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Peter Masters |
Peter Masters |
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Masochism
| Penetration |
| Engagement |
| Consent |
| Communication |
| Power |
| Authority |
| Control |
| Trust |
| Fetish |
| Defence mechanisms |
| Mapping motivations to activities |
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It can be very tempting to simply see BDSM, particularly from the side of a bottom or a submissive, as acts of masochism, where it might seem that these people seek out pain, humiliation, torture, suffering, and embarrassment as ends in themselves, and that it's all fundamentally the same with the choice of pain over embarrassment, for example, being explainable as simply a matter of taste along the same lines as chocolate ice cream versus vanilla ice cream.
The point about BDSM is that oftentimes the pain, humiliation, etc., are not ends in themselves but are ways of achieving other positive outcomes. When we see someone straining in a gymnasium we don't attempt to categorise what they do as some sort of pathology which needs treatment. We know that they perhaps feel like a jolly good workout after a stressful day, or that what they're doing is simply a way for them to physically stay in shape.
And just as the strain, the suffering, and sometimes the pain which accompanies a workout in the gym are necessary to achieve the positive outcomes which strenuous exercise can give us, the pain, embarrassment, and the suffering which often accompany BDSM are also necessary to achieve things like stress relief, catharsis and may of the other boons which are discussed in this site's articles on motivations for doing BDSM.
While true masochism may be a pathology, what we typically see in BDSM is not masochism but is instead the use of pain and suffering to achieve higher goals.
