Have You No Shame?

[intothewoods]

Lately I've been reflecting on the shame I used to feel about my kinky sexuality.

It strikes me that I wasn't raised to be particularly sex negative or in some conservative religious home, so I'm struggling to identify the source of the shame.

And then I was thinking about the lack of privacy in our culture these days as evidenced in reality TV and oversharing in blogging, tweeting, etc. Everyone shares everything these days. If you aren't from a more traditional or conservative home, would it even be possible for you to feel shame? If so, what would be the source or cause?

 

[rosco rathbone]

"have you no shame" lol. Love it.

Then the belt comes down.

I don't see how truly hot, sexy sexuality can survive the death of shame.

Fortunately, for all we love to tell ourselves in America about how modern and free and open we are, this is a shame drenched culture. We're immersed in sweaty, furtive lust and Puritanical masochism, even our Jews like Rep. Weiner, whose political career was terminated over something as picayne as a cock pic.

Even our "sex positive" bluestockings and strippers-who-blog are enmeshed in a stricture of restrictive rules and notions of what does and doesn't cross the line.

 

[intothewoods]

"have you no shame" lol. Love it.

Thank you, thank you. I was inspired by Keroin. She always has such clever thread titles.

Then the belt comes down.

I don't see how truly hot, sexy sexuality can survive the death of shame.

Fortunately, for all we love to tell ourselves in America about how modern and free and open we are, this is a shame drenched culture. We're immersed in sweaty, furtive lust and Puritanical masochism, even our Jews like Rep. Weiner, whose political career was terminated over something as picayne as a cock pic.

Even our "sex positive" bluestockings and strippers-who-blog are enmeshed in a stricture of restrictive rules and notions of what does and doesn't cross the line.

Yes, take Weiner, because he's a jew like me. Although maybe he had crazy sex negative parents.

I want to know where it comes from. Puritans? We all got fucked by the Puritans even if your grandparents were Jewish immigrants?

 

[NickNTime]

Look at even the so called progressive, liberal media. There is a strong undercurrent of orthodoxy and Puritanism that makes it almost impossible to come out as fetishes. I was watching The Soup and there were two segments that on the kinky side. One was about adult breastfeeding and the other about polyamory. Neither of which were that unusual in that the participants weren't acting like idiots or morons, and yet both were mocked by Joel McHale simply because they were different.

Fortunately, I had the balls to turn to my wife and let her know how hot I thought both of those were, but how many people would.

Shame comes from without in most cases.

 

[sweepthefloor]

Blushing is still uncomfortable, and it never goes away. I don't know why. It's so much easier to fuck on my belly with the pillow over my head.

 

[Stella_Omega]

About my sexuality? Never have been ashamed of it. Other things, yeah-- I'm still trying to grow up in many ways.

 

[graceanne]

I'm not ashamed. I was, but part of growing up for me was realizing that I have no reason to be ashamed of this.

 

[Noor]

I don't really have shame with regards to anything sexual or my sexuality. There seems to be a part of BDSM that is shame based which it is totally lost on me.

Shame for me would be doing something that I knew to be wrong by my set of ethics/morals/values like disappearing from someone or having sex with the partner of a friend.

If I would be ashamed to do something then I don't do it. I might think about doing it briefly but I don't, not just because it would be wrong in my eyes but also because it would damage my sense of integrity.

 

[Kurokami]

I used to feel shame, back in the shadow of my adolescence when I didn't really know what I was getting into. But I was a kid, and as a consequence kind of dumb and painfully limited in my life experience. I tended to equate what I wanted, what I was feeling, with darker and more illegal things. Back then, all I had was some vague apprehensions that wanting sex that was rough or painful made me into an asshole, or a potential rapist... or some kind of comedy prop, on my more submissive days. This wasn't helped by every piece of media I'd ever seen showing dominant sexuality as predatory, and submissive male sexuality in particular as being comedic (you know, the tubby guy in the leather chaps and the ballgag. Hilarious!)

Of course, I grew up, actually learned some things... and here I am. Once I met some people and finally got exposed to a wider context for all this, I found a set of terms to appropriately express what I wanted and felt, and figured out the fun side of shame. I realized how limiting to my own sense of fun that general sense of shame was, and it became really easy to discard. I really just don't give a fuck anymore.

 

[BiBunny]

I grew up in a very conservative home. I don't think I ever heard the word "sex" uttered in that house. No alcohol in the house (ever), church every Sunday, all that. But, oddly enough, I have never been ashamed of who and what I am, sexually speaking. Hmm.

 

[Daddy2mylilgirl]

Nope. No shame in my debauchery.

