Objectification: ur doin it wrong!

One of my particular kinks I’ve quite liked for quite some time now is sexual objectification. Put most simply, it’s the creation of a psychological environment in which I’m using my partner for sexual gratification, or she’s using me for sexual gratification, without too much concern for the state of the other person’s sexual arousal or response (within whatever limits my partner and I have set out for the encounter).

I was talking about this with figmentj over the course of the last weekend, and she raised some interesting points that lead me to believe that I’m not really doing it right.

Now, to me, there is very little in the world that’s hotter than grabbing my partner, pushing her against the wall or down on the bed, and whispering in her ear “I’m going to take you now. It’s okay if you don’t want it; you can scream if you like.” Unless perhaps it’s a partner grabbing me by the hair, throwing me on the bed, and saying something similar.

And to me, that’s what I’d consider objectification–the taking of my partner for my own sexual gratification.

And hers–which is where it kind of breaks down. For, as figmentj rightly pointed out, it’s only objectification if the person is reduced to the status of an object–that is, if the person’s feelings, experience, and humanity don’t enter in at all to what’s going on.

For me, the hottest thing about this kind of scenario is savoring the emotional state tat it creates in my partner, and seeing how my partner responds to being treated as a sexual object. If she’s not into it, on some level, it doesn’t work for me, because it’s precisely her responses that most get me hot.

Which is, when you get right down to it, not objectification. Her feelings and experience do enter into it; in fact, they’re precisely the point of the whole endeavor. It’s seeing how she reacts to being objectified that gets me off.

Which means, in the final analysis, I’m not really objectifying her at all.

Which is quite a conundrum, really. figmentj argues (cogently, I might add; I rarely prevail in a discussion like this with her) that what I’m doing may look like objectification, but it isn’t–not really. It’s something else. In order to be objectification, I’d have to have the same attitude toward her that I have toward an object, like a sex toy or something. Obviously, if I use some kind of sex toy, I don’t care at all about the experience from that sex toy’s perspective; it truly is an object. But since the central focus of the objectification I do with a partner is savoring her responses, and thinking about what’s happening from her perspective, then she isn’t an object at all, almost by definition.

So I’m clearly not doing it right. (Okay, that part is tongue firmly in cheek.)

That brings up another argument, one that was indirectly touched on by some of the folks who commented in the post on tattoos, porn, and respect for women, about what it means for porn to “objectify” women.

figmentj also argues, cogently, that much of mainstream porn is in fact objectifying (both to men and to women), but not for reasons that many folks of an anti-porn persuasion might think.

The standard objections to porn–at least the ones I hear most often–don’t really hold up to close examination. “It disempowers women.” Well, surely, if a woman has power, if she has control over her own body, then that control must extend to where, when, with whom, and under what conditions to have sex–including the choice to have sex while a camera is running, yes? “It degrades women.” This is an argument rooted in the notion that certain acts of and by themselves are inherently degrading, when nothing could be further from the truth. Degradation is contextual; it’s in the intent of the folks involved, not the act. Simple PIV intercourse? Not degrading when it’s mutual and consensual; degrading in the context of rape. Coming on a woman’s face? Not degrading when it’s mutual and consensual (yes, there are women who enjoy it, honest Injun); degrading if it isn’t.

And so forth.

The argument that figmentj raised, though, that standard, mainstream porn is objectifying not because sex is objectifying and not because sexual depictions are objectifying, but because the way it is scripted and filmed, with its surrealistically-proportioned actors who are as biologically implausible as a Barbie doll and its over-the-top, phony sound effects that make clear to anyone who’s ever actually had sex that the folks involved are not enjoying it, seems contrived and indeed even psychologically constructed to maximize the emotional distance between the viewer and the people involved.

In other words, much of mainstream porn–if there is such a thing–appears to be calculated to separate the depiction of sex as far as possible from the genuine responses of the people involved, and to be shot with folks who scarcely even look human, increasing that emotional distance still more. It doesn’t draw the viewer in; it doesn’t create an emotional connection between the scene and the viewer; its inauthenticity actually encourages the viewer not to empathize with the actors or even, really, consider them as human beings at all.

The objectification, then, takes place at the point at which the porn is consumed, not the point at which it is made. The real experiences of the actors becomes entirely irrelevant.

