In reply to my previous post, Eileen left some prodding comments. (I love it when she prods me.)
How can we make the spaces for everyone wider? CV is doing a fantastic job of it; what else can be done?
CV succeeded in creating a space that does not feel fragmented because there was more than just tolerance and acceptance, there was invitation and inclusion. At the same time as we celebrate diversity and showcase our differences, we are also welcoming.
It’s not what you do, it’s how you do it. Communities can learn a lot from that mantra. Everywhere else I look I see groups built upon expectations instead of invitations. Their party line is, “Come here if you are interested in BDSM and you are gay.” The “Join us if” mentality is exclusionary, an odd thing for a marginalized community to be based on, I think. The end result of such things is the current state of the sexuality communities: fractured and divided and so utterly, utterly siloed.
Instead, why not just say, “Join us.” No qualifiers, there’s no need. Rules of civility and organization operations are no hindrances to this sort of thing. And of course, don’t just say it. Do it!
Dom Sub Friends (aka DSF) has what is probably their view of a very inviting tagline: The Friendly BDSM Society
. But go to a meeting and you’ll be greeted by the most adamantly heterosexual, maledom/femsub group you’re likely to meet in New York City. They may be friendly, but they are anything but inviting if who you are is someone like me. On the other hand, they are probably a great find for people who are looking for that sort of thing. (In which case I recommend them—they’ve never been anything but friendly to me.)
Naturally, communities will organize around their own cultures, and what they determine as criteria for valuing BDSM activity is not mine. It makes sense, then, that I would not find this group inviting. It also begs the question: would they find my culture inviting? Maybe not. (As a side-note, this is why I am very much not worried about people who may pose a threat to CV taking over the population of the group. They simply have better places to go than our little oasis. To quote our current president of vice, we’re really pretty boring if you’re not actually interested in learning about BDSM with an open mind.)
Therein lies my point, however. They don’t need to find my culture inviting, they already have one. I, on the other hand, don’t. There are no erotic art shows I know of that display imagery such as that in Van Darkholme’s Male Bondage photography book. As a matter of fact, I don’t even know of any other books that do such a thing.
Should we start making our own porn? Should I take photos of you? Should we pitch a fit over spaces, or work to make the spaces different, or leave the spaces altogether? And then, will what you’re working to make and what already exists ever have significant cross over?
I don’t know. I hope there will be crossover, because even though I don’t feel welcome in their community I certainly appreciate their presence as a community. Sexual rights are important for everyone. Their presence strengthens my own stance, as mine strengthens theirs. It is not impossible to stand together and still be different, but it is impossible for me to stand with them when I can not call anything of theirs my own and when there is nothing else for me to claim for myself.
Maybe they don’t even want anything to do with me, but I guarantee that I’m a voice they’d be better off having on their side, especially with the recent climate of sexual oppression and misunderstanding growing stronger every day. I’ve said it before, and I’ll say it again: for some reason, sex and education seem to be the two topics that otherwise smart people consistently behave very stupidly about.
I don’t want to go to the same parties as these other people do. Neither of us would have a good time. My griping isn’t because they have a community, it’s because mine is practically non-existant. What’s sprung up in the past couple of years is truly extraordinary, and I am in the unique position among my tiny social circle of being able to remember what it was like before. I want to cultivate it, and make it grow.
Does that mean making my own porn? I don’t know. I’d be willing to try it. There is no greater equalizer than currency. If selling my brand of sexuality earns it a top spot on people’s radars, why shouldn’t I try for it? That’s what I admire about Tristan Taormino. It’s too bad she’s not a submissive guy. But then if she were a submissive guy, like I am, would her brand of sex sell at all? Would mine?
There is no doubt in my mind that there are other people who have not been lucky enough to find a place where such acceptance and intelligence has coalesced and these people are still looking for it. I hope they keep looking, because I am, and one day we might find each other.
Being loud helps you get noticed. Maybe I am just trying to rouse my little corner into making a little more noise. I feel I have been deafened by the never-ending rhetoric of others that so many people have written about lately.
by Eileen
31 Jul 2007 at 09:46
Hey you –
Is the goal you’re articulating one of creating an all inclusive single space, or of creating a network between individualized spaces through which we can communicate with, get support from and support other groups?
