This entry is to talk about the background and provide a personal lens into my experiences and why I feel so strongly about this topic.
I am a bicurious, Indian, kink-identifying woman, and this is probably my postionality and lens through which I see the world, and it is obviously different for everyone and we all try to make it better from our own perspectives and in our own methods.
In my life as a teen and a tween and through my journey of self-exploration I have faced many instances where I have been shamed for having different interests in almost different realms, come to think of it now it was not very evident to me, but I did know something was wrong and in my own capacity I have fought against it, which gives me a personal connection to this project.
As a teen, I always felt my desires in BDSM were sinful and wrong and that exploring my desires was going against everything my family (and I ) believed in, but I took it one step at a time, I tried to understand what do these desires mean? Is it something considered “normal”? At this point I was in high school and was introduced to fifty shades of grey, which seemed like a good starting point to understand my desires and preferences, and at this point I felt it was a normal thing to do, but what I did not foresee entering this realm is that I would feel “different” from my peers who are not into this realm, or be shamed by the ones in the community that I’m doing it wrong or that I am mentally unstable to have such preferences at a young age, this might have been done subtlely or very directly in-person and online, which prevented me from exploring these preferences until I had a partner at 18 who was open to similar explorations, and this empowered me and made me feel seen and confident, and most importantly that it is safe and okay to have preferences and that age is just a number.
At this point in my life, I was also pursuing my undergraduate studies in leather goods design, and it was the time of lockdown so I had quite some time for experimentation on my hands, and I tried to put in my creativity and skill in developing products for myself and I found immense joy and power in doing this, and with due research realised it is a fast-growing space and field and thus I remember trying to convince my professors to let me take fetish and sexuality related themes in my projects, and with every project I understood the need to be more inclusive and also due to the constant pushing and nagging of my professors, I felt like I was trying to push the boundaries not just for me, but also for the students to study thereon, but I also thought it was not right to try and control the themes and areas I wanted to work in, and thought that pursuing studies abroad would give me much more freedom, flexibility and exposure, but I was proven wrong and rejected from so many schools, simply because of what I assume was bias and unwillingness to let one student pursue a particular target market, is this shaming in the education sector? Do we have to let our students keep their preferences to their private life, if their creativity and skill can enable others to explore their sexuality and be more confident and unapologetic?
As this brief was given to me, I felt it was the perfect time for me to actually go ahead and explore this community, and being new to London and knowing it has a vibrant and open culture in the kink community, I thought it is a good opportunity to pursue this theme, and I can see so much potential in this space.
I started trying to take a more journalistic and ‘get out there’ approach to this project, and I got on FetLife, a well-known online platform for kinksters (exploring, new, amateurs, pros) and there are various groups and forums based on various parameters like location, age, kink, level of willingness ( I mean there are groups where people can vet for potential play partners, some where they can post unsolicited and uncensored nudes and so on) these groups and forums also tend to organise various events from time-to-time, like play parties, sex parties, but the most common of them all are munches. I RSVP’d to one online and let’s see how it goes. I am also reading this book called ‘Kulick,1995, Taboo: Sex, Identity and Erotic Subjectivity in Anthropological Fieldwork’ which is anthropology, but it talks but anthropologists having relationships with their subjects and how it changed their view on society, but they never accounted for it in their studies due to “ethics”, which