Rant: Fucking “Society”

 

“Honest, Officer, It Was An Accident.”

I am not in any way an Anarchist. I want to specify that right at the start, ok? Not an Anarchist.

I do, however, have major, major, MAJOR problems with the use of the term “Society”.

 

• I want to fuck “Society” right up its hemorrhoid-ridden hole.
• I want to fuck “Society” up its hemorrhoid-ridden hole, using a broomstick which has nails hammered right through it.
• I want to fuck “Society” up its hemorrhoid-ridden hole, using a nail-infested broomstick, and No Lube.
• And then I want to run “Society” over with a steamroller, which will be an accident.

 
I totally HATE the whole idea of the term “Society”. “Society” bites the big one, as far as I’m concerned. It can lie down in the road and I’ll run it over seven times in my steamroller which I will have borrowed from a friend for the occasion.

“Honest, officer, it was an accident.” I confide. “I just borrowed the steamroller from a friend to nip down the shops, as my car has a flat tyre.”

( I’m sure I’ll get a time off for good behaviour )

 

“Society” Is Really Fucking Unhelpful.

“Society” is a trite, dismissive term. People blame “Society” for this, they blame “Society” for that. And that’s really fucking unhelpful, because using that term means that a group of culpable, responsible, accountable people have been turned into an amorphous, vague, un-punishable blob.

Great.

I have this ginormous issue with the use of the term “Society” not being used as a synonym for “People”. I remember this one time, I was listening to Steven Spielberg give an interview about Saving Private Ryan. And one of the things he said was:

“We live in a cynical society.”

And I remember thinking, “Hey, hang on a minute, that’s not right.”

( I think I may have been able to track that down in the article titled “Saving Private Ryan’- a realistic portrayal of history?” by Amanda B. It’s near the bottom of that very very long page:

“Perhaps Spielberg’s decision to present the mission [Saving Private Ryan] from the start, as an heroic gesture by the American army, can be explained in the documentary interviewing him. … He defines America as a cynical society and himself, as having a cynical viewpoint.” )

 

“Society” Does Not Get Disappointed And Go Shoe Shopping.

I remember thinking that Spielberg was blaming “Society” for being cynical, and blaming “Society” for himself being cynical. I remember thinking that people become cynical through being repeatedly disappointed, and that it was not possible for something as amorphous as “Society” to be something like “disappointed”.

That’d be a bit like the idea of finding out that “Society” is excited because those shoes “Society” wanted were now being sold at a discount.

“Society” does not get excited, “Society” doesn’t give a fuck if something’s reduced in price, and “Society”, furthermore, doesn’t give a fuck about shoes. “Society” is no more capable of being cynical than I am capable of being a national postal service. It’s all about what people are capable of, and responsible for.

I remember thinking that people are cynical, not “Society”. I remember thinking that the only way for an individual to become cynical is through being disappointed enough times that they come to expect people to disappoint them. I think cynicism is essentially the expectation of being disappointed by another person or people.

I don’t know about you, but I can’t imagine “Society” being disappointed. Can you imagine anybody saying “We live in a disappointed Society”?

And look! Even the fucking Wikipedia cynical page uses the term “Society”:

“After his enlightenment, Diogenes travelled throughout Greece, almost naked and without provisions; enjoying the sun, the warm weather, the beaches, and so gathered about him thousands of pilgrims who listened to his talks, pregnant with sarcastic remarks about society.“

Now, I don’t happen to be a fluent Ancient Greek speaker (nor does Wikipedia give the original Ancient Greek from which to translate, or even cite the source), so I don’t know how accurate that translation is. If the translation is accurate, then it means that this heinous crime of absolving people from their responsibilities towards other people, is waaaaaay older than I’d ever considered before starting this post.

 

“Society” Engages A Solicitor.

I’m not sure if it’s interesting or not, that of all the definitions of cynical I found, not one mentions disappointment.

Yet none of the attitudes described in the definitions are possible without having had some mega seriously consistent disappointment from specific individual people over the years.

No child is born cynical. Cynics are made, not born. But ok, I’m digressing from the “Society” thingy.

How can “Society” be anything at all? When “Society” is in fact made up of groups of people, which in turn are comprised of individual people, all of whom together are responsible for whatever result “Society” produces.

At least Wikipedia agrees with me about the “Society” = People thing.

Now, when dominants and submissives and players and lifestylers and people of all persuasions refer to “intolerant society”, what that really means is that lots and lots and lots of (other) people are bigoted, intolerant, dismissive, invalidating, unaccepting fuckwits.

( I include many dominants and submissives and players and lifestylers in that definition, but that’s another post. I mean, people will be people, whatever marginalised or mainstream group they belong to )

But nooooooo, we can’t punish “Society” for these crimes, because, well, how do you do that?

I can’t imagine “Society” sitting in the dock in court, being accused of all these crimes, and then being sentenced to, um, what?

“I hereby sentence you, “Society”, to cease to exist, and I direct all the plaintiffs in this case to go sue the creators of Society.”

Which would be, um, all of us.

(and anyhow, I can’t even think how anybody might go about actually arresting “Society” and getting (it? them?) to the dock in the first place. Where does “Society” live?)

 

“Society” Fucks Off And I Get To Tell Everybody What To Do.

Ok, I’m going to move on into one possible way in which groups of intolerant fuckwits can be made to play nicer with all the other kids. And the responsibility in this method, lies squarely with all of us.

 
Imagine this:

• If every submissive, dominant, switch, BDSM-er, whatever, came out of the closet they’re hiding in;

  ( yes, yes, I know you’re all hiding in there because of all the intolerant fuckwits and you don’t think it’s safe to come out, which it really isn’t, to be honest )

• And if every member of such a marginalised group of people, after having come out of their closet, made themselves heard, and their presence felt, just as homosexuals did a while back;
• Groups of people will then be forced to acknowledge us, and accept us, and legally grant us the same rights as every other individual is granted under the law.

