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Fire Play, the BDSM practice that will set your lover on fire, literally! Fire play is a sadomasochist practice that consists of touching the skin of a person with fire, or setting the skin briefly on fire. Its effect is psychological, since the sensation it produces is not painful, just a mild warmth. In fact, if it hurts, this is probably a sign that it’s not being done correctly and it may produce a burn injury. However, it’s hard not to be scared when our skin is being set literally on fire. This is edge play and can be dangerous. I have explained the basic safety precautions here. But if you can get hands-on training, that would be ideal. “Fire play is edge play and is extremely dangerous if done incorrectly or carelessly. Even when all possible precautions are taken, there is a great deal of risk involved. Fireplay can be sensual and painless, but it can also result in serious, even life-threatening injuries…not to mention burning your house down. BE CAREFUL!” The Pyro Passion handout. Why do people like Fire Play? If it’s so dangerous, you may ask, then why do some people do this? Unlike BDSM activities like spanking and bondage, playing with fire doesn’t seem particularly sexual. Still, for some people, it is sexual. Different people fetishize different things, and fire can be a fetish, too. Besides, not all BDSM is sexual. A lot of it has to with conjuring awful things, like whipping and torture, as a way to exorcise our horror about them. Burning people at the stake was one of the worst horrors frequently done in Western culture. For the bottom person, fire play provides the exhilaration of getting over the fear of being burned, which is deeply engrained into us. After all, scaring ourselves with something that looks dangerous is a favorite entertainment for many. Think scary movies and roller-coasters. The physics and chemistry of setting people on fire The magic trick of setting the skin on fire without burning it is based on several facts: The heat of a flame travels from the bottom to the top. Therefore, if the skin is at the bottom of a flame, it absorbs little of its heat. However, if we were to put our hand on top of the same flame, it would burn us. A brief contact of a flame with the skin, as done in fire flogging, does not have time to burn. Alcohols give little heat when they burn, compared with, for example, gasoline. The combustion heat of ethanol is 1367 kJ/mol, and that of propanol is 2021 kJ/mol. In contrast, that of gasoline (heptane/octane) is 4466 kJ/mol, more than the double. Alcohols burn slowly and smoothly, not fast and explosively like gasoline, because they contain water. Safe Fire Play From these facts, we can deduct a few tips about how to do Fire Play safely. However, experienced players emphasize that Fire Play cannot be made 100% safe; you can only reduce the risks. Flames should be applied to the skin of the bottom person in a horizontal position, so the heat of the flame moves up and away from the skin. Use alcohol as fuel. The “rubbing alcohol” sold in American pharmacies as disinfectant is isopropyl alcohol (2-propanol), an isomer of propanol that has the OH- group in the middle carbon instead of at the end (see picture). Therefore, its combustion heat is similar to that of propanol. European pharmacies sell ethanol as disinfectant, which is even safer given its lower combustion heat. The concentration of alcohol should be 60%-70%, not higher. This means that the alcohol contains 40%-30% water, which makes it burn slower and reduces its combustion heat. However, alcohol flows down. If it gets on the sides or below the body it can burn the skin on top. The same thing can happen if alcohol pools in body crevices such as the buttocks, genitals, breasts or any other part of the body with skin folds. To avoid this, run a damp cloth over the body every few minutes to wipe out any remaining alcohol. Advanced fire players may use white gas to get more spectacular flames. However, this increases the risk and requires experience and skill. The white gas used in camping stoves is, basically, gasoline. Its higher combustion heat makes it more likely to produce burns. Besides, a gasoline fire is more difficult to put out with water because gasoline floats on the water and keeps burning. In contrast, alcohol dissolves in water and stops burning when its water content is too high. Gasoline can produce toxic fumes in closed environments, and can burn explosively. Keep in mind that hair spray, cologne and some body lotions are flammable. They could increase the heat produced by the alcohol and make it difficult to put out the fire on the skin. The bottom person should not be bound, to let him/her to put out the fire with their hands or by rolling over, if necessary. Things happen very quickly when fire is involved. There is no time to untie or cut a rope, or to unclip a carabiner. Ideally, the person being lit on fire should be nude to prevent clothes from catching fire. Make sure the hair is out of the way of the flames. Fire play should never be done on the face or the neck. A Kevlar hood can be used for extra protection of the head. Fire play should not be done on hairy skin, because hair generate embers that produce burns, especially if the hair is thick. Use areas with little or no body hair, like the buttocks or the back. People with hairy skin should shave beforehand - preferably the day before because alcohol may irritate newly shaved skin. Burned off body hair may not grow back in the same pattern as before. Fire play should be done away from curtains, sheets, carpets, furniture, grass, straw or any other object that can catch fire. There should be a wet towel and a container with water nearby. The wet towel can be used to smother a fire or to refresh the skin if it gets too hot. Water will dilute the alcohol and stop it from burning. It’s a good idea to use a fireproof blanket to put under the bottom person, since any blanket, sheet or mattress will catch fire if the burning alcohol falls on it. However, some fireproof blankets are meant for welding or putting a fire out, not to lay naked on them. They are made of fiberglass, which can get into the skin and cause irritation. Fire blankets made of wool or Kevlar are better. Although they are less fire resistant than fiberglass, the will withstand burning alcohol for a short period of time. Some old fire blankets contain asbestos, which is extremely toxic and should be avoided at all costs. A simple solution could be using a wet towel under the bottom person. An additional precaution is to have a fire extinguisher at hand, in case things get really out of control and threaten to set the building on fire. It should be suitable for A and B fires. The fire extinguisher is not meant to be used on a person; a wet towel or fire blanket should be used instead. Fire play is not a safe practice to do alone! There should be a top partner who can devote his/her undivided attention to the fire, while the bottom enjoys it and deals with the strong feelings it may evoke. Adding a third person - a spotter - increases safety by providing extra eyes and hands. Nobody should panic while doing this. It can be dangerous. The psychological effects of seeing fire on your naked skin should be discussed while negotiating the scene. If you are completely new to fire play, practice on an object before attempting to do this to a person. Even in that case, do not do it alone and take all the safety precautions. You can even do drills in which you use the dire blanket, the wet towel and the fire extinguisher. Things you are going to need Basic items: isopropyl alcohol, 60%-70 - it can be diluted more with water to make the flame go out sooner; container for the fuel - it should be kept in a closed container, preferably one that would not spill or break if it tips over; a bowl or cup (ceramic or metal) to put a small amount of fuel to dip the fire wand - better if it has a large base for stability Fire wands - they are metal rods with a Kevlar tip (these can be bought as fire-swallowing sticks or fire swords) or a cotton tip; which is dipped in the fuel; lighter, preferably with a long stem; cotton balls. Safety items: fireproof blanket (wool or Kevlar) - to put under the bottom person or to use to smother the fire; wet towel - the first thing to use to put out the fire or to refresh the skin; lotion for burns with aloe - to treat redness and first-degree burns; water in a glass or other container - to put the fire out if needed; fire extinguisher - in case things get really out of hand. Basic Fire Play The most basic form of fire play consists of touching the skin with the tip of a fire wand with burning alcohol in it. Another is to dab the naked skin with alcohol and set in on fire. A fire wand, fire-swallowing stick or fire sword are metal rods with a Kevlar tip or sheet, and a rubber handle. The Kevlar can be dipped in alcohol and set on fire. Since Kevlar is quite fire-resistant, it will not burn with the alcohol. The rubber handle protects the hand of the person holding the stick, which may get hot. The bottom partner should be naked, or wear clothes far away from the skin that would be used for the fire play. Put a small amount of alcohol in the metal bowl. Close the main container. Dip the Kevlar tip of the fire wand in it. Light it on fire with the lighter. Touch the naked skin with the tip of the stick. Fire should be in contact with the skin for a maximum of 3 seconds, to avoid burning. Don’t apply fire repeatedly to the same spot. Sometimes, a bit of alcohol remains burning on the skin, which can be put out with wiping motion of the hand. Alternatively, a bit of alcohol can be rubbed on the skin with a cotton ball. Then the fire-swallowing stick is used to light the alcohol on fire. After one or two seconds, the top puts the flames out by wiping them with the hand. The bottom person should just experience a warmth in the skin. The fire should not be kept too long on the skin, because the heat can build up fast to the point where it becomes intolerable and produces a burn. Some redness in the skin is normal and can be treated with aloe lotion. Advanced Fire Play Hair mousse burns slowly and with low heat. White Rain, Salon Selectives, Alberto V05 are the brands that I have seen recommended for this. It is used to draw patterns on the skin, which then are set on fire. Often, the fire moves over the mousse in waves, creating beautiful effects. It usually turns itself off before the mousse is consumed, and needs to be lighted again. Flash cotton can be cut in little pieces, which are put on the skin and lighted. It is also called flash paper, and its technical name is nitrocellulose. It’s a highly flammable compound that burns in a flash without leaving any residue. Therefore, its effect is the opposite of hair mouse: instead of burning smoothly, it produces a quick, hot flash. This increases the danger of setting something on fire, so extra precaution is required. Fire drumming uses two fire wands to drum on the skin. Fire flogging use floggers made of Kevlar, which can be dipped in alcohol and set on fire. The flogging is done with the bottom person standing up or leaning on something. A horizontal position is not used in this case, since the flames touch the skin of the back only during the brief impact. The sensation is said to be nice flashes of heat. Fire flogging is often done at night or in a dimly lighted room because of the visual effect. Cupping is considered by some to be fire play, although the fire is only used to heat the suction cups and does not touch the skin. Still, since fuel can spread to the body, the precautions listed here should be taken. These are advanced techniques with which I am not familiar. The best thing to do to learn fire play is to participate in a workshop organized by a BDSM organization. There is a handout written by Pyro Passion that can be downloaded as a text file and printed. Here is one article about fire play, and another. There is also a book: Flames of Passion: Handbook of Erotic Fire Play, by David Walker and Robert Rubel. Things that can go wrong Fire play may seem simple enough, but it should be considered edge play and done with the utmost precautions. Things can go horribly wrong. There is an account in Fetlife.com (in the Fire Floggers and Fire Whips group, Fire cupping gone wrong; direct links are not possible) about how a scene involving fire cupping resulted in second-degree burns over a large part of the body. In a nutshell the main mistakes were that the bottom was restrained, alcohol inadvertently pooled on her body and suddenly caught fire, and there was no wet towel to put out the fire. Here are a few things most likely to go wrong, and what to do in those cases: The fire stays too long on the skin of the bottom - The top should put it out with his hands. If this doesn’t work, immediately use the wet towel or the glass of water to put out the fire. The clothes of the bottom (or the top!) catch fire - Put them out by with the wet towel. Furniture, curtains, sheets, etc. catch fire - Use the wet towel or fire extinguisher to put the out fire. You accidentally set the cup with fuel on fire - If the fuel is alcohol, it could be put out by damping water on it or covering with a damp towel. If it’s gasoline, this is much more dangerous and may require a fire extinguisher. The fuel container falls down, spills fuel on the floor, and it catches fire - That’s why you need a fire extinguisher! Put the fire out immediately with it. Small spills may be put out using the wet towel, but don’t take any risks. Gasoline fires are much more dangerous than alcohol fires. Alcohol spreads or pools on the body of the bottom - wipe it thoroughly with the wet towel. The bottom panics - The bottom may jump up and run away, which is fine, except that things may get knocked over and set on fire. The top needs to have the presence of mind to put out any flame before helping the bottom. Summary In summary, fire play is an edgy BDSM activity that toils with one of our deepest emotions: the fear of being burned. It is visually beautiful and exciting. The physical sensations it evokes are surprisingly pleasant. If done with the adequate precautions, it can be a lot of fun. Copyright 2022 Hermes Solenzol.

