Another book for the list...

Today's post is going to be a relatively short one. This is digging back a couple of years, but here's an interview on Salon with Hanne Blank, the author of "Straight: The Surprisingly Short History of Heterosexuality."

http://www.salon.com/2012/01/22/the_invention_of_the_heterosexual/

I'll encourage you all to read the interview, and - if it's your type of thing - check out the book. It's on my list now... As are a couple of her other books.

To get back to it...

As I mentioned previously, I just finished When Someone You Love is Kinky. It was an interesting read, and I have mixed feelings about it. What it really comes down to at its heart is that it's meant to be handed to someone you're close to when they find out you're kinky, and give them enough of a background in a "safe" way to be able to handle you and the situation well.

On some level, the premise of this book really depresses me. I'm not saying it's wrong, or unnecessary; I'm saying it's really sad that something like this is necessary. This book is excellent for the task; it covers essentially all the bases and presents it in a gentle way to try and ease the easily scared into it. I can't even fairly criticize that it's aimed too much at bedroom play over lifestyle; there's no good way they could have lingered on that without ruining the whole approach. It's also balanced by the letters.

I mentioned last post, every chapter has a letter; the authors asked their friends, family and acquaintances to write a "letter you'll never send" - to their family, their coworkers, or whoever. In a lot of ways, they were far more "real" than the sections written by the actual authors. The author sections are very informative, but the letters really let you connect with some of these people... And they were far less gentle with the readers. All in all it's a well-balanced approach.

Speaking of the approach... This book's biggest fault is easily the extreme lengths it goes to to ease people into it. It is so paranoid about possibly scaring anyone off that the people who aren't scared will have trouble getting to the parts that are actually important.

So to summarize...

The Good:

• Pretty comprehensive; a lot of information
• Very personal and easy to read 
• Applicable to a wide audience

The Bad:

• Slow to start
• Slanted away from lifestyle kinksters
• Possibly too little too late?
• Sortof aimed at a niche and unfortunate premise

The Conclusion:
Definitely something I'd recommend... But it's not perfect.

When Someone You Love is Kinky

Yesterday I finished reading this book - "When Someone You Love is Kinky", by Dossie Easton and Catherine A. Liszt. I'll do a full proper review of it next week, but the thing I'll call out from it today is that every chapter has a letter in it - a letter written by someone the authors know, published semi-anonymously, but written as "The letter I will never send". Some are to spouses, some are to parents, some are to friends or coworkers or bosses... Most of them, though are very powerful. It's a fascinating way to make you think.

Were I to write one? I'd write it to my parents. I'd say "My family", but I'm pretty sure my sister already knows, and everyone else (everyone living, at least) is in a different country.  All the things I wish they knew - but hedged by the fact that I'm terrified of their knowing. Fear of being rejected for who I really am, rather than loved for the partial impression they have now.

I won't copy one into this post, no matter how much I want to. I'll just say, I feel like this book is worth it just for these... Though these are the part of the book most easily replaced by something else - like Fetlife.

Anyway. Real review next week... And for now, have a good weekend.

Fifty Shades of Grey, BDSM, and Abuse

I found this at http://theladyinblack13.tumblr.com/image/94277426686; it appears to actually be a copy of a reddit post at http://www.reddit.com/r/TwoXChromosomes/comments/2byz2l/many_women_do_not_agree_with_me_on_this_subject.

With Fifty Shades of Grey being made into a movie, I've tried to raise awareness how this book is not about BDSM, but rather domestic and sexual abuse. Many women argue that the relationship in the book is BDSM, but that paints BDSM in a bad light.

BDSM is a community that believes in safety & comfort. Consent is always necessary, and partners take care of each other. After acts and roleplays, partners comfort each other to help transition out of that zone. FSOG does not include any of this. Mr. Grey gives Anastasia (a then-virgin) an ultimatum; to sign a contract or leave. She is sexually inexperienced (being a virgin) and he manipulates that to push her boundaries to make it seem like the sexually violent things he is doing to her are okay. There are instances where after an act, he is mad at her for being upset, but does not comfort her. He uses alcohol to sway her consent - this is by law rape. There is also an instance where she uses the safe word, yet he continues. That is consent being retracted, and Christian ignores the retraction of consent. That is sexual assault.

