MTSR #4: Know The Difference -- BDSM vs. Abuse

 I was given an opportunity a few months ago to attend a week-long set of online seminars on domestic violence and abuse in the Leather/BDSM/Kinky/Fetish (I'm just going to use BDSM from now on, for short) community. What I heard there persuaded me to change somewhat the focus of this article. Most people attending were able to describe different types of abuse, and how they might manifest in a relationship. But a surprising number seemed to think that there was a very fine line between consensual power exchange and abuse, and many were unsure and/or unwilling to say even generally where that line was. I heard things like “something that would be seen as heavy abuse in a vanilla relationship could be just mild abuse in a BDSM one” and “but if someone has already agreed to submit to a dom, then it's not really abuse at all, is it?” Seriously? Mild abuse? Is that like “mostly dead” or “a little bit pregnant?”

Abuse can be present in any relationship, and the BDSM community is not magically immune to it. Men can be abused by their girlfriends and wives, tops can be abused by their bottoms, and vanilla folks can abuse their partners, too. Originally, that was going to be my focus, a slightly-tongue-in-cheek look at whether it might be better after all to pull a “Mysteriously Vanishing Mad” (named after me and my tendency to fall off the edge of the cyber-Earth from time to time.)

Instead, I want to take a bit of a look at some specific types of abuse and how consensual power exchange can resemble it, and then a look at how they're really not the same thing at all! I will call this section “Good Top / Bad Top” and will do my very best not to go too Dr. Seuss on you while doing it.

Abuse can take many forms, including physically striking, threats, namecalling, isolating and controlling. Oh, but wait a minute, I've done all of those things, and had them done to me, and wow- that was just a damn good kinky time! And lemme tell you something else, those damn good kinky times that I was talking about? Not abuse. So does that mean that as long as the people involved have already consented to power exchange in their relationship, nothing that they do to each other can actually be considered abuse? Don't be silly, if that were the case, I wouldn't need my “Bad Top” section, now would I?

Good Top/ Bad Top

Let's take a look at the different types of abuse,(Physical, Verbal/Emotional, Sexual, Neglect/Isolation, Financial and Spiritual) and then I'll try and give an example of how a healthy BDSM relationship can sometimes look like this on the outside but still be abuse free, and what a truly abusive similar situation might look like.

Physical Abuse:

Good Top, or GT, as I like to call him, is aware of his bottom's reactions and tolerances to pain, or is working slowly to discover them. He might push toward those limits but if so, is mindful of his bottom's reactions to that pushing, and is willing to stop if those start to become negative. He trusts his bottom to let him know, via safeword or some other means of communication, if she needs to stop play. He provides after care in a mutually decided upon manner, from water and cuddles and talk time, to a more formal chat later on, whichever style suits both people involved.

Bad Top, forevermore known as BT, might hurt to harm or to punish. He might hurt because he thrives off seeing his bottom in pain, or it might be just that he doesn't give any care or credence to his bottom's limits or feelings. BT has been known to dismiss his bottom as being a whiny baby or a just plain bad slave if she tells him that she is not enjoying or doesn't consent to his style of pain “play.” It's not uncommon for him to convince her that if she decided to complain to anyone in the BDSM community, she would never be able to get another top because she'd be labelled a “bad submissive.”

Verbal/Emotional Abuse:

GT is keyed in to how a bit of embarrassment can turn into huge amounts of hawtness for both her and her lucky bottom. (No kidding! Do you remember that night with the doggie collar and “bad dog” written on his side in grease pencil, dayum sexy! But I digress). She also knows that name-calling and humiliation play are tricky business, and she treats them with care. Because she and her bottom have open lines of communication, she is careful to try and pick scenarios that cause both embarrassment and arousal to her bottom, not ones that belittle his sense of self. The goal of the play (besides getting them both all sweaty and horny) is to build, not tear down, the bottom's self-esteem. Now, GT isn't psychic, and occasionally she might go too far, or get it wrong, but she trusts her bottom enough to ask him often for feedback when in a neutral and non-judgemental position, and to continue to keep his best interests in mind.

