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Published 1 juni 2023

An Anarchist-Feminist Perspective Against BDSM

  • by Usul of the Blackfoot

Introductory Thoughts I understand as I begin writing this zine that I’m going to piss off a lot of folks; people don’t like to hear opinions that contradict or oppose their behaviours. Besides that, I know all too well from personal experience that I’m in the minority on this one. And this subject matter (unsurprisingly) seems to evoke a rare and aggressive vehemence in people- particularly radicals- that other realms of conversation do not.

I chose to write this zine because I’m tired of being persecuted for not having interest in BDSM and all it entails. I’m writing this because I’m exhausted by the near-ubiquity of positive thoughts and words on the matter, I’m tired of being constantly bombarded by people’s stories of “kinky” sexual conquest. I’m absolutely sick of being in info shops and houses designated “safe spaces” (those apparently devoted to abolishing oppressive speech and action and making everyone feel safe and comfortable), and being regaled by a never ending supply of bondage stories, domination fantasies.

I’m writing this because, to be upfront, I think the various behaviours encouraged by BDSM are fucked up and oppressive, and I just can’t understand how so many anarchists and feminists I meet tout these acts as “hot,” and even worse, as “liberating.” And I’m writing this because I think, no, I know there are many others out there who also find the actions and mindsets of BDSM unpalatable, but are too afraid to speak up because it’s accepted (at least in radical circles) as a given and wonderful aspect of human sexuality. Everybody does it, something must be wrong with me. I want these men, women, and others to be able to speak up without fear of reprisal or rejection, just as I hope to be able to.

I want to lay out some things about myself, so those who read this who don’t know me can understand better where I’m coming from. I also want to avoid speculation about my person instead of contemplation of the ideas presented herein.

I’m male bodied and I identify as male. I’m 25. My ancestry is mostly Scottish and Native American (Cherokee, or Aniyvwiya), with a sprinkling of French. As far as civilized family units go, mine was poor but functional and loving growing up, and my childhood- compared to many I’ve witnessed- was fucking sweet. I am a green anarchist and a feminist. I hate civilization and look forward to its downfall, but I am not a primitivist. I’ve never been raped (in terms of full-on, un-consensual intercourse- I know this isn’t the only definition of rape, it’s just the one I choose to use), but I have been molested on several occasions (as in wandering hands, forcefulness, and unwelcome advances after clearly saying “no”). This includes being propositioned by one of my high school teachers to engage in BDSM with a friend and fellow student. I enjoy the emotional and sexual company of men and women, and, though I’ve never yet been with such a person, I’m attracted to people who don’t identify as either. I enjoy emotional intimacy and asexual relationships as much as I enjoy sex.

It might seem odd to state such things outright, but I want to be very honest and straightforward throughout this zine. It is not my intention to attack those who are into BDSM. Too often, conversations from which all involved should benefit are instead battlefields in which all parties are trying to “win.” I have no desire to win this discussion. I also understand that like-minded adults can do whatever they want in private, and I don’t intend to tell anyone what they can and can’t do.

But I’m not going easy on the subject. I do intend to attack BDSM itself, as a set of behaviours, as a set of ideas and attitudes, as a civilized tradition, as a reflection of oppression, patriarchy, and violence, and, to borrow a term from Derrick Jensen, as a toxic mimic of healthy adult human sexuality.

Defining BDSM

BDSM is a complex acronym embodying a number of words and practices. Extracted completely this includes bondage, discipline, domination, submission, sadism, and masochism. Quite a mouthful. Let’s look at each of these individually, just to make clear what we’re talking about.

Bondage is a the act of being bound (or binding others, in the case of those in “dominant” roles), usually, though not always, for sexual pleasure. It is also sometimes known as vincilagnia, from the Latin meaning “the lust to be bound with chains.” The practice of bondage involves an expansive arsenal of paraphernalia, including chains, ropes, collars, gags and bits (like those used on horses), handcuffs, straitjackets, leather and latex clothes specifically designed for bondage, thumb cuffs, St. Andrew’s crosses (large, xshaped racks), slings, tape, and a number of other devices.

Discipline is pretty self-explanatory. It usually involves a “dom,” or dominant party, disciplining a “sub,” or submissive party. This can come in the form of commands, bondage, whipping, hot wax, physical blows, humiliation (such as licking the soles of the dominant party’s shoes, or demeaning the submissive verbally), and so on. Domination and submission are equally self-defining.

Domination is the act of dominating, submission the act of submitting. In a sexual context, this can include a variety of behavior, but is generally characterized by two polarized roles: “dom,” or dominant, and “sub,” or submissive. Dominant people sometimes also use the term “top,” while submissives occasionally use the word “bottom” in place of dom and sub. “Switch” describes those who alternate between roles.

Sadism is the act of inflicting pain, torment, or humiliation upon another to achieve sexual gratification. Masochism, quite similarly, is the act of receiving pain, torment, or humiliation to gain pleasure. Because they so often go together, these terms are collectively known as sadomasochism. The term sadism was inspired by the life and writings of Donatien Alphonse Francois de Sade, better known as the Marquis de Sade. The term is well-deserved, as the Marquis lived a life of extremely abusive, violent, painful sexuality, and was on more than one occasion imprisoned by the austere French authorities for his actions. Masochism is derived from Leopold von Sacher-Masoch, who wrote many works including the 1869 novel Venus in Furs. SacherMasoch was also a socialist, philosemite (an opponent of discrimination against Jews), and, in his later years, a feminist. Seems BDSM has been common in radical circles for quite a long time…

A Brief History of BDSM

The origins of BDSM are not definitively agreed upon. The Cult of Orthia, one of the most important religions of ancient Sparta (one of the most violent, slave-driven, dominant, militaristic societies of all time), performed ritual flagellation called diamastigosis- on a regular basis. The Tomba della Fustigazione, or Flogging Grave, is an Etruscan burial site in Tarquinia dating to the sixth century BCE that depicts quite graphically the whipping of a woman by two men with whom she’s having sex. The writings of the Roman authors Juvenal and Petronius both contain references to flagellation for pleasure.

Many Roman rituals have also contributed to the origins of BDSM. One of the most notable characteristics of the Roman holiday Saturnalia was the exchanging of roles- the exchanging of power- between master and slave. Perhaps even more obvious is the Roman holiday Lupercalia, during which sacrifices were made, thongs cut from the hides of the victims, and young men, dressed in the hides of the sacrificed animals, chased women through the streets whipping them to ensure fertility and to ease the pain of childbirth. Though it is not nearly as blatant a mingling of violence, death, dominance, and sexuality, Lupercalia’s tradition of flagellation lives on in certain Christian Easter Monday whippings.

Of course, flagellation is by no means an exclusively Roman or pagan phenomenon. In the tumultuous European medieval era, Christian flagellants practiced the “mortification of flesh” that has come to illustrate their way of life. Although sexuality is absent in the rituals of Christian flagellants, dominance and submission, sadomasochism, a life of mental bondage and vassalage to God, body hatred, physical discipline (flagellants were called disciplinati in Italian), and public humiliation are omnipresent. The practice of ritual Christian flagellation is much less common today than it was in the middle ages, but the legacy of Christian BDSM lives on in our society. Ritual flagellation is also present in several forms of Islam, and ritual whipping (for women) and spanking (for men) is present in Taoist temples.

More recently, in the Western world, there is an abundance of literature and artwork containing references to or full depictions of BDSM-related activities from the mid-1700s onward. Such prurient literature culminated, of course, in the writings of the previously mentioned Marquis de Sade and Leopold von Sacher-Masoch.

Many years after the writings of de Sade and Sacher-Masoch, BDSM finds influences in the gay male leather subculture, particularly in the U.S.. The leather movement, now sometimes called “Old Guard Leather,” is one of the most potent influences on the attitudes and actions of modern BDSM, and its origins are perhaps the most patriarchal.

Leather culture came about in the period just following World War II, as soldiers returned home from the European and Pacific theatres. These soldiers became addicted to a life surrounded and defined by men, traditional “masculinity,” enforced structure and hierarchy, dominance and submission, discipline, extreme violence, servitude, and an atmosphere or command and obedience. Upon returning home, this morphed into a gay (that is, queer male, and only queer male) subculture involving all of the same traits. This subculture is arguably the most influential element in the formation of modern BDSM.

Thoughts and Arguments Against

BDSM As I mentioned before, I fully understand that in any society whether it be, say, a terrifyingly powerful police state like the Western world at present, or a fictional, yet to be achieved anarchist paradise some of us are working toward- two (or more) consenting adults can do whatever they want in private. But, as with all other behaviours and ideas, just because folks have (or should have, in the case of sexual legislation in Statist societies) the right to do something doesn’t mean I have to like it or think it’s good and wonderful and liberating.

And I don’t think BDSM is good and wonderful and liberating, no matter how many people insist that it is. I also don’t think for half a second that just because it’s consensual, it’s good and healthy. Pretty much every time I’ve had a discussion about this topic in person, people are quick to dismiss any rejection or questioning of BDSM with, “It’s consensual!” I wonder if these people know the horrifying and vomit inducing story of Armin Meiwes and his victim Bernd Brandes, who consented to being fucked, and killed, and eaten. Good job, civilization; well done, patriarchy.

No, whether it is consensual or not, I see BDSM as oppressive, patriarchal in every sense of the word, and as a poisonous charade of healthy, mutually beneficial love and sex. It’s difficult for me to understand how other people feel differently.

I found a post some time ago on the feminist blog Angry For a Reason that I can’t resist using to open this critique. User Twisty writes:

“Like it or lump it, BDSM is patriarchy, the whole patriarchy, and nothing’ but the patriarchy, in a black latex nutshell. It is, I unwaveringly assert according to the Honor Code of the Blaming Spinsters, the eroticization of a vastly horrific social order that has, over the millennia, generated the suffering of untold millions, and against which I am sworn to vituperate.