 

[culloden]

Shame gets a bad rap. Shame helps to set societal limits that benefit us all. One should be ashamed of stealing, lying, and so forth. But of sexuality? No.

 

[Shankara20]

Shame gets a bad rap. Shame helps to set societal limits that benefit us all. One should be ashamed of stealing, lying, and so forth. But of sexuality? No.

I do not agree.

Shame is also used to control unusual social behaviors, those behaviors that make other fell a bit uncomfortable. Use of shame to control is underhanded and often the tool of the pretentious.

Instead of trying to change unwanted behavior by direct corrective instruction, shaming can teach someone that they are broken as an individual unworthy of redemption. What follows next can be behaviors truly detrimental to society as a whole.

 

[Tryharder62]

You know

I think that is why I am putting on a mask when I am around others. No one knows that I am a submissive little slut except the 2 I have shared it with. It is not shame exactly but I would be shunned from my life actually if I was open about who I am. Would lose my job etc. (Very conservative job) So I live out my fantasies in my little office on the computer.

 

[njlauren]

Shame a lot of the time has little to do with background and more to do with the underlying culture we are around and it often has to do, not with behavior that hurts people, but in being different. Some of it does go back to religion, where shame is a major concept in enforcing moral teachings,and I could argue large parts of societal 'shame' can be traced back to that (especially the Puritans, the Aussies are right, they say they got the prostitutes, debtors and traitors and we got the puritans and they got the better end of the deal), but these days a lot of it is simply in being different. GLBT people run into this, where they don't necessarily feel guilty for being gay or trans or whatever, but rather feel guilty and ashamed because of 'what this will do to mom/dad/friends'.

Shame to me is one of those things they tell parents, that attitudes aren't taught, but caught. We live in a society on the surface that is getting more and more tolerant, at least on the surface, things thought of as being 'evil' not long ago are parts of society (getting divorced, for example, or a working mom). But as someone else talked about, think of the signals we get about BD/SM......it is something to be laughed at on Jerry Springer or whatever, it is something for Oprah to cluck her tongue at or act shocked, it is something that people will read about on Kindle because no one can see what they are reading and be talked about in hushed whispers, as if it is child molestation or something. Talk to someone about BD/SM, and immediately their shoulders stiffen up or there is tension in the air , and that gets caught.

And when something comes out about BD/SM, it is often lurid, it is about someone who dies because they were doing something stupid, when is the last time you saw anything positive about it? Sure, some people, some sex educators and writers are very positive, but when BD/SM is treated luridly, like the case of a woman attorney working for a city agency here in NYC who turned out to be a part time dominatrix of some sort (which in NY is perfectly legal, it is not prostitution as long as penetrative or oral sex is involved), and the papers were all over it.....if she had worked as a bartender or waitress or at Wal Mart, no one would care, but because it had to do with BD/SM, total outrage, fire the bitch, etc.....

Course, some people get off on the shame of BD/SM or that it is outlaw, those who have fetishized it. I often hear people saying that is BD/SM were mainstream they wouldn't do it, but I still would, it is hot, not because it is outlaw or frowned upon, it is hot to me because I am wired the way, it would be as attractive to me as going to a baseball game, it is something I enjoy and have deep in me.

 

[NaughtyRedSiren]

I've learned that we shouldn't feel shame for who are. Sexuality is a big part of who we are personality wise! And you should NEVER be ashamed of who you are! If people don't like it... they can go fly a kite

 

[Noor]

Shame a lot of the time has little to do with background and more to do with the underlying culture we are around and it often has to do, not with behavior that hurts people, but in being different.

In my case, my background and culture has a lot to do with my lack of shame. I have always known I was different than main stream US culture and that is okay. I am an independent non-conformist, If my or someone else's life is dependent on it, I can fake it pretty well, otherwise I don't try to fit in.

As long as it is consensual and adult, I see no shame in it. If people can make money at it, great!

There is always an aspect of risk with trust and intimacy, but that is there anytime you let another person into your life whether you are into BSDM or not. Whatever/whoever you surrender part of yourself to, can be a danger, even driving a car, you are trusting that the other drivers will not hit you.

 

[seela]

For me it took stupidly long to realize that my thoughts and fantasies AREN'T the norm. I thought everyone was more or less into the same stuff as I was, even if it wasn't necessarily shown on TV. So I guess I wasn't smart enough to ever feel shame for what I am and what I like, because I never thought I was actually different.

