society

30 Days of Kink – Day 17

December 1, 2012 By Trent Evans

Day 17: What misconception about kinky people would you most like to clear up?

There is one word that makes me see red when it’s used to describe kink: deviance.

This word is a smear, a lazy (and stupid) libel of people who are kinky (or simply dabble in BDSM play). Modern psychology doesn’t help matters when it labels “sadomasochism” as a mental disorder in the DSM—IV. To those who smugly highlight that fact, I would respond by informing them that the DSM used to label homosexuality as a mental disorder too.

Kinky people are not deviants any more than people who like blondes or anal sex are deviants. Human beings are infinitely diverse, because every person is literally unique, with their own singular spin to everything, including their sexuality. Have you ever wondered if two different people perceive the color red exactly the same way? They don’t. Is it close, very close? Yes, of course. But the point here is that sexuality, something orders of magnitude more complicated than the perception of a single spectrum of visible light, is unique to every person. A group of us happen to be labeled as “kinky”, because we are a distinct minority in raw numbers as opposed to those of a “vanilla” sexuality. Does that make us any more ‘deviant’ than those people who enjoy anal sex (another distinct group of us that can be classified and/or labeled)? How many ghettos do we want to conjure up for sexual variance in the human animal? It quickly gets into the realm of the absurd.

Kink is a variation. Yes, there are some who practice kink who are mentally unstable, even dangerous, but the fact is that any group of people, including those of vanilla persuasion, will have a certain percentage of dingbats. There is zero proof, none, that kinky people have a higher incidence of mental illness than the larger vanilla community as a whole. Oh wait! :::headslap::: There is 100% mental illness in the kinky population, right? The DSM says it’s so, therefore it must be true, yes? <end rant>

Kinky people are just like everyone else in all other areas of their lives. We are NO different. If you meet one of us, keep an open mind, and give us a chance:) We aren’t running wild through the streets swinging whips and slapping collars on any hapless female who crosses our paths. We aren’t child molesters, nor rapists, nor criminals. We are just people; a few of us are bad, but most of us are good … just like any other group of people.

Until Day 18.

Trent

30 Days of Kink – Day 16

October 29, 2012 By Trent Evans

Day 16: What are the most difficult aspects of having a sexuality that involves kink or BDSM for you personally?

Oh boy, this is going to be hard. No guts, no glory …

The answer to this (like many aspects of a person’s personality, I suppose) has significantly changed over time. As a young, budding perv the overwhelming feeling I dealt with day in and day out was shame.

I just knew I was different. To a teenager, different = damaged = freak = worthless. When I was young and, really up until a few years ago (I’m in my mid thirties now, if anyone wonders), I spent most of my time just burying who I was. Burying it deep. Is that the kink version of “in the closet”? I suppose it could be somewhat analogous to that. I think it’s simpler though — it was a complete and utter denial of a vital aspect of my personality, and what made me uniquely me.

For those of us who are kinky, just admitting what we are/like/want is difficult enough; I suspect there are many of us who never even quite get to that point. For me, it was worse … because I was (am) a sadist.

Note to those of you who may be freaking the fuck out at that admission (hopefully there aren’t any, but just in case), please read through my earlier entries on this blog in the 30 Days of Kink. Those entries should clarify for you what I mean by “sadist”. Hint: it definitely doesn’t mean I’m a serial killer. Mmkay).

Believe me when I tell you, it was a long, harrowing road to get from here to there. How would you like it as a young kid to wonder:

– If you were irretrievably broken?

– If somehow people might be frightened of you?

– If you were simply nature’s aberration?

– Why modern psychology’s idiotic definitions (don’t get me fucking started on that subject, dear Lord) essentially labeled you as someone that yes, was broken, was a simple biological aberration?

Yeah, heavy, heavy shit. When you’re young, and dumb, and have zero perspective, everything seems Earth-shattering, immediate, profound. Your problems seem so unique, as if nobody on Earth has ever had to deal with what you’re struggling with.

