READERS

12 Dec 2015

A rather lovely quote - trans infighting

"All of us, "trans" or not, are on a journey - to find our authentic selves and find courage to live the lives we want. The word "transition," normally used to denote the transition from one gender role to another, ought to instead refer to a continuous process where one keeps finding, and implementing, one's true, self-identified identity, away from prevailing social expectations."
http://destrantalk.blogspot.co.uk/2010/02/transgender-infighting.html

The first TV/CD Support night presented by Support U.

Welcome to the first TV/CD Support night presented by Support U.

This evening is aimed at those wishing to explore the fem-side of their gender expression in a safe and inclusive environment. Come along, meet others in a similar(ish) situation, get some helpful hints and tips from people that can help you out and enjoy some tea and biscuits.

We have space for you to change here if you wish, or come as you are. Partners and supportive allies welcome if you want to bring them along. Don't feel that you have to dress up, coming drab is completely fine.

DATE: 17th December 2015

TIME: 19:00 - 22:00

WHERE: Support U - Resource service for LGBT in Thames Valley


ADDRESS: 15 Castle Street, Reading, Berkshire, RG1 7SB.





23 Nov 2015

I received a letter today......

Dear Mistress Leyla

I hope that you will find my email both respectful and full of admiration for a Lady I most certainly perceive to be a true Alpha female.

I like to think that I am not the stereotypical male driven purely by physical beauty, however I most certainly appreciate  the undeniable fact that you are to say the very least a  divinely beautiful Lady.

However after reading your words, via your very elegant website ,as well as some of the exerts on your twitter account, you physical beauty is clearly a projection of the beautiful person, you most surely are.

You are a Lady that clearly should be worshiped and adored by others, as you are one of those rare and real Women of true Supremacy in mind body and soul. With out question , you enrich those you deem worthy of your time and or presence. Possible even giving some a true direction to follow , as well as the joy that can come with higher meanings, and purpose.

I am sure you are fully aware of the force of nature you are , and how others will's bend at your whim , being as with out question once you enter another's mind they could not possible be the same again, nor would they wish to be.

I noticed your  enjoyment of chastity , which if I am honest , perked my interest , being as it  can be a deep and meaningful expression of devotion and surrender to another. After all where the mind goes the body surely will follow.  And chastity is most certainly a pure type of surrender, in both a mental and physical sense.  And of course any Dominant that can and does make a submissive wear such a device is surely a Dominant who both revels in, having a true understanding of the true mental aspect of BDSM and the course and effects.

I am not a weak willed male lost at sea as it were , in fact I like to think I am the complete polar opposite to most, and have always tended to walk my own path . However in saying that , I understanding that all males worlds revolve around Females, to some extent. I most certainly have come to appreciate , admire and wish to adore those rare few such as yourself that truly understand the undeniable  power you wheeled.

In conclusion , I do hope that you will not find my message too random or , pointless even, I tend not to sit and compose such messages that often . But after coming across your site , I found that at the very least I wished to express , what I hope comes across as genuine admiration for a Lady that simply was meant to own others, and I admit I do envy those you do own.

yours with respect
Adrian

22 Nov 2015

Help defend #BDSM, #LGBTQ, sex work, privacy and free speech.


Help the first UK solicitor to crowd-fund his pro bono work to defend BDSM, LGBTQ, sex work, privacy and free speech.

If you are reading this and you are in the UK, you may one day need a lawyer to defend you and yours against the government’s anti-sexual freedom laws.
Even if you are not in the UK, you may enjoy reading or viewing material produced there, so this affects you too.

“I am the only lawyer in the UK who specialises in obscenity law and sexual freedoms”


Myles Jackman is the lawyer who specialises in this work and he devotes a lot of his time to working pro bono – i.e. for free. Help Myles do this important work by pledging a small monthly sum.



Help defend BDSM, LGBTQ and free speech * Hush-Hush

7 Nov 2015

Myths and Misconceptions About #Kink


Our culture is full of myths, misconceptions, and confusion about kink, BDSM, and fetishes. We’re going to address 10 of them here; 5 in this article and another coming soon. For each of the misconceptions there will be two answers: one from Benny and one from Cheyenne. That way you can get two different perspectives, but it is also worth saying that like any other identity we can’t speak for everyone who identifies as kinky. The kink world is incredibly diverse!
Also, this post may contain too much sexual content for some readers. If that bothers you, don’t read it.

1) Kink is inherently incompatible with feminism/reifies patriarchy.

Benny – One of the most important tenets of feminism is that people have the right to decide for themselves what the structures of their relationships look like, and what kind of sex they want to have, or not have. Patriarchy tells us there are limited roles people can take in relationships, and that the kinds of sex we can have and the situations in which we have it are limited. A feminist
perspective can open up those options, saying that women, and indeed people of all genders, have the right to make those decisions without consulting a patriarchal society. We have the right to make sexual decisions for ourselves, and we even have the right to define pleasure for ourselves.
When we see a man beating a woman in a BDSM scene, it can look a lot like abuse. It makes sense to question the act of hitting a woman when we live in a society full of non-consensual violence. Without knowing the context of the scene, no wonder people assume it is not okay! However, if that woman ASKED for that scene, specifically requested it, negotiated with the man hitting her, and set limits around what that scene would include, the situation is quite different from the kind of violence that feminism fights against.

Types Of Control in #BDSM


Since the different varieties of BDSM overlap, a mutually exclusive and exhaustive classification system is not very useful. Instead an overview of different types of control allows you to express your wants and needs (and meh’s and do-not-want’s) more clearly with your partner.

Physical Control. 

Bondage is the most obvious form of physical control because it restrains the bottom, thus limiting their physical freedom. Of course, physical control is not only about restraining limbs. It can involve confinement, such as keeping someone prisoner in a dungeon or locking a person on a human-size birdcage. It can involve physically overpowering someone without restraints and instead pinning them down with your forearms or using your body weight to keep them off balance. It may involve having a third person stand guard at the doorway in case the bottom flees.

The essence of physical control is that the bottom is not necessarily playing along with the scenario. He or she can resist. The bottom may struggle against restraints, or try to flee the cage, or fight back in a simulated abduction all as part of the escapist arousal process that lends to the sensation of being overpowered by a stronger force—but not necessarily outsmarted by a superior intellect.