As you pointed out, DSF doesn’t feel welcoming to people of your particular orientation, and yet they’re all very nice, very friendly folks. So, perhaps rather than hoping to expand their community to include us, we could try and link the two together; advertising for each other, spreading similar news stories, referring people whose interests may be stimulated by each other’s cultures. If they were willing to define themselves more clearly, perhaps the experience we had would have been very different. But not many groups are willing to stand up and say “we want to do this specifically, and we want to do it well” (we want to teach, we want to hold parties for a certain orientation, we want members interested in x, y, z.) A group attempting to reach every single person and cover every single interest seems bound to fail, because they’d be too focused on being all-inclusive to form achievable goals.
The thing is, a lot of the specifics of the cultures of these individual groups aren’t articulated. They’re something people have to learn by going. We got no forewarning that DSF wouldn’t be a good fit for us, because they claim to have a completely welcoming and supporting culture when in practice they will welcome those different from them (like us), but are not equipped to support them.
On the other hand, although I find the organization interesting, I’m never going to show up at, say, GMSMA. I’m not actually a member of that community, and as such I’m not invited. But that’s okay – what I’d like would be to know more people who are active in GMSMA, so that I can share experiences with them when appropriate, and exchange information about our separate groups and cultures that I can them pass on, or use as reference material.
At the moment, there’s no tool or place that can link everyone together, so there’s no easy and quick way for someone new to go find a place they might be welcome. But if, say, someone created a massive group calendar . . .
by maymay
31 Jul 2007 at 10:04
Is the goal you’re articulating one of creating an all inclusive single space, or of creating a network between individualized spaces through which we can communicate with, get support from and support other groups?
There’s very little point in trying to jam together different people who don’t even like each other that much to begin with. As Richard once told me, a single shared activity is not actually very bonding.
That said, there does need to be understanding on everyone’s part that we are not entirely dissimilar. In that sense, I think we should think of ourselves as one large community at the same time as we recognize the importance and the inherent advantages of being parts of many smaller organizations.
Don’t get me wrong, things are actually a lot better today than they were one year ago, and they were better one year ago than they were the year before that.
The thing is, a lot of the specifics of the cultures of these individual groups aren’t articulated. They’re something people have to learn by going.
Of course. DSF was actually a branch off of TES founded by people who disliked TES’s way of the world. I have no problem with that. CV, for that matter, is in a way another branch.
My point is that even though every tree has many different branches with dozens more leaves on them, they are all part of the same trunk, they have the same roots, and they need each other and their own space to survive.
by Eileen
31 Jul 2007 at 11:05
Good analogy. Very good, in fact.
Maybe the reason there is resistance on the parts of these groups is because the advantages of supporting ourselves as a larger community are unclear. Any thoughts on specified, articulate goals, or where to find them?
by maymay
31 Jul 2007 at 11:58
Good analogy. Very good, in fact.
Hey thanks, again. I appreciate that you listen to me—and I hope that this conversation might actually make it somewhere, since it’s public. It’s always going to be up to people to hear this, though.
Maybe the reason there is resistance on the parts of these groups is because the advantages of supporting ourselves as a larger community are unclear.
I don’t think they are unclear. I think a lot of people would welcome the coming together of different communities as Floating World (partially) seems to have succeeded in showing. I’m talking about the space for my branch, which I feel is not given the kind of room it deserves and is in fact being actively harmed by the dangerous notions presented by absolutists, the current state of professional BDSM, and all the other things we rail against.
They can’t have things both ways, however. You can’t invite people who are different from you to join with you and at the same time actively undermine their existence and expect them to feel invited. That’s hypocrisy.
Any thoughts on specified, articulate goals, or where to find them?
I want to find more people like you and me and show them that things are not actually so hopeless, because people like us who just haven’t been as lucky as we have been are voluntarily turning away from us in frustration every time they continually run into the big, dumb brick walls that are embodied by just about everything Bitchy has ever bitched about. I think a part of doing that is communicating with other communities, because I guarantee you that at least some of those people I’m looking for are in those other communities, too.
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