Now, this line of reasoning opens up several potential cans of worms–a whole bait factory of worms, in fact, not the least of which are

  • At what point do the feelings of the people involved cease to be relevant, and the experiences of the viewers become most relevant? What if some viewers identify with the folks involved, but other viewers do not?
  • If the people who produce a depiction of sexual activity, and the people who are involved in the sexual activity, are fully engaged in it, but the people who watch it are not, does the viewer’s experience or the experience of the people involved define the caliber of the experience?
  • Is objectification even a bad thing? I would argue that, like everything else, it’s contextual; after all, examples of objectification abound. A professional basketball player is valued by his fans for his skill at the game, not for his humanity; ditto for the Colgate commercial model. Hell, one could even argue that the stars in a conventional Hollywood movie are being objectified; sure, the audience is engaged (if it’s a good movie), and sure they’re identifying with and connecting to the characters on the screen–but the expressions and feelings of the actors aren’t real. The audience is connecting with the actor’s character, not the actor himself…though I fear by this point I’ve distorted the original argument all out of shape.

But those questions are not the real interesting part.

The real interesting part is the implication for porn in general.

Now, I’m not that big a consumer of porn. The mainstream stuff in particular does little for me, for (among other things) exactly the reasons figmentj was talking about–the inauthenticity and the bizarre, weird-looking people in it.

On those occasions when I am interested in porn, my tastes tend to run to things that are a little more…umm, unconventional. I’m quite fond of the sort of stuff that kink.com produces–you know, bondage, S&M, humiliation play, that sort of thing.

Kink.com takes a lot of heat for the movies they produce. Take all the standard arguments against porn and crank them up to eleven; as a society, we’ve always been just fine with violence but a bit less OK with it when it’s combined by sex. A movie of a woman bound on all fours in an iron framework being simultaneously spanked and sodomized is, in short, bound to get folks talking, and not in good ways.

Yet the one thing you can say about this particular species of porn is that the reactions of the people involved are authentic.

Which is why I dig it. It works for me because the responses of the folks involved are authentic; it works for me for exactly the same reason that objectification play works for me.

And that means, at least for me, that this tied-down, cock-up-the-ass objectifying porn…isn’t objectifying at all.

After the Sushi

The three of us made it home from our sushi run almost six hours after the moment when I first said “Hey, why don’t we go get sushi now?”

The last ten minutes was the most harrowing; we’d opted to cheat and call a cab from Sushi House, which took us to the train station one pint nine miles away, as the Google Maps crawler crawls. From there we went to the subway station ten minutes from home, where a decidedly non-poly-friendly car awaited.

During the sushi, the temperature had dropped about twenty degrees, and David seldom wears anything save for shorts and sandals. This made leaving him at the station while I ran dayo home, then returning to pick him up a decidedly less than attractive option. So, we all three squeezed into the car, dayo on David’s lap (to both of their delight, judging from the sounds), and we prayed for no intervention from meddlesome law enforcement types on the drive home.

No meddlesome law enforcement intervention presented itself.

Cut for kinky sex and a cute picture of a cat

How to Tie a Rope Harness With Integrated Dildo Harness

Note: This is part 8 of an occasional ongoing "how to" series on BDSM.

Part 1 of the series, How to Tie a Rope Harness Part I, is here.
Part 2 of the series, How to Tie a Frog Tie, is here.
Part 3 of the series, How to Tie a Shinju, is here.
Part 4 of the series, How to Make a Custom Dildo out of Ice, is here.

Part 5 of the series, How to Make a Spikey Decorative Collar, is here.
Part 6 of the series, Theory and Practice of Ginger Figging, is here.
Part 7 of the series, Rape Fantasy and Resistance Play, is here.
Part 8 of the series, How to Tie a Two-Column Weave, is here.

As you can probably figure out, most of these tutorials are really, really not work-safe.

This particular tutorial is so not work-safe that clicking on this link at work is certain to doom you to absolute doom. The images connected with this tutorial show full frontal nudity. Even thinking about clicking on this link at work may result in angering of your company’s IT Morlocks, and nobody wants that! If you’re not at work and nudity doesn’t offend you, clicky the link!

Onward!

How to Tie a Two-Column Weave

Note: This is part 8 of an occasional ongoing "how to" series on BDSM.

Part 1 of the series, How to Tie a Rope Harness Part I, is here.
Part 2 of the series, How to Tie a Frog Tie, is here.
Part 3 of the series, How to Tie a Shinju, is here.
Part 4 of the series, How to Make a Custom Dildo out of Ice, is here.

Part 5 of the series, How to Make a Spikey Decorative Collar, is here.
Part 6 of the series, Theory and Practice of Ginger Figging, is here.
Part 7 of the series, Rape Fantasy and Resistance Play, is here.

As you can probably figure out, most of these tutorials are really, really not work-safe.