Those are not the only problematic instances. Anastasia begins to hide things in fear of Christian's anger. He becomes jealous and easily angered. Anastasia fears for her safety. Experts have even matched her behavior with that of abused women, in accordance with the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention's description of partner violence.

This book completely throws people who participate in BDSM completely under the bus by misrepresenting BDSM as a whole. Bad people do sneak into BDSM to find a way to escape persecution for their violent ways, but the majority of those in BDSM are not abusive, like this book would have you believe.

This book romanticizes and fetishizes abuse, and painting abuse in a 'sexy' and 'fun' light is really dangerous for women. 1 in 5 women will experience domestic abuse in their lifetime, that's why this book should not be defended. Making this behavior seem okay to accept from a man is dangerous, and people will be influenced to dabble in 'BDSM,' but not have an actual idea of what it is, and they will get hurt.

It is up to every individual what they read, never anyone else. The point of this post is to point out how FSOG isproblematic, not to police anyone's reading habits. I know many women (and men) defend this book and don't understand how it can be seen as abuse, but it is. And I hope more awareness will be raised so this does not influence others

I've unfortunately dealt with specific accusations of abuse in the past - a friend of my sub who found out what we were doing and called the police. It was - thankfully! - dealt with without any trouble, but it had the potential to be serious - and to be on my permanent record. The problem is, nothing illegal was happening... But that's not the standard by which most people respond to it. People see BDSM, see consensual play between adults who are enjoying themselves, and sometimes their first reaction is to panic at the terrible things being done. And Fifty Shades somehow managed to flip that on its head.

Fifty Shades takes a twisted version of BDSM and presents it as something erotic. It makes me sick that to so much of the world, BDSM is popularized by what's essentially an ass hole who doesn't get it. Who's doing a good job of fucking up his sub.

When you're introducing someone new to BDSM, the biggest thing - in my experience - that you have to guard against is preconceptions and assumptions. Having exposure to BDSM in general, having positive attention pointed at it, is good; having attention that seems positive but gives people such a terrible set of assumptions to work from is making it worse for those of us who already have an uphill fight to not be seen as monsters.

I feel sometimes like I'm harping on this, but I can't say it enough; check your assumptions. "Knowing" how BDSM works is almost invariably wrong - because, just like every other relationship, everyone is different. It doesn't matter what's "right" or "wrong", because those don't exist in this context. It only matters what works for you and your partner.

Christopher Ryan on Sex

The below quote is from Christopher Ryan, author of Sex at Dawn (B&N Link, Amazon Link), and is actually transcribed from the Savage Lovecast - forgive me, I don't have the episode number handy but a quick Google search makes me think it was 194 or 210, probably 194. Anyway! This is a book that's on my reading shelf and I've just been very slow to get to; it would have been ideal to read and review with the series of Poly entries I've been working through, but I simply haven't been reading much lately except on my phone - physical books have been suffering in favour of puzzle magazines and 3DS games.

Either way... When I was listening I ended up transcribing this quote because it struck me so much. This is very much how I feel - love is about the two of you growing old together and sharing your life, and not necessarily about getting a good fucking. Sex is great, orgasms are lovely, but they aren't - have not been - never will be - the most important thing to me... Even though that puts me (us!) in the minority.

The beauty of... Y'know, people say the book's not about... Ah, they talk about love, y'know. Jealousy is one issue, and then "what about Love", y'know, "you people are discounting love". But the thing about love... I don't know, maybe this will sound arrogant or something, but real love isn't about sex. If you're lucky enough in your life to find "love", you realize how relatively unimportant sex is, and you realize that you would never walk away from love for a blow job.

[...]

