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Noah -> RE: The use of safe-words (11/8/2006 10:07:32 AM)
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ORIGINAL: Kalira
~~ general reply to everyone ~~
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First, please point out where I said that anyone who uses a safeword to be inauthentic? Please make note of my opening statements:
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Before I start, I want to state that this is in no way a bash against the use of safe-words during a scene. I understand the need for others to use them within their relationships.
Please note that in my post, a few lines below the bit you surgically snipped I tried hard to remove all possibility of doubt as to whom I was addressing:
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Original Noah
This posts addresses whomever may read it and fit the description(s) given, not just the person indicated at lower right. If you have never claimed your kink was more authentic than that of safe-worders then that complaint does not target you. My remaining complaints are targetted in the same manner.
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Original Kalira
And yes, when someone new asks me about safewords, my response to them is ALWAYS the same:
"Safewords are only as good as the intent behind the top. There is no substitute for knowing the person that you are about to engage with. This goes to private play, as well as public play. "
If believing this makes me a superior person, then for the love of God, I am proud to be so.
Well I don't think it makes you superior to someone who recognizes that the best intents of the top are not sufficient to prevent tragedy if the intent of the bottom is nefarious or self-destructive.
By having a policy to "ALWAYS" advise new doms who may ask about safewords that the dom's good intent can outweigh the bad intentions of potential partners I think you are doing a disservice to the community.
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I wanted to thank you for showing that just because people do things differently than others tha does not make what they share "less".
I will state the same thing that has been stated already. With the exception of a few 'drive-by" posters, WHERE has anyone stated or inferred that just because they use safewords, it makes them less?
Well the implication that dangerous nonsense spewed by drive-by posters should be allowed to stand unchallenged strikes me as odd. That said, the McBondage guy wasn't a drive-by. He posted at least twice that I recall seeing. His second post included a thoughtful reconsideration of his first. I don't know any definition of "drive-by" that this pattern fits.
Meanwhile, daddysprop247 said on the same page as Mr. McBondage:
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like PhilLogan, i've always believed that safewords allow the bottom or submissive to ultimately be the one in control, often allowing little to no actual domination or submission to take place.
She is not a drive-by either. She has posted several times and at some length. Now if you want to contort yourself into a position from which you can maintain that there is no derogation in her claim that she engages in "actual" D/s while people who use safewords don't, or do so only "little", well go ahead and stick to your usual MO.
As for the defenses given here of the McBondage comment as innocuous or possibly complimentary, if its intent was to be innocuous or complimentary I doubt that the poster, once chastised, would have chimed back in to say:
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Original PhilLogan
I should not scoff at the criteria that is used by others. However, in my opinion, any true scene that utilizes a safeword lacks the unmitigated bliss that a real power exchange should embody.
I give the man credit for matter-of-factly acknowledging that he had spoken perhaps too hastily and refining his position after taking on board substantive comments from other posters.
People are defending as neutral or possibly complimentary a comment the speaker himself has desribed as scoffing. Is scoffing not a form of derogation down your way? (Breathe slow and deep, kajira; it is a general comment not yet another scathing attack on you personally) In exactly the way his second post was laudable, the collective tortured defense of the insulting comment in his first post is laughable in my view.
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Original Kaliraquote:
Isn't that exactly the tone that Noah is complaining of -- that those who advocate using a safe word are somehow inferior?
No. That was a direct jibe at me. Not a very good one, but one none the less.
Yes. That was exactly the sort of thing I was complaining of and indeed one of the examples I had in mind. But thanks for your attempt to falsely speak for me, Kalira. It rounds out my impression of you in a particular way.
Listen sweetie. As reitereated above I specifically stated that my comments on that subject were directed at whomever had actually engaged in the behavior I was complaining about. I was criticizing a type of behavior. I was not directing a jibe at you or anyone else. Get the fuck over yourself.
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In almost every other situation I can conceive of, the ability to put a stop to something at will is more than sufficient to prevent "damage".
Really? And what do you tell the bottom, who believed that a 'safe-word" is the end to end all? Especially after she played with a top who could care less about what damage he/she inflicted, as long as the scene went on?
Fair question. Morrigel has answered it as well need be.
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That is what I was trying to say. That for a person who chooses SO poorly; does not take the proper time to get to know the person they are playing with...they have a 50/50 chance of getting one who does not care one way or another.
Well this is just Malarkey. True enough in some sorts of cases to mask how much falsity it embodies.
Poor choice is poor choice. This forum is littered with posts from people who took months to get to know a partner and then lost their heart as well as some skin and or cash and major appliances. Maybe if they had skipped the courting and gotten dirty with a safeword the first week they would have gone home with some unwanted abrasions but their heart intact.
Communication is groovy. And like safewords it is fallible.
A hypothetical for you:
Say your Master spends a year or so interviewing, vetting, selecting and getting to know a partner for you. He instructs you with no forewarning to engage with this guy--all consensually in the context of the agreed-upon nature of your relationship. Does the fact that you have not taken the time to get to know this person mean that odds are 50-50 as you say? Well if so then your master is an incompetent fuck.
And what if instead of thoroughly getting to know someone (whatever thoroughly means to you) someone relied on the testimony of several good and trustworthy friends who had her best interest and heart and who each had lots of direct knowledge of this partner?
Still 50-50?
Your propensity for broad generalization heedless of the complexity of life doesn't do anything good for your contributions to these discussions.
Beyond that, your premise that half of the people who might ever get involved in BDSM are people who "do not care one way or the other" sure isn't supported by my experience.
You blithely ignore the fact that for some bottoms one important key to the experience they seek is that it be undergone with someone who does not care about her. Maybe you aren't ignoring this fact. Maybe I spoke hastily. Maybe you just can't get your head around the fact that other people may approach this in ways that make your protocols insuffcient, inadequate or impossible. Anyway, there it is. A bottom like that may choose to rely upon reputations in the community, the willingness of bystanders to intercede appropriately and yes, safewords and it sems to me that by exercising care in other ways she can improve her odds beyond your categorical 50-50.
Your one-size-fits-all solution, while it is in fact good and powerful and quite versatile, doesn't actually fit all. There are kinks you just can't, by definition, get down with with someone you know well.
In some kinds of cases your one-size-fits-all solution can cause more harm than it prevents, as in the case of heartbreak added to abrasions cited above.
That's life. It is neither an indictment of safewords (or your preferred long courtships) nor a claim that either is a panacea.
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I am going to use daddysprop as an example ( I hope she forgives me for this ). Imagine this is a new person, who has been told by everyone IN THE SCENE for many years that as long as she insists on safe-words...nothing bad can happen.
"told by everyone IN THE SCENE for many years that as long as she insists on safe-words...nothing bad can happen"
Wow.
I don't know where this scene is. The one where EVERYONE spouts patent nonsense for years, nonsense which I have never heard anyone say except when people like you attribute it to un-named others unavailable to defend themselves. I do hope this scene appears in glowing purple on Mapquest.
Your insight that safewords are fallible is wonderful. Thanks for sharing. Your fairy tales about Evil Places where EVERYBODY IN THE SCENE FOR YEARS TELLS DANGEROUS LIES TO IMPRESSIONABLE NEWBIES are stupid bullshit.
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