Kink Part Two: Power Exchange 101:
A BDSM Primer
by Beverly Fisher, Slut at Large and Woman of Easy Virtue

When people think of BDSM, they think of women in thigh-high boots, whips and chains, spankings, and being tied up spread-eagled to a bed. Submissive men are imagined to be weak and wimpy, dominants overbearing control freaks into giving pain. But beyond these stereotypes is a whole world of sensuality worthy of exploring. I look at BDSM as “graduate level” sex. People who truly enjoy sex and discovering it’s myriad facets eventually end up exploring some level of BDSM. I think this is so because BDSM explores the power exchanges that occur in all types of relationships, the kink in reality.

BDSM stands for several things: Bondage and Discipline (B&D), Dominance and Submission (D/S), and Sadism and Masochism (S&M). BDSM can refer to any or all of these things, and so much more. BDSM can mean tying someone up, or just bossing someone around. It can involve pain, or not. It’s very erotic, and there’s usually some sort of sexual tension, though sex itself may or may not be part of the experience. BDSM explores the realm of fantasy, acts it out. In fact, speaking of acting, a BDSM session is often referred to as a “scene” whereby the players act out a fantasy based on mutually agreed-upon rules. This is a sexual world that plays not only with the body, but also with the mind.

In a scene, one person is the submissive, agreeing to receive sensation or psychological play, while the other person is the dominant, who controls the scene. Some people are “switches,” who like to be both dominant and submissive (though not at the same time). Sometimes the dominant is referred to as a “top” and the submissive as a “bottom.” I myself am a switch, though in my professional life I am always a dominant. In my personal life, however, I have been known to be submissive on rare occasion, though I have yet to find a dominant I fully trust enough to really explore a scene with.

Trust is a huge part of the D/S relationship. When a submissive gives themselves over to a dominant, they are trusting that person with their body and their mind. The dominant must give completely of themselves, too. Imagine sharing your deepest darkest fantasy with another person, and then trusting them to carry it out, without shaming you (unless shame is part of your fantasy), without truly hurting you, either physically or mentally.

For those into vanilla (everyday, typical) sex, I know it sounds a little crazy. Trusting someone to hurt you without really hurting you. Why would you want someone to hurt you at all? Why would you want to hurt the person you care about? Doesn’t it smack of abuse, misogyny, mental illness? These stereotypes couldn’t be further from the truth.

Getting started

I first became exposed to the whole world of BDSM when I was only 17 years old. I was at the mall one day with my best friend, Brian, and he confessed to me that he was a submissive crossdresser. In other words, he liked to be ordered around and forced to wear women’s clothes – but was still utterly heterosexual. I was shocked, naturally. Horrified even. I contemplated what he told me for a long while, feeling a mixture of curiosity and revulsion. After all, like most girls, I had been raised to believe that anything other than sex in the missionary position with the lights out was dirty, bad, shameful. So the idea of forcing a man to wear women’s clothes and giving him a spanking was pretty damned dirty.

Still, my better nature won out. This was, after all, my best friend. He was still the same person I had always known and loved; he had just introduced a new dimension or element to his personality. I decided that if he was into it, it couldn’t be bad. I told him I wanted to learn more, to understand. We had long talks on the matter, as he explained his kink as best he could.

It wouldn’t be until a year or two later that I actually began physically experimenting with my friend, trying different D/S scenes out. He had a lover named Moffat, who was also a good friend of mine. She was stark raving mad, and we would dominate Brian together doing all sorts of evil things to the poor guy. Once we tied him spread-eagled to the bed and packed his penis in ice, then just left him there for it to melt. That was pretty hardcore, but I didn’t know what I was doing at the time.

Other times we’d dress him up in women’s clothes and handcuff him to the old radiator and just leave him there, while we went on about our business. Periodically we’d approach him, smack him around a little, and then go back to whatever it was we’d been doing. It was all play to me then. I didn’t really understand the nature of BDSM, or the dominant-submissive relationship. I was just dressing up my friend and making him clean my house.

