Padriag
Posts: 2633
Joined: 3/30/2005
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Hmmm... I smell an essay coming on, brace yourselves. 
Why does elitism occur... the short answer is its an overcompensation for a feeling of inferiority or insecurity. Yes I just called all those elitist snobs insecure. It is true none-the-less.
Consider that the various kinks we indulge in as part of this style of life are generally taboo and something mainstream society doesn't accept and at times condemns. That means that for every one of use who chooses to pursue this style of life we have to step outside societies boundaries. That act alone can make a lot of people feel pretty insecure. One of the things society does for most people is give them a sense of place, of belonging, a sense that who you are and what you do is okay. When you step outside of what society accepts you contradict that, and if you aren't a very self secure person, you're going to feel the pressure of it and end up battling insecurity. That insecurity comes from having to define all those things for yourself that normally you could drawn on society for.
People deal with insecurity in different ways, one way is overcompensation. An insecure person may behave very aggressively, forcefully, with belligerance, with elitism, etc. as a way of overcompensating for a deeper feeling of insecurity / inferiority.
Taken from another angle lets look at it this way. Take any given group of people with similar interests. Lets say they all enjoy cooking, sounds harmless enough. Now divide them into two or more groups that specialize in different kinds of cooking... maybe one goes for fancy deserts and pastries, another goes for BBQ, another Itallian dishes. Watch them and you'll see elitism begin to emerge among some of them. Some of those Itallian cooks are going to begin acting as if their style of cooking is THE thing to do, and they may go so far as to criticize those BBQ guys for being country bumpkins, amateur cooks, etc. Meanwhile the pastry chefs think its all pretty silly since no meal would be complete without one of their amazing deserts. And the BBQ cooks will probably just think the other two groups are high society snobs who don't appreciate down home country cookin, that real food for real folks ya know! Why does it happen, insecurity. There's also an element of the fear of the unknown at work here too. People tend to be afraid of what they don't understand or aren't familiar with. That's why those groups begin to react that way, each is unfamiliar with the other's style of cooking (or kink) and reacts defensively. Until they find common ground to accept each other on that hostility will continue.
Here's another example. Stop and think for a moment about the kinds of differences people discriminate against others about. I'm betting just looking at things where you live, you can think of a very long list without much trouble. Things like race, gender, religion, politics, ideology, sexual orientation, clothing styles, music preferences, jobs, economic status, where you live, it just goes on and on.
All of that boils down to a "Us vs. Them" mentality that has been part of the human psyche for as long as there have been human beings. As human beings we are drawn to those most like us (birds of a feather flock together), and we tend to be suspicious of and hostile towards those unlike us.
So to sum up... you have elitism in the "BDSM Community" even towards its own members because some folks are feeling insecure about what they are doing. To overcompensate they work very, very hard to convince themselves what they are doing is right, "the one true way", regardless of what anyone (society) says. Unfortunately that makes them pretty intolerant of someone doing something differently than their "one true way". They get even harsher towards THEM... you know... Vanilla's... because its ultimately "vanilla" aka mainstream society that is the greatest source of their insecurity.
It takes courage to face the unknown, to face what you fear, to face others differences without reacting with hostility or fear. Ghandi said something particularly poignant about this.
quote:
Courage is the one sure foundation of character. Without courage there can be no morality, no religion, no love. One cannot follow truth or love so long as one is subject to fear.
Elitism and intolerance, in whatever form you find them, are born of fear and insecurity. It takes courage in one to overcome it... it takes encouragement for others for them to overcome it, and there can be no encouragement without courage.
There may be a pop quiz on this tomorrow... class dismissed. 
_____________________________
Padriag
A stern discipline pervades all nature, which is a little cruel so that it may be very kind - Edmund Spencer
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Elitism in BDSM/Ds/WIITWD - 
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). Apparently her post sparked some "discussion" about us in this (vanilla) site's chatroom. Shortly thereafter I got an IM from someone I knew there before we left the site (or rather, got booted from because we got married). After a bunch of hemming and hawing he said he had to ask me a question and would I answer him honestly, to which I answered of course, ask away. 
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