  (because everybody behaves nicer when they think lots of other people are looking)

  Come on, kids, can you say “European Court of Human Rights”?

 
It will not be easy, and it certainly will not be pleasant. But without those steps, nothing will change, that is guaranteed. The responsibility for proving that there is a legitimate need for change, rests solely and entirely with us.

 
BDSM is not a “hobby” for many people, any more than being homosexual is a “hobby”. It’s not like gay people can just set aside their homosexuality to benefit a straight partner. And it’s not like it’s exactly the most emotionally healthiest thing to do for a BDSM-er to pretend to be vanilla.

In the workplace, it is not a legitimate reason, under the law, to sack a person for being homosexual. Yet many people get sacked or harassed all the time if it is discovered that their orientation is in BDSM. Where’s the equality in that?

As a result, many BDSM-ers pretend to be vanilla, just as many homosexuals pretended to be straight for so long. And as a direct result of BDSM-ers refusing to stand up and be counted, it remains possible for the law, and for people, to discriminate against us.

So in order for people’s attitudes and behaviours to change, they must be forced into acknowledging that BDSM is a legitimate, significant presence in the population. And the responsibility for informing everybody that we’re here, and deserve respect, and have enough numbers to gather support, rests solely, and entirely, with US.

Nobody else is going to stand up for us and defend us whilst we hide shivering in the closet, waiting for things to maybe get better someday. Nobody else is going to come out of the closet first. It has to be US. It’s OUR responsibility to ensure our rights are being respected, which they aren’t at the moment.

I’d love to see something like a “Kink Pride Day” or something, like they have in some places.

 

Stand Up And Be Counted, DAMMIT.

 
 
Hasn’t anybody else noticed that vanillas aren’t generally asked to set aside their vanilla-ness, as that would just be the height of disrespect, rudeness, and not to mention, an utter lack of realistic expectations?

Hasn’t anybody else noticed that it’s wildly and unbelievably inequitable that a person may be openly homosexual or heterosexual in the workplace, but is not allowed to be a dominant or submissive or switch?

Hasn’t anybody else noticed that, of all the advocacy groups set up to advocate on behalf of marginalised groups, almost none are advocating on behalf of BDSM-ers?

And, perhaps most importantly, hasn’t anybody else noticed that it doesn’t matter what any individual’s specific difference is, because the hassle meted out by the general population is going to be the same no matter what the differences are?

 
This is just a matter of what groups of individuals will be prepared to tolerate, and/or regard as acceptable, and/or have avenues of redress to pursue when boundaries of respect are transgressed.

It used to be considered perfectly acceptable to incarcerate homosexuals for being homosexual, or to target black people, or chinese people, or jewish people for harassment or intimidation. Nowadays, although that still goes on, there are ways to deal with it.

Education is the key. Once it no longer becomes an utter shock and surprise that there are people like us all over the place, and what it means to be people like us, and the rules we play by, then all of a sudden it’s going to be a whole lot less interesting to harass us, as the whole topic will be a lot older and less novel.

And further to that, without making ourselves heard and felt in the world at large, there will be no wider understanding of what it means to have a BDSM orientation, not to mention the specific biological responses we play with which are severely under researched in science. I would love to see some scientific papers published on the long term effects, consequences etc of subspace, and Domspace. And I would love to see aspects of BDSM included in whatever sex education is being offered.

 
 

None of that can change unless We Get Out Of The Fucking Closet Already And Make Our Presence Felt.

 
 

What I Personally Am Doing About This:

 

• I tell everybody
• Whenever I meet anybody, if an assumption is made that:
  • I am vanilla
  • I am heterosexual
  • I have one, and only one partner
  • I compromise and do “give and take” with my partner(s) like “normal” people
  • I am not accustomed to being obeyed, respected, and served by my partner(s)
  • Pain is for “other people”
  • Etc, etc, etc…..

  I disabuse them of those assumptions immediately.

• I talk about what I do (not in a prurient way), and clear up misconceptions
• I answer questions (if they are not prurient or disrespectful)
• I give tiny little demonstrations which can be done in vanilla environments (such as demonstrating how much more sensitive the skin is to touch after a few light repeated slaps, say, on the back of the hand)

 
Now, I totally appreciate that this approach isn’t for everybody. Not everybody has the brass neck I have. And not everybody has the self confidence I have. I so get that.

I also really get that not everybody copes well with conflict. And I know that sometimes revelations of this nature can lead to conflict, depending on the person you’re telling.

I also get that a person who was looking to sack you on some other grounds, can use this as an excuse to enforce those other grounds, even if those grounds would not be enforced on other employees.

Disclosing things is never an easy straightforward thing to do. People so often fail to hear those disclosures respectfully and/or supportively. And this is precisely why so many people don’t disclose, and precisely why it’s so important that more people do disclose.

Additionally, there are a few facts I’d like to point out:

• If a person whom you regard as your friend, hears this information, and gets all squicked out and starts calling you names and thinks you’re revolting, what does that really say about how much they value you as their friend?
• If a person you regard as a supportive relative responds similarly, what does that say about how much they really love you?
• If a person whom you regard as a respected work colleague responds similarly, what does that say about the respect and regard they have for you?

 
So many people are so utterly frightened of people regarding them in any negative light, that they forget to remember that it’s every bit as important how you regard them.

 
Ok, I’d better stop now before I really get started on that tantrum I can feel building up inside.

( what do you MEAN, you think it’s already started?? ;) )