Erotic scene from a novel I'm writing in Spanish, "The Fascist, the Red and the Coup." Luis is a young lawyer and double amputee. He has to share a room with his secretary Nina in a small village in Castile where his dark businesses have taken them. Sasamón (Burgos, Spain), Friday July 25, 1980 “I want to take a bath, to see if I can relax,” Luis said to Nina. “But if you want to shower first, I don't mind waiting.” “No, please, go first. Take all the time you want. I'm going to clean up my notes for you to read later.” Luis went into the bathroom, put the stopper in the tub and turned on the faucets. He undressed and sat on the edge of the tub to remove his prosthetic legs. When he took off the second one, he lost his balance and fell backwards into the bathtub with a big splash, hitting his head against the wall. Nina came running into the bathroom. “Boss, what happened? Are you okay?” Luis grabbed the edge of the tub and managed to sit up. He wiped his eyes with his knuckles. It was totally humiliating to be naked and helpless in front of her. “No big deal… I fell while taking off my prosthetic legs. I'm fine. “You should have asked me for help. I’ve nothing else to do.” Nina sat on the edge of the tub. She took a towel and put it on the back of his head. When she took it off, it was smeared with blood. “You are going to get a lot of blood in the water. Let’s see…” Nina unrolled some toilet paper, folded it, and put it on the back of his head. “Better. Hold it with your hand… Like that. Do you want me to wash you?” “No, Nina. I'd rather do it myself…” “Why are you so determined to make your life more difficult, boss? Come on, lie back.” Nina took him by the shoulders and helped him lie on his back. Luis closed his eyes and allowed himself to relax. His head and butt hurt from the fall. He did feel a little shocked. He took a deep breath, waiting for the pain to pass. If Nina insisted on mothering him, why shouldn't he let her? After all, she had already seen him naked. Since he’d lost his legs, bathing had become a complicated and risky affair. Carolina, his wife, often helped him do it. He felt Nina's hand grabbing his left stump. He opened his eyes, alarmed. Nina stared fascinated at the stump sticking out of the water, a bar of soap in her hand. It was an ugly purple color, with wrinkles where the skin sealed the broken femur. He had seen his stumps a thousand times and still hadn't gotten used to them. He had always been embarrassed by show his stumps. No one managed to hide their disgust. It had taken Carolina months to get over it. But there was no disgust on Nina's face. Just curiosity and dedication. She began to lather his stump. The delicate touch of her fingers on his skin was delicious. Luis closed his eyes and abandoned himself to the sensation. When she was done, she reached into the water for his right stump. Luis opened his eyes and saw that he was soaking the sleeves of her shirt. “You're getting your clothes wet, Nina.” “It's true,” Nina said, looking at her shirt. “Oh no! I even have blood stains on my shirt! Well, since you're naked, I guess you won't mind if I take it off.” Without waiting for his answer, Nina put the soap back in the soap dish and unbuttoned her shirt. She took it off and put it on the toilet. Her bra was black against her white skin. Her breasts looked round and firm. He knew how this was going to end. He could stop it now. Send her out of the bathroom and not cheat on Carolina. But why shouldn't he take advantage of an opportunity like this? It surely would never come again. Why couldn't he screw his secretary, like any other boss? She wanted it. Another woman would have left the bathroom upon realizing that he was naked, instead of taking advantage of his helplessness. And Nina hadn't hesitated for a second to take off her shirt. What a slut you've hired, Luis! His father's voice said in his head. It may be a slut, dad. But she's my slut. But he still felt ashamed and powerless. He could not allow her to continue to take the initiative. “Keep undressing, Nina.” “Don Luis, I think you misunderstood my intentions. I just wanted to help.” “I think I understood your intentions perfectly, Nina.” “Don Luis, surely you will want to be faithful to his wife. And, for me, not to become the secretary who sleeps with the boss.” Maybe she was right. His sister might be a whore, his mother an adulteress, and his father a whoremonger, but he didn't have to be like them. He could be a virtuous man, as advised by Marcus Aurelius and the Stoic philosophers that had helped him get out of his depression, and not take his own life, when he lost his legs. Nina's gaze met his. In her eyes he read an unmistakable lust. He never thought that he would arouse such intense desire in a woman again. He desperately needed to know if it was true. “You’ve told me many times that you were at my disposal for whatever I needed. And now I need to see you naked.” “It's true, I've told you many times, and I was being sincere. And, for the record, it's not because you pay me, but because I want to serve you from the bottom of my heart. Because you believed in me and gave me a chance when I didn't deserve it.” He didn't expect to hear something so intimate. But it was consistent with their conversation the night before. “I know. You are in my debt. And I've always intended to collect that debt.” “You are the one who is married. It is your decision. I'll do what you tell me, boss.” “Then undress. Please, don't make me repeat myself.” Nina folded her arms behind her back to unhook her bra. She placed it on her shirt. Her breasts were not as large as he liked, but her nipples were thick and dark. Nina watched him ogle her with neither embarrassment nor pride. She unzipped her skirt and let it fall to the floor. It went on top of her other clothes. She kicked off her shoes. Sitting on the toilet, she unrolled her stockings. Then she stood up and pulled down her panties. Black fur hid her most intimate secrets. Her naked body was even more beautiful than he had imagined. A flat belly, graceful hips, and muscular yet feminine thighs. “Turn around, Nina. I want to see your ass.” How stupid! His father's voice said in his head. Nina turned her back to him. She had cute dimples on top of her perky buttocks. Luis felt his cock harden. “Do you like my butt, boss?” “You have a beautiful butt, Nina.” She turned to face him. “Can you make room for me in the tub? Or do you want me to wash you from the outside?” Luis slid to the end of the tub, making room for her. Nina stepped into the water, kneeling in front of him. She took the bar of soap and began to lather his chest. “You are a very attractive man, Don Luis.” His heart skipped a beat at hearing her say that. “Nonsense. An invalid like me cannot be considered attractive.” “Excuse me, boss, but it's you who talk nonsense. There are many things in a man that can be attractive, apart from his legs. Like a muscular chest, strong shoulders and an elegant face. Not to mention a brilliant brain, which has always been what I liked most about you. “You are flattering, Nina. It's a shame that I know that you are a liar.” “However, after that first lie, I promised you that I would never lie to you again. Don’t you remember? And you told me you'd give me a spanking if you ever caught me in another lie.” “Well, I hope we’ll both keep our promises.” “I will. When I told you that I like you, it was the truth. Lean back, please.” Luis leaned back, letting his body float in the water. Nina grabbed his right stump and kissed it. Then she lathered it, working her way down his thigh until she found his erect cock. She wrapped it in her fist. “Do you want me to take care of this, too?” Luis grabbed her wrist and forced her to let go of his cock. He sat up and looked into her eyes. “What I want, Nina, is to fuck you. If you don't mind, of course.” “I see you're not beating around the bush, boss. So, that’s what we are going to be? The boss and the secretary who sleep together?” “I don’t see why not. It’s a respectable tradition. And I am very traditional.” “And your wife? Does she also respect that kind of traditions?” “She’d better, after all I've done for her.” "So, you are going to tell her?" “Of course not! And you better not tell anyone, understand?” “As you pointed out on the first day, the word secretary comes from secret. Maybe that's why there are so many secretaries that sleep with their boss.” “Let me be clear. On our daily interaction, you’ll have to behave as if none of this had happened. No kisses, no hugs, no flirting. Even if there is nobody else there.” Nina pouted. “Are you sure? If we're going to be lovers, I wouldn't mind if you groped me once in a while. It can help you relieve stress.” “For now, it will be better that we both behave with decorum. We must never lose professionalism and mutual respect.” “I do understand that, Don Luis. You have always treated me with respect. You are quite a gentleman, and I appreciate that.” Nina washed his hair, then washed herself. He watched her. Kneeling in front of him, she lathered her breasts, her belly, her thighs, her ass and her crotch, letting him appreciate the firmness of her body. He held back his urge to touch her, letting the ritual that had been established between them take its natural course. He would have plenty of time to grope her. When she finished washing herself, Nina put her feet on his shoulders, pinched her nose and dove under the water, raising the level dangerously close to the edge. “And now what do you do?” she said, twisting her hair to drain it. “Do you put on your prosthetic legs to walk to the bed?” It was a tedious process. At home, he would sometimes crawl from the bathroom to his bed, which was just a mattress on the floor. But crawling was too undignified to do in front of Nina. “There is no other way.” “I could carry you in my arms. You are probably not too heavy.” The image of him being carried in her arms like a baby was even worse than crawling. “No, thanks. I'll put on my legs on. It doesn't take that long.” “I hope you will not fall again.” “Not if you give me a hand.” Nina helped him out of the tub and to sit on the edge. Then she held him while he strapped on his prosthetic legs. He let her dry him with the towel. Naked, they walked into the bedroom. There were two single beds. They could fit in one only if they held each other. Nina asked him if she wanted his prosthetic legs removed. “Better not, for now.” Nina giggled nervously. “I'm not on the pill, boss. But I always carry condoms in my bag. Do you mind if I go get them?” “No at all.” Nina came back with a strip of condoms and left them on the nightstand. She lay down by his side, resting her head on his shoulder, tangling her fingers in the hair on his chest. “If I have to be honest, I can't wait. I haven't had a decent fuck in years.” “And I’d wanted to fuck you from the first time I saw you.” Nina's hand trailed down his belly to his cock. She wrapped her fingers around it. “But you didn't hire me because of that.” “No. I hired you for being a liar.” “Seriously?” “You can see the kind of business I'm in. In some situations, knowing how to deceive someone can be a matter of life and death. Neither I want anyone with scruples that would make her hesitate at a critical juncture. Or, what would be worse, betray me.” Nina's fist closed around his dick. “I will be loyal to you, Don Luis. Fucking me can be like sealing a blood pact.” “I hadn't looked at it that way. Getting laid doesn't have to be of any consequence.” “Oh, but sometimes it does! Fucking makes people bond, right? And, with this, I am showing you that I was serious when I told you that I am at your service for anything you need.” Nina placed her thigh over his belly, trapping her hand with her cock under it. She kissed him lightly on the lips. “Well, I suppose that fucking has any meaning we want to give it.” “Let's give it this one, then,” said Nina. “Let it be a pact of loyalty between us.” Her thumb caressed his frenulum, sending sparks of pleasure. “It just got hard,” she said. What if we put a condom on it?” “Go ahead.” Nina turned to the nightstand and got a condom. She tore off the wrapper and looked at it doubtfully. “I don't have much experience with this. You better put it on.” “To have experience, you need practice. Put it on. If you mess up, there are more condoms.” Nina kneeled by his hips. She unrolled it over his stiff cock. “Oops! I think it's inside out.” Luis sat up to examine it. “There is no inside or outside. It's okay.” “And now what?” Her dark nipples looked at him like another pair of eyes. He reached out to feel the firmness of her breast. He pinched her thick nipple, felt it rise under his fingers. Nina looked down at his hand. Luis gradually increased the pressure until he saw Nina grimace and bite her lip. He stopped. “Don’t stop,” she said. “I like it.” He squeezed again. She smiled at him. With his other hand, he explored the slit of her pussy. She was soaking wet. “Straddle me,” he ordered. Nina put one knee on either side of his hips and sat on his belly. He could feel her wetness on his balls. “Put it in.” “I… I've never done it like this… I'm not sure how.” “It's not that hard, Nina.” He grabbed her by the nipples to pull her up. Realizing what he had to do, Nina grabbed his cock, angling it to aim for her entrance. Then she lowered herself on him. Luis felt his penis bend, but it soon found the opening and slipped inside. The vagina that enveloped him was warm and moist and tight. Nina kept lowering herself until she was sitting on his lap, the hairs of her pussy tickling his balls. Nina looked down at him with a surprised expression, as if she herself didn't believe what she had done. “Wow! This feels amazing! Doesn’t it?” “You did quite well, Nina,” he said, stroking her ass. “Oh, I’m so glad! I've never done it like this before… Normally, they shove it in and start pumping like crazy. This time I could feel it gradually filling me… Am I talking nonsense?” “Complete nonsense… I love it! She smiled at him. “Shall I move? I'm not sure how.” “Up and down. Slowly… I’ll guide you.” He grabbed her hips and helped her raise a little. When he felt that he was almost out of her, he pushed her down again. “See? That’s the range of motion.” “I see… Without your legs, it’s easier for you like this… Oh, sorry! I didn't mean to offend you.” “You haven't offended me, Nina. I can fuck on top, too. Especially when I have my legs on… They act as a counterweight.” She put her hands on his chest and started going up and down on him. “You're right… This feels good… I like it… I like it a lot.” He put a hand on her ass to feel her move as she fucked herself with him. With the other hand, he pinched her nipple again. Nina responded by moving faster. “Yes! Hurt me, boss!” Luis gave her a strong squeeze. Nina threw her head back in ecstasy. He felt her come, her pussy contracting around his cock. With her orgasm, she had stopped moving. Frustrated, Luis pushed her aside. He climbed on top of her. Nina's eyes widened in surprise as he entered her again. “Now I’m going to show you that I can fuck you perfectly well from the top.” He grabbed her thighs to spread her legs wide, pushing them up. “Of course, boss! Show me what a real man can do to me!” He began to pump her hard, at first slow and deep, then gradually increasing the pace. Nina grabbed him by his shoulders, as if wanting to push him off. Instead, her hands moved down his sides and down his hips to end up squeezing his buttocks, which contracted with every thrust. As he began to come inside her, he heard her scream and felt her shake with another orgasm. Luis rolled to one side, filled with vague suspicions and remorse. Nina turned towards him and kissed him on the lips. “Damn, I feel so good! Clearly, I needed a good fuck like this!” “I'm glad you had a good time, Nina. I enjoyed it, too.” “You are an incredible lover, Don Luis. I really enjoyed riding you. And, after that, you behaved like a real animal!” “I think I'd better go sleep in the other bed.” “No, no, please!” Nina grabbed him by the arms. “Let’s sleep together. I need to feel your skin against mine. I've been lonely for so long!” “Well, I hope we're not too uncomfortable.” “We won’t be, you'll see. Let me take the condom off. And your legs.”

A spanking weaves an erotic theme using the position of the bodies, force of the slaps, cadence and ritual. What do we like in a spanking? If you like spanking, you are in good company. Most people do. A recent study (Herbenick et al., 2020) showed that 77% of men and 54% of women had spanked somebody, and 46% of men and 66% of women had been spanked. People like spanking for different reasons, but they usually include some of these things: Erotic pain. A sexual spanking doesn’t need to be painful, and most spankings involve only light pain. However, for a lot of people, the quality and intensity of the pain are important parts of the spanking. Physical contact. Besides pain, a spanking involves many physical sensations and skin-to-skin contact between the spanker and the spankee. The butt is an erogenous zone and a target of sexual desire. It becomes the focus of attention during a spanking. Vulnerability. Among the psychological drives of a spanking, there is the feeling of vulnerability brought by exposing an intimate part of the body to the touch and infliction of pain by the spanker. Humiliation. The positions in which spankings are given are embarrassing. The spankee is partially immobilized or compelled not to escape, making her or him feel defenseless. Baring the bottom is intimate and sexual. Moans, cries and struggling elicited by the spanking add to the humiliation. Submission. For some couples, spanking represents dipping their toes into the power exchange of having one partner take control over the other. The ability to undress, embarrass, infantilize and give pain to somebody are powerful and tangible ways to demonstrate dominance. Infantilization. The fact that a spanking is traditionally a punishment for children is another thing to consider, even if this is kept out of mind. Some people may do spankings as part of age-play or a Daddy-little interaction. However, most people who are into spanking prefer not to think about its connection with the corporal punishment of children. I am completely against spanking children and non-consensual spanking of adults. Punishment. Another important facet of spanking is that it is a traditional form of punishment. While some couples may brush over this fact, for others is central. Positions for spanking I wrote another article about this, Eleven Great Positions for a Spanking, including illustrations of each position. Here is a summary of these positions: Standing. Both the spanker and spankee stand. This is normally used for a quick, impromptu spanking. Under the arm. Also used for a short, impromptu spanking. The spanker stands and forces the spankee to bend over, holding her under one arm while hitting her bottom with the other hand. Works well when the spanker is strong and the spankee light, in which case the spankee may even be lifted from the floor to increase her vulnerability. Bending over furniture. The spankee is bent over a table, desk, bed, back of an armchair, etc. A hand on the lower back can hold the spankee in position quite effectively. Over the lap. The spanker sits down and pulls the spankee face down across his lap. This is the most traditional spanking position, but only works well if the spanker is bigger and heavier than the spankee. Over the knee. This is a better alternative to the over the lap position if the spankee is heavy. Instead of sitting on a chair, the spanker sits on the floor or the bed with support for his back. Then the spankee can lay across his legs with most of his or her weight on the floor or the bed. Straddling the thigh. The spanker sits on a chair or armchair. The spankee faces him, straddling one of his thighs and leaning on the back of the armchair. This position opens the crack and puts pressure on the genitals, something women may like and men find uncomfortable. Leg lock. The objective is to partly immobilize the spankee to increase vulnerability and minimize struggle. From a sitting position, the spanker puts the spankee between his legs and bents her over one of his thighs. Alternatively, in the ‘straddling the tight’ position, the spanker traps the leg of the spankee caught between his legs with his free leg. Leg scissors. On a flat surface, like the floor or the bed, the spankee is placed over the lap of the spanker. Then the spanker traps the leg of the spankee further from him with one of his legs. This opens the legs of the spankee at the same time that immobilizes her. This position can be done in such a way that the crotches of the participants are in contact, making it very sexual. Straddling the spankee. The best way to immobilize a spankee is to straddle her on her lower back, facing her feet. Then her bottom can be beaten like a drum. The problem is that a heavy spanker can hurt the lower back of the spankee. This can be solved by finding ways not to put the full weight of the spanker on the spankee, for example, by straddling her while the spanker kneels or stands. Diaper position. Unlike other positions, the spankee lies on the back and faces up. The spanker then lifts the legs of the spankee until the bottom is exposed for a beating. To free the hands, the spanker may place the ankles of the spankee on his shoulder. One advantage of this position is that the spanker can see the face of the spankee. It stretches the butt and the upper thighs, increasing the potential for pain and vulnerability. Bending the legs further down towards the head opens the crack and exposes the genitals. Wheelbarrow position. The spanker sits on an armchair, sofa or bed, and the spankee sits on his lap facing away from