Last Friday I hurried from my office to my boy-friend’s studio. I was, as always, terrified of being late. He said he would regard tardiness as a deadly insult. I didn’t know it for a fact, but I convinced myself one minute past six would be too late and would lead to some horrible punishment.
I arrived 15 minutes early. Jack was alone, sitting at his desk. So. It had already begun. Usually there were other people around, softening the transition from freedom to imprisonment, absolute enslavement which I always experience the moment Jack and I are alone together. As long as other people are present, I can always change my mind. I can leave. Alone with Jack, I am his prisoner. It is true, he has told me I am always free to leave. But I nevertheless feel powerless to resist his wishes in any way.
Jack motioned for me to sit across from him at the desk.
We smoked a joint. The gentle intoxication of the grass heightened the dizzying intoxication I already felt from the adrenaline which was coursing through my body.
Shortly, he ordered me to walk around the desk and stand before him, where he sat with his legs crossed. He told me to turn around, and he removed my panties, He felt my ass all over in a proprietary, rather than caressing, manner. “I just want to remember what you used to look like before I change you,” he said. Then he slapped me very hard, over and over. After a while, I succumbed to my emotions and started shaking with sobs, more in anticipation of what was before me than from what had already occurred. Jack caught me in his arms. It was the first tenderness he had shown me that night. “It’s all right,” he said, “You can take it. You can take anything I give you.” I felt a wild surge of pride at his words. He always had the power to transform my mood like that. From anguish, I was transported to exultation. Thus fortified, I was now required to bend over the top of the desk and submit to a much heavier beating with various whips.
Abruptly, the blows ceased. I heard Jack’s footsteps recede, only to return a moment later. Now I felt a new sensation. Something was being pushed up my ass. It hurt as it went in, and it continued hurting. I begged Jack to remove it; but he refused and soothed me instead, returning again to the whipping. He then had me remove all my clothing and replaced what I had removed with a leather belt which went around the crotch and held the dildo in place. A chain was placed around my breasts. Jack called this chain a bra. He told me to put my street clothes over this “underwear” and to put my underwear in my purse.
Jack took me downstairs and told me to hail a taxi. As we rode off into the night, he asked me if I had read “O,” and I replied in the affirmative. “Remember how she was prepared.” he said. The motion of the cab was vibrating the dildo and causing pleasurable sensations. Jack asked me if the ride was bumpy, adding that I was in a position to know.
I have stated that I felt freer when Jack and I were in public than when we were alone together. This was no longer the case. I felt totally a captive in my chains. It was exciting to be among others as Jack’s prisoner with only he and I aware of our secret.
We reached a luxurious apartment building. We passed the doorman and some other people whom Jack greeted. I said nothing, as I felt too dehumanized in my chains. The apartment was rich with contrasting textures. It showed good and expensive taste. Jack had me bathe him.
Then he forced me to my knees and pushed a tab of mescaline into my mouth. He took a tab, too. He then invited me to sit with him at the bar.
I was beginning to relax. My mind was admitting certain insights about itself. What was this fear, this feeling of powerlessness I always experienced with Jack? I realized that I had built the walls of my own prison in my mind and then banged on them in a panic when I didn’t really want to get out at all. Fear and helplessness were things I provided myself, as they satisfied some need. I questioned Jack about our relationship and about how much freedom I had. Jack said I didn’t really want to know. “You don’t want to know how big this is. You love me so much, and you are so afraid of love.” Well, the perfect love casteth out fear.
We moved back to the sofa. Jack made me rim him, which I had never done before. It completely humiliated me. I had never felt so totally a slave. Then he had me suck his cock. The mescaline was coming on, and I sucked freely without reserve, without my usual fear of chocking. I felt, quite simply, that if I choked I was doing my trip and denying Jack pleasure in the process. I would not cop out on him that way. The desire to give welled up in my. “I love you!” I cried out. Jack asked me to repeat it, and I did, twice. “OK, you said it three times. Now you can’t take it back,” he said. I felt as if I had signed a contract giving myself without limits to Jack. This, in turn, made me feel unlimited.
At one point, Jack said, “I’m uptight, but it has nothing to do with you.”
“Is there anything I can do to help?” I asked.
“Just take everything I give you.” I agreed to try, and Jack said that was all he expected.
He began twisting my nipples. The pain mounted. It hurt me, but I clung to the thought that this pain was something Jack was giving me. Suddenly, the pain just vanished as Jack was still increasing the pressure. He had been watching my face. “You did that beautifully!” he exclaimed. The un expected praise inspired me on. Jack kept increasing the pain, but my ability to endure was now unlimited. I felt like a goddess. Every time Jack hurt me, his own face contorted as if he felt the pain on his own body. I felt that I was receiving his pain and transcending it for both of us and, who knows, perhaps for the entire world. I felt able to take on the pain of the world. “So this is what it is all about,” I thought. “Martyrdom, the ultimate, the cross.” The pains were like red rubies at the tips of my nipples. A golden light appeared. “You look so peaceful,” Jack said. He kept on “hurting” me. “You freak!” he cried in awe. His joy was so great as to resemble agony. I felt as if he had pinned a medal on me. The circuit was full. Agony and ecstasy were joined. I knew I was proving something now. I was proving I could take it. I could take anything the world had to give. Just as God had tested Job’s faith, Jack was testing mine. And I was passing the test. I could love. I needn’t fear. I could pay the price: the heavy price of existence.
I was aware of sexual feelings. How much more must I endure? With ont part of my brain, I seemed to be asking myself that. When will I have proven myself worthy? I would know when.