leads me to wonder what might happen if I tend to get friendly with my participants, and from past experiences of not being able to receive participants, I figured it would be quite helpful to become friendly with the participants, because then there’s a certain baseline of trust and comfort for the participant to talk about some of their ‘personal’ experiences, but anyways, it was interesting how some anthropologists mentioned that it’s an unspoken rule in field-work to not mingle too much with the community, but when some eventually do, they talk about how their positionality and position as researcher in the community is a perspective for the study, and when it is a White person in a minor community or previously colonised community, they talk about their feelings of colonisation within this relationship and some might even face experiences of sexual abuse and assault from the community, and do these count as interactions with the community, which might tamper with their findings, but is it also inevitable and just how society works? I may not be studying kink-shaming from an anthropological perspective, but I certainly think this analysis of other anthropologists who knowingly or unknowingly worked in a similar space/ researched topics around sexuality can be of great importance in transferable principles and understanding how to navigate around field work
While doing my secondary research, I also had to keep in mind that this a journalistic pitch, and I’d have to adapt and use their methods and techniques, and I was hoping to look and read articles which talk about kink-shaming victims, but to my surprise I could find articles, which were shaming some porn channels and stars (Anonymous2019, Mar 27. Why Channel 4’s Mums Make Porn is a kink-shaming insult to young women. Telegraph.co.uk.), and if there was any talk it was about celebrities who spoke up about their experience and the papers/magazines/blogs trying to debate it? It seemed a bit ridiculous to me, like we’ve made strides to be more open and accepting and this is the articles I see in the media, what kind of example are we setting for the future, that it is okay to make someone feel weird because of what you consider “weird”! While I was looking into the secondary research for this, we were working on our Unit-2, and had a workshop on ‘Agency and Social rights’, which I think fits quite well into this framework, and we have to try and fight for our own rights and are we doing it in this aspect, or are we staying silent and letting others also be silent!
I am going to individually talk about some of the news articles or blogs I have read as a part of my secondary research in order to form a base for my primary research and so:
““Vanilla-shaming” has dethroned “kink-shaming”. TikTok’s “KinkTok” has fostered a community in which shame is eradicated and anything goes – unless of course, you’re into “vanilla” sex. Others have called out this trend – as one video noted, “you all have turned vanilla into an insult”. More than a third of women prefer missionary sex over any other position, but we rarely see that on screen – unless it’s used to imply that the sex is boring or forgettable.”( HURT, L., 2023, Jul 18. Kinks, BDSM and even torture porn are everywhere. Why has vanilla sex disappeared from our screens?.) (The Guardian, 4. I think I myself have seen people being “vanilla-shamed” it is perfectly normal to be vanilla, or want to be vanilla with certain partners.)
Portrayal of kinks/fetishes in media, as I had mentioned my personal example of fifty shades of grey is that it is not a healthy representation or accurate and is more a marketing strategy and follows the “sex sells” ideology, and with the rising access to porn to youngsters, what effect does this have? Does it enhance the persepctive on kink, or are we vanilla-shaming instead of kink-shaming? (BOURNE, H., 2023, Sep 23. Holly Bourne: Porn is normalising violent sex — why can’t we talk about it?. Irish Examiner)
The inaccurate portrayal of kink/fetishes in porn leads to a narrative in young teens’ mind which is unhealthy for them and their partners, and they may not know it at first, because who do they ask about these things, and when there is some sort of bodily harm they’re being “sexually violent” when in reality the kids just don’t have the right knowledge and awareness about safe and healthy practice. (Anonymous2023, May 15. Concern grows deeper over normalised sexual violence. Sydney Morning Herald, 8. ISSN 03126315.)
