I'm not exactly a porn connaisseur. Never have been. Right now, I'm under a somewhat vague rule where I cannot watch or read porn (except if I wrote it myself), but I can watch a short gif, even if it is pornographic in nature. I have to show the most erotic images I find to my girlfriend, so she can enjoy them too. Not quite your classic chaste-sub arrangement, but it works for us.
I digress.
Look, I know that (mainstream) porn is supposed to tittilate heterosexual males. I know it's intended to be seen from his perspective, it is totally degrading for females, somehow that seems to turn a lot of guys on, and all of this is by intention.
I get all that. As long as all participants are consenting adults, the secular state has no business outlawing it, and I'm not moralistic enough to rage against it.
I also get that some women actually do like some rough sex. Some do enjoy anal. Pretty much all of them enjoy showing off their body, at least in front of their intimate partner.
So, a little part of porn is actually somewhat realistic.
Just... not a whole lot of it. Many porn practices are just so absurd, or take exaggeration to the highest possible level; the cumshot is the perfect embodiment of that surrealist absurdity.
In the right context, with some bdsm background, I can well imagine that a few women might enjoy it when a guy splashes his load all over their face.
It is the way this is usually shown in porn which makes me fear the worst for mankind. The sheer enthusiasm that those women try to express by way of severe overacting; the out-of-the-blue nature of the occasion, as if it were completely normal to do such a thing; the odd sterility of a scene set up for one purpose, and one purpose only; the obvious pressure on the guy to perform at just the right time; the awkwardness of bad actors in a job where it is questionable whether good acting would actually improve the, ahem, "quality" of the product... it is just too much. It makes me laugh, rather than wish I was allowed to pleasure myself.
Why would I want to watch another guy cum on the body of an attractive woman? How is that supposed to make me hot? I will never be able to understand that.
I still dream of better erotica; erotica that actually turn me on rather than gross me out. Precious little of those seem to exist. This seems so odd to me. Given the ridiculous amount of media out there, and the extreme niches that already have been explored to a lot of success, there should be a reasonably-sized market for better erotica. Maybe that is just impossible to do, because we're all so neurotic about sex that we have no clue how to? I still dream, though.
Empathy. Rationality. Sensuality.
Wednesday, December 28, 2016
Monday, December 26, 2016
Update on Chastity
I asked her if she wanted to play on after the next "release". She was more than happy to say yes.
My ring will stay on. So I guess we are officially in a 24/7 D/s relationship now, for whatever it's worth.
I believe she has started to enjoy giving me some pain.
Specifically, she is becoming a maestro of pain to my balls. There is a certain place, I believe it is basically the perineum or a bit above it. If you press on it uite strongly, and apply that pressure between the balls rather than below them, miracles of soft pain, openness, moaning, groaning and sweet delicate helplessness ensue. Well, if you're a lucky bastard like me who is into that perverted sort of thing, at least.
By the way, talking about "release": That's such an ugly, demeaning term! It comes straight out of porn land, where malesubs are under constant oppression and in permanent "frustration".
The deeper my supermodel girlfriend and I go down this specific rabbit-hole, the more I have to disagree with that view. Being chaste and exploring those soft, submissive places in my soul is actually a tremendous amount of fun. I'm often at a point where I don't actually crave an ejaculatory orgasm. Don't get me wrong, I do like it; I enjoy it a lot. It's just not so much the center of attention any more. There's a certain sense of sadness to it: I find this permanent state of heightened sensuality, horniness and slight submissiveness rather relaxing. It makes a whole lot of stuff a lot easier, often trivial things like doing the dishes. If you imagine that you're doing it as a labor of love, as opposed to a stupid chore, it's just easier to do. Self-deception? Sure! But why not? It's good for me, it's good for her, go for it! I'm quite a bit more productive in my creative endeavours, too. I really don't see the downside.
It is becoming less of a game, and more of a lifestyle, but the roleplay aspects remain in the bedroom. I'm on the road towards becoming more real, more myself, and letting go of some of the charade. In a way, I guess, this charade was always the "perverted" part of bdsm to me. Not that roleplaying is a bad thing. But, if you're playing long-term 24/7 games, such as chastity play, you get to realize that there is a difference between childish, fake stage-acts and the actual, real dynamics of your relationship.
I'm starting to think that some form of "chastity play" can be beneficial for a whole lot of relationships. We're not adapted omnipresent instant gratification. The restrictions of old against free love certainly served to keep an extremely oppressive, mysogynistic and misandric, religious regime running. No question about that. But maybe they did that by co-opting an impulse, or a subtle cecognition of something that is actually rather healthy: that unfulfilled sexual desire is a thing to be cherished: just like its cousin, sexual consummation, and like so many other things in life... everthing in moderation, evern moderation itself.
My ring will stay on. So I guess we are officially in a 24/7 D/s relationship now, for whatever it's worth.
I believe she has started to enjoy giving me some pain.
Specifically, she is becoming a maestro of pain to my balls. There is a certain place, I believe it is basically the perineum or a bit above it. If you press on it uite strongly, and apply that pressure between the balls rather than below them, miracles of soft pain, openness, moaning, groaning and sweet delicate helplessness ensue. Well, if you're a lucky bastard like me who is into that perverted sort of thing, at least.
By the way, talking about "release": That's such an ugly, demeaning term! It comes straight out of porn land, where malesubs are under constant oppression and in permanent "frustration".
The deeper my supermodel girlfriend and I go down this specific rabbit-hole, the more I have to disagree with that view. Being chaste and exploring those soft, submissive places in my soul is actually a tremendous amount of fun. I'm often at a point where I don't actually crave an ejaculatory orgasm. Don't get me wrong, I do like it; I enjoy it a lot. It's just not so much the center of attention any more. There's a certain sense of sadness to it: I find this permanent state of heightened sensuality, horniness and slight submissiveness rather relaxing. It makes a whole lot of stuff a lot easier, often trivial things like doing the dishes. If you imagine that you're doing it as a labor of love, as opposed to a stupid chore, it's just easier to do. Self-deception? Sure! But why not? It's good for me, it's good for her, go for it! I'm quite a bit more productive in my creative endeavours, too. I really don't see the downside.
It is becoming less of a game, and more of a lifestyle, but the roleplay aspects remain in the bedroom. I'm on the road towards becoming more real, more myself, and letting go of some of the charade. In a way, I guess, this charade was always the "perverted" part of bdsm to me. Not that roleplaying is a bad thing. But, if you're playing long-term 24/7 games, such as chastity play, you get to realize that there is a difference between childish, fake stage-acts and the actual, real dynamics of your relationship.
I'm starting to think that some form of "chastity play" can be beneficial for a whole lot of relationships. We're not adapted omnipresent instant gratification. The restrictions of old against free love certainly served to keep an extremely oppressive, mysogynistic and misandric, religious regime running. No question about that. But maybe they did that by co-opting an impulse, or a subtle cecognition of something that is actually rather healthy: that unfulfilled sexual desire is a thing to be cherished: just like its cousin, sexual consummation, and like so many other things in life... everthing in moderation, evern moderation itself.
