Friday, October 26, 2007

deconstructing myself, a response to Marcelle

I want to respond to Marcelle's comment in its own post because I think she brings up many interesting points that I would like to explore in this incredibly self indulgent world that is the blog/diary (blogary?).
As a product of a hetero-normative suburban family I want to discuss the paradigms we work within. To not slip into grad school jargon (also v hard to do) and not indulge too deeply in auto-ethnography (which I hate), I would like to say that intellectually, I treat my sex life like I treat my research endeavors and all aspects of my life. I work within the framework I have been given, try to test its boundaries, and then subvert/deconstruct/understand it for my own purposes or maniacal plots for world domination. I am comfortable in my ontology yet question its fences. I think I have a knack for this sort of work (well I hope so, I am making it my career).
This is what I also love about BDSM; it works within our preconceived notions of sex, desire and interaction and uses those tropes to "do" sex. You play with bondage because its so overt in its meaning. Humiliation in sexy because it subverts our understanding of tenderness, yet it’s ultimately (for me) even more tender since it requires so much more trust and openness. THAT is what turns me on, that jump off the ledge of structural reason into a world of subversion, that in reality is not very subversive. It’s just open about its use of cultural norms for sexual gain. (let’s not even get into the binary of pleasure/pain)
Example:
There is nothing sexy about my dog's collar. He wears it so if he gets lost people know whom he belongs to. I put a collar on a man and what I am doing is claiming him, metaphorically he cant get lost because he's wearing his collar, its comforting in the same way. And its a turn on, not because I own him (this is not colonialism or slavery) its because we are playing at a game of ownership, we know where the boundaries are and we walk the line for both of our excitement and gain. He willingly wears it because with its use we are using all our cultural knowledge of what wearing a collar means and using it to get off on. And that play that "doing" brings sex to another level. One that is not just insert tab a into slot b. its a mind fuck.
And I get to be the pilot of this mindfuck, and I love it!
Now to the type of men I go for, as Marcelle as put it; it is my quest. Yes I agree, I am looking for an enigma, but I don't see why it would be so hard. I mean, I had a friend who dabbled in professional domination and all her clients were these high power Wall St. types. I want to remove kink from the back alley and bring it into my bedroom. Why is that so difficult?
Why can't my counterpart want to queer male female relations like I do, and not in a grad student post modern intellectual way, in a lets stop talking like Judith Butler (shout out to Marcelle since I know she knows who that is) and lets get to the act of fucking.

I know I am creating a fantasy, that’s all I do. I've realized that, I have a very overdeveloped imagination. I think that’s where things went wrong with “the boy” and me. He saw me as this sexual fantasy but I wasn't present, his vision of what he wanted sexually was reflected onto me. Unfortunately I took that to be something different, I saw the person the WHOLE person I wanted him to be. While he was fantasizing about me sexually, I was fantasizing about his entirety.
Transformative political possibility? I hope so, I just hope to become one with my sexuality and the person I am/hope to be. The only transformative power I hope this has is to stop being so self-conscious on the inside. I posture at self-esteem, but I have some very low lows. I see sex like this to be able to give me all the emotional cravings I like, in a way that I can perform sexuality with a nice evil cackle while participating in gender normativity as well as ironically mocking it. I have grown up with too much Abercrombie and have lived too much of a normal well-adjusted female life (mind you we all have our issues and hang-ups) to turn to men in makeup or with an axe to grind against the high school jock. I was that high school jock (Think a few parts Mean Girls, one part band geek, and like 3.2 parts nerd queen) I know I was awful I’m now reformed from my evil middle school social climbing ways but I can’t get away from who I was/am and what that has made me. I like the quirky part environmental part alternative wasp.
Maybe my problem is that I think too deeply about this and need to stop theorizing and start doing.
Until I find someone, this is all just fantasy and blog fodder.

1 comment:

Blog Archive said...

Amen to all that, sister. Thanks for taking the time to respond to me with such thoughtfulness. You have given me a lot to think about ... a LOT.