Friday 26 March 2010

CAUGHT LOOKING.




Hey You! Yes, you peeping through the keyhole. Yes, you, the guy masturbating in the peepshow booth, watching the lady dance her erotic tease.

And you, you, who thought you were safe looking at dirty pictures in secret, while your wife sips her tea; you’re not safe. And neither is the sophisticated gentleman cruising the National Gallery, pretending to look at the chiaroscuro and line in the masterpieces.

You’ve been spotted.

The naked females stare boldly back at you.

You’ve been caught out. You’ve been caught looking.

Your quest to fulfil your carnal desires has landed you in big trouble. Your desire to obtain knowledge of the female form cannot be obtained in any innocent way. In the vernacular, you are a Peeping Tom. To give you your polite name; you are a Voyeur. You are no better, no different to Tom, blinded for his crime of looking at his Lady, as she rode, naked, through the streets. Peeping Tom saw what was taboo; forbidden. So have you.

And girls, don’t think you’ve got away with it either; so wipe those smirks off your faces. That wonderful statue of David, by Michelangelo; did you know that David’s eyes follow you? He’s watching you, looking at his beautifully sculpted cock. He can see the lust in your eyes.


Goya painted the “Nude Maja” in 1800. She stares at the viewer, with an autocratic gaze. She refutes any suggestion that she is debauched; she flaunts her nakedness. The viewer is incidental; an anachronism. The Nude Maja does nothing to titillate; she is simply there. Naked. So what?






From Wiki.

Without a pretence to allegorical or mythological meaning, the painting was "the first totally profane life-size female nude in Western art". Goya refused to paint clothes on her, and instead created a new painting of her clothed. The clothed Maja, eyeballs the viewer with her irritated stare.






The identity of the Majas are uncertain. The most popularly cited subjects are the Duchess of Alba, with whom Goya is thought to have had an affair, and the mistress of Manuel de Godoy, who subsequently owned the paintings. Neither theory has been verified, and it remains as likely that the paintings represent an idealized composite. In 1813, the Inquisition confiscated both works as 'obscene', returning them in 1836.



Le dejouner sur l‘herbe ("The Lunch on the Grass") is a large oil on canvas painting by Édouard Manet. Created in 1862 and 1863, its juxtaposition of a female nude with fully dressed men sparked controversy when the work was first exhibited at the Salon des Refusés. The piece is now in the Musee d’Orsay in Paris. A smaller, earlier version can be seen at the Courtauld Gallery London.





The shock value of a woman, naked, casually lunching with two fully dressed men, was an affront to the propriety of the time. But the naked woman in the painting negates any suggestion of indecency. She simply doesn’t care, and that is perhaps what is so shocking. Like the Maja, she confronts the viewer with an expression that seems to find the viewers’ excitement, boring. It’s as if she’s saying; “Oh, do grow up.” Faced with that, the viewers’ lust is diminished.


Manet embarked on this canvas after being challenged to give the Salon a nude painting to display. (1863) The painting was controversial partly because the nude is wearing some small items of clothing such as an orchid in her hair, a bracelet, a ribbon around her neck, and mule slippers, all of which accentuated her nakedness; her comfortable courtesan lifestyle and sexuality. The orchid, upswept hair, black cat, and bouquet of flowers were all recognized symbols of sexuality at the time. This modern Venus' body is thin, counter to prevailing standards; the painting's lack of idealism rankled viewers who noticed it despite its placement, high on the wall of the Salon.






Manet’s Olympia stares out of the canvas at the viewer. No attempt at seduction, in her frankly, bored gaze. Manet has used the idea of the Classical pose and borrowed it from a much earlier work by Titian. “Venus of Urbino” (1538)






The women are posed in a similar fashion; relaxed, reclining. But Titian’s Venus is a seductress. She invites the viewer in. You can see it in her eyes and her full lips. Her plump mouth is suggestive of swollen labia lips; engorged and wet.

The viewer is on his way to being redeemed. This woman wants him.

The nudes discussed here, disconcert the viewer with their challenging stare. They have turned the tables on you; you are now the one on the receiving end of the gaze. Briefly, you crumble. You are shocked. Oh, you’ll get over it, but you’ll always remember that feeling of being found out; caught looking.