him. Then the spankee bends forward until she is upside down, head on the floor, hips trapped between the spanker’s thighs, and legs are under his arms. The bottom of the spankee is now on the spanker’s lap, crack open, ready to the beaten like a drum. This position may be a bit difficult to achieve, but unsurpassed for the feeling of vulnerability and humiliation. Pain in spanking: sting or thud? Strictly speaking, a spanking is the beating of the buttocks with the hand, and not with a paddle, belt, flogger or other implement. This limits the amount of pain that can be delivered, given the weight, softness and fragility of the hand of the spanker. Pain given to the butt can be of two different qualities. Stinging pain is produced at the skin by the compression of air over it. It feels sharp and prickling, and leaves a tingle and a warmth. Thudding pain is produced by a blunt impact on the deeper layers of the skin and the muscle. It’s a dull form of pain that leaves an ache and no warmth. The lash of a light whip is pure sting. A kick in the butt is pure thud. You can find information about the nerve fibers involved in these two kinds of pain in The Neuroscience of Spanking. I used to assume that the erotic quality of the pain of a spanking was because it’s mostly sting. However, I have met a lot of people who prefer thuddy pain. They like being punched or even kicked in the butt. However, spanking is not a good way to deliver that kind of pain. Still, these people may enjoy being spanked with a rigid hand, glancing blows, or receive an occasional punch. In any case, the following recommendations are to deliver a stingy spanking. How to use your hands for a spanking To maximize the stinginess of a spanking and the subsequent warm afterglow, the whole surface of the hand should impact the skin at the same time, trapping the maximum amount of air underneath. Keep the fingers together and cup the hand to match the curvature of the buttock. Relax the wrist to allow the hand to flop over the butt, instead of hitting it like a rigid paddle. Hitting from a short distance allows more control and does not produce much pain. Lifting the hand high in the air lets in gather more speed and recruit the momentum of the arm, so the impact will have more force. However, this allows less control on where and how the hand will hit the butt. Normally, the butt is hit perpendicularly to the skin. Some people like to use glancing slaps, which provide a more thuddy sensation. Topography of the bottom What part of the bottom is hit is also important for a spanking connoisseur. An artful spanking hits different parts of the butt with different frequency and force, and this depends on the preferences of the spankee and the effect we want to achieve. The parts of the butt are: The cusp is the top of the buttocks, the area of maximal curvature. The crack separates the two buttocks and hides the anus. The crease is the wrinkle that separates the buttocks from the thighs. Some bottoms have two or even three creases. The sweet spot or sitting spot is the area between the cusp and the crease. It’s what comes in contact with the chair when we sit. The sides of the buttocks are to the left and right of the cusp, towards the head of the femur. The upper buttocks are above the cusp toward the hips. The upper thigh is not part of the butt, but it is often hit in a spanking. Usually, a spanking is delivered to the sweet spot and the cusp. Hitting the sweep spot will leave a reminder for when the spankee sits down. It will be also felt by both partners during doggy style intercourse. On purpose or by mistake, slaps aimed at the sweet spot often hit the crease and the upper thigh. This is also erotic. But keep in mind that the thigh is more sensitive to pain than the buttocks, and also more fragile because the hamstring muscle is tighter and more dense than the glutes. The sides and upper buttocks are also more sensitive to pain, and less erotic. They are often left out of a spanking, but a few slaps can be delivered there to produce a full-bottom spanking. The crack is extremely sensitive and intimate, so hitting it is normally reserved for hard-core spankees. Hitting the anus is very painful because it’s made of mucosa - the same thin skin found in the inside of the mouth or on the inner labia of the pussy. Some people call hitting the anus “penalty slaps” but this should be done with caution. Spanking the crack requires a position that opens it, like straddling the thigh, the diaper or the wheelbarrow positions. Other parts of the body - inner thighs, calves, sole of the feet, pussy - can be spanked, but this is a different matter from the one addressed in this article. Cadence Another important part of a spanking is the rhythm with which the slaps are delivered. There are many possibilities and countless combinations. An even rhythm lets the spankee know when the next slap is coming. A hard, even spanking maintained over a long period of time creates a feeling of inevitability and defenseless. If it’s less hard, an even spanking lets the spankee becomes lost in the sensation and the fantasy, possibly leading to sexual arousal and sub-space. An uneven rhythm, especially if combined with spanks of different force, keeps the spankee on edge. It forces her or him to pay attention to the spanker. It prevents going away to become lost in fantasies. Very fast spanks quickly build up the pain, transforming it into a continuous sensation. However, if the spanks are not hard, this can provide an erotic stimulation of the butt that can feel playful, even funny. A slow, hard spanking lets the spankee recover from the pain of the previous slap and start anticipating the next. Combined with raising the hand high in the air, this conveys a message of power, domination and punishment. A burst of quick, hard spanks is great when we want to elicit a response from the spankee, like answering a question. It is common to interrupt a spanking to gently stroke the bottom. This allows the spankee to take a break from the pain and reconnect emotionally with the spanker. Some kind words help. It is also a good moment to ask the spankee if she is okay - in most positions the spanker will not be able to see her face. While doing this, the spanker enjoys the softness and the warmth of the skin. However, interrupting a spanking when the spankee is deep into the fantasy, especially if it is a punishment or power play, can totally ruin the scene. Structure, theme and ritual By structure, I mean what happens in a spanking, from beginning to end. Normally, we want to begin with a warm-up, with soft, slow slaps, building up the force and the cadence to a climax, then continuing with caresses and softer slaps to a soft landing. Then there should be aftercare and, possibly, sex. However, it is more complicated than that. An artful spanking has a story to it, a theme. It often follows a certain ritual. For example, it can be a punishment or pretend punishment (‘funishment’) in which the spanks are intermingled with scolding, and doesn’t end until the spankee promises to mend her ways. Or it can consist of dominating a brat who talks back and rebels until the pain reaches an intensity that subdues her. It can be a wrestling spanking, in which the spankee has to be overpowered and immobilized before being spanked, and may eventually escape and need to be recaptured. On the lighter side, the spanking can be purely erotic, and the communication about how aroused the spankee is getting. Spankings often incorporate an undressing ritual. The spanking may start over clothes, with the spankee fully dressed. This also ensures that the first slaps are not too painful. After the warm-up period, when the sexual tension starts to build up, pants are lowered or skirts are raised. The spanking proceeds over the panties or the underwear, which are eventually removed to announce the culmination of the spanking. The removal of clothes may be used as a threat to increase drama. Ideally, a spanking is a form of communication in which both the spanker and the spankee are active, each in his own role. The communication can be partially verbal. But the most important part is the spanker delivering an ongoing message with the force of the slaps, their cadence, the parts of the butt being hit. The spankee responds to this message with moans, cries, clenching and relaxing the glutes, kicking the legs, curling the toes, and many other non-verbal clues. One of the key skills of a good spanker is to be able to read these clues to empathize with what the spankee is feeling. This increases his pleasure and at the same time lets him introduce changes in the spanking for the enjoyment of the spankee. Afterglow In my opinion, one of the most erotic aspect of a spanking is that red-hot, hard-to-sit-on bottom that it leaves behind. I call this ‘afterglow.’ Scientifically speaking, what is happening is inflammation, characterized since antiquity as “calor, dolor, rubor and tumor” - heat, pain, redness and swelling. I explained the biochemical basis of this in The Neuroscience of Spanking. The afterglow may last from a few minutes to a day or two, depending of harshness of the spanking and the physiology of the spankee. Many spankees really like it, and it’s a turn-on for spankers as well. It makes doggy-style intercourse really hot. Afterglow can be increased by applying hot peppers (capsaicin) to the butt after a spanking. Aftercare An important part of any BDSM scene is the aftercare. It consists of comforting and bringing down the bottom partner from the state of pain, vulnerability and excitement achieved in by the scene. The top partner may also need aftercare to come down from his or her own high, reestablish emotional connection, and assuage feelings of guilt. Even if you don’t consider spanking BDSM, aftercare is necessary. If the spanking had a punishment or funishment theme, it may require clarifying that the debt has been paid (punishment) or that it was all a fantasy (funishment). If there was a domination theme, equal roles may need to be reestablished. Above all, tenderness and communication need to be affirmed. If the spanking was foreplay, sex would ensue. Aftercare can take place after that. Safety A spanking should be fully consensual, and the spankee should be able to withdraw consent at any moment. The best practice is to give the spankee a safeword to interrupt the spanking. Done correctly, spanking is a safe activity. Of course, there are always those who manage to screw things up. Spanking is hitting the butt. If you stray away from that cushiony area, you quickly run into trouble. It is unsafe to hit the hips, the sacrum or the lower back. These areas have no padding of muscle or fat, so you are hitting the bone. Impacting the kidneys - situated under the lower back - can be extremely dangerous. The lumbar area also has important nerves, like the sciatic nerve. Hitting the anus too hard may produce anal bleeding or anal fissures, which may require medical attention. Some people worry about bruising, because then others may see them and know that they have been spanked. On the other hand, many spankees relish their bruises and will proudly show them to anyone who asks. Bruising changes a lot from one spankee to another. The yellow-and-blue bruises happen when the capillaries in the skin break or leak red blood cells into the dermis. Hemoglobin - the red protein that carries oxygen in the erythrocytes - then degrades into a variety of compounds of different colors. That’s what gives bruises their colorful look. Bruises may take a week or more to disappear - the time it takes from those colorful compounds to be fully degraded and be washed away. Unless there is substantial internal bleeding - which is highly unlikely with a hand spanking of a healthy bottom - this process is not particularly dangerous. One safety issue that it is often disregarded concerns the hands of spanker. Spankers may develop tendinitis in the hand, the wrist or the elbow after administering a hard spanking. There is little warning. Tendinitis usually develops one or two days after the spanking, and may last a few days. Think about it… While the butt has all that nice cushioning to absorb the impact, the hand and the wrist are concentrated bone, ligaments and nerves. The laws of physics dictate that the force of the impact is equally distributed between the butt and the hand. This is why when a spankee wishes to upgrade to higher levels of pain, implements like paddles, straps or canes need to be used. But then we have upgraded to full BDSM territory. Note: Spankings occur in all possible gender combinations. I tried to avoid using gendered pronouns. When that was not possible, I assumed that the spanker is a man and the spankee a woman, which is somewhat more common. Copyright 2022 Hermes Solenzol.

A discussion of animal rights in terms of the mental properties that make humans ends-in-themselves and able to enter a Social Contract In this article, I argue that animals do not have rights and should not have rights. I must emphasize that I am not saying that animals should be subject to unnecessary suffering. What I am saying is that giving animals rights analogous to human rights is the wrong way to accomplish this goal. Instead, animals should be given legal protections, which are different from rights. Legal protections and rights are different things I have seen authors - intellectuals who I admire like Sam Harris and Steven Pinker - state categorically that animals have rights. However, this is factually wrong. No legal system in the world recognizes the rights of animals. What legal systems do is to grant legal protections to some animals, which is something entirely different. There are many things that are granted legal protections: A national park is a legally protected piece of land. You cannot take animals, plants or even rocks from it. Building on it is generally prohibited, and even visiting it can be restricted. An endangered species is protected by law. You cannot kill endangered plants or animals. The environment in which they live is also protected, to the point of prohibiting building in it or even visiting it. A public monument is protected by the law against theft or vandalism. This article is protected by law against plagiarism and censorship, because these things would infringe on my rights as an author. As we can see, legal protections are put in place to protect things - tangible things like parks and monuments or intangible things like species and books - because they benefit society or persons to do so. They protect the rights of people or the common good, but the things being protected do not have rights themselves. Today, the law of most countries gives some animals legal protections. You cannot torture a stray dog. Even if the dog has no owner whose rights are being infringed on by what you do to it, society has decided that it is unethical to make a dog suffer. However, this does not apply to a roach or a starfish, because most people agree that these animals do not suffer. Therefore, legal protection of animals is species specific. They are also context specific. A sewer rat can be given a poison that will kill it slowly and painfully, but the same thing cannot be done to a lab rat. Human rights “Human rights are moral principles or norms for certain standards of human behavior and are regularly protected in municipal and international law. They are commonly understood as inalienable, fundamental rights ‘to which a person is inherently entitled simply because she or he is a human being’ and which are ‘inherent in all human beings’, regardless of their age, ethnic origin, location, language, religion, ethnicity, or any other status. They are applicable everywhere and at every time in the sense of being universal, and they are egalitarian in the sense of being the same for everyone.” Wikipedia. In Western societies, we take human rights for granted. However, human rights are still not respected in a large part of the world. Many countries, notoriously Russia, North Korea and Islamic countries, have legal systems that violate human rights. Other countries, like China, respect human rights in principle but not in practice. We have a long way to go to make human rights a universal moral code. Human rights are also a recent invention. Many of the basic ideas that animated the human rights movement developed in the aftermath of the Second World War and the events of the Holocaust, culminating in the adoption of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights in Paris by the United Nations General Assembly in 1948. Ancient peoples did not have the same modern-day conception of universal human rights. Wikipedia. One reason why animals should not have rights is that this would undermine our ongoing fight for human rights. Moreover, most human rights are meaningless when applied to animals. The Universal Declaration of Human Rights consists of 30 articles. Article 1 states that these articles apply to human beings because “they are endowed with reason and conscience and should act towards one another in a spirit of brotherhood.” Of these 30 articles, only a few could be potentially applied to animals: Article 3: right to life, freedom and security. Article 4: no one should be held in slavery or servitude. Article 5: “No one shall be subjected to torture or to cruel, inhuman or degrading treatment or punishment.” Basically, people who want animal rights think that they should not be killed, imprisoned or used for human benefit. Full application of these principles would mean abolishing the use of animals for food (meat, fish, cheese and dairy), clothing (fur, wool, leather, feathers and silk), in exhibits (zoos and aquariums), to hunt and fish, as pets, and for scientific research. In addition, we would not be able to fight animals that attack us, invade our cities and our homes, or are parasites (rats, mice, roaches, ants, mosquitoes, ticks, worms, etc.) This is not a trivial matter. It would entail profound changes in our societies affecting the well-being of every single human being. Future generations would not enjoy the benefit of new medication produced by biomedical research. Many poor countries would simply not be able to afford these changes. Of course, we could also choose to give animals partial rights, so we could still use for worthwhile endeavors (I think scientific research should come first) while still protecting them from unnecessary suffering. But this is my position, known as “animal welfare” as opposed to “animal rights.” Protecting animals from suffering does not require giving them rights. It just requires giving them legal protections. An often forgotten question is which animals should be given rights. Most people would cringe at the idea that they would have the same rights as roaches. However, granting different rights to different species would be “speciecist.” Any principles (brain size, consciousness, ability to suffer, etc.) that we put forth to make these distinctions would inevitably put human at the top of the legal protections. Therefore, it is important that we carefully examine the philosophical and scientific basis for why human have rights and animals should or should not have them. Kant’s categorical imperative as a foundation to human rights Humans have rights because of who we are: conscious, autonomous beings with free will. It goes back to the philosopher Immanuel Kant and his categorical imperative (second formulation): “You act with reference to every rational being (whether yourself or another) so that it is an end in itself in your maxim” (Wikipedia). Humans are ends in themselves, so it is unethical to treat them solely as means to an end. The problem with this is that we treat other human beings all the time as means to an end. If I go get a haircut, isn’t the barber a means to my end? Well, not exactly, because in the process I also take into consideration the barber’s own goals, like getting paid for the haircut. I may also engage in conversation with him, partaking of his life experience as an Apache (this actually happens). By talking to him, I recognize his humanity. Why animals are not “ends in themselves” At this point, you may think of your favorite pet and say: “Wait a second! Why is not my Fido an end-in-itself?” After all, animals appear to have their own goals, just like we do. They want to come and go as they please, to eat, to drink, to nap… And most of all, they want to stay alive. How are those goals different from ours? Isn’t denying their goals while protecting ours an act of species egoism, of “speciesism”? According to scientists like Stuart Kaufmann - in his latest book, A World Beyond Physics: The Emergence and Evolution of Life - agency is a feature of all living beings. He calls agency the ability of life to organize its functions in order to survive and reproduce itself. He points out that without this idea, it is hard to explain saying things like “the function of the heart is to pump blood.” The pumping of the blood seems to serve a goal - moving the blood to oxygenate and nourish the organs of the body - which is just part of the larger goal of keeping the body alive. From this point of view, all living beings are agents because their essence is to keep on living, to survive. Reproduction is just an extension of this: to keep life going in future generations. However, having this sort of agency doesn’t make living being ends in themselves because they do this in an unconscious, automatic way. There is no more purpose to their agency than there is purpose in the Earth turning around the Sun. When scientists say that the goal of living beings is to survive, the word “goal” is used as a metaphor. Having goals implies conscious planning, and this is something that only humans can do. Only humans? Aren’t some animals capable of planning, too? The