Consent is not the be-all and end-all

[MagicMix]

Following on from the thread about the impact of porn and other threads about the implausibility of consent to brutal practices.

The focus on sexual consent in feminism in recent years has been positive to a certain extent but I think we have lost nuance when we consider consent to be the key to sexual ethics.

Consent is not a green light for whatever you want, it is the bare minimum. Sex without consent is obviously very wrong (rape or sexual assault). And most feminists have at least some understanding that coerced consent is a problem and does not equate to true consent, although some seem unable to understand that paying someone is clear-cut coercion.

But we have to go further. Consent does not make everything all right. There are some things that can never be all right and the anti-kink-shaming 'sex-positive' thinking that refuses to condemn anything as long as someone is getting sexually aroused by it has led us down some very dark paths.

If you can stomach it, here is an article about a woman who claims to be sexually aroused by being waterboarded.
www.rollingstone.com/culture/culture-features/waterboarding-kink-sex-bdsm-torture-779066/
Now I don't believe her and my personal opinion is that the M is BDSM is a form of self-harm, but really that is not the main point. The point is, somebody did that to her because she asked for it. People are quite literally torturing other people in the pursuit of sexual pleasure and we are expected to be non-judgmental.

The point is that the S in BDSM is sick and wrong. It was said on the other thread that we need to bring back kink shaming. Yes a thousand times. They can call me a prude, frigid, accuse me of being in a moral panic, I don't care. If someone gets sexual pleasure from hurting people, torturing people, acting out scenarios that put them in the role of rapist or slave-owner, I think that person has an unhealthy, dangerous sexuality and should seek help. It should not be accepted uncritically as harmless just because there was consent.

Flying I made that assumption because I'm that person, but I accept it doesn't apply across the board. I wasn't really applying morality though, more the assumption that if the animal has a nice(r) life then that sort of ameliorates the harm done to them.
You may not object to eating meat but I don't think you can deny that harm comes to the animal eaten. :)

What sort of impact does that have on your confidence and sense of self?

A really bad impact, I can tell you from personal experience. I watched porn from my mid-teens to my early twenties and although I never went so far as to believe that brutal acts were normal or sexy (I did my best to seek out gentler porn) and I believed myself to possess enough critical awareness to not be affected by it, I was deeply affected, in ways I am still realising to this day.

I essentially began my sex life with the subconscious belief that sex was for men, male sexual pleasure was more important than female sexual pleasure, female sexual pleasure was in fact inconsequential, female sexual desire existed only as a response to male sexual desire, female sexuality was submissive. I stress that I would never have said I thought any of those things - I would have strongly disagreed with them. I would have been able to logically argue against all these statements and rationalise that they were wrong, but I still believed them deep down, I actually really believed that I didn't deserve sex that was mutually pleasurable. I'm sure porn doesn't account for all of that, but it sure as fuck didn't help. I actually feel extremely lucky that my early sexual partners didn't ask me to do something like anal or choking because I have a horrible feeling that I would have said yes, even though those are definitely not things I have any desire to try.

I want to make it absolutely clear that I no longer watch porn and I now believe it to be deeply unethical - it was presented to me as normal and something that everyone does to the extent that the little voice of unease saying 'something's not right here' was essentially silenced. I am ashamed of my past actions which I now realise made me complicit in the suffering of women. How I wish I had received any kind of porn-critical education at all as a teenager.

thefirstmrsdewinter no I guessed that but I wasn't going to reply as a vegetarian or as a meat-eater; people's buying habits suggest welfare isn't even a consideration for some shoppers.

Hence my insurance idea; disinterested men would get on board with making "perverts" pay for their hobbies, I'm sure. What I've taken from this is that at the moment women's lives and health and agency are worth nothing. I do wonder if they were somehow monetised in the way you suggest if that might raise the profile of women as fully formed worthy people.
What I read over and over here is that women are often not sure what constitutes violence and abuse so might not attach much importance to protection.

'here' = on the MN boards.

