BDSM Survey Results

“Good Girls” and the Shaming Voice

My upbringing was filled with the rules and rites of being a “good girl”. I never questioned that I wanted to be a Good Girl and I knew, without a doubt, that being a Bad Girl was the worst thing I could be. I was terrified of being bad, and so I paid attention when Grandmother would launch into one of her good girl monologues.

My story is not all that unusual, sadly. Many of us were raised with the shame of needing to be a Good Girl but discovering that many of the rules were beyond our ability to enforce. “Be a good girl” was a phrase that caused me intense shame, for so many years.

I learned that I needed manners, because that was certainly part of being a Good Girl. My sisters and I were so polite that strangers made comments to Mother about it, “What beautiful manners for such beautiful girls!” “Good Girls say please” I was told, as I watched Nick (my uncle and older by 2 years) grab the cookie I was denied for my lack of manners. Grandma swatted at him with her baking spoon and missed, causing them both to share a giggle. He still got a cookie. The time spent writing thank you notes, wistfully listening to Nick and his friends romping outside. The time spent in a corner or being scolded for helping myself, not saying thank you or daring to be anything but smiling and pleasant, while watching Nick do all the things I was told were not Good.

“Good Girls don't yell” Grandma scolded, when she had giggled just yesterday when Nick slammed his fist on the counter, yelling that he was angry (because he called it horny instead of angry, ahahaha, so cute he was)! Mother yelled all the time and I dared to wonder out loud if that meant she was a Bad Girl, to which Grandmother came unglued.

Good Girls print neatly, though goodness knows I never could. I spent hours trying to print with the flowery neatness of what Good Girls should be able to do, and realized I was not really good at being Good. Good Girl's never lie, they don't argue or say anything 'untoward'. They smile sweetly and are calm, able to cook, clean and be 'pretty'.

As a young girl I would solemnly study my reflection, wondering if I was pretty enough to be a Good Girl, or if my nose was too big, my mouth too small. I did not say mean things to friends, and when they hurt me I would walk away, silent. I did not tease, name call or prank. I did not play, really, either.

Good Girls stay clean, unless they are told to go romp with their uncle and his friends. Scoldings for grass stained socks, then sent outside to play guns with the boys. The boys who barked at me, then joyfully teased me and bullied me into playing rough, taking dares and so it goes.

I was terrified of boys, who I told were rough and mean because they liked me. Bjorn, he must have liked me a lot, as he held me face down in the snow, throwing my book bag up in the tree, while I cried softly, hoping he would let me go before I died. Grandmother and Mother both assured me that throwing the bat at me, tackling me in gym (we were playing mash, not football) and the snow smothering were all just because he liked me. I stopped telling them about boys and their demonstrations of love.

That Bjorn, he never stopped. He showed me he liked me every day. He must have loved me as he gripped his hands around my neck, leaving a ring of blue. Funny, but when Mother took me to the doctor and he asked about the bruises and I told him, he didn't think it was my fault. He didn't tell me that Bjorn, who happened to be his son, liked me. He did yell at my parents, which scared me greatly though. After that Bjorn never touched me again. That was grade four.

I tried so hard to be a Good Girl. I said please, helped Mother and looked after my sisters. I tried to stay neat and to not let anyone see me as anything but sweetly smiling. I let mother do my hair and held my sisters close when the parents would fight.

Good Girls don't have secrets from their Mother. When I told Mother that Nick was always playing games that included naked privates and touching and that I didn't like those stupid games she told Grandmother. Grandmother had her call me to the phone where I was told to apologize to Nick. I did, because Good Girls apologize.

To be fair, mother made some small efforts to not let me alone with Nick after that, for a few months. The next summer though, I was back at Grandmother's cabin for a new round of Good Girl talks and trying to deal with Nick and his grabby friends. My grade 5 summer was spent trying to navigate the world of mean boys during the day and listening to Grandmother tell us about boys and their urges and how Good Girls don't let them touch, and Good Girls stop them from making bad choices.

When Mother moved us away I was told that Good Girls help their mothers. I tried. I worked to help buy food and babysit the sisters in the evening. I cleaned house and even rolled mother cigarettes. When Mother brought men home I was a Good Girl and figured out how to make the meal feed them too. When those men would eye up me and my sisters I would do what I could to make sure the girls were hidden away.

Good Girls protect their sisters.