key word in that sentence is “conscious.” Animal consciousness is an extremely hard scientific and philosophical problem that hasn’t been solved yet. However, we know about some differences between the human and the animal minds that shed light on whether animals can formulate goals in a way that makes them end-in-themselves. Unique properties of the human mind that allow us to have conscious goals I explored the characteristics that differentiate humans from animals in another article: Not just intelligence: Why humans deserve to be treated better than animals. The most important ones for this discussion are: Extended Consciousness: This is a term coined by neuroscientist Antonio Damasio (Damasio, 1999) that refers to our capacity to see ourselves as selves that existed in the past and will continue to exist in the future. Some animals - like dogs and cats - have what Damasio calls “core consciousness”: they have a sense of self limited to the present. Extended consciousness is not the same as having memories. It is realizing that the entity that we see in those memories is the same self that we perceive now (Suddendorf and Corballis, 2007). Without realizing that we are a self that persists over time, it is not possible to have a conscious goal, because that means planning for a future state of our self. Although some animals may be conscious, they have what Antonio Damasio calls “core consciousness” - feelings of the present moment -, not extended consciousness. Theory of mind: This is the ability to model the minds of other people in our own minds. For example, we are able to imagine the emotions of a friend who we see crying, the next move of our chess adversary, or whether our business partner plans to cheat us. Novelists can keep alive in their minds characters who think, feel and act in ways very different from the writer. Theory of mind is not having the abstract idea that other people have minds, but the ability to make a model of their minds inside our mind that includes their emotions. Therefore, theory of mind encompasses both cognition and emotion, it is what allows us to feel the emotions of other people. We try to model the minds of animals, too, but in doing so we make the mistake of believing that the minds of animals are similar to our own minds, an error called anthropomorphizing. Animals and young children do not have a theory of mind (Penn and Povinelli, 2007). Recent research found a vestigial theory of mind in chimps (Krupenye et al., 2016), but this is a far call from the multiple recursive theory of mind that we have: “I know that you know that I know that you are lying.” Since theory of mind let us feel the emotions and the suffering of others, it is the basis of human empathy and compassion (Gu et al., 2010; Preis et al., 2013) - to walk in somebody else’s shoes - and not the mere contagion of emotions that we find in animals. It also allows us to understand the consequences of our actions, how what we do may cause happiness or suffering in others. Hence, it is the foundation of our moral sense, our conscience. Social emotions, like shame, pride, guilt, envy, fairness, loyalty, awe and regret, are absent in animals. They also form the foundation of our social behavior, our ethics and our conscious planning. Emotions are our motivators, the drivers of our actions. Human emotions are what give human goals their meaning. In the past, the idea that humans and animals had a different moral status was based on religious beliefs. Humans had souls and animals didn’t. In a scientific worldview, we abandoned those religious beliefs, leading a lot of people to think that humans and animals are basically the same. If humans and animals had the same moral status, then there is no logical reason why they should not be treated the same way. If humans have rights, animals should have them, too. However, science is starting to show that the minds of humans and animals differ in ways that are ethically meaningful. Of course, since we are the products of evolution, these unique properties of the human mind show gradually in the most complex mammals and birds. Still, some epic change must have happened in the evolution of our ancestors that changed their minds into ours. It was not just intelligence, or language, or even theory of mind and extended consciousness, but a synergy of changes that produced an entirely new type of being: the human being. Neuroscientists like Bud Craig have mapped the growth of certain regions of the brain cortex during human evolution that seem to be responsible for these changes: the anterior insula (Craig, 2009, 2011), the anterior cingulate cortex and the prefrontal cortex (Craig, 2010). For example, while the posterior insula integrates sensations and emotions, the anterior insula is able to imagine hypothetical sensations and emotions: “if I hit my toe with this hammer, this is what it would feel like.” This can form the basis for theory of mind. Likewise, the anterior cingulate cortex is in charge of formulating complex goals, which are evaluated by the prefrontal cortex for their social and ethical value. One of the main benefits of having rights is that they make us feel safe about our future because we know that a society with human rights will protect us from being harmed by others. Extended consciousness allow us to see ourselves as beings with a future. Theory of mind lets us peek into the minds of other people and partake of their suffering and their happiness. Social emotions like guilt and shame make other people feel bad if they harm us. All that forms the psychological frame that motivates us to fight for our rights and the rights of other people. Animals, not having these mental properties, cannot conceive what rights are, do not feel the need to have rights, and do not derive any feeling of safety from having rights. Animals live in the present and only care about how they feel in the present, not about what may happen to them in the future. The Social Contract as a foundation to human rights Apart from the Kantian end-on-itself view, a more practical foundation for human rights is the idea of the Social Contract. “In moral and political philosophy, the social contract is a theory or model that originated during the Age of Enlightenment and usually concerns the legitimacy of the authority of the state over the individual. Social contract arguments typically are that individuals have consented, either explicitly or tacitly, to surrender some of their freedoms and submit to the authority (of the ruler, or to the decision of a majority) in exchange for protection of their remaining rights or maintenance of the social order.” Wikipedia. Basically, the idea is that I respect your rights if you agree to respect mine, and we both agree that the State is the ultimate arbiter to resolve our differences. In the process, we grant the State the monopoly of violence to enable it to administer rights and responsibilities. Laws, armies, police, jails and the whole paraphernalia of the modern State follows from this. Animals are unable to enter a Social Contract According to this view of human rights, animals do not have rights because they are intrinsically unable to enter a social contract. If you agree with a lion that you won’t shoot it if it doesn’t try to eat you, the next thing you know is that the lion is pouncing on you when you turn your back on it. It has been tried with different animals and in different ways, and it just doesn’t work. The human always ends up being bitten, clawed, gored, mauled or stomped. Entering a social contract requires extended consciousness to see how it benefits our future self; theory of mind to understand how the suffering of others is identical to our own suffering; human emotions like shame, pride, guilt and fairness to understand its meaning, not just intellectually, but emotionally. The animal brain is incapable of even beginning to understand a social contract. You might as well ask a rock to sing. Without understanding the social contract, an animal cannot reciprocate any rights we give it. This is important, because our social order is one made not just of rights but of responsibilities. We acquire rights at the same time we accept responsibility. We may be born with a right to life, but all our other rights are granted as we take on responsibilities. Thus, we get the right to open a bank account at the same time that we get the responsibility to pay taxes. We get a driver’s license and the responsibility of paying fines or going to jail if we drive recklessly. It doesn’t make sense to give animals rights when they cannot take on any responsibility. But there is more. Having a right only really makes sense if you understand that you have that right. You may give dogs and cats all the rights you want; they will never get it. Without the mental properties that I list above, animals would never understand that they have rights. Therefore, they will not get the psychological benefits that humans get from knowing that we have rights. There is also a practical concern: since an animal doesn’t understand that it has rights, it cannot defend them. What would happen, in practice, is that some humans would appoint themselves as defenders of animal rights. In fact, this is what animal rights activists do. The result would be a transfer of power to the activists, who are likely to use it for their own benefit. They would become a new priestly class who, instead of interpreting the will of God, will translate to the rest of us the wishes of the animals under their protection. Not a bad racket, when you think about it. Utilitarianism: “But do they suffer?” Another major body of ethical philosophy is Utilitarianism. “In ethical philosophy, utilitarianism is a family of normative ethical theories that prescribe actions that maximize happiness and well-being for all affected individuals. Although different varieties of utilitarianism admit different characterizations, the basic idea behind all of them is, in some sense, to maximize utility, which is often defined in terms of well-being or related concepts.” Wikipedia. For some reason, utilitarian philosophers like Jeremy Bentham and Peter Singer have been the most staunch proponents of animal rights. Peter Singer is credited for having launched the animal rights movement. I think the link between utilitarianism and animal rights is due to two basic ideas: They assume that animals have the same moral status as humans. Since utilitarianism pursues the wellbeing of all individuals, and animals qualify as individuals, then the wellbeing of animals must be taken into consideration. The first assumption is not explicitly stated, much less justified, by the utilitarians. I have argued against it above. It is also absurd on its face because, if animals have the same moral status as humans, then all animals have the same moral status. This would make us treat a mosquito the same way we treat a dog. This is absurd and would prevent us from being able to fight parasites, as pointed out in the article Speciesism and the “Fleas on Dog” Ethical Dilemma. The problem of animal suffering in a serie is addressed s of articles in Speaking of Research: Pain Is Not Suffering. The Uniqueness of Human Suffering. More thoughts on animal suffering. The main idea in these articles is that pain is not the same as suffering, and that humans suffer in particular ways in which animals do not. I call this “deep suffering” because it requires extended consciousness, theory of mind and culture. Moreover, since suffering requires consciousness, only some species of animals can suffer. This solves the problem of why it is ethical to treat some animals better than others. It also justifies why we should prioritize human suffering over animal suffering. Therefore, even if we adopt the utilitarian perspective of maximizing wellbeing, we cannot equate human wellbeing with animal wellbeing. For many animals - ants, corals, clams, barnacles, shrimp, jellies, starfish - the concept of wellbeing is not appropriate at all. Even if they have agency - all living beings do - they do so as unconscious automatons. Animal rights are not necessary to treat animals well Giving animals rights is not the best way to ensure their wellbeing. The concept of rights is not useful at all when applied to animals because rights only make sense when the being who has them understands them. The best way to ensure animal wellbeing is to give them legal protections. This is the position of animal welfare, as opposed to animal rights. Having the law protect animals against suffering, abuse and mistreatment bypasses the difficult philosophical problems of them being ends-in-themselves, conscious and able to suffer. We can simply determine that it is wrong to treat animals a certain way because of who we are, not because of who they are. It is wrong to make animals suffer, just like it is wrong to destroy a national park or cause a species to go extinct. We value things - national parks, species, monument, works of art and animal wellbeing - because it is in our human nature to do so. Isn’t that enough? Further reading: Should animal rights be included in the progressive slate? References Craig AD (2009) How do you feel--now? The anterior insula and human awareness. Nat Rev Neurosci 10:59-70. Craig AD (2010) The sentient self. Brain Struct Funct 214:563-577. Craig AD (2011) Significance of the insula for the evolution of human awareness of feelings from the body. Ann N Y Acad Sci 1225:72-82. Damasio AR (1999) The Feeling of What Happens: Body and Emotion in the Making of Consciousness. San Diego, New York, London: Harcourt, Inc. Gu X, Liu X, Guise KG, Naidich TP, Hof PR, Fan J (2010) Functional Dissociation of the Frontoinsular and Anterior Cingulate Cortices in Empathy for Pain. Journal of Neuroscience 30:3739-3744. Krupenye C, Kano F, Hirata S, Call J, Tomasello M (2016) Great apes anticipate that other individuals will act according to false beliefs. Science 354:110-114. Penn DC, Povinelli DJ (2007) On the lack of evidence that non-human animals possess anything remotely resembling a 'theory of mind'. Philos Trans R Soc Lond B Biol Sci 362:731-744. Preis MA, Schmidt-Samoa C, Dechent P, Kroener-Herwig B (2013) The effects of prior pain experience on neural correlates of empathy for pain: An fMRI study. Pain 154:411-418. Suddendorf T, Corballis MC (2007) The evolution of foresight: What is mental time travel, and is it unique to humans? Behav Brain Sci 30:299-313; discussion 313-251.

The majority of prostitutes choose their work — the real moral failure of human trafficking is the exploitation of immigrants from poor countries The difference between prostitution and sexual slavery This is the one Big Lie about prostitution. It has been denounced in prestigious medical journals, like The Lancet (Butcher, 2003; Steen et al., 2015) and others (Decker, 2013). But politicians are paying no heed. They use the words “prostitution” and “trafficking” interchangeably, like they are the same thing. It is true that some prostitutes are coerced into sex work. Common definitions of sex trafficking include two different set of criteria: 1) minors under the age of 18 years being sexually exploited (Willis and Levy, 2002), or 2) adults doing sex work “under conditions of force, fraud or coercion” (Decker, 2013; Steen et al., 2015). Forced sex work should not be called prostitution, but sexual slavery. Sex with minors is statutory rape. Scientists have also pointed out that this lie has grave consequences, not just for the sex workers, but also for the general population, because it seriously undermines the prevention of HIV and other sexually-transmitted diseases (Ditmore and Saunders, 1998; Steen et al., 2015). What percentage of prostitutes are “trafficked”? The excuse for this deliberate confusion is that most prostitutes are trafficked, as the Spanish newspaper El País proclaimed in its editorial of September 4, 2018, without any evidence. In fact, it is far from clear how many women who get paid for sex are forced into it (“trafficked”). This is not by accident. Research into this topic seems to be purposely discouraged. Or maybe it’s just that doing statistics on a business in which the worker, the client and the manager risk being thrown in jail is extremely hard. When research is done, it is in developing countries in South Asia like India, Thailand or Bangladesh (Decker, 2013). Then their conclusions are mindlessly applied to create legislation in Europe and the United States. A study carried out by the United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime, Trafficking in Persons to Europe for the Purpose of Sexual Exploitation (PDF in Spanish; details on pages 7-9) addresses the dimension of prostitution in Europe and the percentage that comes from sexual exploitation. Number of victims of trafficking identified in Western and Central Europe (in 2006): 7,300 victims. Assuming that only one out of 20 victims is identified, the total figure would be 7,300 x 20 = 146,000 victims. This assumption is from the UN report, not mine. Estimated number of prostitutes in 25 European countries: 700,000 prostitutes. Extrapolating to the total population of Europe gives about one million prostitutes. 146,000 victims / 1,000,000 prostitutes = 14.6% of the prostitutes are victims of sexual exploitation in Europe. There is great a study by Aella in her blog Knowingless. She compares different sources for the number of prostitutes trafficked in the USA: “So in the US: the Trafficking In Persons report says ~16,000 newly trafficked per year (if we assume 2 years spent trafficked, this is ~32,000 currently sex trafficked). The Human Rights Center report says 4,600 currently sex trafficked, the Ohio study says (maybe?) ~76,000 currently sex trafficked, and mine says ~39,000 currently sex trafficked. I don’t know if averaging these is the right thing to do, but I did it anyway, which leaves us with 37,900 (or ~0.01% of the US population).” What Percentage of Sex Workers in the US are Trafficked? by Aella. She estimates the number of sex workers in the USA as being between 830,000 and 1,200,000, which is similar to the number for Europe. Putting both numbers together, she concludes: “So: given my estimated sex trafficking prevalence, I estimate about 3.2% of active, in-person sex workers in the US are currently being sex trafficked.” What Percentage of Sex Workers in the US are Trafficked? by Aella. Using the numbers she gives, the higher and lower boundaries for the percentage of prostitutes trafficked in the USA would be 9.5% and 0.38%. Even the higher number is still lower than the estimate in the UN study for Europe. I think that their assumption that only 1 in 20 victims is identified is wrong. This assumption involves a lot of guesswork, and can significantly change the resulting percentages. In any case, even the higher estimates show that it is false to equate prostitution with trafficking. The great majority of prostitutes choose this work voluntarily. The real human trafficking: immigration from poor countries A fact that is rarely discussed about human trafficking is that a lot of people want to be trafficked - in the sense of wanting to migrate from poor, developing countries in Africa, South Asia and Central and South America to the rich, developed countries of Europe and North America. They are so desperate to do this that they are willing to risk their lives in the process. Being exploited for their labor - including sexual labor - it’s not the worse outcome they face. Much worse is to die, lose their children, being forcibly sterilized, or being imprisoned at the hands of the same State that sanctimoniously preaches against the horrors of prostitution. Undocumented women from Mexico or Central America crossing the border into the USA assume that they are likely to be raped on their way. These women, and those crossing the Mediterranean in precarious boats to reach Spain, Italy or Greece, have to give large sums of money to their coyotes or smugglers. Often, they don’t have money at hand, so they assume a debt to the smugglers. Prostitution is just the most expeditious way to pay that debt. Of course, this is coerced sex, but the fact that sex is involved is not the most salient moral issue here. It is the economic injustice that forces people into these extremes. There have been cases in which immigrant women have been locked in secret factories and made to work excruciating hours in what can only be described as modern-day slavery. Others have been forced to work as intern maids in the households of the rich. Often, their children are held as ransom. The immorality of confusing prostitution and human trafficking Most prostitutes are not trafficked. Most trafficked women are not prostituted. These two things are confused on purpose to advance a repressive ideology that could not gain traction otherwise. This is a huge ethical failure. It involves turning a blind eye to an injustice much larger than sexual exploitation: the steep difference in wealth between rich countries and the poor countries that they colonized in the past and continue to exploit economically. Famine and violence make life in some of these poor countries so harsh that the risks of migration seem the most rational option. If you lived there, you would want to be trafficked, too. References Butcher K (2003) Confusion between prostitution and sex trafficking. Lancet 361:1983. Decker MR (2013) Sex trafficking, sex work, and violence: evidence for a new era. Int J Gynaecol Obstet 120:113-114. Ditmore M, Saunders P (1998) Sex work and sex trafficking. Sex Health Exch:15. Steen R, Jana S, Reza-Paul S, Richter M (2015) Trafficking, sex work, and HIV: efforts to resolve conflicts. Lancet 385:94-96. Willis BM, Levy BS (2002) Child prostitution: global health burden, research needs, and interventions. Lancet 359:1417-1422.