Processing Pain in Play: What Can Interrupt or Block Pain Processing?

 By lunaKM Submissive Guide 


What do you think can interrupt your pain processing ability? If you’ve experienced anything like I have, there are moments where you just can’t change the pain response to anything beyond pain. What normally feels really good is just not. There are a number of things that can block your ability to translate the pain using techniques talked about earlier.

Let’s think about the things that we need to actively process pain and make play enjoyable for both parties. You need focus, trust, little to no distraction, appropriate mood, and a healthy and rested body. Any of these things can fall out of balance and then you may have issues processing pain.

Mood

Mood is separated in two parts. Your emotional state and the environmental mood set up by the scene.

20 Oct 2015

Adventures in Depression Part 2




I remember being endlessly entertained by the adventures of my toys. Some days they died repeated, violent deaths, other days they traveled to space or discussed my swim lessons and how I absolutely should be allowed in the deep end of the pool, especially since I was such a talented doggy-paddler.

I didn't understand why it was fun for me, it just was.

15 Oct 2015

Adventures in Depression

Recently, as I was casually surfing the widest web, I came across a blog which caught my attention. The blog had nothing to do with BDSM, or fetish or any of my usual reads, in fact, it was a blog which hit a soft, delicate part of myself - and will anyone who has ever suffered from depression or is currently suffering from depression. Or as I put it - lives with the disease on a daily basis and will do so forever, because it is who we are.

I would like to thank the author... Allie... You have summed it up perfectly.

There are two parts to this topic, the first you will find below and the second will be posted soon.

Here is the actual address of Hyperbole and a half

Some people have a legitimate reason to feel depressed, but not me. I just woke up one day feeling sad and helpless for absolutely no reason.

21 Sept 2015

Alan Groont! We don't want fake #submissives like you!!

Yet again, another story of a submissive who entered into a BDSM relationship with a Mistress and still doesn't realise he is a worthless little pig.. A silly dog who thinks BDSM IS all about 'topping from the bottom'. I call this FAKERY and it should have a punishment all of it's own. Here is what he said:

"There are plenty of real dominants out there who know how to do things the right way, the way I like them.”

THE WAY you LIKE IT??? Read the article here, and if anyone knows his twitter.....

There are several stupid types of submissive, read them here on My blog.

Submissive Alan Groont, 53, says he was shocked and alarmed when his relationship with Mistress Mandy Martin, 28, took a “violent and dramatic turn” after he was caught masturbating in the shower.

19 Sept 2015

A list of roles within BDSM from #FetLife

Discovered this list of general roles within BDSM on Fetlife today - Worth a look.


Dominant: A person who seeks to exercise power, authority, or control; usually over a submissive in a D/s dynamic.
Domme: A person who seeks to exercise power, authority, or control; usually female or feminine-presenting and usually over a submissive in a D/s dynamic.
Switch: A person who enjoys participating in either side of a sexual/kink dynamic depending on mood, partner, or situation.
submissive: A person who seeks to submit or give up control; usually to a Dominant or Domme in a D/s dynamic.
Master: A person who seeks to exercise power, authority, or control; usually over a slave in an M/s dynamic.
Mistress: A person who exercises control as an owner or dominant over someone else; usually female or feminine-presenting and usually over a slave in an M/s dynamic.

18 Sept 2015

What I did today....The Lady of the manor and her ponyboy

I received an email from Eric today... He wanted to play a game. A role-play game. Eric's character was going to be called 'Alex', a junior stable boy under the employment of Lady Leyla.

Alex has secrets. Alex loves to dress in women's clothing. It is Alex's day off and he has snuck into the woods on the manor houses grounds in his feminine clothes and is enjoying his favorite pass time of playing with his ass. He gets caught by the Lady of the Manor.
Today, I am the Lady of the manor
Reading this little scenario gave me ideas. It wasn't going to be a simple '"Bad boy alex, what are you doing? You will be punished!" Oh no! Alex was really going to get it.

11 Sept 2015

Dominant. submissive. Or both?

20 Aug 2015

The Amnesty Sex Work Argument, Broken Down

VICE: by Frankie Mullin / @frankiemullin
"You might have noticed a shit-storm around sex work in your newsfeed this week: Amnesty was accused of being onside with pimps, there were lots of open letters and there were even more opinions. Lena Dunham got involved.
The beef is based on Amnesty's proposal that sex work should be fully decriminalised, as the charity believes this will make things safer for sex workers. Some people disagree; most conspicuously some of Hollywood's leading ladies including Lena Dunham, Anne Hathaway, Carey Mulligan and Kate Winslet. According to those in opposition, Amnesty has climbed into bed with a bunch of pimps. Others think that decriminalisation is the way forward for sex workers. Managed to miss the whole thing? Here's a breakdown of what happened.
First up, what did Amnesty actually propose?
On the 7th of July, Amnesty issued a draft policy proposal, suggesting that the criminalisation of sex work harms those most in need of protection, i.e. sex workers themselves. The proposal follows a two-year consultation and is backed up by numerous studies from organisations like the Human Rights Council, United Nation Convention Against Transnational Organized Crime, the Commission on Human Rights and UNAIDS. On a global scale, Amnesty argues that decriminalisation offers sex workers better legal protections and makes them less vulnerable to exploitation from third parties.
Then came the letters...

30 Jul 2015

Coming Out transgender at work.

Guardian readers and Charlotte Seager

"I got a standing ovation – it was the most amazing day of my life

I worked for the City of Los Angeles and transitioned near the end of my career. I told my HR chief, who brought together a team of managers and we spent a year planning my transition.

When the day came for the announcement, we brought together every manager in the department along with my staff and I got up to tell my story. My colleagues listened, transfixed, and when I got to the end they gave me a standing ovation. It was one of the most amazing days of my life.

I didn’t come to work en femme for about a week, but when I did I got lots of compliments and support. Many people expressed admiration for what I did and called it courageous. I called it necessary. A couple of gay and lesbian co-workers said that I served as an example, and gave them courage for their own coming out. For me, that is the best result of all. – boots4me

A customer shouted: ‘I’m not having my kids exposed to this!’While working in retail it became noticeable that my assistant manager didn’t agree with, as she called it, “my lifestyle”. Things became more awkward when, during Bristol pride, another co-worker said that they didn’t believe “those people” should share equal rights.It wasn’t just my co-workers. Once, while working on the tills, a large gentleman and his family became aggressive. He leaned down to look at my face, gave me an ugly stare and shouted: “Are you a woman?” I looked up, startled. He continued: “Are you a man dressed as one? Are you a man?”