Thursday 18 March 2010

REQUIEM

“You must repent!” The tall, handsome, young man, confronted Vicky in her neat, pine kitchen. He was very close, his proximity made Vicky feel short of breath.

“Pray with me Sister.” He took out a small, black prayer book from his jeans’ pocket, flicking through it, she assumed, to find the right prayer.

“No.”

She swallowed. She wondered how big his cock was. Long and thick? She tried to banish the thought. Why did she always think inappropriate thoughts, at inconvenient moments? The image faded, then returned. Huge, hard, right down to the glistening, bulbous head.

He turned from her, in disgust, and sat, without being invited, at Vicky’s kitchen table.

Had he caught the end of her thought? Had he known what she was thinking?

She blushed.

His long, straight, dark hair, glimmered in the late autumn morning sunlight. It shone like a halo.

Was he right? Should she turn to Jesus? She was depraved, she knew it. She’d been told often enough. Strangely, by men, when they’d finished doing something depraved to her.

He tapped his fingers irritably against the scrubbed wooden surface of the table. One…two…three…four. And again. And again. The sound stretched out Vicky’s already over stretched nerves. She stood, hugging herself, her arms across her breasts, her hands beneath her armpits. She sneaked a glance at him. He wore a cross on a silver chain around his throat. She couldn’t helped but notice the irony between his emblem of faith, and her emblem of slavery. Hers was worn in the form of a heavy emerald and platinum slave collar, fixed tight around her throat and placed there by her Master.

She smiled. Both she, and this strange young man had devoted their lives to higher authorities. They couldn’t be more different.

Vicky could feel her fuck juices trickling between her thighs. It always happened in the presence of males. Her cunt was salivating to a conditioned response. Like Pavlov’s dogs.

She giggled.

“See how Satan makes the slut laugh at your authority, oh Jesus Lord. The stench of her foul juice, is the corrupt, rotten stink of the sewers, oh Lord.”

“Well, there’s no need to get personal,” Vicky remonstrated. “And I wasn’t laughing at the Lord…oh never mind…” Conversations about God, always wearied her.

The fragrance of fresh coffee pervaded the kitchen. She was nervous, despite telling herself that this was her own home, he was the intruder. She’d made the coffee and been glad of something to busy herself with. But he hadn’t wanted it, asking instead, for a glass of water. That had annoyed her. He had watched her make it. He could have told her not to bother. Bloody Christians. No sense of propriety. No manners. Full of their own smug self assurance.

Vicky turned towards the window. A squabble of blackbirds squawked in the garden, startling her, adding to her feeling of foreboding. She blinked back hot tears. He’d spoken Jesus’ name. Thoughts of sweet Jesus always made her cry. Gentle Jesus. Could He forgive her? She doubted it. She’d heard all this shit before, from her parents. Ironic, how all four of their daughters had turned into sluts.

She turned to face her tormentor.

His grey, steely eyes watched her from beneath heavy lids. The atmosphere was tense. Vicky knew why he was here. Apart from telling her that Jesus loved her, he’d come to tell her that her Master was dead. Vicky already knew. She’d known after the first weekend had gone by without a summons to his home. Not even a phone call to tell her that she wouldn’t be needed. She’d been sure after the second weekend. There’d been nothing. Vicky’s Master had never been out of touch, during the twelve years that he’d owned her. Even if he hadn’t time to summon her to his home, he’d call her with various orders, or a task he’d want her to fulfil.

“There is no hope for Jonathan. He died before he was able to repent. He is in hell now,” the young man said confidently. “Fortunately, I have been able to keep his sin from his beloved family. Sister, Jesus is but waiting to welcome you. Sister, you can still be saved.”

“I’m not your bloody sister,” Vicky said, irritably.

“We are all Brothers and Sisters in Christ,” he told her, smugly.

Her Master was very creative. Even if it were something as simple as going out and fucking a stranger, and whispering to him what she’d done afterwards. He’d want every detail. How big was the stranger’s cock? Had she orgasmed? Where had they done it? In a car, or in a dirty back alley? Had she sucked his cock? Had she swallowed his spunk? What did it taste like?

He’d call her and order her to masturbate, while he listened to her whimpers and cries on the phone. He’d sometimes refuse to let her orgasm, for weeks on end, then order her to come, while doing something utterly degrading with his friends.

She recalled a guy fisting her cunt, while she sucked a series of guys’ cocks. Her Master had ordered her to masturbate her clit.