BDSM’s got it all: sex, power, rape, pain, dominance, submission, the false pretext of freedom [emphasis added], delusions of superiority, sublimation of the orgasm at all costs, women who think it liberates them [emphasis added again], a conservative orthodoxy, compulsory conformity, absurd, exaggerated gender roles, and a silly dress code. It is profoundly anti-feminist… anti-individual, and unattractive.”

The conversation that follows is what I’d like to see a lot more of in anarchist and feminist circles. It can be viewed in full at http://angryforareason.blogspot.com/2006/02/asalways.html.

Most of the traits Twisty lists can also be applied to Civilization, and aptly so. BDSM is in every way tied to and a product of Civilization. There are few, if any, anthropological indications that the behaviours and mental atmospheres encouraged by BDSM existed in societies before the world was poisoned by pandemic civilization. Considering the nature of civilized societies, it’s not really surprising that BDSM is as common as it is.

During the last six thousand years as civilization has conquered and destroyed, its many defining characteristics have remained unchanged. A quick glance at any fallen or contemporary civilized society reveals that they all depend on and benefit from slavery, violence, subjugation, mental and physical torture, imaginary guises of freedom and superiority, self-destruction and personal sacrifice of those not in power, domination and humiliation of those not in power, strict gender roles, compulsion in so many ways, power structures and established hierarchies ruling over every aspect of life, and discipline and punishment for rule-breakers. Sound familiar?

Throughout his works, anti-civ author Derrick Jensen frequently alludes to oppressed peoples fetishizing and glorifying their own suffering in religious beliefs that reinforce the socio-political structures keeping them down. Many African slaves, for example, adopted Christianity, which teaches: “Servants, be obedient to them that are your masters according to the flesh, with fear and trembling, in singleness of your heart, as unto Christ (Ephesians 6:5-7)” and “If you are willing and obedient, You shall eat the good of the land (Isaiah, 1:19).” It might have uplifted the spirits of impoverished and beaten slaves, but adopting the religion of white Westerners didn’t do a bit of fucking good in terms of stopping slavery. It, in fact, reinforced and strengthened slavery.

BDSM is the same. As Twisty said, it is qualified in part by the “false pretext of freedom.” It glorifies and eroticizes slavery and submissiveness, authority and subjugation, embarrassment and punishment, and promises “heaven” in the form of pleasure and release for its followers. Many who practice BDSM insist that it sets them free, but, like Christian dogma to slavery, how is BDSM stopping or even challenging the social and political institutions that keep us all imprisoned?

Twisty lists “women who think it liberates them” as one of the defining points of BDSM. I would extend this to men, trans folks, and genderless/genderqueer people, ending with people who think it liberates them. I certainly know many such people, and I’m sure you do too.

All of the friends and acquaintances I’ve known who are into BDSM are victims of one or more of the previously listed symptoms of civilized life/patriarchy/oppression, &c.. It’s entirely subjective, of course, because there are countless others who enjoy BDSM whom I don’t know. However, it’s these close relationships and the critical thinking I’ve applied to them that really made me begin to doubt BDSM as a natural part of human sexuality.

One friend, a privileged white male, likes being bound, whipped, spanked, humiliated, lambasted, and punched in the face- like, actually punched in the face- during sex. Another friend loves being bound and silenced, she likes playing the role of a little girl being raped by an older man, she enjoys being strangled and cut during sex, and all of her relationships are with older, overbearing dominant men who keep her in mental slavery and emotional dependency to their abuse. A third friend loves being tied up and talked down to, spanked and told he’s bad.

I could go on and on, but with each and every one of the folks I know who enjoy such things, the reasons are blatant. A repressed childhood of Catholic school and abusive male figures, being told as a young girl that masturbation is poison and you’ll go to hell if god catches you doing it, a lifetime of gender confusion, the feeling of being held down and choked by the conditions of growing up, seeking retribution for one’s patriarchal bullshit instead of seeking solutions and making amends: all of these things, and other forms of psychophysical repression, manifest themselves in the pursuits and behaviours of BDSM.

I think most of the people who view BDSM as liberating don’t realize that the power of these various oppressive institutions we’ve been discussing is actually reinforced by BDSM, as it also relies on and encourages the exchange of power. What this essentially means is that those who practice BDSM recognize that there is a power structure, really many overlapping hierarchies, in our society. However, instead of battling these structures and actively seeking their annihilation, people fetishize exchanging power briefly in hopes of getting off. More often than not, those most interested in exchanging power are those in power. A quick glance at Craigslist or any other website advertising erotic “services” shows that there is an endless supply of wealthy (powerful) white (powerful) men (powerful) who can’t wait for the next dominatrix to come along and sell them some punishment for being “bad little boys.” These fuckers are fully aware how awful their lives and actions are, maybe they’re even aware how puerile and held back they are mentally, and they’re totally willing to exchange their blood money for the hot commodity of poor powerless people to discipline them.

Surely, helping these rotten bastards get off in exchange for money only cements the idea in their head that they own the world, that they own all the people in it, and that they can buy whatever that want, even remonstration and punishment for their misdeeds.

This brings up an entirely different aspect of BDSM that disgusts me; that is, the consumerism and capitalism driving it and profiting from it. You name it, BDSM is all about buying and selling it: toys, props, absurd costumes, sex acts, professional domination, overpriced conventions and fetish balls, porn, porn, porn. I’m sure there are folks out there who make all their own BDSM gear, but even so, BDSM is undeniably money-driven, money-making, money-oriented. Probably because in our society money is the same as power, and that’s really what it’s all about, isn’t it?

The assorted miscellany available for BDSM “play” is pretty telling itself. Many of these “toys” are overt in their relationship to the multifarious onslaught of oppression. Hell, even calling these implements toys (when they are clearly made for less-than-playful means) demonstrates the kind of sophistry that must go on in the minds of folks who see BDSM as a freeing force. Bits and whips, to take two examples, have been used to drive animal slavery (including humans) for as long as domestication has existed. Among certain practitioners of BDSM chains and shackles- serious, heavy, transport-to-the-New-World shackles- are used as restraints. Does this even need discussing? And among others handcuffs, thumb cuffs, ankle cuffs, and straitjackets predominate bedroom activities. These are the same devices used by those who “protect and serve” the dominant culture and its insane policies and practices by arresting, imprisoning. and enslaving those on lower rungs of the hierarchy. Of course, some people toss out the props and get straight to the point by donning the costumes of cops, businessmen, doctors, slave masters, and soldiers.

In the face of all of these arguments to the contrary, people who participate in BDSM still claim that it is liberating. If it’s not liberating them from patriarchy, capitalism, fucked up childhoods, slavery, gender roles, groupthink, or the dark shadow cast by nation states (which it absolutely isn’t on all accounts), what the hell exactly is it liberating them from?

Radicals and, to a much greater degree, queer folks are two of the most vilified, persecuted groups of people in the world at present. I suspect, then, that due to constant abuse and due to constantly paying attention to just how abusive this world is, many queer and radical (and radical queer) individuals don’t know how to express love and sexuality any other way than through violence and abuse.

In every city and small town I’ve been to that hosts an anarchist community, there are ongoing projects aimed at mental healing, mediating conflicts between people, healing our bodies from the poison of industrial society, and groups to help survivors of rape. And yet, there are no discussion groups aimed at rooting out the patriarchy, violence, and desire to lord over others in our sex lives. There is only positive affirmation- “ooh babys!” and “hell yeahs!”- toward a system of false freedom and continued constraint.

And there’s a lot of rhetoric, too. People have invented a whole slew of sophisticated, gentle vocabulary to soften the image of BDSM. These include SSC- safe, sane, and consensual- and RACK- risk aware consensual kink. But these clever titles completely ignore the historical roots and modern linkages of BDSM to just about all the tremendously bad crap in the world. Sex involving BDSM can be as consensual, aware of risk, safe, and sane as possible, but it’s still patriarchy, it’s still domination, it’s still slavery. And those who consent to slavery, domination, and patriarchy are helping these things thrive just as much as the slavers, dominators, and patriarchs. Doesn’t sound very safe or sane to me.

It’s exactly this kind of language and attitude that makes BDSM a toxic mimic of healthy love and sex. Clever lingo disguising horrors underneath the surface is a technique as old as the oppressive forces who use it. Military officials insist that Our Glorious Empire’s wars abroad are liberating people.

Liberals demand angrily that voting is responsible and will free us if only we’ll all vote the right way. The hordes of religious zealots here and elsewhere insist that obedience, worship, prostration, loyalty, and the complete revocation of personal choice and responsibility will bring us eternal happiness. When disaster strikes the Empire, our political leaders tell us to go shopping- that’ll make everything alright. Instead of allowing and helping our kids to educate themselves, we send them to schools where their heads are filled with garbage and propaganda, because it’s the responsible decision, the choice that will make them free people in a free country.

These examples all imitate actual responsibility and healthy adult decision making. Instead of allowing all people their autonomy, we conquer, err, liberate them and make their choices for them. Instead of abolishing all governments and governing ourselves, we continue to rely on Statist governments to make decisions for us; we continue voting to convince ourselves we have a voice, that we have responsibility. Instead of freeing our minds, taking action when action is called for, and seeking to attain our own happiness, now, in the real world, we trust in god to take care of us, make decisions for us, guide our lives. Rather than removing ourselves entirely from capitalist economies and making all of our own necessities, we make the most responsible, freedom-loving choices when we go shopping. When our kids could be learning naturally as children do, we send them to government schools in hopes that they’ll get good jobs.

We’ve all seen through this obvious bullshit, we’re all fighting hard against such clouded, insane doublethink and the systems that bring it about. And yet, many still think BDSM will free them. As long as we practice capturing, binding, enslaving, silencing, flogging, torturing, dominating, submitting, berating, humiliating, and otherwise abusing one another, we’re all free and liberated and happy. As long as we imitate the social and political structures destroying our lives and minds and bodies and the world, we’re free of those things. Yeah, right.