BT wants her bottom to feel emotionally dependent on her. To do this, she attacks the things he feels are most important to him, belittling and dismissing him. He is most definitely not turned on by this, but she might be too keyed in to her own arousal to notice. She doesn't care to get his feedback on the scene, or if she does, she doesn't think that it should affect the way she “plays.” Her bottom's sense of self and self-esteem continue to free-fall throughout the relationship, and she might even like that, since it gives her even more control over him.

Sexual Abuse

This one's a tough one. A lot of TPE (Total Power Exchange) relationships include some type of idea that the top can initiate sex with the bottom even if the bottom “isn't in the mood.” A lot of times, both partners find this thought very sexy (very VERY sexy!), but does that mean that sexual assault can't happen in a TPE relationship? This is another case where we can't just look at the act itself, but we have to look at the reasons behind it. In this case, what is the reason for the bottom to submit to the sexual advances if she's not in the mood? GT's bottom freely submits, and chooses to, knowing that she has the power to end the play at any time but chooses not to. BT can't get that type of submission because it's never freely given. He might impose himself on her through physical force, or simply through fear that if she doesn't comply something horrible (and nonconsensual) will happen to her, ranging from him leaving her forever, to killing her or someone she cares about. Kind of lacks the finesse of power exchange, doesn't it? More like power I'll take what you won't give me by force thankyouverymuch.

Neglect/Isolation

There's a huge difference between telling your bottom that he can't go to the movies with his buddies tonight because he still hadn't finished his list of chores you gave him, and telling him he can't answer his sister's panicked phone message that she thinks she's having a miscarriage. Top and bottom can negotiate how much control the top has in the bottom's life, but GT's bottom trusts that his top will keep his best interests and priorities in mind.

GT wants a relationship with a happy, healthy, sane and well-adjusted bottom, and knows how important a support structure of family and friends are to maintain that. She would never demand that he abandon them completely, (though she might curb his tendency to be at Cousin Bertie's beck and call, who makes her bottom so mad he pukes for hours after talking to him.)

BT knows that the more isolated and alone her bottom is, the more he will be completely dependent on her. She will be continually trying to find ways to keep family and friends away from him.

Financial Abuse

BT has complete control over the finances in the relationship. He makes her hand over all her paycheques and not a cent gets spent without his approval. If his bottom can't even get bus fare without his approval, how can she ever leave him, right?

GT might have a (consented-to) agreement that says the exact same thing: the Top controls all the finances in the relationship. In reality, though, the money remains accessible by both members of the relationship, and it is up to the bottom to choose to only do with it what her top decides. It then becomes up to GT to make sure that the money gets used in a responsible manner, that bills get paid and the bottom's well-being is being looked after, and any remaining funds (originating from the bottom) are put into a savings for the bottom or some other agreed-upon fund, not the top's pocket to spend on a shiny new leather jacket.

Spiritual Abuse

BT might attack or belittle her bottom's spiritual beliefs, or insist that he follow her own church or even a cult. This is way not cool.

GT doesn't even go near that shit. A person's spirituality is part of their core system of beliefs and is not open to negotiation. Nope, never. (Did I remember to say that is way not cool?)

---

I hope this helps clear a little of the mystery away between what is abuse and what is just us kinky folk being kinky. To me, there really isn't any type of fine line, the difference is there, and it's huge. Like, pink elephant in the room huge. You might have noticed a common theme present in all the “Good Top” examples that was markedly lacking in the Bad Top's. It's all about three things: respect, trust, and communication, and if those babies aren't there, then your BDSM relationship is in the toilet anyway. Sorry to have had to be the one to break it to ya.

If you feel that you are in an abusive relationship, (and keep in mind that you are the only one who can tell this, no one else can tell you for you) then there are people who are there for you and who can help. In Canada, shelternet.ca is a great place to start, and if you're in the states, the National Leather Association's Domestic Violence Program has a fantastic amount of resources available to help you. Remember, abuse is against the law.

