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Showing posts with label kinky. Show all posts
Showing posts with label kinky. Show all posts

The Time I Kidnapped a Stranger




Q: What's the wildest thing I've ever done?

Well, of all the tales of my sexual misadventures the one that elevates eyebrows most rapidly is probably my story about abducting someone I’d just met. I tied them up in the back of my car, drove them to my flat, and then kept them captive overnight for the purposes of torture and sexual violation.

Before the police are dispatched to commit me to a similar fate I should point out that this kidnapping was entirely consensual. In fact it was probably more her idea than mine. The kidnapping also did not take place in some darkened alley, isolated moorland, or other quiet spot chosen so that no one could hear my victim scream. Instead it took place in a Waitrose car park near Cirencester in the middle of a Wednesday afternoon. Any screams of resistance would have quickly got the attention of a wide selection of bemused shoppers.

Alice (my ‘victim’) had instructed me on the best place to park; an isolated corner near the recycling bins. Well at least it had looked isolated on google street view, but those pictures had been taken in summer when the trees were all leafy. It was March when I reversed my car between those white lines, and as I looked out through my windscreen the spot seemed desperately exposed.

‘Oh well’ I thought, as I switched off the engine, ‘Here goes nothing!’

I locked my car behind me and wandered out towards the hulking glass lego brick of Waitrose. The plan was to have a pre-kidnapping chat over coffee first, just so we could assess each other for any dangerous levels of insanity. Alice and I had been talking for a couple of weeks now, including on the phone, and we had already reassured each other that we sounded sane at least. From the slightly philosophical slant to Alice’s okcupid profile I was initially worried that she might turn out to be a dreamy hippy with her head lost in the clouds. However, our chats had reassured me that she was intelligent, switched on, and prepared to ask deeper questions about life, even if they didn't have easy answers.

‘I’m on my way’ messaged Alice as I crossed the car park. I sat myself on a bench near the entrance to Waitrose, watching the automatic glass doors slide back and forth as empty shopping trolleys rattled outwards, weighted with cornucopiae of luxuries and essentials drawn from across the earth. One was pushed by a dead-eyed woman who appeared to be in her late thirties. It also contained her sproglet, who writhed in his cage-like trolley-seat and wailed. This woman’s expression did not suggest amazement at the wondrous achievements of globalisation contained her cart, but rather a quiet wish that the end times would come sooner rather than later.

A man sat down next to me, hunched between too large shopping bags. He began staring at his phone. I adjusted my overcoat and tried not to look conspicuous given that I felt overdressed for afternoon shopping, nor holding any shopping bags or other shopping related paraphernalia.

Then Alice appeared bounding down the nearby steps, her mouth stretched into a grin and barely a hint of nerves showing in her sparkling green eyes. I was relieved to see that she looked like she did in her profile pictures. Her long mousey hair bobbed gently with each step. Her figure was verging on the petite, and a warm looking cardigan hugged her chest. Her short skirt gave way above the knees to black tights encasing a pair of thoroughly graspable legs.

All in all she looked quite kidnappable.

*

We got a coffee in the Waitrose cafe. I think it was safe to say we were the only couple there on a ‘first date’. It’s possible I am underestimating the sex lives of the various grey haired senior citizens who shared that space with us. Perhaps they were just shielding their tindering behind copies of the Daily Telegraph or were rubbing walking sticks slowly against each other’s thighs when no one was looking… thankfully I wasn’t paying close enough attention.

Alice was cheerful and inquisitive and after brief small talk about jobs, science and what it was like to be temporarily living with her parents, the conversation quickly turned to the business at hand...

“So do you know lots about rope stuff?” She asked, a little too loudly.
“Ha, yes I’ve picked up a few things, don’t yet know how to do advanced things like suspension, but I can tie a few harnesses and other fun predicaments.”

Discussion of ropes and BDSM continued at a lowish volume, but I remained concerned that some of our neighbours might have their hearing aids turned up to high.

“Yeah, I think some people are kind of conflicted about the whole being feminist and into submission thing” said Alice “But I guess I am here so I can't be that conflicted.”

“Yeah, but I think be submission can be perfectly feminist so long as you’re making independent choices about what you want to explore.” I said.

Yeah?” said Alice.

“Sure, I think if what feminism is trying to achieve is genuine equality for women, including freedom of choice, then why shouldn’t a woman feel free to choose what sexual experiences she wants to have?”