A sweet soprano voice had sung Pie Jesu, on a cd, as she’d orgasmed. The blast of sensory overload had made her piss herself .

Her Master had posted that on his web site. People paid a fortune to download her latest degradation.

The young man started to hum; “Stand up, stand up for Jesus, ye soldiers of the cross,” under his breath. Vicky recognised the rousing hymn from long, dull Sundays with her parents, at church.

Her Master was a respected lawyer. There was no reason why anyone should, or could have let her know. No one really knew about her. Vicky was simply a slave. She had no rights at all. She was forbidden to call her Master, except in dire emergency. Even then, she had her own special number to call. One that couldn’t be traced. She was her Master’s secret. His family never knew of her existence. No one knew of the perversions he’d demanded of her, perversions that she’d willingly embraced. The depravity that she’d come to relish. No one but the men involved. And the men filming her. Her Master liked to show his pretty slave off, and his tastes were unusual.

So who was this young man and how had he found her? And why did he persist in telling her about Jesus?

He’d called her on the telephone earlier that morning, introducing himself as Leon St Clair. His name had meant nothing to Vicky and she’d almost refused the appointment. Then he’d mentioned her Master’s name, Jonathan Eagleton. He needed to talk to her about the late Jonathan Eagleton. The phrase sent chills throughout her body. Her fears were confirmed. Her beloved Master had passed away. From now on, he would be spoken of in the past tense.

“Will you sit down,” he said in a deep, even voice.

It wasn’t an invitation, it was an order, and despite feeling annoyed that Leon St Clair should think he had a right to give her orders in her own home, Vicky frowned, but obeyed. She was used to obeying orders from men. The heavy, wooden chair shrieked as she dragged it across the flagstone floor. She noticed him grimace at the noise.

He could grimace, she thought to herself. At least the noise had made him shut up his damn holy humming. The sooner he told her what she needed to know about her Master, the better. Then he could go, he could leave her in peace. Now that she had confirmation that her Master was dead, she wanted to be alone with her thoughts.

At last he broke the silence. “You knew my uncle.”

Vicky was seated opposite him. The table was between them. She still couldn’t meet his slate grey gaze. She closed her eyes. She could smell his cologne. It was deliciously male. A hint of citrus and sandalwood and sexy male pheromones. She thought again about the size of his cock and felt a gush of sex juices between her thighs. She blushed again. She wasn’t wearing any panties. Another of her Master’s orders. She knew there’d be a wet patch on her denim mini skirt when she stood up.

“Yes,” she said. “I knew your uncle.”

“You were close.”

“Yes.”
“Close being the operative word.”

All statements, not questions. He already knew about her. A hint of sarcasm in his tone.
“We were lovers,” she said, defensively.

“I think not,” he retorted. “You see, my dear, the pictures and the films I’ve seen of you, have little to do with making love and everything to do with a whore, a nymphomaniac, being unable to satiate her filthy, base appetites. My uncle was a devout, God fearing man. You, whore, you corrupted him. ”

She felt herself blushing scarlet. He must have been to the house. Been down into the dungeon. She knew that her Master destroyed nothing. He was cataloguing the photographs and the films for his old age, he’d told her. And for when she was past her best. When men wouldn’t want to look at her anymore and all she’d be fit for was sucking cock through a hole in the wall. He’d have it all there, to remind him of his sexual prowess.

Leon St. Clair lifted the silver cross around his neck to his lips, and kissed it, as if to remind himself of his Christian status. She wondered what he’d do if she reached under her skirt and unfastened the weighted clit ring. The ring that pierced and stretched her genitals. She could kiss that, it symbolised her way of life as much as the silver cross did his.

“You must repent,” he told her. “You can be forgiven you know. Jesus is weeping, begging you to come to him and pray.”

“What!”

“Surely you can see your life for what it is?”

Yes, she could and she quite liked it. All she needed to do, was find a new Master. There’d be plenty of takers.

She’d been with her Master for twelve years. He’d bought her at the slave auction and taken her straight to his home. At the time, she remembered being proud that he’d paid the highest price of the night for her. She’d felt relief that her owner was an older man. She’d felt safe. She’d knelt, on the dirty, spunk stained floor of the auction room, naked at his feet, daring to press her soft cheek to his leather pants.