MTSR #3: Bondage, Beautiful Bondage

Rope Dojo Kit (incl. bandage scissors) from TwistedMonk.com

Yes, she’s back: the big, reflective orange vest in the middle of all that luscious leather. And again, I am going to ask all those fabulously experienced folks in our lovely community to, just for a short while, remove the “well of course! We know all this already!” hats, and instead please help me indulge those among us who might not by commenting helpfully and filling in any gaps that I might have left in my new rant.

Today, I want to talk about bondage! Hooray!

Specifically, I want to talk about positional, or situational bondage. Being somehow physically restrained or having movement restricted by a bondage medium like rope, chains, cuffs, and other things that make me drool like Pavlov’s newest inductee. While merely decorative bondage (like that big muscle dom with the rope bracers, or that cute little thing in the hareem girl outfit made entirely out of small individual gold chains) is gorgeous to look at, it’s not the topic of today’s article and you can’t make me write about it, so there!

Bondage is so much a part of our kinky lifestyle that it gets its own freakin’ letter in our acronym. Even many vanilla folks reluctantly agree that getting tied up to your headboard for sex is … well, okay. It’s kinda hot.

And because it’s more passive than other forms of kinky play, like cutting or wax dripping or flogging, it has this lovely aura of benign charm. It’s hot, it spices up the love life, and it’s (seemingly) safe. So it’s a very common starting point for people who want to slowly ease themselves into this crazy sexy stuff that we do.

Unfortunately because of its alluringly comforting façade, it’s also something that we are more likely to try, on our own with our partners, in the solitude of our own bedrooms, without seeking out any further information or training on the matter. How hard is it to tie a knot, right? That was absolutely the case for my long ago teenaged self (though I suppose it was mostly other people’s bedrooms.) Primarily, this column is for those of you who might possibly fall into this category now or in the near future.

Don’t get me wrong. I’m not saying you should become uber Shibari (Japanese style bondage art) experts before tying your boy/girlfriend up to the bed for fun sex. I’m not even saying that this is a bad place to start, or that you shouldn’t do it! Anyone who’s seen the amount of rope in my toybag would know that that was extremely hypocritical of me. All I ask is that you are aware of the risks of what you’re doing, and therefore you’re capable of dealing with those risks, before you try it. And that, my dear kinky friends, is what you will be, at least to some extent, if you do me the honour of reading the rest of my admittedly long-winded article.

So. You went to the hardware/sex store, or your Halloween box, or your tie drawer, and you have the goods. Now you want to tie you lovely naked lover up. What should you know before you start? Well, a couple of things.

Let’s start with the wrists. As any slightly kink-flavoured porn will tell you, the wrists are the most common areas to be tied up. (Actually, if you look closely it's not the wrist joint, but the area of the forearm just above, which we'll call the wrist for simplicity's sake.) And porn wouldn’t lie to me, would it? Wrists, though, are also pulse points (places where, because the blood vessels are so close to the surface of the skin, it’s easy to take someone’s pulse.) This makes them a place to look out for. Because if you think of it, if you can feel the blood vessel with your fingers, they’re not protected by any muscle groups, and you can also easily cut off that circulation. Of course, we don’t want that! I don’t know about you, but trips to the ER for an emergency amputation of a dead hand is a hard limit for me!

So, should we never tie up the wrists? Well, that wouldn’t be much fun! Instead, let’s just make sure that while being tied up the hands don’t get permanently damaged, in three easy steps:

1) prevention
2) monitoring and
3) response readiness!

1. We can prevent injury to the wrists by making sure that whatever is binding them isn’t too tight. There’s a rule in rope bondage called the “two finger rule”. If you can’t fit two fingers between the wrist and the rope, then the rope is too tight. The same applies to cuffs and chains, and anything else. Now, this means that there should always be a two-finger space between the wrist and bondage, so make sure that if you’re using rope, that its tied off in such a way that if you pull on it, it doesn’t get any tighter. (You can try this out on yourself before you do it on your partner!).

