longwayhome
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quote:
ORIGINAL: LadyPact
It happens to be my opinion that certain third party observers throw the term "abuse" around too easily when it comes to consensual kink. The example that I tend to use for this goes as follows:
I know for a fact that there are people on this forum that, to them, if they were the receiver of face slapping, they would see it as abuse. Which is fine, FOR THEM.
That does not mean they get to impose their standard for the activity on other people. Who's opinion carries the most value? The people actually engaging or the outside observer? I'm cool if something, when happening TO YOU is abusive. If it is not TO YOU and other people are doing what they do, have a relationship between them, or any other way it can be expressed, kindly see yourself out of it.
I have one exception to this rule. If a person come to you and tells you they are being mistreated in the first person sense, that's when it's ok to step in. No different than if a person calls red in a public dungeon or something similar. I actually teach this in my DM class. My job as a DM is to be there if people NEED me. Not my idea of if I think I should impose my beliefs on other people's play. The same should go for any third party when it comes to other people's activities.
By the way, as a person who does do the DM gig, I can tell you that I have stopped third parties from interfering way more than I've ever had to pull scenes in a play space. Most of the other DMs I know would probably tell you the same thing.
I agree with what you say completely.
My contributions on this thread have been led by how others have contributed which might have mistakenly given the impression that I spend my time evaluating other people's relationships for sign of abuse the whole time because I can't help but see abuse in consensual play and relationships.
I don't really play in public because it is the wrong head space for me. It makes me think about rescue and makes things feel manufactured and less real. In my mind I don't really want other people trying to work out whether something is going too far or not far enough. As you suggested the term abuse is very much in the eye of the beholder. Not being keen on playing in public is a very personal thing and I know plenty of people really get off on it or it gives them a safer place to play, so I have nothing against public play (or the possibility of doing it if someone else was really keen).
Consensual kink, however brutal it might seem to an onlooker is of course okay. I prefer my kink in private with someone I know well so that consent can be more general and play more edgy without the ability to safeword out. I am well aware of the risks of this but it can also severely limit opportunities for play. Sometimes fantasy can be better than pale reality and I cannot claim to have experienced everything I might like to. Everybody who has fantasies is not a fantasist. There are certainly people here with more "real" experience than me, but also plenty with an awful lot less experience who blame that on Dom/mes, subs, this website, in fact anyone other than themselves.
From the point of view of abuse, I think that I have tried too hard to be balanced in my previous posts. This was mainly in response to tamaka. I find myself a bit concerned about tamaka's implied position on this thread (and not too implied on others) that it aint real BDSM if it isn't hardcore 24/7 abuse, and that "play" of any sort doesn't cut the mustard. BDSM can be a central part of your life and certain relationships, but you also have to live and look after those close to you, and that doesn't fit very well with being locked up, kept away from family and friends, beaten and kept in chains every day. My public and private lives are quite distinct. That makes me less genuine in some people's eyes but I cannot afford to be a sub in every aspect of my life. I have people to look after and a distinctly non-sub job to hold down.
Whether that constitutes abuse is a personal matter and intimately linked to what sort of relationship agreement you have, but I disagree with the implication that anything short of her type of 24/7 abuse is some kind of inferior "play". That of course is not your implication, you are merely saying that what people might think is extreme is not abuse unless there is something else going on in the dynamic that outsiders would not necessarily see anyway.
It's all play (no matter how serious and/or brutal) and it's all a mixture of fantasy or reality. 24/7 means different things to different people as does abuse. I just try not to judge someone's chosen path. The best way I can put it for me is that I prefer to be submissive in certain close personal relationships but I am not everyone's sub (I know that's not a big point just common sense but not everyone sees it that way). Even if you just like the kink, want little or no power exchange and enjoy topping from the bottom, that's fine if you can find others who complement that. It's not for me and it's not D/s but that's up to the individual.
On the other hand if you like a bit of the old ultraviolence that's equally valid. YKIOK and YKINMK and all that. I personally prefer my bones intact but I know fine well that extreme violence doesn't equal abuse, just as abuse is not a necessary part of BDSM as a small number of people suggest on occasions.
As usual in real life all these distinctions can be navigated far more straightforwardly than pontificating on a message board. I just can't help but pontificate when there's a thread where people aren't acting like children and slapping each other with dead fishes (not that that has stopped me in the past), so many apologies.
Edited (hopefully) to make sure that some of the above wasn't saying the exact opposite of what I meant.
< Message edited by longwayhome -- 7/26/2017 5:15:09 AM >
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