It would take years of learning on my own, experimenting with clients and friends, to really come to understand the nature of the power exchange that takes place between a dom and a sub. I have a whole different level of respect for Brian and other submissives. I am awed at their strength, their power. I know that sounds like an oxymoron, for a submissive to have strength and power, but it’s nonetheless true. The better the submissive, the stronger that person is. It takes incredible strength and self-confidence to let go of yourself completely, to put yourself in another person’s hands, to trust someone with your mind and body.

Over the years, I’ve met a lot of wonderful submissives and switches, but precious few dominants that I actually liked. Many of the dominant men I’ve met, in particular, are flaming assholes. This is, of course, purely my bias. But I find a lot of people agree with me. Brian says dominant male is an oxymoron. He may be right.

I’ve encountered a few dominant males in my personal (non-professional) life... all of them, without exception, had erectile dysfunction issues. They were into control and power because they felt weak. This is not a good dominant. In my opinion, a good dominant is a loving person, who wants to help the sub go to another place. It’s a facilitator’s role – not a power trip. Sure there’s a rush in having control over someone, in having them jump at your every word, flinch or moan at your touch. But in the end, the submissive is the focus, the center of attention. I know that seems wrong – the dom looks like the center of attention in any given scene. But the dom is focusing on the sub, their needs, their desires, their fantasies.

The power exchange

Sometimes a little BDSM enters into a vanilla relationship. If you blindfold your partner and tease them, you’re practicing BDSM. Teasing with ice cubes or silk scarves is BDSM, in particular, something called “sensation play.” Tying your lover up and making love to them is BDSM. It doesn’t have to be harsh or painful to be BDSM. It can be very sensual and loving indeed.

Saying you’re into BDSM is like saying you’re into food. There’s so many different varieties out there, so many different cuisines to explore. Some people are into giving and/or receiving pain. Others simply enjoy being ordered around. Some are into humiliation, or crossdressing like my friend Brian. Some just enjoy elaborate bondage, but aren’t into pain. There are those who like it all. Sexually speaking, they may enjoy a controlled rape fantasy, or watersports (being urinated or defecated on). Some enjoy elaborate fantasies, others simply want a spanking. The variety is endless.

The key to all of this is the power exchange. Power exchanges go on in all of our relationships, all the time. During vanilla sex, the woman may get on top of the man, and have control over intercourse. She is in power. Then there is a switch, as the man mounts the woman. Now he has the power, the control. It’s subtle, but it’s there. Power exchanges occur in relationships outside of the bedroom, too. When your three-year-old refuses to eat his broccoli, that’s a power exchange. When your boss orders you to complete that report by Friday, that’s a power exchange.

BDSM takes those everyday power exchanges and magnifies them 100 times over. We play with our notion of control – when we have it, when we don’t. We explore the notion of giving away our power, or taking power from another. A scene is a psychodrama, a real-life enactment of the everyday power exchanges that go on all around us.

Most important, the BDSM power exchange is consensual. People involved “in the lifestyle” (as BDSM players refer to their subculture) emphasize safety and informed consent, sometimes called SSC (damn, these people have a lot of acronyms, don’t they?) which stands for safe, sane, and consensual. Others prefer the term RACK (Risk Aware Consensual Kink), because it acknowledges that many BDSM activities are inherently risky.

BDSM is not abuse. People do this by choice, not out of coercion (though that does occur, but that’s not BDSM. That’s abuse. Get it?). The relationship is not necessarily about the dominant getting what they want. It’s about the submissive having his or her needs met, first and foremost. Abusers have no regard for the feelings, desires, or limits of their victims. Dominants always are aware of their sub’s limits. A dom must be incredibly empathetic, constantly aware of the sub’s reactions, either physical or emotional. The dom is in a position of helping the sub explore their fantasies, and doing so in a way that gives both of them pleasure. Sometimes pain is part of that pleasure.