She’d been just twenty two. No virgin, but naïve enough to have been shocked at the demands he’d made of her. He’d been insatiable. Her first night with him had introduced her to debaucheries she’d never dreamt of. He was cruel too. She’d been squeamish, she’d refused, when he’d ordered her to lick his ass hole. Her refusal had earned her the first whipping. It had taken weeks for the welts to heal. By the end of the first week, she’d lick his ass hole, wiggle her small tongue into his wrinkled, tight anus, and thank him for the privilege. But he was fair. He’d shown her that her true nature was submissive, and now she couldn’t imagine living any other way.

“Well?” Leon said. “So you rather loosely describe yourself as my uncle’s lover. But that’s not the whole story is it, slut? He owned you. And don’t deny it. I’ve seen the paperwork. The bill of sale. Documents signed by you, giving up all of your rights to Jonathan.”

She hadn’t flinched when he’d called her a slut. She almost regarded it as a term of endearment. Besides, it was the truth, she was a slut. She was listening to Leon’s sexy, deep voice and, once again she imagined sliding his long, thick cock down her throat.

“Yes, he owned me,” she said sadly. “But I did love him, in my own way.”
Leon sighed, exasperated. “Of course you loved him. He paid you enough, didn’t he? You were his paid whore.”

“It wasn’t like that…”

“It was exactly like that. If it wasn’t cash on the table. He bought you this house.”

He stood up. He was very tall, she shrank back into her chair.

“He wanted to make sure I’d be okay,” she said tearfully. “If anything should happen to him. And now it has…”

He walked over to the kitchen window and stared out into the bright garden. He turned around, watching her again, a look of disdain on his dark, angular face.
“So my uncle owned you. What exactly did you have to do for him?”

“You’ve seen the photographs, use your imagination!”

“Yes, I’ve seen them,” his lip curled. “Do you realise that if the police saw them, you could be prosecuted for gross indecency? Bestiality is illegal, you know. Oh foul woman. Not only have you flouted God’s law, you have flouted man’s law.”

“Those were my Master’s orders.”

“Oh, whore of Babylon! You corrupted my uncle. And you would corrupt me. You stink of sulphur and your vile juices. I am sickened to my stomach. I know you. Oh slut. Repent. Repent.”

Well, if he was sickened to his stomach, he was looking good on it. Vicky thought about his cock throbbing inside her. Her cunt muscles clenched and spasmed. Cunt juice surged through her like a tidal wave.

“You don’t know me.” she said angrily. “How do you know me?”

“Father forgive the whore,” he blazed. “You don’t even remember those you have defiled.”

“What.? When? ”
“My uncle gave you to me, for my twenty first birthday gift. You tried to corrupt me and two of my friends.”

So that explained the resonance she’d felt. She remembered now. She’d thought that she’d recognised him because of a family resemblance. But it was because she’d fucked him.

“I don’t recall you minding much at the time.” Vicky retorted.

“Of course I didn’t mind,” he shouted. “I was young. Innocent. You took my virginity and stained me with your filth and corruption.”

“If you call a three way fuck, innocent…As I remember, it was your idea. And you only stopped there because you ran out of holes.”

“And my friends. My poor friends. Forever defiled. They’ve both gone over to Satan, you know.”

“Good for them. I hope they’re having a lot of fun.”

“I weep for them.” And he was. Tears streamed down his face. “You may have succeeded with my poor, lost friends. But you didn’t succeed with me. Oh no.”

“Bill and Harry!” Vicky exclaimed. “Bill liked having his cock sucked. He wanted me to try and get his balls in my mouth too.”

“Oh, whore. Let me cast the devil from you.”

He stepped towards her, and placed trembling hands upon her head.

She slapped him away angrily.

“See how Satan resists. Oh Jesus. Come into this troubled soul.”

His hands shook and he reclaimed her head.

It was most appropriate, Vicky thought, that her face was level with his cock. She could see that he had the most massive erection beneath his jeans zipper. She pushed her face into it and tugged at the zip with her teeth. His hands gripped her harder and he swayed. Banishing Satan was obviously a tricky business.

He groaned his prayer.

“Oh Jesus. See how the whore of Babylon, the daughter of Sodom, tries to seduce your faithful servant.”

