Ferns has an interesting post up on the subject of ‘play acting’. By that she doesn’t mean traditional style role playing of the kind where the haughty Lady McFaddleshaw berates and beats Jack, her hapless but handsome stableboy. Instead she’s talking about the traditional dynamic of dominant and submissive and the activities that often go along with that (collars, bondage, kneeling, etc.)
I have some sympathy for the original comment that provoked her post. As an outsider looking in I used to think kink often looked strange. A hot and sexy strange, but still strange. I wondered if it would seem ridiculous in person, and imagined myself bursting into laughter. Luckily that proved not to be the case. Admittedly I have often laughed, but not because I thought we were play acting and it looked ridiculous.
One mistake I think we often make is to divide the world into real versus fake, when in fact what we really mean is familiar versus unfamiliar. In kinky and non-kinky situations we’re constantly projecting different elements of ourselves and censoring our external representation. Yet some situations are so familiar that we do this instinctively, and so begin to think about that as a real representation, when in fact it’s just one we’re very familiar with. Whether we’re at work or hanging out with friends we’re projecting a persona. That changes depends on circumstances and social dynamics, but it’s always there. The dynamics of kink are very different to the typical workplace or home, but that doesn’t make the kinky persona any less real. In fact one might suggest that most people play act their way through their work life, projecting someone quite different to have they actually feel. Yet that projection is so instinctive that it becomes the benchmark for what is ‘real’ and ‘normal’.
The artwork is by Francois Dubeau and you can see more from him on his site and in his store.