Excerpt from my novel Games of Love and Kink Madrid, Saturday June 4, 1977 Lorenzo let them into his house. It was a small apartment on the ground floor of a two-story building. The main door opened directly to a rectangular living room with white walls. At the other end, there was a sliding glass door that opened to an inner patio with a pair of motorcycles scrapped for parts, and other junk. The other rooms were on the right: first a tiny kitchen, then a recess that hid two doors to the bedroom and bathroom. The furniture was quite Spartan: a rectangular dining table next to the entrance and, in the back, a three-seat sofa, a coffee table and a turntable. The entire wall on the left was covered with bookshelves. “Wow, you have so many books!” said Cecilia. “Not what you’d expect from a simple mechanic, right?” said Julio. “Lorenzo is actually a self-taught intellectual. He has read everything.” A smell of lamb roast with rosemary filled the place. “Come to the table, Cecilia,” said Julio. “That smell is making my mouth water!” “Me too!” she said, sitting down by him. Lorenzo came out of the kitchen with a platter of meat. “Help yourselves.” Lorenzo picked up the bottle of Rioja wine and uncorked it. “See? I told you this guy cooks like a chef! We should do something to thank him.” With a playful smile, Julio unfastened the buttons of her blouse. Cecilia let him do it, directing a mischievous look at Lorenzo. “What the hell are you guys doing?” “Just letting her tits out, to make lunch a bit more pleasant.” Julio took off her blouse and dropped it on the floor. “Like in Peña Sirio, right, Lorenzo? Remember? You couldn’t peel your eyes from me!” “So, you’re at it again?” “No worries, you’re with friends. Come on, just look at her and enjoy yourself, damn it!” Julio and Lorenzo drained the bottle of wine. She didn’t have any. There was custard for dessert, which she loved. Lorenzo then invited them to sit on the sofa, where he served them coffee and Galician herbal liquor. He tried to act normally, but his hands shook a little and his eyes constantly wandered towards her chest. He took out a chunk of marijuana wrapped in foil from his pocket and rolled a joint. “Shall we play some music?” she asked. “Yes, take your pick,” said Lorenzo, absorbed in his task. Julio watched them with an amused air, taking small sips of his liquor. She rummaged through his records. She chose the LP Entre Dos Aguasof the flamenco guitarist Paco de Lucía. She went to sit on the couch, pushing Julio aside so she could squeeze between them. Lorenzo, taking slow pulls from his joint, moved away from her. “Don’t move away,” she said with a teasing smile. “Today, you may touch me. Right, Julio?” “Yes, man, don’t be shy! Enjoy! Today is your birthday!” “You guys are messing with me, aren’t you?” “No, man, we’re totally serious! You can touch Cecilia all you want.” “Damn, man! She’s your girlfriend! How can I touch her?” “This way, look! You caress her breast like this, then you squeeze it.” Julio demonstrated. “Can you see how firm they are? Then you pinch the nipple a bit to get it hard, like this!” Julio’s hand evoked shivers of pleasure all over her body. “Come on Lorenzo, get in the mood!” she said. “I know you are dying to do it.” Lorenzo left the joint in the ashtray and put his hand on her other tit, caressing it, first softly, then weighing it, squeezing it. Julio continued his demonstration. Being fondled by two guys was deliciously perverse. The notes of the guitar of Paco de Lucía streamed playfully, like the pleasure from her nipples. The drums of the rumba beat with the rhythm of her heart. Julio withdrew his hand, leaving her to Lorenzo, whose eyes were fixed on her chest with absolute concentration. After a while, he released her to give the joint another draw. She took the opportunity to sit on his lap. Lorenzo, holding the joint between his lips, placed a hand on each beast. She grabbed the edge of her miniskirt and slowly pushed it up, revealing her shaved pussy. “You guys have really turned me on! Do you want to touch my pussy to see how wet I am?” she whispered. Lorenzo seemed to wake up from his dream. He took his hands away from her chest and crushed the joint in the ashtray. “What are you trying to do? What the fuck is wrong with you?” “Come on, man, don’t get upset now!” said Julio. “We thought that, since today you’re old enough to vote, this might be a good time for you to lose your virginity. So I’m loaning you Cecilia so you can fuck her.” “You are out of your minds!” Lorenzo stood up so suddenly that she didn’t have time to get up from his knees, and fell on her butt. Lorenzo ran from the living room and locked himself in his bedroom. “That’s what I was afraid of! We screwed up!” said Julio. “Well, being shy is just natural.” She got up from the floor. “Come on, go talk to him!” Julio went to stand in front of the closed door. “Come on man, don’t be shy! I don’t mind, really! I know how much you like Cecilia.” He waited for a little while, but there was no answer. He returned to the living room. “It’s hopeless! We should leave.” “May I try?” “Go ahead… But I don’t think you’re going to get him to come out.” She went to the bedroom door. “Lorenzo, please, let me in! I just want to tell you something.” “You’ll end up traumatizing the poor guy,” Julio said, sitting on the couch. “He’s not a poor guy! He’s a man with a pair!” she said aloud so Lorenzo could hear her. “Come, Lorenzo, open up! Please, don’t make me speak through the door. That’s rude!” Lorenzo let her in, closing the door behind her. “It was my idea, I’m sorry. I wanted to be the one to take your virginity. It would mean so much to me! Come on, please!” she pleaded. Lorenzo looked at her tits. He was a bit pale. He approached her slowly. “It’s just that all this is so awkward, girl!” “Of course, I understand… You know? Maybe we shouldn’t have told you that this is your birthday present, as if we were doing you a favor. The truth is, I would like to do it. It would be a big disappointment for me if you rejected me, after going this far.” “But, what about Julio?” “He agrees, can’t you see? We talked it over. Please! I’m really turned-on!” She unzipped her skirt and let it drop to the floor. “See? Here I am, all naked for you! You do like me, don’t you?” “That’s not the problem. I like you a lot, but…” “You see, it’s like making a difficult move when you are climbing. You just get started and then your body knows what to do, right?” she ran her hand over the bulge in his pants. “I know you’re dying to do it, you dummy!” “Can’t we do it here?” “Well, it’s just that… this isn’t what I had agreed with Julio. What’s the matter, does it embarrass you that he watches us? You two are best buddies, aren’t you?” She grabbed his trousers and slowly unzipped them. She inserted two fingers into the fly. “Do you have any idea how much pleasure I can give you?” she intoned seductively as she rubbed the tip of his cock. “No, you don’t have the slightest idea of how utterly amazing is to make love! Being able to touch me wherever you want… And then push your cock inside me… Can you imagine how soft and warm is the inside of my pussy? And then being able to see the pleasure in my face while you fuck me. And when you come, it’s a thousand times better than when you jerk off! You’ll see!” As she spoke, she pulled down his underpants until he was able to wrap her fist around his rod, taking it out of his fly. She held it while she opened the door. He let her lead him by it to the living room. At the sight of Julio, Lorenzo stopped in his tracks. Realizing that she was humiliating him in front of his friend, Cecilia let go of his cock. She kneeled in front of him and put it in her mouth, feeling him shudder with pleasure. She unbuttoned his jeans and pulled them down, along with his underwear. All the while she sucked him gently, enough to capture his attention but without getting him too excited. She took it out of her mouth to admire it. It was the only cock she had seen other than Julio’s. It was long and thin, slightly curved upwards. Out of the corner of her eye, she saw Julio watching them from the sofa. He looked nervous and excited. * * * Julio had mixed feelings as he watched Cecilia kneeling in front of Lorenzo, sucking his cock with total concentration. He had hoped that Lorenzo would refuse to have sex with her. He knew him well: deep down, he was a prude. Moreover, his strong sense of loyalty would make him refuse to do anything that could look like betrayal. But he had not taken into account Cecilia’s stubbornness and her unexpected talent for seduction. Besides, it seemed that there was already a certain intimacy between her and Lorenzo. That should have made him jealous. He wondered why it didn’t. Lorenzo stumbled, his ankles held by his pants. “Come, lay down on the rug,” Cecilia said. Lorenzo obeyed, and she carefully removed his shoes, pants and underpants. Naked, in profile in front of him, she was gorgeous. Her delicate gestures revealed a total dedication. Her gaze moved from Lorenzo’s slim body to him, as if to be sure that he was fine. When she had Lorenzo naked from the waist down, she began to make love to him, kissing the inside of his thighs, licking his balls, and putting her lips back on his swollen gland. It was a beautiful sight, loaded with eroticism. That’s why he wasn’t jealous. His own penis attested to it with a strong erection. Cecilia had taken over Lorenzo, had him completely subdued with her beauty and her skill. Just as Laura had subdued him when she took his virginity, doing something very similar to what Cecilia was now doing to Lorenzo. That thought bothered him. Cecilia was his sexual servant, he didn’t like the idea that she knew how to dominate a man. Cecilia’s lips left Lorenzo’s penis and continued their journey up his body, tracing a vertical line on his belly with her tongue. She pulled his shirt up so she could suck on a nipple, and ended up kissing him on the lips. Julio was paralyzed, unable to take his eyes off them. Part of him wanted to shout at them to stop, that they had already gone too far, that he couldn’t take it anymore. But a stronger part of himself enjoyed watching Cecilia’s entranced look, and the expression of pleasure and bewilderment on his friend’s face. He could not stop such a beautiful thing. Cecilia straddled Lorenzo, rubbing her crotch against his hardened penis. Then, in a fit of impatience, he saw her seize it, lift her butt, and impale herself. It was so neatly done that he could imagine the sensation of Cecilia’s warm vagina wrapping around his own cock. Lorenzo stiffened, on the brink of climax. “Not yet, champion! Take a deep breath, the best part is yet to come!” she said, her gaze fixed on Lorenzo’s face. Cecilia lowered herself until she sat on his belly, smiling at him with complicity. Lorenzo put his hands on her tits, squeezing them. She giggled and corresponded by pinching his nipples. “You have trapped me, girl!” “It’s to keep you from coming too soon, buddy! I lost my virginity the same way.” The sound of his own voice surprised him. He had not been able to speak up to that point. Lorenzo and Cecilia turned to look at him, and suddenly he felt part of what they were doing, not an invisible spectator anymore. “Man, this is amazing!” murmured Lorenzo. “Once you’re a bit less excited, we’ll start moving, okay?” said Cecilia. Lorenzo nodded. Soon, she started to move up and down on him, putting her hands on his chest. Lorenzo’s cock slipped out. She grabbed it and put it back inside. Lorenzo grabbed her buttocks and guided her in the up and down swing. They were completely focused on each other, and Julio felt the sense of complicity drift away. A certain uneasiness fought against the excitement of the scene. Cecilia seemed to have found the right angle and was now moving up and down in a mad frenzy, her tits bobbing in voluptuous waves, her curls shaking in the air. Suddenly, she stopped. He heard Lorenzo moan with pleasure. Cecilia threw her head back and abandoned herself to her own orgasm. It was the first time that he had seen Cecilia climax from afar, without being him who was giving her pleasure. It was a sight of remarkable beauty. It was over. It was too late to go back. He felt that a door had been opened to an unknown dimension. Until now, Cecilia had been his alone, but she had just shown him that she could enjoy another man. She was in full control of her sexuality. She had proved to be a great seductress. His uneasiness returned with renewed intensity. By the way she looked at him with a worried expression, Cecilia must have felt his mood. She got up and came over to sit on his lap. She kissed him tenderly. “Now it’s your turn. Come on, fuck me!” That was unexpected. He couldn’t deny his arousal, his cock was still hard. But he felt too confused inside. He couldn’t make love to her. Not in front of Lorenzo. “Come on! Don’t you have enough already? You just came!” “Yes, but only once… I want more! Besides, with you it’s different.” Lorenzo got to his feet and looked perplexedly at his half-naked body. He picked up his jeans, his underpants, and his shoes. “Thank you for my birthday present, guys!” he said, as if not quite sure what to do. He went to the bathroom. He must have realized that he needed privacy to make love to Cecilia. The privacy that Julio had not wanted to give him. How would he feel about Lorenzo from now on? Would they dare to talk about what had happened? Or was the whole thing going to become an obstacle to their friendship, something they would carefully avoid in all their conversations? Cecilia, on the other hand, would surely want to know how he felt. What was he going to tell her? The thought of confessing to her how much it had excited him to see her fucking Lorenzo frightened him. Maybe she’d take it as an invitation to do it again. He didn’t feel capable of going through this again. “Come on, don’t be so stubborn!” she whispered. “Do I have to seduce you, too?” Cecilia’s hand settled on his belly, caressing his erection through his pants. She already knew. She understood that he had enjoyed seeing her fuck Lorenzo, and now she wanted to wrap up the whole thing by making him cum too. But he couldn’t allow her to control him as she had controlled Lorenzo. He had to show her that he was still in control, of his own desires and hers. “Yeah, I see you’re a born seductress. Come on, get dressed, we’re leaving,” he said, giving her a swat on the butt. “Then you don’t want to do it? Is there anything wrong?” she said with a hurt look. “Come on, don’t be annoying, Cecilia!” “You are not jealous, are you?” “Well, yes, a little! But you were right: jealousy is fucking great!” If you enjoyed this story, you will find more erotic scenes like this in my novel Games of Love and Kink. Copyright 2022 Hermes Solenzol.

(Just a few uncomfortable questions) Being a progressive meant having hope in the future? Progressives defended freedom of expression? Censorship was something conservatives did? You listened to people with opinions different from yours? You could be proud of being a man? You could be proud of being a woman? The Patriarchy didn’t mean “men”? It was not self-defeating for a man to be a feminist? Intention mattered? People were presumed to be innocent until proven guilty? Abortion, contraception and reproductive rights were not women’s problems, but everybody’s problem? It was possible not to be racist? Racism meant hating people because of their race? Sexism meant hating people because of their sex? Vaccines were routine healthcare? Conservatives believed in science? Leftists believed in science? Doctors and scientists were not terrorized by zealots? Lab rats were cool? Monkeys in scientific experiments were cute? Meat was a healthy meal and not a crime? Bicycles didn’t have motors? “Ecologist” and “environmentalist” were synonyms? Ecology was a science? Nuclear war was our worst fear? “Privileged” was not an insult? “Socialist” was not a dirty word? “Educate yourself” meant “go to school” instead of “agree with my dogma”? The Left supported workers? Workers voted Left? Baby boomers were hippies, pacifists and anti-establishment? Conservatives believed in democracy and fought dictatorships, and not the other way around? I do remember. I must be getting old.

To be or not to be... a prostitute Excerpt from my novel Games of Love and Kink. Madrid, Friday July 22, 1977 He was a wealthy guy, you could see that a mile away. He wore a silk shirt, dark blue with a delicate, sawn-in pattern; cream-colored trousers, and brown moccasins. The body underneath those expensive garments spoke of frequents visits to gyms and massage parlors. He was around forty, neatly shaved, with a haircut that looked good despite his receding hairline. He ordered mullets, purple carabineros shrimp, and a salad. Perhaps not the most expensive items on the menu, but certainly the most delicious. He hadn’t take his eyes off her from the moment he’d walked into the restaurant. Now that her brother Luis was not home, she liked to dress sexy for work: a gray miniskirt, sandals, and a see-through beige blouse. The apron covered her legs to the knees on the front but, on the back, you could apprize most of her tan thighs. She liked to show her sexy body. Lucas, her boss, certainly did not complain if she made the place more attractive to the customers. Soon after serving him the salad, he motioned her to come to his table. Without saying anything, he picked a glass shard from the lettuce. Cecilia took it. It was sharp. It could have meant a trip to the ER if he had swallowed it. “This totally unacceptable! Somebody should spank the cook!” she joked. “I’ll get you another salad right away, sir!” “With more tomatoes and a bit less glass, please.” “Don’t charge him for the salad, of course,” Lucas said when she told him what had happened. “And be nice to him. If he complains again about the glass, we’ll have to give him the rest of the dinner for free. I wonder what they broke in the kitchen.” “Do you want me to find out?” “No, I’ll take care of that. We’ll have to look everywhere for more pieces of glass. You take care of the client. Make sure that he doesn’t lack anything.” She approached the customer and gave him her most charming smile. “I’ll get you your salad right away, sir! We won’t charge you for it, of course. If you want anything else, just let me know.” “I will. You are very kind.” Outside, there was a rumble of thunder and a sudden gust of wind through the trees. Good! Hopefully, it’ll get cooler. She went to clean a table that had just been vacated, turning her back to the customer. She leaned over without bending her knees, knowing that this would give him a good view of her legs. Maybe even a glimpse of her panties. Hopefully, that’ll make him forget about the glass shard. Lucas told me to keep the customer happy, didn’t he? He took a leather notebook out of his pocket and wrote something on it. He tore the page off and left it on the table. When she came to take his plate away, he put the note on the plate, as if meant to be thrown away but, with a subtle movement of his finger, he indicated that she should read it. He didn’t even glance at her throughout the whole process. She went behind the counter to read it. It said: “10,000 pesetas for sex.” Her first reaction was to show it to Lucas. But what was he supposed to do? He wasn’t going to bother the customer about that trifle. And even less so after the problem with the glass shard! No, she was old enough to handle this type of situation by herself. She was about to throw the note away when she saw the customer giving her an amused smile. All right, funny guy! Let’s have some fun! She wrote in the note “20,000 pesetas”. It was a ridiculously large amount of money. She was sure nobody would spend it, just to fuck. When he was done with his dinner, she put the note under the bill. He read it, wrote something on it, and called her. “On second thought, I’m going to have coffee, too. Put it on the bill, please.” Under the bill there was the note, to which he had added: “Deal.” She had fallen into her own trap. Well, no problem. I’ll just throw the note away. Game over. She felt flattered to be worth such a hefty price. Twenty thousand pesetas! That’s more than I make working for a month in this damn place! Just for sex. And the guy is good-looking, too! Damn it, and I’m so horny! It’s been more than a week since I’ve been laid. And it’ll be three more weeks before Julio gets back. She remembered a story she had heard about Groucho Marx. “Madam, would you sleep with me for a million dollars?” Groucho had asked. “Of course!” the lady had replied with a chuckle. “Now, would you sleep with me for five dollars?” “Gentleman! Who do you think I am?” she replied. Then came Groucho’s punchline: “We have already established that. Now we are just haggling about the price.” That was the issue. The price was good, but it meant that she would become a whore. Julio called her that, sometimes, and that turned her on. But this was no joke. This was the real thing. “Cecilia! What are you doing? That coffee it’s getting cold on the counter!” Lucas called. She was torn by doubt. What to do? Tell him that it was all a joke and back out? Go ahead with the adventure? What would Julio say? The guy was looking at her out of the corner of his eye, waiting for an answer. She needed to make up her mind. Let’s look at it rationally. Sex for money… what’s wrong with that? I need both. Such an opportunity doesn’t come every day. It’s an adventure, an erotic adventure, the kind I like. Julio is enjoying his adventures in the Alps. Why shouldn’t I have my own adventure, here in Madrid? He will understand. After all, this is what we talked about, right? To do the erotic revolution. Sex for money. Prostitution. It’s just another taboo. One more barrier to break. Yes, it has to be a rational decision, not based on mere social conventions. She hurriedly scrawled in the paper: “I’m off at eleven.” She put the note under the coffee plate and brought it to him. He read it, nodded almost imperceptibly, and put it in his pocket. Maybe it was just a trick. Like Groucho, the guy had wanted to establish what she was. Now that he had achieved that, he would be satisfied. Maybe he would show the note to his friends. Or, at worst, to Lucas. She tried not to think about it. He took his time finishing his coffee. When Cecilia returned with the additional bill, he motioned for her to listen. “A dark blue Mercedes,” he whispered. “I’ll be in front of the restaurant at eleven.” She nodded. It was ten-thirty when he left. She was nervous. She tried to hide it as she cleaned the tables. Every once in a while, thunder rumbled outside. Sinister ideas came to her mind. What if he raped her? Well, that would be the same, wouldn’t it? Except that she wouldn’t get paid. It was a risk she was willing to take. Of course, it could be worse. He could hurt her, even kill her. But why would he? She decided to be careful. Back down at the least sign of danger. She didn’t finish until five after eleven. Her heart was beating fast as she went out into the street. Gusts of wind swept dry leaves along the sidewalks. A Mercedes was double-parked a few feet away. It was dark. Blue or black, at night you couldn’t tell. She walked towards it quickly, looking back to see if someone who knew her was looking. He was behind the wheel. Was there anyone else in the car? She tried to look through the windows, but the glass was too dark. The interior light went on, long enough for her to see that no one else was there. He wanted to reassure her. The door opened. Cautiously, she sat in the front seat, leaving the door ajar. How will this turn out? Will Cecilia get hurt? Or will she had the sexual adventure she’s hoping for? What will her boyfriend Julio say when he finds out? To discover the answer to these questions, and enjoy more erotic adventures of Cecilia, read my novel Games of Love and Kink. Copyright 2022 Hermes Solenzol.

