This podcast covers what sadism and masochism are, the unexpected origin of both terms and a possible point of discussion. Because of time constraints I didn’t get to give an example question, here it goes:
If a woman wants to be dominated does this mean she is undermining feminist ideals?
Comment below for an awesome discussion. If you would like me to play Devil’s Advocate, just say so.
One thing I just learned: the acronym BDSM generally denotes Bondage/Discipline, Sadism & Masochism, but has come to also incorporate Dominance/submission and Master/Slave, both of which conveniently have letters contained within BDSM.
All of this kinky fun in the best 90 seconds of your life.
Sadism and Masochism (S&M): Our pain is my pleasure (Podcast #022)
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Transcript of Sadism and Masochism (S&M): Our pain is my pleasure (Podcast #022)
Visit the home page to play this podcast directly through your browser and to view the whole collection of 90 Seconds to Culture podcasts.
Sources / Further Reading:
S&M For Beginners - A nice article about S&M with some interesting tidbits of information
Online Etymology Dictionary: Masochism, Sadism and more
Wikipedia: Marquis de Sade
Wikipedia: Leopold von Sacher-Masoch
[tags]sex, sadism, masochism, etymology, podcast, psychology[/tags]
(photo by nullalux)
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{ 4 comments… read them below or add one }
If a woman wants to be dominated does this mean she is undermining feminist ideals?
Without getting into a nebulous, excruciating debate about feminist ideals, I think it’s safe to say that she isn’t. If it did, by corollary, embodying the ideals of feminism would mean being a dominatrix, which isn’t really the case.
It appears as though, I need to stoke the fires a little bit. Times for some devil’s advocacy.
Maybe her desire to be dominate just illustrates a more fundamental urge to be dominated in other aspects of life? Microcosm, macrocosm.
Is it possible that while the feminist movement is burning strong, that many (women) inherently wish to be dominated? If so what does this imply about the feminist movement?
(BTW, I do not wan to see the words “hegemony” or “Nth wave” in your response.)
Well, basically, I think that second-wave feminism foreshadowed the hegemony of later waves, the downfall of which was the simile with patriarchy and parsimony.
I think you can’t answer the question of whether a desire to be dominated in the bedroom extends outside the bedroom in the abstract. The answer probably lies in a review of the pertinent literature on women who like to be dominated.
It’s entirely possible that many women inherently wish to be dominated, but many women might be a small subset of the female population that is mutually exclusive from the feminist movement, to the extent that there is any such coherent movement.
If a ‘feminist’ believes that the values he / she holds about how women should act and think should be held by all women, then yes, wanting to be dominated undermines that hope. It’s one thing to advocate equal rights for women, but it’s a complete other thing to believe that all women should carry the qualities a select group does, simply because they were advocating that freedom.
When equal rights are achieved in a certain area, it’s up to the individual to make their own decisions, and in some cases that means choosing domination.