I was stunned. He was incredibly loud and caught me off guard. I replied quietly: “I’m female transgender”.

“For fuck’s sake! Do you see this?’’. He flung his arm in the air and motioned aggressively at my co-workers. “I’m not having my kids exposed to this!’’

What followed was a blur of obscenities and shouting, the customer argued with my manager and it was difficult to get him to leave. He was moved to the next till but continued to spout abuse.

A few months later I was let go. It was clear the decision was partly based on the fact that I’m LGBTQ [lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender and queer]. I didn’t fight it, the workplace was unpleasant. I hope that no one in future has to experience anything like this. – Abigail WardI am proud to be the first person to change gender in the RAFWhile working in the RAF for 18 years I had to keep my gender identity a closely guarded secret. It was a personal battle I struggled with all my life, but in 1998 I made the decision to live my own life, not someone else’s.

It took a year to get everything in place before I told the RAF I was transitioning. No one had been allowed to remain in the service as an openly transgender person before, so I expected the worst. Fortunately the people I told were amazingly supportive and I was allowed to stay. I became the first transgender woman to serve openly in the RAF.

We worked everything out together. I moved to a headquarters staff team to transition and adjust to my new military life. To be fully accepted I knew I had to prove I was more capable of doing my job than ever, so I asked to rejoin a frontline squadron. I became highly valued at my job and an atmosphere of respect and support grew with me. Throughout 16 years of service as a trans woman I always felt I was part of a tremendous team, I had their backs and they had mine. Transgender issues in the workplace

 It is the people around you who make or break you. I knew I had a big part to play to earn their respect, and by achieving that I paved a pathway for other transgender people to follow in my footsteps. I have just retired from the RAF and I am proud of my achievements – but I am prouder still of the people I worked with. – CarolineRP

To get a job, I had to give in and apply as a fake male

After coming to terms with being transgender, I applied for hundreds of jobs, and got zero call-backs. I had to throw my hands up in the air, give in, and apply as a fake male. If I was only responsible for myself I wouldn’t have done this, but I take care of my disabled mother so I had to think of her.

I applied for a job to become a teacher for adults with developmental disabilities, and wouldn’t you know it, the first job I applied for as a male, I got. I am now hesitant to come out, because as part of my current role we provide personal care to people, and there are students who have gender preferences. I am scared that being transgender may become an issue with my students – and if they have a problem (or their families do) what is to happen to me? – Aileen Everlast

My opinion at work now counts for a fraction of what it once didI changed gender fine at work, but since transitioning things have altered. I work in a male environment and my opinion counts for a fraction of what it once did. I am routinely excluded from discussions, not informed of meetings and denied equal training. Despite requests, I have been given nothing but unrewarding and unpopular tasks since I transitioned, while new starters are assigned high-profile work.


I don’t know if this is discrimination, but it feels like it. I can’t tell if it’s because I’m trans or a woman. I have no idea what to do about it. Despite this, transitioning is still the best thing I have done in my life. I now have a future. –AnnaKays"


Coming out & being transgender at work.Real life experiences

For transgender men and women, coming out at work can be a nerve-racking experience. So, as cities around the world host LGBT pride events this summer, we want to hear your stories of being transgender at work. Whether you had a supportive workplace or faced intrusive questions, share your experiences.

Transgender child

Part 1: Transgender in Cincinnati

25 Jul 2015

Countries with most transphobic murders

Examples of Transphobia.....

Being transgender in a transphobic society

Being transgender in a transphobic society leads to moments of sheer desperation


"Imagine that, after having taken the most difficult step of deciding to live as your authentic gender, you find yourself losing the support of family members and friends just as you’re trying to adjust to a new social role. Then you walk out on the street and are discriminated against in various ways, from being referred to as the wrong gender, to being prevented from entering bathrooms or dressing rooms, to being verbally and even physically attacked.
Even if you’re fortunate enough to “pass” so that people can’t tell you’re transgender – which few trans people do early in transition – you must reveal your assigned gender when you present identification, and then deal with people’s often extreme reactions when they feel like you’ve “fooled” them simply for being who you are. If you try to change your name, let alone your gender marker on your ID, you’re told that you can’t do the former without a court order or the latter without surgery. But you can’t have surgery without money, and you don’t have money without family support, especially when people won’t hire you because you’re trans. You can easily find yourself homeless when you have neither a job or a support system, even as the shelter system also discriminates against trans people.
Germaine Greer is not on my list of positive feminists. In Fact, I dislike most of her speeches and most of her views. Why? She is a TERF. Trans-Exclusionary Radical Feminist - a loosely-organized collective with a message of hate and exclusion against transgender women in particular, and transgender people as a whole. They have attached themselves to radical feminism as a means to attempt to deny trans women basic access to health care, women's groups, restroom facilities, and anywhere that may be considered women's space.
My article about TERFism can be read here

Hunted: Gay & Afraid. The rising bigotry


"Last night's Hunted: Gay and Afraid was a documentary about the recent global wave of regressive anti-LGBT legislation – and not the first, either. The excellent 2012 documentary, Call Me Kuchu, explored similar territory in 2012, as did BBC2's Stephen Fry: Out There in 2013 and Reggie Yates' Extreme Russia, earlier this year.
 All of those documentaries benefited from compelling personal insights into how individuals in the LGBT community have been affected. This Dispatches film, fronted by the former Newsnight reporter Liz MacKean, took a different tack.
 MacKean's film focused not on the victims but on the "villains", specifically the World Congress of Families, an organisation which, though based in the US, has tentacles stretching into Europe, Africa and beyond. View footage of any high-level meeting to draft draconian, homophobic legislation, anywhere in the world, and it seems you'll find a WCF member or affiliate lurking in the corner of the frame.
 Figures such as the WCF managing director, Pastor Larry Jacobs, and Brian Brown, president of the National Organisation for Marriage, were tracked down by MacKean and confronted with the accusation that the effect of their lobbying can be to legitimise violence.
 This isn't news to viewers of the above-mentioned documentaries. It was striking to note how the same lobbying tactics have been replicated from country to country: First, select a biddable local politician as a frontman, then falsely conflate homosexuality with child abuse, spuriously blame gay people for public health issues and repeat as necessary.
 Sadly, MacKean's strategy of pointing out the logical flaws in these arguments seemed to have little effect. Bigotry rarely responds to reason."
The episode ' Gay and afraid' by Chanel 4's Dispatches can be viewed here:
 
 
DISPATCHES

8 Jul 2015

I'm Transgender - I'm Still Human! - Talulah-Eve Brown


"As a transgender woman I have been a victim of transphobic hate crime for a very long time now. When I tell people about my experiences of hate crime their reactions are "OMG. Why don't you report it?", well... if I was to report every single hate crime I faced then I would be in court every single day!

