Safe, Sane and Consensual
…my ass.

For something that started off as a slogan, SSC certainly gets a lot of press. It also gets written into a lot of by-laws of groups. Gets put on a lot of rule lists at play parties. Gets bandied about as if it’s a law, rather than a media explanation.

Bah. Fuck SSC.

Safe, sane and consensual (which, by the way, is a word people mis-spell too often. It drives me bats) are just *words*. Who’s to say that what I want to do is safe? Don’t the people actually doing the scene know what’s safe for them and what’s not? Certainly better than a stranger who is running an event? Sane is equally hard to define, because what I might think is nuts, you find to be your greatest pleasure. And consensual varies from couple to couple. For instance, I resist a lot. I like to do that. It works off energy. C likes it when I do resist. To an outsider? It might look non-consensual, but for the two of us, it’s what we enjoy.

Course, I don’t know that C and I have ever played in public. I have, many times, but I don’t think we have together. We’ve been to parties and munches, but never played. And that’s fine with me. I don’t like having my scenes dictated by a media catchphrase or someone who *thinks* they know what’s best for me. I’m all for keeping dungeon areas fluid-safe. But beyond that? Bah.

And even RACK (risk aware consensual kink) doesn’t work for me. I don’t want a slogan. I want a *scene*. I don’t want to be politically correct – lord knows being a female submissive in this world isn’t politically correct, either. I just want to be allowed to be who I am and do what I enjoy.

Sounds like a good reason to play at home to me.

There’s another problem with SSC, for me. It seems to be handed to newbies like a shield. People hand the phrase to new people and expect it to protect them. It doesn’t. How in the world is someone who hasn’t ever played before supposed to know what’s safe or sane? The last thing I want to give new people is a false sense of security. And that’s what this slogan does. “Everyone who does BDSM is SSC.” Or “We’re not perverts – everything we do is SSC” Oh please. When was the last time a vanilla person defined getting hit with a bullwhip as *safe* or *sane*?

Sometimes, I’m more than happy to stay in my little leather closet.