Thursday, December 22, 2016
Acute not-yet-resolved sexual tension at the pub
Yesterday, I got to witness what I can only describe as a scene of intense lust and mutual seduction. Just writing it down makes me drool all over again, while at the same time feeling for our young heroes.
I was with my supermodel girlfriend at one of our favourite pubs. A guy and a girl came in, maybe around 20-25ish, and sat down at the bar. Cute blonde petite girl, and I have no idea what the guy looked like, except for his long brown hair and his beard. I'm sure he was rather good-looking though.
I said to my girlfriend that those two had not yet had sex, but were about to, later tonight. She agreed.
The next time I looked, the girl had her hand dangerously close to the guy's thigh, but not touching, all the while she was talking about whatever they were talking about. The guy did not react to this at all. Then, perfectly in alignment with some punchline in one of her jokes, her fingertips, ever so slightly, touched his knee.
Over an hour or so, that longing physical closeness escalated, ever... so... slowly. Hands touching each other for a second, fingertips touching the outer side of his leg, hand almost stroking him, but not quite. Finally, hand settling on him.
I was amazed by the sheer disconnect between what happened quite literally at face level, and what was really going on below. Smalltalk and jokes and what I'm sure constituted some witty dialogue. And at the same time, physical intimacy that spoke volumes of longing, desire, thrill, seduction, expectation. All of that was made even sweeter, more precious, by the fact that it was the girl chasing the boy this time. I have rarely witnessed this constellation. It was her who was facing towards, him facing the bar. It was her trying to touch, him trying not to be touched too much by the touch.
At some point, they turned towards each other, and his knees ended up a bit between hers. At that point, I guess the whole thing was really settled. The rest was play time, keeping up the appearance, not giving in to temptation all too soon. I am absolutely certain that they left together, and that what I saw was just one small fraction of the main attraction. They still had not kissed, but... Oh boy!
Sadly, my supermodel girlfriend felt that we were invading their privacy a bit, and we left. I coulda watched them for a few hours more without getting bored. It was thrilling like the first season of Battlestar Galactica, and fascinating like pretty much everything to Mr Spock.
And also, calll me insensitive, but I don't see how one invades someone's privacy by just watching them in a public place. I rather like to think that my one and only was a tad jealous.
I was with my supermodel girlfriend at one of our favourite pubs. A guy and a girl came in, maybe around 20-25ish, and sat down at the bar. Cute blonde petite girl, and I have no idea what the guy looked like, except for his long brown hair and his beard. I'm sure he was rather good-looking though.
I said to my girlfriend that those two had not yet had sex, but were about to, later tonight. She agreed.
The next time I looked, the girl had her hand dangerously close to the guy's thigh, but not touching, all the while she was talking about whatever they were talking about. The guy did not react to this at all. Then, perfectly in alignment with some punchline in one of her jokes, her fingertips, ever so slightly, touched his knee.
Over an hour or so, that longing physical closeness escalated, ever... so... slowly. Hands touching each other for a second, fingertips touching the outer side of his leg, hand almost stroking him, but not quite. Finally, hand settling on him.
I was amazed by the sheer disconnect between what happened quite literally at face level, and what was really going on below. Smalltalk and jokes and what I'm sure constituted some witty dialogue. And at the same time, physical intimacy that spoke volumes of longing, desire, thrill, seduction, expectation. All of that was made even sweeter, more precious, by the fact that it was the girl chasing the boy this time. I have rarely witnessed this constellation. It was her who was facing towards, him facing the bar. It was her trying to touch, him trying not to be touched too much by the touch.
At some point, they turned towards each other, and his knees ended up a bit between hers. At that point, I guess the whole thing was really settled. The rest was play time, keeping up the appearance, not giving in to temptation all too soon. I am absolutely certain that they left together, and that what I saw was just one small fraction of the main attraction. They still had not kissed, but... Oh boy!
Sadly, my supermodel girlfriend felt that we were invading their privacy a bit, and we left. I coulda watched them for a few hours more without getting bored. It was thrilling like the first season of Battlestar Galactica, and fascinating like pretty much everything to Mr Spock.
And also, calll me insensitive, but I don't see how one invades someone's privacy by just watching them in a public place. I rather like to think that my one and only was a tad jealous.
The Mainstays of "Real" Femdom D/s Relationships
Those are the topics you'll find most often when you browse the internet for femdom field reports, in almost random order:
By the way, if you genderflip it, I'm sure it looks quite a bit different than that.
- Household chores
- Garden chores
- Sissy clothing
- Cuckolding
- Pegging
- Household chores
- Feminization
- Garden chores
- Chastity play
- Orgasm denial
- Household chores
- Garden chores
- Cock and ball torture
- Household chores
- Garden chores
- Flogging, caning, etc.
- Punishments
- Humiliation
- Household chores
- Pussy worship
- Garden chores
- Washing the dishes
By the way, if you genderflip it, I'm sure it looks quite a bit different than that.
The Power of the State Compels You
If we define power as, simply, the right and ability of one or some persons to determine the actions and circumstances of one or many other persons, and we define that power not given by consent is abuse or violence - then it follows necessarily that every known society is committing abuse on its citizens.
Who knew.
Who knew.
Wednesday, December 21, 2016
Another round of no-play
We're back in the game since monday night.
It's been a while.
It is definitely true that I have grown less attentive in my "free" time. Of course, day-to-day life plays its part, but mostly it is like all the chastity connaisseurs say: all work and all play makes a man a dull boy. It's interesting to experience this firsthand.
The rules are:
I believe that male chastity is a way to get women to pay attention to the males' sexuality. It is the one thing that almost always is completely overlooked, even moreso in conservative, traditional relationships. We're simply supposed to be horny, and to desire our ladies, and while they may deisre us back, some egocentric urge in us just does not get satisfied this way.
Ironically, chastity helps us be recognized in our sexuality.
It's been a while.
It is definitely true that I have grown less attentive in my "free" time. Of course, day-to-day life plays its part, but mostly it is like all the chastity connaisseurs say: all work and all play makes a man a dull boy. It's interesting to experience this firsthand.
The rules are:
- No cumming, obviously, except on demand.
- I may touch myself though, as long as she doesn't explicitly prohibit it.
- I may read porn only if I wrote it myself. I must not watch any porn. Images are okay, but if they excite me I lot, she wants to see them too.
- She wants frequent kisses.
- I will receive some form of attention every day. Many of those might be a bit uncomfortable, but not necessarily every one.
I believe that male chastity is a way to get women to pay attention to the males' sexuality. It is the one thing that almost always is completely overlooked, even moreso in conservative, traditional relationships. We're simply supposed to be horny, and to desire our ladies, and while they may deisre us back, some egocentric urge in us just does not get satisfied this way.
