Meet the Other Phone. Flexible and made to last.

Meet the Other Phone.
Flexible and made to last.

Buy now

Please or to access all these features

Feminism: Sex and gender discussions

When did being kinky or having a kink become a thing?

26 replies

2rebecca · 01/09/2018 14:43

I probably need a better noun than thing but couldn't think of one. Being a bit kinky used to be the stuff of Carry On films and nudge nudge wink wink type conversations. It maybe meant the odd sex toy or the stuff in the film 9 1/2 weeks. Now it seems to be used to cover antisocial often criminal sexual behaviour like exhibitionism and seems to be used to try and normalise sexual predatory behaviour.
Is it a generation thing or just a subsection of men who use the term? Can't recall anyone in real life talking about their "kink" but social media seems full of it and it seems to sometimes include paedophilia.

OP posts:
AncientLights · 01/09/2018 14:49

Attention seeking? I'm special cos I get my lady dick out in public. Don't link shame me you transphobe. DARVO. We could psycoanalyse this lot for ever.

Charliethefeminist · 01/09/2018 14:55

I feel like we are being told we should be more like the Romans with their orgies, and that even noticing the difference between the sexes is prudish.

NotTerfNorCis · 01/09/2018 14:55

All of these things are recognised as kinks or fetishes except for AGP, which is 'brave and stunning'.

silentcrow · 01/09/2018 14:57

Oh, I can take you right back to the late nineties with that one - before the internet had pictures, there were bulletin boards with forums all about it. BDSM, furry, all the colours of the sexuality rainbow. Though this is before the alphabet soup era - it was vanilla LG and much argument about B being a social contagion then. I actually got accused of being a trendy bisexual by someone who turned out to be a cross-dressing polyamorist Hmm It was special badges all over the place even then, but hadn't become mainstream such that the whole student population was aware. People my age were just about gettimg used to the gay guy on their course and lesbians were like hen's teeth.

Somebody who had dial-up access before even then will no doubt tell you AOL or something was rife with it way before, but I can trace my own observation to '98 or thereabouts. Trans and genderfluid as badges for the student age group did come later, though, and the dodgier stuff had not crept out either.

silentcrow · 01/09/2018 15:00

Actually, to add to that, I think this is why the trans thing crept up on me so quietly - I still have friends from that era, mostly poly or wannabe poly, and so when you have friend who have friends, it all seems normal.

Bowlofbabelfish · 01/09/2018 15:03

What happens between consenting adults in private is their business.

However: once people start to demand the right to live a paraphilia out in public, it’s a different matter. Because then non willing participants become involved and that, quite simply, is abuse.

There seems to also be a link between public links and the climate of breaking down sexual boundaries. Witness the hatred fling at anyone who doesn’t validate a kink or paraphilia in public. It’s more boundary erosion.

Then there’s the issue of how normalisation of what was previously extreme behaviour is happening via porn. Choking for example. This then spills over into everyday life in a number of ways: young girls expected to engage in anal/choking as routine first experiences for example.

At the extreme end you get cases like the few that have happened recently where women have been killed and the perp has argued ‘sex game gone wrong’ as a defence. The very fact that this can even be entertained as a defence shows how normalised its become.

So yes, it’s worrying.

FlowerCupcake · 01/09/2018 15:04

Carry On Films and nudge nudge wink wink are more innuendo than kink. Kink is another word for fetish, and fetish was first used in an erotic sense in 1887 by Alfred Binet (did a lot of work on intelligence testing). So it is hardly a new concept. I think it is more to do with sexual liberation and the relative anonymity people seem to feel when they use the internet as a mode of communication.

Also, I like how this immediately turned to trans issues. Because natal women only have vanilla missionary sex with the lights out. They would never dare be exhibitionists.

RowleyBirkin · 01/09/2018 15:04

Wasn't that the upshot of the two huge long threads about Jess Bradley i.e. that there's a network of linked trans rights activists who have previously worked campaigned against porn censorship and for 'sexual liberty'?

NotTerfNorCis · 01/09/2018 15:15

Because natal women only have vanilla missionary sex with the lights out. They would never dare be exhibitionists

To be fair you don't often hear of women stalking men and boys in parks in order to flash at them.

EverardDigby · 01/09/2018 15:18

There was a big S&M lesbians using the London Lesbian and Gay Centre scandal in the early 90s.

However it might be that you know a lot of people who "have a kink" but just don't talk to you about it.

EverardDigby · 01/09/2018 15:19

Here we go, it's even on the wiki page under controversies https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/LondonLesbiannandGayyCentre

2rebecca · 01/09/2018 15:29

That's probably part of my point that in the past kinks were milder and more private. Talking in public about your "kink" and kinks involving adults dressing in nappies and trying to persuade nurses to chnage them or exposing randoms on the internet to you talking and fantasising about your kink and extreme porn just being a "kink" is new.
The word kink which just means a mild twist makes it sound like something minor and innocuous.
I have no problem with consenting adults doing whatever they want in private but stuff like exhibitionism is non consensual and is one person imposing their sexual fetish on others.