“I suppose the choice thing makes sense, though I'm not always sure everyone's choosing for the right reasons.”

“Do you really need a reason if it’s what works for you though? I mean, I think it’s also fair for someone to find the idea of a man dominating a woman to be offensive, even if it’s consensual, because there’s such an awful history of male violence against women that some people might see BDSM as somehow trivialising it.” I rambled “So, I try to be careful who I tell about this stuff, I’m not sure being a man who dominates women is an identity one should wear too openly out of respect for that. But behind closed doors if you want to be tied up and I want to tie you up then, equality wise, isn’t everyone a winner?”

“Yeah, I might be more offended by it if it didn’t also turn me on? I don't know.”

“Mmm. In some ways you could think of the submissive as actually the consumer, or person being serviced, and the person 'in control' as the service provider. It’s a shared experience but the sub doesn’t really have to take any initiative, it’s mostly the top’s responsibility to make the plans and learn the skills needed. The trick is controlling the submissive's experience and pleasure while simultaneously making it seem like you’re actually using them for your pleasure.”`

Alice nodded while sipping her coffee. Supermarket noises drifted into the cafe: the rattle of trolleys, the sporadic beeps of the checkouts, the hum of chiller cabinets. These sounds combined into kind of low roar, like the background echos at a public swimming pool.

“Have you finished your tea?” asked Alice
“Yup” I replied
“Good. Well I’m ready to go when you are!” she said
“Cool, let’s make a move then!” I said, caught slightly off guard and wondering to myself if I would ever truly be ready for what we had planned.

*

So a hot scenario might be.. We meet and have a drink, we leave and you can order me into the boot of your car, take me to your flat where you can do whatever you like but I'd love it if you could spank me and hit me with a belt or similar…

This was Alice’s message a few days before our meeting.

One slight problem with this plan was that my car was tiny and didn’t have a boot. Or at least it didn’t have a boot large enough to fit someone in without them suffering severe discomfort or permanent spinal reconfiguration. My solution was to put the back seats down...  

“In you get!” I said. I held Alice’s arm and gave her a gentle push, but she didn’t need any encouragement as she clambered in through my back doors, giggling. 

Easiest kidnapping ever.

I followed her in and produced some rope from the footwell. I started to tie around her wrists, but kept looking up to scan the car park and check no one was coming to arrest me. My car really wasn’t designed for discrete kidnappings. I should invest in a white van someday, or something with tinted windows. Anyway, as I was cinching the final knot to hold together her wrists I looked up to scan around again.

“Shit!” I said out loud
“What?” asked Alice
“Someone’s coming!”

Slowly but surely a dark haired lady was pushing a heavily laden shopping trolley towards the one SUV that was parked near us. This women appeared to be in her later years but was clearly fit enough to push a fully laden trolley to the most isolated corner of the car park. The side door of my car was still open so we couldn’t both hide without looking suspicious.

“You hide and I’ll try and look natural.” I said to Alice as the old lady approached.

Alice lay flat in the back of my car with various bits of rope strewn around her while I slid out of the back door and then leaned against the car casually, opening my phone and staring it intensely. Through the corner of my eye I watched as the lady slowly reached her car and opened the boot. Alice watched me from where she lay half-bound, grinning and stifling her laughter. Firstly, and with time defying languidity, the old lady lifted a bag of vegetables into her boot… then some bottles of lemonade… then a collection of soup tins…

My focus remained fixedly on my phone screen.

...then some toilet paper… then some cereal boxes… then a bag of chilled goods…

I checked my emails and paced up and down a little, because standing still had become too awkward for me.

...then a bag of potatoes… then some bottles of red wine…

There was no way I didn’t look suspicious was there? All the lady had to do was wander over into the next parking space and peer into my back windows. Fortunately she was occupied moving an infinite number of individual items into her boot. This inefficiency an unexpected outcome of the new plastic bag tax.

…then a multipack of crisps…and finally her trolley was empty!

“Ok she’s just taking back her trolley” I relayed to Alice who was getting bored and was trying to poke her head up from behind the front seats to get a look at what was happening.
“Quick get down she’s coming back again!”

