I'm glad you're finding at least some understanding and (maybe) closure with all this. *hug*

Actions do speak louder than words. And while there's always room for self-reflection and questioning, the important thing is getting to that point where you are secure and proud in what you're doing, without the need to rationalize things to yourself. So yeah, I think it makes sense? ;)

You are so welcome! I am happy to chat and listen. And I agree; yay fandom.

Big time. I really appreciate it, and it's really humbling and cool.

And if you want me to talk about if *I* agree with things I said then I can certainly do that, but tomorrow.

(The short answer is yes. The almost-as-short-answer is mostly, but they also come from a place of feeling less projected-on, and pressured, pushed and non-consensually included in scenes, so they probably sound less intense and more magnanimous.)

- HC

Anyway, if you're around, glad to gab some more about this if you like. You're also more than welcome to drop me an email if you want to talk that way.

This is fine. Major productions over a casual conversation kind of freak me out. :)

By all means, a lot of what was going on then was being really very pressured all around, both by people in my life, but also in work/writing online. This is one of those topics, too, where you're pretty much going to get it from all sides no matter what you say or feel. If I hear from a kinky person I'm being anti-BDSM (or was), nearly always, I'd hear from someone who was earnestly anti-BDSM (as in, for all people), that I'm being much too pro: often from people reading the exact same thing/words. In other words, it's easy to feel like you just can't win.

Also, too at the time (it happens still, mind but was happening a lot then), there seemed to be a lot of projection going on and assumptions that how I'd say I felt in my personal journal or life would mean I'd say or do the same things working at Scarleteen. In that same year, if I recall correctly, I took a lot of flack from someone for a message board response to a user who was considering a BDSM scenario that really didn't sound like a goodie by anyone's standards, and certainly not with that particular user's history. This user also had some history that I was taking into account in my response -- as I do when someone is an ongoing user -- which clearly, those pitching a fit, were not aware of nor did they seem to make any effort to make themselves aware of. The truth of the matter is that at the time, I was working very hard to try and manage my personal feelings and still do my job well when BDSM topics came around, and it wasn't easy. I also didn't have anyone who was complaining I was doing a crappy job offer to earnestly volunteer to help, either.

(I think too, that often people don't recognize some generational differences going around. I don't actually have any idea how old you are, but I know for me, turning 40 in a few months, when I was engaging in BDSM, it wasn't because anyone was pressuring me too, I didn't feel any pressure to be kinky, or like if I wasn't, I would be a prude, or like I needed to to prove my worth or sexiness to anyone. It's not something I discovered in porn or at Nerve or from vague suggestions on reality TV. And we hear that a lot at Scarleteen from the YP around a lot of things sexual, including -- though not at all exclusive to -- BDSM: this feeling of needing to leap into something which they might have, in fact, some interest in without pressure, but there's this undertow of pressure, especially pressure to be sexier than anyone else, that makes them feel they need to leap in, without giving themselves any time they need first, or even really considering each situation to be sure it's a good one.)

But that stuff, and our big convo here: five years ago. Long time, all things considered. :) I think for me, a lot of what I just needed was some space away from any kind of BDSM community at all, and certainly from people shoving me around a lot in one direction as well as the other. I most certainly needed to get away from people who in some ways, I felt were basically including me in parts of their scenes not only without my consent, but when I'd stated my express nonconsent. I think I also really needed to see more people addressing the fact that abuse does happen in BDSM community, just like it happens everywhere else. At the time, I was hearing either denials or people who agreed, but also didn't seem to want to address it with anyone but me, either, someone who had left the scene and those practices. In the interim, I feel like I've seen and heard a lot more people bringing it up, starting to address it in communities, not leaping to fast hiding or denials as much. And that's made a HUGE difference in my feelings. So has hearing less and less from people who talked the talk about negotiation and awareness but SO did not walk that walk.

(more in a sec)

Also, when I was (briefly) involved in some TNG groups, I saw similar things around me. People who explained that they had, years before, lied their way into the community (i.e. claiming "I'm 18" when they were 16, etc.) and who -- at least from what they said about it -- had done so not because someone had dragged them there but because they felt themselves to be orientationally kinky and didn't think they should have to wait when all the vanilla folk around them were starting to be sexually active.

