A Place To Draw Blood Laughing

In which I become politically charged through osmosis, because passion inspires passion and I hung out with a bunch of passionate folks last night.

Everyone has heard the phrase I’m starting with today. It’s a maxim of the kink community; it’s practically gospel. Say it with me now, people:

Your kink is not my kink, but your kink is okay.

Well I’m here to tell you that as of right about now, I think when it comes to this particular maxim, the community is full of shit.

We’re actually excellent at maintaining this structure within our own groups. I hang out with people who do scat and are wigged by needles. We get along just fine. But the idea isn’t intended as a simple guideline between friends; it’s intended to be something much more powerful.

Communities concerned with sex, especially of an alternative variety, share a common interest: Sex! In some way, somehow, we’re wanking differently than our perceived conception of the norm. As such, would it not make sense for us to draw together? To support one another when brought under fire by things like abstinence-only education in American schools?

That’s not “not our problem,” by the way. I don’t particularly care what your political opinions are concerning issues that aren’t sex related, but surely you must see the trickle-down effects of the idea of abstinence-only education? Any initiative that restricts information harms us. Hell, restricting information harms everyone. It’s called censorship.

But in the meantime, the straight scene doesn’t talk to the gay scene, the gay scene doesn’t talk to the trans scene, the kink people don’t talk to the swingers, the poly people don’t talk to the sex positive people. The list goes on. We are not a cohesive unit. We are ten thousand fractured little shards all so wrapped up in making our own kinks okay that nobody stops to think that maybe, possibly, if every queer person in America spoke up at precisely the same time we’d deafen our way to acceptance.

Saying “your kink is not my kink, but your kink is okay” should be an open invitation. It should encourage more people to go cross community jumping, to reach out in ways that they wouldn’t otherwise and trust that it’ll turn out all right. I am a cross community jumper. I’m kinky and poly and bisexual too. And every time I show up at an event that’s not kink specific, I have to remind myself that the people I’m with have common interests with me, do not live under bridges and have intelligent things to say.

Maintaining insular communities is the epitome of the phrase “your kink is not okay.” Isn’t there a word for someone who does the very thing they say they don’t do? One of those long fancy words we don’t like hearing in relation with ourselves?

We, when by “we” I mean apparently everyone on the frickin’ planet, are obsessed with us-versus-them mentalities. Gay versus straight. Kinky versus vanilla. Look, if making our communities and our world better is going to be all about carving out a place for ourselves in a grandiose battle for freedom, I’m pretty sure we’re gonna lose. In case you haven’t noticed, we are currently outgunned.

The political and social issues surrounding sex have been pinned with war language, and that just wigs me the fuck out.

I’m trying very, very hard not to make this a fuzzy-wuzzy “Can’t we all just get along?” post. But seriously? Why is it that when I see what’s going on around me, instead of being content to live my life excellently and let others live their lives as they choose, I feel the need to stand up and just start shouting? We keep saying that other people, vanilla people, politicians, whatever, need to accept alternative sexualities as a community, but we suck at accepting each other. We are a laughable joke of a community.

And because we are such a joke, we damage ourselves. The premise of the community’s movement is currently one of having our differences accepted by the population at large. Although within the guidelines of us versus them this appears logical, even rational, we’re too busy not talking to each other to realize the flaw in our current argument.

If they say “You’re different, we’re not,” and we respond with “We’re different, you’re not” we have screwed ourselves. Remember the bit about how bad arguments remain bad no matter what kind of spin you try to put on it?

The idea isn’t to stand up and fight for our particular right to be different. The idea is to stand up and fight for everyone’s right to be different. The day that any person can say “Hey, I do things a little bit differently” with absolutely no fear or trepidation is the day alternative sex communities will have a secure place in the world. Not because we’ll be able to say such things; we already do that. But because everyone will be able to.

In the end, being vanilla is just another way of having sex. It’s not “normal.” Normal is pretty much a useless word. Everyone does things a little differently. The way we’re all going to live without tearing each others throats out is not just by accepting that, but by simply admitting it.
I can’t up and force people to admit that they’re different. It’s easy for us to say “Everyone is different” but very, very hard for us to say “I’m different.” It’s the us-against-them mentality all over again. I’m different. Me against the world.

Scrap the us-versus-them mentality. Your differences are not my differences, but your differences are okay. Live and let live, and every once and a while, socialize.