Y'know love is about getting old together, it's about raising a child together, it's about sharing your life. It's not about orgasms, and so many people confuse that; they think that, y'know, good sexual chemistry is love. Good sexual chemistry is a reason to, you know, sign onto a lifetime together, and then a few years down the road they find they've made a big mistake. So even though our book is about sex ostensibly, one of the points we're trying to make in the book is that people take sex way too seriously; and y'know; and we can chill about sex, we can have fun with sex, it doesn't always have to be sacred. It's like music; sometimes it is sacred, sometimes you heard god in the Bach toccata; but other times it's just for dancing and having a good time.

Anyway. For now, I'll leave this entry here; a lazy entry for a lazy holiday weekend, and depart with the promise that when I do read the book I'll review it fully for you in the blog. Hope you all had a great Labour Day!

The Sun and the Moon

A story from the Krachi people of western Africa, as presented in Myths and Legends: Classical Greek, Celtic, Norse, Chinese, African, Native American & more (edited by Jake Jackson). Offered without much comment, but it came across very much to me (while reading as a bed-time story to my son, of all things...) as a relationship that would have worked out far better for everyone involved if it were Poly... Assuming everyone could work with that, of course. Then again, both of the people in this are significantly lacking in redeeming qualities, so maybe it wouldn't have worked out then either?

Any kind of poly relationship needs some basic trust, some basic communication, that the sun and the moon here are clearly lacking. This relationship was doomed by the fact that they didn't communicate or respect each other they way they needed to. So consider this your lesson for today.

Either way, have a nice bed-time story from me.

The sun andy he moon fell in love and decided to marry. For a time they were very happy together and produced any children whom they christened "stars". But it was not long before the moon grew weary of her husband and decided to take a lover, refusing to conceal the fact that she greatly enjoyed the variety.
Of course, the sun soon came to hear of his wife's brazen infidelity and the news made him extremely unhappy. He attempted to reason with the moon, but when he saw that his efforts were entirely fruitless, he decided to drive his wife out of his house. Some of the children sided with their mother, while others supported their father. But the sun was never too hard on his wife, in spite of their differences, and saw to it that their possessions were equally divided up.
The moon was always too proud to accept her husband's kindness, however, and even to this day, she continues to make a habit of trespassing on his lands, often taking her children with her and encouraging them to fight the siblings who remain behind with their father.
The constant battles between the star-children of the sun and the star-children of the moon produce great storms of thunder and lightning and it is only when she becomes bored of these confrontations that the moon sends her messenger, the rainbow, into the field, instructing him to wave a cloth of many colors as a signal for her children to retreat.
Sometimes the moon herself is caught by the sun attempting to steal crops from his fields. Whenever this happens, he chases after his estranged wife and if he catches her he begins to flog her or even tries to eat her.
So whenever a man sees an eclipse, he knows that things have come to blows once again between husband and wife up above. At this time, he must be certain to beat his drum and threaten the sun very loudly, for if he does not, the sun might finish the job, and we should certainly lose the moon forever.

Book Review: Opening Up

I just finished Opening Up, by Tristan Taormino (Goodreads link: https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/1128665.Opening_Up), and I'll admit that - as a first choice for a book to review here - I'm really happy with my choice. The thing is, though, once I finished it I found it hard to figure out how to review it... Mostly because I was an indifferent English student at best, and I just agreed with way too much of what it said. Going through the book, there were only one or two concepts I was not already conscious of and comfortable with; the main difference was her terminology, where she may use a different word or phrase than I did.

Tristan Taormino is an excellent author who writes in an approachable yet intelligent manner, and I was instantly comfortable with how she presented all the information. She found and interviewed a number of people in all forms of poly relationships as source, as well as seeking out all sorts of academic and popular books on the subject. Tristan lays out all the topics in a logical, well-ordered manner, splitting them up by chapter and addressing each concept in order; with relevant quotes and excerpts from her interviewees, each segment is easy to understand and easily relatable.