Then you grow up and realize you are but a tiny, tiny speck of nothing in an unimaginably immense universe of everything — and all of this, and I do mean all of this, has happened before. Over and over and over again.

For some people, that’s a terrifying realization, but for me it was freeing. My problems weren’t insurmountable. Hell, my “problems”, weren’t even problems — they were just me.

So, there’s the self-doubt out of the way. Now comes the isolation. Yes, in this interconnected world isolation (at least in the modern west) should slowly become less of an issue. We hope. For those of us old enough to remember life before the connectedness of the Intertubes though, isolation was a huge concern. There just are only so many pervs to go around. Depending on the research (and the researchers’ particular definitions) I’ve seen online, the percentage of people who practice some form of BDSM are anywhere from 1-25% of the general population. Now, this may be self-serving, or simply wishful thinking on my part, but I suspect the actual number is closer to the upper end of that range.

Somebody bought those metric shit-tons of bodice rippers in the 70s-80s.

Somebody bought all those copies of 50 (yes, I know, I know — the damaged hero trope was what really roped in — heh — the 50 readers. I still ain’t buyin’ that rationalization).

Somebody watches (and pays for) all that internet BDSM porn.

Okay, I’ll get to my point. Though maybe 15-20% (my estimate) are pervs of some stripe, that still leaves us as islands in a sea of vanilla. Worse, the BDSM umbrella is so broad that the spectrum underneath it from A to Z is incredibly diverse. How many of that 15-20% are like me with a penchant for both pain/impact play AND total power exchange? 1% of that 15-20%? Maybe not even that — but you see what I’m getting at here.

Isolation is still a serious hindrance to pervs the world over. The internet is a lifesaver for us, as even if we can’t connect physically, we can communicate with like-minded souls.

The last one I’ll mention is perhaps the most vexing (and sometimes painful) one of all. The feeling of “otherness” in relation to your fellow man. The society we live in is oriented around the vanilla, and for good reason — vanilla is what most of us are, and it works, generally. But pervs always feel as if we are on the outside looking in, both on a societal level and a personal one.

How many of us can speak freely about who we are at the workplace? At home? Or how about in the unassailable redoubt of our own minds? Vanilla people by definition won’t understand, simply because it’s beyond their human experience. Okay, that’s not fair — some do. But to most it’s a baffling mystery at best, disgusting perversion at worst. I’m not worried about those people. What I think pervs struggle the most with is having to keep that part of them from those that are closest to them. It’s akin to walking around with a suit of armor or a mask on your entire life — one you take with you to work, to that Thanksgiving dinner with your family, to your fucking doctor’s office. It never, ever comes off, and it gets to a point that you forget how to take it off. How to be that fully formed person you are. Perhaps that shielding of oneself becomes a permanent part of you.

It did with me. I’m trying to remedy that, but it’s a struggle — and I suspect it always will be. Being able to talk to you helps. It helps a lot. Even if only one person ever reads this, and gains a modicum of perspective, a glimmer of hope, a sense that they can change and start being who they really are … well then all this will have been worth it. Until Day 17.

Trent

30 Days of Kink – Day 13

September 2, 2012 By Trent Evans

Day 13: Explain as best you can what the appeal of kink/BDSM is to you? Why are you drawn to what you’re drawn to?

Intensity. That’s what comes to mind when I think of this question. Be it physical or psychological (or maybe even spiritual), BDSM is simply more intense than vanilla sex/sexuality. Perhaps that might be a trifle self-serving — after all since I’m not by any stretch of the imagination “vanilla”, I can’t really compare the levels of intensity. But I suspect that I can make a fairly educated guess:)

Part of this intensity, to me, relates to the ability to strip the human psyche down to its most primal parts. When you get right down to it, humans are animals, with animalistic drives. Sex is one of the most powerful of those drives; witness planet Earth, fair teeming with 7 BILLION of us.