Ironically, chastity helps us be recognized in our sexuality.
Thursday, December 1, 2016
Being an atheist is okay. So is shaming religions.
The following text is certainly appropriate for this time of year:
http://pin.it/NoLwuti
It says:
Being an atheist is okay.
Being an atheist and shaming religions and spirituality as silly and not real is not okay.
Being a Christian is okay.
Being homophobic, misogynistic, racist or an otherwise hateful person and blaming it on your religion is not okay.
Being a reindeer is okay. Bullying and excluding another reindeer because he has a shiny red nose is not okay.No.
Whoever posted this, has yet to learn the difference between an ideology and a person.
Religions and spirituality are silly and not real. We can disagree about that, but why would it not be okay to point it out?
The wording is clearly bad, too. You cannot shame a religion. It's a system of thought. It has no rights or feelings.
Shaming religious or spiritual people, on the other hand, is certainly wrong. Not only is it not okay in the ethical sense, it is factually incorrect, plain and simple.
Saturday, November 12, 2016
So now you elected Donald J. Trump...
Dear electorate of the U.S. of A.,
after four years, when you find that you are far worse off than before -- who will you blame then?
Sincerely,
S.T.
after four years, when you find that you are far worse off than before -- who will you blame then?
Sincerely,
S.T.
Tuesday, November 1, 2016
Rocky Horror Picture Show 2016: A Very Incomplete Review
I will say flat out that I don't go into this unbiased. My love for the original is too intense for that, and I guess most of us go into remakes of beloved classics with a certain sense of impending doom, dark stormclouds, heavy, black, and pendulous. My first impulse when I heard that they were doing a remake was somewhere in-between "oh no" and "so what". A mental mind-fuck can be nice, right?
So I only saw the few bits that Fox put on youtube. I won't watch the whole thing. What I have seen was quite enough.
Every bit of it feels like plastic dolls walking awkwardly in a perfect doll's house. It feels like something straight from the pits of the marketing department. It feels like something that should be a bit shoddy, a bit worn down, but has been re-edited, re-shot, re-synthesized into perfection until it was so perfect as to make everyone puke.
Let's talk about "Science Fiction / Double Feature". The singing is close to perfect, as far as I can tell. And Ivy Levan sure is a stunningly beautiful woman. But there is a distinct lack of dirty in this version. It sounds like soul music. The role of the singer as an usher is ironically fitting - she's there to preserve order and keep those messy kids from putting their shoes up on the backrest. And, while she acts sexy, and as I said above she is definitely very pretty, somehow she really does not come off as sexy at all. It's like a sideshow act after it was processed multiple times by the marketing deparment's washing mashine.
The same goes for "Sweet Transvestite". So, now we have to talk about Laverne Cox. I actually think she did a terrific job there. It was not her acting that was wrong, nor her singing. What's wrong is the context. (It is in all the details: The elevator versus that... whatever... ramp thingie. The tights compared to that... weird... whatever... mask.)
I remember when I first saw - nay, experienced Rocky Horror. I must have been 14 or 15. There was a distinct feeling of doing something forbidden, of crossing a line of some sorts. Well, the whole thing had the word "Horror" in its title. Back in the 80s, this was not a clear sign for a teenager to go for it. There was danger in the air.
Enter Tim Curry as Dr. Frank'n'Furter.
He was in drag. He was under heavy make-up. He wore suspenders and a corset and stockings. He was dominant, domineering, excentric, fabulous and, well, ahem, extremely attractive.
And that was what made his appearance so delightfully charming: it confused the hell out of me, without me even realizing it until very much later.
Laverne Cox, on the other hand, is a woman. A transgendered woman (well, duh), and a black woman (again, so what). And she's singing about being a "sweet transvestite", which is wrong on many more levels than I care to count.
Not only can I clearly hear the marketing guys who controlled that whole production going "Hey, how do you think we're gonna one-up the original?" - "Ah yes I know, we'll cast a black transwoman!" Only, this does not work. At all. There is nothing intrinsically challenging in that for anyone -- except, I guess, for Fox Network execs, which is a point of unintentional irony in and of itself. Back in the 70s and 80s, a guy in drag, to most of us, felt somewhat wrong. We might have felt a bit like we were caught in the act, and it was a double trap: On the one hand, we felt dirty for our attraction for someone we were not supposed to feel attracted to (they may do some more folk-dancing); on the other hand, there was a little bit of shame for our hypocrisy in precisely that feeling of doing something wrong (I'm a muscle fan!). The film made all that rather obvious by the simple device of an utterly manly guy in drag. You cannot achieve that easily in 2016, and you can definitely not achieve it by casting a woman as Frank.
The new casting also completely takes away one of the most interesting aspects of the show: The huge difference and conflict between Brad and Frank, Janet's internal troubles being caught between those two, which triggers her transformation. By the ending credits, Brad ("help me mommy"), in all his clean-cut, suit-wearing, career-promising unglory is completely defeated. But neither does Frank win -- how sentimental, and even pretentious of him. The real winners here are Riff Raff, Magenta, and Janet. The first two, who have overcome the physical and financial oppression by an egomaniac leader, will go back to the planet of Transilvania and our whole world will do the Time Warp again! -- while the latter has grown into acceptance of her own sexuality, and superheroes come to feast, and is a far way from relying on Brad's brittle protection or indeed his career. *)
This was very relevant in the 70s when they created the show, and the 80s when I first watched it, and it is still relevant today, albeit in different ways. And The Rocky Horror Picture Show totally achieved all that, probably, without even trying.
I have no clue how they try to resolve that issue in the remake; but, sadly, my guess is that they simply don't. It doesn't have to be relevant or vibrant or alive, as long as it's shiny, conformant, and nonthreatening.
Ultimately, I think, this is my verdict about the New Rocky Horror Picture Show: It is totally nonthreatening. In art, this is a death sentence.
The New Rocky Horror Picture Show is to Real Rocky Horror Picture Show precisely what Brad is to Frank: a product of prude sexual repression bound to live a sterile beaurocratic life, bring home the money and die without anybody taking note. A result of postmodern prudery, brought on not by political machination, but by capitalist pondering to the lowest common denominator in the name of profit.
Quite ironic, that.
--------
*) I guess a point could be made just by observing who lives and who doesn't: Rocky's dumb maleness, Eddie's macho attitude, and Frank's over-the-top arrogance don't make it; Dr. Scott, Riff-Raff, Magenta, Brad and Janet survive; but only Janet is transformed in a positive way by her experience
So I only saw the few bits that Fox put on youtube. I won't watch the whole thing. What I have seen was quite enough.
Every bit of it feels like plastic dolls walking awkwardly in a perfect doll's house. It feels like something straight from the pits of the marketing department. It feels like something that should be a bit shoddy, a bit worn down, but has been re-edited, re-shot, re-synthesized into perfection until it was so perfect as to make everyone puke.
