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ORIGINAL: LadyAngelika

laurell, do I look like the kind of person who gets the least bit concerned about what someone, especially someone on a message board, thinks of me? ;-)

- LA

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Don't hate cos you can't relate.

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ORIGINAL: VaguelyCurious

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ORIGINAL: LadyAngelika

laurell, do I look like the kind of person who gets the least bit concerned about what someone, especially someone on a message board, thinks of me? ;-)

- LA

Frankly you look like the kind of person who has gorgeous legs, owns at least one skirt and one pair of shoes, has been known to carry a cane and has at least one hand. I don't know what you expect us to discern from this with regards to your attitude to other people's opinions :P

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ORIGINAL: SocratesNot

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Don't hate cos you can't relate.

I don't hate, I'm just wondering are "internal enslavement" relationships really consensual if the slave lost the ability to disobey or leave the relationship.

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ORIGINAL: SocratesNot

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Don't hate cos you can't relate.

I don't hate, I'm just wondering are "internal enslavement" relationships really consensual if the slave lost the ability to disobey or leave the relationship.

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ORIGINAL: SocratesNot

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In general, I have my opinions and I don't have very strong opinions about what others do unless there are non-consensual victims.

I think exactly the same.

Now, there is a thing that I am intolerant about, just because I think that this may be non-consensual.
This thing is TPE or even more precisely "internal enslavement". Of course, the decision to enter such relationship was completely free decision of the slave, so the relationship started as completely consensual.

However, there are great many masters and slaves who claim that in TPE a slave actually does not have a choice. S(he) must obey. S(he) is actually unable to disobey. S(he) is also unable to leave the relationship because his / her will and control is completely transfered to the Master or Mistress.
In such situation we can no longer talk about consent because the slave lost the ability to disobey. Not because Master or Mistress prevent them from disobeying by threats or something like that, but because there is something inside them that simply prevents them from disobeying or leaving relationship, no matter what happens inside the relationship.

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No you aren't, you are an asshole. Over and over again people have explained this for you.

You are either mentaly and/or emotionaly handicapped or you are 14 years old.

Either way, it's spelled asshole

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ORIGINAL: SocratesNot
However, there are great many masters and slaves who claim that in TPE a slave actually does not have a choice. S(he) must obey. S(he) is actually unable to disobey. S(he) is also unable to leave the relationship because his / her will and control is completely transfered to the Master or Mistress. In such situation we can no longer talk about consent because the slave lost the ability to disobey. Not because Master or Mistress prevent them from disobeying by threats or something like that, but because there is something inside them that simply prevents them from disobeying or leaving relationship, no matter what happens inside the relationship.

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ORIGINAL: Jeffff

You are TRYING to give the impression that you are curious.

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ORIGINAL: SocratesNot

Since many of you complained about me being intolerant of practices of other people, now I would like to ask you a completely theoretical question.

If you are a completely sane, sensible human being and you consider certain practice to be totally abhorrent and objectionable, not just because you don't like it, but because you think it is utterly wrong because of some logical or ethical reasons, how do you deal with the possibility of existence of another sane, sensible human being who does not consider that very same practice to be objectionable at all?

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ORIGINAL: VaguelyCurious

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ORIGINAL: Jeffff

You are TRYING to give the impression that you are curious.

Jeff, you're confused. He's Socrates. *I'm* Curious (resisting the temptation to say 'and so is my wife'...)

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Posts: 2833
Joined: 6/2/2008
Status: online

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ORIGINAL: SocratesNot
However, there are great many masters and slaves who claim that in TPE a slave actually does not have a choice. S(he) must obey. S(he) is actually unable to disobey. S(he) is also unable to leave the relationship because his / her will and control is completely transfered to the Master or Mistress. In such situation we can no longer talk about consent because the slave lost the ability to disobey. Not because Master or Mistress prevent them from disobeying by threats or something like that, but because there is something inside them that simply prevents them from disobeying or leaving relationship, no matter what happens inside the relationship.

Well, you've gone a bit too far, but largely you describe my relationship (not a generic TPE relationship.. I only speak for myself and Carol here). Of COURSE there is some point at which Carol would say "wow, this is just wrong". That point, however, would require that she or I become radically different people than we are. I'm an engineer so I like to be precise. Honestly though, the people who say "no matter what" are not idiots. They just don't choose to spend a lot of neurons on "comet strikes the earth" type scenarios. And honestly, can you really fault them?