It's not that I don't want to report it because obviously I would love to see justice over this kind of abuse, but over time it has just become something that I'm used to so It just makes my life easier to brush it off.

6 Jul 2015

Police fire at #pride march in Istanbul with water cannons and rubber bullets

"Is Turkish society overtly homophobic and religious? Or have these attitudes been fuelled by the religious regime of Erdogan's New Turkey?"

Police in Turkey blasted water cannons and fired rubber bullets at a pride march on Sunday as people celebrated in the city streets under rainbow banners, according to eye-witnesses in Istanbul.

For many Turks, Gezi symbolizes protest against injustice. And Sunday was no different.






— www.huffingtonpost.com

2 Jul 2015

Photoshoot result

Working with Rich Suit, we came up with these:


...

29 Jun 2015

Male submission, Evolution and Enslavement

COURTESY OF www.enslavement.org.uk/malesub

One repeated accusation levelled against the Internal Enslavement website is that we are in some way opposed to female dominance or male submission.

This is simply false.

In attempting to understand relationships of Enslavement between masters and female slaves, we have limited the scope of our work, without claiming that similar relationships do not take place between people of other genders and orientations.

28 Jun 2015

Look, Ladies, His Boobies ! Part Two

Part One HERE

Feel free to email Me your stories at mistress.lady.leyla@gmail.com, I do publish them

By Ian / Brianna

               “BUT Janet!”  I pleaded, “please don’t give me any more hormones!  They hurt!”
              
               My voice came through muffled from inside my slave helmet, my tongue depressed by the force-feeder funnel my wife used to spit Premarin and Provera tablets into my mouth along with a good deal of her spit, which washed them immediately down my throat.  She chuckled and did it again, as she did every morning, despite my pleas. 

25 Jun 2015

Serving as a hostess at my wife Janet’s bridge party - A submissive's story - literally!

Ok readers, here is a BDSM story submission by Brianna., Emailed to me this morning.

What do we think of it? 

Part One:

HOW did it ever get this far? I’m actually serving as a hostess at my wife Janet’s bridge party ! A hostess, moreover, dressed as a maid, which is what I became six months ago - my own wife’s personal maid !

The dark side of Barbie and Ken's marriage: Artist's extraordinary photos tell tale of dolls' miserable relationship

Fed up: Soon enough, the pair are so comfortable with one another that they become more like friends than lovers

READ MORE BELOW

The dark side of Barbie and Ken's marriage: Artist's extraordinary photos tell tale of dolls' miserable relationship

Regulator Atvod's ban on fetish films criticised by free-speech campaigners

Activists from Backlash, which promotes freedom of sexual expression, said Atvod was illegally subverting free speech and accused it of being out of touch with the online world.
Photograph: Richard Fremont/Getty


Courtesy Of The Guardian's Damien Gayle - @damiengayle

Authority for Television on Demand says clips on fetish sites would be banned if on DVD but one dominatrix dismisses regulator as ‘UK’s Pornfinder General’
  
Free-speech campaigners have condemned the first rulings against film-makers under new rules banning the depiction of harmful sexual fetishes.

The Authority for Television on Demand (Atvod) ruled that sites run by two dominatrix film-makers offered video-on-demand clips that would be banned on if they were for sale on DVD.

One site, Glasgow Mistress Megara Furie, was found to have breached rules with a film showing repeated kicks to a man’s genitals that appeared to draw blood. The second, Mistress R’eal, fell foul of regulations with several videos, including one of a man being whipped until welts appeared on his back.

But activists from the group Backlash, which promotes freedom of sexual expression, said the rules applied by Atvod amounted to illegal subversion of free speech and accused the regulator of being out of touch with the online world.

The rulings are the first to be brought under rule 14 of the Atvod rulebook, which bans a video-on-demand service from showing material that would be refused classification by the BBFC (British Board of Film Classification).

Atvod’s ruling on Glasgow Mistress Megara Furie’s film Ballbusting said: “The sustained kicking appears to cause pain and on several occasions reference is made to the man’s genitals beginning to bleed. The end of the video features a close up which gives clear sight of Glasgow Mistress Megara Furie’s bloodied feet.”

The ruling added: “With clear sight of forceful kicks to the genitals which appear to break the skin, this goes beyond the allowance made by the BBFC [British Board of Film Classification] for ‘moderate, non-abusive consensual activity’.”

Mistress R’eal fell foul of the same rule with A Bullwhipping In The Woods parts 1 and 2, two videos that show a man being whipped for not eating faeces off the shoe of the dominatrix.

Atvod said the gag and restraints used in a third video meant a man’s “means of indicating a withdrawal of consent is not apparent”, again in breach of BBFC rules

Both sites were also found to have breached a second rule intended to keep hardcore pornography out of the reach of children.

Peter Johnson, chief executive of Atvod, said all the videos ruled against had been shown to the BBFC, whose analysts agreed they would not pass them for sale, even in licensed sex shops. He said Glasgow Mistress Megara Furie had acted quickly to shut down the service and remove the offending video, but Mistress R’eal was facing enforcement action. Sanctions include a fine of up to £250,000 or a ban from providing video-on-demand services, Johnson said.

Ruth Evans, Atvod’s chair, said: “Under the new rules, material which is banned from sale on a DVD in the UK is also banned from UK video-on-demand services.

“This is particularly likely to affect pornographic videos which feature violence or in which consent is not clear. If you can’t walk into a licensed sex shop and buy it, nor can you view it at home on a UK video-on-demand service regulated by Atvod.”