“I think she saw me...” Alice said as the lady’s car pulled away.
“Better get you out of here before she calls the cops!” I joked, a little nervously

Now we were alone again I removed Alice’s boots and tied her feet together as well. I tied the ropes holding her hands to the metal runners of the front passenger seat.

“For the full experience shall I tape up your mouth?" I asked "Or do you want to be able to talk during the journey?”
“Up to you.” Replied Alice
“Tape it is!”
I wrapped non-adhesive bondage tape around her mouth and head; around and around, covering the bottom of her face almost completely.
“Can you say ‘stop the car’?” I asked
“Tttrrmmmpp ddd aaaarr” was the noise that emerged
“Ok, good enough.” I said, deciding that any distressed noises she tried to make would be reason enough to pull over.

Now I had a stranger tied up and gagged in the back of my car. At this point any cars pulling up beside me or any pedestrians walking by could have easily glanced in, seen that I had a girl tied up in my car, and been rightfully alarmed. In anticipation of this problem I had brought a sheet with which to cover my victim. Unfortunately once my hostage was sheet-enshrouded it made it look like I was transporting a dead body in the back of my car instead of a live one.

Not a dead body. I promise.

Still, I decided the sheet-covered-dead-body-look drew less attention than the tied-up-and-gagged-hostage look, so I left her like that, got in the driver’s seat, and told my sat-nav to guide me back to Oxford.

“What have you gotten yourself into?”  I said to my sheet covered hostage.

She quietly tugged on her ropes. I calmly drove my car.


*
It is an odd sensation driving a car with a person tied up in the back of it. Driving is an activity that benefits a certain amount of calm concentration, and I like to think I did a good job of focusing on the task at hand. We pulled away from Waitrose and I navigated the series of roundabouts that took us out of Cirencester and into the rolling English countryside. Despite my professional focus on not crashing or running anyone over, there was still a voice in the back of my head that was silently screaming “OMFG there’s a girl tied up in the back of your car! How the shit did this happen!”


Once on a straight stretch of road I decided some kidnappy banter was in order.


“Well someone’s in trouble now!” I said “What am I going to do with you I wonder?”


These was silence from under the sheet, so I continued “You’re going to be my little slut to play with. I’m sure you’ll make a great little fuck-toy when I get you back to mine. Once I’ve beaten you into shape a bit that is!”


The continued silence from the boot made my words feel creepier than they usually do. I’d found gagging her really sexy at the time, but the resultant quietness made it hard to gauge if my banter was going down well, or if Alice might be developing terrifying doubts while left alone under a sheet with her thoughts.


“...So much trouble!” I trailed off


We drove along in silence for quite a while as I focused on roundabouts and slip roads and overtaking lorries on the dual carriageway. A bit of me started to worry that Alice might have fallen asleep and I feared she might react with horror on reawakening to find herself tied up in the back of a stranger's car.


“You ok back there?” I asked
“Mrrmmm”


I wasn’t a hundred percent sure if that was meant to be a ‘mhmm’ or a ‘hmm?’...


“You ok? Not fallen asleep?”


“Mmm mmnh” came the response followed by further silence.


*


The journey mostly passed without incident. I made sure I stuck to the 50 mile an hour limit while passing the Swindon police station, as it would have been a very bad time to get pulled over for speeding. I was fairly sure the only law I was actually breaking was that my passenger wasn’t wearing a proper seatbelt, but it was still a situation that could take quite a lot of explaining.



Eventually I reached the Oxford bypass, almost back to my lair. Unexpectedly the sat-nav on my phone told me to take the next exit. I had not been using this sat nav for long and I had yet to develop a healthy skepticism over its advice. Rather than thinking ‘No that’s not the way to my flat’, I instead thought ‘Oh, this must be a new shortcut!’ and I obeyed the infernal machine. I quickly found myself in the quiet suburbs of North Hinksey going in entirely the wrong direction. Then I remembered I had just told my sat nav to take me to ‘Oxford’ and not to my actual address. “Crap, just need to turn around” I muttered to myself. North Hinksey seemed surprisingly busy with traffic so I pulled off into a cul-de-sac and attempted a three point turn. The road was really quite narrow and that was when a local pushing a wheel-barrow started approaching along the pavement.


