From: cyberoid@stein.u.washington.edu (Robert Jacobson)
Newsgroups: soc.bi
Subject: Re: Tantra, Power Exchange, and Reconciliation
Date: 26 Dec 92 06:14:14 GMT
Article-I.D.: u.1992Dec26.061414.4511
Organization: University of Washington

In article <1992Dec25.055511.25377@thelema.uucp> STella@thelema.uucp
(STella) writes:

>Note to the asbers seeing this thread for the first time: I've set
>followups back to soc.bi by default, but I wanted to give y'all a
>whistle, in case anyone wants to join the thread in soc.bi.

Stella, thanks for extending the discussion to a.s.b., but next time
let me know your intentions first...it's netiquette.

>In article <1992Dec19.213643.4922@u.washington.edu>
>cyberoid@stein.u.washington.edu (Robert Jacobson) writes:
>
>>I have no hard and ready rules governing power considerations, 
>>except that in my own relationships I strive for as nearly-equal
>>sharing as possible.
>
>As do I.  I rarely play with people who're uncomfortable with either
>role, beater or beaten.  But equality is not marching through life in
>lockstep, and for me to feel that power is equal in a relationship is
>PERFECTLY compatible with asking hir to give me the gift of pain, or
>allowing hir to control the timing and nature of our sexplay.  Or with
>beating someone till my arms are so tired I won't be able to control
>the whip, or teasing hir into quivering, gibbering lustpuddles.

I don't equate equality with marching through life in lockstep, either.
In fact, given that we live in a power-based society, equality of any
sort is pretty rare and genuine equality is anything but lockstep.

>[Stuff omitted]
>BDSM, however, is more than flying whips, dripping blood, and
>heart-felt screams.  Inside the safety of an agreed SM encounter, I
>can be pretty damn sure that folks will NOT do anything that I do not
>fully, freely, individually consent to.  I have had a friend, after
>beating me till I was weak-kneed, ask me "may I kiss you?"

Fully understood, and quite different from being screwed in the more
common context, outside the sexual realm, where one cannot say "stop."
That's a fair distinction.

>[Stuff about "vanilla" sex omitted, no settlement having been reached]
>>Tantric sex, about which I am only now learning, seeks to liberate
>>deep energies in human beings and unite them through shared energy.
>>It seems to me (as a novice, understand) that inequities in power,
>>even if only symbolic, would tend to defeat this goal of perfect
>>sharing.  Perhaps this is naive and counter to others' experience.
>>I would be glad to hear more.
>
>Naive?  I think not.  Counter? you betcha!
>
>The night I had my clitoral hood pierced, I was clearly bottoming to
>the needle, to my fears.  BUT when the needle shoved home, my pain
>(less than a stubbed toe) was divided, shared, among the (how many was
>it?  25-30?) people in that room.  My joy, the ecstasy of having
>passed through something I'd feared, however, was multiplied as each
>person in that room fed their joy back to me, as all I was and willed
>to be was concentrated in that loving needle-thrust.
>
>If you have a body of water, a downslope, and a waterwheel, you can
>grind corn or make electricity.  If you have a lake, and no head, no
>unequal elevation, you can go fishing.  waterski, or various other fun
>things, but the waterwheel won't move.  When I take the whip in hand,
>or receive it on my eager back, I'm helping create a power-inequity
>that liberates energy.  I am an equal partner in that creation
>(without both top and bottom, nothing happens), but to make it happen,
>I must play at being unequal, or the wheel won't turn.

The lesson of tantric sex, as little as I understand of it, is that
it is possible to liberate this energy inherently, without wild gymnas-
tics or demonstrations.  This doesn't contradict your own discoveries;
it's only another way.  The difference may be akin to that between
fission and fusion:  both release lots of energy, in different ways.

I also appreciate, Stella, your admonition to ask my partner about her
needs.  Good advice.  Still, it doesn't answer my first question, which
is how to reconcile what are apparently (to me) antithetical approaches
to the maximum enjoyment of sex.  I have no case to make or normative
bias to enforce.  I'm not into power relations.  Another, perhaps an
SO, might be.  If we wanted to get together, how might we do it?  Maybe
only someone who has solved this problem can tell us.

Thanks for the response.  I thought the topic had been ignored to
death.  I welcome its resusitation because of its more than theoretical
importance.

Bob