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BDSM and the importance of Community

A sense of belonging is central to our experience as humans. When our interests and lifestyles do not match those of the majority, it can be challenging to fully allow ourselves to be authentic. Community is essential in BDSM culture and research shows that it may be more complex that it seems.  Graham et al. (2016) evaluated the perspectives of 48 BDSM practitioners who used 133 terms to express their experience of how community played a role in their lives. These terms were partitioned into 3 categories: social, personal development, and resources. Participants experiences of community ranged from fun to spiritual and from activism to safety.  Membership in a kink community allows for individuals to learn new skills, develop meaningful connections and also provides accountability and support for when negotiations do not go as planned. Research showed that while community participation has its downfalls, such as social politics and the drama that can accompany it, the majorit...
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BDSM Embodiment - Turley (2015)

     “For many practitioners, BDSM places the body into central focus..." (Turley, 2016). The researcher uses the term 'embodied exploration' to describe her understanding of what it is like to practice BDSM. Turley (2016) sets up her argument by reminding us that we explore and experience the world through our bodies. While we might forget the importance of the body as we use our minds and cognition to process these experiences, the body is very much central to how we exist in the world and how a body is comprise will impact the way that individual experiences the world. It is important to note that bodies which do not fit into what we have created as a societal norm automatically engage in what would be considered kinky sex purely because the mechanics in which sex is made pleasurable to those individuals will look different from how we might generally define sex.       Similarly, the ways in which pleasure is elicited during a kink experience ...
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Power and Therapy

Guilfoyle wrote his dissertation on Concealing and Reveal Power in the Therapeutic Relationship  in 2006. The premise of the article is that power is hidden in the therapeutic relationship and can be further obscured by attempts by the therapist to equalize it. Often the concept of power in therapy is simplified into understanding the influence or control that the therapist has over the client. More recently, the concept of power and identity outside of therapy and how that interacts with the therapy is highlighted.  Guilfoyle notes the ways that power is often framed problematically which further invisiblizes it. By framing it as instead productive, the author believes that we can further understand the ways it operates. The ways that power is obscured are fourfold: conflating it with its effects, concealing it in knowledge, taking it out of context, and how therapeutic resistance is defined and understood. If we discuss how a therapist might be granted influence over a clien...
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What my capstone has become, 6 weeks to go

As I began this project, I knew that I wanted to further understand power dynamics. As a push for culturally informed counselling is unfolding, what stood out for me was the concept of power. My preexisting interest in sexuality led me to consider the culture of sexuality, which could involve different geographical, religious, gender orientations. My involvement in a sex positive 12 step meeting led me to consider power and sexuality through the lens of BDSM.  These aspects of my life were explored and analyzed and further explored somatically, recognizing that there are limitations to the intellect. It felt like the subject matter of my capstone was a moving target and that my focus kept changing. I didn't realize that it was all really about me.  Then I decided upon an autoethnography, finally admitting that the paper was and always has been about my personal experience. I thought that I wasn't allow to contribute personally to academia because I am not a fact. I feared that...
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Curative Kink: Survivors of Early Abuse Transform Trauma Through BDSM

Cascalheira, Ijebor, Salkowitz, Hitter and Boyce author this article published in 2021 which analyzes the experiences of 20 participants from 5 different countries. The authors generated 6 separate themes that they located in the participants experiences which include: "cultural context of healing, restructuring the self-concept, liberation through relationship, reclaiming power, repurposing behaviours, and redefining pain." In order to create context, this paper cites another study done by Hughs and Hammock in 2020 that found 19% of kink identifying people link their kink to past trauma. Furthermore the authors quote another study by Brown et al. from 2020 that found around 20% of the western population identifies as kinky.  The cultural context of healing includes many aspects of the kink experience including kink concurrent therapy, stigma, and the kink community culture itself. Some therapists were able to provide supportive therapy to individuals who were attempting heal...
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Counselling the Kink Community

 Yates and Neuer-Colburn straighten out some of the myths perpetuated by an increase in kink representation in popular culture in this article advocating for kinky folks who are seeking counselling. After highlighting the shortcomings of various definitions of kink, the authors note that integral aspects of acceptance, presence of community, building trust, finding empowerment and fulfillment are often absent in many, less familiar, individuals understanding of the culture.  In particular, heightened intimacy is an enormous part of practicing kink. Folks within the community practice kink in a variety of ways and are unlikely to necessarily know the ins and outs of all types of kinky practices. Kink does not necessarily involve sexual contact, though sometimes it does. Detailed communication facilitates folks to come together safely and enact fantasies that are either shared or where both parties have consented to participate. These exchanges include timelines for both the rel...
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BDSM, becoming and the flows of desire

Charlotta Carlström (2018) conducted a 5 year study interviewing BDSM practitioners and generally involving herself in the local Swedish kink community. Through their exploration, the author presents the concept of 'flow' referring to the the process of becoming a practitioner of BDSM. Important to note is that this is only one of many ways to flow. What if we see desire as an energy that motivates and orients us towards different stimuli that we then lean into? Though abuse is not a theme within power exchange relationships, I'm going to use my personal experiences as an opportunity to illustrate the use of energy. Through the experiences of sexual assault that I have accrued, I personally experience arousal that is connected to fear. Authority figures can stimulate fear in me and as a result I can use this understanding of myself to recreate the experience of fear and arousal in ways that leave me feeling physically and emotionally safe and cared for.  Once I notice that ...
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