Clarifying non-normative and alternative pornography

The month of July is BDSM month, more precisely July 24 (24/7), which refers to the practice of BDSM as a way of life: 24 hours a day, 7 days a week. What is this BDSM thing? To talk about BDSM, it is first interesting to talk about non-normative erotic practices. Non-normative or alternative erotic practices are those that go beyond what is meant by “conventional sex”: anything that is not penetration and stimulation of the genitals through masturbation or oral sex. Historically, alternative erotic practices have been considered perversions, as they were called in the early 20th century. Today, they are called paraphilias in medical terms, but not without a certain negative connotation. Let us clarify that feeling attraction or enthusiasm for things or practices that go beyond what is understood as usual is not wrong in itself. This becomes a problem when they cause significant discomfort to themselves or others.

What do non-normative or alternative sexual practices cover?

Kink is an umbrella term that encompasses non-normative sexual practices. Fetishes are an example. Fetishism: This is a sexual attraction to a part of the body that is not considered sexual or to objects. For example, foot fetish or shoe fetish, although there are many others. In the evil world, there are countless practices. Some examples could be spanking, tickling, using certain clothing like latex, golden showers and playing with bodily fluids, animal play which involves pretending to be an animal (cat, dog, horse. ..), exhibitionism games in places. intended for him or in other places, choking games, role playing games, domination and submission games… to name but a few. Among all these practices, some are linked to BDSM and others are not.

Sado-Sado. This includes practices in which there is a transfer of power from one of the parties involved, while the other party exercises said power. These are the acronyms of:

1. Servitude. Bondage refers to practices that involve restrictions on movement by means of ropes, handcuffs, chains, etc.

2. Domination and discipline Games in which one person obtains pleasure by dominating one or more others through orders.

3. Sadism. Pleasure is obtained by inflicting pain on another person. All of these practices, especially those that involve pain, have been previously agreed upon and desired by all parties.

4. Submission. In submission, pleasure is obtained from obeying others.

5. Masochism. Pleasure in receiving pain.

In this way, it could be said that kink includes BDSM in addition to other alternative practices, being a broader generic term. BDSM would specifically refer to practices of power transfer.

As we said before, we assume that everyone involved wants this type of practice. For this reason, in BDSM it is important to talk about consensus in the practices carried out, and there are different consensus systems. One of these, the first to emerge and spread, was known as SSC: the practices are safe, sensible and consensual. Safe in terms of having certain ideas or bases about what we do as well as risk prevention; understand through sense that all people involved have full decision-making capacity; avoid the consumption of drugs, alcohol or any substance that modifies the differentiation between fantasy and reality; and consensus has to do with all parties agreeing on what practices will be implemented, with what intensity, and being able to stop them. Consensus is what differentiates and distances BDSM from situations of non-consensual violence, such as abuse or gender violence, because it occurs at a specific time and in a specific situation, with the total power of the submissive person to stop everything . at the time you want.

In order to be able to immediately end the practice at any time, the so-called “safe word” is usually established in advance. The safety word is a word agreed upon by both parties, short, loud and sometimes decontextualized (“stop” or “red” for example) which is used to stop the practice in progress in the event of any type of discomfort. .

There are other consensus systems than the SSC which are based on other foundations and everyone can choose what seems best suited to their practice. The pleasure obtained through these practices may be associated with something genital but this is not obligatory. There are people who find sexual pleasure, for example, in spanking or being spanked without this necessarily leading to more genital practices.

In short, kink and BDSM practices are diverse ways of experiencing sexuality, each as valid as the other. These are not disorders or something problematic as long as they are experienced in a positive way, without harming ourselves or others and as long as everything is safe and consensual. Feeling attraction and practicing this type of practice is neither better nor worse than other sexualities. Each person is a world and the wonderful thing about all of this is knowing ourselves and our particularities and being able to share them with people with similar tastes to ours.