I think it’s time we all started thinking a little more critically about our sexual behaviours and attitudes. I think it’s time we anarchists, we feminists start discussing which sexual behaviours are good and liberating and which aren’t, instead of just accepting BDSM as an inseparable aspect of human sexuality, as a universal presence inf social spaces, as a given interest we must all have. I assert it’s time for us all to engage in truly safe, sane, consensual sex and asexual relationships; it’s time for us all to be aware of the risks of imitating and engaging in oppressive behaviours under the guise of freedom and pleasure. Maybe then, we can all heal that much more from this society’s mistreatment and insanity.

Anti-Copyright 2009

Usul of the Blackfoot. Please reprint, republish, & redistribute.

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Published 1 juni 2023

Response to Jeroen & Bob (RopeMarks)

Since Jeroen van der Klis of BizarreDesign and Bob Roos (not his real last name) of the RopeMarks brand have written about me on Facebook, I feel it’s time for me to write about my side of the story.

(Scroll down to read Jeroen & Bob’s texts about me and other additional information)

Jeroen I want to let you know that it isn’t personal that I’ve requested content removal. We always had friendly communication in the past. I’ve send you an email in which I’ve asked for all content depicting me to be removed from your websites and social media accounts, just like I have asked other people the same question. Me-Chiel, Kaskuyken and CarmineWorx have all removed the content immediately after I’ve asked them, they all worked with me to remove the content from their websites and social media accounts, without any problems.

After your first reply to my email you haven’t responded anymore, which ended the conversation about the content removal, even though I’ve asked you via email to remove the content again and again. Since you didn’t respond to my emails I’ve asked you to remove the content on Twitter by writing a comment under each tweet depicting me (Just like I have asked other accounts who share content depicting me to remove their tweets), which you have also ignored. That is why I started the process of reporting all tweets depicting me or referring to me. Which eventually led to Twitter blocking your account.

It’s important that you understand that there is not much else that I can do when an uploader refuses to remove the content. The only thing that is left for me to do is to report the content. Content that is online without my consent from the moment I first requested content removal by email or otherwise. After this request has been received and responded to, the uploader is aware that I have withdrawn my consent and therefore the content that is still on the internet is shared without my consent. The other option for me is to contact my lawyer which isn’t something that I want to do if I don’t think it is necessary.

Bob/RopeMarks, you write that there is a lot wrong with me, “more than I have let on to show”, you say that I am “too chicken” to confront my “collaborators” yet as you can see in my previous message to Jeroen is that I have contacted many people that I’ve “collaborated” with.

You say that there is a lot wrong with me, more than you thought at first, which shows that you were aware that I have had problems already when we first started collaborating. Before we made content together I have already been through some very harmfull events in my life and I was already in contact with people who have mislead me for years and who have turned out the be very harmfull to me during the time that we were “collaborating”. Results of these harmfull events were visible as seen in the scars on my body, they were visible to you and anyone else I’ve worked with and everyone who has seen the content that we have made. At the time I wasn’t aware of the way some of these people have negatively influenced me and I wasn’t aware of how far their abuse would go but I am fully aware of what has happened now.

All the signs of abuse were already there when we first started collaborating, yet you offered me a contract which basically stated that I give up my rights to you and to use the content for commerial purposes, without any financial compensation. During the time that we collaborated I believed that we were friends and we never spoke about the contract again. Making content for free for one or a few times doesn’t really strike me as odd but we have made a large amount of content, “as friends” content which you have been able to make money off for many years. The contract has many contradictons and doesn’t seem to be a legally binding document. I’ve also had contracts with some other producers who have removed the content depicting me after my request.

You were aware that I have wanted to build my own website from the beginning, in order to have more autonomity. I’ve come across a few people who have wanted to “help” me build my website but I sensed that they wanted to exploit me in some way. During the beginning of the covid era you offered to “help” me with my website as a friend and I accepted and trusted you. Just like I trusted you when making the extreme content that we did.

The result of this “help” was a website that, before anything else, had banners on it to all your websites. You made a website that was basically an extention of your RopeMarks websites. In the stories you have written about me on your websites and social media accounts you have refered to me as the RopeMarks house slave or other similar terms. As if Arienh was an extension of your brand. While my reason for having my own website was being able to do what I wanted with my stage name, you knew this. From the moment you started to “help” me you have made it seem like having a website was very difficult, you would help me with this, “as a friend”, the website would be on your server. You basically controlled the whole website instead of me. Yes you paid me a few hundred euros over the years when some content was sold but you never gave me full transparancy of the websites finances. You said you would “help” me but I have had no autonomy or control over www.arienh.com whatsoever.

My request to you, to remove the content we made, was different than the way I approached other people. This is because I’ve began with a request to you, to take down the website www.arienh.com on December the 20th, 2021. Which on January the 20th , 2022 you redirected to a page on Clipspool.com. (Now I know you have a clipspool account as well), then on 21st of January you redirected www.arienh.com to your website. Which I at first agreed to because I believed I had no other options. This all was way before I contacted anyone else about the removal of content depicting me. Since December the 20th, 2021 you have never once asked me, or anyone contacting you in my name, what had actually happened to me. You asked how I am doing but you haven’t asked why I left the scene or anything like that. You also wrote that I was “passive aggressive”, while I was being formal and straight to the point, which I had to be to get my point across.

In our whatsapp conversation at the time I can read that you have said that you can’t and won’t give me full transparancy of www.arienh.com ’s finances (you send me a few screenshots instead), you also wrote many reasons why you couldn’t transfer the domain yet. By then it was already May 2022. I’ve repeatedly said that it is possible to transfer a domain to someone else at any time, you said I had to wait for the domain to reach the end of the contract date, which as I could read on the internet wasn’t necessary and multiple real friends have adviced me on this matter as well. And it turned out that it wasn’t necessary at all when you finally transferred www.arienh.com to me on July the 10th, 2022, more than 7 months after my first message to you about www.arienh.com. I have downloaded our full whatsapp conversation, so I can read the exact dates.

Since I’ve gained control over my own website and with everything I had to do to gain control over my own domain in mind, I have created a website with the purpose of telling a bit of my story. Which I probably would not have done if I didn’t feel mistreated by some of the people that I have “collaborated” with. Nothing on my website relates directly to you or your brand, however it does now.

After the whatsapp conversation about www.arienh.com I’ve asked help from a lawyer to get the content depicting me removed from your websites and social media accounts, because I was sure you wouldn’t agree with removing the content if I requested this by myself. The situation concerning www.arienh.com has shown me that your main interest is making money off of the content and by doing so of off me and other women who have never asked you for any financial compensation in return.

I know you haven’t paid other models because you told me many times while “collaborating” that paying the models is not something that you do. I accepted this at the time believing we were friends. Knowing that a friend would remove anything refering to me from the internet if I’d ask them, I do not consider you my friend anymore nor do I see our previous relations as friendship. Seeing you as my friend so far has been a “misinterpretation of reality’’ indeed.

The only time when I have received some money from our collaboration, other than the few hundred euros I’ve earned from www.arienh.com over the years, was when we went to do a show at the tattoo convention in Germany, both of us received financial compensation for doing the show “@tattooconventionnewgeneration on Facebook”, October the 6th, 2019. During this show you hit me with a wooden cane while being completely suspended “for the show effect”, multiple times on the same spot and so hard that it left a permanent dent in my left upper leg. I’ve told you about this but you never once said that this was something you shouldn’t have done. In my opinion, hitting a dent is someone’s leg isn’t something you do just because you want to give a crowd something spectacular to see. I’m not saying that you did this on purpose but you never once said you might have made a mistake there, even though we were “friends”. I mentioned the dent in my leg to you once when Jeroen was present, we were at his atelier. I’ve send you the photos of the dent in my leg via Whatsapp as well and you acknowledged it was visible. I’d rather not have had the money, nor the dent in my leg.

My partner has requested “@tattooconventionnewgeneration on Facebook” to remove the photos they share from the show from Facebook. You haven’t removed the links to the redirection to these photos, that you shared from their Facebook account either. At first they were very understanding but somehow the photos are still online and there hasn’t been a response from the tattoo convention anymore.

My lawyer has contacted you about removing all content depicting me, as well as the stories you’ve made up about me. She contacted you on November the 15th, 2022. What you did was remove the content from your websites. Make your social media accounts private – the content depicting me is still online on these platforms, except Twitter.

You also didn’t contact SMRevenue/Shopmaker to end the affiliate programs with third parties who showed content depicting me that was shared from your websites. You even wrote to my lawyer that you don’t have control over what third parties are sharing on their websites. When I send an email to these websites to remove the content, they often say I have to contact you, Bob, if I want the content removed. Which I already have requested through my lawyer. However some websites actually do remove the content, when I ask them. I’ve been working on getting the content removed for the past year, something which you could’ve done in days. I’ve learned that it doesn’t take long for content to disappear from the internet, even though you have claimed in an email to my lawyer that it can take a long time for content to disappear because of my search engines cache. Which also isn’t true, because a removed image will change into an icon saying “this image has been removed”, or a variation of this, which will be gone in about a week after content has been removed.

You are aware that I have been raped, that I have been violated and that the videos of this experience have been shared all over the internet, yet you share my real name on social media, by doing so you are putting me in danger. Since you haven’t asked what has happened to me you aren’t aware what my concerns are based upon, nor if my behaviour is a healthy response to the situation I am in or not. At this time I am not at liberty to disclose the full extent of the situation but you are able to read enough about the matter on my website www.arienh.com just like anyone else, to understand that my behaviour of the last 1,5 years doesn’t spring out of nowhere. Since you are not a licensed psychiatrist I also advice you not to make assumptions about another person’s mental health. I also want you to know that I am the driving force behind all my interactions and those send in my name and that I have a large support system standing by me, privately and professionally.

