The Sexual Manifesto: Can BDSM Be Feminist?

by Christine Borden for the San Francisco Appeal:

“Images of women crying out in pain and receiving a sound beating don’t usually scream “feminist.” For some, it’s cause for alarm, calling up notions of rape and patriarchal power and privilege. For others, though, BDSM fits hand in hand with sex-positive feminism. BDSM encompasses a wide variety of behaviors, kinks, and actions, but literally it boils down to: bondage and discipline, dominance and submission, and sadism and masochism. Which can mean anything from erotic tickling to a 24/7 slave-master relationship to spanking to, yes, a Dom and his very bad, very naughty female submissive. It’s understandable why men beating up women for pleasure can make some people squirm (and not in a good way), but BDSM can be a very feminist lifestyle. First, not all subs are women and not all Doms (Dommes) are men, but that’s neither here nor there for those absolutely offended by this deplorable abuse of women. But let’s get down to–how do you say?–brass tacks. Much of BDSM is power play, and gosh, if examining power relations within sex isn’t so Women’s Studies, God help those poor, misguided womyn. Power always lurks in the sexual setting, whether it’s a violent upset in power in the case of rape, or whether it’s simply a matter of giving or receiving. Some like it equal, some like it hot, and some like a good foot to the face as they’re bent over against a wall taking it up the rear…” Read full article here.