We also want to protect the pulse points, since these are the places most likely to cut off circulation. So if, for example, you were tying the wrists together, tie them with the insides of the wrists are facing each other, so that the pressure points of the bondage (when in doubt, check to see where the rope marks the skin if you strain against it) are NOT the pulse points. Never should the rope or chain or whatever be biting into the vulnerable part of the wrists, always the backs. This same advice applies to all the other pulse points (inside of elbows and knees, the sides of the neck, and the spot where the inside of the thighs meets the groin) as well as the airway. In fact, anything that goes around the neck should put pressure ONLY on the very back of the neck, nowhere else. Since the head contains the brain, we really want to make sure we don’t cut off circulation or oxygen, even for a few seconds.


2. Monitoring is hopefully pretty self-explanatory. As super sexy as the thought of typing up your sweetie and leaving them locked in a closest to whimper and panic is, I can’t really recommend it. Even if the original position that you tied them in is perfectly safe for him or her to stay in for hours on end, all that delicious struggling could very well change that situation very fast. So, unfortunately, monitoring is fairly essential in a bondage situation.

Since we’re using wrists for our example, let’s go on with them. We can monitor in many ways. We can get the bottom to tell use how their wrists feel. Do they have pins and needles in their fingers, do they still have full sensation? Don’t be content, though, to rely entirely on your bottom’s verbal updates. Sometimes, a bottom will not want a scene to end, or feel pushy mentioning anything without prompting, so they won’t always tell you if something is wrong. Also, there’s a sensation that rope bondage enthusiasts like to call “flying” that’s something akin to subspace, that a bottom occasionally reaches which is a sort of blissful out-of-it state, that sometimes short-circuits their ability to self-monitor. Flying is nummy, but you need to make extra sure you’re watching your bottom closely if they go on a little trip there. So, check independently, too. Have them squeeze your hand, have they lost a lot of grip strength? That’s a sign that the hand has too little circulation, and needs to be loosened or released immediately. Ditto if the fingers turn blue or purple, or extremely cold.

3. Now, what to do if things go bad? Quite simply, we make sure that there is an easy way out of that situation before it turns awful. For example, if you’re playing with police style cuffs, always make sure you know where the key is, and that it’s easy to get to and use. Also, check out your cuffs beforehand. It’s illegal to sell police style cuffs in Canada that don’t have a safety catch that lets you undo them even without the key, so check to see if yours are of that type. It should be a tiny little lever-thingie right near the keyhole.

If instead you’re playing with rope, always make sure that you keep a pair of bandage scissors (you can get them in the first aid section at a drug store) handy that are strong enough to cut the rope you’re using quickly, and can get in between the skin and the rope binding it to cut the rope. However, with rope, you have another ally: cunning preplanning. Learn how to tie your partner up so that you don’t have to spend 30 minutes untying them to get to their wrists. Tie them up in small connected parcels that can be loosened and undone independently of each other, and you will lose far less rope to emergency cut-outs. And saving rope is virtue, didn’t you know?

Also, call me a worrywart, and a doomsayer, and anything else you want, but please do me one simple little favour. If you are playing all alone with your partner in your comfy bedroom (hold on, let me enjoy this delicious image for a second). Sorry, if you’re playing all alone with your partner, and you think that there might arise a situation in which your partner simply can’t get out of the bondage you put them in themselves, no matter how much they wiggle or squirm or struggle, please make sure that should the very worst happen they have someone within screaming for help range, or a phone that they can access, so that someone else can help them out if for whatever reason you can’t.

Now, the above covers most types of bondage situations that you’re likely to come across. One final thing to note however, is that every potential problem listed above is compounded and made far more urgent if suspension is involved. Now I myself don’t practice suspension bondage, and refuse to until I can get someone far more experienced than I am to teach me how to do it properly. While I recommend the same, I ask that if you don’t take that advice, you proceed very, very carefully. A person’s bodyweight pulling down on any point of bondage makes it potentially very dangerous, and cutting off airway and circulation can happen much faster, not to mention the fact that if you don’t do it right, the bottom can fall and injure themselves that way (if they’re lucky and escape the ropes/chains altogether instead of having them tangle around say… his or her neck).