So today I went to a munch which is basically a mixer for kinky people and I found this event on fet life. It is called the ‘Afterwork munch’ in Camden. It was in this place called Bronze age bar in Camden market and I took a friend of mine and we went together and initially we get lost because we went to the same bar which was in Kilburn but we couldn’t find the table so how these events work in most places is that they just have like a recognition thing on the table which is booked for this particular event. So you just have to recognise the table and go and meet the host. We got pretty late because we were obviously roaming around and went to take the wrong bar and everything and once we got the correct place, we found the table for the teddy bear as it was mentioned in the post that they would be one and introduced ourselves and sat at the table. My friend immediately mentioned that he did not like the vibe and if I wanted to leave, we could just immediately leave but I insisted that we stay because I had had actually wanted to do some research and we had come this far and so he said okay and then we just took a seat we just went to get a drink at the bar and he just asked me if I really actually just wanted to be there and I said that I do want to do this research because I feel like I should dive into it without thinking too much and yeah because this is definitely a new territory for me as a person as well, because I’ve never been to one of these events before we noticed that most of the people that the gene age of the people in the group was over 30-35 and they were mostly male and there was a female host and another female and that and then there was me and that was it, the people I had interacted with were three men who presumably Asian and two other white men or just white males in general who were considerably older than the Asian men and they seem to have a normal life but it was a pretty uncomfortable situation. So I did not really want to go ahead and discuss or talk to them more, but it was weird to have like two people who are in their 20s, and everyone else was probably middle-aged. A few people introduced themselves in the group to a few people who are sitting around me and the presumably looked Asian, South Asian specifically and the names were also very South Asian and they just kinda like really leaning in and once I started talking they were like “what is your story?” and then when I mentioned that I do research in kink shaming and my friend tried to back me up by saying that, ‘When she says research, she definitely means research only’, I think that was his way of like protecting me, or like giving them a hint that I am not here for anything else other than the research which I was, I was definitely looking forward to this event until I got there, but it was also a little weird because only this man even though I was like fully dressed in my coat and my pants and everything I practically felt them undressing me just with that eye contact and there was a table distance in between us, but I don’t think that really made any difference to have they looked at me and also when I mentioned that I do research in kink shaming especially as a 20 year old student who is also Indian or South Asian and is accompanied by a man. This is my general feeling and how I felt throughout this interaction of the community of like 20 minutes. It was probably one of my weirdest interactions with humans and I think having a certain expectation of it being very open and welcoming certainly let me down a lot more than I thought it would, but I am anyways glad that I took this step and I went out of my comfort zone to actually go to and try to meet someone in real-life but when I did mention my research a little I don’t think that really intrigued them because it was not really worth that time or maybe they did not feel comfortable talking about it or maybe I did not have the right questions in a proper manner or approach.
I would think of approaching the community in a better way but I definitely think this is a turning point in how to be doing my primary research because showing up to random events and expecting people to open up may not really help in terms of feasibility and also in terms of my safety and well-being, which is definitely a priority but I think I go ahead and collaborate with the establish networks like psychologist, psychiatrist or intimacy, coach and wellness coaches who have some experience in this field and might be willing to help me out in a safe and ethical manner for both myself and also the client or stakeholder.
Well, if we look at this from a pretty personal perspective rather than research perspective, I really don’t think I would have gone to this event because I did have presumption that people are going to be weird and it also just does not come from nowhere. It comes from just personal experience with how people react to women being like they openly kinky. And also it’s also mention that they do research like academic research into this particular topic and I also don’t think a lot if women show up to these kind of events not that it’s just women who get shame but also men do but to a certain level. I don’t think I can argue with male privilege and the patriarchal system which is inbuilt in Asian society, because I think that then definitely to have a privilege to explore and be more open about the sexuality that women do.
I have approached my tutors, with the mention of how uncomfortable the previous interaction, and suggestions on how it can be better, and I was asked to think about what is considered “safe” and “unsafe” in my personal perspective, and as I was reflecting and analysing the previous, I think it was the overwhelming nature of a new group and new people, space and etcetera, and I thought I shouldn’t be too ambitious and start small by building connections in and around my circle and university and friend groups, so I started by sending a message within the groups of my network, and I looked up various organisations which do support sex-positivity and work within this realm of supporting victims, as well as kink-aware therapists to find out different perspectives in this realm as well as a legal perspective to see if we have strict enough laws to cater to a more inclusive community. I sent out a very brief message on various groups, and had one respondent from the university, and I was able to set-up an in—person interview with him. I hope it goes well. In response to this, another person from my school personally approached me with wanting to talk about her experience.