Sexuality expressed within the context of BDSM allows us the freedom to be who we really are deep down inside, to embrace that raw, primal being. This “freedom” is paradoxical, but no less true, for that kneeling sub bound tightly in her rope. In a more subtle way, for the Dom it allows him to throw off the cultural/societal strictures and prohibitions, and get in touch with that inner animal, that being that seeks to control, to conquer, to revel in the power of imposing his will on his beloved submissive.

The animal world is replete with unequal power dynamics with regard to sexuality. Though we like to think we are so very much different, we’re kidding ourselves. Our drives are no different, rather they are tempered, restrained by higher functioning brains, our capacity for reason, our singular ability to be aware of our own consciousness, and our place in the larger world. When it comes down to sex though . . . the ancient, lower functioning (some will refer to it as ‘reptilian’) brain is very much the underlying, driving force.

BDSM allows one to acknowledge that fact, and rather than try to suppress it, one can redirect it, draw from it, for the (hopefully) mutual pleasure of all involved. It’s all too tempting to generalize about the innate natures of males and females here. I’m not going to do it though, simply because the human race is so marked by exception, contradiction, and just plain baffling craziness, that there is no point in it. I can only speak for me, and with luck, most of time such speech will be cogent:)

The ‘why’ of this question is the tougher nut to crack. I suspect many of us in the BDSM “community” (I sometimes scratch my head at the meaning of that term, but I suppose it works) will never really understand why we are the way we are. Personally, I don’t think it really matters. Do vanilla people sit down and navel gaze about why they like what they like? My guess is . . . no. I think we, for whatever reason, were (for the majority of us) made this way. I was going to say ‘born this way’, but then Lady Gaga started playing in my head. Sorry, where was I?

As with so much else when it comes to human sexuality, the why (when it can be determined at all) is never simple. The human mind is so incredibly complex, every process and structure so interconnected, that it is impossible to determine a single causative factor in determining why someone likes what they like. We can deduce, surmise, and guess forever — and we’ll still never nail it down.

For me, part of the appeal is the mystery of the motivation, the uncertainty of the origins of such urges. It adds a spice, an underlying ambiguity, even a danger to everything we do. We pervs key in on this, again, as animalistic beings. We just can’t help it.

I’ve always found one of the most fascinating aspects of quantum mechanics to be the Uncertainty Principle. In laymen’s terms, this states that it is actually impossible to pinpoint simultaneously, with zero probability for error, the exact position and velocity of a particle (physics majors: yes, I understand I am grossly simplifying here).

I bring this up for two reasons: 1) I’m a nerd, 2) I equate the ‘why’ of BDSM sexuality with this principle. Bet you never thought you’d see someone connect quantum mechanics with whips and chains. Yes, that just happened.

We really can never know, exactly, why we are who we are. To my twisted mind, this not only adds mystery and excitement, but it lends me a modicum of comfort as well. Do any of us really want to be completely understood (or even fully understand ourselves)? If we’re honest, I’ll bet most of us would answer ‘hell no’.

There are, of course, reasons we can cite for individual kinks that we like, but even there we will get tripped up in the exact whys of things. For instance, I am a big time fan of spanking and corporal punishment. I find the female buttocks probably one of the most beautiful, viscerally exciting sights in the world. Spanking a woman . . . it’s just right. The why is pretty easy to guess, but can we nail it down precisely? No, we can’t— if we’re honest with ourselves. Do I think about this as I am spanking a woman, feeling her body against mine, listening to her cry out, watching the color of her bottom deepen further and further? Of course not—I accept, and enjoy.

I’m going to leave this here, because this is such a fascinating question that I could easily write a damned book about it. Rather than continue flapping my gums, I’ll quit while I’m ahead:) Until Day 14!

Best,

Trent

30 Days of Kink – Day 17

30 Days of Kink – Day 16

30 Days of Kink – Day 13

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