No one told me what Good Girls could do when men 'dropped' quarters on the floor so they could look down my sisters shirt when she bent down to pick them up. No one told me what Good Girls do when Mother's men friends would shove their hand down my pants, clamp a hand over my mouth and whisper awful things to me. No one told me what Good Girls do when the date Mother arranged tried to have sex with me, or what to do when Mother 'gave me' to a guy as a 'companion' for his delivery trip up north. That was grade 10.

Now I know. My Daddy has taught me what a good girl really is. A good girl doesn't hide the truth to save your feelings. She is not responsible for anyone's actions but her own. Good girls can get as dirty and sweaty as they want, they can scream orgasms through a mist of tears (and he even encourages them to!) Good Girl's don't have to sit silent and frozen, accepting abuse. Nor do they need to feel shame for their feelings, their thoughts or their natural body.

In fact, my Daddy tells me that Good Girls are the same as Good People, with all the same rights and responsibilities, qualities and faults.

I am a Good Girl, because I am a good person. I don't smile and pretend I agree with you, but I don't say things to you just to hurt you. I don't give a flying fuck if you think I am pretty, or sweet, or demure and I own my sexuality, my successes and my mistakes.

Rope Making Fun

For Christmas Firm-Hand-Buddha made me a rope machine!  I ordered a tonne of yarn and have been chomping at the bit to get at making some jute.  I am a rope addict (as if calling myself aropedeevil didn't already give that away), and it was very hard to wait!  Finally, we had good weather (I actually got a sunburn) and I was able to try the machine out.

The first few attempts were TERRIBLE, resulting in kinky rope that felt rather bizarre, but after a few more tweaks things ran a great deal smoother!

As you can see, It was smooth enough that I was able to spend a weekend and spin a reasonable amount.  Note that the dark red, and the dark purple rope are treated.  The rest are still fuzzy and untouched. 

I am thrilled with this rope, but I admit, not everyone will like it.  It is single ply, which means even at 6mm, with 3 strands of 12 yarns, the rope lacks that hardness that many associate with rope.  This stuff is soft, alive and not for the faint hearted.  Single ply jute requires more love, more care, if one wants it to last.  But it is also incredibly responsive and sexy to have on your skin.  I may be a bit in love!

When I took a moment to quickly condition the rope, the colour darkened to reveal the rich undertones that make jute so damned special.
As soon as my bunny is feeling better I will be doing some body work to break mine in (purple is for MY BUNNY...)


For your amusement, here is the video I shot.  No go pro, so it is what it is.
Happy Rigging!

Loving Wax

As some of you may know, FHB decided that we simply needed to make low temperature candles for wax play.  This began a round of experimentation and learning, as neither of us has ever made a candle before.

Our first candles looked a bit rough but man, they were a blast to play with.  As you can see in the photos,
the labels are made from recycled paper!  To the right you can see the drippings on my sex girlfriend.  The wax melts at 124 degrees, which means that most skin types tolerate the wax being dripped onto them.

We began to sell the candles, as many who play with wax are purchasing paraffin candles and finding that the temperature of the dripping wax varies.  We had heard a few stories of burns and what not.  Our goal was to produce a sensual candle that could be tolerated by most skin types, and I think we succedded.

However... Feedback indicated that the colours were just not vibrant enough.  Some of the more S/m players in the community wanted a wax that was hotter as well.   Additional FHB was simply not happy with the way the candles looked.

So... We upgraded our molds, practiced, experimented with different candle dyes and voila!

As you can see the candles are much smoother, and the colours are much darker.  The candles now melt at 123-126 degrees, with darker candles being a bit hotter than the lighter colours.

I find these candles are still great fun, and we decided to make tapers, so that candles could be placed in suspension ropes, for predicament play.  Those candles looked AMAZING but there were some issues... Mainly they are very narrow, so they tend to curve from body temperature, which created some issues for use.

I managed to make it work though, and bunny found that the wax, dripping in the same spot over and over, was very HOT, as each drip traps a little more heat.

Here you can see bunny suspended (she is gorgeous, no?) and the candles are dripping away.  They fit nicely in the rope, but I think they need to be more wedge shaped, and perhaps dipped in a harder wax.