I’ve preferred to have kept our communication private through my lawyer but since you’ve made claims about me so openly on Facebook I feel obligated to share my side of the story, which I have tried to avoid. It came to my attention that this isn’t the first dispute you have had with a former “model” that you have openly communicated about online. As you know, my lawyer has requested removal of all content depicting me as well as all other references to me, “Arienh”. Afterwards ending all communication. We can make this a slow process or just get it over with.

Kind regards,

Arienh Autumn

Emails with Jeroen and comment I wrote to Jeroen on Twitter.

Facebook message posted by Jeroen:

Facebook comment written by Bob, RopeMarks:

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Published 1 juni 2023

BDSM Normalized Abuse In My Last Relationship. What I Wish Every Woman Would Know

by peaceful dumpling, February 7, 2022

I had never strayed far from a “vanilla” sex life until my ex-boyfriend slapped me in the face during a kiss. This was very early on in the relationship. I did not see it for the bright red flag it was. I balked, mouth agape and asked him, “What the hell was that?!” He simply told me “I thought you’d like it,” as if it was something so common it didn’t even cross his mind to ask.

Even though the slap was an unwelcome and unexpected intrusion, I brushed it off. The friend who introduced me to him told me he was into some kinky stuff, describing him as reminiscent of the man from 50 Shades of Grey. I ignored the violation. Maybe he was used to women who did that sort of stuff. We continued seeing each other, and he didn’t slap me again. At least, not until after he’d systematically groomed me into accepting it.

abuse

Now I understand the initial boundary violation for what it was: a test. He wanted to know what he could get away with. At first I had a strong reaction to physical abuse. However, he slowly broke down my boundaries, becoming increasingly violent and verbally abusive during sex.

Throughout the relationship he subtly emotionally abused me outside the bedroom, and outright physically assaulted me—but “only” during sex. It took me nearly two years to extricate myself from an extremely abusive relationship. I wholeheartedly believe I would have been able to clearly see the abuse, if not for the normalization of many of his behaviors by pornography.

I began to be disturbed by the things he said during sex. He called me a stupid sl*t, worthless, a slave. There was genuine hatred in his eyes when he strangled and hit me. If I brought up my discomfort with the things he said during sex, he casually brushed it off, saying it was “just sex, it doesn’t mean anything.” His excuse that he didn’t mean anything during sex seems to be fairly common among men.

It was as though he had two distinct personalities.

Immediately after sex he became a caring and loving partner. He would get me water, hold me, and act as though he hadn’t strangled me and told me he wanted to kill me. Within the BDSM community, this is known as “aftercare,” but I believe it is a form of trauma bonding. Trauma bonding is a psychological term for a deep connection with one’s abuser, especially when the abuse occurs as a cycle: periods of abuse and periods of regret or “fixed” behavior.

Outside the bedroom, we had a “normal” relationship. We went on romantic dates, hiking trips, adventured, made plans to go skydiving, and had regular board game nights with friends. When I got sick he took care of me. We were outwardly a happy couple. My family liked him, and my uncle even told me I should marry the guy. Nobody knew I’d tried leaving him twice, and he’d followed me in his car while I tried to find somewhere to hide. Nobody knew he’d held me down in our shared home and wouldn’t let me out the door until I threatened to scream. Nobody knew the police had been called by a good Samaritan after he wouldn’t stop following me. He ended up taking my dog so I’d have to go back to his place. I couldn’t leave. There was no way out, nowhere to go where I’d be safe. I couldn’t tell anyone. I stayed.

I remember the look on his face after he anally raped me. I was bleeding. Wide eyed, he profusely apologized. He claimed he didn’t think it hurt me—even though I had repeatedly cried “Stop!”

He hadn’t stopped. He promised me he wouldn’t do it again (he lied). There were tears in his eyes. I forgave him. I knew it was no accident but I couldn’t bring myself to face the fact that my partner raped me. It was easier to ignore the truth. He got carried away. It was an accident.

He loves me, he’s sorry.

The sexual and emotional abuse took a toll. I became depressed and withdrawn. When I mentioned I’d like to go back to university to finish my degree, he asked me, “Are you sure you can do it? I think it’ll just be a waste of money.” Maybe I really was too stupid. Worthless. I didn’t apply.

I made friends with a woman I worked with. My abuser didn’t like her, and would have panic attacks when I’d make plans to see her. He went out of town one weekend and I took the opportunity to meet up with my friend. After a few drinks I started crying. I couldn’t hold it in any longer.

I told her everything. He showed up at her house that night, stood outside her window and listened to us talk. I don’t know how long he watched us, but when we spotted him outside a jolt of fear ran down my spine. My friend’s male roommate forced him to leave. The woman I’d only known tangentially opened her home to me. She let me stay until I was able to move as far as possible from my abuser. I owe her my life and freedom.

After I left him I wrote about the harassment, emotional abuse, and coercive control I’d survived. He was calling me at least 30 times a day, texting incessantly. He called my own mother multiple times to tell her how “crazy” I was for leaving him after I blocked him. He got new numbers and continued to harass me. One of my close friends (ironically the woman who introduced us) refused to believe me because “he’s a great guy, you’re blowing this all out of proportion.” Public shame didn’t deter him from attempting to contact me. He claimed repeatedly he was moving across the country to be with me. Only after I threatened him with a restraining order did he stop contacting me. He was terrified of law enforcement, and cleverly hid his abuse within acceptable confines to escape legal consequences.

BDSM acts as a magnet for abusers. It’s an easy out, when your partner “consents” to being harmed. Even those who aren’t abusive may become desensitized to extremely abusive acts common in porn. Children are being exposed to porn, and internalizing what they see. Younger and younger girls are expected to accept violence during sex. Teen Vogue has written articles grooming young girls to accept BDSM, strangulation, and anal sex—so long as it’s “consensual.” Can one truly consent to an act that is expected as part of “normal” sex?

There have been cases of women being strangled to death during sex and men getting a slap on the wrist for it, because the woman “consented.” We Can’t Consent to This is a website dedicated to fighting the “rough sex” excuse, listing the stories of numerous dead women in the U.K. murdered by their partners. Most of the women listed were strangled to death by their male partner. According to Family Justice Center, “People who have been strangled are 7 times more likely to be killed by their intimate partner (past or present).”

Many people within the BDSM community claim strangulation is “safe,” and there is a correct way to safely cut blood flow to the brain. Women’s Health Magazine wrote an article describing “choking” (choking is a misnomer; strangulation is the proper term) as a thrilling and exciting way to spice up one’s sex life. Strangulation is posed as harmless fun.

But the truth is, there is no way to safely strangle someone.

Dr Helen Bichard of North Wales Brain Injury Service and The Walton Centre NHS Foundation Trust says of strangulation (also known as erotic asphyxiation): “I am extremely concerned by the cultural normalization of strangulation. Erotic asphyxiation should be as much of an oxymoron as erotic brain damage, because brain damage is the potential result. Much of the online advice is misguided; some of it is fatally wrong. When you compress the carotid artery you cut off oxygenated blood flow to the brain, and the brain therefore cannot function properly. Consciousness can be lost in as little as four seconds—a sign that the brain is being compromised. Any pressure to the artery can lead to dissection, in which blood clots can form and cause stroke, sometimes delayed by weeks.”

I’m sure there are those who will claim my ex wasn’t actually into BDSM, since he didn’t seem to care about consent. I may even be called a “kink shamer” for critiquing BDSM and its ability to disguise abuse. I’m not interested in shaming anyone.

I’d like to understand why “kink” is something that cannot be criticized or questioned, especially when the BDSM community is rife with abusers and women with stories like mine.

Why must we unquestioningly accept the hordes of men chomping at the bit to physically and sexually abuse women under the guise of “kink”? Obviously consent is an important issue but we can’t overlook the fact that the abuse of women is considered sexually rewarding to men. Can abuse truly be consented to, so long as it is relegated to the bedroom, or are we as a society playing with fire by normalizing the brutalization of women during sex?

It’s been years since I left him. I still have nightmares of being trapped in that house, that relationship. Now, I’m in a healthy relationship with a man who has never even raised his voice at me. Even so, I still have flashbacks to the terrorizing vulnerability I felt. The echoes of sexual abuse haunt me when my current partner tenderly caresses my neck in intimate moments. A flash of terror courses through me, despite the loveliness of the moment.

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Published 1 juni 2023

Pornography as crime scene videos: Suzzan Blac discusses her Pornhub research

BY NMN

etail from Suzzan Blac’s painting entitled ‘Let me entertain you’ which depicts the sexual and physical violence now commonplace in mainstream pornography
Detail from Suzzan Blac’s painting entitled ‘Let me entertain you’ which depicts the sexual and physical violence now commonplace in mainstream pornography

This is an edited transcript of the second part of Suzzan Blac’s talk at the ‘An evening with Suzzan Blac’ webinar we held in July 2021 and the subsequent discussion with Ygerne Price-Davies. The transcript of the first part of the talk, which was about her extraordinary paintings, is in a separate article. You can watch the recording of the whole talk on YouTube.

Of all the harms done to girls and women, pornography is the most damaging and far-reaching, affecting not just the victims within the porn industry, but also women and girls outside of it.

I first saw pornography when I was six years old. It was shown to me by one of my mother’s boyfriends as he sexually abused me. Throughout my childhood and teenage years, every older boy and man who sexually abused and raped me had pornography. And that’s not forgetting the sex traffickers who forced me into pornography. [Editor: Suzzan talks about this in the first part of her talk.]

