Kink Shame

by Loren Berthelsen, Editor in Chief

A while back I was talking to someone about pet peeves and two items quickly emerged as biggies for each of us:  people who chop the heads off their profile pics and scene names.  The pros and cons of scene names is an especially active dialogue in our various communities just now.

As much as I wish people didn't use scene names, that's not really the issue.  Why we do it is the more critical question.

Fear and shame are major co-conspirators in keeping us in the closet.  That goes for kinky folks as much as it does for any flavor of LBGT.  Fear of discovery.  Fear of losing our job or our children or our families. And that fear walks hand in hand with shame.  Lots of people think we're freaks because of our play or our poly families or just because we like a nice, tight leather corset.  It's easy to live in shame if you buy in to the "freak" label.

I've certainly felt it.  That moment when you're chatting up the woman in the airport van as you're headed to IML and "the question" comes up.  Why are you in Chicago?.  My first inclination is to toss it off with a "Oh, for a convention."  It's a die-hard habit and I still go right there even after decades in the community and a name that, when Googled, leaves nothing to the imagination.  It's an easy answer and it's generally the end of a potentially uncomfortable discussion.  there are two problems with that:  it's not honest and it doesn't give the person I'm talking with the opportunity to engage me.  Most of us were probably vanilla at some point in our lives so why is it my choice to rob her of the chance to grow, to learn something new.  Or maybe even to share with me that she's got a killer flogger at home.

But the bigger problem with shame is that is keeps us in the closet and largely invisible which makes it easier for the mainstream community to marginalize us.  The larger community (be it het or gay) rarely gets the chance to find out that we come in all shapes and sizes and that yes, to borrow from the LGBT rights movement; we are your doctors, neighbors, teachers, parents, sons and daughters.  

The marriage equality fight has proven that it's much harder to discriminate against someone if you know them personally.  Hiding behind a scene name pretty much guarantees that the only people who know you will be other people in the scene.  Plus, if you've effectively segregated your life, then your kink friends never get to know about the other you that goes to work each day and who knows, maybe scrapbooks on weekends.   

A lot of the people I interact with use scene names.  I respect their right to do so and am against outing people as a practice.  But I always encourage everyone to be as open as possible about their kinky selves...as open as possible.  

Here's my little closeted secret:  I'm not out as kinky to my side of the family.  We're out to my husband's family, although of course we only go as far down the rabit hole as they're comfortable with.  But my family?  I just can't go there yet.  We go see them almost every year before going to IML.  I know they probably have questions about the "convention" we go to each year in Chicago.  They've also gotta wonder why we show up with 5 suitcases, 4 of which stay in the garage the entire visit!

I wish I had the courage to come out to them, at least a little bit.  I doubt it would matter.  It would just be one more crazy thing they didn't understand about me, like wearing a mohawk at 53 or living in California.  But is it shame that keeps me quiet?  Maybe.  Probably, at least a little.  Am I protecting them?  Maybe.  Probably, at least that's how I rationalize it.  

So I make up for it in my own way be being completely open in the rest of my life.  A woman stopped our family the other day in the farmer's market and asked if we were part of a band or something.  I looked at my husband and our boy, all of us sporting mohawks and then chuckled a bit as I looked her dead in the eye and said, "No, we're a polyamorous leather family."  Did it blow her mind?  Maybe.  Probably.  Or could be I just didn't see her texting her domina about the cool leather family she just met.

Come out, come out wherever you are.  Most people out here don't bite.

 

 

Comments

[David Ortmann]

Excellent and timely article. Thank you, Loren.

[Race Bannon]

In Sam Harris' essay, Lying (available as a Kindle Single), he rather eloquently argues that we can make our lives much simpler and also improve society as a whole by telling the truth when it's often been considered acceptable or tempting to lie. Even those supposedly innocent white lies can have significant negative ramifications down the line. I remember when my book first came out and at one point got a bit high profile in various papers and magazines around the country. I felt I had to make sure I was the one to tell my parents about the sexual side of my life before someone else did. I sent my dad a copy of my book. He read it. All he ever said to me was "I admire you for giving people information so they can do this all safely." That was it. No big drama. No raised voice. No real shock at all. Years later when my parents came to visit and asked what the closed door was to, I said it was where "my partner and I play our special way." That was enough information for them. They declined to see it, but said that it was great that I had such a place. Sometimes, perhaps usually, when we come out the reaction is not as horrific as we imagine it would be. There is tremendous power in truth.

[Reid]

This is great, Loren. Well put...we all have to face our demons. I do truly believe there are right situations and wrong situations, and I wouldn't necessarily call it 'shame', more 'self preservation'. I think I would damage my mother more if she knew what I was into than make things better between us. That being said, I don't want to know what she's up to, so why would I tell her what turns me on? Mutually assured ignorance just works sometimes....