With a bit of kerb scraping, and a burst of acceleration that I didn’t know my tiny car was capable of, I zoomed away from the peaceful village of suspicious onlookers and rejoined the Oxford bypass. A few minutes later I reversed into a parking space in front of my flat, heart beating at a confused pace. My parking space was also not as private as I would have liked it to be; this kidnapping lark was a tricky business! God knows how anyone kidnaps anyone in real life. I unlocked the front door then opened my boot. I did not want to take the risk of trying to carry a tied up Alice into my flat; getting dropped on the floor was not on her list of kinks, so I untied her feet while keeping her under the sheet. Next I untied the rope that I had fastened to the front seat, then hurriedly led her across the driveway by her bound hands and through my front door.


I locked the door behind us while she hovered in my hallway, hands tied and not knowing what to do with herself. I led her up the stairs and into my bedroom, pulling her along by the rope around her wrists. I could feel her wet cunt through her tights as I forced her onto my bed, leaning over her I muttered into her ear “You’re mine now slut.”


I took my time undressing her, untying and re-tying her limbs. I tied her spread-eagled and face down on my bed, ass exposed; I had promised her the belt and the belt she would get! I stood over her, still fully clothed, and felt my belt gleefully sliding through the loops of my jeans. Folding it in half I left it resting across my hostage's shoulder blades and ran my hands down her back and up the slope of her delightfully smooth ass. I made the first spank a hard one and she gasped, the solitary red hand-print stood out well against her white skin, and it invited more….

*


Alice took her spanking like the perfect pain slut she aspired to be. My hands beat down on her ass until it was wrapped in that familiar red glow, a newly primed canvas, ready for painting with the heavy brush strokes of my belt? No. First I thought it could use some further texturing with my flogger. The pale skin of her back and shoulders was quickly patterned with a multitude of thin red lines, which spelled out words the most primitive of languages... a code that read: ‘Mine!’

My flogger did it’s stingy work until, having satisfied myself with the sounds of her whimpers, I finally retrieved my belt from where Alice had let it slip to. I let the leathery folded end of it slip gently over Alice’s body, watching as her blushing skin twitched in fear of its touch. I flipped the belt up into my other hand, aimed, and swiped it down cruelly. Rewarded with my favourite slapping noise and its accompanying groan. I beat her furiously with my belt until bruises started to show; every good meal should be well tenderised before consumption after all.

I removed my trousers and my hard cock forced its way out of my pants. I crouched in front of where she lay, arms tied out either side of me, and taking hold of her hair I lifted her face off my sheets. After slapping her cheeks a little I ran my thumb down to her lips and she began sucking it eagerly. Still grasping her hair I pulled her head backwards and her jaw downwards, and then slowly I inserted my cock into her mouth, which she took in even more hungrily than my thumb.

Alice wriggled against her ropes, frustrated by her powerlessness as I fucked her face and my balls danced against her chin. My spare hand found my belt to lash her with from this new angle, just to add injury to insult. After I’d had my fun with her mouth I let her head sink back into the sheets. I ran my hands down over her abused body to find her soaking-wet cunt. Sheathing myself appropriately I eased myself onto the bed between her splayed legs and watched the rope digging into her ankles as she continued to struggle.

“Do you want me to fuck you slut?” I asked, still toying with her.
“Yes!” She groaned
“Yes Sir!” I spanked her again, a motion that was now almost automatic.
“Yes Sir! Please fuck me Sir!” She said
I placed my right hand firmly on her shoulder as I entered her, slowly at first, pushing deep.
“Do you like being my little fuck toy?” I whispered in her ear
“Yes sir” she said, teeth clenching as I begin to fuck her harder.

I grasped her by the hair again and used her just as I knew she wanted to be used.

*

It has been remarked by some that it takes me a long time to cum, but I never know what baseline I am compared to. I can’t remember how long I took with Alice, perhaps the hours of building excitement foreshortened the main performance, but I still remember being very sweaty by the end of it.

Well I say the end of it…

“What? You don’t think I’m done with do you?” I said to her as she lay there bound and exhausted. From my bag of tricks I produced a long white object with a bulbous end and a power cord… I plugged it into the wall and switched it on. Alice whimpered as she heard the sound of my magic wand vibrating frantically…

“The night is young! And there’s nowhere for you to go after all!”


*

The End

How I built my hardpoint

So I have been tinkering around with bondage for a few years now; mostly tying pretty girls to my bed, or tying them to themselves, or, if I’m really lucky, tying them to other pretty girls. However I wanted to expand my bondage in a more vertical dimension, which meant having a secure overhead ‘hardpoint’ to tie to.