This particular tutorial is reasonably work-safe, as long as seeing someone’s arms tied together is okay. There’s no nudity in the images in this tutorial. If it sounds like it’s up your alley, clicky the link!

Onward!

Fragments of the Weekend: Theater of Pain

We started with dayo.

The three of us–sulenda, dayo, and I–arrived at Galleria Domain late in the evening. We started with dayo, with fingernails and knives and blindfolds and a very nasty little wooden paddle that’s about a foot long but only a quarter of an inch wide, and has a bite that belies its size. sulenda had brought an exquisitely lovely folding knife that made a most dlightful sound when it was unfolded, and each soft snick brought a delightful shudder from dayo.

And then, when she was a quivering happy mass, sulenda turned her attention to me.

Which is not, looking back on it now, something I was entirely prepared for.

Now, mind you, I know that she plays rough, and I know she likes inflicting pain. What I didn’t quite realize was the extent to which these things are true.

She also rather likes to win. Life lesson here: Victory goes not always to the strongest or the fastest, but rather to the person who’s willing to do whatever it takes to win. I’ve never played with anyone who plays quite as rough as she, and that made for quite an experience.

I’ve also never played before with anyone who is not a romantic partner or a potential romantic partner, and that too was an experience.

Now, all these things might sound like complaints, but they’re really not. Far from it. If I have any regret whatsoever, it’s that sulenda is leaving the country soon, and the odds are pretty good I may never see her again. That’s a pity; she’s thoroughly a delightful person, and I’ve vastly enjoyed being able to spend time with her. I also suspect I could potentially have a great deal to learn from her.

Like this thing she does with rope, for instance. At one point, she did this rather clever and tricksy thing where she tied a loop around the fingers of my right hand, put my right hand on my shoulder, ran the rope down my back, twisted my left arm up behind my back, ran the rope ’round my left wrist, then back up over my shoulder again and around my right elbow. The result: Just fine, if a bit awkward, as long as I didn’t move; instant punishment in the form of pain if I struggled.

Which, naturally, was the point, as the challenge was to escape.

And I did. After a great deal of struggling, accompanied by some rather colorful swearing and general thrashing around in pain. I apparently had an audience for that bit theater of pain, indeed. I’m told it was quite entertaining.

The strongest memory I have, though, is a vivid, almost visceral image of the look on her face while her nails (carefully filed to points, I might add) dug into my arm. “I’m a good person,” she said. Twist, dig, white-hot flash of pain. “Say it!”

And I did. And she is.

And I still have marks.

I neglected the next morning to ask her how to do that tricksy tie thing with the rope. It’s a skill I definitely wish to have.

Fragments of the Weekend: Pincushion Porn

Tuesday night, dayo and I came in from a walk in the park and curled up in front of the TV to watch some of Tristan Taormino’s porn. I had mostly packed for the return trip, but left the box of needles out, seeing as how we hadn’t played with them yet. dayo also had a shiny new purple aluminum cane that needed a proper christening, as well.

The porn was simple, as porn most often is. A group of porn stars in a house for a weekend, a bunch of cameras, no plot or script; reality TV applied to fucking. I still had sulenda‘s marks on my body–still have them now, as I write this, in fact–and that seemed somehow appropriate. We put on the porn, refreshing in its lack of fake tits, and I curled up behind dayo with the needles.

“One! One needle in your flesh! Ah, ah, ah!” I’ve been told I’m very Count von Count in most things, particularly in most things related to sex. Go with what works, I suppose.

Clicky for pic after fifteen needles; no blood, but might be triggering for some folk anyway

Rape fantasy and resistance play

Note: This is part 7 of an occasional ongoing "how to" series on BDSM.

Part 1 of the series, How to Tie a Rope Harness Part I, is here.
Part 2 of the series, How to Tie a Frog Tie, is here.
Part 3 of the series, How to Tie a Shinju, is here.
Part 4 of the series, How to Make a Custom Dildo out of Ice, is here.

Part 5 of the series, How to Make a Spikey Decorative Collar, is here.
Part 6 of the series, Theory and Practice of Ginger Figging, is here.

As you can probably figure out, most of these tutorials are really, really not work-safe.

This particular tutorial is not in any way work-safe, photographically or in text. It covers a topic that is both very common and yet at the same time triggering for a lot of people: rape fantasy. It covers communication, negotiation, and some starter scenarios, if this is the sort of thing you might like to try. If it sounds like it’s up your alley, clicky the link!

Onward!

Frolicon, and some thoughts on BDSM

About three weekends ago, figment_j and dayo came down to visit for Frolicon, a BDSM/alternative sexuality convention here in Atlanta. Now, you might think that sounds like a lot of fun…and you’d be right. We met up with datan0de and femetal, and more than a few good times were had by all.