Let's talk about "Science Fiction / Double Feature". The singing is close to perfect, as far as I can tell. And Ivy Levan sure is a stunningly beautiful woman. But there is a distinct lack of dirty in this version. It sounds like soul music. The role of the singer as an usher is ironically fitting - she's there to preserve order and keep those messy kids from putting their shoes up on the backrest. And, while she acts sexy, and as I said above she is definitely very pretty, somehow she really does not come off as sexy at all. It's like a sideshow act after it was processed multiple times by the marketing deparment's washing mashine.
The same goes for "Sweet Transvestite". So, now we have to talk about Laverne Cox. I actually think she did a terrific job there. It was not her acting that was wrong, nor her singing. What's wrong is the context. (It is in all the details: The elevator versus that... whatever... ramp thingie. The tights compared to that... weird... whatever... mask.)
I remember when I first saw - nay, experienced Rocky Horror. I must have been 14 or 15. There was a distinct feeling of doing something forbidden, of crossing a line of some sorts. Well, the whole thing had the word "Horror" in its title. Back in the 80s, this was not a clear sign for a teenager to go for it. There was danger in the air.
Enter Tim Curry as Dr. Frank'n'Furter.
He was in drag. He was under heavy make-up. He wore suspenders and a corset and stockings. He was dominant, domineering, excentric, fabulous and, well, ahem, extremely attractive.
And that was what made his appearance so delightfully charming: it confused the hell out of me, without me even realizing it until very much later.
Laverne Cox, on the other hand, is a woman. A transgendered woman (well, duh), and a black woman (again, so what). And she's singing about being a "sweet transvestite", which is wrong on many more levels than I care to count.
Not only can I clearly hear the marketing guys who controlled that whole production going "Hey, how do you think we're gonna one-up the original?" - "Ah yes I know, we'll cast a black transwoman!" Only, this does not work. At all. There is nothing intrinsically challenging in that for anyone -- except, I guess, for Fox Network execs, which is a point of unintentional irony in and of itself. Back in the 70s and 80s, a guy in drag, to most of us, felt somewhat wrong. We might have felt a bit like we were caught in the act, and it was a double trap: On the one hand, we felt dirty for our attraction for someone we were not supposed to feel attracted to (they may do some more folk-dancing); on the other hand, there was a little bit of shame for our hypocrisy in precisely that feeling of doing something wrong (I'm a muscle fan!). The film made all that rather obvious by the simple device of an utterly manly guy in drag. You cannot achieve that easily in 2016, and you can definitely not achieve it by casting a woman as Frank.
The new casting also completely takes away one of the most interesting aspects of the show: The huge difference and conflict between Brad and Frank, Janet's internal troubles being caught between those two, which triggers her transformation. By the ending credits, Brad ("help me mommy"), in all his clean-cut, suit-wearing, career-promising unglory is completely defeated. But neither does Frank win -- how sentimental, and even pretentious of him. The real winners here are Riff Raff, Magenta, and Janet. The first two, who have overcome the physical and financial oppression by an egomaniac leader, will go back to the planet of Transilvania and our whole world will do the Time Warp again! -- while the latter has grown into acceptance of her own sexuality, and superheroes come to feast, and is a far way from relying on Brad's brittle protection or indeed his career. *)
This was very relevant in the 70s when they created the show, and the 80s when I first watched it, and it is still relevant today, albeit in different ways. And The Rocky Horror Picture Show totally achieved all that, probably, without even trying.
I have no clue how they try to resolve that issue in the remake; but, sadly, my guess is that they simply don't. It doesn't have to be relevant or vibrant or alive, as long as it's shiny, conformant, and nonthreatening.
Ultimately, I think, this is my verdict about the New Rocky Horror Picture Show: It is totally nonthreatening. In art, this is a death sentence.
The New Rocky Horror Picture Show is to Real Rocky Horror Picture Show precisely what Brad is to Frank: a product of prude sexual repression bound to live a sterile beaurocratic life, bring home the money and die without anybody taking note. A result of postmodern prudery, brought on not by political machination, but by capitalist pondering to the lowest common denominator in the name of profit.
Quite ironic, that.
--------
*) I guess a point could be made just by observing who lives and who doesn't: Rocky's dumb maleness, Eddie's macho attitude, and Frank's over-the-top arrogance don't make it; Dr. Scott, Riff-Raff, Magenta, Brad and Janet survive; but only Janet is transformed in a positive way by her experience
Sunday, October 9, 2016
Nitpicker's Corner: "Colors" by Laleh
Just because it's black in the darkI absolutely love the song in question. To be honest, I love pretty much everything by Laleh.
Doesn't mean there's no color
However, we have to talk about those two lines of the chorus.
Color is what happens when light of a certain wavelength within the visual spectrum interacts with the eyes, or whatever similar organ, of a living being. Objects reflect only parts of the visual spectrum due to their physical qualities (which I do not pretend to understand in detail), and that is why we get objects of different colors.
Color is not an intrinsic property of objects, but the result of those objects reflecting light. If you direct a source of red light on a green object, then (if I'm not completely mistaken), the green object will absorb, i.e. not reflect that light, and it will appear gray or even black.
So, in the dark there is indeed no color. It is black exactly because of that fact.
With a more subjectivist philosophy in mind, one could even argue that color only happens when said light interacts with a light-perceiving organ, i.e. an eye which is connected to a working, living brain. Without light to shine on them and an eye to percceive them, the physical properties of the object are still there, of course, but nobody cares. They are, one might quip, potential colors, not actual ones.
So, after all, colors appear to be there before they are hit by lightwaves, waiting to be perceived, like buds that have not opened yet. Just like the acorn is, in a way, a tree in waiting, so is unperceived color a sense perception that just has not had the chance to happen as of yet. The green object hit by red light would, then, be a sadly missed opportunity.
Simply because I'm such a literature buff (and because, by pure chance, I am just at the right time, namely right now, re-reading James Joyce's Ulysses), I shall have to quote the opening lines of the Proteus episode to you:
Ineluctable modality of the visible: at least that if no more, thought through my eyes. Signatures of all things I am here to read, seaspawn and seawrack, the nearing tide, that rusty boot. Snotgreen, bluesilver, rust: coloured signs. Limits of the diaphane. But he adds: in bodies. Then he was aware of them bodies before of them coloured. How? By knocking his sconce against them, sure.
Wednesday, October 5, 2016
The Narrative Appeals of BDSM
It has long been my view that one of the appeals of BDSM is its inherent narrative structure -- its dramatic capacity.
Take, for instance, the classic "9 1/2 weeks". Both the novel and the movie were bestsellers back in the day (I think); even if bdsm practitioners will tell you (and they are right) that they're lousy examples of actual BDSM, because everything in them is based on non-consensual acts, or abuse for short. What titillates the most is not Kim Basinger's body, or Mickey Rourke's smile, but the drama of a woman who falls for an abuser, enjoys it for a while because it is so erotic, and then tries to escape his iron clutch. We may protest the inherent sexism, and rightly ask why anyone would like to make out in the cold rain (without catching the common, absolutely unerotic cold!), but few of us can help feeling slightly aroused by the hot action in there.
