MrsB is mysterious
• MrsB is friendly
• MrsB is unfriendly
• MrsB is a figment of Padre’s imagination/isn’t a real person
• MrsB’s vagina will eat you alive
• MrsB has a somewhat annoying affinity for bulleted lists in her writing.

 In response to these ideas, I present to you a bulleted list:

•     I find it both flattering and mildly bewildering when I hear that people think I’m awesome and/or worship me.

•     I cannot objectively respond to reports that I’m thought of as aloof or superior, but I can understand why people would think that.

•     I both love and hate hearing that people think I’m scary, for very different reasons.

•     I am pleased, flattered, and totally in agreement with people who think I’m smart and/or hot. I am smart and hot. ☺

•     I am mystified when people find me mysterious.

•     I try to be friendly most of the time. Sometimes I try more than other times. Sometimes I’m tired and I don’t try at all, and then I feel guilty afterwards. Sometimes – when I feel I must – I actively try to be unfriendly.

•     It is 100% true that have a singular love for bulleted lists. It is also true that my vagina will try to eat you alive and then spit you out. If you’re into that kind of thing, my vagina can be a magical wonderland.

--------------

Here are some other bullets which go some way towards explaining what I’m about.

•     One of my pet peeves is when an introduction to someone goes like this:

Them: “Hi, my name is CollarBaller!”
Me: “Nice to meet you, Baller. I’m MrsB.”
Them: “Ooooooh, you’re Padre’s wife!”
Me: “…”
Them: “…”
Me: “That's true.”
Them: “Man, he’s CRAAAAAAZY!”
Me: “…”

When people relate to me mainly a propos of my husband, I find it  rude. It's rude because you've made it clear to me right off the bat that in your mind, I occupy a position adjunct to him. If you have started a conversation with me this way, I have already lost interest in you, because it makes me feel that you're less interested in me than you are my husband.

•     I am interested in people who shoot directly from the hip as often as is plausible. To me, this is the most appealing way of interacting with people. It is astonishingly difficult to accomplish in the face of social pressure to fit in and be “likeable” and “approachable."

•    Here is the single most important thing about me: Truly intimate connections with people render me simultaneously utterly powerless and utterly secure. The thing that drives me through life is my desire to get to a place of uncomplicated, open, mutual caring and initimacy with other people. That place is what I’m about. This kind of relationship, be it platonic or romantic, has proven to be rare and elusive. BDSM affords me an opportunity to attain moments of it.

•     I want to know people, not in the sense of “being acquainted with; being aware of”, but in the sense of “being intimately familiar with; understanding.” I don’t want to know who you are trying to be before understanding who you are now. That seems like a backwards way of getting to know someone.

•     I have few friends, but the ones I have mean the world to me. See above. The kind of friendships I want require a ton of trust and vulnerability. Offering that is difficult for most people, myself included. It’s risky.

Miscellaneous Confessions and Revelations: Mid-Summer

• I am smart and I think and learn quickly. I need to learn to slow my thinking process down so I can think and learn better. 
• Nearly 8 weeks after the death of my father, I feel that I am just now beginning my transition into adulthood. Here's what it feels like: there is a hole in my safety net. The choices I make will determine whether the net unravels or is mended; I'd better start being conscious of them.
• Poverty disfigures a person's sense of worth.
• Carrying around a refillable water bottle can be life-changing.
• Kissing and making out make me feel pretty.
• I've always kept a ledger of the debts. That practice is toxic for me. I need to start seeing the gains and focusing on the black ink in the ledger rather than the red.
  In other words: Grace. Gratitude.
• Stating out loud what I truly feel, even if I'm ashamed to feel that way, helps me move on. Burying myself and staying silent it has the opposite effect.
• I don't consider kink my sexual orientation. I consider intensity my sexual orientation; kink is my preferred instrument of expression.

A Question about Sub Space, Sexual Arousal, and Mid-Scene Negotiation

Question

Kinky people: Does one of these situations strike you as more creepy than the other? Please explain your answer. 

Situation 1

Two non-kinky people – let’s call them Casey and Avery - have several friends in common and think one another are cute, so when Avery asks Casey out “for coffee,” Casey accepts. They really hit it off, hang out awhile after coffee has been had, and go for a little walk. 

A then asks C to “come over,” and the two of them end up going hot and heavy on Avery’s couch. Soon, various appendages are inserted into various orifices. Safer sex practices are followed. Each tells the other they’ve had a good time. No verbal consent is ever obtained for any sexual activity. 

