Padriag
Posts: 2633
Joined: 3/30/2005
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quote:
ORIGINAL: amayos
I believe the acronym has expanded considerably in the pursuit of accommodating the mainstream palette. It is for this reason I have been avoiding identifying myself with many of the labels and community-oriented terms that are commonly associated with BDSM—not due to their literal meaning, but the sensual diversion they have come to popularly represent. Some literal terms or ideas I will defend boldly, but I do concede to the plasticity of many others.
I think that the term BDSM has been stretched to fit such a wide range of interests and pursuits, of varied styles of life, that it has reached a breaking point of no longer having any valid meaning. For a long time I've refered to the BDSM community as a "loosely affiliated confederation of people with vaguely similar interests" because that's how I see it. So many people with so many different ideas, desires, interests, fetishes, boundaries, etc. A single acronym hardly seems to suffice. Perhaps the only term I can think of that is broad enough to still apply to the "community" as a whole would be "kinksters". Yet straight away I can think of one or two exceptions even to that.
Then to I have often felt that part of the reason there is such a fight over possession of various terms (like master and slave, to name two frequent examples) is in part because all these various groups are each striving, rivalling each other, to have their particular ideas and concepts recognized, validated and made the "official" meaning of the disputed label. A fight for ownership, for control, to control the ability to convey their particular ideas and concepts through singular labels. So while I have long identified myself with specific terms, I find myself, like you, wanting to eschew them and perhaps invent purely original terms. But then I am left with the problem that a wholly original term would not be understood and that defeats the utility of the label. Somes days you feel like you just can't win. 
Noah, I enjoyed your post as well. I agree that ther needs to be a dialog (not a argument, not a fight for control, but a discussion, an open exploration) of these various terms. Not just where they began or who started what (as often comes up as someone attempts to assert authority by virtue of historical precedent), but more importantly what the terms have become, how they are used now, and whether they remain accurate representations of the concepts indicated.
For example, we often use the terms power exchange and TPE... but is that really accurate any longer? As LA is fond of pointing out, is there really any power exchanged or is it something else, authority? That one at least has been discussed before, but there are plenty of others that have hardly had such an examination at all.
And what too of simply creating new terms, why not? Why not write new values on new tablets? Is our collective vocabulary so limited that we must fight over "master", "slave", "dominant", "submissive", etc? Can we not think of, invent, or imagine other labels... a wider variety that is perhaps more appropriate to the wide range of "kinksters" among us?
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Padriag
A stern discipline pervades all nature, which is a little cruel so that it may be very kind - Edmund Spencer
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RE: Ranting on the degradation of BDSM.... - 
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