The biggest concept I'd never really heard of before is the idea of compersion, or taking joy in the joy of a loved one - essentially the antonym of schadenfreude. When it comes to polyamoury, it's a major part of many - if not most - functional relationships. If you aren't happy and comfortable with the idea of people getting joy externally to their immediate relationship with you, it's all too easy to fall into jealousy.

At its heart, Opening Up has everything you need to introduce anyone to all the major and most of the minor ideas involved in polyamoury. If you're new to it as a lifestyle, or simply want to ground some of your thoughts, this is a great book for you; more to the point, though, this is an excellent book to use to introduce other people who aren't involved to your lifestyle. I'd recommend this to anyone who is looking to learn more about it, and its approachable nature makes it perfect for someone trying to figure all of this out.

...And Hold the Sex, Part 2

I stopped at Barnes & Nobles today and - out of curiosity, as well as because it’s a fun toy - I did a few searches on their little mini computer kiosks. Unsurprisingly, since I started doing this a few days ago and I’m anxious to make sure I have topics to talk about, I searched “on-topic” - BDSM, bondage, submission, submissive, dominance, sadism, masochism. There are plenty of books in their system on those subjects… But excluding erotic fiction, only five in the store.

I took the time to go look at them, and the first worrisome sign was that they were all under “Relationships -> Sexuality”. Not only was every one of them a manual on “How to spice up your sex life using your kinky side!”, but four of the five were “50 shades of X”. (The fifth was “The Book of Kink: Sex Beyond the Missionary”, by Eva Christina, if you’re curious.) I’m certain that “50 Shades of BDSM” and “50 Shades of Kink” are both great books with several redeeming qualities, but it’s hard for me to take them seriously given the bandwagon they’ve jumped on… And it isn’t reassuring that there’s really nothing else there.

I looked through them enough to know that their classification under “Sexuality” was accurate and deserved in these cases. And don’t get me wrong, there’s absolutely nothing wrong with that; I’m thrilled to know that there are books on safe, fun bondage and mild pain play alongside books on how to give better oral sex and the highlights from the Kama Sutra. It just frustrates me that they’ve been relegated to the little niche they’re in.

Not a single book on Dom/sub relationships. Not a single book on pet play or pony play. Not a single book on power exchange except when it comes to fuzzy handcuffs. Not a single book on the… I hesitate to say “serious side” of BDSM, but that’s very much how it came across to me. The only things they stocked were riding the “50 Shades of Grey” wave, and however nice it is to see positive, constructive discussion of the lifestyle, it makes me sad to know how terribly slanted the message they’re displaying is.

I don’t know if this is cause or effect. Are the only books on the subject under sexuality because that’s what B&N believes, or because that’s just all that sells? Functionally I suppose it doesn’t matter, but it definitely doesn’t help BDSM’s image. It does nothing but perpetuate the stereotype that bondage and kink are nothing but bedroom issues. I have most of my friends I’m out to well-trained on the subject, but just the fact that I have to address it every time is the heart of the problem. In the 18 or so years of my activity in the lifestyle, I can think of one person where I *didn’t* have to introduce the idea that it wasn’t all about getting off.

In the end, I know that most of my attitude arouind this comes down to my own prejudices, but mostly it's just a reward thing. The human brain seeks activities which reward it; and sex is one of the most common rewards around (right after food). It's very easy for me to bemoan the lack of non-sexual BDSM culture when sex isn't the same reward it is to me as the majority of society. That's okay, though; I'm used to being an outlier, and some people in the Fetish community make me feel downright vanilla.

I wish there were a good fetish book store in the area - something that would cover the subjects more evenly. In a bigger city there might be; and you can always have one just by the luck of the draw. Next time I’m there I’ll do a search on a few different topics - other less-than-socially-acceptable things, like polyamory, pet play, pony play, age play, and whatever other various fetishes come to mind at the time. For now, if I want to read something on the subject - and I don’t want it to just be soft core porn - I’m going to have to resort to Amazon, and I recommend you do the same.