Situation 2

Two kinky people – let’s call them LeatherPony77 and GreySadist – are chatting and flirting at a private play party. There’s a good vibe and they decide to play. A very short negotiation establishes that both enjoy caning, so GreySadist is going to cane LeatherPony77; LeatherPony77’s safeword is “Ernest Hemingway”; and if blood is drawn the scene needs to end. 

Both become sexually aroused while playing. After a little while, GS asks LP if it’s OK to kiss, and LP agrees. Then after awhile longer, LP asks GS to insert an appendage or two into one of their orifices, and GS complies. Safer sex practices are followed. When the scene ends, each tells the other they’ve had a good time. Verbal consent **is** explicitly obtained for all activities, although some consent isn’t obtained until after they have begun playing.

This is a serious question; I’m interested in hearing all perspectives on this. I’m trying to figure out whether and/or why Sub Space is considered a more vulnerable or judgment-impairing state of being than sexual arousal. I know people who feel that Sub Space can or does impair one's judgment, but I've never heard those same people say how they feel what sexual arousal does to one's judgment. Full disclosure: In my own experience, I don't find that one leaves me more or less capable of making decisions. 

Humiliation vs Shame vs Embarrassment vs Objectification vs Degradation

Thanks to @lamoscacojonera, you can now read this post in Spanish! Leerlo en Español.

...................................................................................

I happen to be married to a really perverted guy. When he and I met, he let me explore the limits of my libido for the first time (so far, no known limits; expanding along with the universe), and showed me how to let myself be a really, really perverted gal. I was new to kink, and his kink informed my own in a very formative way. So as a result, I like to play with other really, really perverted guys and gals. 

One of the really perverted things I have been both drawn to and repelled by(*) is that type of play we kinky people call Humiliation. I've met lots of people into Humiliation Play in the last decade, and I've discovered that no two bottoms/subs/slaves/littles/pets mean quite the same thing when they use that term. It's more of an umbrella term for lots of different types of emotionally submissive play. Under that umbrella are humiliation, shame, embarrassment, degradation, and objectification. (I may have left some out. Let me know if I have.) 

What I've discovered is that it's not enough to tell someone that you're into Humiliation and leave it at that. Most tops/doms/daddies/mistresses/owners I meet have a more general understanding of the kind of play that lies under that umbrella term. I've tried for years to explain why I like certain kinds of Humiliation and not other kinds, and I have yet to satisfy myself or any of my potential play partners, so I've shied away from that kind of play with others for fear of a Bad Experience. 

I don't want to shy away from it anymore. So this is really a personal exercise for me to define what I think each of the following terms means, whether I want it, and under what circumstances. I hope other people find it useful, too, since I've noticed I'm not the only person who has trouble finding the right language to talk about this stuff.

Humiliation

To humiliate: to cause a painful loss of pride, self-respect, or dignity

I love everything about this definition. As both a submissive/bottom type player, and a Dominant/Top type player. It's masochistic ("painful loss"); it fulfills power exchange goals; it allows for all kinds of delicious creativity. To use this term in a discussion with a play partner is an invitation to get to know each other better. Find out what makes the other person tick. What do you fear? What do you crave? Why? What are your neuroses? What do you want, need, despise? What do you spend lots of time thinking about? It's not enough to say someone is into humiliation - each person has different sources of pride, self-respect, and dignity. Find out what they are. Then find out what is the healthiest way to take it away from them. 

Which brings me to what I view as the sub-sets of Humiliation:

Shame

Shame: The painful feeling arising from the consciousness of something dishonorable, improper, etc, done by oneself

This, for me, is the most explosive, potentially hot, and also potentially toxic one. It's tricky; it's dangerous. It's awfully closely related to guilt, and more importantly, self-worth. I love to feel ashamed in a scene. It makes me really, really hot. This bothered me for a long time. There I was, an intelligent, educated, modern woman and feminist, with plenty of shame issues to overcome in her day-to-day life (as every woman does), and feeling ashamed in a scene made my pussy dripping wet. This in and of itself, I thought, was shameful. (A viciously hot cycle for anyone who could figure it out.) I took lots of time to think about this. It was a process. I've worked it out for myself now, and I'm OK with how I am and why this works for me. 