Never-ending happiness is endlessly boring, just like mindless fucking.
Even in the simplest bondage scenario, there is a sub struggling against the ropes, crying in "pain", sighing pleasure. There is a dynamic, there is dramatic structure, there is tension and climax and payoff. Of course, simple phantasies will never fully exploit the potential therein -- but it is there, nonetheless.
This is why 90% of BDSM porn is about non-consensual violence, rather than politically correct, SSC-conforming scenes. Knowing you can safe-word out of your predicament is great in real life, but in our imagination, we want the racy stuff. Those cries better be for real. Those sighs better be just as real, too.
Of course, the narrative thrill is there in real life, too, because of our tendency to get lost in the game and ignore its game-like characteristics. It's what can make long-term games and mind-games so appealing. Many a sub completely forgot that there even was a safe-word agreed upon. So lost were they in the crazy world of commands, humiliation, and ropes.
Will the chaste sub make it to the end of the set period of no-action? Will he come out at the other side, a changed person? Will he be able to fulfill all the tasks he was given? Will the domme finally grant him his well-deserved release, or will she find some excuse to prolong his suffering?
These are the sort of questions that drive a well-written story. Character arc, challenges, pro- and antagonists... it's all right there.
The appeal of BDSM is not necessarily "just" pain and cruelty, even when simulated. Our inborn craving for well-told stories is just as good an explanation as any.
Take, for instance, the classic "9 1/2 weeks". Both the novel and the movie were bestsellers back in the day (I think); even if bdsm practitioners will tell you (and they are right) that they're lousy examples of actual BDSM, because everything in them is based on non-consensual acts, or abuse for short. What titillates the most is not Kim Basinger's body, or Mickey Rourke's smile, but the drama of a woman who falls for an abuser, enjoys it for a while because it is so erotic, and then tries to escape his iron clutch. We may protest the inherent sexism, and rightly ask why anyone would like to make out in the cold rain (without catching the common, absolutely unerotic cold!), but few of us can help feeling slightly aroused by the hot action in there.
Never-ending happiness is endlessly boring, just like mindless fucking.
Even in the simplest bondage scenario, there is a sub struggling against the ropes, crying in "pain", sighing pleasure. There is a dynamic, there is dramatic structure, there is tension and climax and payoff. Of course, simple phantasies will never fully exploit the potential therein -- but it is there, nonetheless.
This is why 90% of BDSM porn is about non-consensual violence, rather than politically correct, SSC-conforming scenes. Knowing you can safe-word out of your predicament is great in real life, but in our imagination, we want the racy stuff. Those cries better be for real. Those sighs better be just as real, too.
Of course, the narrative thrill is there in real life, too, because of our tendency to get lost in the game and ignore its game-like characteristics. It's what can make long-term games and mind-games so appealing. Many a sub completely forgot that there even was a safe-word agreed upon. So lost were they in the crazy world of commands, humiliation, and ropes.
Will the chaste sub make it to the end of the set period of no-action? Will he come out at the other side, a changed person? Will he be able to fulfill all the tasks he was given? Will the domme finally grant him his well-deserved release, or will she find some excuse to prolong his suffering?
These are the sort of questions that drive a well-written story. Character arc, challenges, pro- and antagonists... it's all right there.
The appeal of BDSM is not necessarily "just" pain and cruelty, even when simulated. Our inborn craving for well-told stories is just as good an explanation as any.
Tuesday, October 4, 2016
Stripping the Gurus
No, the title is not in reference to any kinky activities, though some of the personalities mentioned on the website below might (have) enjoy(ed) them a lot.
"Stripping the Gurus: Sex, Violence, Abuse and Enlightenment" by Geoffrey D. Falk
It is about the odd and abusive behaviour that lots of "holy men" engage in,. Holy men ranging from Ramakrishna to the Dalai Lama to Paramahansa Yogananda. To some, this might be shocking news, for others just interesting reading material.
It didn't tell me anything particularly new, and I don't know if I agree with some of what he writes (plus, honestly I only browsed it), but I thought it was probably interesting for others, so I'm posting the link here.
"Stripping the Gurus: Sex, Violence, Abuse and Enlightenment" by Geoffrey D. Falk
It is about the odd and abusive behaviour that lots of "holy men" engage in,. Holy men ranging from Ramakrishna to the Dalai Lama to Paramahansa Yogananda. To some, this might be shocking news, for others just interesting reading material.
It didn't tell me anything particularly new, and I don't know if I agree with some of what he writes (plus, honestly I only browsed it), but I thought it was probably interesting for others, so I'm posting the link here.
Do monks and nuns feel this way, too?
Don't even try to argue that you don't know what I'm talking about.
So... do they, or don't they?
So... do they, or don't they?
Due for release
Tomorrow I'm due for "release", as they say in kinkalese professional terminology. Seeing as my beloved is void of any sadistic urge, I'm sure I'll get it, too.
I am looking forward to it, sure. But not at all in the way I used to, or in the way I expected.
I feel like I am now a bit more calm about this whole chastity thing. I also feel like I got over the initial craving. Yes, it feels like cold turkey. (At least as far as I know it from going off cigarettes 15 yaars ago.)
I am looking forward to the intimacy, being with her and inside her. It's not so much a race for a goal as it used to be. I wonder what my feelings will be after the "finish".
I told her that we can and should freely express our wishes and desires, the both of us -- only, mine are optional while hers are always binding. It seems to me she is good with that. She did, for what it's worth, send me to go pick something from the store across the street a few days ago. That's a good start!
I have to admit I just love "serving" her, pulling her a bath and giving her feet a rub and stuff like that. Not even nessecarily the sexual things. And she seems to feel in a similar way, so we might be up to a "race of kindness" in the future.
ETA: In an online forum on FLRs I read this:
This feels very true. The question is whether this is simply due to hormone fluctuations. After that, this probably being the case, the next question is: Does it matter? After all, our emotions ARE our hormones, to the highest degree. We cannot distinguish the physical from the psychological in this case. So, if I hack myself via orgasm control to become a better person, then I do have changed myself. It's actually a rather huge thing, once you start thinking about it.
I am looking forward to it, sure. But not at all in the way I used to, or in the way I expected.
I feel like I am now a bit more calm about this whole chastity thing. I also feel like I got over the initial craving. Yes, it feels like cold turkey. (At least as far as I know it from going off cigarettes 15 yaars ago.)
I am looking forward to the intimacy, being with her and inside her. It's not so much a race for a goal as it used to be. I wonder what my feelings will be after the "finish".
I told her that we can and should freely express our wishes and desires, the both of us -- only, mine are optional while hers are always binding. It seems to me she is good with that. She did, for what it's worth, send me to go pick something from the store across the street a few days ago. That's a good start!
