Power, privilege, and missing the point

I just know I’m going to get it for this, but here goes.
The ever-erudite and thought-provoking Orlando has got me thinking again. In an ongoing series of posts, he is examining privilege, entitlement, and the concept of slumming in the context of sexual power dynamics.
I recommend reading the series (though he charmingly [...]

Read Full Post »

Monday Advice: The Philosophy Edition

As if by magic, this week I’ve had a question dropped in my lap that touches the root of all the discussion that’s been going on here triggered by that old post about not asking why. This one takes it away from the radfem discussions and the political questioning of desire that so often [...]

Read Full Post »

Strap-ons: Yet Another Alternate View

So it may come as a surprise to no one that now that I’ve quit the pro-domming business, I’ve been having wicked fantasies about doing terrible, terrible things to lovely boys and men. I mean, it’s like the old joke about the gynecologist, right?
Well, sort of. See, I’ve had a thing about Not [...]

Read Full Post »

Questioning Desires: A place for sissies and worms?

I realize lately that I’ve been feeling an uncomfortable internal conflict over two major lines of thought I’ve been reading in the blogrolls.
One: the argument that those of us who are kinky and whole have been having with the radical feminists over whether submission is okay for women (In case you’ve been sleeping: the kinkyfeminists [...]

Read Full Post »

Radical feminism: how far have we come?

I know, I know, I said I wasn’t going to talk about it anymore. If it’s any consolation, I haven’t been over to the radfem blogs lately, though I’m sure I’ll keep on reading Trinity and then it’ll be all over.
But I just finished reading two essays from the old standby that I’m ashamed [...]

Read Full Post »

Radfem vs. BDSM: (Hopefully) My Final Word on the Matter

Thanks in large part to Trinity, but also to a good friend of mine from grad school, I’ve been spending a lot of time over in some of the radical feminist blogs, particularly in the discussions about BDSM. My friend was hungry to find the intersection of radfem and BDSM online, in intelligent, academic [...]

Read Full Post »

BDSM and paths to healing

I’ve been loving on Trinity’s blog enough that I’ve been reading the back issues. Yesterday I took a look at this post on the commonalities she draws between some radical feminist camps’ views on BDSM, and the rhetoric of ex-gay movements. In a nutshell: while both are careful to say up-front that they’re [...]

Read Full Post »

Rape scene, or fetishized consent? Or, I finally saw Blade Runner

I cannot stop watching this movie.
And I can’t believe I went all of these years without seeing this beautiful, strange, moving and problematic piece of cinema. I finally saw it this weekend – twice in as many days – and I’m ready to watch it again, soaking in it the way I soaked in [...]

Read Full Post »

Dorothy, we’re not in Guantanamo anymore…

It has not escaped my notice that I have a hot spot for interrogation scenes. Okay, maybe a wet spot would be more accurate. But there’s a mystery to it for me. While I admit to enjoying the rush of power that comes from hurting someone until they break, the place I [...]

Read Full Post »

Bitchy made me do it

I was reading back in Bitchy Jones’ Diary last night and was again stirred and moved and amused and made curious by it. I have to be careful over there, as her blog never fails to draw me in to several hours of reading.
When I first picked up on her blog nearly a year [...]

Read Full Post »