I’ve thought about writing something out about this for a while now.
I am constantly seeing pro-kink people defending BDSM with remarks such as – ”How is BDSM misogynistic when there are submissive men and dominant women?”
As someone who was deeply involved in the BDSM community, and who was more specifically, a domme who enacted that domination out solely on men, this is one of the most frustrating defences of BDSM.
First, let me state that just because, in any situation involving misogyny or oppression of any kind, there are instances that seem to go against the grain doesn’t make that a good argument. It also doesn’t make it free of the same critique.
I can tell you, firsthand, that it is especially true of BDSM.
I would also like to tell you guys that I am more specifically going to be talking about the verbal and emotional humiliation/degradation of this type of relationship, instead of the physical acts of violence. I am doing that because there seems to be this prevalent attitude that if the woman is a dominant and the man a submissive, that there is no way it could be a misogynistic act, when that is exactly the opposite of true.
General trigger warning for talk of BDSM from here on out.As a female dominant, many of the acts that I was made to perform on men were acts of verbal degradation, humiliation, and emotional abuse. This included such things as verbal humiliation with words like bitch, slut, whore, and pussy. The desire to be dressed as a woman, to wear “girly” things, and then be made fun of. And I’ve even been told “just treat me like a girl”.
In fact, I never once encountered a situation where these kinds of things were not desired and asked of me.
Now, I’d think it would be plainly obvious to see the root of these desires, but if not let me just spell it out for you; the reason these men wanted to to be treated this way was because of their misogyny. Because the most humiliating thing they could imagine was being treated like a woman.
Misogyny and sex based oppression is at the root of all BDSM. The power disparities come from the idea that woman belongs on the bottom of the dynamic. If this were not the case, female specific slurs would not even be a factor, wearing underwear associated with being a woman wouldn’t be a humiliating act, and asking to be “treated like a girl” wouldn’t require abuse.
These acts of violence towards the female class, the misogyny, were things I was conditioned to ignore and feel numb to. Yes, the dominant in the situation was brainwashed into doing what was pleasing for the submissive, because the dominant in this case was socialized her entire life to cater to men. Even when she thought what she was doing was empowering.
I remember in the earlier stages of my dominance that I expressed explicit disinterest and discomfort with calling men gendered slurs to help them get off or dressing them up as a woman to make them feel degraded.
I was totally fine with the physical abuse of men, because I hated them, and if anyone out there doesn’t think that dominant men who act out physical violence on women don’t do it for the same reason you are sorely mistaken.
But at some point, after the constant reasoning and explanations that I’m really the empowered one, that it was all fantasy, that I needed to be more open, I accepted. After all, they were the ones on their knees right? I was clearly the empowered one, even if I had to treat them like a woman to do it. Even if I had to use the abuse and humiliation I had been subjected to my entire life.
For me, these words and hatred and humiliation, are a lived reality that I had literally no escape from. Not even in my private life, in a space where I was supposed to feel safe with someone who said they cared about me.
For them, it was a fun game to get their dicks hard to. Because once it was over, they were able to take off their costume and return to the role of man.
There is no argument for BDSM, and it especially cannot be made because of dom female/sub male roles. Misogyny is a requirement in all BDSM relationships, and I have yet to see any example where it doesn’t.
BDSM helps to continue to numb women to their subjugation, it helps to further men’s role as the dominant class, and it should never go without this critique.
Misogyny is misogyny, and no amount of orgasms will change that.
Hellborndaughter (found at For Survivors of Kink Abuse, original post no longer up)
Anti-Porn Feminists 
Reblogged this on oogenhand and commented:
Forced “feminization” is also an issue in prisons…
Not really relevant to this post. There is a huge qualitative difference between a fetishistic man paying a woman to ‘treat him like a girl’, and a man being ‘turned into a woman’ against his will in prison.
[EDIT: Sorry bub, I said before that I wasn’t going to put up with you taking up my time and energy, then ignoring what I wrote, you are not entitled to my attention.]
I could say the same to you for not publishing that comment. Why me in particular? You rebut many other one-time commenters who never reply.