15/3/2024
I have prepared my questions for the interview and printed out a few consent forms too. I am quite nervous but excited, and when I arrived earlier than expected at the venue, but he was kind enough to get coffee for us to relax the vibe, and I did not get right into the interview, because it would seem somewhat awkward and selfish, so we chatted for a bit and realised that he was also a similar background as I am, Indian and from a design school and had different experiences in kink than I did, but then we got to the interview in a quiet corner and I was given consent to audio record it, and we did talk about various aspects including media influence, cultural influence and counselling and support, post the incident and how having a kink-aware/non kink-aware therapist helped and shaped his various relationships in life. He also talked about how sometimes he has been in a position to make someone feel problematic, because I think we all might do that knowingly or unknowingly at some point in our lives done this with ourselves, to our peers etc., and it was quite brave of him to realise and acknowledge it, I think this is one step to becoming self-aware and accountable for our actions. Post-interview also we had a chat for a really long time and it was quite interesting since we come from similar backgrounds to see him open up, and turns out we both are eager to visit the same kink club in London, so we might try and visit it sometime. Well, I think in this process, I may have tried to create a safe space, or I am in the process of figuring out what a ‘safe space’ would look like, and I’m looking forward to talking to more people soon. I am also hoping to talk to the people from my uni.
Today, I am still kind of nervous about how this project is going to without the response of stakeholders, or people in general unwilling to talk. I have reached out to organisations and hoping for positive responses from them. In hindsight, I did put up a story on my instagram, and one of my schoolmates, who is now pursuing psychology is interested in talking about it from a psychological perspective, which I think is quite interesting.
I am also starting to try and form a narrative and so far I have different perspectives on how I am going to go about the pitch, and this would be in this way:
This is a depiction of me trying to understand various factors which influence the phenomenon of kink-shaming and trying to bring out the voices in all perspectives, but I’m still unsure as of now as to how to frame the perspective and narrative, do I try and tell the story of the victims? Do I tell the story of the culture it produces? Do I try and make someone feel it, is the feeling going to cause any visible change? Most importantly, with this I think I want to amplify the voices, but is amplifying the same as feeling? I didn’t think so because once you feel it you understand something better and I think I want to be able to do that.
Also, today I put up a story on my instagram in my search for people to interview about kink-shaming, and I had a respondent say that he thought kink-shaming was positive, and I asked him if I could interview him on this perspective, since I wanted to know different perspectives I could incorporate, and when I met him and explained the project and what I was talking about, he said that he did not feel that was right, but he mentioned that his perspective was that when someone is trying to shame you, it might be because they’re into it or not into it, and you tend to find like-minded people, which is an interesting factor I had not considered. In our interview, he also talked about how there’s a lot of porn which portrays sex/kinks/fetishes/bdsm in a different light than real-life and that may cause a shift in expectations, and he had also mentioned about how different cultures talk to young minds about sex and relationships and how they influence your perspective, for better context here, he is a Indian-male, cis-het, but during adolescence moved to china, and found a different culture in approach to sex education and how it changed the perspective on sex not by too much, since he always had supportive friends who understood things, but his experience would be that of people asking him why and how? He was into certain things, such as nails and scratches and they would listen to his perspective but very few actually made him feel bad, so my inference here is that better sex education leads to a better understanding of how to navigate social scenarios like this! This interview slightly relates to the article here: Anonymous2023, May 15. Concern grows deeper over normalised sexual violence. Sydney Morning Herald, 8. ISSN 03126315., which talks about porn and it affecting relationships in teenagers.
In the meanwhile, I have been collaborating for a while with Dana Shergill, who runs an organisation called, The Partition in Canada, and works on using imagination in empowering people, and I was able to give her a few questions to ask her clients, and fortunately, she was able to arrange another session on the 27th, and I can be a part of it. I am quite looking forward to this collaboration and getting a first-hand perspective from the participants.
