Clarification: Bondage and Discipline

Both of these words have multiple meanings, and some more than others are relevant to the "lifestyle." Let's start with discipline. The definition that comes most readily to mind, for most people, goes something like this:

"To punish or chastise in order to gain control of another, or to enforce obedience."

Others have more to do with a learning experience:

"A specific, usually named, set of rules of behavior";

"To train for the purpose of achieving behavior that complies with a set of rules";

"Behavior that is in accord with an established set of rules";

and there are more. Note the recurring theme in most of the definitions: rules of behavior. The aim of real discipline is to elicit and reinforce a particular kind of behavior. To be sure, disciplinary activity that happens in the lifestyle is often attributed to the motives specified in these definitions, but in fact, that is sometimes, perhaps even mostly, pure posturing. In that case, the so-called "discipline" is merely choreographed abuse.

What about bondage? The definition most applicable in the "lifestyle." is as follows:

"A state of being physically restrained for purposes of sexual gratification."

Other definitions which may at times be used are:

The state of being under the control of another person;

Being a slave or serf;

Indenture, slavery, or serfdom;

and many variants on the theme. The mental states that describe being in bondage aside, in "lifestyle" terms, it usually refers to the physical restraint of a person, using ropes, chains or a variety of other devices that limit or prohibit movement.

When bondage and/or discipline is used for purposes of behavior modification, it can be considered a true disciplinary regime. This is a normal, but not necessarily frequent or required, part of a Dominant/submissive relationship.

The use of bondage and discipline to achieve immediate sexual gratification depends on the potential of the practises to cause or experience pain, discomfort, humiliation, or helplessness, as an outcome. When used in this way, these practises lay more in the domain of Sadism and masochism.

Whether or not the target is bound, physical punishment as part of discipline may be delivered in a wide variety of methods. If you want a catalog of tools, go to your favorite fetish shop and you will no doubt find a huge array of items designed to inflict any level of pain to any body part desired. Novice disciplinarians though, should proceed with extreme caution. It would be altogether too easy to cause permanent damage or disfigurement, through ignorance.

The idea of an apprenticeship for disciplinarians has great appeal, but there is the problem of finding a credible instructor. One way might be to ask for recommendations from a submissive who has participated in multiple scenes. Before you accept such recommendations, however, be sure to perform a full-body inspection of the submissive - remember, it takes all kinds, and your advisor may think nothing of the fact that his/her body is covered with lesions and scars.

Punishment using humiliation requires more thoughtfulness, and a much more intimate knowledge of the abusee's state of mind..

Given the potential for these practises to result in injury, disfigurement and in extreme cases, even death, one seldom comes upon anyone who engages in them on a permanent, full time basis. Most often, participants in the activities engage in what is knowns as scenes. Before we get into a discussion of what scenes are, lets first deal with another concept: that of the Safe, Sane, and Consensual (SSC) credo.

It should be obvious even to the most casual observer, that these practises can result in great harm to some participants, and put others at risk for jail terms. To mitigate these risks, and hopefully eliminate them, ethical practitioners only engage in activities that are:

Safe - To the extent humanly possible, risks of physical and psychological damage to each participant are identified and eliminated.

Sane - All parties to the activities are nominally sane, and in control of their decisions. It should be obvious that any use of drugs or alcohol would automatically violate this condition.

Consensual - All parties are fully informed of intended and potential outcomes of the activities, and agree to participate voluntarily. It should be noted that, even if written consent is obtained, it will probably NOT provide legal protection for anyone in the event of a death, or significant physical or psychological injury to one or more participants. Let me repeat this in clearer terms: CONSENSUAL OR NOT, IF YOU KILL OR INJURE SOMEONE DURING THE ACTIVITY, EVEN ACCIDENTLY, YOU WILL IN ALL PROBABILITY BE PROSECUTED!

Sometimes participants will use another term for it, but a scene is a somewhat choreographed session, occurring over a defined period of time, with specific and clearly understood rules which establish limits governing the type and intensity of activities to be undertaken.

One implication of the SSC credo, is that consent is dynamic. Consent may be withdrawn or modified (reduced) unilaterally, at any time by either party, and such withdrawls or reductions are binding! For this reason scene rules also usually define the safewords: i.e., words that the receiver of abuse holds in reserve, to be used only as signals that things are going too fast or too far. It is most common to have only one safeword, which stops activity altogether, but sometimes a second safeword is used to indicate a need to reduce the intensity of the activity.

Obviously, if a scene includes having the abusee gagged or otherwise silenced, some alternative means of signalling an end to the activity must be agreed upon, up front. Since most means of silencing the abusee have a significant concurrent risk of asphyxiation, such practises are generally discouraged for any level of activity beyond erotic photography.

About safewords and safesignals: It would be extremely easy to get so involved in an activity that the disciplinarian fails to notice or heed such signals. It is good practise to pause action at regular intervals for a reality check. During these pauses, both the giver and receiver of discipline should clearly and distinctly reaffirm the specific signals to be used and honored. The reaffrmation should be clear, distinct, and unambiguous - redundancy is NOT a bad thing! The conversation might go something like this:

M: "Slave! What is your STOP safeword?"
S: "Sir! My STOP safeword is DUTCH!"
M: "Slave! Your STOP safeword is DUTCH! Is that correct?"
S: "Yes Sir!"
M: "Slave! What is your SLOW safeword?"
S: "SIr! My SLOW safeword is AGAR!"
M: "Slave! Your SLOW safeword is AGAR! Is that correct?"
S: "Yes Sir!"

As I said, clear, distinct, and unambiguous - and redundant. This exchange brings up a few other things about safewords. The words should be short and intelligible even if issued during a scream - for obvious reasons. They should be completely out of place for the action that occurs during the scene - so that if used, they are guarranteed to stand out from the action and get attention. If used the word should be shouted, not mumbled, and MUST BE HONORED AT ONCE! A disciplinarian who fails to heed a safeword runs not just the risks associated with the activity, but may find him/herself unable to find any willing playmates - ever again.

Inasmuch as this is a blog, and not a textbook, this is about as far as I intend to go in discussing bondage and discipline. There are a lot of web-base resources for learning about them, as well as about the practises of sadism and masochism, and dominant/submissive relationships. Unfortunately sometimes those resources are erroneous or are deliberately misleading. Your best resource in dealing with these subjects is common sense.

The next, and last blog in the Clarifications set will be a cursory discussion of personalities and motivations, and how they relate to D/s relationships and BDSM practises.

QM