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BDSM lifestyle
BDSM lifestyle
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A third accomplishment through the BDSM performances is the consensual exchanges of power, and the ability to take on a power role that may be the opposite of what one has been forced into in their daily life. This is not only powerful for those participating, but can be emotionally moving for those who witness it. I believe that this is the main difference between those who practice BDSM privately, and those who are willing to put on a more public performance, although it is still hidden from mainstream dominant culture. This is illustrated in a quote from panther, in Techniques of Pleasure:
For a lot of people, BDSM is not about whips and chains, it's about control, it's about power exchange. I think there are a lot of people who can relate to the power exchange: losing control, who holds the remote, who holds the checkbook, who chooses the radio station, who is driving, who decides where we're eating, where we're going on vacation. It's like the classic joke: 'we know who wears the pants in that family' or 'she knows her place.' (Weiss 143)
These performances fly in the face of dominance and oppression. The practitioners negotiate terms, set up safe words, and the one in the submissive role has the option to set up safe words and end a situation at any time. Although the BDSM subculture does perpetuate certain aspects of the dominant mainstream hegemonic culture, such as being full of primarily white people, and mostly men filling the dominant roles, the choice to participate in the performances or not, and witness or not, makes it transgressive. Perhaps most interesting at all, some BDSM practitioners reenact traumatic events from earlier in life as a way to take back control over what happened to...
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...s a subculture isn't hurting anyone, and making people happy or helping oneself or others in some way, it is clearly effective, whether or not the goal is to be resistant.
Works Cited
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Haenfler, Ross. Goths, Gamers, and Grrrls: Deviance and Youth Subcultures. New York: Oxford UP, 2010. Print.
Pitts-Taylor, Victoria. In the Flesh: The Cultural Politics of Body Modification. New York: Palgrave Macmillan, 2003. PDF.
Scott, James C. Domination and the Arts of Resistance: Hidden Transcripts. New Haven: Yale UP, 1990. Print.
Weiss, Margot Danielle. Techniques of Pleasure: BDSM and the Circuits of Sexuality. Durham: Duke UP, 2011. Print.
Many powers that women possessed in the past, and that they posses today, are located in the most secure vault in the body, the brain. These powers are not consciously locked up, and at times many women do not even now that they exist, and this is mainly due to the “male world” (53) in which women live in. Audre Lorde presents this ideal that one of these powers that are being oppressed by society is that of the erotic. Lorde presents the argument that allowing the desires and feelings of the erotic to play a conscious role in the lives of women will allow women to live a different life, one filled with empowerment from both past and present endeavors.
Leblanc, L. (1999) Pretty in punk: Girls’ gender resistance in a boys’ subculture. New Brunswick, NJ: Rutgers University Press.
One of the central themes of theatrical form is identity and the catalyst by which identity is formed is the body. In using the body as the site of formation of individual identity, women are “uniquely identified with their anatomy” and specifically the parts of their anatomy that differ from that of men (Callaghan 30). Because women are thus defined by their relation ...
The reading assigned titled “The Socially Constructed Body” by Judith Lorber and Yancey Martin dives into the sociology of gender with a specific focus on how the male and female body is compromised by social ideals in the Western culture. She introduces the phenomenon of body ideals pressed on men and women by introducing the shift in cosmetic surgery toward body modifications.
“Sexual identity is part of the failure of sexuality,” says Marx. Sontag uses the term ‘postpatriarchialist deconstruction’ to denote the role of the observer as artist. It could be said that Debord promotes the use of capitalist constructivism to deconstruct the status quo.
Wigley, Mark. "Untitled: The Housing of Pleasure." Sexuality and Space. Ed. Beatriz Colomina. Princeton Papers on Architecture, 1992. 327-389.
Something Lorde did not try to hide as she says “It is never easy to demand the most out of ourselves, our lives, our work (Blah). One must go farther then they ever have before, naturally letting down their guard so that they can experience the erotic feeling and embrace it. Confusing the impossible with the possible is common, but finding the erotic is something that everyone can be successful at. The erotic opens up the doors of capability and shows all the possibilities it has in store for those who determined enough. The erotic is self empowerment, happiness, excitement, sadness, disappointment and everything in between. It is exactly what everyone believes it to be and so much
control by taking away their sense of power and ultimately their own manhood. A direct
“Body Art as Visual Language” by Enid Schildkrout talks about the different forms of body modifications, and their meanings within different cultures. For example, Schildkrout says “Head shaping may be a sign of high status in one culture and low status in another, but to a total outsider, these practices may appear to be simply mutilation.” In this quote, the author talks about how one body
Jones, Barry A. "Resisting The Power Of Empire: The Theme Of Resistance In The Book Of
BDSM, a three part acronym which stands for bondage and discipline, dominance and submission, sadism and masochism (Oxford Dictionary, 2014) has seen a drastic increase in popular culture in the last twenty years (Weiss, p: 104). Since it being brought into the public eye with the Marquis de Sade and Leopold von Sacher-Masoch, BDSM has predominantly been portrayed as a sexual deviance that only those who are sexually violent or those who are mentally unsound participate in. Images of BDSM have existed in popular culture for quite some time. Wearing cuffs, collars and leather are often found in both fashion and mainstream media so much so that many who purchase and wear them may not be aware of their significance to BDSM.
Carl Wittman, "Refugees From Amerika: A Gay Manifesto (1970)," The Radical Reader: A Documentary History of the American Radical Tradition, ed. Timothy Patrick McCarthy and John McMillian (New York: The New Press, 2011), 583.
In this paper, I will attempt to do an overview of the studies that have been conducted on strippers and stripping as an occupation. I will utilize studies and articles that focus primarily on women as strippers to consider specifically the questions addressed in the opening paragraph. Are women empowered in any way by this occupation? Or, as some feminist theorists have suggested , is it purely objectification, with no positive benefits to the women involved? This paper will evaluate the existing studies and literature in an attempt to locate moments of empowerment, a sense of agency, and, to borrow Carol Rambo Ronai's term, "resistance strategies " present in the daily lives and experiences of strippers.
Leary, Timothy. "Evolution of Countercultures." CyberReader. Ed. Victor Vitanza. Mass: Allyn & Bacon, 1996. 364.
Through discourses in theatrical, anthropological and philosophical discussions, Butler portrays gender identity as being performative rather than expressive. Gender, rather than being drawn from a particular essence, is inscribed and repeated by bodies through the use of taboos and social