Ok, I decided to let this one (and only this one) through after all, for the amusement factor only:
one-time commenters
Yes, exactly, time is experienced as linear in only one direction, even by radical feminists!
and nobody was forcing him to leave comments on this blog!
[EDIT: Look dumpling, I’ll spell it out for you one last time.
You are free to read or ignore this blog; when you leave a comment, if I delete it, it looks like I can’t answer your arguments. Writing my replies takes time and effort, when you ignore them, and then go on to ask further questions under other posts, you are disrespecting that time and effort and acting as if you are entitled to said time and effort.
I have never solicited your comments in the first place, and I have never asked you for your time and effort except in fair exchange for my own.
I let through your comment containing the line “You rebut many other one-time commenters who never reply” because it is a laughably stupid thing to say.
Time, for human beings, is linear, and we only experience it in one direction. The first time someone leaves a comment, I have no way of knowing if they are going to stick around for a conversation. If I reply and they never come back to comment again, then … they never come back to comment again, and there are no further comments for me to reply to or not!]
So, let me get this straight… You have taken the experiences of one female dominant (who also professes to having a strong dislike of men, making her less than objective) and applied it to all of BDSM? As evidence goes, this is very lacking. You are very clearly only interested in propping up your own outlook on this subculture rather than providing an informed analysis of it, and I hope that nobody is taken in by this.
Can you come up with an explanation of ‘forced femininity’ etc that doesn’t involve misogyny?
What are such men getting off on if it isn’t women’s degraded status under patriarchy?
The OP’s opinion is rational and would be rational if she had never been involved in a single beedy ess em relationship; her personal experience adds extra proof.
Firstly, you have ignored my points about the poor representativeness of this article. If you had used some sort of survey of lots of men in the BDSM community, and the majority of them professed to such thoughts, you may have a point. But this is just the experiences of one person, and is not a sound basis to accurately judge all of the BDSM scene.
Now, on to the stuff you just said. I think it is very narrow to just assume that all submissive men in BDSM must view it as “feminisation”, and be specifically getting off on the idea of women being oppressed. Why couldn’t a man simply enjoy the feeling of submission? Are you saying that submissive behaviour must be viewed as an inherently “female” thing? I beg to differ, I say that, ultimately, getting off on being dominant or submissive is entirely independent of perceived gender roles, and needn’t really involve such concepts. A man could easily enjoy doing BDSM stuff with a dominant woman without constantly thinking “ooh, this must be what it feels like to be a woman!”, and rather simply enjoying the feeling of submitting.
As for this person’s supposed rationality, I again question the rationality of anybody who says that they hate an entire gender. Hatred of a person just for their gender is not a rational thing to do. And of course, she too makes the mistake of generalising her experiences so massively.
The OP’s opinion is perfectly valid, she was in these specific types of BDSM relationships, and she used her experiences and rational thought to come up with the hypothesis that male subs into ‘forced feminisation’ are getting off on women’s sub-human status under patriarchy.
One doesn’t even need to have been in a BDSM relationship to work that out, I can work it out myself just from knowing that such a thing as ‘forced feminisation’ exists, and that we live in a patriarchy.
One doesn’t need to interview every single member of the far right to ‘prove’ that the far right is racist, it’s self-evident.
The onus here is on you to come up with an explanation of ‘forced femininity’ that doesn’t involve getting off on women’s second-class status; you may as well try to argue that those in ‘master/slave’ relationships aren’t getting off on the idea of slavery.
“Are you saying that submissive behaviour must be viewed as an inherently “female” thing? I beg to differ, I say that, ultimately, getting off on being dominant or submissive is entirely independent of perceived gender roles, and needn’t really involve such concepts.”
That may well be, but a man asking to be ‘treated like a girl’ (with it being a given that he wants to be treated the way ‘girls’ are treated under patriarchy) is very much saying that submission is a ‘female thing’. I am not reporting on the nature of ultimate reality here, I am reporting on the behaviour of men into ‘forced feminisation’.
“As for this person’s supposed rationality, I again question the rationality of anybody who says that they hate an entire gender. Hatred of a person just for their gender is not a rational thing to do.”
An oppressed group is allowed to hate the class that oppresses them. Loving ones oppressor class is, to me, far less rational than hating them.