Rule 14 came into force in December amid protests by sex workers, pornographers and free-speech campaigners. Those opposed to it drew wide publicity with a protest outside parliament that included “face-sitting”, a sexual activity banned under the rule.

Campaigners with Backlash told the Guardian they believed the new regulation, brought in using a statutory instrument (a law enacted through delegated powers), went beyond the scope of the EU directive it was based on and as a result would fail a judicial review.

Itziar Urrutia, who runs the Urban Chick Supremacy Cell, a dominatrix fetish website, said: “The patriarchy knows full well that the CPS [Crown Prosecution Service] don’t prosecute these minority-interest websites under the Obscene Publications Act because a jury wouldn’t convict. So they resort to illegal ‘rules’. This will end in a grown-up court.

“Atvod have erected themselves as the UK’s Pornfinder General. A modern witch-hunt against a peril that sacrifices children to a fantasy evil created by the state. The sole purpose of this new puritanism is mass control and surveillance, under the pretence of ‘protection’.”

Urrutia successfully fought Atvod last year over rules that demand explicit material must be kept out of the reach of people under 18. She added: “I have some bad news for our government: like it or not, paywalls don’t stop minors from accessing porn because they don’t need to pay for it. They are far more techie-savvy than these luddite civil servants.

“What children need is sex education to help them understand the role of porn in society,” she said.


Hot Girls Wanted, Porn Isn't 'Ruining' Women. Exploitative Labor Is.

Hot Girls Wanted, the newish documentary produced by actress Rashida Jones, is making headlines and earning some rave reviews—as well as getting panned by people in the adult industry and advocates for sex workers—for its depiction of one tiny sliver of the wide world of porn, a fly-by-night talent agency called Hussie Models, which operates out of a scuzzy little house in Florida. The movie centers around a handful of young women at the Hussie house at a particular time, but purports to be a window into “professional amateur” pornography as a whole, strongly hinting that it’s an industry that ruins many guileless young women who only wanted to be famous.

The idea that young women are being lured into the Big City only to have their virtue wrecked is a very old story, going back to the 19th century social purity movement and the Christian reformers who set up weekly soapboxes outside houses of prostitution. In Hot Girls Wanted, the general notion that porn irreparably or at least very seriously taints women is paired, a little shakily, with shots of writhing pop stars like Miley Cyrus. Its goal is somehow clear and vague simultaneously: Hot Girls Wanted is aiming to convey something about our sexually-saturated, erotically schizophrenic culture—but that something never resolves to anything much at all.


If amateur porn was, in fact, lying in wait within the recesses of the Internet to snatch very young women away from loving homes to plunge them deep into highly visible sexual slavery en masse, Hot Girls Wanted would highlight a trend of sexual corruption that no civil society should put up with. But the film’s obsession with sex kneecaps a much more important discussion on young women and labor: a discussion that in one way is specific to a small and unregulated corner of the porn industry in Florida, but speaks more generally to the way cultural shame contributes directly to exploitation.

READ MORE BELOW

In Hot Girls Wanted, Porn Isn't 'Ruining' Women. Exploitative Labor Is.

10 Jun 2015

Coming Out As #Kinky: Food for Thought - www.submissiveguide.com

Coming Out As Kinky: Food for Thought | Submissive Guide

This past winter I ran an educational event through the campus Women’s Center on BDSM in response to Fifty Shades of Grey. With the movie coming out I knew that people would be interested in the topic and consider trying it themselves and I wanted them to be safe about it. I covered the basics of SSC and RACK, I discussed the differences between bedroom only, D/s, and M/s, talked about the different typed of toys and risks associated with the toys (Dildos should be made of glass so they do not hold bacteria and Never insert anything into your anus that doesn’t have a base because your rectum forms a vacuum and could suck it in), and held a discussion.

Homeless ex-con is charged with hate crime after 'pushing transgender woman onto NYC subway tracks

Rolan Reid, 32, was seen on surveillance video pulling a plastic bottle from the garbage and throwing it at a transgender woman before shoving her   


 

A homeless man is charged with attempted murder as a hate crime after pushing a transgender woman onto the subway tracks, authorities said Saturday.

Rolan Reid, 32, was arrested Thursday at Bellevue Hospital, where he was undergoing a psychiatric evaluation after approaching and assaulting a woman at the Bleecker Street station in Manhattan.
Reid was originally charged with second-degree attempted murder and second- and third-degree assault, though these charged were upgraded to hate crimes, NBC reports. 

The victim, a 28-year-old woman referred to as Danny by neighbors from Harlem, was standing on the downtown 6 train platform on Monday the morning of the assault, according to police.
She saw Reid spit into a garbage can, after which the man, who was 'acting erratically' according to the police report, asked her, 'What are you looking at?'

Surveillance video shows Reid rushing to a garbage can and grabbing a plastic bottle, which the victim claimed he threw at her, authorities said.

Reid then pushed the woman into the subway tracks and fled, police said, as other riders helped her back onto the platform. She was taken to Bellevue for treatment for scratches and cuts before being released.

Cops caught up to Reid on Thursday night after spotting him on an uptown 6 platform at Canal Street wearing the same shirt and khakis he was wearing on Monday.

Though Reid originally denied pushing anyone onto the subway, he changed his story and told officers, 'I’m going to throw you guys onto the tracks as well.'

The New York Daily News reports Reid has a long history of dangerous outbursts and erratic behavior, with 28 prior arrests on his sheet.

In February 2014, Reid was arrested with a knife on him, and when police asked why, he replied, 'To stab you,' sources told the Daily News.


He was charged with menacing in 2011 after trying to strike someone with a garbage pail, and in 2009 was arrested for hurling bricks around a homeless shelter in Brooklyn.


9 Jun 2015

Get Spanked in a Unicorn Mask: A Chat With BDSM's Friendliest Couple



The scene in front of me is strange: A young woman, wearing a unicorn mask, is lying across the knees of a bearded man in glasses. He is spanking her. She counts out each blow out loud, pausing only to add “Lord Vader” at the end of the number. “Five, Lord Vader,” she says, her voice muffled by the mask, then “Six, Lord Vader.”

