Kink Critical - Tumblr Posts
every man who has a problem with feminism and just women in general is into that painful bdsm extreme type porn and hmmmmmmmmm… i wonder… if there is a link there somewhere…… almost…….. hmmm…..
every man who has a problem with feminism and just women in general is into that painful bdsm extreme type porn and hmmmmmmmmm… i wonder… if there is a link there somewhere…… almost…….. hmmm…..
When BDSM goes too far
So I have defended bdsm time and time again because I enjoy aspects of it myself but I want to talk about the fact that there is a line here.
Bdsm can have a fine line between finding pleasure in being dominated, with possibly the sensation of pain, vs using it as a form of self harm and letting people abuse you. It’s really important to examine why you enjoy what you enjoy sexually. You need to keep yourself mentally and physically healthy. There comes a point when your consent doesn’t mean that it’s automatically a healthy thing for you to be doing because it’s not safe…
Things like a spanking, choking, hair pulling, even an open hand slap, a little warm wax, scratching, whatever can be done very safely. No actual real bodily harm is being caused besides maybe a bruise here and there from a rough grab at your thigh. It’s all temporary pain, a sting in the moment.
But I have seen bdsm of (girls usually but men too) doing some…. horrific things. Things like giant sewers stabbed though women’s breasts, being punched in the face (like.. enough for blood/black eyes), being kicked in the head, being branded, etc. and I want to say that I don’t support that. That is NOT SAFE BEHAVIOR. Having giant open wounds, blisters/burns, black eyes, head trauma, etc. is 100% not fucking safe or healthy for you to be doing to yourself or letting someone do to you. You can cause yourself permanent bodily harm, bad infections, etc. Bdsm can be taken too far and it’s no longer healthy for you to doing, regardless of your consent.
I’m not here to blame anyone and call anyone a bad person for engaging in these unsafe behaviors but I really worry for your safety and I hope you don’t really hurt yourself.
Anyway, I’m tired of the idea that all kinks and fetishes are a-okay and entirely free of moral implication lmao
If a white man is really, really into the idea of degrading and harming a black woman during sex, that could possibly, maybe, conceivably have been influenced by the fact that we live in a racist and sexist culture
If an older man is really, really into the idea of having sex with barely-legal girls dressed as schoolchildren, that could possibly, maybe, conceivably have been influenced by the fact that we live in a pedophilic and sexist culture
If a man is really, really into the idea of holding down a crying and screaming woman and forcing himself into her while she says no, that could possibly, maybe, conceivably have been influenced by the fact that we live in a sexist rape culture that shames victims and excuses rapists
If a man is really, really into the idea of degrading and yelling slurs at a trans person of either gender during sex, that could possibly, maybe, conceivably have been influenced by the fact that we live in a transphobic culture
And maybe, the people who are super into acting out these oppressive power imbalances during sex….. actually are pretty likely to be racist, sexist, pedophilic, and/or rapists. Like, it’s possible that racists, sexists, pedophiles, and rapists are drawn to things that are racist, sexist, pedophilic, or rapey. It might be vaguely, possibly, somewhat conceivable, perhaps.
And yes, there are people who are not straight men who act out these things with their partners. Some things - a white person degrading a black person, a cis person degrading a trans person, an older person creeping on a young person - are still power imbalances. But if the two people are, in theory, equals in terms of oppression and privilege, it is POSSIBLE that they’re coming at it from a more healthy place (although it is also possible that there’s another power imbalance in the relationship, such as teacher/student, senior/freshman, celebrity/fan, professional/aspirational amateur in their field, etc). Two white cis women of similar ages who really trust each other playing out a rape-ish scenario to explore power together have the technical -possibility- of doing it somewhat safely, without exacerbating existing power imbalances. It’s, like, vaguely possible.
But that’s not what I’m talking about. I’m talking about the massive amount of people who are involved in these things to play out power imbalances that they already benefit from. Just because not everyone in those communities is white, or cis, or straight, or whatever, doesn’t mean that there isn’t a whole fucking lot of cis het white men violently playing out their privilege through kink. And “well I’M into this and I’M queer and my FRIENDS are queer” doesn’t really negate that. The morality is much more up for discussion (which does NOT mean much more moral, necessarily - it can still be super fucked up, depending) when you throw in a subversion of the normal power imbalances, and that’s not what I’m discussing here.