I have to admit I just love "serving" her, pulling her a bath and giving her feet a rub and stuff like that. Not even nessecarily the sexual things. And she seems to feel in a similar way, so we might be up to a "race of kindness" in the future.
ETA: In an online forum on FLRs I read this:
There is a part of us submissive males that realizes we want to let go of our ego, that it is actually better for us if we do.
This feels very true. The question is whether this is simply due to hormone fluctuations. After that, this probably being the case, the next question is: Does it matter? After all, our emotions ARE our hormones, to the highest degree. We cannot distinguish the physical from the psychological in this case. So, if I hack myself via orgasm control to become a better person, then I do have changed myself. It's actually a rather huge thing, once you start thinking about it.
Friday, September 30, 2016
Surprise!
As it turns out, she has been planning to ask me about some more serious chastity play for about a year now. Just as I did... We both hesitated. She is really into this stuff now, while still retaining her enormously charming, enormously empathic, friendly personality. I love her to pieces for it.
And all that, while I am pretty certain that we're one couple that has a lot of high-quality communication, compared to several other couples I've known. It's a bit scary, when you think of it.
She put a ring on me. Okay, it was my idea, but who cares -- it's such a strong symbol, reminder, and so inconspicuous. I was tempted to go on my knees for the occasion -- it would have been such a lovely reversal of gender roles. But then again, who cares. We had lots of fun, I'm horny as heck, it's all good.
I sent her a list of possible punishments today. I tried to make it so they're not all really just fun for me... :-) I'm curious whether she will finally let out her cruel side. As things are right now, I cannot imagine breaking the chastity of my own accord, anyway. There might of course still be the uncontrollable nightly occasion, which I have not experienced in like half a decade or so.
I'm on some FLR forum these days, but I hesitate to post a lot. This is not an FLR, nor does it feel like it. On the other hand, it is not purely a bdsm/chastity type thing, either. It is something deeper, something very personal and romantic, not at all a "Strict and Cruel Dominatrix/worthless slave" arrangement. More like very-good-relationship version 2.0.
On the other hand, I love that I can now visit my old fellas at the local bdsm café and brag to them because, technically, I now have a 24/7 D/s relationship going! It's like the holy grail of bdsm, innit?
Another thought is that this makes me try to be a better person, in all respects -- such as trying to tidy up more, hanging up the laundered clothes (which she hates and always forgets), cooking for her, and sticking to my exercise and diet regime. Oxytocin is my new best friend!
I am happy. I am in love. She is happy. She is in love.
This is good.
And all that, while I am pretty certain that we're one couple that has a lot of high-quality communication, compared to several other couples I've known. It's a bit scary, when you think of it.
She put a ring on me. Okay, it was my idea, but who cares -- it's such a strong symbol, reminder, and so inconspicuous. I was tempted to go on my knees for the occasion -- it would have been such a lovely reversal of gender roles. But then again, who cares. We had lots of fun, I'm horny as heck, it's all good.
I sent her a list of possible punishments today. I tried to make it so they're not all really just fun for me... :-) I'm curious whether she will finally let out her cruel side. As things are right now, I cannot imagine breaking the chastity of my own accord, anyway. There might of course still be the uncontrollable nightly occasion, which I have not experienced in like half a decade or so.
I'm on some FLR forum these days, but I hesitate to post a lot. This is not an FLR, nor does it feel like it. On the other hand, it is not purely a bdsm/chastity type thing, either. It is something deeper, something very personal and romantic, not at all a "Strict and Cruel Dominatrix/worthless slave" arrangement. More like very-good-relationship version 2.0.
On the other hand, I love that I can now visit my old fellas at the local bdsm café and brag to them because, technically, I now have a 24/7 D/s relationship going! It's like the holy grail of bdsm, innit?
Another thought is that this makes me try to be a better person, in all respects -- such as trying to tidy up more, hanging up the laundered clothes (which she hates and always forgets), cooking for her, and sticking to my exercise and diet regime. Oxytocin is my new best friend!
I am happy. I am in love. She is happy. She is in love.
This is good.
Wednesday, September 28, 2016
Male chastity is stress relief.
Forgegone conclusions are a great way to gain freedom.
This August, I received a diagnosis for type 2 diabetes. I was admitted to the hospital, received infusions, rumbazumba the whole messy shenanigan. So I decided to treat elevators and escalators as demonic entities, refrain from eating any sweets and stick to a low-carb diet, and do my frackin' exercises every day.
With the motivation of maybe, one day, being able to eat a good piece of mousse au chocolat (I do make a mean one!) without regrets, and maybe never having to inject myself with insulin, there was no question whether I'd stick to the regime or not. I just went for it.
Needless to say, losing about 6 kgs in a month, and receiving all the health benefits from that, is a motivation booster in itself. During our vacation, I was able to walk 7 to 8 kms per day with my girlfriend, which would never have happened a year before. I don't sit in and watch stupid youtube videos at night, but read books... real books, doorstoppers like Ulysses! The last time I had enough energy to do that was like 10 years ago.
Apart from that, this one decision, once taken, freed me from a lot of stress. It is actually really nice to not even think about a Mars bar. And I really don't. If I forget and accidentally do use an escalator, I walk back the stairs, and back again, just to reinforce the habit. It feels a bit like I'm my own dominatrix, sometimes.
Now I have given up the decision about having an orgasm and laid it into my girlfriend's loving hands. I do not have to spend a minute thinking about whether I want to wank tonight. Instead, I can focus my mental energies on more productive stuff, such as the aforementioned reading of books, or, even more importantly, finding ways to please her.
Somehow, now I feel a bit guilty about forcing her make do my decisions for me...
Just a bit.
This August, I received a diagnosis for type 2 diabetes. I was admitted to the hospital, received infusions, rumbazumba the whole messy shenanigan. So I decided to treat elevators and escalators as demonic entities, refrain from eating any sweets and stick to a low-carb diet, and do my frackin' exercises every day.
With the motivation of maybe, one day, being able to eat a good piece of mousse au chocolat (I do make a mean one!) without regrets, and maybe never having to inject myself with insulin, there was no question whether I'd stick to the regime or not. I just went for it.
Needless to say, losing about 6 kgs in a month, and receiving all the health benefits from that, is a motivation booster in itself. During our vacation, I was able to walk 7 to 8 kms per day with my girlfriend, which would never have happened a year before. I don't sit in and watch stupid youtube videos at night, but read books... real books, doorstoppers like Ulysses! The last time I had enough energy to do that was like 10 years ago.
Apart from that, this one decision, once taken, freed me from a lot of stress. It is actually really nice to not even think about a Mars bar. And I really don't. If I forget and accidentally do use an escalator, I walk back the stairs, and back again, just to reinforce the habit. It feels a bit like I'm my own dominatrix, sometimes.
Now I have given up the decision about having an orgasm and laid it into my girlfriend's loving hands. I do not have to spend a minute thinking about whether I want to wank tonight. Instead, I can focus my mental energies on more productive stuff, such as the aforementioned reading of books, or, even more importantly, finding ways to please her.