It's not something I myself did (I was 21) or that I approve of, or approved of even then, but it's part of what was in the background of my responses to stuff from Scarleteen, which in its own way is "the world says you're not old enough, but the world is neither respecting you nor being realistic about what you want to try or need to know."

Edited at 2010-01-23 10:34 pm (UTC)

Thanks for sharing all of that with me: that's quite an extension of openness, and I appreciate it.

I can also resonate when it comes to violent fantasy. I had similar things going on in my head a very long time ago, and a similar outcome. In other words, when there was somewhere for some of that vibe/flavor to play out, things changed fairly radically. I suspect not in the same way as they did for you -- for me, my safety in my teen years with most things started out nonexistent, so I was both pretty streetwise, but also found what was or felt like safety in a lot of things by comparison, including plenty of things that SO were not safe, but I also didn't want them to be and wasn't alone, either -- as both of us having an identical background/sexual and life history seems unlikely, but I hear you.

By the by, I don't know how comfortable you feel with the story you just told me about yourself and your teens in regard to this, but if you ever want to and have the time, that actually sounds like something some of the YP at Scarleteen could really benefit from hearing from someone who has been there.

I think for me the tricky thing with all of that stuff around that one response, out of context, was that most of the time I DID say (and still do) exactly the kinds of things you're saying I should/should have been. And if I wasn't, or felt I couldn't, I stepped/step aside so someone else did. Between the message boards, advice pieces and articles, I think we have around a couple hundred, maybe a bit less, posts, advice answers, pieces, etc. on BDSM on Scarleteen, and I think you'd likely find most, maybe even all of them, were just fine by you, especially if those which had some context to them were really considered in context. And that was a big toughie with all of that for me: I had people telling other people -- or me -- what I felt and thought and meant (even people who don't know jack about me presuming they knew something about my sex life or sexual history) without a) really looking at my whole history in talking about these topics there and b) not considering that context counts. And frankly, that with that one post, that user actually reported feeling very good about my response, and strongly uncomfortable with Vinnie's and the other conversation she found off the site in people's journals about it.

(more incoming)

(more with the more)



Probably, this was in part merely an issue of faith. Obviously, not everyone knows me nor has the time, or wants to take it, to check out context and history. The users at Scarleteen tend to: they either often tend to read around a bunch before posting anything, or have been around for a while enough to have a pretty clear sense of me, IME. A lot of them also tend to read WAY more threads and material there than likely most adult onlookers do. Of course, there's also the faith in someone's intentions, and the fact that it IS tough to so this kind of work sometimes and work it with one's personal feelings and experiences. And while I think I'm generally very good at that balancing act, I'm mortal. At this point, I've engaged in tens of thousands of conversations online alone, and I know full well that in some of them, I have not done my best, and in some, have potentially even flat-out failed. That's going to happen, especially with my kind of workload. :) And if and when it does, the users themselves usually let me know, but if outside people contact me to give me constructive feedback, that's a good thing. Even though I think I should be allowed to flop sometimes, I should also always be willing to recognize that and consider why I did, try not to next time, you know?

But "constructive" is pretty key, as you know.

I really appreciate your apologies, but I think we're good. Seriously. :) If nothing else, even back when, you were willing to talk with me about this stuff, and while I don't think the conversation was exactly chill or all that fun for either of us, I appreciated your engaging with me then like I do now. I also really, really appreciate you acknowledging that I have a process like everyone else does, and your willingness to consider what that was/is.

The years that I was in and around the scene in Chicago in the mid-nineties, while I certainly met a few "I am Big Dominant Man's" (an approach that generally just resulted in a mad fit of giggles on my part, something I don't have to tell you those types don't find amusing, but do tend to just slink away from, IME), nearly everyone around me at first were also all really good people, and people who did walk the walk when it came to consent, to negotiation, to being really mindful and thoughtful and caring. And with one of my last BDSM partnerships in that scene, being all of that was actually quite a challenge for the play partner I was with (in part because *I* was not being as fully honest as I should have been about being triggered because part of me liked being triggered, and was kind of torturing myself with it), one I have to give props for managing so well.