BUT! There is a big But here for me. I only consent to this kind of play with people I trust, because sometimes I carry the shame with me beyond the scene. This is something I do not want. I know there are people who like to hold on to the shameful feeling they get in a humiliation scene; they want to enjoy it, feel it linger, process it. More power to them. I don't know how they do it. For me, it's not healthy. I have no interest in emotional masochism outside of play. I view shame as a very personal thing. It is related to our own self-images, our self-esteem, how valuable we view ourselves as people. One feels ashamed of oneself. We are each our own harshest critic. We internalize it. It can warp us. 

There are lots of ways to prevent this from happening. I need evidence that you care about me despite my exposed flaw.  If I don't get some kind of validation from my play partner either during or after a scene involving shame, I may end up hating something about myself, and/or hating the person who made me feel that way. I don't want to resent myself or my partners. The best validation for me is a hard cock/swollen pussy. Let me touch it. Fuck me. Have an orgasm brought on by my humiliation. It proves to me that you are just as fucked up as I am, in your own perverted way. That's my aftercare. Then, check in with regularity in the days after. Continue to be my friend/lover/partner. That way I know you, the person I care about and trust, are OK with my flaws, you embrace them even, and I don't have to beat myself up about it.

Embarrassment

To embarrass: To cause to feel confusion or self-consciousness; to disconcert; to fluster. Embarrassment usually refers to a feeling less painful than that of shame, one associated with less serious situations, often of a social nature

Embarrassment is like Shame's exhibitionist cousin. One cannot be embarrassed without an audience. When you have chocolate on your face, and you don't realize it until after you've given a 90-minute presentation to your colleagues - that's embarrassing. If you got chocolate on your face at home, and happened to notice it in the mirror 2 hours after you ate the chocolate, that's just realizing you should wipe your face. 

If I'm subbing to you and you want to really take the humiliation to another level, put it in front of an audience to add embarrassment to the shame. But beware that I will most likely get defensive in front of those voyeuristic fuckers over there whom I don't trust. If you want to see angry/bratty/snarky MrsB, this is the way to go. I will threaten to kick you in the nuts. I will call you a fucking asshole. I might step on your toe with my stiletto, or do something to fuck up your perfect rigging. I will provoke you. I know full well what the consequences are. Scenes like that can be cathartic and fun, but they'll be very different from scenes in the privacy of home. I can't get embarrassed if it's just you and me. 

If you really want to break me, do a humiliation scene complete with embarrassment in front of an audience, and then tell me that if I talk back you'll stop playing with me. I will do one of two things: shut down quietly, or break down explosively. BEWARE: this kind of scene may have a Bad Ending. I don't want the scene to end when I break down. I want to push past it. I will feel like a failure because you are setting me up do to something that's close to impossible for me. The trick is to make me feel like I'm not a failure. I need a reward for my efforts. Let me have some success after my total failure. See above re: swollen genitals and orgasms. Or (less ideally but still good) give me a task you know I can complete, and let me complete it. Let me please you.


Now, onto something very different:

Degradation

To degrade: To reduce in worth, honor, strength, character, rank, status, etc.

This, to me, is the essence of Power Exchange. I find it difficult to be satisfied in play without some kind of degradation involved. WHAT is reduced by kind of play, and play partner. In a simple rope scene, it may be agency. In a pain scene, it might be strength or endurance. If there is D/s involved, it's status. But in any case, the thing the sub agrees to give up is transferred actively to the top in the form of power and control. The sub is degraded in direct proportion to the empowerment of the top. And I think it's really important to note that while the word "degradation" normally carries a hugely negative connotation, when used in a BDSM context I am not necessarily implying something unpleasant or negative. Becoming reduced or "less than" can be a really wonderful experience when that's what you want.

When I sub, I want to feel like you are worth more than I am. I want to feel lesser than you. I want you to feel like More than me. I will do what I can to allow you to feel that way. If I'm the top in the scene, I want to feel like I'm better than you are. I want to feel more powerful. I want my status to be elevated. In play involving really intense Power Exchange, I want the bottom to feel degraded on multiple levels; I want them (or me) to feel like their needs and wants don't matter at all; I even want them (or me) to feel that their only desire is to please and elevate the top; therefore a total loss of ego on the part of the bottom is the ultimate goal. This is the essence of degradation for me, and it plays an important part in my overall concept of kink.