At this point I'm not knowledgeable enough to attempt full suspension type bondage, and I know this can be dangerous and requires badass rope skills, but I have some other, less extreme, schemes in mind that made this project seem worthwhile!


Anyway this is the story of my hard-point building adventure, presented in the form of instructions for repeating my feat... if you wish to be so foolish. (They don’t teach you this shit on blue peter after all!)

*DISCLAIMER- This is probably a bad idea. Don’t do it.*

How to build the Tuttlesmith Hard-point


You will need:

A sturdy and secure beam in your attic that is positioned conveniently above your bed:

(Failing that you can install something that spans a bunch of ceiling trusses like this. Using individual weak-ass ceiling trusses is a definite no no!)



You will also need: Something to drill holes in your ceiling with. Some straps designed to withstand at least double a human’s weight, which can be dangled through those holes, (I went for some hammock supporting straps from amazon). And finally something to cover over the holes with.
(Amazon better appreciate the free advertising!)




Step one: Put down something to catch the dust...

A rubber sex sheet is not necessary for this, but if it’s the nearest thing to hand then it seems like a viable option...



Step two: Figure out where to drill the holes!

Safety note: when bumbling around in an attic it is important to remember not to fall through the ceiling. Take care locating sturdy wooden ceiling trusses to stand on and don’t put all your weight on one truss. (Ideally put down boards to spread your weight). Make sure you can maintain your balance when wielding random tools. Peel back any insulation to access the ceiling panels but wear gloves and a dust mask as fibreglass is itchy bad.

Locate (/build) super strong beam. Wrap straps around this beam and let them hang down to figure out where they hit the plasterboard below. Check there is no electrical wiring or other sensitive stuff anywhere nearby where you plan to drill that could make you dead, then drill little wee holes to act as markers in the ceiling. (I wanted to drill up from below with the big circular drill instead of down from above as there’s a greater chance it will make a mess when exiting the panelling than entering)



Step three: BIG DRILLIN TIME!

Go back to bedroom and locate guide holes made above ^.

Equip electric drill with circular whizzy thing (matching the diameter of your hole disguises)… Test the drill trigger, watch it buzz, and feel afraid.

Before driving a powerful electric drilly thing into plasterboard above your head it is wise to appreciate that bits of plaster will probably fly everywhere including into your eyes if you are unable to resist looking up at the carnage you are creating. Therefore some kind of eye protection is advised…



I mean a creepy gas mask is definitely unnecessary, but you’d be surprised the number of things that baby comes in useful for...

 (Other uses for creepy gas mask include but are not limited to: Cutting onions. Freaking out your house mate. Spraying anti-mold spray into high places above your head. And even surviving nuclear/chemical/biological terrorist attacks.)

Find a safe place to stand (use a ladder if ceiling is high… Standing on the bed like I did is probably not ideal, but if you’re a reckless mo-fo like me just try not to slip on any oily patches on your rubber sex sheet…) Also always keep the ‘safety’ switch toggled on the drill until you’re ready to use it!

Locate big central drill bit into little guide drill hole.

Say “Here goes nothing!”

Pull the trigger and drive that sucker home. (Careful now)

Plasterboard may resist and drill head may stop spinning. Grit teeth and continue to wreck your ceiling by pulling the drill out a little and then pushing it back in again…

Say “Oh jesus what the fuck am I doing!” out loud and plasterboard rains down around you, spraying everywhere and far exceeding the spread on your rubber sheeting.

Feel relief as you finally breach the ceiling that was much thicker and tougher than you expected.



Marvel at the amount of mess you have made in such a short time:



If the first hole wasn’t too traumatic, carry on and drill another one!

Step four: HIDE THE EVIDENCE

Insert desk cable organiser things into the holes you have made and hope your parents never ask you “Why do you have two weird disks in your ceiling?” (Covering  hard point holes with fake fire alarms may be an alternative but two fire alarms above my bed seemed excessive…)



Step five: Get it all dangling...

Return to attic. Loop straps around big beam to get an appropriate length and dangle through the holes.


  

Discover you looped one strap around once more than you did the other: Return to attic and readjust so that it doesn't look stupid.

Continue to not fall through the ceiling.