Towards the end of those years...eh, I saw more of the not-so-great-people. Who knows, maybe with both of us there were always those people, but we just didn't see them at first or meet them at first. Or maybe we both just had similar experiences where the yucky-folk didn't show up until later on. So, I saw more and more not-so-greats, and seemed to meet more people who'd basically...well, not call those people out or be at all supportive of my doing so. I actually was given a very clear message from a few people in the scene that I should just put a sock in it, and that no -- for the worst example -- a mountain of cocaine and a play party led by Domme who thought it was fine to let her five-year-old be present was not my problem or my business.

I walked away from BDSM then for mostly different reasons (glad to talk more about that if you want), though that kind of stuff certainly had an influence, but then a few years later all the other stuff I talked about earlier in the thread here, and in that journal entry in '05, started and grew, even though I was definitely out of the scene, but also infrequently doing BDSM in my own sex life separately.

Yeah, WAY different. Mind, I didn't really have a clear awareness right off the bat at that time, and with that person, that I was starting to be triggered so much and so deeply, or was on that verge. Not until after we had really crossed a line, anyway, which was intentional on no one's part at all (and wasn't helped by the fact that with that particular scene, I simply totally dissociated, and the sitch were such that that would not have been at all easily discernible to that person). And I dissociated a few scenes more before either of us realized that's what was even going on.

All the same, I didn't take any negatives about BDSM in genral away from that, however, what became clear to me was that I had my own shit to work out that a) would have to be worked out for everyone's sake if I was to do that kind of play again, and b) that BDSM in general actually probably was not the best place for me, altogether, ESPECIALLY as a switch. My topping anyone at that time and in that headspace would have been so seriously unsafe for everybody: bottoming (for me, at that time) was unsafe and unsound enough. And that was a mixture of both where my head was at and what I needed when it came to sex, but also with how I was, personally, starting to feel and think about power and hierarchy, in the world and in my relationships.

Does that make sense?

(here's the more)



So has, in all honesty, making my own community, and the sea of voices of input, get smaller as I can, and less radically different. Trying to put together everything being said and reacted to by very hard-line not-so-awesome radical feminist women, very hard-line not-so-awesome BDSM folks, and with you being neither is exceptionally difficult. Especially in public, especially with so many pushy voices in your ears.

And on top of all of THAT, I was in a space with my Buddhism at the time that was very intense, where a whole lot was happening in my head and my life all at once. I was also without a lot of that community, and without enough people around me, online and off, who seemed to get any of that, particularly when it came to trying to figure out how power fit into that picture, and certainly how hierarchy could. I know in the conversation we had, one of the things I was really struggling with was feeling very misunderstood when it came to what I was trying to say about hierarchy and power as a spiritual issue for me, as something I was trying to work through via that lens. Of course, any catty comments (though I don't recall you personally making them) about how so not hawt trying to view power differently was just felt like...well, a really dumb brick wall, if you get me.

So, there's my initial babble. It's pretty rambly, but it's a helluva lot to try and sum up!

- HC

A truce, indeed. We were both touchy as hell. Combustion may well have been unavoidable. It happened, it sucked, we both moved on, took whatever from it we did, and here we sit now, obviously a lot less touchy. :)

But now you have to go asking the $20,000 question, eh? :)

It's one that I'm still sure I don't have a clear answer to, but do feel pretty clear I may never have one.

That said, I'm still happy to try and talk some of it out, especially in a safer space for that, which we seem to have. That said, it's probably worth asking how familiar you are with the core tenets and philosophies of Zen Buddhism, particularly when it comes to things like how we do (or don't) distinguish ourselves from others, per thinking about power as vertical or horizontal? I don't want to go into things that are rudimentary for you or you already know or have a good sense of.

(Apologies for the delay. Have a partner recuperating from a minor surgery who needed caretaking, which of course also meant we got into a conversation about all of this.)