I’m talking about men who get off on “pretend” raping their girlfriends. I’m talking about 55 year old men who exclusively date 18 year olds (especially 18 year olds who look ~15). I’m talking about white men who get off on yelling slurs at their black female partners. I’m talking about white men who get off on degrading and humiliating their asian female partners. I’m talking about cis men (or women!) who yell slurs at, and insult the bodies of, their trans partners.
Just because some people involved in some questionable fetishes AREN’T re-enacting their already existing privilege against their already existingly oppressed partner, doesn’t mean that there isn’t a huge number of people who ARE.
You can’t deny that most people into being doms in ddlg are men who want a young, childlike girlfriend (and usually one who is a traumatized CSA survivor whose red flags system doesn’t work properly, and is thus easy to manipulate). You can’t deny that a massive amount of people into being doms in bdsm are men who like to hurt women. You can’t deny that transphobic fetishes aren’t often held by cis people. You can’t deny that most racist fetishes are held by white people. You can’t deny that most “lesbian” or “bisexual” fetishes are held by straight men (and a fun reminder, now, that a whopping 46% of bi women are raped and 75% are sexually assaulted, which is a. higher than any other sexuality and b. directly related to how “sexy” we’re portrayed as, and how we’re considered to be “always up for anything”). And you can’t deny that men have always been very talented at pressuring their female partners, or even female non-partners, into sexual acts. You can’t deny that men often have the power to both coerce women into doing what they want, and the power to get away with it. You can’t deny that men who are into these privilege-highlighting power imbalances are likely to pressure and coerce their oppressed partners into submitting to it, regardless of how much they actually want to do it.
And it’s bullshit that that’s called “infantilizing [these women].” Yeah, some women are really into being yelled at and beaten and pseudo-raped and injured and whatever the fuck, sure, a small amount. But just because some women choose it, doesn’t mean that no one can talk about how easily it can be coercive, abusive, and rape. If you say “well I choose to do this, so you can’t talk about how many women are pressured into this, because the idea that I could be a victim insults me,” that’s just… Really worrying, tbh. Yeah, you have agency. Yes, women can make their own choices.
But we are also often victimized, and that’s not an insult. There’s no shame in being a victim. And just because you aren’t one, doesn’t mean that we can’t talk about how these power imbalances, both the ones that exist in day to day life and the ones that are played out in hyperdrive by these fetishes, create an environment in which it’s very easy for women (and other people in oppressed classes! I’m just mostly talking about abusive cis het men) to be abused and taken advantage of. Why would you place your own pride above that?
Cis het able-bodied white men are literally THE most dangerous group of people, statistically speaking. They are the most likely to be violent, the most likely to be abusers, the most likely to be rapists. And when a cis het white man is really into playing out his privilege as powerfully as possible, you’ve got to wonder about that. You can’t just say “oh, well it’s SEXUAL though, so it doesn’t mean he condones it in real life.” Sex happens in real fucking life. What people are into sexually has bearing on what they’re into, and what they accept, in real life, because sex is part of real life. You don’t become fictional or hypothetical when you have sex. You’re still a person. And in the case of cis het able-bodied white men, you’re still a person with extreme privilege. In the case of cis het able-bodies white men who sexually play out an extreme version of the privileges they already hold against the people they already oppress, that matters. That’s really happening, in the “real world”, in “real life”.
So I don’t care that not all doms are cis het white able-bodied men. I don’t care that some are cis women, some are trans men, some are trans women, some are gay, some are bi, some are pan or ply or ace or aro, some are poc, some are disabled, whatever. I care that a lot of them ARE cis het white able-bodied men, acting out their privilege over their partner. I care that they’re getting off on their already violent privileges. That they’re getting off on their ability to oppress others. That they’re getting off on their extreme power. Just because #notalldoms fit that class of people, doesn’t mean that it’s not a very real problem that needs to be talked about. And if you aren’t one of those men, you still have a basic responsibility to hold those in your community accountable for abuse. If you say “I’ve been to loads of kink events/kink spaces and I’ve never seen anyone like that”, you sound just like the legions of men who rushed to say “I’ve never heard locker room talk like THAT” as soon as Trump’s bus tape leaked. If you haven’t heard or seen it, you should probably pay better attention.