24/3/2024
I still struggle to find a way to develop a narrative, since I have so many ideas going on? Digging into the internet for examples of investigative pitches and storytelling are all out-dated and I do not think the principles are really transferable. My initial idea post my experience on 27/2 was to try and make the tutor feel it, but how am I conveying the story when I’m trying to make someone feel something? How do I put in my research and the different perspectives and voices of people in here? An immersive experience definitely helps to relate better with the topic, but RESEARCH incorporation into this, esp. when I don’t have many accounts of participants describing their experience? Is that a gap I should address or a lack of effort in reaching out? On a surface-level analysis I would say people are not very comfortable talking about these experiences, some might not know about what’s happening, some may not feel very strongly about it.
Is my stakeholder demographic strong or would I need to re-think about the demographic? One of my biggest concerns has always been installing trust in stakeholders! But now I think it is too early to come to any conclusions without talking to the people in different perspectives. I hope with this outreach I can concretely base as to whether this is a viable MA project and with reiterations and analysis, whether this would be a good project/venture which can be beneficial for the community.
Responses from organisations are not great, (1 out of 6), and even from psychologists, psychotherapists and counsellors (1 out of 6), which is definitely surprising since I’d have hoped that being kink-aware therapists they’d be interested in talking to someone who is working on this, but the lack of response has some meaning to it I guess?
In terms of research, I will have to line-up my secondary research in all perspectives and form a narrative, and make it immersive or an experience, which is quite a challenge but I am sure I can do it with due thought.
25/3/2024
Today I did the interview with one of my classmates, she was Asian, and she gave me a different perspective on society and culture, and I found it awfully sweet and cute, it was more about kink-enabling than it is about kink-shaming and it made so much sense, and even though the narrative is something I would like to see more of in the world, it is a long shot to get there and would require a lot of change and awareness. Her perspective was that in her culture sex was not talked about, but her partner was open and discussed it with her in the context of their relationship, when I asked her if she would discuss it with friends or if these conversations happened in parties during games, she said it didn’t and it was quite different from the previous respondents and culture and society does play a big role in these kind of scenarios. When she pursued rope bondage as a project in her school, her professors only warned her to be careful as it can lead one into quite dangerous situations and I told her about my experience and she understood and said that she never encountered these situations and that all the workshops she had been to to learn shibari, everyone was non-judgemental because they were also there to learn it, just like her, but when her work was showcased and her parents saw it, her dad who is very conservative was absolutely speechless, and so was her mum but apparently she wasn’t as speechless as her dad, and her professor tried to tell them that it is normal and that she has not done anything wrong. I really think this shows how a supportive environment can be nurturing in a relationship, friendship and in education too allows one to thrive. I personally have experienced something similar when I was doing my undergrad and was doing my graduate collection, ‘SUBSPACE’, a leather subculture, fetish-fashion collection for the Berlin market, at first I wasn’t quite sure if they’d be willing of the theme, but when I further explained my initial idea they were quite supportive and let me do it individually and pushed me out of my comfort zone all throughout the project and it was probably the culmination of my skills as a designer as well as my personal interests, which made me want to turn into the field of kink and figure out what I want to pursue my career in.
Also, I did try to form a narrative and I think I gave a first framework, which I should gather and line up and see if it works, but it starts off with a situation where we spin the bottle, and I consensually shame the person the bottle faces towards, and I am a little about the implications it would have on the receiver but I’m trying a more ‘Show, don’t tell’ approach, but is this taking it a little too far or is it fine? The receiver even though they know what is happening and it is a part of the pitch, might genuinely feel shame and it might lead to awkwardness/feelings of sadness, and I think it is quite hypocritical of me to, but I am going to let it marinate in my head and see if I come up with something healthier and just as impactful, this experience will be followed by me mentioning certain statistics, and then touching on the multiple aspects in short sentences based off the responses I get.