Yes, you would need to interview lots of BDSM people in order to support the claim you are making. The difference with the far right is that it this a sexual practice, not a political outlook. Being scared of other races is right there in the tenants of the far-right, they fear change and other cultures. Meanwhile, all BDSM is is the sexual practice of tying people up and/or adopting dominant or submissive roles. That has no direct bearing upon a person’s views on social issues, so one would need to conduct some sort of survey in order to support a claim about the views of the people in this subculture. The experiences of one person in this subculture is in no way representative, this would certainly not fly in a sociological study.
And no, the onus here is upon you. You have made a claim about BDSM culture, but have provided insufficient evidence with which to support it. I merely point out that you should have provided better evidence to support your claim.
As for the men who asked to be “treated like a girl”, I must again point out that, of course, this is just the experiences of one woman, and that being submissive is entirely independant of any gender roles. So, having said that, it’s likely that the men in this examples are, to some extent, sexist themselves, and have this preconcieved nature about gender roles and submission. However, there is no reason why a more progressive man could not view the experience entirely independantly of gender roles.
Lastly, no, you have misunderstood me. I did not advocate “loving” any group. Rather, I am against the concept of generalising a group altogether. It’s unfair, and is exactly the same mentality as racists use (which I notice you expressed distaste for earlier). It’s never rational, and it’s never constructive. I do understand how a woman could be angered by having stereotypes projected onto her by some men, but it’s not a logical reaction to hate each and every man for that. Just as it wouldn’t be logical for a man to hate all women because he had had bad experiences with some, or for a person to hate an entire race because they had encountered criminals of that race before. It is far more logical and fair to judge a person as an individual rather than on their race, gender, nationality, ect.
Listen dude, I really cannot reword this any more clearly or simply; I am not making (and never did make in this post) a generalisation about all submissive men, I am saying something about the men who are into ‘forced feminisation’. Can you come up with an explanation for ‘forced feminisation’ that doesn’t involve getting off on the way women are (mis)treated under patriarchy?
Well… You kinda did support that massive generalisation of BDSM. The woman in your post seemed to be talking about all of BDSM, saying that it was not a valid defence of kinks not being sexist. You added nothing further, so assumed that you were on board with everything she had said.
And didn’t you notice? I said that the men that this female domme mentioned probably were sexist to some extent or another, (wrongly) equating submission with femininity. So yes, while men like those are holding a sexist outlook, not all male subs would share this viewpoint. Thusly, BDSM can actually be considered as a non-sexist kink, depending upon the people who practice it.
You can’t ‘wrongly’ equate submission with femininity, femininity in the real world is about submission (even if not all forms of BDSM submission are directly, obviously, linked to femininity).
“BDSM can actually be considered as a non-sexist kink, depending upon the people who practice it.”
Yeah yeah all those other BDSMers are ‘only’ getting off to slavery, or the holocaust, or pedophilia, but at least they’re not ~sexist~!
Just don’t think too much about how oppressions overlap, or about how all forms of degradation, whether within the BDSM ‘scene’ or outside of it, are about othering the victim, and women, under patriarchy, are always othered, so it’s all connected actually anyway.
Of course you can wrongly equate it. Submission on its own isn’t a gendered thing. It’s just the act of giving power and control over to another person/force. It doesn’t need to have any connection to “femininity”.
Your second point, about supposed other assorted bad things that BDSM encourages is… Odd, to say the least. While some BDSMers may get off to pretending to be slaves/slavers, does this mean that they support actual slavery? That they would want to actually own slaves? No, of course no. Reality and fantasy can be easily seperated. If a person actually wants to go out and enslave random people, then that is their own poor grasp of reality and lack of morals rather than BDSM itself. As for the Holocaust part, is that a thing? I don’t see a connection between being into BDSM and liking the Holocaust. I mean, if there are people who roleplay it or whatever, then it wouldn’t really be that big an issue if they kept it entirely behind closed doors and didn’t actually support anything that happened with it.