A subset of Degradation is:

Objectification

To objectify: [I am using the classic feminist definition for the purposes of this entry; it seems more relevant to our kink definitions of "objectification"] The seven features of objectification are 

1. instrumentality (to treat as a tool used for a purpose)
2. denial of autonomy
3. inertness (to treat as though lacking in agency)
4. fungibility (to treat as though interchangeable with other objects)
5. violability (to treat as though lacking in boundaries)
6. ownership (to treat as though capable of being bought or sold)
7. denial of subjectivity (to deny the validity or the existence of the object's thoughts/feelings)

While Degradation implies a lowering or reduction of these things (rank, status, worth, strength, etc), Objectification implies an elimination of these qualities. I have told people in the past that I love to be objectified; now I realize that isn't strictly true. I have learned that in order to be fulfilled in my kink, I need to feel like an active participant in it. I think it takes a special kind of mindset to feel that one's active participation in a scene goes only as far as surrendering one's right to self. It's difficult for me to find that particular mindset when it's needed. 

Now, if someone is attempting to objectify me and I'm not actually expected to "act" like an object (that seems like an oxymoron) - then that makes for a hot scene. I do enjoy the dilemma posed when the goal is to objectify me (for the pleasure of the top) but I'm unwilling to do so (for the preservation of my pride). There is a give and take there; I'm required to actively subjugate my own pride for the pleasure of the top and I feel like I'm participating in something. If I'm to be an object from the get-go, I get bored. The one kind of objectification I nearly always like is sexual objectification - I love to be reduced to a body or even a body part for use. (The feminist in me is pitching a fit as I write this, but deep down, she loves that I'm owning my sexual desires this way.)

                          ---------------------------------

So, patient readers, there you have it. My own personal breakdown of the age-old Humiliation vs. Shame vs. Embarrassment vs. Degradation vs. Objectification question.



(*)The top in me goes: "Attracted to AND repelled by? Internal conflict! HOT."

6+ reasons why FetLife threads aren't safe spaces to talk about consent

UPDATE: I've made several edits based on constructive criticism offered and lots of processing

Of course we should all talk about consent; and of course we all should be constantly working to maintain our understanding of how consent works, and also working to maintain a high community bar for the understanding of consent; and of course individuals and communities need some way to talk openly and educate about consent standards and violations, and to find some way to compassionately and effectively deal with instances of consent violation; and of course we should be sure that supportive resources are in place for anyone who might feel the need for advocacy, legal aid, medical aid, safe haven, or counseling because of abuse and/or consent violations; and nobody is disputing any of these things. We are nearly all in agreement about these things.

And but one of the worst and most ineffective place to talk to one another about consent is on various FetLife threads. (Originally cross-posted, with utmost irony and really awful results, of course, on FetLife.)

1. Perception isn't perfect
Human beings are, for better or worse, really bad at believing there is more to something than meets the eye. Our daily living experiences validate that our 5 senses and the cognitive skills attached to them are normally right. But the farther away from an experience one gets, the less likely our perception is to be correct, and even our direct senses can come into conflict with one another when more than one of them is stimulated at once - and that's not even accounting for memory or emotions, and how skewed those can make things. In other words, there are normally more than two sides to every story. What one person perceives as consent, another can perceive as non-consent, and vice versa. This gets even more complicated when you bring sadomasochism, D/s dynamics, and sexual arousal into the equation.

Additionally, you might think you understand why something was written, or why someone is reacting in the way they are, but it's nearly impossible that you actually know. And that's because human beings are complex and have complex histories. It takes an awful lot of commitment, vulnerability, and giving energy to really listen and try to understand what another person's honest perspective is. None of us can truly understand another person 100% of the time; not even the most intimate among us can come close. 

2. Moral relativism
Reasonable people can disagree on how to define "right" and "wrong." Even when we are trying to agree on a standard of consent. An example: Many people take it as an absolute that consent can never ethically be re-negotiated mid-scene. I personally disagree - I believe there is an ethical way to approach re-negotiation and extension of consent mid-scene, and I have practiced it in the past to most agreeable results. I will continue to practice it - but only as a bottom. As a top, I would be absolutely terrified to take even the most trustworthy-seeming bottom's word for a consent re-negotiation mid-scene, in the current climate - even if they had expressly negotiated that it was OK. (Which means, I suppose, that I can't expect to continue practicing it as a bottom...)  I can guarantee there are other kinky people who feel similarly on issues surrounding play and consent right now. That discourages me to no end, and it should be discouraging to anyone who believes in the YKINMKBYKIOK* axiom.