So, I knew that there was a connection between sex offending and pornography. Over the years, and in my obsession with perpetrators and why and how they could so easily abuse and hurt girls and women, I researched sex offending, rapes, kidnapping, torture and sexually motivated murders and noticed that high pornography use was a significant and prime factor in their offending. I began writing about this in my blog, The Violence of Pornography, in 2016, documenting such cases.

I also read about research on the aggression in pornography. Whenever I posted about this on social media, however, I would be attacked by men. Some would laugh and say ‘You’ve never seen any pornography’. Well, yes that was true, I hadn’t seen any pornography – at least not since I was trafficked into it in 1977. I knew I would be traumatised if I accidently came across any.

So, in 2017 I decided that I had to watch it. How could I speak out against porn if I had never seen any recently? I chose Pornhub, because it was the most popular mainstream porn-site, having 115 million hits a day. I watched and took screen-shots of hundreds of videos on it.

Like many women who don’t watch porn, I had no idea about it’s true content. You just assume that much of it is ‘adults having consensual sex’ with maybe a bit of hair pulling and slapping going on. How wrong I was!

Crime scene videos

I could not believe what I was seeing, I thought that these things could only be seen on the dark web. I watched women being sexually and violently abused, humiliated, degraded, raped and tortured.

These were not sex videos. They were crime-scene videos.

There were women being raped when they used their safe words in ‘kink’ videos and when they were sleeping or passed out from alcohol or high on drugs. There were drug addicted prostitutes unaware that they were being filmed. Women being suffocated with plastic bags, water-boarded, strangled manually or with ligatures. Women being really hanged with ropes.

Many are ‘professional videos’, but a significant amount of user-generated content is uploaded onto Pornhub, often with no consent from the women appearing in it.

I watched one man film a woman standing on a chair with her neck in a noose. He would kick the chair, let her hang for a few seconds, then pick her up, place her back on the chair and do it again. And again. And again.

I watched a tied-up naked female being shot continuously for fifteen minutes by a man with an automatic BB rifle. I watched women’s breasts being tortured with needles, cigarettes being stubbed out on their nipples, and breasts already heavily bruised being punched or stood on by men in heavy boots. I watched women having their genitalia whipped with nettles or being sharp whipped, causing deep lacerations, some were ‘live streamed’ with requests from paying males.

Many of these videos have millions of views and endless derogatory comments along the lines of, ‘Loving the torture and seeing women suffer’.

There were tons of ‘domestic violence’ videos, mostly home-made by men who abuse their wives and girlfriends, filmed on their mobiles.

I frequently came across child sexual abuse imagery, some of real children and also CGI child abuse. I only saw these as thumbnails. I never clicked on the videos. Obviously, I couldn’t research this. I reported it to the Internet Watch Foundation, but never heard back. 

There is also a lot of extremely disturbing and realistic CGI bestiality videos.

There were a significant number of men sexually offending outside the home, filming their offences with mobile phones and uploading them onto Pornhub. Offences ranged from up-skirting, secret toilet filming, indecent exposure, to masturbating and ejaculating onto unsuspecting females.

There is an incredible amount of criminal activity on Pornhub and I have evidenced much of it in my blog in the form of screen-shots for all to see.

Pornhub is completely unregulated and violates its own uploading terms. I am happy to say at least they are now being held accountable and have many lawsuits against them.

And, there are so many views. You can’t actually ascertain how many views a video has, because one video might have two million views and is then uploaded with a different title that has 600,000 views, and then another, and so on.

Strangulation (aka ‘breath play’)

I’d also like to talk about how common strangulation is on Pornhub. The kink community have changed the language, so it’s no longer called strangulation. They now call it ‘breath play’, which can mean suffocation or strangulation or hanging or choking. Quite often they call it choking when it’s not actually choking.

Choking is the act of having something stuck in the oesophagus. Strangulation is completely different. It can be done manually or with ligatures or with their arms or legs. It’s extremely dangerous because even for a few seconds it can cause a lot of health issues including brain damage – and that is if it’s non-fatal. It really is extremely dangerous. There are thousands of videos of men strangling women until they lose consciousness, either suffocating them, putting things in their mouth, suffocating them with plastic bags and strangling them or hanging, and I mean really hanging, them.

Rape, donkey punch, incest…

There are other disturbing videos like of rape but they don’t call it rape anymore. You can’t type in the word rape. Pornhub removed that term, but other words that mean the same thing are there – for example, unwilling sex or surprise anal.

There’s hate fuck, and donkey punch where men kick and hurt women and then punch them in the back of the head as hard as they can. I’ve seen women’s vaginas being stapled shut. Electric torture, punch fisting. Women being pissed on, either in their mouths or in their vaginas or anuses and they have women licking toilet bowls. Or, their heads being flushed down the toilet while they’re being pummelled from behind.

The most humiliating and degrading stuff.

There are also tons of incest videos with titles such as ‘No Daddy Stop’ or ‘I’m Not Mommy’. They dress 18-year-old girls to make them look like little girls and put them in child-themed rooms with much older men or sometimes elderly men, like it’s a granddad abusing his granddaughter. There’s a lot of incest, an awful lot of incest, brothers and sisters and so forth.

There are also horrible channels called sexually broken where they destroy women in every way possible.

Normalising and eroticising sexual violence against women and girls

I have documented all these types of videos on my website, The Violence Pornography. I have blurred the genitalia and it is very distressing to see, but I put it out there because I think people, especially women, need to see what it’s like without having to watch it themselves.

My research makes it absolutely clear that pornography normalises and eroticises sexual violence against women and reinforces rape myths. It is common for the girls and women who are being abused in these ways to be portrayed as if they are loving it. As if they’re not really saying no. It is made to look as if they say yes because they’re worthless whores and they love it.

This is extremely dangerous – especially knowing that young boys are watching this kind of content.

I believe that pornography should be deemed hate speech and that it is a violation of Article 3 of the Human Rights Act: the right not to be tortured in an inhumane or degrading way.

I could talk a lot more about pornography but most of it, as I said, is on my website.

Gay men’s porn

Ygerne: I just wanted to say thank you so much, Suzzan, for such a powerful and moving talk. And now if it’s OK with you, I’d like to ask about gay men’s porn. Did you research that and what did you find?

Suzzan: Every time you speak out on social media there are people who love to derail you and that’s one of the many things that was said to me. Gay porn! And I realised that I hadn’t actually watched any gay porn. So it was clear I was going to have to. Believe me, I didn’t want to do it, I really didn’t want to, but it was the only way to get answers.  

So, one night I sat down with a big glass of wine and I went to Pornhub’s gay porn channels and typed in the same search words that I had for the women – such as rough sex, unwilling sex, torture, strangulation, everything. And I prepared myself…

At first I was confused because when I started watching the videos, they were lovely, absolutely lovely. The men were kissing. I had never seen any kissing on the straight porn channels.

They were also hugging and caressing each other. They were talking to each other; they were wearing condoms; they were respectful.

I thought I’d probably get to the other stuff later. So, I kept watching. I kept typing in the same search terms. There was one that came up under “rough sex”, and it was this huge hairy guy in leather. He was with another guy, a young guy, who was strapped to a cross and I thought, here we go. So, he gets a whip – but it’s a cat-o’-nine tails that has thick, wide pieces of soft leather – and he flogs him very gently so he doesn’t hardly even turn pink. And then he kisses him.

And I’m like, what? So, I type in torture and most of what I see is being tortured with feathers and tickling. Tickling torture! And it was like that in so many videos.

And I realised that this is the polar opposite of how the women are treated in pornography. There was no hate. There was no degradation; no humiliation; no cruelty; no sadism; no pain; nothing.

So then I did the same thing with trans porn. And again, I watched hundreds of videos and took screenshots and it was like the gay porn: caressing, kissing, and respect.

I looked at casting couch porn. You’ve probably heard of that. In the straight porn, it’s nasty: right from the beginning they start calling her names, humiliating and degrading her, and then some guy comes in and literally throws her about the room and pummels her. In the gay men’s porn, he’s asked some questions and then they start kissing and have normal sex.

The difference was astounding, really astounding and I thought that just proves the misogyny on that platform. It is virulent, it is horrific, and I’m glad I’ve documented it because now a lot of it has been taken down, as you know.

Pornhub has a lot of lawsuits against it as we speak and it took down millions of videos. Eighty percent of its unverified videos were taken down. So, that is some good news. We’ll see what happens next.

Wider implications

Ygerne: I saw that the house of Pornhub’s owner was attacked by an arsonist and burned down.

Suzzan: Yes, I saw that too. In the research I did years ago, I found him. I found that MindGeek owns Pornhub and so many other sites. I found a photo of him and put it on Twitter. Of course, nobody took much notice at the time. It wasn’t until, and I’m glad to say this, a male reporter at The New York Times took this story up, that anything actually happened and then Visa and Mastercard and other companies stopped dealing with Pornhub. So, I’m glad of it.

Ygerne: That’s why the work you are doing documenting it is so important.

Suzzan: I think it is important. Without seeing the images, it’s hard to believe. Images are really important to me – as you can see in my paintings. It’s not that people don’t believe exactly, it’s just that if you’re reading text, you’re detached from the reality. But, when you see images… It’s like, no one believed that the holocaust could happen – no one – until they saw the images and videos of what was going on over there.

It’s the same with everything. That’s the reason I took screenshots because I didn’t believe it. I’d read about it, but I didn’t understand the extent of it and how it’s worse than awful. The misogyny is truly horrifying.

As I said, it’s not about adults having consensual sex – as many people claim. They say that it’s consensual and if a woman likes a bit of rough, it’s her choice. But that’s not what it’s actually like.

And of course, a lot of the videos out there are not professionally made. There are millions of mobile phone videos – taken by men – boyfriends, husbands. I documented that too. It is domestic abuse – but it’s not only that because you’ve got men who are abusers, who are not just filming their wives and girlfriends and putting it on Pornhub, they’re also doing live cams and making money from it.