I actually feel extremely lucky that my early sexual partners didn't ask me to do something like anal or choking because I have a horrible feeling that I would have said yes, even though those are definitely not things I have any desire to try.
And sadly women and girls who subsume their own desires like this and partake in activities they aren't genuinely happy about seem to do more and more psychological damage to themselves.
I was reading a lot on prostitution last night because of the related thread and it was a common complaint. Women got to the stage they would completely dissociate, and were unable to become genuinely intimate with anyone.
Porn definitely shapes sexual desire, as well as reframing what is acceptable. It's pervasive and morally bankrupt.

What I've taken from this is that at the moment women's lives and health and agency are worth nothing. I do wonder if they were somehow monetised in the way you suggest if that might raise the profile of women as fully formed worthy people.
I think many men don't think women's lives, health and agency are worthy of active consideration. It doesn't cross their mind to care. Again something that stood out in the interviews with punters on some of the prostitution articles. They didn't give the women and girls a second thought.

Women got to the stage they would completely dissociate

I think dissociation is basically universal amongst prostitutes, isn't it? How else could anyone possibly deal with the experience? Have you read Rachel Moran's Paid For? It should be required reading for everybody, can't recommend it highly enough.

Porn definitely shapes sexual desire, as well as reframing what is acceptable.

This is so obvious when you have watched it regularly and then stop. Always the people arguing that this is false are people who are still watching it. If they would quit for just a year they would realise how wrong they are. It's completely impossible to comment objectively on something that is still pervading your consciousness so strongly.

Though I am sad to say I believe my sexuality has been permanently damaged by porn in some ways. I don't think I will ever completely get those images out my head.

This is so obvious when you have watched it regularly and then stop agreed, especially if you stop because you're having a fulfilling sexual relationship with someone else.
The whole NoFap thing might focus on men's enjoyment but it is very interesting to note how they describe sex (and masturbation sans porn) once they have regained their normal sexual response.
I think it's possible for porn-sick women to regain that normal sexual response but it's not a given, as the damage is more psychological than physical.

MagicMix just to add, I wasn't implying you were porn-sick yourself

I fear the problem with women fetishising themselves as either objects or subordinates comes from the tacit understanding that we men can be very violent. Women love us and desire us, and actually being a sub is paradoxically maybe an unconscious way of excercising some control in the dynamic and an excercise in controlling their own innate fear of us.

Like saying “abuse me, but only this much,” as long as the guy doesn’t cross that line she can think “at least he respects and loves me enough to not really unleash on me”. Also maybe they also see it as way of acting as a release valve for potential violence.

I’m a man and a pretty damn assertive one, but I am saddened and amazed by how badly some women I have dated have asked to be treated (sexually), particularly when they are younger. I’m getting quite saddened by all this, and wish it was different. :(

FFS when we’re seriously debating whether or not men have the right, if women like it, to engage in what American soldiers did to Iraqis and Afghanis at abu-Graib and Bagram, for which both Bush and Cheney are wanted in The Hague -- the conversation around consent and around kink has become utterly bankrupt.

Quite. It astounds me that there are people who will argue that this is fine. Mind, only a few days back, I saw a bunch of guys I know discussing that case of the teen with a colostomy bag with a 'damn this is going to make people demonize anal sex and women might be more unlikely to say yes to it' angle

amazed by how badly some women I have dated have asked to be treated (sexually), particularly when they are younger
I think there might be something in your hypothesis. paradoxically maybe an unconscious way of excercising some control in the dynamic and an excercise in controlling their own innate fear of us
It's a similar idea to mine from earlier, that it's a way of trying to exist within some awful boundaries (in the case of the young women you slept with, perhaps some of those boundaries were self imposed).
Does being subby or slutty or overeager to please provide the woman in question with an alter ego to project sexual feelings onto? A disassociated man-pleaser, because having sex as an avatar makes her less emotionally vulnerable?
In the absence of real intimacy, being able to make a man's sexual dreams come true, and to see his appreciation, is probably the next closest thing. That's power at least.
Real intimacy is pretty scary, and the disposable nature of many relationships doesn't help it flourish.
So she gets control from the negotiated boundaries, feels respected when he respects them, feels powerful when she succeeds in pleasing him, and possibly fetishises her own body once disassociated from it.
I guess (and I know very little about this so it's a guess) it might the the reason for inappropriate and unsafe sexual behaviour in girls and women who have suffered sexual abuse.
It sounds pretty crap to me.