3. Online Disinhibition
The next several reasons are covered under the umbrella of a tidy little theory in cyberpsychology (yes, it's a thing) called Online Disinhibition. The principals of Online Disinhibition are as follows:

     a. You don't know me (dissociative anonymity) - a good number of the people with whom we find ourselves debating things like consent are people we don't know. And they know we don't know them, and we know they know that we don't know them. When a person believes he is unknown, he is likely to perceive himself as less responsible for his words and actions.

     b. You can't see me (invisibility) - Pretty self-explanatory in terms of disinhibition - we all act like disgusting apes sometimes when we think nobody's looking. But also, when we can't see one another's facial expressions or body language, hear one another's tones, or regulate our own, we miss out on the vast majority of communication (varying statistics put the amount of communication which is non-verbal at between 60-90%).

     c. Time isn't real (asynchronicity) - People do not interact with one another in real time on FetLife. This allows for hiding from responses we are not ready to hear; it also allows for "hit-and-run" style, emotionally-charged messages.

    d. It's all in my head (solipsistic introjection) - Imagination is a powerful and underappreciated thing. When debating something with an unfamiliar, invisible person outside of real time, our imagination tends to fill in a lot of the blanks without our recognizing it (see: Perception). We can't have a really honest debate about something this way, since we can't really understand what the other person is communicating.

     e. It's just a game (dissociative imagination) - Many of us tend to view cyberspace as some sort of "other" reality. We do and say things in this other reality that we fantasize about doing and saying "in real life" but which we probably would never have the chutzpah to actually do or say directly to a person's face.

     f. We're all equals (minimizing authority) - There's something deeply appealing about the level playing field of the internet. It's entirely up to the individual to assign weight and status to any of the voices on FetLife - especially given it's an online forum where the method by which we view comments is in many ways even less sophisticated than YouTube. But while everyone may get to be a special snowflake online, in important discussion like the one about consent, should all voices be considered equally relevant? I don't think so. The voices of people who speak out as victims need to be heard, their subjective experiences respected, and their feelings honored. People who want to swoop in and pretend to speak for all victims, or people who are only interested in stopping the discomfort of unpleasant situations, should not carry the same weight.  But especially since on FetLife, the loudness of a person's voice is determined simply by the person's persistence in making it heard, not by the merits of what the voice is saying, or the direct experience of a person behind it.

Now, Online Disinhibition is a value-neutral phenomenon. Some of its effects can be really good and other not so good; it depends on context and goals. In one study, it was found that in anonymous settings, people are more likely to participate and take more risks with ideas - in other words, more people were being more creative. But also found that anonymity tended to lead to more hostile interactions, and that overall satisfaction and learning were less likely in anonymous settings than in face-to-face interaction. Possibly because, as another study points out, when people are more anonymous in a discussion, their comments are less likely to influence anyone else's opinion or thinking. It's great that people who might not otherwise have a voice can use FetLife, and more importantly, the network of people who comprise FetLife, to find those voices. But there is a difference between using your voice to speak your truth for yourself, and using it to speak louder than the other person rather than listening to what they have to say.

Finally
There are no universal, no-exceptions rules when it comes to when, how, why, and where consent ought to be asked for or provided when it comes to What it is We Do. Because really, the "we" isn't "We the FetLife community", or "We in the Chicago/Ohio/West Coast/etc scene" or "We, who hold these truths to be self-evident", or even "We are Siamese if you please" - it's only "we" the incredibly complex, unique individual people involved in a given situation, and the people they rely on for real-life support. On FetLife, the consent debate has none of the nuance or complexity it deserves, and all the polarization and calcification of ideas of a modern political debate^. 

If, as I’ve heard said, people are upset and they’re going to keep shouting about it until they feel heard and safe, then people seriously need to consider whether shouting and/or repeating themselves ad nauseaum on FetLife threads is the best way to feel heard and safe again – bottoms and tops, men and women and other-gender, accused and accusers alike.  Things keep happening; people keep shouting; this has been going on for years, and still people feel neither heard nor safe. If we're going to have these talks, we need to do them in person, we need to listen with compassion, and we need to learn to exist as adults with these other, real people in a setting where we have all five of our senses available to us. Or at the very least, on the phone, or via email where we can be focused on one other person and not worried about broadcasting our vulnerabilities to the entire kinky world. We need to all of us understand the "WHY" of consent violations - was it an honest misunderstanding? someone who actually thinks it's OK to do what they want when they want? something that happened which nobody was anticipating? someone who was coerced? someone or who has dysfunctional ways of asking for or giving consent? did something go wrong for just one person, or did more than one thing go wrong for more than one person? These are all very different, and they all call for very different responses. We'll never come up with the right answers if we're going about finding them the wrong way.


*Your Kink is Not My Kink but Your Kink is OK
^(hat-tip to a special someone for that metaphor)