Somehow, now I feel a bit guilty about forcing her make do my decisions for me...
Just a bit.
Tuesday, September 27, 2016
A little follow-up to my last posting
Amending my last posting on the current state of my chastity affairs, I would like to add the following:
I do experience a hugely increased urge to "serve", i.e., plain old do a lot for, my girlfriend. I feel deeply in love, very romantic, I want to take her out to dinner and do a lot of little stuff, like vacuuming the bedroom, without mentioning it. I always loved her a lot, it just went from intense to hyperrealistic, from comfortably warm to hellishly hot.
This is so entirely clichéd as to border on embarrassing!
Now, I'm fairly certain that this has to do with the hormonal changes involved in our roleplay, and it coincides with what every other practitioner of bdsm-type chastity will profess, but I would not like to neglect the possibility that this is simply thankfulness -- after years and years of not being able to live one's fantasies, finally having a partner who is as appreciative, cooperative and adventurous as that is simply fantastic, and I am indeed deeply thankful to her.
I do experience a hugely increased urge to "serve", i.e., plain old do a lot for, my girlfriend. I feel deeply in love, very romantic, I want to take her out to dinner and do a lot of little stuff, like vacuuming the bedroom, without mentioning it. I always loved her a lot, it just went from intense to hyperrealistic, from comfortably warm to hellishly hot.
This is so entirely clichéd as to border on embarrassing!
Now, I'm fairly certain that this has to do with the hormonal changes involved in our roleplay, and it coincides with what every other practitioner of bdsm-type chastity will profess, but I would not like to neglect the possibility that this is simply thankfulness -- after years and years of not being able to live one's fantasies, finally having a partner who is as appreciative, cooperative and adventurous as that is simply fantastic, and I am indeed deeply thankful to her.
Natural Courtship, Mating and Bonding
One of the major surprises of my new condition is how it feels 100% just right - like it had been the natural state of affairs all along, and I had just failed to see it. Like coming home. "There and back again", indeed.
(For those who haven't read the other posting and won't, the short of it is that I started into a very loving, very gentle, device-less version of bdsm-style male chastity, and it is precious.)
As the title written on the beautiful belly of the young lady on top of this blog suggests, I will not move to generalize, out of a few moments of private enjoyment, that all guys in relationships should always be in a state of courtship, encouraged by "enforced" bdsm-type chastity. Duh.
I will, however, allow myself to indulge in those ideas for a while, just because they are so sexy. I believe that your own beliefs can very much be a part of your joyful kinky adventures, as long as you are prepared to admit that this is what you are doing. It is a kind of extended (or in-tended?) roleplay.
I will also allow myself to deliver a few hypotheses, in the firm knowledge that they are not at all conclusive or scientifically sound, but just my own private adhoc speculations.
The question is, of course, why the heck does it feel so good? And moreover, why does it feel so natural?
I'm guessing that modern neurobiology might have something to say about that -- Marnia Robinson seems to cover that in "Cupid's Poisoned Arrow", but I have not read the book yet. From what I have heard, it is probably something to do with the brain's reward circuits.
It is at least a curious occurrence how basically all of the romantic media industry revolves around this one very subject: Pair bonding, and male persons' apparent inability to accept it, live it, enjoy it, submit to it and become monogamous in the process, mostly because of their need for "indepencence", i.e., freedom to mate with everyone else.
I don't believe for a second that monogamy is the natural order of human affairs, period. There is far too much evidence to the contrary (see "Sex At Dawn", by Christopher Ryan).
In the light of what I have experienced in my life, and specifically what I am experiencing right now, I should say that there are two distinct modes of pleasure with regard to sex and relationship: Marnia Robinson would call them "mating" and "bonding" modes. Both are probably related to one or the other of two different hormones *), and you can get a high from either, as well as get hooked on them.
This might imply that, contrary to what we are generally taught, there is really not only one source of happiness with regard to sex, but there are two: orgasm is one, and deliberate delay of orgasm is the other. One triggers the satisfaction of mating, the other brings in the rewards for bonding. **)
If so, that would mean that we humans are probably only half-monogamous, the other half being polyamorous: driven by a sex impulse to procreate no matter what, but at the same time, longing for life-long bonding. Would that not explain an awful lot in terms of our pervasive issues with relationships? Like, why we have seen a need for using religions (the other strongest force on the planet) for millennia now to regulate them, why we tend towards serial monogamy rather than straight-up polyamory in the face of failing societal rules for relationships, and why so many very happy, very committed monogamous relationships tend to fall apart after quite a huge amount of time.
It would also mean that we get to... well, not precisely choose between those two modes, but probably rather... surf them. Go more for one at a time, rather than assuming that real happiness is only real once you have both. Realize that it's not your partner who is to blame when things start to go a bit boring, nor yourself, but your biology -- but also that, rather than being a slave to your body, you now have a choice to do something about it.
That would be awesome indeed.
Of course, all of this does not explain at all why there seems to be such a massive difference between men and women -- how much of it is related to nurture rather than nature.
Since these are just ad-hoc thoughts from a few days of experience, it may very well be that this is all really just a reflection of my personality and upbringing. Yay for catholic education! Hooray for christianity!
But wouldn't it just be way more interesting the other way?
=====
*) or, more probably, complex circuits involving one or the other of those, among other substances
**) Marnia Robinson, as far as I see, advocates for a kind of sexual restraint, otherwise known as "karezza", for both sexes. As this opposes my kinky malesub view, I choose to ignore the female side of the equation for now...
(For those who haven't read the other posting and won't, the short of it is that I started into a very loving, very gentle, device-less version of bdsm-style male chastity, and it is precious.)
As the title written on the beautiful belly of the young lady on top of this blog suggests, I will not move to generalize, out of a few moments of private enjoyment, that all guys in relationships should always be in a state of courtship, encouraged by "enforced" bdsm-type chastity. Duh.
I will, however, allow myself to indulge in those ideas for a while, just because they are so sexy. I believe that your own beliefs can very much be a part of your joyful kinky adventures, as long as you are prepared to admit that this is what you are doing. It is a kind of extended (or in-tended?) roleplay.
I will also allow myself to deliver a few hypotheses, in the firm knowledge that they are not at all conclusive or scientifically sound, but just my own private adhoc speculations.
The question is, of course, why the heck does it feel so good? And moreover, why does it feel so natural?
I'm guessing that modern neurobiology might have something to say about that -- Marnia Robinson seems to cover that in "Cupid's Poisoned Arrow", but I have not read the book yet. From what I have heard, it is probably something to do with the brain's reward circuits.
It is at least a curious occurrence how basically all of the romantic media industry revolves around this one very subject: Pair bonding, and male persons' apparent inability to accept it, live it, enjoy it, submit to it and become monogamous in the process, mostly because of their need for "indepencence", i.e., freedom to mate with everyone else.
