I’m just back from yet another fetish community event. No, it wasn’t a dungeon party nor was it an erotic art installment. There was no pornography, live suspension acts, or naked people running around but there were tightly cinched waists, decadent cocktails made with absinthe, porn directors, and a number of people I was very careful to address as “lady” and “sir.” I was at none other than the annual Dickens Christmas Fair.

On the surface there really isn’t a lot of common ground between the popular English novelist and BDSM play aside from the tactic of keeping people on the edge of their seat waiting for more. No one expects to find a play piercing scene in Great Expectations and Bleak House is hardly the name of a community play space. While I’m sure there is someone out there who really is into some Nicholas Nickleby role play, the writings of Charles Dickens aren’t exactly smut. So why is it that even the smallest flogger gently swung would likely hit a pervert right in the face at the Dickens Fair?

The same can be said of renaissance faires and sci-fi conventions. Maybe we’re all just trying to get our money’s worth for our collections of expensive fetish wear. When you drop a lot of cash on a well-boned corset or latex uniform you want to be able to wear it. Leather pants go just as well at Folsom as they do at a Firefly marathon. Speaking a little more realistically we can be pretty nerdy at times. No one does esoteric knowledge about the Star Wars Universe better than a kinkster. When the zombies do finally attack I hope I’m at a peer rope workshop because pretty much everyone there has come up with a plan and we’ll be already armed. If someone has taken the time to install hooks for floggers and whips in their home they might make a great addition to your trivial pursuit team. If your computer won’t stop crashing the dungeon monitor just might be the one to beat your operating system into submission.

We’re sex hackers. We explore sensation and analyze power dynamics. We don’t take anything sexual for granted. I don’t think it is unreasonable that we like to do the same thing with notions of the past, the present, and the future as well.

Filed under: Stories |
Posted on December 21st, 2008
Posted by Miss Maggie Mayhem