26/3/2024
Today, I was looking into a more legal aspect and I talked to an old friend in india who is a lawyer and it was quite an interesting conversation because we talked about there being a lot of grey areas and ingredients in the law which makes a ‘contract’ or ‘crime’ or ‘case’ and also about the laws surrounding lgbtqia+ and transgenders’ marriage related etc., what was quite interesting was that he mentioned that a bdsm contract would not be legally binding and enforced and if any injuries are sustained during a session would be considered ‘bodily harm’ irrespective of the context, and the case would be filed as such and most people who sustain sex-related injuries don’t really come up to file a case, since all of the court records are public, except for the crimes under POCSO Act (Protection of children from Sexual offences) which are for minors, people under the age of 18, and they are not even in the same room as their perpetrator and I asked him if these principles if applied to legal adults would it encourage people to come forward about their abuse/assault/agony, and he said maybe, but it would also be misused and would be hard to find out whether they’re doing things out of spite or if they have an actual grievance. An another interesting point mentioned was that 70% of the cases are filed against the State and not the perpetrator, because the rights violated are given by the State, which I think is a matter of social rights and agency, that the cases are not filed against the perpetrator but against the State. He had also mentioned that when someone is shamed, and they choose to file a case they would have to be quite persistent about the lodging with the police and it would filed as ‘mental agony’ and that it would take a lot of time, except for the cases filed by people in the SC/ST (scheduled castes and scheduled tribes) would be taken quite seriously and when I asked why caste system is a part of this, he mentioned that these communities are quite oppressed in all aspects that the law is trying to giving them a preference and not feel very oppressed, but it does not do the same for the other castes.’Private complaints’ maybe filed but they would be for certain offences and do not contain ‘mental agony’ and in the case of a married couple (legal man and legal woman) if either of them have experienced marital rape, it does not count since they’re married and it does not constitute rape. It was also quite interesting to note that sexual orientations do not matter while filing a case and during legal proceedings, so any offences to LGBTQIA+ community would be translated to just legal man/legal woman in the proceedings, and what one identifies as does not matter, when we talked about transgenders it was interesting because once a person who is 18+ goes through a gender-affirming surgery they would have to go to the District magistrate (who is essentially a judge) and file for a legal change and if the judge approves then only would they be considered a ‘trans’ person, which is legally a third gender in India only from 2019, and homosexuality was decriminalised 2018, after it was recriminalised in 2013, but same-sex marriages are still illegal.
I would say there’s a lot of grey area in the law and some bias in the law in terms of recognising sexualities, alternative sex and in helping maintain privacy for the victims etc., but these also arise from various factors like societal conventions, socio-economic status of people, culture and miss of law and so on. In his perspective, with more legal awareness on these topics one can easily lodge in grievances and get legal aid. In the end, I would like to highlight one particular sentence which is, ‘‘there is no bias to the person, but to the offence committed’’, I think it quite summarises the legal context of sexuality, kink and kink-shaming in india.
27/3/2024
Today, was the session with Dana and Rae, and we had 4 other participants, and in total 7 participants and we had all shared our experiences with kink-shaming, learning/unlearning done in one’s kink journey etc. In addition to the questions already mentioned in 20/3 above, I added the questions of
How do you think the portrayal of kink/fetishes in media has affected your views on kink/fetish?
How do you think we can make our community more inclusive and have a more accepting attitude?
It felt freeing to share it with other people who’ve shared similar experiences, and be a part of my own research, but having a group of people together and sharing similar experiences, and in comparison with the interviews from the others, I think I see a few patterns emerging and a lot of it point out to three broad areas:
Knowledge (in terms of, getting correct information about practicing safe and healthy kink)
Awareness (in terms of, legal awareness and awareness about porn and the normalcy of kink)
Education (in terms of, safe practice and implementation, aftercare and communication and boundaries)
Resources. (In terms of, access to support, better tools/toys and knowing how to use them safely and effectively)
These are just broad areas, I’ve seen emerge based off the interviews I have done so far, which are quite few, and I am yet to consider other perspectives before coming to conclusions.
I am trying to see gaps in media portrayals of kink/fetishes, and try and use them as examples since, we’re quite influenced by media, and trying to see the gaps in portrayal will help understand how the influence of media on people and how it affects us, and does it actually play a role in shaming/normalising/denormalising kink and our attitude towards it’s acceptance.