As for the mention of pedophilia… Really? Pedophilia is its own thing. A person might be into BDSM, and a person might be afflicted with some perverse interest in children. And a person might be interested in both. But this doesn’t mean that there is some connection between the two. This is like saying that there are some people who climb rocks who are also racist, so rock climbing must have some connection to racism. You’re very eager to generalise the BDSM community as a pack of immoral deviants, you’re almost coming across as one of those moral guardians who gets outraged over any sort of behaviour that they deem “improper”.
Oh, one other thing. Should have mentioned this earlier, but I find it interesting how you referred to me as “dude” earlier. While you do happen to be correct about my gender, just why did you assume that I am a male? Do you think that no woman would disagree with your viewpoints? Isn’t this an example of gender profiling, which isn’t really very progressive?
Your arrogant windbaggery makes it very obvious you are a dude (and gee, it reminds me of another arrogant windbag who kept hanging around here …), and if you think that me correctly identifying you as an arrogant dude is ~sexism against men~ then boo-fucking-hoo, I don’t care.
Of course there are people who fetishize the holocaust, concentration camps and Nazi uniforms (I didn’t say ‘encouraged’, I said ‘getting off on’) – speaking of arrogance, you come here claiming to know what BDSM is about, and you clearly know less about it in real world terms than I do!
Have you never heard of ‘age-play’, ‘daddy-doms/little girls’? The heterosexual mainstream is infected with paedophilia (‘barely legal’ etc), the BDSM ‘scene’ is the patriarchal mainstream in concentrate, so of course it is infected with paedophilia as well.
And of course dominance/submission is gendered, we live in a patriarchy, that’s what patriarchy fundamentally is, male dominance and female submission, so any ‘role-play’ of dominance/submission is going to be gendered because it is gendered in the real world. A man who submits is feminised under the patriarchal world-view (which is the only world view because there is no opting out of patriarchy).
Think about it this way, how is it possible for a man to claim both that he is submissive, and that he is also masculine?
It doesn’t work, because the definition of ‘masculine’ includes as a given, a lack of submission.
It’s written into the very language we use.
Okay, so you’re saying that you have no problem with discriminating against others, as long as it is directed at groups you deem as acceptable targets? That’s a very worrying mentality… And no, my standing by my viewpoint (or “arrogant windbaggery”, as you termed it) doesn’t make it “obvious” that I am a male, that’s bloody ridiculous. Are you saying that women can’t be set on a viewpoint that happens to oppose your own?
Regarding my knowledge of BDSM, I do not need specialist knowledge of it to point out how flawed and irrational your hamfisted attack on it is. You rely upon massive negative generalisations of it in order to try and advance your own agenda, this is quite clear.
As for the pedophilia, I again say that it’s its own thing, and doesn’t really have some fundamental connection to BDSM. “Age play” or whatever is still two consenting adults doing what they want behind closed doors, and not actual pedophilia. It’s fine to find it offputting, but as long as it’s not going beyond the private life of these people then it doesn’t really matter.
So, on to your last point. I find it interesting that, for somebody who can see the obvious problems that society’s ideas on gender roles can cause, you seem very eager to assert their existence and importance. Submission absolutely doesn’t have to involve gender roles, but you’re here insisting that they cannot at all be left behind. This strikes me as being somewhat cyncial about your chosen ideology’s effectiveness in challenging these problematic ideas.
Oh please, how is me correctly identifying you as male ‘discrimination’? I didn’t say I identified you as male because you disagreed with me, you made that bit up, I said your arrogant windbaggery made you very obviously male. We live in a patriarchy, this means that most men have an over-inflated opinion of their own worth, therefore the majority of arrogant windbags are going to be male.
“I do not need specialist knowledge of it to point out how flawed and irrational your hamfisted attack on it is. You rely upon massive negative generalisations of it in order to try and advance your own agenda, this is quite clear.”
No, my argument has been clear, consistent and correct throughout, and you haven’t actually managed to prove me wrong once; you saying I am wrong and demonstrating how I am wrong are two different things.
“As for the pedophilia, I again say that it’s its own thing […]”
Are you really trying to argue that a fetish has nothing to do with the thing fetishised? That makes no sense.
What does ‘being behind closed doors’ have to do with anything? BDSMers are all too keen to tell the world what they are doing (how do you think I get any of my material? I’m not hacking into anyone’s computer), and BDSM imagery is entirely mainstream now.
