Des Moines Register
by Rekha Basu
Elton Davis is a 53-year-old farm-raised Iowan, a separated husband and father of two, a self-described cultural worker and job coach. And he’s a member of Des Moines’ bondage, domination, sadism and masochism or “kink” community.
I’ve known Davis in different contexts, but until he approached me recently, upset that I gave what he felt was a black eye to a community he thinks is already misunderstood, I didn’t know he was part of what he calls that “fringe.” He was willing to put a face on it because, “if you shine a light on something, it becomes less scary.”
This column is typically more concerned with people’s rights than with their intimate behaviors, but at times those can involve overlapping or conflicting interests. In a February piece, I shared a former member’s concerns about CIPEX, a local club for people with fetishes, because of one board member’s past and questions about whether policies were always properly enforced. But it’s important to sift through the secrecy and stigma and one person’s experiences to acknowledge the importance of the club’s mission to its community. Because no adult deserves to feel persecuted or shamed for practices he or she engages in with other consenting adults.
Davis says CIPEX is educational, and it aims to foster “a safe, sane and consensual practice of BDSM.” Those are also criteria spelled out by the National Coalition for Sexual Freedom (https://ncsfreedom.org). By sane, Davis means it wouldn’t include anyone who, for example, was abused as a child and is perpetuating a self-destructive pattern. Safe refers to specified rules that he says are taught and modeled. Members also can make “safe calls” to a CIPEX board member before having an encounter with someone they don’t know well. If the member doesn’t check back in, the board member will follow up — even with calls to police. Davis says any sexual assault or rape reported in the kink community results in police calls. “If you pick someone up in a bar, I don’t know anyone that provides (those safety controls),” he said of the general population.
And by consensual, he’s not talking about the sort of situation depicted in “Fifty Shades of Grey,” with its billionaire dominant man and inexperienced submissive college woman. Davis calls the male character “extremely unhealthy, mentally unstable and obsessive,” and said it isn’t clear if the student even gave her consent.
In his experience, Davis says: “Couples negotiate with each other. They are honest to a fault.” He says these kinds of relationships involve a greater level of trust than others he has had. “One person is assuming control. One is relinquishing control. Either one can stop at any time if one is uncomfortable.” …