I’ve now told you some bad things to look out for in the wonderful world of bondage. Hopefully this doesn’t stop you from surfing the internet and hitting Canadian Tire (Canada's answer to Home Depot) for your play nights; that would be a shame. But if, and this is unfortunate, the risks have turned you off playing with bondage at least for the moment, consider this rope and chain free solution: Have your bottom lean over the side of the bench, or lie flat on the bed, or stand or kneel exactly where you want them for whatever nefarious deeds you plan on enacting on them. Then, lean in close to their ear, and whisper, in your domliest voice: “Do. Not. Move. A muscle. Until I say you can.” Trust me on this one, in some ways this is the cruelest, and hawtest type of bondage that exists, and it’s far safer, too! (Physically, at least…)

Until next week, Mad the Safety Ranger Out.

MTSR #2: Mmmm,.. Fluids!

I love bodily fluids. Boy, howdy!

Sadomasochists playing so hard that their shirts are drenched completely in sweat make me get all tingly.

Hard, straining cocks dripping pre-come is an image of many of my fantasies.

A sexy woman who’s so horny that she soaks not only through her underwear but right through her jeans, who wouldn't love to see that?

A pair of leatherboys who delight each other on first meeting by noticing that one is flagging yellow right and the other left, and decide to take a quick detour into a bathroom stall for a nice little golden shower getting-to-know-you private event–yummy!

That cute androgynous bottom so lost in the moment that he is beyond noticing the drool and snot pooling around the huge ball gag clamped firmly in his teeth makes everyone want him (or possibly want to be him.)

A hawt drag princess with a needle corset pulled so tightly that the blood from the wounds starts to stain the pretty ribbon laced in between them–any one of these is pretty much guaranteed to give me a metaphorical hard-on.


Because I’m such a greedy fluids slut, many of the above delicious drippings are likely to show up in a scene in which I participate. And this means that I like to know exactly what risks I’m taking with any behaviours that involve said lovely fluids.

Let’s start with semen. You remember sex ed in school, right? Semen carries sperm, that can make babies. It can also carry little nasties that cause wonderful STIs like chlamydia, and AIDS, and hepatitis, and, and…

Well. D’uh. Fortunately, semen comes exclusively from the penis. And we all listened in sex ed (right?) so we know. We either keep little mister awesome in his rain jacket, or we choose to share his ..quirks…with all of his partners. We all know what constitutes high risk sex, low risk sex, risk free se…abstinence. We’ve heard it a million times before. For one-on-one vanilla sex at least. But them vanilla folks, they have no idea how marvellous the whole gamut of bodily fluids can be. Or how dangerous.

So, here are a few pointers for the rest of us, who like things a little more rocky road:

Let’s warm up with a nice, lovely, lower risk fluid, shall we? Urine: pee, piss golden showers, whatever you want to call it, it’s a huge turn-on to many, many people. Now, there’s this saying that’s going around. Oh, everyone knows you can share piss all you want, it’s sterile! This is a lovely example of everyone NOT knowing, but blindly repeating what they heard from someone else. Now, don’t get me wrong, if you are going to wrap your mouth around an unprotected cock and suck down either urine or semen, swallowing the pee is far safer.

The pH of urine is inhospitable to many microorganisms. One hugely positive note: there are no documented cases of HIV being transmitted through urine. (blood, semen, vaginal fluid, and breast milk being the virus’s carriers in the body) This does not mean that you should consider urine a stronger tasting version of Gatorade. Hepatitis B, chlamydia, and gonorrhoea can survive in small amounts in urine, as can the bacteria present in a urinary tract infection. Another thing to keep in mind, if you are the mind-expanding type: some drugs, particularly hallucinogens like peyote, can pass un-metabolized through the urine. So you might be getting an extra tasty surprise! Personally, I love piss play, and I think it’s a good, happy wholesome activity in which to participate. However, I like the idea of participating with a full knowledge of what I’m getting into. To quote the immortal G.I. Joe of my childhood: “Now you know. And knowing is half the battle!”