Being ‘in private’ doesn’t stop something being harmful, and ‘consent’ and ‘choice’ doesn’t stop something being harmful either. A woman who was sexually abused as a child may ‘choose’ to re-enact that abuse, but what’s a trauma-flashback matter as long as it’s ‘behind closed doors’ right?
“I find it interesting that, for somebody who can see the obvious problems that society’s ideas on gender roles can cause, you seem very eager to assert their existence and importance.”
I am reporting on the way society and language works, for real, in the real world, under patriarchy. I do think gender roles are harmful (I do not think they are innate), that’s why it is important to report on their existence, and the harm they do. Problems don’t disappear by insisting they don’t exist.
“Submission absolutely doesn’t have to involve gender roles, but you’re here insisting that they cannot at all be left behind. This strikes me as being somewhat cyncial about your chosen ideology’s effectiveness in challenging these problematic ideas.”
Like I said, you challenge an idea by first acknowledging its existence.
I have no interest what-so-ever in making abuse more ‘equal opportunities’, or covering up how gendered and harmful BDSM is.
You keep insisting that submission isn’t gendered, but you cannot offer any rationale to support that claim (repeating ‘oh yes it is’ is not an argument). You can’t even reply directly to my most basic of questions: how can a man claim to be both masculine and submissive?
The answer is he can’t, because we live under a patriarchy, and by the rules of that patriarchy (rules that are there already and that I do not magic into existence by reporting on their existence), a man cannot be both masculine and submissive, because submission is coded as feminine, and to be masculine is to be dominant.
It’s discrimination in that you assumed I must have been a male due to my displaying of what you percieved as negative attributes. In this, case, standing by my disagreement of your position. And yes, my disagreeing is the problem. No doubt, you wouldn’t have perceived me quite so negatively were I supporting your position instead. Might have even deigned to not assume my gender, in fact.
As for the nature of your argument… No, it hasn’t been clear nor particularly correct. Despite my repeated pointing out of the methodological flaws in your argument, you have gone on pretending that your anecdotal evidence and massive negative generalisations are valid evidence to make such claims about BDSM. Until you can accept the shortcomings with your current argument and bring forward compelling evidence, the claim that you have made just cannot be seen as particularly valid, if at all.
I mean why not go out and try and find some survey results, or something? Maybe try and gather some data yourself? Really do an informed and detailed analysis of BDSM culture from which you can draw conclusions. It’s not like more evidence is going to harm your position, right? Unless you are worried that the evidence won’t agree with your prefered stance…
> What does ‘being behind closed doors’ have to do with anything? BDSMers are all too keen to tell the world what they are doing (how do you think I get any of my material? I’m not hacking into anyone’s computer), and BDSM imagery is entirely mainstream now.
Haha, I would imagine that right-wing bigots express similar sentiments about homosexuals. Yes, it’s a thing that exists and some people who do it are open about it. No, those who are aren’t all obnoxious deviants who want to force what they do on everyone. And yes, plenty of them would keep it private. Obviously, you simply wouldn’t know.
As for the point about sexual abuse, I feel that you are again trying to demonise BDSM as a whole by pointing out one negative way in which it could be applied. Yes, some people who have been abused could use it in a way that is psychologically unhealthy. This doesn’t make it inherently evil or wrong, just an unfortunate way in which it can be applied. But, to me, it seems that the way to neatly avoid it is to address sexual abuse itself trying to prevent it and provide help for those who have suffered it, in hopes that they don’t start doing things that hurt themselves.
> Problems don’t disappear by insisting they don’t exist.
But… Isn’t the way to move past this particular problem to start being proactive about it? To start ignoring and downplaying the gender roles when possible, and thus take away their power? Raising awareness is an essential step, but as is following that up with action.
> You keep insisting that submission isn’t gendered, but you cannot offer any rationale to support that claim (repeating ‘oh yes it is’ is not an argument). You can’t even reply directly to my most basic of questions: how can a man claim to be both masculine and submissive?
