This is probably the most pointless post I’ll ever write. That’s a great sales pitch to open with I know, but at least I’m honest. I’m also a masochist, so I’ll persevere with it.
It’s actually a piece of advice that I want to impart. Specifically, that if you’re writing about anything complex and controversial, you need to decide what your goal is. Do you want to simply receive affirmation from people who already believe what you believe (aka intellectual masturbation, fun but ultimately unproductive)? Or do you want to reach out to others (typically the majority) and make them actually think about the issue you care so passionately about? If it’s the latter then it’s important to create all the credibility you can, and comes across as a thoughtful intellectual honest person. No matter how good your core argument is, if the rest of the text makes me think you’re an irrational idiot with an axe to grind, then you’ve already lost.
The post that promoted this chain of thought was this one on the feminist current site. It’s all about a Canadian police officer called Jim Brown who was recently outed as kinky via photographs on his fetlife account. The photographs seem pretty tame in my view (this post has a few of them), but no doubt the descriptions sound extreme to the average non-kinky person.
I’m obviously not a fan of people being scapegoated for their BDSM interests. I think it’s ridiculous that teachers, policing and politicians get regularly attacked for any kind of public sexual life. But I will agree it’s a complex issue. I can certainly think of scenarios where that public/private boundary becomes an issue. For example, a rape crisis councilor who had a fetish for rape roleplay. That’s not illegal, but it’s clearly a pretty fucked up situation.
However, what’s pretty much guaranteed to obscure the genuine complexity of the situation, is to throw in a bunch of stupid assumptions and assertions about BDSM, as the feminist current article does. For example, a male dominant clearly enjoyed degrading women. It’s abuse. It’s misogynistic. Consensual is put in quotes, because obviously it couldn’t really be consensual. The fact that all genders and sexualities enjoy BDSM is conveniently ignored. I particularly liked this quote – “Is his fantasy of abuse and domination erased the minute he shuts off his laptop or leaves the brothel?” – implying that it must be porn or paid for. No ‘normal’ women would freely participate.
The original story raises some interesting issues. But sadly they’re all lost beneath the faulty logic and unproven assertions. No doubt the regular readers to the site cheer something they already believe, but I’m just going to flip the idiot bit and move on.
I’ll leave you with a shot of a little knife play, given that was apparently one of the horrible scary thing the police officer photographed.