For some reason, we are all giggling. This show, part of a demonstration about BDSM, is way outside the well-trod Fifty Shades of Grey realm. In the thirty minutes Sunny Megatron and her partner Ken Melvoin-Berg spend teaching a small crowd at a porn convention about the joys of dominance and submission, they go from talking about light spanking to a terrifying account of using a razor and Icy-Hot to trick a sub (completely willing and consenting) into believing that her throat had been slit upon accident. The goal of BDSM, they say, is to give the submissive a roller coaster experience. And even though I’m only listening to Sunny talk cheerfully about screaming “Oh no, we’ve made a horrible mistake!” as she and Ken convinced a woman (for a split-second) that her life really might be over, my body still feels exactly the way it would right before the first drop of an amusement park ride. By the end of the presentation, I’m breathing heavily and really confused about my feelings. Do I ever want to try BDSM or do I want to stay away from it forever? Isn’t my fear a suggestion that I should try it?

I first met Sunny Megatron earlier this year when I wrote about her excellent show Sex With Sunny Megatronwhich ended its first season run on Showtime a few months ago (Sunny and Ken are crossing their fingers for a second season; so am I). Delighted by her excitement about a man who loves the feel of bugs crawling all over his face and body, I followed her on Twitter. Then, I met her at the AVNs. And then, after watching her and Ken flog a woman with a rubber chicken, I knew I had to talk to them about getting into the world of BDSM. There’s something about Sunny and Ken that’s different from other sex educators, many of whom are so sex-positive that any awkwardness or reticence on the part of the student is met with judgment. Sunny and Ken are funny, real, not always serious—as sex should be.

I spoke to Sunny and Ken on the phone just after midnight on a day in late February.

I call you guys the friendliest couple in BDSM. Can I call you that?

Ken: Yeah, absolutely.

Sunny: Yeah, we will beat you but then we’ll give you a cupcake afterwards.

Ken: I turn into a Jewish grandmother if I think I hit you in a place where I didn’t mean to.

I want to get your take on what people who are interested in trying BDSM and should do if they want to try it in a safe, effective way that isn’t scary. 

Sunny: First thing they should do, is start reading. There are great sites. There are so many books out. (Tristan Taormino has a great kink book.) Start learning. Don’t feel that you should pigeonhole yourself into a role. Do a lot of self-examination. Stay open-minded. What you think you are interested in today, you may hate when you do it. Or, you may love it. And then next week you may be into something totally different or want to play a different role. That’s fine.

Ken: I would also encourage people to take a look at different TV shows and movies that portray BDSM so that they can start getting a feel for what’s real and what’s not. Reading Fifty Shades of Grey is a great starter area for people to look at. Then, they might want to readMaster of O or The Story of O. They might want to take a look at Anne Rice’s Beauty series. Somewhere in the middle of that and Fifty Shades is probably going to be the truth.

I think a lot of people who I’ve talked to about trying BDSM have done this thing where they go to a sex shop, get an instructional manual, come home, and find it really dry and prescriptive. Is that a misconception about BDSM? The fact that it’s really prescriptive?

Sunny: It is. When you’re looking at the educational material, yeah, a lot of it is going to be dry. It’s educational material! And then, when you’re looking at some of the books, erotica, movies, etc., that’s way over the top fantasy—stuff that maybe you’re not really going to do in real life but it gets you hot to read about it. Where you need to meet is somewhere in the middle. To make your fantasies come alive, but recognize you can’t do it like it is in the movies or the book; to follow safe protocol and know what you’re doing at the same time. It’s a balance.

Ken: There’s something Sunny always says that I think is a great quote and that’s “you don’t watch pornography as a manual of how to do sex.” Much of it’s for its entertainment value.

But don’t believe the dry manuals on BDSM that say “there’s only one true way.” There is no one true way. You have to expose yourself to a variety of different things. I really encourage people to go on FetLife or a similar website and find out where there’s a meet up of just regular, everyday people that have a meeting at a restaurant. That’s called a munch. You don’t have leather on. You have your regular clothes. You’re drinking a cup of coffee or a beer and talking to other like-minded souls. It’s like a church for perverts.

Sunny: One thing that I think is really important is don’t just go with one source as the end-all, be-all. Different things that different people say are going to resonate with you. What you’re going to do is construct your own way out of that. The more sources you can use, the more you can open up your kink-portfolio so you can find more of what calls to you.

One of the things you’ve mentioned before is that if you’re into BDSM, you don’t have to be into all the preparation that goes into BDSM. People who are into BDSM are going into all different types of things.

Ken: Absolutely. Me and Sunny, there’s sometimes where we have unicorn masks on, we’re fucking each other. There’s pumps involved and floggers. Sometimes, we’re just going at it.

Sunny: I think most of the time people think S&M and BDSM sex is a lot of hard work and planning. Most of the time, it’s, “Hey, I want to get off.”

When I think about BDSM, I actually have a pretty skewed view because I started reading De Sade when I was 16-years-old and was afraid that BDSM involved a crazy Frenchman coming to to my house to kill me after castrating me.

Ken: You wish!

I do! When I saw your workshop, BDSM looked so much friendlier. Other workshops that I’ve seen, even on a college campus have been much more intense. Halfway through I’m like “This is just scary. I’ve got to go.”

Ken: Yeah. You see a lot of that. Sometimes Dommie McMasterton is the one who’s teaching the course. They’re very leather, very serious. But Sunny and I, before we even told each other we loved one another, were dating for one year with no protocol set up other than constant communication. I think that was the key. We both laugh during sex. We joke a lot.

As we explored one another—and I’ve been doing this a lot longer than her—I’ll tell you what I learned: I haven’t found anybody as fun or as sexy or as entertaining as my wife. We have fully explored many aspects of BDSM together. She started off bottoming. She didn’t really like it very much. She’s like my evil co-pilot. She’s my evil sister.

Sunny: Before I was involved in BDSM, that dark, serious aspect of it turned me off. Not that it was scary, but it made me laugh. I was like, “Are you people serious? I can’t do that.” Really, BDSM to me is about play. It’s about assuming different characters, playing with different roles. It’s like play theory. Why do little kids play? Why do kittens play? Why do, when we grow up, some of us play Dungeons and Dragons or go golfing?