I laid out my logic a few times, explaining full well why it isn’t gendered and why it doesn’t have to be beholden to gender roles. This directly addressed your “most basic of questions”. That you cannot accept this suggests that our viewpoints on this may be irreconcilable. You’re clearly very set on seeing things in terms of gender roles (to the exclusion of anything else), so I doubt that I am going to change your mind on this.
“And yes, my disagreeing is the problem.”
I called you an arrogant windbag, that’s a description of your behaviour, not your opinions.
“Despite my repeated pointing out of the methodological flaws in your argument, you have gone on pretending that your anecdotal evidence and massive negative generalisations are valid evidence to make such claims about BDSM.” […]
“I mean why not go out and try and find some survey results, or something? Maybe try and gather some data yourself?”
The argument was never ‘x number of BDSMers do y’, the argument was what does it mean when men get off on ‘forced feminisation’? The OP had personal experience of said men, her experience gave her insight on what ‘forced feminisation’ is and means. I have no direct experience of such men, but I can use rational thinking (including understanding what words mean) to examine what ‘forced feminisation’ is about.
You haven’t actually been able to refute anything I’ve said, you haven’t been able to answer this question (and this is the third time I’m asking it): how can a man be both submissive and masculine?
You claim that you answered this question, but you haven’t, you haven’t demonstrated anything, just repeated your claim without any rationale to back it up. (Seriously, cut and paste what you think is you demonstrating your argument, because you haven’t.)
That’s the actual point here, BDSMers say the BDSM ‘scene’ can’t be misogynist because of female dommes, but an examination of what ‘forced feminisation’ means, shows that it is still misogynist.
“I would imagine that right-wing bigots express similar sentiments about homosexuals.”
You’re arguments are getting really desperate now. You claimed BDSMers were all operating ‘behind closed doors’, I pointed out that that wasn’t true, as BDSM imagery is now mainstream, and, according to you, that makes me the same as a ‘right-wing bigot’ complaining about two men holding hands in public!
“As for the point about sexual abuse, I feel that you are again trying to demonise BDSM as a whole by pointing out one negative way in which it could be applied”
And again, you are trying to claim that a fetish has nothing to do with the thing being fetishised, which makes absolutely no sense whatsoever!
“But… Isn’t the way to move past this particular problem to start being proactive about it? To start ignoring and downplaying the gender roles when possible, and thus take away their power?”
Do we tackle racism by ignoring racists and pretending that racism isn’t important? Would that be a useful strategy in Ferguson perhaps?
How do oppressed people manage to ignore the boot on their throat?
This is the problem with post-modern identity politics, privileged people opt-in to oppressed identities for sexual kicks, and then imagine that it is possible to opt-out.
So what makes me an arrogant windbag? What exactly qualifies me for that honour? I’m pretty sure that it is just because I’m opposing you on this. Heck, you yourself are being similarly rigid and verbose with the arguments you’re putting forward.
> The argument was never ‘x number of BDSMers do y’
That’s what it was in the original quote. She outright said “Misogyny is a requirement in all BDSM relationships” so she’s saying that all of BDSM is like that. You added nothing further to this in your post, so apparently you agreed with her. Are you willing to admit that she is wrong, and that not all BDSMers are necessarily like that?
> You haven’t actually been able to refute anything I’ve said
My point here is that you’ve bee unable to support anything. You want to make all of these negative generalisations of BDSM, to say that it’s this whole negative subculture, but you just haven’t provided any good evidence in support. All you have is one person’s acedotes and some stereotypes that you have put forward.
> you haven’t been able to answer this question (and this is the third time I’m asking it): how can a man be both submissive and masculine?
Already addressed this in the last post. I don’t view submission as needing to be a gendered thing. A man needn’t be adhering to some masculine gender role 24/7. I am again perplexded at your implication that gender roles are utterly inescapable. I’m certainly not trying to adhere to some set of guidelines on how I should act as a male, and I would imagine that you aren’t overly concerned about playing to some gender role either. It really doesn’t matter if a man isn’t “being masculine” when he’s being a sub, he really doesn’t have to care.
So, I’ll put a question to you: why can’t a person just leave behind a gender role? Earlier on, you said it was because a man cannot claim to be masculine and submissive, but just why does a man need to claim to be masculine?