And it’s just like every other ethics or social justice discussion. If “person doing this bad thing” doesn’t fit you, you don’t have to defend yourself against it. If you’re not a cis het able-bodied white man, “hyper-privileged men in kink who act out their privileges over oppressed people during sex” doesn’t apply to you. If you see people discussing harmful privileged men in kink, and you want to say “not everyone in power-play kinks are like that!”, chill. Most of us know that. And it’s not about you. That’s why we’re specifically discussing the privileged men, dude(tte).
TL;DR Sexual behavior isn’t completely devoid of moral implication. If someone is acting out their privileges against a person they inherently oppress, during sex, that’s not any less immoral than acting them out not-during-sex. Sex doesn’t create morality, or even a lack of morality. You have to wonder about people who use kink to enjoy their already-existing status of power, you have to wonder about people who use kink in a way that falls exactly in line with the harmful aspects of an oppressive, backwards culture. “Not everyone here is a cis het white able-bodied man” doesn’t negate the fact that many doms are, and that the power imbalances they choose to play out have a moral and ethical undertone. Any man who gets off to holding power over someone he oppresses is shady as shit, and it’s not wrong to discuss that.
people with rape kinks/abduction kinks/any kinks that directly involve overriding the autonomy of another person and harming them in a very serious way should take a hard look at themselves to examine exactly why they find the idea of intimately harming another human being so enthralling
some fucker: i like to think about physically abusing women in a bunch of really fucked up ways, bonus points if they hate it or cry while it’s happening. i also like to say the n word and various other racial slurs with explicitly derogatory and hateful intent. on top of that, i love expounding on how beneficial conversion therapy is and how much i would love to sexually assault young lesbians to “fix them”
y’all: that’s horrible! how can you have such little respect for marginalized communities? you’re an awful person!
some fucker: no, no; you misunderstand. i do these things so i can nut.
a disturbing number of y’all: protect this poor oppressed kinky snowball uwu
Also, while I'm ranting:
Just because something gives you a boner doesnt mean that its excempt from critical discussion.
I’m not anti kink, and I support sex workers, but the mindset of kinkshaming being a sort of unacceptable sin needs to go away. Daring to criticize kinks that have strong elements of racism, pedophilia, and incest needs to be more common. Calling out people who objectify and sexualize unknowing, unconsenting people (like fetishists who steal content from plus size fashion blogs) is also important.
I don’t understand how the BDSM community constantly talks about how important consent is, but then they also talk about “subspace” as if it’s a totally normal and even desirable result of a “scene.”
“Subspace” describes the state of someone who has gone through so much pain during a BDSM “scene” that they enter a dissociative state in order to cope with it. It’s often described as being similar to an out of body experience, as being “trance-like,” or as being a state where the mind recedes from the body.
Even putting aside from the fact that it doesn’t seem healthy in the first place to hurt someone so badly they have dissociate to cope with it, how exactly can someone give ongoing consent when they’re in a state like that? If a person isn’t competent to give consent when their brain is under the influence of alcohol or drugs, how are they mentally competent to give consent when they’re literally in a dissociative state?
libfem website article suggestions:
Why You Should Get Over Your Discomfort With Being Called Demeaning Slurs If It’s, Like, A Sex Thing
Here, Have A Tentative Endorsement Of Actual Intercourse In Public Spaces
A Bisexual Talked To Me???? Am I Qu**r Now??? (Blog Post)
Why Trans-Fetishism Is Progressive
Why Racial Preferences Are Natural (According To A White Free-Lance Psychologist)
How To Push Your Sexual Boundaries And Warp Your Perception Of Your Own Sexuality In A Way That Is Palatable To Straight Men
Are Lesbians Actually Holding Back Qu**r Rights?
Why It’s Okay To Be Homophobic To Gay Men, But Only When They’re, Like, Obnoxious About Being Gay. Real Homophobia Ended A Long Time Ago, Right?
How Feminism Was Actually Always About Helping Men, Too
“im a survivor and i engage in bdsm to cope and explore my trauma in a safe environment”
you just admitted yourself that you’re retraumatizing yourself. what’s more, you’re retraumatizing yourself… for the purpose of sexual gratification? and your partner is not only okay with it, but playing the part of your assaulter brings them sexual gratification as well? and you’re still gonna argue that it’s a healthy coping mechanism and a healthy sexual practice to be involved in?