Pain, pleasurable?

How can pain be pleasurable? Well, your average, typical pain, like a toothache, is just not fun. Sudden pain, like tripping or stubbing your toe, is never pleasant. But pain, for some people, can be a very pleasurable sensation if it’s administered properly. Think of your lover’s nails on your back. A light brush of those fingernails is intensely pleasurable. Increase the pressure, and you’ve got a pleasurable sensation going to a painful one – and yet in the heat of passion, when she rakes those nails across your back, it feels good somehow. What about a really deep massage, that hurts but feels good at the same time? It’s a little like that. It’s not so much painful as it is tremendously stimulating, bringing all of your senses to bear.

In the case of people who enjoy spankings, floggings, canings, etc. generally speaking the dom will first “warm up” the sub, starting with a light spanking that brings the blood to the surface of the flesh, before moving on to more vicious implements. Just striking someone with a cane, without warning or warm up, would be mind-numbingly painful. But a skillful dom will build up the sub to a level where they can receive that kind of pain and enjoy it. It still hurts like hell when it’s happening, but it takes the sub out of their head, to a place where they are only feeling, a place some describe as almost a floating or drifting feeling. Some call this “sub space.”

It’s hard for those of us who don’t enjoy pain to understand. And yet I know I enjoy a minor amount of pain, in the right circumstance. I’ve had lovers who, in the doggie-style position, smacked my bottom a bit... and it was heavenly. When the endorphins are flowing, the line between pleasure and pain becomes blurred. That endorphin rush is part of what submissives get off on, the same rush we get when we do a vigorous workout.

The thing is, pain is not a requirement for BDSM. Many people enjoy it, but there are also many who prefer bondage alone, simple psychological play, or even a teasing, sensual scene. It’s all about choice, and respect for one another’s boundaries.

Respect is a huge part of the dominant/submissive relationship. A dominant has to have a tremendous amount of respect for his or her partner in order to carefully guide them through their fantasy. A sub has to respect, like, and trust his or her partner in order to feel good about sharing that fantasy with them, and to feel safe doing so.

In a way, I think the dom/sub relationship is more intensely intimate than traditional vanilla relationships. I think this because in vanilla relationships, we often keep our fantasies, hopes and fears a secret from our partners. We are afraid to talk about our deepest sexual dreams and desires. In a dom/sub relationship, fantasies and desires are open to discussion and fulfillment. Secret shames become our wildest, most exhilarating scenes. Roles are open for debate; fantasies are played out. Our sexual selves are more satisfied, because we are able to be truly free with our partners.

Safe and sane

The BDSM relationship is, paradoxically, controlled by the submissive. The submissive has set limits and boundaries. Some of these are “hard limits,” places that the submissive will never go no matter what; some are “soft limits,” boundaries that the sub is willing to have pushed – sometimes just a little – in the course of a scene. A good dominant respects these limits.

Often in a scene, the players will use a “safeword.” This is a word that the sub can use to call a halt to the scene at any time. If they are gagged, they may use a hand gesture or other signal that they’ve had enough. Sometimes, nested safewords will be used, such as “yellow light” indicating that the sub is close to the edge of his endurance, and “red light” to end the play. Some subs want the feeling of truly being out of control, and shun the use of safewords. They are trusting the dominant to be truly empathetic, and aware of their limits, boundaries, and endurance.

Most dominants are not just interested in their own gratification. They truly desire to please their partner as much as they are receiving pleasure. Submissives seek to please the dominant; the same is true of dominants. It only looks one-way.

It is true that some BDSM activities can be dangerous if the players aren’t careful and prepared. Often BDSM play will involve a simulation of rape or another non-consensual act. This is where the safeword comes in, to prevent things from getting out of control. The safeword is rarely “stop” or “no” because it’s part of the fantasy to be able to use those words and have them ignored. Instead, typical safewords are things that one would not normally say during the course of a fantasy. I like to use the person’s own name. Even in the heat of passion and play, we never forget our own name.