Different ways the Dominant/submission dynamic can be imposed on others or used to smuggle sexist stereotypes Top disease is a term once common in BDSM circles, but that I haven’t heard recently. However, I think it is quite useful to understand how some forms of bigotry are smuggled into BDSM, and the underlying attitudes that exist behind some violations of consent. I would define top disease as behaving as a Dominant with people who have not agreed to enter a Dominant-submission dynamic, or treating people as submissives without their consent. In its milder forms, top disease is quite common. It may just amount to people acting in arrogant and entitled ways, which may be just an annoyance. However, in its extreme forms it can lead to breaches of consent, abusive relationships, and the reinforcing of sexist stereotypes under the guise of BDSM. The following is my personal inquiry into the different types of top disease and their causes. The novice drunk with dominance The experience of dominating another person for the first time can be intoxicating. The devotion of the submissive is so real, so authentic, that a novice Dom may fall into the illusion that she does it because of him, not because she desperately needs to submit to somebody. A novice Dom may think that, if a woman submits to him, it’s because he has some magical power that he previously didn’t realize he had. So he may start prancing around and acting arrogant and bossy. It happened to me a long, long time ago. I remember walking into a party with a girlfriend in a collar, or spanking her in public, and how people in the party treated me differently, with a new kind of respect. I was a Dominant, with capital D. And, somehow, this was a public role, not just something that my girlfriend bestowed on me. But it all came crashing down the moment I decided to switch. Then I had to let go of that image to become a humble bottom. It felt like I was losing something. I feared that, once I was seen submitting, I will never get my Dominant badge back. Unfortunately, for many people in the BDSM scene, that’s the way it was. It’s part of BDSM culture, I guess. The Dominant or the Dominatrix dresses in a certain way, moves in a certain way, claims honorifics not just from the submissives, but from everyone around them. And people comply, out of respect for them, for their submissives, and for the BDSM culture. We feel that it’s just part of being polite, of respecting the other person’s identity. However, this attitude is at the root of the problem of Dominants treating people as their submissives, before they have consented to anything. Or them berating submissives for not “doing it right”, or for being “fake submissives” for not want to obey and pay their respects to them. In the end, it is all an illusion. BDSM roles are conventions, agreements based on who does what to whom to satisfy complementary desires. It is true that, for some people who see BDSM as a lifestyle, their role becomes an important part of who they are. Still, that role does not make sense outside a relationship or, at most, a close circle of like-minded people. The natural-born Dominant The natural-born Dominant - male or female - believes that dominance is something that emanates from their unique personality. Some of them even believe that other people pretend to be Dominants by “playing” in “scenes” which, as their name indicates, are mere theater, temporary masks that when are shed reveal a dull vanilla core. But not them. They are authentically Dominant. They are endowed with a particular energy, an essence that makes submissives fall on their knees before them. Of course, only true submissives would recognize them because, just as there are many pretend Dominants, there are many fake submissives who play games and cannot recognize the enormous depth of a life dedicated to Dominance and submission. The belief in the natural-born Dominant probably comes from the politically correct idea that homosexuals are born that way. This idea has been debated by science for decades (Roselli, 2018), ending in an inconclusive stalemate in which a “gay gene” was never found; instead, there seem to be a multitude of genes that predispose to homosexuality, but do not determine it (Ganna et al., 2019). If homosexuality can be determined from birth, then why not dominance and submission, which are other forms of sexual behavior? There may be some truth to this. Just like some children know that they are homosexual from an early age, some people recall having BDSM fantasies well before puberty. I had my first fantasies about spanking when I was 5. In my opinion, kinky tendencies and fetishes are imprinted by erotic experiences during childhood. The same could happen with homosexuality. The susceptibility to be imprinted with an attraction to a particular gender, objects or actions may be driven by certain genes. Imprinting can be a force as powerful as the genes to drive behavior. It makes no sense to be proud to be Dominant. There is nothing intrinsically good about beating people or ordering them around. It’s actually the opposite: these things can only be justified when people enthusiastically consent to explore them with you. The idea that Dominants and submissives can be real or fake has been largely rejected by the BDSM community as bigoted and narcissistic. Just like the idea that there is a “true way” to do D/s, sadomasochism or bondage. There are many ways of doing BDSM, which evolve and come and go in fashions. Likewise, some people come into BDSM following a mysterious drive from early in their life. Others are initiated by their lovers. It doesn’t matter. Everything is authentic when you connect with it. The BDSM expert BDSM, in any of its facets, is not easy. It requires a set of skills that are as difficult to learn as any gear-intensive sport, like rock climbing, scuba diving or sailing. Ultimately, BDSM is an art and, like any art, it has its geniuses and its incompetents. Therefore, it’s just natural that people who are good at it accrue a certain amount of recognition. There are, indeed, experts in shibaru, flogging, caning, needle play, wax play, and the different types of D/s. However, just like in any sport or art, recognition should come from others, not from calling yourself an expert. Unfortunately, there are no BDSM competitions; no art galleries or museums to anoint your art. There is just the testimony of your play partners. Hence, it is relatively easy for pretenders to engage in false advertisement. It is also easy to mistake arrogance and self-assuredness for domination. This leads to disappointments and, in the worse cases, abuse. Male supremacists: “Men are naturally dominant” Gender essentialism in BDSM is the belief that being Dominant or submissive are integral characteristics of a certain gender, and not roles freely chosen in a consensual agreement. Male supremacy is the ancient belief that men are better than women - stronger, braver, more intelligent, etc. The idea that a gender is better than the other has been debunked by science. Although there are differences between the sexes, they are relatively minor, obscured by differences between individuals, and easily overcome by training. One particular idea that comes from male supremacy is that men are - or must be - dominant over women, who should obey and serve them. A variant of this is the belief found in fundamentalist religions - Christianity, Islam and others - that God has ordered that wives obey and serve their husbands, each adopting stereotypical gender roles. The presence of these beliefs, even in developed countries like the USA and Europe, should not be underestimated. Most BDSM communities exist in progressive cities where these ideas are soundly rejected as sexist. However, they appear in some forms of domestic discipline in which the husband is entitled to sexual service from his wife, to her obedience and, most important, to punish her with spankings and other old-fashion corporal disciplines. If the reason a wife submits to domestic discipline is a religious belief, this brings into question whether she is consenting to it. In regular BDSM, consent is based on an erotic desire. If a wife obeys her husband and allows him to punish her not out of a kinky desire, but because of her religious beliefs, we could still say that she is consenting, I guess. But the situation starts to look uncomfortably real - it is no longer an erotic fantasy. If there are any elements of coercion or pressure from the religious community around her, then her consent starts to look problematic. Female supremacists: “Women should dominate men” There is also the converse gender essentialism: female supremacism. Some people who are into femdom (women dominating men) believe that men should serve and obey women. In a mirror reflection of male chauvinism, they believe that women are naturally superior to men, or that they deserve a privileged treatment. This supposed superiority often feeds on the fantasy that many submissive men have of the ideal Dominatrix: smart, conniving, cruel, selfish and amoral. However, there is a pseudo-feminist version of this belief. It goes like this: since men have been oppressing women for so long, it is only fair that now women should be empowered and start being served by men. This idea is so pervasive that it has started to infiltrate feminism, promoting attitudes of disrespect, exclusion and even hatred towards men. Women who adopt this attitude believe that the only way men can be tolerated is by accepting their place as inferior and subservient. Unfortunately, some submissive men eagerly adopt this attitude, and try to impose it on other men under the guise of defending feminism. For example, Amie Srinivasan writes in her book The Right to Sex: “Itziar Bilbao Urrutia, [is] a London-based, balaclava-clad, gun-wielding and skateboard-riding femdom who runs a fetish site called Urban Chick Supremacy Cell. […] Urrutia and her team berate men for their complicity in capitalist patriarchy, while restraining, pegging, and bleeding them (consensually, and for a fee, or “femdom tax”). Sometimes the men are made to recite feminists texts. In most femdom fetish porn, men are humiliated for failing to meet the demands of heteromasculinity: for being “sissies.” In Urrutia’s pornworld, men who are rich, successful and dominant are object of contempt; the sissies may be saved.” Likewise, the late and beloved Mistress Velvet of Chicago “began introducing black feminist theory into her sessions with clients,” making them read feminist texts as homework. All is good in BDSM as long as it is safe, sane and consensual, and there are no reasons to believe that the work of Urrutia and Mistress Velvet did not fulfill these requisites. However, there are two ways to view these practices. One is that these women considered these female supremacist ideas as universally valid, and they that used femdom to indoctrinate men about them. But this would impose these ideas on men outside their scene, denying their right to be vanilla (not submissive) or dominant. It would also contradict the basic claim of feminism of advocating equality between women and men. Alternatively, these female supremacy ideas could just be a fantasy shared between the Mistresses and their submissive men. In this case, they are not serious and could be viewed as a parody of real feminism. There is a certain danger in BDSM when we start to blur the boundary between fantasy and reality. Gender and racial oppression, and the fight against them, should be kept separated from erotic fantasies about sexual submission. Otherwise, we risk that they would not be taken seriously by general society. Besides, sub-space is a state of great psychological vulnerability that could be easily misused for ideological indoctrination. We would certainly be alarmed if a male Dominant tried to inculcate on his female submissives the idea that women are naturally subservient - as it often happens in Christian domestic discipline. Why should we have a different standard for femdom? Needless to say, being Dominant or submissive is not intrinsic to any gender, but chosen roles that manifest themselves in the presence of people who adopt the complementary role. Absent that, the default should be equality: treating others with respect as equals, and not infringing on their personal autonomy. Conclusions Ethical, experienced practitioners of D/s know when to be in role and when to be out of role. Needing the adoration of strangers is not dominance, it is narcissism. A Dominant needs the surrender of just one person: the one he has chosen as submissive. Dominating somebody requires a huge investment of energy and skill. It requires knowing the submissive intimately. Dominating is a gift, and good Dominants don’t squander it. So, if you see somebody prancing around, bragging about how good a Dominant they are, and demanding obedience from strangers, they probably suffer from some form of Top disease. I advise you to give them a wide berth. References Ganna A, Verweij KJH, Nivard MG, Maier R, Wedow R, Busch AS, Abdellaoui A, Guo S, Sathirapongsasuti JF, Lichtenstein P, Lundström S, Långström N, Auton A, Harris KM, Beecham GW, Martin ER, Sanders AR, Perry JRB, Neale BM, Zietsch BP (2019) Large-scale GWAS reveals insights into the genetic architecture of same-sex sexual behavior. Science 365:eaat7693. Roselli CE (2018) Neurobiology of gender identity and sexual orientation. Journal of neuroendocrinology 30:e12562-e12562.