I'm going to jump in before I have read the entire thread to thank earlywalker for your input.
I have never been involved with BDSM and I think this is a feminist issue which I've never given much critical thought, aside from the PORN and escalation and coercive aspects
I am listening

Doesn't "Vanilla" sound rather racist?

What about gay/lesbian BDSM?

Everyone is talking here about the male/female dynamics. Are the same power/control issues at play? And is it gendered?

I remember when I was learning about rad feminism, (pre internet) I looked to the lesbian press"( newsletters, magazines and books) to inform my thinking. There was and is a culture of this between women.

I didn't pay much attention to the male gay BDSM world, but it certainly has been visible. influencing fashion, etc.

What do you think?

Has anyone looked into the neuroscience of BDSM?

Was wondering that too. Will investigate.

Who else is into designing a study?
I imagine there is no shortage of consenting subjects.
For longitudinal studies.

In the US we can just sneak it past the shutdown

Seriously any major pain research is related to pharma interests.
Keep me posted Kismet

Not sure if this case has been mentioned but when it does all go wrong there is no justice for the woman anyway...

Millionaire jailed for girlfriend's 'rough sex' death www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-46591150

That poor woman! I know people that got more than that on drugs offences the sentencing is ridiculous. I don’t think leaving someone at the bottom of the stairs to die is what BDSM is about though.
Sub/Dom is not strictly woman/man though, I don’t know where this idea has stemmed from that the woman are always the vulrenable ones. Female dominatrix’s have always been more popular.
There were lots of study’s online, all the ones I read same the same things about the high during BDSM being similar to a runners high or when you eat hot chilli in food. www.google.co.uk/amp/s/www.medicaldaily.com/sm-may-be-new-yoga-bdsm-causes-blood-flow-brain-alter-state-consciousness-269863%3famp=1

I don’t know where this idea has stemmed from that the woman are always the vulrenable ones.

How many men have died of "rough sex" because of the woman's extreme violence?

Rough sex doesn’t kill those woman, Male violence does.
To pin that in with BDSM is minimilisation of the abuse they’ve suffered.

It's the men who kill them that are "pinning that in with BDSM". They say it was consensual rough sex. You say it's male violence. Where do you want to draw the line between the two?

@SonicVersusGynaephobia @Earlywalker but isn't that the problem? Where is the line? And if a woman enters into a BDSM relationship and suffers because of it she is deemed to have consented to "rough sex" and her sex life is fair game to the court as in the Broadhurst case, OR is it a convenient way for men to use as an excuse when really they are just a violent bastard and the woman may not have even been into it at all?!

I have a friend who has recently entered a BDSM relationship. She claims she's in control but has shown me pictures of her black and blue after a flogging, I find it incredibly disturbing and worry for her safety.

I work with teenagers. I’ve had a lot of safeguarding over the years and when I had yet another session of safeguarding ‘refresher’ training last week, I rolled my eyes and thought what a waste of time, I know it all.

It wasn’t more of the same if already heard. It was a crystallisation of this thread and the room was plunged into a sickened, tearful silence as the trainer told us in simple, straightforward terms what pornography is doing to children now and how it is not being combated by parents or schools.

The majority of teenage girls now expect violence the first time they have sex.

Think back to being a young teenage girl and what your fears, anxieties and curiosities were about sex. Imagine if you, and the boys around you, understood sex to be what is shown in porn.

Because porn is where children are getting their first impressions, beliefs and understanding of sex.

Who on earth thinks that can be a good thing? Male on female violence as an intrinsic part of sex from the very first time. That’s where this has led us.

Damn right we should ‘kink shame’ misogynistic sexual sadists. They have poisoned the well of developing sexuality for a generation.