Some dominants choose to ignore safewords, but their reputation often precedes them, and they have difficulty finding others in the lifestyle willing to play with them. These are usually the control-freak types, who are not really interested in the subs and seek only their own gratification. As in the “real world,” there are predators everywhere, and we all have to be careful about who we give our hearts and bodies to.

Safety measures are important in bondage to prevent injury. Safe sex measures are always important when there is an exchange of bodily fluids. Some BDSM play requires a proper education in how to perform the various acts involved, including play piercing, use of sounds, and even caning, among others. Just picking up a cane and thrashing someone is very dangerous. There is skill involved that a good dominant will take the time to learn and understand.

You do what?!

BDSM is a blanket term that encompasses a huge variety of practices and behaviors. People do all kinds of things, far more than just tying a lover spread-eagled to the bed – a simple form of what’s called “restraint bondage.” There’s also “stimulation bondage,” where someone is tied up with the intention of stimulating them sexually, rather than restraining their movement. People get into all sorts of play, including erotic spanking, flogging, whipping, pinching, knives, hot wax, clothespins, ice, play piercing, bondage using cling wrap, handcuffs, medical play, electro-play, crossdressing – you name it, from common household items to things you might find in the hardware store, people play with it. Some prefer psychological play alone.

BDSM may or may not involve sex, though it usually is based in some kind of sexual fantasy. The vast majority of professional (read: paid) dominants will not include sexual play as part of their services.

People of all sexualities practice BDSM, and interestingly enough, it’s estimated that the majority of submissives are men. Some sources estimate that as much as five to ten percent of the adult population in the U.S. practices some sort of BDSM. That’s a whole lot of spanking going on.

Historically, BDSM has been around a long time. The term “sadism” comes from the infamous Marquis de Sade, and “masochism” from Leopold von Sacher-Masoch. There are reports of people being willingly bound and flogged going back to the fourteenth century. I have quite a few old photographs from the turn of the century depicting women spanking and flogging other women, and occasionally a man as well. John Cleland’s 1749 novel Fanny Hill features a flagellation scene. A friend of mine saw an etching from the temple of Aphrodite in Greece, depicting a woman riding a man’s back, with a flogger in her hand. People have been doing this a long, long time.

The gay male leather culture has contributed a great deal to the modern BDSM lifestyle. So has the advent of the Internet, which brought like-minded individuals together to explore BDSM, to meet, to play, to discover. Today those in the lifestyle meet not only online, but at clubs, play parties, informal gatherings called “munches” and even large conventions.

The psychology of BDSM

There was a time when sadomasochistic behavior was assumed to be pathological, the sign of a sick and unhealthy mind. But increasingly, since at least the 1990s, BDSM has become more acceptable in the psychological community. Today, according to the DSM-IV, the standard diagnostic reference text “Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders” published by the American Psychiatric Association, “The fantasies, sexual urges, or behaviors” must “cause clinically significant distress or impairment in social, occupational, or other important areas of functioning” in order for sexual sadism or masochism to be considered a disorder. People involved in BDSM, and most psychiatrists, believe this type of behavior to be a healthy expression of sexuality.

So why do people do it? How and why would anyone get involved in BDSM? In my case, it was something of an acquired taste. I learned about it, and wanted to learn more. I’m still a huge fan of vanilla sex though, and actually prefer to live a vanilla lifestyle. But I do enjoy playing with BDSM once in a while. I came to it through a process of discovery, trying little things here and there, and discovered I liked it and wanted to try more. This kind of approach to exploring BDSM is very common among women in particular. It’s much like how you learn to enjoy new foods. As a kid, you eat nothing but hot dogs and chicken nuggets. But somewhere along the line, maybe not until you’re an adult, you get a taste of a jalapeno. And you like it – and want more spicy food in your life.