Suddenly, I no longer felt passive and helpless. I felt responsible. I was a free, responsible human being acting on my own desires, daring to pursue pleasure. The revelation rather startled me. It was somewhat embarrassing. Jack was hurting me, or I was enduring, or both were happening. What a price to pay. But well worth it. Finally, I came. As the seizure consumed my body, I understood, emotionally, if not intellectually, why I had prepared as I had for that fearsome event.
Now I think of Jack. Never have I found the kind of acceptance that I found in his arms and under his whip. Jack loves me as I am. He enables me to love. Our relationship may mean many things to different people. To some, it is oppressive. To others, it is perverse. But to me, it is simple a night of loving. And I trust that many more will follow.
Liberation was inspired by earlier liberation movements. Blacks were followed by women and then gays. Why not s/m people? In this spirit, I invited T Grace Atkinson to speak at a meeting of The Eulenspiegel Society. She is the only speaker to demand an honorarium. Everyone else spoke for free. But for her $15, Atkinson denied any kinship between our movement and feminism. I guess I shouldn’t have been surprised that a woman who has called sexual intercourse, itself, oppressive should say, “I do not know any feminist worthy of that name who, if forced to choose between freedom and sex, would choose sex. She’d choose freedom every time.” One has to wonder what kind of “freedom” requires renunciation of sex. It does remind me of the Christian insistence that “homosexuals” refrain from sexual gratification if they can only enjoy gay sex.
That was my first brush with anti-s/m feminism but it was to be far from my last. In California, I came out as a lesbian and hooked up with the s/m liberation groups that existed at that time, The Society of Janus, and Cardea. The former was for all s/m affectionados while the latter was for women only. Out of Cardea, SAMOIS was born, the world’s first lesbian-feminist s/m liberation group. I joined Samois and soon found how much hostility we attracted from the women who’s self-designated mission in life was to liberate women. Of particular notice was WAVPAM (Women Against Violence in Pornography and the Media). Despite their title, this organization was against all pornography, not just the violent kind. By starting Samois, we had thrown down a gauntlet of sorts. We were invading the very stronghold of what these women considered the Woman’s Movement.
Groups like WAVPAM contended that s/m was the quintessence of male-female relationships in this oppressive, male-supremacist society. We were the very thing they were sworn to defeat. How could women even think of being part of it? At one of their conferences which we invaded, we heard ourselves declared “mentally ill.” The irony was palpable considering lesbians had recently been described as “mentally ill” and only rehabilitated by fervent activism. Why couldn’t they see we were following in their footsteps?
Pat Califia and Gayle Rubin are both published writers who have had an impact on the public’s awareness that there really is a lesbian s/m existence. Samois collectively published Coming to Power, a collection of writings of members, and What Color is Your Handkerchief. Gayle Rubin wrote, Deviations and Traffic as well as essays. Pat Califia has written more books than I can list, both fiction and non-fiction. My favorite is Doc and Fluff.
The more it changes, the more it stays the same. A fan of the Twilight trilogy wrote some fan-fiction with an s/m slant. Her books are also a trilogy called Fifty Shades of Grey. The first two of these have been made into movies and given the full Hollywood treatment. Oddly, the s/m community hasn’t taken kindly to this work. I think that is snobbish of them, maybe old-timers looking down on the newbies. But this work has also drawn down the hostility of the modern political crowd. I just found a blog that has given a lot of attention to the “fact” that “This book should come with a warning label, dangerous, toxic, for your health, do not leave in reach of children—EVER.” Ah, the children! Someone once said that patriotism is the last refuge of scoundrels. But protection of children is at least as popular with those who would control other people’s personal choices. From the fundies who want to outlaw abortion to “save innocent lives” to censors of adult entertainment, these people seem to believe they have a vested interest, even an ownership of children that gives them the right to play tyrant.
When I was a lot younger, s/m was considered something perverted, indecent and shameful. One couldn’t find anything that catered to it except in the sleaziest parts of town. Since then, it has come out of the closet and is now respectable enough to be discussed and featured in mainstream as naughty but titillating. At least that’s how the mainstream now views it. But the hard-core politicos, true to their puritanical nature, still find it heinous. They confuse s/m with domestic violence and other forms of unconsensual violence. A friend of mine once quipped that Leftists tend to be prudes and Rightists tend to be perverts. Well, there were enough stories about Hitler. Can’t we have the perversion without the fascism?
Besides masochism, the other important thing in his life is cystic fibrosis, a disease he was born with and suffered with all his life. He believed that his masochism was a way to dealing with the disease. It was a way he found to control his body and the pain it experienced. But we are all sick. We all suffer from a chronic, life-long disease. The disease is mortality. Because we are mortal, we are all subject to sickness, pain, humiliation, death and decay. As a mortal, I can identify with Bob Flanagan even though I don’t have cystic fibrosis.
I am one of the (notorious) founders of 
I have had three significant relationships. The first, with 
Last time I visited New York, TES was still going strong. We are everywhere! There are s/m liberation groups in other places, too. 
We entered a building a few blocks away, still in the East Village. The lobby looked like a cathedral. We were welcomed by a man named Turk who had a lot of tattoos and a plump, dark-haired girl named Paulette. Turk was holding forth on the virtues of drugs when Tom tapped me on the shoulder.
feelings would be hurt if he knew I had fucked Jim. Later, I figured out that Jim had probably paid Tom in meth to bring me.We learn by our mistakes.
My Web of Pain 