Okay. For the record, it is entirely possible I will explain any of this poorly, or in a way that's really messy. I'm someone who tends to be much batter at expanding things conceptually than clarifying them. Sometimes when I try to clarify, I also wind up saying things that are dreadfully obvious, so people assume I think they're stupid instead of recognizing I'm just working hard to try and be simple and clear, which is often a challenge for me.

It might help to first understand that I came to Buddhism because I was already on board with nearly all of it before I did. In other words, most of Buddhist philosophy and practice feels very authentic and intuitive to me; it's a very good fit for my feelings as well as my politics.

Ultimately, in my mind and heart, when it comes to Buddhism and BDSM, per the tricky stuff, the central issues at hand are about power and about attachment.

When I (we) say vertical and horizontal power, I mean that horizontal means we all have equality. Our essential power is all equal, and we strive to always recognize that equality and live in a way that respects and nurtures it. Vertical power is hierarchy: it's a way of seeing or enacting power where someone has more and someone else less; where someone is seen as greater, and someone else as lesser.

Now: there certainly can be situations in which vertical power can co-exist within a horizontal framework. For instance, let's say that a kitchen needs to be managed, and I am given the job of managing everyone doing several jobs, and you're given the job of doing the dishes. If we both understand that a) neither one of our jobs is any more or less important than the other, b) neither of our jobs says anything at all about the character or value of either of us, and c) that this is a momentary vertical structure -- it's not permanent, nor are our places in it permanent, in fact, we may swap them tomorrow and d) experience all of this will both of us feeling and knowing, intrinsically, that we're all horizontal per power, we can hold both spaces, if you get me. And certainly, I think there are some people/relationships per BDSM where that can happen.

However, I think that we have to bear in mind that anyone in BDSM is still anyone in the rest of the world, a world where a LOT of people feel power (theirs and/or that of others, or power in general) is, in at least some way, not essentially horizontal, but essentially, intrinsically, inarguably vertical. Or feel that they have a given place or value power-wise, which is essential.

(more incoming)

Morning! Not sure what your schedule is like, but I have some time today to duck in and out of this, and I'm enjoying the conversation. But we could obviously just as easily string this out over weeks or months. :)

I think one thing it's probably important for you to know about me, personally, that's clearly very different from you is that hierarchies between people, to me, in BDSM or otherwise, have always felt, intrinsically and intuitively, very false to me: they haven't felt at all real. They've felt constructed. And with D/S, the roles also never felt authentic to me: it felt much more like you do when you're a kid playing cops and bank robbers. I think I tried to express that last time around in '05, but remember feeling like for some reason, I just couldn't get that across. It's possible some of why I couldn't, though, is not fully getting at the time that for others, they DO very much feel authentic.

That given, this is obviously going to be a very different conversation and I'm likely going to frame this very differently than you do because it sounds to me like you, on the other hand, feel that what you're calling rank (and I get it) does feel in some way intuitive and authentic to you. This isn't about flicking switches for me to change me so I can get to an ideal life, it's about learning NOT to do that.

But what I'm also hearing sounds to me like what you might be describing is, the sense that yes, this is workable but only when the horizontal (worth) is there, and you're potentially talking about problems on all sides when it isn't, be that a person exploiting others with power, or a person devaluing themselves so much, having so little sense of their own value, that they aren't authoring their own lives or driving that car and are looking to someone else to do it.

I'd absolutely agree, by the way, that there are problems then people don't see us all as having an essential equality, as having equal worth (which also means equal responsibility) that are about more than someone in a vertical power structure exploiting their power or oppressing others with it: people who think they are value-less and also without responsibility can very much also hurt themselves and others, and also keep us from equality. Of course, where it all gets tricky again is figuring out how those scenarios happened, which is always going to be complex, but I do think that a lot of the time, someone's place -- or their parents, or the one they wanted, or wanted and didn't get -- in a vertical power structure plays a big role. I really, really like Paolo Friere on that, but once we go to talking about power and oppression in that context, we are talking about bigger structures than in a couple, so.