Step six: Tidy

Replace hole disguises (with some difficulty). Get vacuum out and try to deal with the massive amounts of mess you have made.

Step seven: Sleep

Go to bed and go to sleep while enjoying the self-satisfaction of having achieved something combined with a quiet unease as to whether you have just significantly decreased the value of your property.

Step eight: Awake

At about 3am get hit in the face by a falling white plastic hole-disguiser that decided it didn’t like being in your ceiling that much after all.

The next morning drill several holes in it in revenge (using a small hand drill, and your knees carefully deployed in a vice like manner). Repeat for non-offending plastic hole-disguiser. Push them both back into the ceiling.




Return to the bloody attic with a hammer and nails.

Go to hammer the first nail into offending hole-disguise and watch in annoyance as the hole-disguise falls back through the hole. Realise that using a hammer and nails is quite hard when balancing on attic ceiling trusses.

Go back down the ladder, put hole-disguise back in hole, go back up ladder. Nail that mutha-fucker in there properly this time.



Repeat for second hole-disguise (Including the going-up-and-down-ladder bit because yes you accidentally knocked that one through the hole as well).

Add some glue around the sides of the hole disguisers just to make sure they're not going to fall out and hit you in the face again. Then put the insulation back as you found it. Get out of the damned attic before your knees give out on you from all the crouching. Go back into the damned attic because you left your drill up there.

Continue to not fall through the ceiling.

And finally…



Profit!

(Rope bunny acquired separately; sadly they do not magically appear as soon as you build a hard-point!)

New drawing


Apologies for this blog's continued inactivity, there should be some guest pieces for other blogs in the pipeline that I'll post here when they get published.

In the meantime though I have been doing some more drawing; this one is of a scene at the very start of my book and features a girl called Piper who's on her knees and about to be in all kinds of trouble...

... read the start of my book for free here!




Update nov 8th

#BDSM #kinky #merchandise #T-shirt #valentines #card #heart #bondage #sexy #joke #spanking

Apologies for my recent blog silence, more is coming soon I promise! 

Things I'm working on include a couple of new blog posts; one on the complex nature of consent and another is a riposte to those who think kinky people are 'fucked up'. Oh and there should also be a book showing up someday; editing is hard.

I'm also gearing up to write some straight up erotic fiction, just because.

I've also just started myself this little Zazzle store thingy so I can sell some subtle kinky design ideas what I have.

First up; a range of products featuring a romantic heart picture that is more than it seems... Perfect as an advanced valentine gift for someone with compatible interests!


www.zazzle.com/timothytuttlesmith





Here are some links to the individual products:
 
Mug
T-shirt
Girl's T-shirt
Card

Hope you like! 

book draft pic...

#book #dating #NewYork #NYC #onlinedating  #BDSM #bondage #kinky #sex #romance 

The book draft 1 is written! ~96,000 words... Now I just need to make it good! (Oh and figure out all that agent/publisher business...)



Why do people like BDSM?

#BDSM #Psychology #psychiatry #science #whybdsm #SnM #S&M #kink #kinky




I guess it's about time I addressed the elephant in the room.

Why do weirdos like me get turned on by BDSM[1]?

The simple answer is, “Because it’s fun!”

However, I can understand that many people could find the idea of getting restrained, punished, and ordered around to be horrifying. They could also perhaps perceive the person doing the restraining and hurting as not just ‘un-fun’ but somewhat sociopathically deranged.

While I can’t speak for everyone out there, my experience has been that that good consensual kink and genuine abuse are as separate from each other as oil and water. In fact the communication and empowerment fostered by the former should help people recognise and call out the later, though unfortunately that is not always how it goes.

It might also be worth pointing out ‘for the record’ that, since I started exploring my dominant side, I have not felt the slightest bit inclined towards actually assaulting anybody. For me, a girl’s consent to tie her up and cause her pain is the lynchpin that makes any given scenario erotic. There is something in the exchange of power and trust involved that is crucial to the eroticism of BDSM, at least for me. When it comes to taking charge I get aroused by how a partner responds to me doing twisted things to them, not by the violent acts themselves. I often imagine myself in a partner’s position as I’m ‘abusing’ them, and, since I know I would enjoy being on the receiving end myself, empathy allows me to enjoy both sides of the coin at the same time.