If I’ve learnt anything from my contact with the bdsm community, the poly community, the geek community and the atheist community is that any social group who claims to “not to be like other groups” and to be"accepting and safe for all" is going to spend a lot of energy hiding the predators within the community and silencing abuse survivors.
When I say I’m kink critical it doesn’t mean “you get turned on by feet so I hate you” it means I am wary of people who think their orgasms are more important than someone’s existence or safety from harmful and dangerous behaviours, you’d be surprised how often people’s fantasies of misogyny, racism, transphobia and ableism can leak into how they interact with the real world and that’s fucking scary
Nerdy conventions are not a place to publicly explore your freaky slave kinks! Y'all wanna say that bdsm is about consent but don’t give a shit about the consent of those who can’t be exposed to that shit?
I’m in a Unicorn Hunter Spotting group on fb (unicorn hunters are cishet couples who aggressively try to find a queer woman for their “third” and treat her like a sex toy rather than a legit partner, it’s fuckin gross) and this got posted. I have legit never been so creeped out in my life.
Bonus: literally ALL of the creepiest unicorn hunters I have encountered/seen are DD/LG. Not helping with how much DD/LG skeeves me out. *shudder*
“We just want a housewife”- that’s called hiring a maid.
fuck anyone who says porn/bdsm culture isnt a huge problem- in the last few months, i’ve been choked (hard enough to pop blood vessels in my face), slapped, and scratched hard enough that the marks didn’t disappear for days. All of these things happened on first dates or the first time I went home with a person, and it was always without asking (obviously or i would have told them to fuck off). The closest thing to asking permission that I got was from one guy, who after slapping me across the face asked “was that okay?”
people argue that hardcore pornography and bdsm fetishes stay in the bedroom, that there’s a difference between violence in porn and violence in reality, but thats bullshit. Men are so okay with (and turned on by) hitting women that they dont even think they have to ask
As somebody with weird/gross kinks, I can say with authority that having/indulging in those kinks does not lead directly to sexualizing those things in a non-sexual context.
Where your gag comes from.
(TW: sexualized racism + misogyny, slavery) Discretion is highly advised.
Apparently, for some people (usually white in my experience), it’s difficult for them to comprehend the perspective that BDSM kink culture is neck-deep in racism and misogyny, particularly in the sexualization of racist-misogynistic historical practices. It’s become quite clear to me over months of pointing out the eerie similarities between the master/slave dynamic that’s common place in bondage subculture and the master/slave dynamic that was quite vividly practiced through patriarchal gender roles between men and women, as well as slavery…that many people struggle with being able to draw parallels between the techniques of torture slaves were subjected to and the methods of punishment “subs” are subjected to in kink culture. From the whipping to the gags.
It’s been communicated to me, based on the hesitant and confused reception of this argument, that I’m going to need to get visual. This post will include illustrations and imagery that may be potentially disturbing to some viewers, as well as triggering to people who feel mentally disarmed by images of black slavery and female oppression. This will not be my final post on the topic, but it will be an introduction to much larger, much more elaborate posts addressing the racist-patriarchal narratives usually replicated in kink culture (this does not exclude femdom kink practices, which I’ll be writing about in future posts).
I’ll first like to point out the gag. A torture device used to stop, “Negro Heads, with punishments for Intoxication and dirt-eating.”
[Slave Mask: Image Reference, NW0191. Source:Jacques Arago, Souvenirs d’un aveugle. Voyage autour du monde par M. J. Arago … (Paris, 1839-40), vol. 1, facing p. 119]
While the tin collar…
[Slave Mask Image Reference, NW0192. Source: Thomas Branagan, The Penitential Tyrant; or, slave trader reformed (New York, 1807), p. 271. (Copy in Library Company of Philadelphia; also Library of Congress, Prints and Photographs Division, LC-USZ62-31864)]
…was used to punish “drunkenness in females,” and the mask on it functions as a “punishment and preventative of….dirt eating.”