Here you can see the wax.  The red is so dark that it left red on her very pale skin.  Also, we didn't use oil, which tends to increase the risk of tinting of skin, as well as reduce the spread of the heat.  Using baby oil on the skin seems to allow the candle drips to spread their heat over a larger surface, reducing the risk of burns.  I was pretty happy with the colours, as well as scene itself, although we had an incident with wrist drop after this tie, my first experience with that. (and hopefully the last.

We are now making Three types of candles.
Sensual Pillars:
UV Black Light Pillars
BDSM Tapers

The pillars, which are all low temperature wax, melting at between 124 and 126 degrees.  These candles are easily tolerated by MOST skin types.  The UV pillars are so much fun!  They glow under blacklight!

You can purchase these at my store at www.aropedeevil.com  They are available in Green, Yellow, Orange, Red, Pink and Blue.  The Yellow and Green glow the brightest, but you can see in the picture above that the other colours also glow.

I am using an LED blacklight flashlight that I purchased on Amazon for $14.00, to use at the trade shows when selling the candles, but I have a bar light that we will install for this type of fun.  I think you could drip wax on your bottom with abandon, then write messages with the glow wax!

I am very ahppy with these.  The colours are bright, even without the blacklight.  (Note that the photo to the upper right is a mix of glow and regular wax)

These are some of our BDSM taper candles.  Note that these are HOT, burning at between 124 and 129 degrees.  Not for the light hearted, and the risk is greatly increased for injury.  Test by using at a distance of 18 or more inches above skin.  I suggest that these are used AFTER a barrier of low temprature wax is on the skin.  I cannot stress this enough: These candles are not 'low temperature'.  Use at your own risk, and please, take care.

Justice for Kinksters who are Sexually Assaulted

The Criminal Justice System in Canada has neglected violence towards women long enough. While there are laws that are specifically created to prohibit assault and sexual assault, there are also policies and procedures that work against bringing justice to those who are victims of assault-particularly sexually assault.

It is ridiculously difficult to find justice if you are raped, unless you are the perfect victim: one who was virginal, chaste and sweetly innocent, prior to being brutally attacked by an assailant who causes measurable physical harm and leaves behind forensic evidence. The perfect victim must also remember to run straight to the hospital to seek help, to file a report straight away, and to never contact with their assailant again.

Our current system is one of re-victimization, in which the few women who come forward are subjected to disbelief, judgment, interrogations, accusations, shaming, silencing and in the end still are unlikely to see their assailant placed behind bars.

If you are kinky, forget it. For those involved in any sort of 'alternative' lifestyle or activity, such as BDSM, Swinging, Polyamory, “kink” and so on, although files are opened and statements are taken, all too often the reward for braving the re-victimization of reporting intimate violence, is to be told that the charges will not be pressed, as the courts are unprepared to hear about BDSM, that consent in the context of these 'alternative' sexualities is difficult to understand.

Even when individuals do come forward to the police, reporting physcial, sexual and emotional abuse, they are likely to face stigmatization and unlikely to find justice. In a local study (Sumka 2016) victims reported that their cases were turned away by the crown, due to the inability of the criminal courts to comprehend consent in a BDSM context.

The BDSM community is not a few dozen people hiding in basements. It is comprised of adults of all ages, ethnicities, backgrounds, education and occupations. It is 25-50% of people that you know. There are workshops, socials, conventions in which people meet, learn, and explore various aspects of sexuality. There is a social network very similar to Facebook that is dedicated to these so called 'kinky' people. Dungeon events are held in this very city, very much in the open. Halls are rented, banquet rooms booked, catering arranged, and convention centres used.

It is estimated that between 100,000 and 200,000 adults between the ages of 21 and 59, here in the greater Edmonton area, engage in what could be termed as “kinky”, “alternative” or “BDSM” activities and/or relationships. These numbers are based on the Kinsey institute (which estimates that 25% of adults in that age bracket enjoy kinky activities) and Joyal & Carpenter 2016 (who completed a study in Quebec and found that closer to 45-55% of adults are “kinky”). With many studies reporting that roughly 25% of adult women will experience rape and 45% will experience Intimate Partner Violence, this means that our current policies are sending a very clear message to 45,000-90,000 women of the Edmonton Area, that their right to live their lives as sexually autonomous beings, free from assault of their person, is not being upheld, due to their sexual choices. These policies put the burden of their assaults upon the victim, for daring to choose to engage in sexual activities such as BDSM, under the guise that consent in these instances is too difficult to understand for the court system.