There are lots of different reasons that we play. It’s an outlet. BDSM is another extension of play. When you’re playing, you don’t always have to play the same game or have the same attitude. I’m a laughy, jokey, light, fun person. That comes out in my play. I can’t play a character that’s dark and scary that I don’t relate to. That’s not me.

Ken, you’ve talked about the serious stuff. I remember you mentioning going to a dungeon and told them your name was something like Thunderpants.

Ken: Yeah. They kept asking me. “All right. What’s your name?” “I’m Ken.” “Well, what’s your name here?” “My name here is Ken.” They kept asking me, repeatedly. I had to have some scene name.

Sunny: ”What’s your scene name?”

Ken: I just used the only thing I could think of that was in my mind at that time, which was my Starbucks name. When I go to Starbucks, I either call myself Fatty McFatAss or Thunderpants. One or the other, just because I like to see them laugh. They write it on a cup. They’re like, “let’s see. We have a Double Chocolaty for Fatty McFatAss. Fatty McFatAss. Are you in the house?” Thunderpants was the one that I was using at that time. I’m “Lord Thunderpants,” which also happens to be just enough characters to completely fill out a FetLife profile.

Are people responsive to a profile like that? [Ed note: Sunny told me her fetlife name but asked that it not be published.]

Sunny: Oh, yeah. They’re like, “Oh my God! That’s hilarious. That’s great.” We’re poking fun at ourselves. We’re poking fun at the seriousness of BDSM. It’s not about, “Who can wear the most leather and latex and be the most serious?” It’s about playing, having fun, tapping into your psyche. It’s learning things about yourself, about your partner, tapping into yourself physically and learning the things that your body can do. That’s fun!

After your workshop I thought “Huh. I might want to try this again.” The only time I’ve ever tried it was we went down to the porn store and bought the BDSM beginner’s guide, which came with a small booklet and I think a flogger or something. I remember thinking “This is boring. I don’t know what to do here.”

Ken: There’s one really great book that isn’t being referenced very much these days. Were you ever in the Boy Scouts, when you were a kid?

No.

Ken: You’ve maybe seen like a Boy Scout Handbook before?

Yes.

Ken: It shows you this kind of knot does this, this is how you do basic first aid, this is what a poisonous spider looks like. There’s this great book called, Screw the Roses, Send me the Thorns.It was like the bible for S&M when I first started out because it told you how to do the most basic things that all of these other books aren’t telling you to do. How to do the knot, how to do a single tail whip, how to make a gag. Also, how to have fun with it and how to talk to somebody. It’s a great book that is very much overlooked. It’s all we used up until like 1998, as an instructional manual for almost everyone.

Sunny: It’s kind of like BDSM’s answer to The Joy of Cooking. You pick up The Joy of Cookingfor “How do I pluck a chicken again? How do I do this basic thing? Or, what temperature do I bake a potato?” Just the basic stuff.

Ken: Instead of The Joy of Cooking, you look at Screw the Roses, Send me the Thorns. It tells you every basic thing that you need to know. The authors are Philip Miller and Molly Devon.

How did you discover the laughing and the unicorn masks and the rubber chickens? Why did you start doing it on stage?

Ken: I’ve actually got a couple reasons. Every time I do something like that, I very carefully think it out. The first thing is that I want her [the submissive] to feel at ease. That little bit of humor puts it at an edge where she feels comfortable on stage. The second thing is it’s actually a sensory deprivation device. The only thing that she can see out of the unicorn mask are those two nostrils. Everybody in the audience is at ease because they’re looking at her looking ridiculous. She knows she looks ridiculous but she’s more at ease because she can’t really see or hear anything other than what’s going through the nostrils. It also helps her hyper focus on whatever I’m doing to her.

If I’m spanking her, she’s feeling it more. If I’m doing something that is arousing her sense of smell, she’s smelling it more. So on and so on. It’s a great tool overall, for a number of different reasons. That’s also one of the reasons why we do things like clowning in BDSM. It puts us and other people at ease. They’re more likely to want to do fun things in that kind of a situation.

Think about it, you’re at a piano bar. There’s a bunch of guys there. They’re all cruising around. Are you going to want to look for the guy who looks like super, duper creepers that are checking everybody out or would you go to the guy who had the unicorn mask out who was blowing up balloons and having fun?

Probably the latter.

Sunny: I always regarded sex as fun. I would do silly things and laugh during sex. But I’d get partners who were like, “What the hell are you doing?” The thing for me was BDSM allowed you to be whoever the hell you were. It was okay just to be.

Ken: It worked great for both of us.

It seems like you really have to find the right person and place. Some people you can go to for really great information and laughing and such. Some, however are so “sex-positive” that it feels like it’s actually kind of harsh.

Ken: They’ve been so politically correct that you’re not able to have fun even in a very simple way.

Sunny: Mm hmm. I look at people who are attracted to the BDSM community or any alternate community. They are looking for something different. Oftentimes, they’re looking to find the part of themselves that’s been buried or whatnot. But sometimes they just become one of the stereotypes, like everybody else.

Would you say that some people are coming into BDSM in search of an identity?

Sunny: Right. They want to belong. They fall into what they think they should be. If, what they honestly are inside is the person who’s very serious, who wears latex. That’s awesome. For some people, that’s really them. So many other people are going along with it because they’re not sure. In any kind of group or society, we have the pressure to go along with status quo.

Ken: A young girl who just came to me for some assistance who just recently got involved in S&M about three months ago. She had been with her dom for, I want to say, two weeks. Suddenly, they were collared, which is like an S&M version of a marriage—that’s a really quick period of time to have it. As you can imagine, a week later, they were hating each other. After talking to her for a bit, I actually recommended that she simply consider just being monogamous and doing normal, not normal, but like...

Sunny: Average.

Ken: ...Having an average sort of relationship instead of looking for fringe. She was recently out of a bad marriage and wanted to explore. But she wasn’t seeking the sort of person that she is really like. I think that that’s a lot of what S&M is. What makes it good is when you’re seeking someone within your own tribe.

It sounds like that would be difficult, though. I think it’ll be a bit different now that Fifty Shades Of Grey has come out, but I think that I could easily go on OkCupid and find somebody who likes to laugh and play Nintendo. It’d be much harder to say “I’m really into BDSM. I’m also into laughing while I’m doing it.”