In some cases, along with the gags, “…a flat iron goes into the mouth, and so effectually keeps down the tongue, that nothing can be swallowed, not even the saliva, a passage for which is made through holes in the mouth-plate…when long worn, [it] becomes so heated as frequently to bring off the skin along with it.” - US Slave: Slave Tortures: The Mask, Scold’s Bridle or Brank.
Here’s another illustration of a tin mask sometimes used by Brazilian slave masters for reasons documented as to stop, “…[slaves] who were prone to eat earth or dirt to wear…”
[A water color by Jean Baptiste Debret (held by a museum in Rio de Janeiro); published in Ana Maria de Moraes, O Brasil dos viajantes (Sao Paulo and Rio de Janeiro, 1994), image 469, p. 93. Also published in Jean Baptiste Debret, Viagem Pitoresca e Historica ao Brasil (Editora Itatiaia Limitada, Editora da Universidade de Sao Paulo, 1989), p.128, a reprint of the 1954 Paris edition, edited by R. De Castro Maya). (source: University of Virginia)]
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Torture Devices With A Misogynistic History
A scold was defined as: “A troublesome and angry woman who by brawling and wrangling amongst her neighbours breaks the public peace, increases discord and becomes a public nuisance to the neighbourhood.” The device was a locking iron muzzle, metal mask or cage which encased the head. There was an iron curb projecting into the mouth which rested on the top of the tongue. This device prevented the shrew from speaking. In some instances the iron curb was studded with spikes which inflicted pain if the victim spoke. Some branks had a bell built in which drew attention to the scold as she walked through the streets. The woman would be humiliated by the jeering and comments from other people.
THE SCOLD’S BRIDLE
[Scold’s Bridle: This was a metal frame place over a woman’s head. It had a bit that stuck in her mouth to prevent her talking. The scold’s bridle or branks was used in Scotland by the 16th century and was used in England from the 17th century. It was last used in Britain in 1824].
Made by blacksmiths, the bridle was a cage-like device, made from iron. It was approximately nine inches high and seven inches wide, and was fitted to the woman’s head. The most basic type was made of a band of iron, which was hinged at the side and had a protruding part, or tongue piece, that could be flat or with a spike, which went into the woman’s mouth, to hold her tongue down. Another band of iron went over her head, the front of which was shaped for her nose to go through. Depending on the design, the bridle could be uncomfortable, painful or torturous, and scarring of the tongue was not uncommon. Some had a bell secured to a spring, which was attached to the bridle, so the wearer could be heard as she approached.
Some houses had a hook in the wall at the side of the fireplace where the wife would be chained, until she promised to behave herself and curb her tongue. Although sometimes fitted to a nagging wife by the local gaoler (jailer) at the request of her husband, or by the husband himself, it was more often a punitive sentence ordered by a magistrate. Judicial bridles were more elaborate than the basic type; they always had at least one spike and they could be locked. They also had a chain attached to the side of the bridle, with a ring on the end. This could be used to publicly humiliate the woman by leading her through the town, or staking her at a designated area for a set time period. The amount of time the bridle was worn could be from 30 minutes to several hours, depending on the seriousness of the offense, during which time the miscreant would not be able to eat or drink. It was also said to be used on witches to prevent them from chanting or casting spells.
It’s pretty evident that when some women, especially women of color , argue that BDSM kink culture has an overwhelming amount of racist-misogyny embedded in its practice of reenacting bondage and inequitable dynamics, they have a reasonable argument worth considering. It’s not difficult to understand the viewpoint that some kinks take things steeped in the actual subordination and oppression of people and turn it into a sexualized drama that’s just “fun and games,” for the (hopefully consensual) participants involved.
If you are engaged in kinky, consensual sexual activity, your gut-reaction is most likely to defend something you’ve learnt to enjoy despite its highly problematic elements. However, the primary intent of this post isn’t to persuade you to stop practicing these things, but to come to realize that kink culture is still affected by whiteness and patriarchy while relying on it all the same. Relying on the use of sometimes and somewhat altered methods of torture to be able to act out scenes that induce discomfort and/or pain and to keep within the narrative of unequal power relations and acted abuse.
there’s too much abuse going on in kink communities/bdsm relationships not to talk about sexual violence and male violence and how this manifests and that takes priority over people feeling #shamed for how they have sex. I think to dismiss these discussions as purity politics is unfair and unsafe