OP posts:
Mrbatmun · 01/09/2018 15:32

Urgh I know, and now we have 'kink shamers' as well. Who appears to be anyone objecting to people wanting to play out their fetish in public.

EverardDigby · 01/09/2018 15:36

The lesbian issue though wasn't about consenting adults in the privacy etc. but about them "flaunting" it to everyone else using the centre. Obviously not as extreme as some of today's examples....

Turph · 01/09/2018 15:39

Bowlofbabelfish agreed, the paraphilia should not be made public and the public shouldn't be forced to participate. Likewise cottaging in busy public places. It's not on. I also agree re. porn behaviour, girls are having rectal surgery to fix what has been damaged by unrealistic expectations.
It is 100% an internet thing, and I can confirm that the dial up days had so much in the way of unregulated chat/link/filth/hookup sites some major players had to close theirs down.

Bowlofbabelfish · 01/09/2018 16:07

However it might be that you know a lot of people who "have a kink" but just don't talk to you about it.

As I said, zero issue with what consenting adults do in private. However that’s a VERY different thing to doing it in public and demanding others participate and validate.

arranfan · 01/09/2018 16:16

One of the powerful scenes in Unforgotten Series 2 was when Tessa, the police officer wife of a child rapist, who had known but tried to maintain she hadn't, broke down and said of the 80s: [it was an era when] a rock star could go on telly and be interviewed about his underage girlfriend without getting arrested. We all bought into that – until we didn’t.

Would that be a kink now but wasn't addressed as such then?

Mrbatmun · 01/09/2018 17:07

If you have a 'kink' or whatever the expression is, then the only people who need to know about that are you and anyone you are sharing that kink with in private. It's not something you need to shout from the rooftops or be 'proud' of or whatever. Get on with whatever you like doing, but keep it to yourself.

OvaHere · 01/09/2018 18:19

There was a lot of discussion in the media earlier this year about K being added to the LGBT+. I'm not sure where the lobbying originated or whether it ever became official.

This is one of numerous articles about it.

metro.co.uk/2018/02/05/k-kinky-included-lgbtq-umbrella-7282939/

BluthsFrozenBananas · 01/09/2018 18:36

I’m sure the convention used to be that you never drew unwilling or unwitting people into your kink. There used to be quite a few older men who were into the gay s & m scene where I worked in the early noughties. I remember one of them coming in quite worked up because on his way to work he’d seen a young couple where the man was leading the woman around on a dog leash (this was central London so odd sights were commonplace). This man felt very strongly that the couple were breaking all the rules by playing out their fetish in front of the public. When did doing this become acceptable?

I have no interest in shaming people for their adult, consensual activities, but equally I don’t want to see them or be a bit part player in them.

terryleather · 01/09/2018 18:56

Apart from involving others unwittingly & without consent in one's sexual practice which is completely objectionable as pps have already said, hanging on to the coat tails of LGB+ will have the added effect of legitimising kink/fetishes as an identity rather than sexual preferences that one has (and thus beyond reproach no matter how questionable they are) while also performing a slight of hand to get to be seen as an oppressed minority.

NothingOnTellyAgain · 01/09/2018 20:11

On the other thread about edward lord, there are some links about work his (their? xher?) partner has done with someone who is apparently well known for putting paedophilia as a normal sexuality

and there's an extract from a book where it talks about people's "oppressed" sexual identities with a list of various fetishes with people who are into "intergenerational" partnerings at the bottom of the oppression heap.

this stuff is all overlapping with lgb + the original ts (transsexuals) being hijacked by fetishists >> exhibitionism etc + paedophiles to push agendas which will benefit them

I did feel this was a bit tin hat and going too far but having seen the links today across green party challenors + this lord person and his partner + jess thingy >> it all seems to be pointing to " we said these looked like weirdy perverts and guess what"

NothingOnTellyAgain · 01/09/2018 20:12

will that be deleted

dunno

these people's open social media show their links, interests, views

all in public domain

NothingOnTellyAgain · 01/09/2018 20:14

edward lord xhemselves having tweeted saying someex PIE bloke who is very pro paedophile is a total hero >> available on other thread

this guy was involved with swim england I think when they changed their policy to say all self id in the (often communal for swimming clubs etc) changing rooms and any girls who didn't like it should be re-educated

Echobelly · 01/09/2018 20:27

I think it's been around for a while. For me there's a fairly clear line between kink and 'weird and abusive' - namely consent. I am a fairly sideline participant in the kink scene and it is all about consent, and I think in the last decade or so people have got very up on being aware when consent doesn't really appear to be consent as well (eg if someone seems to be manipulated or have an unhealthy relationship).

Sadly I am quite sure some people have tried will try to 'kinkwash' abuse.