Excerpt from my novel Games of Love and Kink. On their way back to Spain after skiing in the Alps, Cecilia and Julio have to share a hotel room. Cecilia is religious and prudish but, in the course of an intimate conversation, she discovers that she shares with Julio certain erotic fantasies. The idea that had started to form in her head was terrifying. But the temptation was irresistible. “But if I like it, it wouldn’t be bad.” Her heart was beating fast. She kept staring at the ceiling, not daring to look at Julio. “Hey… Are you trying to tell me something?” said Julio, pulling on her arm to make her look at him. “Do you want me to spank you?” She felt herself blush. She rolled to turn her back to him. “I’m so stupid! I shouldn’t have told you anything!” Julio grabbed her by the shoulder and shook her lightly. “Hey, I’m sorry! The last thing I want is for you to be ashamed of what you’ve told me. I’m so happy that you did! I just don’t understand what you want… Before we came into this room, you made it perfectly clear that you didn’t want me to touch you… And now you want me to spank you?” “Wouldn’t you like to?” “Of course I would! But I didn’t think that’s even a possibility.” “Well, it is now.” “Are you sure, Cecilia? Don’t you think it would be a sin?” “If it hurts, if I don’t feel pleasure, how could it be a sin?” “Look here, Cecilia, I know what you are doing. You are just going around inside your pretty head looking for excuses. I’m dying to do it, I assure you. But I promised you that tonight I wouldn’t try anything with you, so I will not mislead you. Whatever you decide, you must decide for yourself, don’t come to me afterward telling me that I tricked you.” It was true. Her own arguments failed to convince her. Guilt and desire fought each other inside her. “The thing is… if we don’t do it now, it will never happen!” she whined. “When we go back to Madrid, I will never see you again.” “Why not? Why shouldn’t we continue being friends? Maybe you should think about all this more calmly.” If she let this opportunity slip away, it would never come back. She would never find that husband that knew how to discipline her in a loving way. And Julio would never find another woman that would let him spank her. That made up her mind. She wanted to give him that present, left him with an unforgettable memory. Like the first time he made love with Laura. “Just a few slaps, on my pajamas, okay?” Julio was looking at her with a mixture of excitement and fear. “Okay. If you want me to stop, you only have to tell me, got it?” “Got it.” She couldn’t believe what was about to happen. Julio sat up in the middle of the bed with his back straight, leaning on a pillow and the headboard. He left his legs under the covers. “Lay down on my legs.” Cecilia kneeled on the bed to his right. She hesitated, and for a brief moment their eyes met. Julio’s face showed desire and a certain anxiety. No, she wouldn’t chicken out now. She let herself fall across his lap. Julio’s crossed legs made her butt stick up rather obscenely. She felt his warmth. His smell intoxicated her. Julio slapped her bottom. The thick fabric of the pajamas took all the force, so she felt only a blunt impact, not at all painful. “How was that?” “It didn’t hurt at all! Try hitting me harder.” “Let’s see…” Out of the corner of her eye, she saw Julio raise his hand, which landed with force on her bottom. But, once more, the spank had no effect at all. Julio hit her a few more times with the same result. It was frustrating. It came as a sudden, unconscious decision. She grabbed the waist of her pajama and with one motion pulled her pants all the way down to her knees. * * * Julio was astonished to see that Cecilia had lowered her pants. He almost asked her to get up from his lap; almost told her that it had gone too far. He had promised her that he would not take advantage of her, and he took his promises seriously. But when he saw the bottom that Cecilia was offering him, he just couldn’t resist. He had often noticed that insolent plumpness under her ski jumpsuit, trying to imagine the exact shape hidden under her clothes. And now her buttocks were almost completely exposed to his eyes, because her panties had bunched between them. The naked skin seemed incredibly soft. Its pale color challenged him to turn it to pink. He took a deep breath, caught in his indecision. “What’s the matter?” she asked with a trembling voice. “Nothing… Is just… that you have such a beautiful bottom. May I touch it?” He didn’t wait for her to answer. His hand seemed to move by itself to touch that exquisite roundness. Her skin was as soft as he had imagined. It responded to his touch with goosebumps. “No, no! Just spank me!” She would not accept caresses, only slaps in which the pain balanced any pleasure she could feel. If he hesitated now, it would break the magic of the moment. He raised his hand high in the air and let it fall hard on her left cheek. The spank exploded like a firecracker. Cecilia squeezed her bottom, but did not complain. He immediately hit her on the right buttock. At the third blow, she couldn’t avoid moving her bottom to try to escape his hand. “So, now it hurts, doesn’t it?” “You bet!” she said in a faltering voice. “Go on.” His excitement was so intense that it went to his head, getting him drunk. His cock, hidden under the blanket, was hard as a rock. His mind shot up in a torrent of punishment images. Cecilia had been a naughty girl. She made a lot of trouble on the bus. Clearly, she deserved a good spanking. He decided he had to tell her. The punishment wouldn’t be complete without a good scolding. “So, you think this is funny, don’t you? Look, Cecilia, you had this coming a long way. You are a good girl, most of the time, but from time to time your wires get crossed and you throw some silly temper tantrums, like the one today on the bus. I couldn’t believe that you could be so selfish and arrogant. You need to be taken down a peg or two, so I’m going to spank your bottom bright red. Okay?” * * * The reprimand that Julio had just given her made her feel humiliated and a bit scared. Julio’s voice sounded quite stern. “Yes, I deserve a good punishment for the stuff on the bus and for being so unkind to you when you offered me to share the room. Don’t hold back, Julio.” “Oh, yeah? Well, then get yourself ready!” As if to emphasize what he’d said, Julio grabbed her hip with one hand while with the other he gave her a series of quick slaps, alternating between her cheeks. The sting was sufficiently severe to keep her from thinking about anything else. Still, the spark of pain elicited by each slap had an undeniable lining of pleasure, which merged with the perverse joy from the humiliating position in which Julio held her and the idea that she was being punished like a little girl. Soon she started wiggling her bottom from side to side, up and down, as her body hopelessly tried to escape the slaps. It was some sort of obscene dance that she performed following the rhythm that Julio marked with his spanks, like the monotone rhythm of a metronome precisely warning her when the next slap was going to land. The stings of pain acquired the inevitability of destiny. Neither of them said anything, each one completely absorbed in their task: to punish and to be punished. She only let out sighs and occasional moans… whether from pain or pleasure, she didn’t know. The spanks produced a loud noise on that reverberated on the walls of the room, minor explosions that for her were as alarming as the blows themselves. * * * Julio had often fantasized about a situation like this, but the reality far surpassed his imagination. The sensual movements of Cecilia’s body in response to every slap. The way she contracted the buttocks, then lifted them again to offer herself to his hand. Her groans, her moans… But most of all the beautiful pink color that her skin was taking, with a warmth that stuck to his hand with each slap. All these sensations surrounded him like an intoxicating cloud of pleasure, making him wish that that exciting game would never end. However, his body had other plans. Suddenly his cock seemed to take on a life of its own and pulsed in pleasurable spasms. Alarmed, Julio realized that he had gone too far. His ejaculation completed the sexual act that he had promised Cecilia he wouldn’t do. All he could think of was to keep her from knowing what had happened. He felt so embarrassed he just wanted to vanish. Horrified, he pushed Cecilia off his lap and jumped out of bed. Oblivious to his upset, his penis continued to pump semen into the front of his pajama pants. Squeezing it into his fist to hide it, he ran to lock himself in the bathroom. * * * Cecilia was left face down on the bed, not even caring to pull up her pants. Her heart was beating loudly in her ears. She was shaking. The contrast between the intensity of her interaction with Julio and her sudden loneliness filled her with confusion. She felt abandoned, rejected in the middle of that intimate act to which she had surrendered herself so completely. Without knowing exactly why, she started to cry. Coming out of the bathroom, Julio looked at her with surprise. “You’re crying! What’s wrong?” He rushed to the bed. He laid beside her and hugged her from behind. “I’m sorry,” he said. “I didn’t want to hurt you that much.” “It’s not that…” she sniffled. “Why did you leave so suddenly?” “Oh, it’s that! Well… it was that… I couldn’t hold it anymore… I went into the bathroom so you wouldn’t see me.” Cecilia sat up to look at him. “Do you mean that you have… ejaculated?” “Only a little.” She laughed, tears still filling her eyes. “So, that means that you got really excited.” “I think it was the most exciting thing I’ve ever done in my life!” “More exciting than making love to Laura?” “Yes, even more than that!” That made her proud. But immediately a crushing wave of guilt invaded her. “Oh, Julio! What have we done!” “It’s nothing, girl, don’t worry about it… You just have taken a pretty hard spanking!” “No, Julio, I can’t deny it! I enjoyed it as much as you did.” “Okay, so go to confession and that should take care of that.” “Oh, no, please! What am I going to tell don Victor? A guy spanked me and I liked it? I’ve spent years trying not to have to tell him about my fantasies!” “You never told him?” “I only confessed to having unchaste thoughts. He never asked for details.” Julio hugged her again. She felt a wetness touching her bottom, contrasting with the warmth of her skin. She reached to pull up her pants. “Please, wait,” Julio begged. “We should…” “Just for a second.” She laid still while he caressed her bottom, making her feel the warmth and the sting that the spanking had left. She knew that she should refuse, make him stop, but she felt a softness inside, a docility that made it impossible to deny his desire. “Your skin has become very soft,” he whispered in her ear. “Yes. You spanked me hard.” She wanted him to keep touching her, maybe even dare to go further. She would let him. She was enjoying it too much. However, it was he who pulled up her pants. “I’m sorry. I think I got carried away.” “Don’t be silly! I also enjoyed it. I like the warmth that you left on my behind.” “It was the most wonderful thing in the world. I only hope you won’t regret it tomorrow.” “I don’t know how I will feel tomorrow.” “It’s late. We better go to sleep. Do you mind if I turn off the light?” “No, go ahead.” Julio rolled on the bed to turn off the lamp on the bedside table. “Good night, Cecilia.” “Good night, Julio.”

How desire, arousal and sex are used for control and service in Dominance/submission BDSM and sexual desire BDSM is not always sexual but, for most of its practitioners, is an essential part of their sexuality. For sexual masochists, spankings, bondage and different forms of erotic pain are a big turn-on and sometimes required for their arousal. Likewise, inflicting pain elicits sexual arousal in sadists. This chapter, however, is about the converse: how sexual desire, arousal, and sex are used to control and subjugate a submissive in the particular form of BDSM called dominance/submission, or D/s. Pleasure can be a tool for control as effective as pain. For a lot of people, it may be shocking that some people agree to be used sexually for the pleasure of others, giving up their own pleasure in the process. This may seem abusive and exploitative. According to some feminist ideologies, women who submit do it because they have internalized the dictates of the patriarchy to service men. However, there are a lot of submissive men who put servicing and pleasuring their Mistress above their own desires. Because that is, precisely, their main desire. I believe that there no subconscious political forces in D/s. In my article The Origins of Dominance-Submission, I speculate that the desire to submit arises from the anxiety produced by shame, pride and societal pressures. In any case, we must keep in mind that in most cases the desire to submit sexually arises spontaneously in the submissive, and not from any kind of brain-washing by the Dominant. How sex can be used in dominance/submission (D/s) In another chapter, What Happens in a Dominance-Submission Relationship?, I listed seven basic practices of D/s. Here is how sex can be used in each them. Obedience - The most direct form of expressing sexual submission is by renouncing our natural inclination to feel pleasure and achieving orgasm. Once sexual arousal has started, we feel compelled to let it progress and grow until we achieve orgasm and release. But a Dominant can start and interrupt this process, dragging in on for as long as necessary to convey to the submissive his control. Obeying his commands is the first step in the process. Surrender can be expressed as the acceptance of pain, but also as the renunciation of pleasure. But it goes even further. Sexual desire and arousal are vulnerable states, so letting the Dominant have complete access to them is a deep form of surrender. Sexual pleasure is not always desirable. Being sexually aroused in the wrong place, - for example, in a public place in front of strangers - can be scary and humiliating. Service can simply consist of pleasuring the Dominant with oral sex or other sexual acts in which the submissive plays an active but subservient role. The submissive can also serve the Dom by becoming sexualized to increase his desire and arousal. Discipline - Obedience, surrender and service naturally lead to the development of a sexual discipline in which the submissive allows his sexuality be gradually tamed and molded by the Dominant. Punishment - A direct way to punish the submissive could be depriving her of sex for a period of time. A more subtle punishment would be to arouse her but not letting her achieve orgasm. Other forms of punishment can involve sexual acts that are degrading for the submissive and pleasurable for the Dom. Demeanor may involve dressing, posing and moving in sexualized ways to gratify the Dom. The submissive presents herself as a sexual object for everyone to admire. Mind-fucking can be done quite effectively by using sexual desire, arousal and need to orgasm to put the submissive into a state of defeat and surrender. This can be done by manipulating the mechanisms of sex to induce frustration - for example by prolonged stimulation with no hope of release. But even orgasm can be used for mental manipulation - for example, by making multi-orgasmic women climax repeatedly. In the following sections, I give specific examples of ways to use sexual control in D/s. Erotic dressing and public nudity One of the milder forms of sexual control is to use sexual shame and its tension with exhibitionism to sexualize the submissive. The taboo against nudity and being exposed can be used to evoke an intoxicating combination of fear, shame and exhibitionistic desire. BDSM centers on the body of the submissive - it is being restrained with bondage, hit or tormented to produce pain, or sexually stimulated. Alternatively, public attention can be focused on it by exposing it in erotic attire or in various levels of undress. Many submissives are exhibitionists, more or less openly. This is because sexualization evokes the same feelings of vulnerability as being beaten or tied up. Evoking sexual desire in others gives you the power to capture their attention and, at the same time, the vulnerability of being used by the mere fact of being watched. Exhibitionism exists in tension with the fear and shame produced by nudity. Of course, public nudity can have some unpleasant consequences is real life. That is why there are BDSM parties in which these things can be practiced in a public, and yet safe, environment. A submissive can arrive in a regular outfit and change into sexy paraphernalia, or have her body gradually exposed to the gaze of other by the Dominant. Provocative dressing may include erotic clothing - miniskirts, hot shorts, high heels, garter belts, stockings, lace bras and panties - or fetish gear - corsets, harnesses, leather, latex, pants with exposed crotch or bottom, etc. All this marks the submissive as a sexual object on display. Secrets under the clothes Other of games may involve secret manipulation of clothing in public. The most obvious one is to make a woman wear a skirt without panties. Depending on the length of the skirt, there is a risk that somebody would catch a glimpse of her bottom or pubis. Fear of public humiliation and the extra care dedicated to not getting exposed is a good mind-fuck. Likewise, wearing a tight shirt without a bra will expose breast and nipples at the limit of decency. Both submissive men and women can be ordered to lower their underwear to just below the crotch. This is pretty safe if wearing pants, but nevertheless will induce a feeling of exposure and hinder walking. There can also be hidden bondage. Women can have a rope tightly bound around the hips and between the labia. Men can have their penises and genitals bound. Private nudity In private, doing house chores while naked is an old favorite in D/s. Even better, the submissive can be made to wear high heels, a garter belt, stockings, gloves and… nothing else. Leaving exposed parts of the body that are usually covered is more sexualizing than mere nudity. Of course, sexy clothes can also serve to emphasize sexual service at home. Sexual jewelry Recently, a number of sexy objects to be worn in the genitals or the nipples have reached the market. Jewelry for women is designed to spread the labia or rub the clit, producing constant sexual stimulation. Other jewelry clamp around the nipples, keeping them erect and aroused. Men may wear straps around the penis and balls. One level up is sexual piercing, which is permanent. In women, the nipples, the labia and the clitoral hood may be pierced. Men may have the frenulum or the glands pierced. Many people do this just as a fetish. In a D/s context, sex jewels and piercings are worn at the request of the Dominant, as a constant reminder of the submissive’s surrender of their physical autonomy. Using sex toys for domination Dildos, butt plugs, vibrators (especially remotely controlled ones) and fucking machines can be used to establish sexual domination. I described their use and safety concerns in the chapter Sex Toys, so here I am only going to briefly explain how they are used in D/s. While a male Dominant is able to fuck his female submissive any time he wants, penetrating her with a dildo allows him to stimulate her vaginally without being distracted by his own pleasure. A dildo can also be worn under the clothes to send the message that the submissive is sexually possessed. Butt plugs that can be inflated inside the rectum to increase their invasiveness are particularly well-suited for D/s. Even better are the ones with articulated lobes that open inside the rectum. Some can even be locked with a key. In women, this acts as a sort of chastity belt, because vaginal penetration becomes impossible. All this emphasizes quite effectively that the submissive is sexually owned, because the stimulation of the anus and the rectum is unrelenting. Anal hooks and butt plugs with a handle in the base can be used to attach a leash or ropes for bondage. Tugging on the leash or the ropes sends sensations inside the anus, provoking an exquisite feeling of vulnerability. At BDSM parties and similar public settings where the submissive can be put on display, butt plugs with bright colored crystals at the base, or with an attached tail, can be used to make everybody aware of the plight of the submissive. This adds an element of humiliation, or simply advertises that the submissive is sexually owned. In D/s, vibrators allow Dominants to induce sexual arousal in their submissives very quickly, and to stop it equally fast. This is done in women by stimulating the clitoris, and in men by using vibrating rings around the penis. Turning the vibrator on and off at intervals, the Dominant can keep the submissive in a constant state of arousal and suspense. Vibrators that are controlled remotely are particularly well-suited for sexual domination. Stimulating the submissive when she least expects it can be a sophisticated form of mind-fuck. However, the Dominant must be careful that this doesn’t interfere with work or creates a dangerous situation - for example, while driving. Fucking machines take the idea of sexual domination to an extreme. They are often combined with bondage to induce strong feelings of helplessness and sexual subjugation. They can be used for pleasure, discipline or punishment. By controlling the size and shape of the dildo, the depth of penetration and the speed of thrusting, the Dominant can deliver a variety of overwhelming sensations. In multi-orgasmic women, they can be used to induce repeated forced orgasms, which can lead to altered states of consciousness. However, there are some safety concerns. Vaginal abrasion and even tears can occur without the submissive noticing them. Special caution should be used when using fucking machines in the anus, which is more fragile than the vagina. A fucking machine can produce hemorrhoids, especially if it is not adequately lubricated. A submissive should never be left strapped to a fucking machine unsupervised. Repeated orgasms and prolonged sexual arousal can lead to physical exhaustion, shortness of breath and panic attacks. Bukkake Bukkake consist in ejaculating over the face or the body of another person. It’s a fetish often portrayed in porn, usually involving several men. Because it is very visual, it is used by detractors of porn as an example of how it humiliates women. Of course, facials are also done on gay men. In BDSM, the degrading element of bukkake is one of the main reasons it is done. Judging from the happy, semen-covered faces of many women in Fetlife.com - a social medium for people into fetishes and kink - this act can also be very erotic for the receiver. Face fucking Rough oral sex is a common act of sexual domination. When the Dominant is a man, this may take the form of face fucking, which can be done to women or other men. While in a normal fellatio the person giving it is the active partner, in face fucking the receiver is ordered to just open the mouth. Then the penis is shoved into it and moved with the thrusts of fucking. Gagging, slobbering and drooling are considered a plus, since they emphasize the vulnerability of the submissive. Face fucking works best when the head of the recipient is braced against the bed or other furniture to prevent it from moving away from the penis. Bondage can also be added to increase passivity. Alternatively, the Dominant may grab the hair or the head of the submissive to retain it, or force it to move the ways he wants. There are gags that force the mouth to stay open, increasing the exposure of the submissive. A ring gag consists of one or two metal rings placed between the front teeth and held with a strap around the head. However, this has the inconvenience that the penis has to be inserted through the ring and rubs against it. A Jennings Gag is a device used by dentists to keep the mouth of their patients open. It consists of two metal bars that go behind the front teeth joined by a ratcheting hinge that can be released with a lever. Again, a thrusting penis may chafe against the metal bar or the front teeth. A better choice may be a type of gag consisting of a wedge inserted between the molars, held in place by a strap around the back of the head. There is nothing hindering the entrance of the penis in the mouth, and the front teeth are opened wide enough not to be a problem. Face fucking can be challenging for the receiver, who feels invaded and out of control. Some people have trouble breathing through their noses, particularly when receiving this rough treatment, so getting out of breath - to the point of passing out - is a potential problem. Another potential problem is that face fucking can easily induce vomit. If the submissive is laying face-up, the vomit can go inside the windpipe, presenting an asphyxiation hazard. Vomit is very acidic (it contains hydrochloric acid), so it can burn the throat and the mouth of the submissive and the penis of the Dominant. This can be prevented by a quick wash with plenty of water. Face sitting When the Dominant is a woman, rough oral sex can consist of face sitting. The woman straddles the head of the submissive, facing backwards toward the feet or forward, and places her pussy or her anus over the mouth and nose of her partner. The submissive is then ordered to lick, while the Dominant is free to move to expose her favorite bits to his or her attentions. As with face fucking, the submissive is immobilized in this position, his head trapped between the legs of the woman and her crotch. The feeling of subjugation can be increased by adding bondage. One important safety issue here is the ability of the submissive to breathe. Unlike face fucking, the top can easily block both the mouth and the nose of the bottom, even inadvertently. Indeed, face sitting is sometimes considered as a form of breath play. The risk of asphyxiation is increased by the fact that the Dominant is unable to see the face of the submissive. The safest way to practice face sitting is to release the pressure frequently to allow the submissive to breathe, and use this opportunity to communicate with him or her. Orgasm control and chastity Chastity and various forms of orgasm control are so important in D/s that I have addressed them in a different article, Orgasm Control and Chastity in BDSM.