> That’s the actual point here, BDSMers say the BDSM ‘scene’ can’t be misogynist because of female dommes, but an examination of what ‘forced feminisation’ means, shows that it is still misogynist.
You assume that all male subs ask to be “treated like women”, and that all view it as such. Quite the assumption to make.
> You’re arguments are getting really desperate now. You claimed BDSMers were all operating ‘behind closed doors’, I pointed out that that wasn’t true, as BDSM imagery is now mainstream, and, according to you, that makes me the same as a ‘right-wing bigot’ complaining about two men holding hands in public!
I assumed that you were bringing up BDSM becoming more mainstream as a negative, given your previous statements trying to assocaite them with the Holocaust and pedophilia.
> And again, you are trying to claim that a fetish has nothing to do with the thing being fetishised, which makes absolutely no sense whatsoever!
It doesn’t have to. No reason why a person doing BDSM has to be taking advantage of somebody who has suffered sexual abuse.
> Do we tackle racism by ignoring racists and pretending that racism isn’t important? Would that be a useful strategy in Ferguson perhaps?
Not what I meant. The approach I am referring to would respond to racism/sexism ect by being actively opposed to it when that was required, and going about one’s own life not caring about things like gender or race in other people.
Ok, I think the real problem here is that you don’t know what you are talking about, you think you do, but you don’t.
First of all, lets take the concept of ‘an argument’. You think that simply by making claims that you have made an argument. Sure, in the everyday sense of the word ‘argument’ as in disagreeing with someone, you are arguing, because you are disagreeing with me. But you have not put forward an argument as in “a reason or set of reasons given in support of an idea, action or theory.”
The second thing you can’t quite grasp is how words, and the concept they label, work.
To give a simple example, ‘a bachelor is an unmarried man’. Now, to prove that statement, I do not have to go out into the world and count or measure all the unmarried men to prove that they are all bachelors, I only have to know what the words ‘bachelor’ and ‘unmarried man’ mean, the proof is built into the meanings of the words.
When I talk about submission being intrinsically feminine, and masculinity being intrinsically linked to dominance, I am saying something about the meaning of those four words and the concepts they label.
I am not saying anything about the putative biological innateness of gender roles, I am not saying anyone should perform any kind of gender role, I am talking about what masculinity and femininity mean and what dominance and submission mean.
Even when submissive men are not playing out a ‘forced feminisation’ fantasy (and nowhere did I claim all submissive men were into ‘forced feminisation’), they are still being submissive, and that is still feminine, because submission is feminine, the ‘forced feminisation’ fantasy just makes it easier to see (but not, apparently, easy enough for you).
(I said:) “And again, you are trying to claim that a fetish has nothing to do with the thing being fetishised, which makes absolutely no sense whatsoever!”
(you said:) “It doesn’t have to. No reason why a person doing BDSM has to be taking advantage of somebody who has suffered sexual abuse.”
Again, you haven’t even understood my question, so I will try to spell it out really simply and clearly. How can a person act out a Nazi fetish without involving Nazi uniforms, insignia, or other symbols relating to Nazism?
That’s all it’s about, how can someone do ‘age play’ without there being someone present pretending to be a child, and someone else pretending to be an adult having sex with a child?
“So what makes me an arrogant windbag?”
Ha ha ha ha ha!
Your continued self-righteous indignation over my ‘discrimination’ against you by correctly identifying you as male, proves me correct about a. you being a windbag, and b. male entitlement and male arrogance in general.
Seriously, take a look at yourself, take a look at all the words you’ve written about this terrible crime I have committed against you, by correctly identifying you as male!
Wow, could you be any more patronising? Well, sorry, but your argument isn’t made more valid if you try to play up your opponent as naive/dumb.
> First of all, lets take the concept of ‘an argument’. You think that simply by making claims that you have made an argument. Sure, in the everyday sense of the word ‘argument’ as in disagreeing with someone, you are arguing, because you are disagreeing with me. But you have not put forward an argument as in “a reason or set of reasons given in support of an idea, action or theory.”
