While at a kink community conference a few years ago, I had the privilege of watching a masterful leader enact an incredible scene on their follower in one of the conference’s dungeons. I use leader and follower here because I don’t know which terms these folks would self-select from the growing array of kink vocabulary that mean an even greater range of things for kinky folks. Anyway, the leader began with consent conversations, arranged for the follower to be bound, standing with their hands above their head in cuffs attached to a rig, adjusted implements throughout the scene, intimately checked in, gradually increased stimulation from flogging to successively more intense whipping. The room hushed with all eyes locked as the scene began and all eyes were on the leader and follower as they swayed in an erotic and cherished dance. The ambience of this moment reminded me of something sacred or holy. Afterwards, I found tears coming to my eyes at the beauty as the leader and follower retreated into a side part of the dungeon to reconnect and do their previously selected aftercare.
I can imagine many have witnessed scenes such as this on their own and maybe are picturing their own experiences of such transcendent moments, which are often the playthings of kinky folks like us. One of the things that stood out in this particular scene was that the leader was in a wheelchair. He was not held back from expressing and leading this sexual ballet by his chair.
It seems like conferences are increasingly attending to the needs of people like this masterful leader by having attending to and making accommodations for the needs of people of a variety of differences in ability. While it is wonderful that we kinky and consensually nonmonogamous folks are attending to disability justice increasingly, we nevertheless have a lot to learn from people with health conditions or impairments.
As a somewhat geeky person, I find myself drawn to the published academic literature on kink and disability as I draw together these thoughts. As several authors note, the sexual satisfaction and experiences of kinky disabled populations are often overlooked by researchers (Reynolds, 2007; Tellier, 2017). Moreover, some types of disability have been more frequently covered by researchers such as the experience of chronic pain that some kinky folks find is helped through their kink experiences by offsetting it with “good pain,” providing emotional outlet for the torture of chronic pain or helping to bring a sense of control to pain (Sheppard, 2017; Sheppard 2018; Sheppard, 2019). Others, such as Bob Flanagan, have been icons of disability visibility in the kink community by publicly and proudly owning their disability (Reynolds, 2007). Flanagan’s’ work is a reminder to confront negative stereotypes of bodies that don’t conform to societal norms or bodies that have impairments. In a similar thread, Cooper’s (2022) autoethnographic exploration of a female disabled professional dominatrix draws attention to how ableism can dictate which bodies can or cannot be sexual, orgasmic, dominate, and sex workers. Together Flanagan and Cooper clearly remind us that contrary to prejudicial ableist norms, disabled folks are sexual also!
With 1:4 people in the US having a recognized disability (CDC, 2022), COVID likely increasing the number of disabled people for years to come (BLS, 2023), and the pronounced traumatic impact of having health conditions and impairments (Kafer, 2016), it is imperative that kink and consensual nonmonogamous communities listen to the lessons of Flanagan, Cooper, and others, and attend to disability justice in our munches, events, communities, and resources. It is often the unheard voices that need to be echoed the loudest, and so it is the experiences of people with different abilities and struggles that I wanted to highlight for this month’s NCSF diversity moment. If we listen to the voices of those different from us and take action to increase access and inclusion in our community spaces, we stand as leaders in a society that often disregards those that are different or don’t follow the norm. To ignore or disregard the challenges faced by those that are different than us is to perpetuate the harms of mainstream society, to which many of us who have experienced shame or discrimination for being kinky or consensually nonmonogamous are well versed. I believe that kink and consensual nonmonogamous communities have unique tools of boundary setting and clear communication in consent tools (Gunning et al., 2023; Iantaffi, 2010; Kattari, 2015) that can be supportive of disabled people pushing against these mainstream harms and finding their voice validated and their sexualities celebrated (Tellier, 2017).
References
- BLS. (2023, January 11). Labor Force Statistics from the Current Population Survey. Retrieved April 13, 2023 from https://www.bls.gov/cps/definitions.htm#population
- CDC. (2022, December 12). Disability Impacts All of Us. Retrieved April 13, 2023 from https://www.cdc.gov/ncbddd/disabilityandhealth/infographic-disability-impacts-all.html
- Cooper, N. (2022). The Experiences of a Disabled Dominatrix. Disability Studies Quarterly, 42(2).
- Gunning, J. N., Rubinsky, V., Aragón, A., Roldán, M., McMahon, T., & Cooke-Jackson, A. (2023). A Preliminary Investigation into Intersections of Sexual Communication in Bondage, Domination, Sadomasochism and Disability. Sexuality & Culture, 1-17.
- Iantaffi, A. A. (2010). Disability and polyamory: Exploring the edges of inter-dependence, gender and queer issues in non-monogamous relationships. In Understanding non-monogamies (pp. 172-178). Routledge.
- Kafer, A. (2016). Un/safe disclosures: Scenes of disability and trauma. Journal of Literary & Cultural Disability Studies, 10(1), 1-20.
- Kattari, S. K. (2015). “Getting it”: Identity and sexual communication for sexual and gender minorities with physical disabilities. Sexuality & Culture, 19, 882-899.
- Reynolds, D. (2007). Disability and BDSM: Bob Flanagan and the case for sexual rights. Sexuality Research & Social Policy, 4, 40-52.
- Sheppard, E. (2017). Kinked and crippled: disabled BDSM practitioners’ experiences and embodiments of pain (Doctoral dissertation, Edge Hill University).
- Sheppard, E. (2018). Using pain, living with pain. Feminist Review, 120(1), 54-69.
- Sheppard, E. (2019). Chronic pain as fluid, BDSM as control. Disability Studies Quarterly, 39(2).
- Tellier, S. (2017). Advancing the discourse: Disability and BDSM. Sexuality and Disability, 35(4), 485-493.