What was interesting, she thought, was that he didn’t push her head away, instead, grinding his pelvis into her face. What was even more interesting, now that she’d got his zipper open, was that he wasn’t wearing any boxers. His cock sprang out. Proud and erect. Beautifully ready for her. She wrapped her fingers around his erection and pumped it. She wiggled her tongue into the tiny slit and he whimpered. She slurped at the head of his cock, like it was an ice cream cone, then slowly, expertly, she sank her mouth onto him, taking him down, down into her throat. His balls slapped her chin. Her nose was buried in his pubic hair. His pelvis jerked. His hands slipped down to the side of her head. He pulled all the way out of her throat, then slammed back in again, and again. He gripped her head hard as he fucked her face.

Her neck and head jolted painfully, as Leon controlled the fuck. She realised, there was a family resemblance, he tasted just like her Master. Unlike her Master, he came quickly, jerking his spunk down her throat, straight into her belly.

He stumbled away from her. He was trembling.

“I have cast the devil from this maid’s soul. Thank you oh Jesus. Oh Jesus stay in our hearts. Oh Jesus.”

Oh please. Vicky thought.

“So, are you going to be my new Master?” she asked, sweetly.

“Jesus Lord. Tell me in your holiest, holiest, holiness what I can do to keep this maid free from the stain of sin.”

He slumped down into the chair, his hands clasped, his lips moving in silent prayer.

“I am to keep you clean and white and fit for Jesus, sister. I am to be your new Master. Jesus has spoken to me.”

Vicky personally, hadn’t heard Jesus say anything, but she was content. As far as a good slave is allowed to be content. She considered that Leon showed promise as a Master. Although she would have to teach him how to hold back his orgasms.

She knelt at his feet. She placed her face in his lap. His cock was erect again. She lowered her head and lapped.

Thursday 11 March 2010

PROSTITUTION

Times change; attitudes change, and thank God they do. As writers and social reformers, George Bernard Shaw and Charles Dickens, used their writings to demonstrate the injustices targeted at women. The attitudes to women; those who had “fallen”.

How women were judged, in Victorian England, was a concern of both writers. Shaw wrote a play. MRS WARREN’S PROFESSION in 1894. It was banned from performance for twenty seven years, until the Lord Chamberlain considered that the public were safe from corruption.


When it was performed in New York in 1905 the whole cast and crew were arrested.





Felicity Kendal, plays Mrs Warren in a new production of Shaw’s play. Here’s what Felicity says in a recent interview with Natalie Hale.

“Despite these increasingly irreverent times, Mrs Warren’s Profession still packs a punch.

Mrs Warren’s daughter, Vivie, has never really known much about her mother. A prim young woman, she has enjoyed a comfortable upbringing, a Cambridge education, a generous monthly allowance and now has ambitions to go into the Law.

Is it conceivable that all this privilege and respectability has been financed from the proceeds of the oldest profession?

How will Vivie react when she finds out the awful truth about her mother’s ill-gotten gains?

Shaw’s ultimate test of a mother-daughter relationship is one of his most witty and provocative plays, laying bare the rampant hypocrisy of Victorian society and its constrained morals.

“It’s a very political play actually, because Shaw was a very, very fierce socialist. Everything he wrote was influenced by his thinking.

“In a nutshell, he is arguing for equality for women and looking at why and how so many women in that period were forced into prostitution because of the society in which they lived.

“It’s also about the hypocrisy of how prostitution is very much accepted as a part of society but those involved in it are not accepted and are not respectable.

“It’s fascinating because we still have quite a few of those ideas about women. Certain things are still deemed respectable while other things are not.

“We judge people by what they do rather than who they are.

“It’s also about a relationship between a parent and a child. In this case it’s a mother, who’s a prostitute, and her daughter. But it could just well as be a drug dealer father and his son, and will the son accept how he has made his money.

“It’s a timeless piece actually with very contemporary arguments and questions being asked.”

The two strong women make a brief reconciliation when Mrs Warren explains her impoverished youth, which originally led her into prostitution. Vivie forgives her mother until learning that the highly profitable business remains in operation.
Shaw said he wrote the play "to draw attention to the truth that prostitution is caused, not by female depravity and male licentiousness, but simply by underpaying, undervaluing, and overworking women so shamefully that the poorest of them are forced to resort to prostitution to keep body and soul together."