I think the critical thing to appreciate is that BDSM is a game, it’s not meant to be ‘real’. Though it’s possible that the more realistic the game seems, the better it can be. (Just like the best films and TV shows are often the ones that are the most believable). Watching horror films is considered a socially acceptable, mainstream activity, but in these films viewers are bombarded with unpleasant visual and auditory stimuli. Yet millions of us still pay to see films like this, perhaps because we get to explore these extreme situations while remaining safe in the knowledge that they’re not really happening to us. BDSM on the other hand provides a more immersive experience, with physical sensations thrown in as well.

While I think of BDSM as exploring a fantasy rather than living out a reality, from what I’ve seen on the interwebs it can sometimes be hard to see where the boundary lies. Also, depending on who you play the game with, it could be a lot more dangerous than going to the cinema.

I have heard a number of psychological theories that frame kinky interests as some kind of learned deficit. For example; an interest in bondage might come from not being wrapped tightly enough as a child, or that getting excited by pain and degradation might be a result of childhood sexual abuse, or even that people who explore kink may be compensating for perceived sexual inadequacy. However, most of these theories seem to be based on little more than the tendencies of certain psychiatrists to make up stuff because they think it sounds good[2]. In fact, a recent study suggested that people who practice BDSM in either dominant or submissive role may be more mentally stable than the average member of the general population[3]. Some of the more up to date literature suggests that many psychologists are now ascribing the attraction people have towards dominance and submission as being based on sexual arousal by hierarchical status[4]; the idea being that our evolutionary ancestors evolved to pursue sex with more dominant individuals who could secure the best food, protect them from predators, etc etc. This idea sounds like it could have some merit, but it’s an idea that still makes me a tad uncomfortable as a card carrying lefty who thinks social hierarchies are generally a bad thing, even if I’m happy to play sex games based around them.

I definitely don’t think this hierarchy idea tells the whole story either, so as scientist who likes BDSM I am qualifying myself to make up my own bullshit hypotheses on the subject. They run along these lines:

BDSM practices are not ‘learned dysfunctions’ but are nuanced expressions of the powerful dichotomy of fear and excitement that lies at the heart of almost all human sexuality. Perhaps the sexualisation of specific BDSM practices are due to classical Pavlovian conditioning[5], or a case of ‘Monkey see monkey do’. I know my tastes have evolved with exposure to different images and situations, and when I first used to search for bondage porn on the internet, the more sadomasochistic elements sometimes seriously put me off[6]. However, as I became desensitised to the ‘grossness’, I also began to get turned on by the more hard-core fantasies as well.

Apparently the seeds of our sexual interests are planted during childhood. The idea that early sexual abuse conditions people to like BDSM is an extreme version of this conditioning idea, and to some extent it makes sense that a victim of abuse could learn to associate feelings of helplessness etc with arousal. However, I personally have no memory of being sexually abused, (despite going to a primary school run by catholic nuns[7]), and out of all the kinky people I’ve talked about this with none have described any specific abuse they can trace their sexual ideas back to.

I’ve also talked to many people who have told me that they only recently got interested in BDSM because it sounded like a fun thing to try out. Apparently it wasn’t something they fantasized about at all during adolescence. I suspect that even the most minor childhood experiences of power exchange can sow the seeds of kink that may then sprout later in life. Thinking back to my own childhood, vague memories surface of playing a game when we got hold of some rope and tied some girls to a tree. After we pretended to hold them hostage for a little while they got bored, escaped and did the same to us (I think we let them, because fair is fair!) I think we also got told off for playing this game by some adult authority figure, which probably only served to heighten the illicit thrill. Perhaps a mildly violent subtext to cute childhood games is all BDSM fantasies need to take root.

However, we find ourselves with a chicken and egg scenario: was I tying girls to a tree because I was excited by it? Or by doing the tying did I learn to associate that activity with proto-sexual excitement? I don’t really know anything about how kids develop sexual thoughts. Some parenting sites tell me it starts surprisingly early… but, to be honest, I don’t want to think about that too much. However, why should tying a girl to a tree cultivate my erotic development while doing something like homework with a girl do nothing? Kids do homework with each other all the time but I feel safe saying that BDSM interests are a lot more prevalent than homework fetishes.