Ken: It’s funny that you say that. My Tinder profile, not too long ago—and both of us have Tinder profiles and OkCupid—said, “Hi. I’m Ken. I like comic books and science fiction and zombies and blah, blah, blah.”

A week ago, or two weeks ago, I said, “Fuck it.” I decided to change it. I wrote, “I’m going to abduct you, stick your head in a toilet, and anally fist you. That would be our first date.” Within five minutes, I got ten times more responses than I ever had in the other profile.

All legitimate responses?

Ken: Some legitimate and other people who just thought I was being very clever and kitschy. Most people that respond to profiles, on any form of social media, are looking for something specific. For the demographic I’m looking for, those people really responded well to me being very honest about what I would do, or they assumed “Oh my God! This guy must be joking.”

Sunny“He’s hilarious!”

Or he’s a psychopath? Have you had any of that reaction?

Ken: No. They meet me and they realize that I’m cracking a couple of jokes along with it, and the risky stuff I do, I explain to people in detail before I do it. I want to make sure they’re consenting to do this, but also to know if anything I do might trigger them later.

But, do I do risky, kind of crazy shit? Absolutely. I’ve done everything from being involved with abduction scenes to interrogation scenes, clown stuff. Believe it or not, Mark, it’s the clown thing that freaks people out more than anything else. Coulrophobia, as I’m sure you know, is probably one of the top phobias in the world. It boils down to one thing. Inability to read facial expressions. If they can’t tell what emotion I’m feeling versus what’s being displayed on my face, suddenly people think I’m the creepy clown from American Horror Story season four, as opposed to Ken, the funny guy, who just happens to have clown makeup on.

Sunny: That reminds me of another thing. A benefit to being funny, when it comes to S&M and life: your serious seems a lot more serious compared to your funny. You can get a lot of mileage by being psychologically diverse. You can be more psychologically sadistic when you have a larger range of behavior or emotion.

Ken: You know what’s an interesting example of this. Are you married? Do you have a boyfriend that’s living with you right now?

Yeah.

Ken: Is he in this room?

No. He’s in another room.

Ken: There’s a joke that is a perfect example of this. I would like you to do to him at some point just to see how he reacts. It goes like this. “Knock, knock.”

Who’s there?

Ken: KGB.

WE ASK THE QUESTIONS AROUND HERE!

Ken: Yeah! Then smack him in the face.

I will tell you I have done that joke on my partner several times. He thinks it’s funny. I actually got a lot of hate mail a while back when I made him see a gross movie and he was fine with it, but the internet wasn’t.

Sunny: Yeah. You know that you have a relationship with him. You know what his boundaries are. You wouldn’t really purposely hurt him.

Would you say that knowing the person and being able to communicate clearly is more important than any actual skills you might have in the BDSM world?

Ken: I would actually say that communicating to that person in a way they can understand is more important. You need to know what your submissive has desire for.

Sunny: For me, I feel more comfortable knowing the person to some degree. If I don’t know you, I could fuck some shit up. I need to be able to look at you and be, “Wait a minute. Something’s not right. I’m going to check in.” If that’s a stranger or somebody you don’t know very well, the likelihood of you being able to do that effectively is diminished.

That Icy Hot thing, where you put Icy Hot on the flat end of a straight razor and then run it against the throat of someone who’s blindfolded. You make them believe that you’ve actually slit their throat. I would probably never want to do this, but I can’t get my mind off of it.

Ken: We just did that in LA.

Was that with people you knew or people you didn’t know?

Ken: No. It was with somebody that I had vetted very carefully, and I actually talked to her top for an extended period of time so we could do this in a way that it would be safe.

He was there during the whole thing, and she jumped a little bit but I don’t think she was nearly as frightened as other people that I’ve done this to in the past because she knew that her dom was in the room—that there was no way he would let somebody put a straight razor up against her throat and cut her. I asked her afterwards, “Why didn’t you jump or react as much?” That was her exact answer. She knew her dom was in the room.

Sunny: Right. She said she was confused. “Wait! What’s going on?” She said, “I think if you would have done it to my arm, I would have been more freaked out.” She said, “The fact that you did it to my neck, I knew that he wouldn’t let you do that for real.” It was interesting. She was disoriented and confused for a couple of minutes.

Did she enjoy it?

Sunny: She did.

Ken: She enjoyed it very much. She sent me a long thank you note afterwards.

It’s very different from the Fifty Shades type of BDSM. There’s no laughing there.

Ken: Some people expect the title “Master” to be branded on you and then people have to assume that what you say is correct, but one of the best lessons I ever had about this was from one of my former submissives before she was my submissive. I was in a bar. I was playing with her. She said, “No, you can’t do that.” I’m like, “Why not?” She says, “Although I am a submissive, I’m not your submissive.” That was something that really resonated with me.

Sunny: Right. I think overall when it comes to BDSM, especially new people coming in, yes, there are absolute truths that you need to follow. When it comes to technique and safety. When it comes to obtaining consent. Hygiene. That’s sort of thing.

Ken: Nobody likes stinky balls. That’s the other thing I think I’ve learned. I’ve had some S&M sessions where I’ve shaved my nuts. I’ve washed myself really well.

You can’t just jump right into risky play, right?

Ken: Yeah. I’d say wait for anything that’s risky. Really, really look into watching TV shows, books, website. Go to a munch before you dive right in.

Sunny: I would just also tell people to take it slowly. Once they dip their toes in the water, they are like kids in a candy store. They’re diving into everything. But kink is not going anywhere. Your ass is not going anywhere. You have all the time in the world. It’s much better to leave yourself or someone else wanting more than doing too much and being, “What the fuck did I just do?” and traumatizing yourself or somebody else.

Ken: In fact, I still have tricks that I have up my sleeve that I haven’t shown Sunny. We’ve been together for six years now. I purposely hold stuff back just because I want to be able to tantalize and amaze her with some cool trick that I’ve never used on her before 20 years from now. That’s an important thing to do. If you have this repertoire of knowledge then you don’t want to expend everything in the first year or five years. Pace yourself out a little bit.


For more information about BDSM and Sunny Megatron, you can visit her site or check out her Twitter.

Practice makes perfect

Resulting form the lack of effectiveness in work while wearing shackles, I did promise Mistress to practice more at home when I have time an...