I've never had any problems talking about my sexual preferences (or the lack thereof) to guys I've been intimate with. My preferred relationship model hasn't turned out to be wildly popular among some people that I know, but I don't think I've ever really been ashamed of it, either. When I first got to know a couple of hard core feminists and they tried to guilt me into admitting that I'm secretly trying to undermine everything feminists have ever fought for, I was pissed off and questioned my preferences for a while, but even then, I wouldn't say I was ashamed. They got me thinking, and it was probably one of the best things that could have happened at that point in my life.

 

[catalina_francisco]

When I first got to know a couple of hard core feminists and they tried to guilt me into admitting that I'm secretly trying to undermine everything feminists have ever fought for, I was pissed off and questioned my preferences for a while, but even then, I wouldn't say I was ashamed. They got me thinking, and it was probably one of the best things that could have happened at that point in my life.

Ah, what you need to remind such feminists is that one of the main standpoints of feminism is the belief that every woman is an expert oin their own life and has the right to decide what is right for them, not be told what is right by others. After all, that was one of the points feminism was borne from, women being told by men who they should be, what they should do, and how they should feel...changing the gender of the one doing the telling does not make it any less oppressive, nor right.

Catalina

 

[seela]

Ah, what you need to remind such feminists is that one of the main standpoints of feminism is the belief that every woman is an expert oin their own life and has the right to decide what is right for them, not be told what is right by others. After all, that was one of the points feminism was borne from, women being told by men who they should be, what they should do, and how they should feel...changing the gender of the one doing the telling does not make it any less oppressive, nor right.

Catalina

Pretty much, yeah. It was years ago and I was quite a bit younger then, but even back then after a while of thinking about things, I said more or less exactly what you've written here.

 

[KoPilot]

Yeah I was at first (and still do feel pangs of guilt), but not because of the usual suspects.

I was mostly ashamed that I didn't realize what I was doing and what I wanted until way into our dating, so I was absolutely convinced for a while that I'd misled him. Sometimes I still get paranoid that I'm asking too much even though all evidence points to the contrary.

 

[JMohegan]

Lately I've been reflecting on the shame I used to feel about my kinky sexuality.

It strikes me that I wasn't raised to be particularly sex negative or in some conservative religious home, so I'm struggling to identify the source of the shame.

And then I was thinking about the lack of privacy in our culture these days as evidenced in reality TV and oversharing in blogging, tweeting, etc. Everyone shares everything these days. If you aren't from a more traditional or conservative home, would it even be possible for you to feel shame? If so, what would be the source or cause?

Shame = "the painful feeling arising from the consciousness of something dishonorable, improper, ridiculous, etc., done by oneself or another".

That's a universal human emotion.

Traditional, conservative, or religious folks are not the only humans with a sense of honor or appropriate conduct. They just have a different sense of what is honorable or appropriate than, say, I do.

 

[IrisAlthea]

Shame = "the painful feeling arising from the consciousness of something dishonorable, improper, ridiculous, etc., done by oneself or another".

That's a universal human emotion.

Traditional, conservative, or religious folks are not the only humans with a sense of honor or appropriate conduct. They just have a different sense of what is honorable or appropriate than, say, I do.

This.
I've actually been thinking about these things this summer watching children of different ages and how they develop a sense about what is private and not, who can hear about the things that didn't work out the way they planned, what is appropriate dress code where and so on.
Most of these things do develop without any obvious prompting as they watch older children and adults.

Blushing and feeling ridiculous and a bit ashamed, for example, because I accidentally opened a bathroom door someone should have locked if they wanted privacy, put my foot in my mouth and made someone a bit uncomfortable isn't very logical and it's not because I really think I'm a bad person for sometimes doing these things.
It's pretty much the same thing with sex and kink.
I don't think I'm doing anything wrong, but yes, I did blush and I did have that "accidentally opening the bathroom door"-feeling, when one of the children came in to the kitchen happy about having found this really cool vibrating, silvery space rocket toy in the master bedroom.
I really wished my mother in law was somewhere else in space at that time.

These are things we can laugh at afterwards and not really the same as that kind of shame that comes from thinking there is something inherently wrong with who you are or what you are doing, but it is still shame.

 

[Netzach]

No, I'm way too busy being ashamed of my family and my upbringing to have time to be ashamed of being a sexual iconoclast.

That might change if I were outed into the news or something, but as long as it's reasonably private, I'm cool.

 

[intothewoods]

So shame in your sexual desires is caused by religion, conservative values, puritanism, being different, having nothing better to be ashamed of and ... gum?

If you're not ashamed of your kink, it's maybe because you don't give a damn or you have other, more pressing matters to be ashamed of?

Hmm.