Earlier this week when I was at my local meditation center conversing with my meditation mentor about keeping up with at-home practice. For those who don’t know… ideally someone meditates in a specific room in their living habitat which is off-limits to sexual activities. My meditation mentor had suggested that I find a space to do […]
In William Shakespeare’s The Merchant of Venice, Shylock muses “If you prick us do we not bleed? If you tickle us, do we not laugh? If you poison us, do we not die?” after being mocked and derided for his outsider status as a Jew. Many in the BDSM community are left asking the same […]
There comes a point in nearly everyone’s life as a polyamorous person where they ask themselves the single most important question they can. Unfortunately, it usually comes under a cloud of doubt, pain and misery. It is almost always a “newbie” question, but it can happen to anyone. The way it usually happens is all […]
In these days of fetish social networks and online dating sites, it can be easy to browse an individual’s page and learn pretty much any detail you want to obtain. But in the days before easy to access “hook-up” sites, the information had to be subtle enough to hide from the squares but still be […]
What is it with names? In the world of BDSM we have the opportunity to choose our own names, something rare in the rest of our lives. The names we choose speak volumes. Yes there are photos, art, and other creative ways to describe ourselves, but our names come first. We choose scene names to […]
Being kinky can be frustrating, even maddening at times. I remember, as a kid stumbling into my first fantasies, and feeling isolated and freakish, when I realized that some of the things I wanted were pretty exotic compared to most people. I was in my early 20’s before I actively pursued kink with others openly. […]
I presented a class on BDSM, Sex, and the Law: Consent and Beyond at the New England Dungeon Society last Friday, subtitle: “when things go horribly wrong.” Because the truth is, “The Law” doesn’t get involved unless things do go horribly wrong. In fact, some might say that getting “The Law” involved is the very definition of things […]
What we call magic markers in North America, Australians call Textra. Have no doubt, though: Alrene Textaqueen makes magic with felt tipped pens. Textaqueen loves markers and she loves her fierce queer community. She’s spent the past ten years drawing women and genderqueer folk “un-dressed-up” in her series of portraits entitled Textranudes. Textaqueen’s work feels […]