Some BDSM practices revolve around controlling orgasms, either by suppressing them or by triggering them at the whim of the dominant Permission to orgasm The most basic method of orgasm control is to establish that the submissive cannot orgasm unless she is given permission by the dominant. The submissive will beg for release for a while, until the dominant finally allows it. The permission could be given on the condition that the submissive does or says certain things, like accepting spanks or other forms of pain, or saying degrading things about themselves. Male dominants usually allow female submissives to cum relatively soon. Male submissives are not so lucky. For many dominant-submissives couples, permission to orgasm is always required when they are together. Some dominants may even require it when they are apart. There may also be a schedule for when the submissive is allowed to have an orgasm. Because orgasm is so difficult to control, breaking this rule is often a cause for punishment. A drawback of this practice is that many women find it difficult to get to orgasm, so if they are denied the opportunity when the time is right, they may never be able to do it. In this case, the dominant may quickly grant permission, but still have the rule in place so that he knows when she is going to orgasm - perhaps to facilitate it. Also, voicing out an incoming orgasm is slightly humiliating and a way to signal submission. With some playful training, this could even become a way to facilitate orgasms. Edging Edging is a sexual technique that consists of repeatedly coming close to orgasm without letting it happen, leading to long sessions of masturbation or intercourse. It has been reported to increase pleasure and trigger a more powerful orgasm when it is finally allowed to happen. Edging is practiced mostly by men, often when masturbating alone. However, in BDSM it is directed by the dominant during a scene. It can be done to both men and women. The reason why edging is more common in men is that the orgasm is normally associated with ejaculation, so it is easy to know when it has taken place. In women, strong arousal, pleasure and orgasm can become blurred while edging. Edging requires that both the submissive and the dominant can recognize the point of orgasmic inevitability, so that sexual stimulation can be stopped before reaching it. This may require some training. Orgasm denial Orgasm denial is similar to edging in that the submissive is sexually aroused, often close to orgasm, but climax is never allowed to happen. The BDSM scene ends without the submissive having reached sexual release. This causes him or her to continue in a mental space of submission and of baseline sexual arousal. Orgasm denial also conveys the message that sexual release is a privilege of the dominant, which is denied to the submissive. Or perhaps it is reserved as a reward. Both edging and orgasm denial work well when coupled with bondage, because this ensures that only the dominant can sexually stimulate the submissive. Again, orgasm denial can be problematic for women who have trouble climaxing. Ironically, for these women, it may also be a psychological relief by taking the pressure of the social imperative to orgasm. Then they may find it easier to climax when allowed to do so. Just putting orgasms under the control of the dominant can ease the ongoing insecurity and frustration caused by the difficulty to climax. When sexual frustration becomes part of the game, it loses its bite. Still, sexual control games that encourage orgasms may be more appropriate for these women. Ruined orgasms A ruined orgasm is one that occurs in such a way that it brings little or no pleasure. The basic way to do this is to provide sexual stimulation until past the point of orgasmic inevitability. Then the stimulation is stopped, so the orgasm occurs but in a blunted way, bringing little pleasure. In men, this means an ejaculation devoid of pleasure. Since it is followed by a refractory period, even the sexual desire goes away. Ruined orgasms produce a sexual frustration that is even more intense than orgasm denial. Orgasm denial maintains and even increases sexual desire, while a ruined orgasm leaves the man in an asexual state of no pleasure and no desire. Ruined orgasms are easier to give to men than to women because the female body has more resources to produce a satisfactory orgasm. The thighs can be clenched together to stimulate the clitoris. Even if this is prevented by tying the legs apart, pelvic muscles can be contracted in an almost invisible way. Orgasm can take place purely in the brain, without any genital stimulation. Therefore, a better way to ruin an orgasm is to deliver pain while the orgasm is occurring. But, be warned that pain would just increase pleasure in many masochists. In that case, mental distractions - like the dominant talking or having to answer questions - can work better. Ruined orgasm can have strong effects on women. They can even be painful. “I’m female and I have ruined orgasms from edging more often than I want. […] You climb that mountain only to find there’s no peak and you’re absolutely done for a while because you can’t edge more (too sore). It’s like sitting down to your favorite meal only to find you can’t taste it, and it still gives you heartburn.” Anonymous, Fetlife. Torment after orgasm Many dominance-submission practices are done with the implicit knowledge that the submissive is going to be sexually aroused by them. So, even if there is sexual denial, they will satisfy his ongoing sexual desire. However, if a man is made to ejaculate before any action starts, his refractory period would deprive him, not just of any further sexual satisfaction, but even of the sexual desire that motivated him to engage in the scene to begin with. Spankings, canings and floggings would be just pure pain. Sexual service would be done for the sole satisfaction of the dominant. If the ejaculation entailed a ruined orgasm, the entire scene would give the submissive no sexual pleasure whatsoever. Torment after orgasm works better for men than for women, because most women lack a strong refractory period. Still, making a female submissive climax before doing nasty things to her would deprive her of some of the kinky pleasure she might have obtained otherwise. Conditioned orgasm The technique of conditioned orgasms is based on the experiments of Ivan Pavlov on classical conditioning. He observed that dogs salivate when given food. He rang a bell while feeding them, and found that, after some repetitions, the dogs salivated just by ringing the bell. Here, food is called the unconditioned stimulus - it naturally induces salivation - and the bell sound is called conditioned stimulus - it only induces salivation after being coupled with the unconditioned stimulus. This basic experimental design was repeated many times, in different animals species and using different unconditioned and conditioned stimulus. Some savvy dominant came up with the idea that it might be possible to condition women to orgasm. The unconditioned stimulus would be sexual stimulation of the clitoris or the vagina, and the conditioned stimulus would be a special word said by the dominant. However, other things can be used as conditioned stimuli, like showing a particular object, or hitting in a particular way. Does it work? You would think that scientists would have tried this, but I could only find two fairly old studies, which somehow seemed to miss the point. The first (Letourneau and O'Donohue, 1997) was done in women, using erotic videos and an amber light as unconditioned and conditioned stimuli, respectively. As measures of sexual arousal, they used subjective ratings and vaginal pulse amplitude. The women said that they had become aroused by the amber light. However, there were no significant differences with control women, who were exposed to both the videos and the amber light, but at different times. I think that this control may not be valid because the control women still associated the amber light and the videos, albeit indirectly: they both occurred during at the doctor’s offices during the experiment. If both groups became conditioned to the light, this would render the statistical comparison between them not significant. The other study (Kantorowitz, 1978) was done in men (8 subjects), who were shown three pictures of naked women during the plateau, resolution and refractory phases, respectively, of masturbation sessions. They measured penile tumescence - the level or erection - with which they responded to subsequent presentations of the three pictures. While the photos had the same erotic power at the beginning of the experiment, after conditioning those that were paired with the plateau phase produced more tumescence and were found more erotic than those paired with the refractory period. A later review paper (Khan et al., 2011) suggested that orgasmic conditioning could be used “for treatment of paraphilias like fetishism and pedophilias.” This sounds too much like conversion therapy for my taste. It would be nice if this could be used to treat pedophilia, which causes lifelong trauma to abused children. But why do they want to eliminate fetishisms, which are mostly innocuous? What I hear in the BDSM community is that orgasmic conditioning works, at least in women. My impression is that only women who orgasm easily can be conditioned to climax on command, but other women can become very aroused when they hear the trigger word. Forced orgasms Forced orgasms are practiced on multi-orgasmic women, taking advantage of the fact that they have no refractory period. Typically, the woman is tied up and make to orgasm again and again by stimulating the clitoris with a vibrator, the vagina with a dildo, or whatever works for her. Past a certain point, the orgasm is no longer desired and, ironically, is experienced as unpleasant. This may be because of physical exhaustion or because she feels like she is losing control. As with other techniques of orgasm control, the dominant uses this one to emphasize his control over the body and the mind of the submissive. I have heard some submissive women reporting that they reach altered states of consciousness through forced orgasms. Chastity Chastity is refraining from sexual activity, which is important for many religions that consider sex immoral. It is also associated with the virtue of temperance in some philosophies, which extol chastity as a method to develop self-control. In BDSM, chastity is another way by which a dominant exerts control over the submissive by controlling his or her sexuality. Chastity in BDSM has a different meaning than in religion. Since kink has a sexual component, a submissive in chastity does not completely refrain from sexual activity, only from some aspects of it. Most often, chastity is understood as just refraining from orgasm. Indeed, the submissive may be sexually stimulated without allowing the release of orgasm in order to increase sexual desire and frustration. Male submissives may be allowed some types of orgasms - like prostatic orgasm from anal sex - but not ejaculation. Female submissives may be used for the sexual pleasure of the dominant - by being fucked vaginally or anally, for example - while not being allowed to climax from this. Likewise, male and female submissives may be ordered to perform oral sex - and may derive pleasure from it. In its milder forms, chastity is demanded for short periods of times in order to increase the sexual desire of the submissive before a sexual encounter with the dominant. Using this enhanced desire as a foundation, the submissive can then be manipulated with edging, conditioned orgasm, forced orgasms, and other forms of sexual control. In its more strict forms, the submissive is made to live in chastity for long periods of times, months, years, or for as long as the DS relationship lasts. BDSM chastity has become enormously popular lately, judging from the increase in advertisement for the devices used to enforce it: penis cages for men and chastity belts for women. However, chastity is often practiced just by trusting that the submissive will not masturbate. Many people practice chastity alone, without a dominant ordering them to do so. They do not do it as part of a religious practice, but because it arouses kinky feelings in them. Penis cages Penis cages are metal or plastic devices that wrap around the penis, locking it and the testicles with a padlock or with a built-in lock. The cages are made of bars or have a hole to allow urinating. The cage is small and curved to make an erection painful and impossible. Some cages even have spikes inside. Others are extremely short in order to compress the penis into the pelvis, making it look like a clitoris to add humiliation (“sissification”). In FemDom, it is common to make fun of the man for having a small penis, or by calling his penis a clit. By wrapping tightly behind the testicles, penis cages are impossible to remove once locked. The key is given to the dominant partner or, in cases where chastity is done outside a DS relationship, to an intimate friend called the “keyholder”. Modern penis cages have an electronic lock than can be operated at a distance from a cell phone or a computer. The news recently reported that some of these devices had been hacked, and the hacker demanded a payment in order the release the penis of the unfortunate owner. For uncircumcised men, an alternative to penis cages is a piercing in the prepuce that traps it over the glans, preventing erections. Chastity belts It is not clear to what extent the chastity belts worn by medieval and renaissance women were actually used. However, devices inspired by them are commonly used in BDSM, both by women and men. In women, their primary function is to prevent vaginal penetration. They are also supposed to prevent masturbating by stroking the clitoris. However, there is some controversy about whether a determined woman can get around this. It is possible to insert the back of a spoon or even a finger around the belt to reach the clit. Many women can also masturbate by clenching the thighs. The typical chastity belt has two straps. One cinches the waist. The other, attached to it at the front and the back, covers the crotch. This second strap has a plate that covers the pubis, with holes for urination. A hole over the anus permits defecation. Some chastity belts allow the attachment of dildos and butt plugs to their inside. Like penis cages, chastity belts lock with a padlock or built-in lock, or even with a remotely controlled mechanism. Of course, once the belt is open, the submissive has to be convinced to put it back on. More complex chastity belts have additional straps that go around the top of the thighs. Others look like shorts, with straps around the waist and the thighs and tough fabric in between, and a plastic plate covering the pubis. These are medical devices similar to straightjackets. They are more effective than conventional chastity belts to prevent masturbation by stroking the clitoris. However, this type of chastity belts need to be unlocked for urination and defecation. Prolonged wearing of chastity belts may produce chafing of the skin by constant rubbing of the metal straps, and urinary tract infections from improper cleaning. Why do people submit to orgasm control? We can find some common themes in all these methods of sexual control: surrendering sexual satisfaction to the dominant, being used sexually without sexual reward, self-denial of sexual pleasure, using sexual desire and sexual pleasure to control the body and the mind, increasing sexual desire without fully satisfying it, erotization of sexual frustration. We live in an increasingly sex-positive culture where everybody is supposed to be able to find sexual satisfaction. And the BDSM community is at the center of this sex-positive culture. So why do kinky people enjoy depriving themselves of sex? First of all, this proves that there is a BDSM desire that is different from sexual desire, although associated with it. Many kinky people develop fantasies about being spanked, tied up or subjugated from a very early age, and these go beyond the purely sexual. The desire for kink arises from psychological urges different from the sex drive. Perhaps they are rooted in mental tensions about desire, social interactions, shame, guilt, envy and frustration. One of the main drives for the desire for sexual subjugation is to seek relief from societal pressures for sexual accomplishment. Men are supposed to be better if they have a large penis, develop powerful erections, thrust powerfully during intercourse, and give women orgasms. One way to conjure the fear of not achieving these things is doing exactly the opposite: locking their erections away in a cage that makes their penis look small, and renouncing intercourse. Similarly, women base their sexual prestige on having numerous and powerful orgasms. So renouncing orgasms, or having them being controlled by somebody else, becomes a way to rebel against this pressure that threatens their self-image. There is also a basic contradiction in the dominance-submission dynamic. The submissive is supposed to serve and obey, but often ends up being the one being served by the dominant, who pleasures her and caters to her kinky desires. By denying orgasms to the submissive, both partners prove to each other that the relationship is truly about service and surrender. A lot of the current popularity of chastity may also be related to the NoFab culture, and beliefs about preserving sexual energy and the supposed benefits of abstaining from masturbation. There are also elements of psychological masochism in sexual control. Contrary to the traditional beliefs of psychologists, these may not be unhealthy at all. If confronting negative emotions in a positive way is healthy, then there is nothing wrong with dwelling on feelings of subjugation, humiliation, envy and frustration. It is healing to turn these emotions into something positive by endowing them with an erotic charge. Ultimately, what comes into play here are crucial existential issues. Our self-image, of body and mind. Our inability to live up to the expectations that we and others place on ourselves. Our relationship with our desires and our inability to fulfill them. The mirage of sexual pleasure, that comes and goes and still leave us unhappy. By giving up control, we renounce of these things and find ourselves free from them. References Kantorowitz DA (1978) An experimental investigation of preorgasmic reconditioning and postorgasmic deconditioning. J Appl Behav Anal 11:23-34. Khan MH, Mukhtar MZ, Bajwa M, Alwi M, Gul M, Niaz S (2011) Role of orgasmic conditioning and reconditioning in psychiatry. European Psychiatry 26:1546-1546. Letourneau EJ, O'Donohue W (1997) Classical conditioning of female sexual arousal. Arch Sex Behav 26:63-78.