I disagree that consent is more difficult to understand from a BDSM context. I have never been asked by a non-kink partner what boundaries I have, what limitations I wish to put on our encounter, and I have yet to NOT have been asked the same by a BDSM partner.

Consent, you see, is understood as what differentiates kinky fun from assault. In the majority of BDSM communities, spaces, groups and conventions, Consent is NOT murky. SAFE SANE CONSENSUAL, RISK AWARE CONSENSUAL KINK are two common frameworks used in the BDSM community.

The generalized culture of BDSM, here and around the globe, includes active consent of one's partners. Only activities agreed to are engaged in, no additional activities are to be added. Everything is agreed to in advance. Checking in with one's partner(s) during an activity is recommended. These are some of the common practices in BDSM and other alternative communities that specifically address consent. There are negotiations, safe-words and discussions about boundaries.

Yet, the court is so embarrassed by the very idea that some consenting adults might choose to engage in spanking, flogging, or bondage, that if one is assaulted while engaging in these things, justice is denied to them. This refusal to educate the courts regarding these practices leaves vulnerable the many individuals who choose to explore these activities and lifestyles. Victims are assured that their right to their own body is superseded by the court's embarrassment over sexuality that does not resemble their own.

Worse, the blatant lack of accountability for assault and sexual assault in the BDSM community has sent a clear message to those who thrive on abusing others: Within the BDSM community they can explore their criminal deviance freely, without fear of reprisal. Every case turned away is an advertisement to those who enjoy beating, abusing and raping women “Hide here! The courts will not punish you!”

Many organizations are following the court's example. Without an arrest being made many will not prohibit (ban) these individuals from events. Who can blame them? If the CJS is afraid to stand up to these predators, how can we expect individuals to stand up to them?

I am here, speaking on behalf of myself as a victim of assault in the BDSM Community. I am here speaking as a woman, as a person who has the right to seek out consensual sexual experiences that have meaning for me, without giving up my right to being free of assault, molestation, harassment and rape.

TABOO Edmonton

We are at Taboo this year, with ASPECC (Alberta Sex Positive Education & Community Centre), at booth 125, come check us out!
15% of all sales are going towards the gender inclusive bathrooms at the centre!  We are also raffling off a basket to raise funds for SACE.

A Story was Written on My Heart

The epilogue was filled with hints of rope, friendship and connection.

The words within called to me, and my interest was piqued,

I wanted to know more.

Those first few chapters had some minor adventures,

a great deal of intimacy building,

and my heart swelled with the love of deep friendship just as my face pinkened

with the blush of flirtation and attraction.

Some pages were easy to turn. Those parts of the story were familiar

I was comfortable as those parts unfolded; the friendship grew.

Some pages were painful. There were villians and foes.

Yet still those pages were filled with support, mutual affection, respect.

A few pages were a struggle. The story left me confused.

They challenged my idea of who I am, my labels exploded.

Leaving me uncertain. Excited, but a little scared.

Those pages included growth.

The next chapters were like most stories,

filled with day to day normalcy, challenges, joys.

Except this story was mine, and each word was felt deeply.

My heart was filled with the words of this story.

Some stories are writing only on our skin,

To be felt in the moment, but not taken into ourselves.

Some are written in our guts, held there tightly,

with small parts being released at a time,

Letting us heal slowly and safely.

Stories like this, when written on our hearts,

Those we feel forever, remember always.

They impact us profoundly, become part of us.

They leave us forever changed.

When I noticed that the story seemed to be winding down

I panicked.

I wasn't ready for this story to end.

I refused to read any new pages,

instead rereading the old, clinging.

I was so sad, so stubborn.

I clung.

I was not the only one writing the story

My stubborn refusal to move forward

It made no difference.

Words kept being written, on my heart.

I wept.

I don't know if this story has ended.

Or if this was just book one of four,

or maybe just a very dramatic chapter.

I just do not know.

All I know is that my heart holds this story,

My thoughts keep turning to it,

re-reading it like the cherished book it is.

Feeling the shock of the absence of new pages,

the pain of loss.

No villains appeared in those last pages.

No drama happened between the characters.

Yet I feel the hurt, as if there was a villain.

I feel angry, as if I was hurt.

I feel shamed, as if I am the villain.

With nothing to point at, no one to blame.

This story stopped, here.