In DOMBEY AND SON, Charles Dickens uses the character of Edith Granger, a beautiful young widow, to demonstrate the stark choices available to women. There were virtually no opportunities for women in Victorian England, to make their way in the world. They were stuck between two stifling lives; remaining single, or marriage. Edith is one of those women; her life has been devoted to attracting a suitable, preferably wealthy, husband.





In a bitter exchange between Edith and her mother. Edith states her case and reveals exactly where Dickens is coming from. Despite her alluring beauty, Edith has little self esteem and no self respect. From her childhood, she has been trained in the art of attracting a husband.


“The very voice was changed, as it addressed Edith, when they were alone again.
'Why don't you tell me,' it said sharply, 'that he (Mr Dombey) is coming here to-morrow by appointment?'

'Because you know it,' returned Edith, 'Mother.'

The mocking emphasis she laid on that one word!

'You know he has bought me,' she resumed. 'Or that he will, to-morrow. He has considered of his bargain; he has shown it to his friend; he is even rather proud of it; he thinks that it will suit him, and may be had sufficiently cheap; and he will buy to-morrow. God, that I have lived for this, and that I feel it!'

Compress into one handsome face the conscious self-abasement, and the burning indignation of a hundred women, strong in passion and in pride; and there it hid itself with two white shuddering arms.

'What do you mean?' returned the angry mother. 'Haven't you from a child - '

'A child!' said Edith, looking at her, 'when was I a child? What childhood did you ever leave to me? I was a woman - artful, designing, mercenary, laying snares for men - before I knew myself, or you, or even understood the base and wretched aim of every new display I learnt. You gave birth to a woman. Look upon her. She is in her pride tonight'

And as she spoke, she struck her hand upon her beautiful bosom, as though she would have beaten down herself.

'Look at me,' she said, 'who have never known what it is to have an honest heart, and love. Look at me, taught to scheme and plot when children play; and married in my youth - an old age of design - to one for whom I had no feeling but indifference. Look at me, whom he left a widow, dying before his inheritance descended to him - a judgment on you! well deserved! - and tell me what has been my life for ten years since.'

'We have been making every effort to endeavour to secure to you a good establishment,' rejoined her mother. 'That has been your life. And now you have got it.'“





Edith continues;

“'There is no slave in a market: there is no horse in a fair: so shown and offered and examined and paraded, Mother, as I have been, for ten shameful years,' cried Edith, with a burning brow, and the same bitter emphasis on the one word.

'Is it not so? Have I been made the bye-word of all kinds of men? Have fools, have profligates, have boys, have dotards, dangled after me, and one by one rejected me, and fallen off, because you were too plain with all your cunning: yes, and too true, with all those false pretences: until we have almost come to be notorious? The licence of look and touch,' she said, with flashing eyes, 'have I submitted to it, in half the places of resort upon the map of England? Have I been hawked and vended here and there, until the last grain of self-respect is dead within me, and I loathe myself? Has this been my late childhood? I had none before. Do not tell me that I had, tonight of all nights in my life!'

'You might have been well married,' said her mother, 'twenty times at least, Edith, if you had given encouragement enough.'

'No! Who takes me, refuse that I am, and as I well deserve to be,' she answered, raising her head, and trembling in her energy of shame and stormy pride, 'shall take me, as this man does, with no art of mine put forth to lure him. He sees me at the auction, and he thinks it well to buy me. Let him! When he came to view me - perhaps to bid - he required to see the roll of my accomplishments. I gave it to him. When he would have me show one of them, to justify his purchase to his men, I require of him to say which he demands, and I exhibit it. I will do no more. He makes the purchase of his own will, and with his own sense of its worth, and the power of his money; and I hope it may never disappoint him. I have not vaunted and pressed the bargain; neither have you, so far as I have been able to prevent you.’ “





So, as I said earlier, thank God attitudes have changed. Women do have choices. They can marry and have careers. They can have careers and have children. Or they can remain single. Whether the wonderful Billie Piper, as Belle du Jour, is a call girl, an escort or a prostitute; she celebrates herself. She still sells herself, but it is her choice. There will still be those who judge her; but the glorious Belle simply doesn’t care.

Thursday 4 March 2010

BDSM; The practice and the law.




My introduction to BDSM was through stories. It was a gentle, yet erotic initiation.
N.T.Morley’s anthology, MASTER/SLAVE, (available from Amazon) showed me the way. Tempting me, enticing me, luring me along the forbidden, erotic pathways.