I can tell you the specific thing within Carol which would work against such thoughts. Carol has an extremely strong drive to please me. She also trusts and respects me a great deal. Accordingly, I can give her alternate ways to view her reality and she will adopt them. That's not magic. If you've ever had a class in philosophy from someone you really respect you've experienced the same thing. This just takes that to an extreme. Given that I can, in fact, alter her world view significantly, to a large degree change what she thinks of as fundamentally right and wrong, proper or improper, it makes sense to say that she's going to be OK with whatever happens inside the relationship because I make sure she's OK with it. For instance, Carol was wired strongly monogamously. She is not any longer. It's also worth noting that Carol never really wanted to be a slave. Yet now, deep inside her own self-image, she sees herself as owned property.

I completely agree with you that in such a scenario, talking about "consent" becomes ludicrous. That's why I don't really think in terms of consent any longer. The concept of "consent" just doesn't work for a couple like us. That doesn't mean that there isn't some sense of "right" and "wrong", just that "consent" is a poor tool for measuring that -- not in the (what I find to be ridiculous) consensual/non-consent way -- but as in the literal statement, "she doesn't consent".

As you pointed out in a previous post though, you'd really need to talk to Carol to figure out if she was a victim or not. More than talk to her really, you'd have to experience enough of her life, both past and present to understand whether she is growing and flourishing as a human being or withering and fading. Based upon such direct observation, you would come to whatever conclusions you do and then act or not as your own sense of honor and integrity dictated.

About the only mistake in all of this is that you need to be truly and really careful about reading some post or series of posts on the internet and then coming to such conclusions. I'm a pretty astute judge of human nature with roughly twice your experience practicing at it but I wouldn't find anywhere near enough hard data via in such communications to come to any conclusion along those lines. So here on the internet, I take 'em at face value. If they say they are happy, I default to the assumption that they are correct. If they say they are unhappy, I go with that. I don't see any other rational approach.

EDITED TO ADD:
And in the interests of fair play since I've been pretty frank negative about some of the opinions I noted in SocratesNot, I feel compelled to come to his defense on this one. Jeffff, he's pretty accurately summarized Carol's and my relationship. There was nothing asshole-ish in that particular comment. It does, in fact, apply to us at least. And Lally2, not that I disagree with your view of TPE, but it isn't how or why it happened with Carol and I. Again, I find SocratesNot to have pretty accurately encapsulated our reality. And really, the dropping of the whole "consent" thing IS a reasonable thing to worry about. I did. I might even go so far as to say I think I'm see him slowly expand his consciousness and realize the world is more complex than he thought.

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ORIGINAL: LadyPact

Oh......  This is about to get good.

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Freedom of thought (also called freedom of conscience and freedom of ideas) is the freedom of an individual to hold or consider a fact, viewpoint, or thought, independent of others' viewpoints. It is different from and not to be confused with the concept of freedom of expression.// [edit]

Explanation

To deny a person's freedom of thought is to deny what can be considered one's most basic freedom: to think for oneself. Since the whole concept of 'freedom of thought' rests on the freedom of the individual to believe whatever one thinks is best (freedom of belief), the notion of 'freedom of religion' is closely related and inextricably bound up with these. While in many societies and forms of government, there has been effectively no freedom of religion or belief, this same freedom has been cherished and developed to a great extent in the modern western world, such that it has often been taken for granted. This development was enshrined in words in the United States Constitution by the Bill of Rights, which contains the famous guarantee in the First Amendment that laws may not be made that interfere with religion "or prohibiting the free exercise thereof". Today nearly all democratic nations around the world contain similar language within their respective Constitutions. A US Supreme Court Justice (Benjamin Cardozo) later went on to reason in Palko v. Connecticut (1937) that: "Freedom of thought... is the matrix, the indispensable condition, of nearly every other form of freedom. With rare aberrations a pervasive recognition of this truth can be traced in our history, political and legal."[1] In other words, without the right to freedom of thought, other rights such as the right to freedom of speech hold little meaning. Such ideas regarding freedom of thought, as developed over time, ultimately became a vital part of international human rights law. In the Universal Declaration of Human Rights (UDHR), it is listed under Article 18: Everyone has the right to freedom of thought, conscience and religion; this right includes freedom to change his religion or belief, and freedom, either alone or in community with others and in public or private, to manifest his religion or belief in teaching, practice, worship and observance. The Human Rights Committee states that the above Article 18, which became legally binding on member states with the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights; "distinguishes the freedom of thought, conscience, religion or belief from the freedom to manifest religion or belief. It does not permit any limitations whatsoever on the freedom of thought and conscience or on the freedom to have or adopt a religion or belief of one's choice. These freedoms are protected unconditionally."[2] Similarly, Article 19 of the UDHR guarantees that "Everyone has the right to freedom of opinion and expression; this right includes freedom to hold opinions without interference..."