Re: [UUPoly-L] On Poly, Kink, and Unitarianism

["Laura Stewart" <mathlaura@gmail.com>]

I think "kinky" is a really really broad term to use.  Inquiries about
it would need to be phrased in a very specific way.  "Are you kinky?"
would definitely not be a good question to ask in a properly-designed
study unless it was purely trying to measure how many people idenfity
with that label.  I, for example, enjoy engaging in activities which
are BDSM in nature, but I am not part of any BDSM "community", don't
go to any BDSM-geared events, etc.  I also completely consider it
something I do and not in any way part of my identity.  I know people
who do consider it a big part of their identity.

You'll also find that in groups that have a generally high level of
sexual liberation (though that's certainly a nebulous concept) that a
large number of the individuals in said group don't have much of a
concept of what exactly counts as kinky or deviant.  An attitude of "I
just do what I like/other people do what they like" isn't too uncommon
(in my personaly unscientific experience).

There is also the divide due to the evolving use of the word "kinky".
When Kinsey was writing, he used the word essentially with an
inherrently negative context, but not because he was judging
particular behaviors.  In some of Kinsey's surveys about sexual
attitudes, his scale asking how much people accepted certain sexual
practices used  a scale with "normal/acceptable" on one end, "unusual"
in the middle, and "kinky" on the other side.  Now the word is used
with pride by some, as purely descriptive by others, and sometimes
almost just as a weak synonmy for "titalating"  (e.g. "I need to go
buy whipped cream and fishnets!"  "Kinky!")  The word "fetish" has had
a similar weakening, from a psychological meaning of some
non-inherrently-sexual item or practice that one MUST have in order to
experience sexual pleasure to basically the same colloquial useage as
"kinky".

I'm not sure exactly how I would phrase a question asking people if
they were kinky.  Maybe "do you associate with some group or community
due to a shared sexual practice?"  if one were trying to determine who
was in a kinky "community" or "scene".

-Laura

On 2/28/07, wabaldwin@aol.com <wabaldwin@aol.com> wrote:
>  Ah, but now we need to ask Unitarian Universalist groups, "How many of you are poly, or kinky?"...
>
>  Bill
>
>  -----Original Message-----
>  From: haslamk@gmail.com
>  To: uupoly-l@uupa.org
>  Sent: Wed, 28 Feb 2007 11:18 AM
>  Subject: [UUPoly-L] On Poly, Kink, and Unitarianism
>
>   Over the past couple of years I have done several presentations for the Poly
> community.  On occasion I asked unselected Poly audiences for a show of
> hands indicating a connection to the UU community.  Roughly 1/3 of the
> audience is somehow connected to the UU community.
>
> And on one occasion at a huge BDSM meeting of some 700 attendees (Winter
> Fire -- 2005) I was at a workshop on Polyamory for the Beginner with about
> 70 or so present.  (Note, about 10% of the entire population at WF)   I
> asked how many of these "BDSMers" at the Poly workshop were also in some way
> or other affiliated with the Unitarian Universalists and again about 1/3 of
> the hands went up.
>
> OK, OK, so it is not very scientific, not well designed, and not
> representative, and far from accurate but it does give a rough indication
> that there is a lot of crossover between UU, Polyamory, and Kink. These are
> not findings that will please everyone but certainly indicative of a piece
> of the demography of the Poly, BDSM, and UU communities.   The truth is
> sometimes a bit difficult to swallow.
>
> As scientific papers often say at the end, more research is needed.  Grad
> students out there in sociology looking for a thesis topic might find
> something of interest here.
>
> Ken Haslam
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