They’re actually making money out of their wives and girlfriends who are not consenting. And that says a lot about consent in pornography. No one can really tell if the person in pornography is consenting or not. Because you can’t tell if they’re a trafficking victim; you can’t tell if they’re a domestic abuse victim; whether it’s secret filming; whether it’s a minor. Simply no one can tell.

Facebook and YouTube have something like 20,000 to 30,000 moderators working on their sites to get rid of illegal content. Do you know how many Pornhub have? And we’re talking millions and millions of videos, I can’t remember the exact number, but millions. They had 20 or 30 moderators!

That’s a joke, isn’t it? I think they said a moderator can look through about 150 videos an hour. They literally fast forward through them. But they aren’t all in English. There’re a lot of foreign videos there, from all over the world. So, often they wouldn’t even know what the title said or what anybody said.

But, 150 videos an hour, how can anyone moderate that? It’s impossible. But, you know, it’s coming to a head now and people are finally understanding what Pornhub’s about and it’s about time.

Ygerne: The comparison you made with YouTube… It’s like when it comes to porn, the attitude is it’s just a bit of fun, and any criticism of it is deemed to be prudish.

Suzzan: Well, it’s free speech, isn’t it? [Laughs.] It’s free speech, but not for the women who are performing in these videos, or not performing, or don’t even know they’re in the videos.

And as I said, there is so much violence on there. It’s not sex! I’ve been called all sorts of names as you can imagine.

You know, we all like sex. But most pornography is not about sex anymore. It’s now about the humiliation, degradation and suffering of women. They love to punish women and there are millions of these videos, with millions of views, and men who are enjoying them.

What is that doing? What is that doing to young boys? What is that doing to their minds when they see that and they’re looking at it everywhere, including in school?

It’s awful and I think they should ban mobile phones in schools because even my own daughter, years ago when she was a teenager, was traumatised. She didn’t tell me at the time, but she was traumatised by boys showing her violent pornography. And it’s still going on and they’re getting younger and younger; we’re talking 10, 11, 12.

We must put the onus on the perpetrators

Ygerne: I remember getting shown porn when I was in primary school.

So now a question from the audience. What would you advise us to use in terms of language in the sense of putting the onus on the perpetrators? Would you use the word prostitutor to define this person?

Suzzan: Yeah, the problem has always been seen in terms of the victim and the perpetrators are hardly mentioned and that needs to change. The onus really needs to be on the perpetrators. We need to ask why they are doing this and make them accountable. Definitely more needs to be done about that.

Even with victims of murder, women who were murdered, the emphasis is always on her: she was drunk, what she was doing? Why was she out on her own? Why was she wearing headphones, why this, why that? But, not the perpetrator. And why is that?

It has to do with misogyny and, and victim blaming. Because it is women too who are doing this. Women can also be misogynistic. I’ve known that first-hand. Yes, it needs to be changed and we all need to collectively keep fighting for these things.

Ygerne: Misogyny is so engrained in all of us, isn’t it.

Suzzan: Yes. And with domestic abusers, it’s always been why doesn’t she do this, why doesn’t she do that. I’ve experienced it. My sister and my mother have experienced it.

Even though you’re married to that person or live with them, they can still terrorise you and no one understands that, unless they’ve been in that situation. Just because you live with that man, it doesn’t mean it will calm down and be okay.

I have been in that situation and my sister has too. The worst time is when you leave them. That’s when he would threaten. He’s broken her bones. He’s kicked her when she was pregnant.

When I was young and this was going on, she was only 17, 18, I was so used to violence it didn’t affect me, it was normal. In the end, when she would threaten to leave, he would say he was going to kill her and the children. When finally she did leave, he followed her and beat her up in a spa shop, and kicked the hell out of her. Nobody, not one person, said anything. Nobody did anything. They just watched or walked out.

When she fled to a women’s refuge, he came and found her and was swearing and throwing stones at the windows. Then they put her in a caravan with her four children. The terror that she went through hasn’t left her. She’s still not right from it now.

This is what people don’t understand. This is why we must concentrate and focus on these perpetrators.

Impact of watching porn

Ygerne: Thank you so much. We’ve got loads of positive comments coming in from the audience. Gratitude to you for your honesty and resilience.

Suzzan: Thank you. You’re so kind. I appreciate that. It’s worth the hard work.

It has been traumatising work, especially the pornography. For a year I’ve had to take a break because just watching it traumatised me and I was having other effects. For example, I would go to the shops or the post office and I would see different women, I would look at different women, young women, elderly women, all kinds of women and think about what genre they would be in. Every time.

If it’s done that to me, and, believe me I’m not masturbating to this material, I’m analysing crime scenes, because that’s what they are, what is it doing to young men in particular, who are masturbating to this kind of material? And then they’re out in the real world looking at women in the real world, what is it doing to them?

Ygerne: It’s terrifying.

Suzzan: It is and there’s so much to talk about.

I’ve researched serial killers and sexually motivated murders because most serial killers kill women. You can see the rise in serial killers, especially in America, since the early 70s, 80s, and 90s which coincided with the increase in violent pornography. You can see, it’s almost like an exact match.

And their prime motivation is fantasy. Sex offenders say that it’s all about the fantasy. Whatever they do, whether they look through a woman’s bedroom window or expose themselves or want to kidnap and rape and murder a woman, it’s all about the fantasy and this escalation.

What happens is, they start watching what they like to call vanilla porn, although there’s not much of that around anymore, I can tell you, except in gay porn. If you don’t want to see violence then watch gay porn.

They start with the vanilla and go on to harder and harder stuff, and then bestiality. And once they’ve covered everything, they can no longer become aroused and that is when they cross the line into real offending. And might actually film it and import it onto Pornhub.

I can’t tell you how dangerous it is and how many rapes there are a year and sexual assaults – but I bet you money they are rising and have been rising since pornography became so available on the internet.

Ygerne: We’ve run out of time now – so I just want to say, if anyone wants to find out more about Suzzan’s research, you can find it on her website, The Violence Pornography. If there are any parents that have been affected by topics we’ve talked about, we provide some links to some good resources below. Thank you for participating and all your questions.

And thank you, Suzzan, for passing on your wisdom. Good night, everyone, and thank you.

For the first part of Suzzan’s talk, which is about her life and extraordinary paintings, see: Suzzan Blac discusses her life, trauma, and extraordinary art.

Her book, ‘The Rebirth of Suzzan Blac’, is available on Amazon.

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Published 1 juni 2023

Suzzan Blac discusses her life, trauma and extraordinary art

BY NMN

This is an edited transcript of the first part of Suzzan Blac’s talk at the ‘An evening with Suzzan Blac’ webinar we held in July 2021 and the related discussion with Ygerne Price-Davies. The transcript of the second part of the talk, which was about her research into pornography, is in a separate article. You can watch the recording of the whole talk on YouTube.

Introduction

I am a survivor of child sexual abuse, sexual assaults, numerous rapes and sex trafficking.

This had been my life. My normal. So normal, that I didn’t even realise that I had been abused and been a victim for the majority of my childhood. I only began to acknowledge and understand this in my mid-twenties. I finally sought counselling when I was thirty-three years old.

Recovery was extremely traumatic and it took me more than twenty years to overcome the worst of it. One of the reasons it took so long to recover, was the victim blaming that many people inflicted upon me. In my experience, victim blaming is as painful and distressing as the abuse itself.

Between 2000 and 2004, in order to try and help myself, I decided to paint my story of abuse to help me process my pain, anger and trauma. I began by drawing subconscious doodles whilst watching TV, as I knew that these drawings had to come from deep inside of me and not my thoughts. I then turned the drawings into realistic paintings that depicted ‘me the victim’ and ‘the perpetrators’.

I was sometimes shocked by what I had painted, but I knew that they were my true feelings. I painted forty images over four years and I hid them away for over a decade, because they were for me alone, and not meant for anyone to see, especially knowing that I would be condemned if I showed them.

In 2011, I decided to put them online. I had other works out there, but I knew that ‘silence impairs the victims and empowers the perpetrators’. So I had to speak out by using my art, and although I had many people make hurtful comments, I had hundreds of survivors thanking me for giving them a voice.

I have also been training police and social workers in child sexual abuse (CSA), child sexual exploitation (CSE) and victim blaming since 2014.

I also paint about sexual objectification, sexual conditioning, pornography, prostitution and misogyny.

I am motivated by my pain, anger, injustice and indignation surrounding violence against women and girls (VAWG) and victim blaming.

I’m now going to show you twenty-four of my works with a very brief description of each one.

1. The trusted uncle

Blac, Suzzan. ‘The trusted uncle’. Oil on canvas.
The trusted uncle

This painting depicts my mother’s brother, who sexually abused me as a baby. I painted it like a ‘Happy family portrait’ to convey the lies and cover-ups of family members who knew that it was happening. It also conveys the horrific fact that babies are sexually abused and raped, especially since the invention of the internet and mobile phone cameras. I was actually told that ‘I was sick’ for painting this image.

2. One of mother’s boyfriends

Blac, Suzzan. ‘One of mother’s boyfriends’. Oil on canvas.
One of mother’s boyfriends

This painting depicts one of my mother’s boyfriends who sexually abused me from when I six to when I was eight years old. He was also extremely violent, and in this image I watched in horror as he beat my mother to a pulp. No child should ever have to witness such violence.

3. You’re such a good girl

Blac, Suzzan. ‘You’re such a good girl’. Oil on canvas.
You’re such a good girl

This was the first time that anyone had ever called me a ‘good girl’. He also told me that it was all my fault, because I was so ‘pretty’. Here, I am trying to express what sexual abuse was doing to me internally, whilst I remained frozen and detached throughout the abuse.