What about vaginal fluid? Apart from pregnancy, realize that it carries much the same risks as semen. It *can* carry viruses like Hep C, HIV, and other little nasties and especially if you have a cut in your mouth, it can pass those things on. Quick handy hint? If you don’t feel like taking those chances, a flavoured condom with the tip cut off and split up the side makes a tastier grapey (or chocolatey) alternative to saran wrap or a dental dam.

Okay, so. We’re warmed up now, right? Let’s move on to the heavy hitter: blood. As superhot as the vampy fantasy of digging your teeth into your lover’s neck until it oozes red, and licking off the drippage is, we all know that this is high-risk behaviour. Everyone knows what we are possibly taking into our body with that lovely coppery red. But what about situations when we might not know we’re trading that possibly deadliest of deadlies? Those sadomasochists among us like hurting each other. We beat and flog, and hit, and tie, and cut, and scratch, and bruise each other. And sometimes, just sometimes, we draw blood. Even worse- sometimes we don’t know we have.

There’s a convention followed by many with a taste for a bit of protocol that if you draw blood with a cane on someone, that the cane then belongs to them, and can be used on no one else. When we stop to think about it, we do care about sharing blood, and we don’t ever want to do it inadvertently. So my advice here is simple. Better to be safe than to be sorry. If you have an insertible that you’re using on more than one person, you put a condom on it, right? (and if you don’t –you should!) Well, if you have a toy that has a chance of drawing blood, whether or not you think you have, sterilize it as best you can between uses! Give it a good hard scrub, and then a once over with bleach or peroxide, and let it dry out for a few days between uses when feasible. And make sure that your needles go into a sharps container, not the trash can! (You can get these at any pharmacy that sells diabetes supplies, and they’ll even take it back to dispose of properly once it’s full – how’s that for service?).

This kinky stuff we do is risky, we know that, this is part of what makes it so damn sexy. But let’s be sure we know what those risks we’re taking are, so we can choose them with eyes wide open.

Mad the Safety Ranger Out.

Gotta Love this comic by Kott0n_K4ndy!

MTSR #1 : Meet the Safety Ranger

(originally written for FetLife in 2009)

When I was a teenager, and using the 3000-question purity test as a checklist of fun new kinky things to try, the very last thing that I thought that I would ever do is tell anyone how to do anything that has to do with this cool kinky crap that I was just getting into. For the longest time, I used the “your kink is okay with me” excuse to never ever interfere in any scene or play that I had the good fortune to be near.

But call me Jay Wiseman, I have gotten to that point in my life where I’d like to be able to help people not make some of the stupid, stupid mistakes that I made in my sadomasochistic journey. Don’t get me wrong. I’m not pretending to be an expert. Just a very interested amateur who is hoping to share my research with others. Thus, Mad the Safety Ranger is born. Expect her to nag you in a friendly way on some hopefully interesting and drool-inducing topics.

I’m not sure what changed, really. Maybe I’ve gotten old. Or maybe I’ve just had the even better fortune to have encountered some wonderful people who are new and not so new to the “scene” who have shown me that all those years of playing around and learning everything I could possibly learn from anyone willing to show it/write it/ talk about it have given me a personal pool of knowledge that it would actually benefit others who are, like me, just trying to pick up more ways to turn rope, leather, steel, and that most wonderful toy of all: the mind into even more sexy, sexy fun!

This past Saturday, I had the pleasure of meeting some lovely young folk who made me feel both ancient and happy that there are more people who, like I was at that age, are just looking for ways to scratch that kinky, twisted itch that is so hard to put a name to. They though, have access to resources I had no idea existed. Among other things, they have found other kinky folks to learn from. And I’m honored to be one of those “other kinky folks”.

And I’m asking for all of your participation in this my new project. Those of you who are new to this fun schtuff, please, post a question, or ask for clarification, or leave a comment! Those of you who, like me, have been around the block a couple more times than we care to admit, lend me a hand! I am still at the very beginning of my adventures into this brave new kinky world. I am sure that I will leave things out. Please, add/correct or expand, and let’s see if we can’t share the wealth of knowledge that we worked(played) so “hard” to accrue!