There’s nothing like the forbidden, to make me want to explore further -- and so I did, and I devoured the stories. I’m not brave enough to have ventured into the alluring world of BDSM, so I talked to people who know more about it than I do.


So, I thought, in a moment of clarity, that’s what they mean. It’s not just about inflicting and receiving pain and humiliating the submissive. It’s a negotiation, between adults, capable of making their own decisions in a simple and loving way. It’s a two way compliment and commitment from one to another. It’s a relinquishing of power, an exchange of power.


I love you and I trust you. Of course to the uninitiated it’s horrifying -- whoever wants to make love to the sounds of their lover’s cries and sobs. But to those involved, it’s intoxicating.

Jude Mason told me; “I can't speak for anyone but myself. But, in my mind, it's nothing like that at all. The person who gets a thrill from having someone else control him/her is simply enjoying an aspect of themselves not everyone has. A spanking can be the most sensuous act between two people who enjoy it. The feeling/shock of being spanked at the instant of orgasm is amazing. Having someone offer up their bodies for you to play with is such a rush.”







The stories in Morley’s anthology are amazing. M.Christian’s, superb, IN CONTROL -- who is in control? The master or the slave? Kristina Wright; IN THE STACKS -- a little homage to the Marquis de Sade. Midori; I SHOULD NOT WANT THIS -- a slave questions her willing participation in a violent whipping. She concludes; how could I not want this?

Life all fetishes BDSM has a long history; it goes back deep in time. Here’s what Wiki tells us.







The historical origins of BDSM are obscure. During the ninth century BC, ritual flagellations were performed in Artemis Orthia one of the most important religious areas of ancient Sparta, where the Cult of Orthia a pre-Olympic religion, was practiced. Here ritual flagellation called diamastigosis took place on a regular basis. One of the oldest graphical proofs of sadomasochistic activities is found in an Etruscan burial site in Tarquinia. Inside the Tomba della Fustigazione, (Flogging grave), in the latter sixth century b.c., two men are portrayed flagellating a woman with a cane and a hand during an erotic situation. Another reference related to flagellation is to be found in the sixth book of the Satires of the ancient Roman Poet Juvenal (1st–2nd century A.D.), further reference can be found in Petronius’ Satyricon, where a delinquent is whipped for sexual arousal. Anecdotal narratives related to humans who have had themselves voluntary bound, flagellated or whipped as a substitute for sex or as part of foreplay reach back to the third and fourth centuries.






Do you get the feeling that I’m avoiding talking about extreme BDSM? Yes, I am; but I think I have to; talk about it I mean. We have the right to do as we wish to our own bodies; don’t we? We have the right to give consent to someone else to someone else to do things to our own bodies; don’t we? Well, apparently not.



Yet I can visit a tattooist and have tattoos all over my body. I can have my clitoris, my nipples, or any other part of my body pierced. Of course I can.

But in 1990, the infamous Spanner case was brought to our attention.

In December, 1990, in the UK, 16 Gay men were brought to trial and given prison sentences of up to four and a half years for engaging in consensual S&M activity. This followed an investigation, by the police called “Operation Spanner” prompted by the chance finding of video tapes of S&M activities.

During a raid in 1987 the police seized a videotape which showed a number of identifiable men engaging in heavy SM activities including beatings, genital abrasions and lacerations. The police claim that they immediately started a murder investigation because they were convinced that the men were being killed. This investigation is rumoured to have cost £4 million. Dozens of gay men were interviewed. The police learned that none of the men in the video had been murdered, or even suffered injuries which required medical attention. However the police may well have felt that they had to bring some prosecutions to justify their expensive investigation.

The convictions have now been upheld by both the Court of Appeal and the Law Lords in the UK and the European Court of Human Rights in Strasbourg.

If the police discover you have engaged in SM activities which have caused injury, you and your partner could be prosecuted for assault.

Despite what you may have read in the newspapers, for the most part, the men were convicted of the standard offence of assault occasioning actual bodily harm. Their defence, that they had all consented to the activities, was denied.
S&M is not itself 'illegal'.





It’s not very comforting to know, is it, that if the police investigate you for participating in BDSM, the law is not on your side? Even though you have freely given your consent.