You wanted to say negative things about BDSM, I pointed out your lack of evidence in making these claims. You could not produce any supporting evidence, and instead went to bullshit like this, pretending that I have no reasons to support what I’m saying. I’ve said this multiple times, you have made these claims, and I am questioning them. That’s the point I’m making.
As for the supposed gendering of domincance/submission… I’m not sure that your mind can be changed by this. You’re deterimined to see them as innately gendered concepts due to your tunnel-vision focus on gender (thus validating your view of BDSM being a tool of sexism). You want to see male subs as some sexist thing, so you insist that submission is all about gender.
Moving on to the part bout fetishes within BDSM, I really don’t see your point. Yes, they can do those things, but what is the problem as long as its all kept private, and these people don’t go around supporting actual instances of those things? It’s their sex life, they’re free to do it even if you’re grossed out by it. For the record, those things are offputting to me too, but from an objective standpoint I have no issue with them conceptually.
> Ha ha ha ha ha!
You’re calling me arrogant, and you’re there (figuratively) laughing at me in an obnoxious fashion? Hypocrite.
> Seriously, take a look at yourself, take a look at all the words you’ve written about this terrible crime I have committed against you, by correctly identifying you as male!
You’re trying to strawman me as being outraged over this, but I’m not. I simply don’t see gender profiling as a fair or logical thing to do. But, for you, discrimination is okay as long as its done against certain groups, so you don’t really care. It continues to worry me how you seem to see no problem with discrimination itself, just as long as its directed at groups that you hold unfavourable opinions you.
I obviously aimed my last comment too high.
Let’s go back to the basics. Lot’s of people claim that BDSM cannot be misogynist because of the existence of male subs (whether these male subs play out ‘forced femininity’ games or not is irrelevant, as the underlying concepts still apply).
BDSM is predicated on dominance and submission, dominance and submission are coded masculine and feminine (because of the way 6000 years of patriarchy has shaped human thought and language), therefore BDSM is predicated on masculinity and femininity, and is therefore misogynist, because gender is a set of social conditions and conditioning that places men over women, and hurts women.
You seem incapable of seeing this in any terms other than BDSM being some oppressive tool of misogyny. Yes, I understand your argument. But, for reasons I’ve laid out a few times, don’t agree. If you aren’t capable of seeing BDSM as anything other than gender play, or cannot seem to conceive of people not playing to a gender role, then your view on this is obviously too warped to really be debated against. I suppose, in conclusion, I’ll repeat what I said in my first comment about hoping that nobody is really taken in by this.
And please, do try to rely less on patronising. If you need to insinuate that the person you are arguing against is stupid, you are either an egotist or lack confidence in your argument.
I think you really don’t understand how concepts (the set of ideas that fall under the label of one or several words) actually work, which is why you keep insisting that my argument is about whether or not people are playing out gender roles in real life. Either that, or you are being entirely dishonest in your arguments.
If I want to do a simple calculation in my head, for example 4+4=8, I don’t have to go out into the world, find four objects, then find another four objects, then put them all together and count them all up to make sure they add up to eight, I just have to know what the numbers four and eight are.
The same with the concepts of masculine and feminine, dominance and submission; the concept of masculinity precludes submission, they are mutually exclusive concepts. This would be true even if no one on the planet had performed a gender role in a thousand years.
If you can understand that, and then come to my earlier question, how is it possible for someone to be, at the same time, both masculine and submissive, and if you tried to answer that with some intellectual honesty (instead of saying ‘oh yes it is’, or coming up with disingenuous reasons not to answer the question), you would have to agree with what I have said, that dominance and submission are intrinsically gendered, because gender is about dominance and submission. The particular flavour of dominance/submission, whether it’s ‘forced feminisation’ or a Nazi fetish is irrelevant.
You said before that I should go out and survey BDSMers, but how could I survey BDSMers for certain traits (dominance/submission, masculinity/femininity), when you refuse to define those traits?
Explain to me what you think those four words mean.
[…] sex abuse), this doesn’t mean they have anything to do with “female pleasure”; ‘femdom’ porn is by and for men, and it depicts male fantasies (if that were not the case, men wouldn’t have to pay women to do these things in real […]
Men are shit… they love to prove it to us time and time again.