But there are other ways people stumble into BDSM. Probably the most common for men is imprinting from childhood. My friend Brian was quite young when a neighbor girl dressed him up in girl’s clothes and tied him to a tree. It was like a switch was thrown, and from then on, he had fantasies about female domination, crossdressing, and bondage. When he was old enough to start exploring these fantasies, he discovered other aspects of BDSM, like pain. He was tasting the jalapeno, too. Many men have experiences from childhood that somehow imprint on their psyche, the embryos of full-grown adult fantasies.

I’ve found that a huge number of men who enjoy being submissive are actually quite the opposite in their real-world lives. They have high-powered, high-responsibility jobs, a tremendous amount of responsibility at home. So their ultimate fantasy is to have someone else take control, take charge. They no longer have to make any decisions, other than to obey, or not to obey. BDSM takes things down to an amazingly simple level, which is a huge relief for people with very complex lives.

Some people are not healthy about their approach to BDSM. I’m talking about doms who have out of control lives, and very little power. They use being a dominant as a way of feeling okay about themselves, as a way of having control over others. Being a good dominant is hard work. You have to construct a fantasy for your sub, and make it feel real. Creativity is a must. Empathy too. It’s not about controlling someone else so much as helping them get what they’re looking for, in a way that’s fun for both of you.

Many find BDSM to be empowering. One female dom of my acquaintance was in a vanilla relationship that was also abusive. She discovered BDSM and learned to take control of herself and her life. Most submissives report that after a scene, they feel stronger, more empowered, more centered, grounded, and in control of themselves. I’ve met executives who like a good spanking right before they go into an important business meeting. Exploring one’s boundaries gives us a firmer notion of where our boundaries lie, and helps us feel more in control of our lives.

Psychological play

BDSM isn’t just tying up your partner and spanking them. The vast majority of any BDSM play takes place between the ears. It’s about examining your mind, your fantasies, your demons – it’s about self-exploration.

I mentioned psychodrama earlier. BDSM is like a performance, using words like “scene” and “play” and even “actors” when referring to the people in a scene. Role-playing of various sorts is most common. BDSM play is tremendously imaginative.

As part of that play, people will sometimes refer to one another as “Master” or “Mistress.” The person playing the role of the dominant in a scene is sometimes called a “top,” while the submissive is the “bottom.” Elaborate BDSM costumes are worn, leather and latex, spikes and studs, lace and velvet. Sometimes a submissive will enter into a formal contract with a dominant, agreeing to certain duties and responsibilities which may even include a long-term commitment. Some slaves are formally collared, meaning that the dominant places a collar on the sub that symbolizes a lifelong commitment to one another. Some even live a full-time D/S relationship, but that’s play too (though there are some who might be angry with me for saying so. Many people take themselves very seriously). And yet self-exploration, exploring the psyche, is serious stuff indeed.

The scene is always negotiated ahead of time. Physical and psychological limits are discussed, safewords established, possible activities planned. Everyone knows what their roles will be, but there are not necessarily set lines. It’s improvisational theater at it’s most wicked. BDSM plays out the rituals and rites of the psyche, testing and exploring cultural taboos. We scrutinize and challenge the nature of what’s sacred by committing sacrilege and blasphemies. We learn about ourselves through testing boundaries and limits, experimenting with our own ideas about what is sexual, what is emotional and mental.

Through experimenting with all sorts of things, not just BDSM, I’ve discovered things that turned me on that I never would have expected. Exploring myself, my psyche, my sexuality, I’ve learned things I couldn’t imagine. These things reflect not only in my sexual self, but in my everyday being, the face I present to the world. The more I know myself, the more confident and assured I feel. Playing out my fantasies has helped me to understand more about where I come from, where I’m going, and my place in the world.

 

-30-