4. She likes it

Blac, Suzzan. ‘She likes it’. Oil on canvas.
She likes it

This image depicts the first-time my mother’s boyfriend sexually abused me in front of my mother, whilst she was at her dressing table. She turned around and asked why he was doing that, to which he replied, ‘Because she likes it’.

He laughed and said, ‘What’s the matter love, you jealous? There’s plenty to go around’.

I searched her face for a reaction, but all she did was ‘tut’ and resumed putting on her make-up. I knew then that it was not going to stop, that it was okay and was to become my ‘normal’.

5. Playtime

Blac, Suzzan. ‘Playtime’. Oil on canvas.
Playtime

This image depicts my childhood – although at the time, I didn’t feel like a child. I felt like an ‘Entity’ that existed, merely to survive every day, every hour, every minute. He destroyed my childhood and he destroyed my innocence. Still to this day, I get very emotional when I watch small children innocently play, because he took that from me and put me in the darkest of places.

After many years of sexual abuse from others, including those I had trusted, even a teacher, I became a teenager on a path of self-destruction. These next paintings depict the devastating consequences of my years of abuse.

6. Embracing death

Blac, Suzzan. ‘Embracing death’. Oil on canvas.
Embracing death

By the age of fourteen, I was regularly drinking, taking drugs, partying, being highly promiscuous and self-harming. I was called a slag, slut and a whore, and yes, I was.

One night, as I lay on the piss-flooded floor of a night club toilet, I felt like I was home. I was disgusting, vile and filthy and this is where I belonged. I was so intoxicated, that I thought I was going to die, and I embraced the thought, because I hated my life, I hated humans, and I hated myself.

7. Demonic whispers

Blac, Suzzan. ‘Demonic whispers’. Oil on canvas.
Demonic whispers

This painting depicts the time that I was sex trafficked when I was sixteen years old. This is a portrait of the man who threatened, hurt and (alongside others) repeatedly raped me. I had been taken to London under the pretence of ‘modelling’.

Locked inside a once former Victorian hotel with many other girls and women, we were forced into pornography and prostitution. This was a whole new level of abuse, terror and trauma, one that will always stay with me.

8. Tell me you love it

Blac, Suzzan. ‘Tell me you love it’. Oil on canvas.
Tell me you love it

On the first night that this man abducted me, he led me to a room, told me to take off my clothes and viciously raped me. Whilst raping me, he forced me to repeatedly tell him that ‘I loved it’.

9. I’ve killed bitches before

Blac, Suzzan. ‘I’ve killed bitches before’. Oil on canvas.
I’ve killed bitches before

After raping me, he told me to get dressed, and as I did so – he grabbed me by my throat, shoved me against a wall and as he stuck a large knife underneath my rib-cage, he seethed into my ear, ‘I’ve killed bitches that misbehave before, so you need to think about that.’

My only thoughts were, ‘I’m only 16 and this is how I die’.

While I was still shaking in absolute terror, he withdrew the knife and laughed at me, saying, ‘You should see your face.’

This was pure sadism. I could never speak about how this affected me.

There are no words, and that’s why I had to express myself through my paintings.

10. Pornographic meat

Blac, Suzzan. ‘Pornographic meat’. Oil on canvas.
Pornographic meat

On the second day, along with other girls, I was forced into making pornography in a large room full of men. I had to completely detach; I became a ‘dead actress’, a ‘fleshed robot’ that obeyed their every command in absolute fear.

The other girls and I did not speak or even make eye contact. We were first made to watch films of the worst kind of pornography, including bestiality, sadism and child abuse. One man joked that he was going to get the popcorn.

When they began filming me, one of the men asked for ‘Butcher shots’ and I immediately turned inside out. I cried for me and I cried for the other girls, because we were no longer human beings, we were pieces of meat inside an abattoir.

11. Shut up and take it

Blac, Suzzan. ‘Shut up and take it’. Oil on canvas.
Shut up and take it

This image depicts one of the traffickers taking me back home. In a train toilet, he violently raped me – three times between London and Birmingham. As I whimpered, he shushed me, covered my mouth and told me, ‘This was part of the deal, so shut up and take it’.

He drove me back to my flat, asking many questions about my boyfriend and family. He then told me that I would be seeing him again soon.

12. The end of everything

Blac, Suzzan. ‘The end of everything’. Oil on canvas.
The end of everything

After I got home, I never told a soul about what had happened to me. I was still traumatised and knew that it was all my fault. I also was being terrorised by one of the traffickers. So I had to internalise all of that pain and fear.

After a while I deteriorated both mentally and physically. I cut all of my hair off, because I didn’t want to be pretty anymore. My weight dropped to six stone, I developed intestinal worms, severe cystitis, boils, chancres and weeping eczema that turned septic.

One night, I sat naked in the shower tray, and poured a bottle of red food colouring all over me. Rocking and crying that ‘I needed to die’.

13. The epitome of sorrow is to die alone

Blac, Suzzan. ‘The epitome of sorrow is to die alone’. Oil on canvas.
The epitome of sorrow is to die alone

This painting depicts one of my suicide attempts. I had taken all of my clothes off and laid down on my 9th floor balcony, one winters evening, after failing to jump off. I was hoping to die of hypothermia. As my face stuck to the icy concrete floor, hot tears ran down my freezing face as I thought how awfully sad it was to have to die alone.

I woke up at dawn. I slowly walked into my lounge which was like walking into a furnace and saw my reflection in a mirror. It was surreal, I looked like a wax model covered in blue and green veins. I just curled up into my bed, so sad that I wasn’t dead.

14. No one asked me why

Blac, Suzzan. ‘No one asked me why’. Oil on canvas.
No one asked me why

This image depicts the time I had my stomach pumped in a hospital after taking an overdose. After hostile staff discharged me, and as I walked away from the hospital, I began to cry – because not one person in there had asked me why I had done this to myself.

It was then I knew that even doctors and nurses never gave a shit about me, they didn’t care if I died, they just did their job.

15. I am a piece of shit

Blac, Suzzan. ‘I am a piece of shit’. Oil on canvas.
I am a piece of shit

This painting depicts how others made me feel, whenever I disclosed what had happened to me. I was condemned, isolated, abandoned and judged. Not believed, made to feel guilty, ashamed and that much of it was my own fault.

This is how many people make victims and survivors of sexual abuse feel. If someone says that they were robbed, mugged or beat-up, there is sympathy and empathy, but not if you are a victim of sexual abuse, you are literally treated like a piece of shit.

16. I’m fine thank you

Blac, Suzzan. ‘I’m fine thank you’. Oil on canvas.
I’m fine thank you

I painted this self-portrait to show how it felt, to constantly hide myself by wearing a mask for self-protection and social acceptance. People made me feel like an ‘outcast’. If I spoke out about the crimes committed against me as a child, I would be met with a wall of silence, made to feel uncomfortable, defective and dysfunctional.

No survivor of sexual abuse should have to hide their pain, anxiety and distress, in the fear of being re-victimised. No human being should ever have to feel what I have painted here.

Now I want to show you some of my other works, ones that I painted years after my story of abuse.

17. Your suffering is real

Blac, Suzzan. ‘Your suffering is real’. Oil on canvas.
Your suffering is real

I painted this image of myself to express and convey how severe, continuous sexual traumas impact your mental health, your body and your very soul.

Sexual violence is unlike any other kind of violence. It’s blackness creeps inside your every vein and permeates every organ until you emotionally shut down and are no longer the human being that you once were. Unable to speak of the horrors, you outwardly smile – whilst hiding the truth that you are internally destroyed.

18. The prostitutor

Blac, Suzzan. ‘The prostitutor’. Oil on canvas.
The prostitutor

This image represents the men who prey on vulnerable girls and women. They are the pimps and pornographers who target ‘bent but not broken girls’ in order to profit from their bodies. They are men on the streets, men online, sex traffickers, husbands, boyfriends and fathers.

The majority of these girls and women are victims of previous sexual abuse, rape and domestic violence, who have mental health issues and are often alcohol and drug dependant.

19. Let me entertain you

Blac, Suzzan. ‘Let me entertain you’. Oil on canvas.
Let me entertain you

This image depicts the sexual and physical violence now commonplace in mainstream pornography. Women are being humiliated, degraded, hog-tied, raped, punched, kicked, suffocated with plastic bags, strangled, tortured and even hanged.

This isn’t about sex; these are crimes committed against women. These videos are the stuff of serial killer fantasies. In fact, the only thing that they don’t do to women in mainstream pornography is kill them.

20. What women want

Blac, Suzzan. ‘What women want’. Oil on canvas.
What women want

Which brings me to this painting, which depicts a young boy watching this kind of sexual violence on his mobile phone.

For the first time in history, boys are viewing this horrific and hateful misogyny and violence against women, which has become so normalised that boys are completely desensitised. Many use pornography on their phones to sexually harass, intimidate and exert power over girls. Pornography alters and influences sexual behaviours and reinforces misogyny in young, malleable minds. This is why the government needs to implement age-verification now.

21. Blue Hair

Blac, Suzzan. ‘Blue hair’. Oil on canvas.
Blue Hair

This painting is one of a set of six images, named Abasement of dolls that depict issues that affect women and girls, such as sexual conditioning, sexual objectification and sexual exploitation. 

Right from birth, baby girls are objectified and conditioned with bows, ribbons, lace and frilly nappy pants. Toddlers wear sassy clothes, jewellery, heels and painted nails. Many little girls are only given ‘girly toys’: housework sets, make-up and hairstyle sets, etc. Girls are taught that only being attractive and pretty are valued, and this often stays with them.

Many teenage girls and women resort to extreme diets, Botox and cosmetic surgeries, because they don’t match up to the high standards of beauty.