This brings me to my core idea; where the roots of BDSM interests tap into the molten heart of what makes our sexuality function. Sex is kind of scary, especially when you’ve not done it before. Even without all of the complex social stigma and bizarre rules that various human cultures have invented to confuse the situation and generally discourage sex as a practice, sex can still be fucking scary. Both parties are exposing themselves to another conscious entity over whom they have no direct control. Also, for coordination purposes, it often falls to one party to lead. This makes trust and power exchange a key part of any consensual sex, even if the sex is gentle and tender, and you don’t bite their nipples even once.

When first thinking about exploring sex with another individual, nervous fear and erotic excitement are likely intertwined, perhaps along with more complex ideas of surrender or taking control. It seems quite natural that we can learn to associate arousal with these abstractions, and when the idea of sex in of itself becomes more mundane, BDSM may help to reconnect with this sense or erotic trepidation.

It would seem possible that the human neuronal wiring for sexual arousal could be somehow linked with our ‘fight or flight’ circuitry on a genetic level. Social behaviour in mammals is far from universal but sex has to be, otherwise that particular species of mammal won’t be around for long. Back when our solitary ancestor encountered our other solitary ancestor in a dark forest, its brain’s first two thoughts were probably; ‘Do I run away from it?’ or ‘Do I fight it?’... Thankfully for us, this creature then thought; ‘I don’t think I need to run away from it... or fight it... perhaps I should have sex with it?’ Our DNA has been through millions of generations of these nervous animal encounters. It might make sense for the ‘Fight?/Flight?/Sex?’ decision processes to be linked on a biochemical level. Those animals that thought “Fight?-no, Flight?-no… meh whatever,” missed a lot of opportunities to make offspring, and the horny critters that kept considering “Sex? Sex? Sex?” in the absence of a fight or flight stimulus might have wasted a lot of time humping inanimate objects.

It would seem unsurprising then if the childhood games that most feed our sexual development often involve a careful balance of fear, aggression and excitement[8]. More complex fantasies might then evolve out of these games, no doubt fed by all the crude and bizarre sexualisation we encounter in advertising and elsewhere. Thus it is easy to end up as one kinky adult.

Also if you’re aggressively told as a kid that doing certain things is really bad, or you find your sexual feelings stigmatised, that probably feeds into it as well. However, I’m not really sure how to fit this thought into the rest of my vague theory, so I’m just going to tack it on the end here and leave you with a conclusion! (You can tell it’s a conclusion because I’m underlining ‘conclusion’ at the top, like we do in real science sometimes.)

Conclusion

BDSM is a fun game. At least it is fun for many people who have learnt to find it fun somehow. There may be a lot of non-traumatic ways one can learn to find it fun. I’ve even put forward some muddled reasoning as to how the simplistic blueprints may be in our very DNA. DNA may also have nothing to do with it, but this wouldn’t change the fact that BDSM is fun[9]. Maybe you should try it sometime! (Or don’t. That’s fine too.)


[1]And from my highly biased sample of the New York dating population there seems to be quite a lot of weirdos like me.
[2] Someone let Freud get away with it once, and look what happened.
[3] Of course there are always going to be significant selection biases to contend with when surveying people about stigmatized sexual behaviour. I don’t claim that this study is correct, just that it exists. Reference is: Wismeijer & Van Assen, “Psychological Characteristics of BDSM Practitioners” - The Journal of Sexual Medicine (2013) Volume 10, Issue 8, pages 1943–1952
[4] Jozifkova, E. “Consensual Sadomasochistic Sex (BDSM): The Roots, the Risks, and the Distinctions Between BDSM and Violence” Current Psychiatry Reports (2013) 15:392
[5] In Pavlov’s most famous experiment he would ring a bell every time he gave a dog food and eventually the dog would reflexively salivate at the sound of the bell even when there was no food around.
[6] To begin with, I would fantasise more about being tied up myself. I just preferred looking at attractive girls getting tied up and dominated by other girls (and so keep weird looking male genitalia out of it!).
[7] I’ve noticed a lot of kinky Catholics out there though. Just sayin!
[8] Maybe the upfront kids who just play ‘Doctor’s and Nurses’ (i.e. poking bits of each other’s anatomy to see what happens) go on to develop vanilla tastes, while the more shy kids who disguise their interests behind power games and tying other kids to trees turn into kinksters.
[9] Regardless of this many people may find the very idea of BDSM offensive for potentially legitimate reasons, but if you are one of those people maybe you shouldn’t have opened this book?