What is so ironic is that many people who are DEEPLY hurt in the BDSM community are not hurt by whips or needles or spankings; but pathologizing therapists.

Example: if you are into torture you are fucked up.

I couldn't find "fucked up" in the DSM-IV TR. Is that a clinical term. What do people who engage in BDSM suffer from?

Normal, natural, and suppose are words used to try to justify the known and reject the undiscovered. Bury your head in the sand and keep telling yourself the world is as simple as you thought it was when you were 8.

I am writing not in response to the article, but in response to the predictable replies decrying any criticism of sadism.

I have seen these arguments repeated more times than I care to remember, but I have never found them to be anything other than intolerant of anyone holding an opinion other than sadism’s.

The same weary old dogma is trotted out.

Hurting another person is the ultimate form of love.

It’s all about exercising choice.

If you think we are sick, its because you do not understand or the ultimate sadist insult, ‘you are narrow-minded’.

“Hurting another person is the ultimate expression of love.” Since when has abuse and humiliation had anything whatsoever to do with Love? Love and abuse are as far apart as it is possible to be, complete opposites ends of the spectrum. Love is kind, gentle, and uplifting. Violence is nasty, mean and vicious. They are not complimentary, no form of yin and yang, but two totally alien concepts which only get mixed in the wacky world of sadism where particularly disturbed individuals satisfy their warped lust, then try to hide this abuse by calling it love. How can I prove this? We all love our kid’s right? Would any parent express their love for their children by whipping them, calling them a ‘painslut’ or cutting their body?

“It’s all about exercising choice” I’m all for exercising choice, but I generally find that people who shout loudest for their ‘right’ to choose are the last to realise that choice is not singular. Fine, make your choice but understand that you are responsible for the consequence of that choice. If you choose to abuse, then you cannot run from the consequences when that abuse goes wrong. Sadists regularly come before the courts having followed the peculiar rules of sadism, only to be shocked when reality bites and they are made to pay for the consequences of their choices.

“ ‘If you think we are sick, its because you do not understand’ or the ultimate sadist insult, ‘you are narrow-minded’.” Of course if we where just to listen to the brilliant arguments the sadist’s use then the scales will fall from our eyes and we will be transported to the sunlight uplands where torture and abuse make everyone happy. Or we could use a little scepticism, you know like the story of the king’s new clothes. We could look at the arguments and decide that they are nothing more than self-serving dogma, held by those who are slaves to their need to abuse. A little scepticism could show that we understand what sadism is really about, and that it is nothing more than a nasty cult of violence.

Scepticism could make us get accused of being narrow-minded. Sad I know, but it’s better than abandoning scepticism and becoming so open minded that our brains fall out.

then why can't you even sign your name to your fucktard screed?

There is a certain projection that SM/BSDM and other sexual expressions are therapy, ok-to-play-in-all-ways, politically correct pursuits despite the chains and pain. What is striking is that the impulses we humans have don't account for politics, for safety, for cultural acceptance nor should they have to. Steven's experience is so interesting because he embraces the mystery of being attracted to something that doesn't purge him, leaves him with complicated and painful feelings and yet makes him feel alive and human. That's why humans are so wonderful and strange...at our cores we aren't necessarily driven by some nice picture of what we should be.

The judgement I hear from others just screams how uncomfortable we are with feelings and experiences we can't distill down to some understandable cause. We want to analyze it...say it was because he was raped or that he is working something out that has to do with feelilng unloved or unwanted. Why does that necessarily have to be? Why does his sexuality have to be justfied as right or wrong? And why do we always use that blanket justification of therapy as the rea? People who appologise for S/M are just as uncomforatble with it as those who vilify it.

The meaning he gets from his sexuality are singular and hard to understand, but I don't think we have to understand any of it nor do we have to justify it.

To those of you who respond to BDSM as being torture and say those who do it are "fucked-up" and need therapy...all you're doing is proving you are indeed "fucked-up." Ahhh, I see you can use my herbal enema!

BDSM is truly the most intimate way of experiencing what it is to be alive in a body. There is every flavor and experience possible in BDSM play...every possible thing from mild to wild. One size doesn't fit all. And there is, fortunately, every size available. There is no other way of being completely free and to learn about who you really are. Fortunately, within the context of a loving and honest relationship, delving into BDSM is absolutely natural...it IS what we all crave. We all want to experience and play with control and release...the act of even vanilla sex is just that...control and then release in orgasim. Sometimes you want to "take it." Sometimes you want to "fuck the shit out of it." Sometimes you want to selflessly give your partner all the pleasure you possible can without wanting an orgasim yourself. And this is just "vanilla sex," I'm talking about. What fantasies do you have when you are having vanilla sex? Come on...you all fantasize during sex.

If you attack BDSM as being sick, you are the sick one...and you don't even know it. Frankly, you need to quit being scared chickens who can only follow what you've been told is right. And if you can't find out what is right for you and your body and your psyche, you'll never become much more than superficial...you're opininons about most everything will merely be mimicking what you've been sold it right.

Become a much more mature and insightful person. Buy some nylon rope and a silk scarf and "play" a little. You'll be amazed how much fun "playing" is. You'll find out so much more about yourself...really!