I also don't have an issue with competitiveness and ambition, really: like I said, I think that's so situational and what motivates them, and what they're about, matter. Like, I have an issue with those things when they are about a nation or individual trying to have power over the whole world and get all the resources we all should be sharing. I don't have an issue with those things when kids want to win the spelling bee (without any crazy stage parent dynamics, mind). And from a Buddhist perspective, I think the latter can support core tenets just fine in most cases, while the former never will.

Am I getting you here?

Which puts me on attachment.

(Just a reminder again, I'm talking about my life here, my world view, my own framework and the framework I want to put my energy into in my life.)

One really tricky spot with D/S is when we're not talking about switches, but about people who identify solidly or solely as a top, and those who do as a bottom. For whom this is an identity, not a role. I'm not questioning any of our rights to identify any way we want in our lives, or questioning what anyone feels their identity is: rather, I'm speaking to the ways identities/roles, especially those affixed to power, can be really problematic in most Buddhist views.

If we really see power as horizontal, yet recognize that sometimes a vertical structure can also be present, but still ultimately honors and strives for the horizontal/fully equal understanding, we really can't do that if we state or frame a given position of power as in any way permanent. For that framing to work, and also do work towards non-attachment as a whole, those roles can only be temporary. (In this way, switches obviously present far less of a conundrum, and may not present one at all.)

In other words, if anyone thinks that their topness or bottomness is something unchanging and permanent, something fixed -- and obviously all the more so if they feel it exists outside a present moment, such as in a scene -- it ultimately seems to me that it really can't exist in a spirit of non-attachment OR horizontal power/understood equity.

You'll notice I said "seems to me." Because here's the thing: maybe it can. I really don't know. I know that it can't in my head as I understand all of these things to date, and that it also can't per how I have experienced it myself and understood/heard about the experiences of others.

You said something about there about if power or ambition has creative purpose, and I can't really speak much to that through this lens. I certainly think it can and often does, but I also think those terms are broader than I can use in this context, because what kind of power matters to me, and what the ambition is and where it comes from, for as much as we can know that, matters to me.

I have absolutely no idea if I've managed to express any of this well, so I'm going to go be quiet now, let you have a look at it, and then see what you think about any of it, including if I've been either obtuse as hell or painfully obvious. :)

The usual thing I'll say at Scarleteen about fantasy, is that our thoughts are our thoughts: we can refine them, but not control them. We can also clear them, process them, whatever, but I don't say control. When they're asking about sexual fantasy, what I'll typically say is that ideas and thoughts are not actions, and that accepting fantasy as it is when we have it is usually the best tack. And if it's bothering us or we find it disturbing, we can certainly talk to a counselor about it to find out what it bothering us and why we're disturbed. In that case, if and when fantasy is coming from a place that isn't healthy, or is about needing to work something difficult out, talk-therapy about it will tend to either a) work that out and the fantasy ceases or b) get the person to a more okay place so that the fantasy then feels okay, or adapts to something that is okay.

Do you know what I mean?

Again, some of this part of the discussion is tough for me, because when we're talking about me, and what feels authentic and instinctive to me, these roles don't. They always felt like playacting unless I got very deeply triggered and then, for me, those triggers were about abuse, something which I know full well is not going on for everyone involved in D/S, and which doesn't play a part in it. But for me, it did, and for some others, it also does. And I think there are folks out there like me, for whom none of this -- per roles, per top/bottom, master/slave, etc. -- feels actual or truly real, like who we are, but others still for whom it feels different. I can obviously only speak so much about the latter because it's not my experience or something I emotionally understand, even if intellectually I do.

I agree with your friend, for the most part. And that again, what's in our heads isn't the same as our actions: it's our actions we really need to be most concerned with. But I've also not really had that process when it comes to this specifically: D/S for me wasn't something in my head, but something I tried to take on that felt artificial to me, personally.

"But I also think that sometimes we're not perfect, and I'm not sure that we can or should (and again, not saying you said this) expend effort trying to prune away bad motives entirely, so much as we should understand and recognize when we've got them and be careful what we let them fuel." I'd agree with this.