Now, in some ways I think that my own approach to BDSM–or at least the things bout BDSM that draw me to it–are a little unusual, at least in comparison to what I see in others. I’ll get to that in a minute. First, some notes about the con itself.

Which was a blast.

lolitasir gave a demo workshop on fisting, which is one hell of an awesome way to start a weekend. Some how datan0de–at least I think it was him, it may have been one of his clones–ended up being drafted into the demo, playing the part of “lube boy.” And, all in all, there are worse positions to be in. Especially considering it is, y’know, a great way to get up close and personal with a woman writhing in ecstasy, which is always fun.

I also learned to put in a pair of contact lenses. I have a set of contacts that looks like cyborg eyes, and I swear, I have no idea how you folks who wear these damn things all the time do it so easily. Half an hour of working and swearing, it took, just to get them in, and another half an hour to get them back out again.

Lots of panels (and dayo taught me a really cool no-knot two-column tie I’ll be putting up on Symtoys at some point), lots of sushi. Going out for sushi straight from the con, in fetishwear and the whole bit, was fun.

And, of course, lots of play parties.


I had the opportunity to play with dayo and figment_j at the same time, and that by itself was a tremendous amount of fun. Play with each of them is effortless and tends to flow very well, and the three of us together have that same dynamic. figment_j and I had the pleasure of co-topping dayo, with floggers and crops and knives, oh my… After the fisting, it was time for us to turn our attention to figment_j, which is where I really noticed that my style of play, even at play parties, isn’t the same as many of the other people I see play.


I first played with figment_j in a public play party last year. One of the things that I found with her, and one of the things that delights me a great deal about her, is her fearlessness when it comes to exposing herself emotionally. The two of us seem to have a very natural kind of unspoken language when we play, that extends far beyond the physical things we do.

It’s been my observation that many of the people I’ve watched play in public are willing to expose their bodies for whatever scenarios they and their partners create, but are less willing to expose their emotional selves. And certainly in a situation where a person is playing casually, especially with a new partner, that makes sense.

But one of the things that most delights me about figment_j is how easily and readily she makes herself emotionally vulnerable, and how effortlessly we carve out a very private space even when we’re surrounded by people. It was fun to see how that private space expanded to include dayo, too.

I’ve experienced the same thing with dayo, and it does seem to me that this kind of intimacy is not the norm in public play spaces. It takes, I think, a very particular kind of courage to play that way.

Later, when figment_j and I were talking about it, she was expressing frustration that she can’t do the kind of edgy physical play that she’s seen other people do. There was, for example, a person being whipped with singletails at the same time as we were playing–something that’s definitely a nontrivial kind of scene.

I think, though, that the best measure of an activity is in how the people involved respond to it, and in the psychological environment it creates, rather than in the nature of the physical activities, or the amount of bruises it leaves. (Don’t get me wrong; I love leaving marks on my partners, oh yes. Bu that’s not the measure of the quality of the encounter, not by a long shot.)


I get quite a lot of email from my BDSM pages every month, and one common theme I’ve seen in a lot of the email is people saying “I’ve heard of [insert some kind of activity here], and I just don’t see myself getting into that–I’m worried that I’m not a ‘good’ submissive.”

I think that kind of idea can be especially easy to fall into at a play party, where you might be exposed to a wide range of different activities–singletail play, knife play, piercing play, needle play–I’ve even watched people doing fire play at a play party (sans fire extinguisher, which kind of ticked me off, but that’s a whole different issue altogether). Since it’s easier to see the physical side of the things going on than it is to see the emotional side, I think the tendency exists to say ‘So that’s what BDDSM is all about; I don’t want to do those things; that must mean I’m not really doing it right.’

But for me, the stuff that happens behind my partner’s eyes is the interesting stuff. The various techniques that get us there are more or less irrelevant; they’re just the path to the destination. It’s the destination itself, not the road you take to get there, that matters.

And I do realize that approach is somewhat unusual. For many people I’ve talked to, it’s the activities themselves that matter. And, yes, I do get that, too. Being flogged, for example, just plain feels good–in fact, I’ve seen people reach orgasm just from a flogging alone. For many people, in the right context and with the right partner, things that are painful become intensely pleasurable. And that’s totally cool. I like getting my partner off; I like doing things that my partner likes.

But I also like creating that shared emotional vulnerability while we’re at it. That, for me, extends the activity beyond physical pleasure, into a much more emotionally charged space. It creates a physical and emotional dance that, properly done, really lets you see right into your partner’s soul.

And I dig that.