22. Blonde girls

Blac, Suzzan. ‘Blonde girls’. Oil on canvas.
Blonde girls

Again, this is about the sexual objectification of little girls, in the media, film, dance studios and even by their own parents – for example, entering them into horrific ‘beauty pageants’ such as ‘toddlers and tiaras’ or buying Playboy merchandise for them. Incidentally, Playboy merchandise was sold to girls as young as eight in the high street.

23. Black Hair

Blac, Suzzan. ‘Black Hair’. Oil on canvas.
Black Hair

This painting depicts the young women who enter the porn industry, many because of mental health issues, oppressed religious backgrounds, suitcase pimps and coercive boyfriends. These are eighteen-year-olds – they are still kids! – who enter a world of grown adult men who love ‘fresh meat’.

Many pornographers make them appear even younger and then have them ‘punished’ and ‘destroyed’.

Many of these young women leave after a short period of time after being so traumatised, a trauma that continues, because their videos remain online indefinitely for all to see.

24. The life giver

Blac, Suzzan. ‘The life giver’. Oil on canvas.
The life giver

This painting represents sexism and misogyny. I portray a history of derogatory and sexist terms used to silence, erase, hurt, subordinate, humiliate, degrade, hate and punish women.

My point is that no one is morally or legally allowed to make racist, homophobic or transphobic slurs as they are deemed ‘hate crimes’ but you can call women anything you want, because misogyny is not deemed a hate crime.

The discussion

Ygerne: I just wanted to say thank you so much to Suzzan for such a powerful and moving talk. I personally find your work really significant. It’s very hard hitting and often can be quite disturbing, but I think that the depiction of such extreme experience and psychological trauma is pivotal because speaking with a lot of women who have experienced sexualized violence and sexism more widely that sharing stories especially in creative ways enables us to overcome misogyny together. So thank you for sharing your story with us.

Suzzan: You’re welcome.

Ygerne: In the past I’ve heard you say that understanding complex PTSD helped your recovery. Would you like to talk a bit more about that and how it’s helped you?

Suzzan: Absolutely. Recovery can take so long and it wasn’t until literally about five years ago that someone explained to me the concept of complex PTSD. I’m now 61 and I wish that someone had told me earlier in my life. That’s why it’s so important to talk about this.

Going through my teenage years and adult life, no matter how many times counsellors and therapists would say to me, it wasn’t your fault… I don’t mean just as a child, I mean as a teenager and a young woman because a couple of years after I was sex trafficked, I actually went back into pornography and prostitution. No matter how many times they said it wasn’t my fault, I still knew it was my fault. So I still had the shame, self-blame, the guilt, everything was still there, it remained.

And you can’t ever recover whilst you have those intense feelings inside of you. Then a few years ago I learned about complex PTSD which is different from ordinary PTSD. Ordinary PTSD occurs after a one-time event, say being held up at gunpoint. That actually happened to a friend of mine in Birmingham. Or like a serious car crash or something like that and afterwards you develop PTSD.

But, with complex PTSD you are traumatised over a long period of time, especially from childhood and the teenage years as in my case, as in many other women’s cases. You are constantly, repeatedly traumatised over years. For me it was every day or every other day for all those years.

Each time that you are traumatised you internalise that trauma and become detached – especially in sexual violence. Each time someone abuses you, you become detached and as in my case, completely detached, all through those years.

And so, you never really feel what’s happening to you, you never really feel that pain. All through my teenage and early adult years I was self-abusing because what you don’t ever want to do is feel that pain. So, you keep abusing yourself, in whatever way, drink, drugs, putting yourself in certain situations, like I did.

I would put myself into dangerous situations because I wanted to keep being abused or abusing myself so I would never have to feel it because it was too enormous. The enormity of it was too much – unlike someone who is suffering from PTSD from a one-time event – they can talk about it. If you were mugged or robbed or attacked physically, you can tell people. But, with sexual violence, you can’t. So that compounds it and you have all these extra symptoms because you cannot talk about it.

Once I understood that, I could understand that it was not my fault. In the end I understood completely why I carried on abusing myself. I wanted to relay that to other people because it took so long for me to understand it.

Ygerne: You mentioned victim blaming and how that made it so much harder for you.

Suzzan: Exactly! You don’t get victim blamed if you are mugged. They don’t say, you shouldn’t have worn that jewellery or you shouldn’t have carried money with you. Nobody says that.

But, if you are raped, especially young girls, around 14 and upwards, it’s what was she wearing? How much was she drinking? And they don’t ask such questions to elderly ladies who are raped.

There’s so much victim blaming of young women and it compounds the recovery. That’s another reason you don’t want to talk about it because people are really cruel. In my book I talk about the many times that I suffered victim blaming. This is something we need to address; we need to address this because it is only young girls and women who are targeted, nobody else.

Ygerne: It’s re-traumatising all over again and it comes from this hatred for women, doesn’t it?

Suzzan: Absolutely. Misogyny plays a large part in all of this.

Ygerne: OK, so we’ve had a question that came through from the audience. She says: are you married to a man and if so, how were you able to trust him or anyone? How were you able to move past the hatred of people?

Suzzan: I never wanted to have a relationship when I was a young woman. I never trusted anybody. How could I? So, I would just go out with someone and you know, whatever. I never wanted to get close to anybody or have anyone close to me.

And I never wanted children, either. I’ve been asked quite a few times by people whether it was because I was worried I would abuse them. And I would say no it wasn’t that. It was because I didn’t want to bring them into this evil world.

But I met my children’s father and I found myself getting close to him and I didn’t want to. I don’t think I’ve ever really trusted him and I had good reason not to. We ended up going through hell.

I even went to the women’s hospital because, like I said before, I thought I was mentally ill. At that time I didn’t know that I had been abused. People find that hard to believe, but I thought I was just a looney. That’s what I thought. That I was a looney who took drugs, drank, and had a good time and hated the world. I thought I was mental. We went through quite a difficult period.

I was on the pill from when I was 13 years old, and I went to the doctor because I had severe migraines. He told me to come off the pill and as soon as I did, I got pregnant, which was a big shock. And that’s a whole other story – of how an abused person feels when they have a child.

We did divorce years later. And I’ve only had one relationship since then. I haven’t had one now since 2017. I’d rather just not.

It not just relationships that I find hard, it’s friendships, it’s work colleagues. Because, being abused affects every aspect of your life. Say something comes up in a work situation – for example, Mother’s Day and you’re asked about your mother. I would often say that she’s dead. She’s not, but I would say she was. I couldn’t talk about her because I stopped seeing her when I was in my early 30’s and I’ve never seen her since and I don’t want to see her.

So, it’s things like that, things that come up all the time. It’s very difficult. So, I would rather be alone, I’d rather just write and go for walks and just be by myself these days, with my cat, I love my cat. And, of course, I’ve got my two beautiful grownup children and a granddaughter. And I’m happy with that, but it’s been very difficult to trust. It’s hard to trust people.

Ygerne: That’s understandable.

Suzzan: It is, because I’ve even been abused by doctors – when I was in my early 20s. I went to a place for help to get into work. One of the lecturers started abusing me there and I went to the on-site doctor and he closed the blinds and started abusing me too. So, all my life, up to a certain point – after having children and counselling, everything changed. But, before I had children, I was constantly, constantly abused.

And as I said, you just detach.

I didn’t know I had an inkling about being abused when I was in my mid to late 20s. Having my daughter was the catalyst to my recovery because I understood at that moment when she was born what it should be… How the protection and love that you have for a child, for a baby, for your baby, was so intense and everything kind of changed from that moment.

Ygerne: That’s a moment of hope.

Suzzan: Oh, absolutely. But it was so hard because even when I had children I had so many difficult times and even when I was in therapy. When I was 33, I’d had my second child, my son and suddenly social workers got involved because they knew I was in therapy for my own abuse and I had a lot of abuse from them. It just went on and on. It was absolutely awful, never ending.

Ygerne: It was the blaming again, wasn’t it?

Suzzan: Instant victim blaming, yeah, absolutely. I mean, I know things have improved, but they’re not good enough, especially when it comes to young women.

Ygerne: There’s definitely a long way to go. We have to keep fighting.

Suzzan: We do, absolutely. And all of us can impart the knowledge and understanding to younger women that I didn’t get, and that’s why I do what I do.

Ygerne: Thank you Suzzan. Thank you so much, it’s been amazing to have you.

Suzzan: You’re welcome. And thank you to everybody who watched. I wouldn’t say it’s been fun, but this stuff needs to be out there and women, especially younger women, need to understand more from us older ones.

The Rebirth of Suzzan Blac: book cover

If you want to see more of Suzzan’s paintings, you can go onto her art website.

She has also written a book about her life called ‘The Rebirth of Suzzan Blac’ which is available on Amazon.

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The second part of Suzzan’s talk, which is about her research into pornography, is available here.

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Published 1 juni 2023

Ex-Performer Describes What BDSM and Abuse Porn Is Really Like

“They want the suffering.”

Have you ever wondered what really goes on in the world of extreme abuse porn?

Meet Theodosia, an ex-porn performer who spent years doing bondage, domination, submission and masochism (BDSM) porn. After surviving childhood abuse, the trauma she endured fed into violent and abusive romantic relationships, and eventually to a boyfriend introducing her to the world of violent pornography. She came to learn that the women who could endure a lot of pain on camera were valued in the BDSM porn world, and she was taught that her primary talent was suffering well.

One day, after years of being abused on camera, Theodosia realized she could no longer stomach the world she was thrown into. See how Theodosia got her start in BDSM porn, and why she eventually left the industry on her own terms.

Fight the New Drug is a non-religious and non-legislative organization that exists to provide individuals the opportunity to make an informed decision regarding pornography by raising awareness on its harmful effects using only science, facts, and personal accounts.

To learn more about how pornography impacts individuals, relationships, and society, visit http://ftnd.org/. This video was made possible by Fighter Club. To help us create more content like this, consider joining Fighter Club at http://ftnd.org/fc.

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