I don't believe for a second that monogamy is the natural order of human affairs, period. There is far too much evidence to the contrary (see "Sex At Dawn", by Christopher Ryan).
In the light of what I have experienced in my life, and specifically what I am experiencing right now, I should say that there are two distinct modes of pleasure with regard to sex and relationship: Marnia Robinson would call them "mating" and "bonding" modes. Both are probably related to one or the other of two different hormones *), and you can get a high from either, as well as get hooked on them.
This might imply that, contrary to what we are generally taught, there is really not only one source of happiness with regard to sex, but there are two: orgasm is one, and deliberate delay of orgasm is the other. One triggers the satisfaction of mating, the other brings in the rewards for bonding. **)
If so, that would mean that we humans are probably only half-monogamous, the other half being polyamorous: driven by a sex impulse to procreate no matter what, but at the same time, longing for life-long bonding. Would that not explain an awful lot in terms of our pervasive issues with relationships? Like, why we have seen a need for using religions (the other strongest force on the planet) for millennia now to regulate them, why we tend towards serial monogamy rather than straight-up polyamory in the face of failing societal rules for relationships, and why so many very happy, very committed monogamous relationships tend to fall apart after quite a huge amount of time.
It would also mean that we get to... well, not precisely choose between those two modes, but probably rather... surf them. Go more for one at a time, rather than assuming that real happiness is only real once you have both. Realize that it's not your partner who is to blame when things start to go a bit boring, nor yourself, but your biology -- but also that, rather than being a slave to your body, you now have a choice to do something about it.
That would be awesome indeed.
Of course, all of this does not explain at all why there seems to be such a massive difference between men and women -- how much of it is related to nurture rather than nature.
Since these are just ad-hoc thoughts from a few days of experience, it may very well be that this is all really just a reflection of my personality and upbringing. Yay for catholic education! Hooray for christianity!
But wouldn't it just be way more interesting the other way?
=====
*) or, more probably, complex circuits involving one or the other of those, among other substances
**) Marnia Robinson, as far as I see, advocates for a kind of sexual restraint, otherwise known as "karezza", for both sexes. As this opposes my kinky malesub view, I choose to ignore the female side of the equation for now...
Saturday, September 24, 2016
There and, hopefully, never back again: Re-starting a journey of male chastity.
Warning: This is a looong posting. Be prepared!
=====
There is a highly specialized genre of blog posts on the internet. It concerns itself with the writers' numerous experiences with "male chastity" -- that is to say, "enforced" abstinence of men regarding sex or, more specifically, ejaculation. There are fora for it, there is, as usual, according to rule 34, a plethora of porn about it, and -- equally as usual -- fantasy and reality often dance a very intimate danse macabre in those writings.
One basic narrative goes like this: Guy (heterosexual, white, 25-35 years) cheats on spouse. Spouse catches guy. Spouse purchases a chastity device which the guy is forced to wear. Henceforth, the guy is completely helpless, and the woman gets ever more dominant. Girl gets all the joy, guy does all the chores. BDSM tropes of all (im)possible kinds ensue.
Alternatively, the guy talks his woman into keeping him chaste; she complies more or less out of pity or curiosity, but without any real interest. After a while, she realizes the benefits to the situation (guy's horniness makes him do everything he can for her), and he is now a veritable sorcerer's apprentice who cannot undo what he has done. Again, BDSM tropes ensue. Happiness in slavery.
I will try and do my best to avoid all those cliché-ridden trappings of the aforementioned genre. I want to be as honest as possible.
I was interested in male chastity even before I started out with tantra. Problem was -- as with practically every aspiring male chastity apprentice -- that there was no fitting female partner to be found. Several kinds of experiments with self-locking, online and short-term keyholding *) arrangements, and 8-9 years later, I had given up on the whole thing, had begun exploring tantra and was moving on. The interest spiked a few times over the years, but all in all, it was a closed book.
Now, after 3 years with my current girlfriend, I somehow talked her into giving male chastity a try for a few days. Without going into the boring technical details too much, let me just say that there is no device (aka chastity belt) involved and very little bdsm stuff. She's soo not into being sadistic, it's actually kind of amazing!
It's an arrangement for mutual pleasure where she gets all the orgasms and gets to say when or if I am allowed to come, and I get... well, what I gain from it is to be the topic of the rest of this blog posting.
The most obvious, of course, is permanent, unrelenting horniness. While for many of you, it might not at all be obvious how this can possibly be a boon, for those who already took a peak into western tantra and taoist sex, the advantage of "semen retention" should be obvious (although, as I have expressed early, I do not believe for a second that the tantric explanations of it bear any connection with reality).
As for all the clichés mentioned above, it is definitely true that there is more energy, that I can focus on my partner more clearly and with more mindfulness, and that I now have more of a certain kind of tender feeling towards her. It used to be there before, half-buried below heaps of everyday busy-ness, but now it is way stronger. I guess it is called courtship.
Do you remember the first time you ever fell deeply in love? Did you feel completely and utterly helpless, and strong at the same time?
If you're a guy, you will know what I mean when I say that you would have done everything in your power for the girl of your dreams -- if not just to do her. I don't know how it feels for girls; I guess it's somewhat different, since our biological roles in sex are quite different, regardless of what modern narratives try to promote. **)
It's one of those feelings we all crave basically all our lives, and many of us try and regain that feeling, as soon as we feel its end with our current partner, by moving on to the next.
In many modern relationships, that initial phase of traditional courtship has vanished altogether. So was the case with us. I guess, deep inside, I was missing that phase. There were reasons, of course, and I won't bore you to death with them, but somehow it didn't seem quite right to me -- only, at the time I didn't realize that something was missing.
There is, on top of that, the tantric/taoist thing about having no goal to achieve for myself. Being able to focus on her like that feels nothing short of amazing. In a way, this is, to me, a key to actual real-life tantra.
Where we stand now is that I have this insane desire to please her -- not only under the sheets, but in general -- that I want to do good things for her every day, all day long (and I'm not quite sure how this will play out once I'm back to the office.... sheeeesh!!). It just feels so damn RIGHT. It feels like how this relationship should be. It feels like how I should feel toward her.
I have the feeling that this is a journey of shared self-exploration, of growing as persons and as a couple. For me, anyway, it feels like a huge step of personal development.
I don't entertain for a moment the idea that this will be our future state forevermore. It shall be a game we play for a little while, then another little while, then maybe another, not so little one...
Let me also say that there is not a moment of "force" there. All these theatrics about the guy being forced into submission seem exceedingly tedious and quite useless to me. Should I ever feel that this gets too much for me, I will simply tell her, and we will decide, as a couple, what to do about it.
And that's it for now. No clever punchline here. Just insane amounts of desire, a lot of joy and great curiosity.
=====
*) "Keyholding", where one person keeps the key to another's chastity device.
**) Hooray for gender diversity! I have no clue how these things feel for trans*persons. In this posting I'm talking about the majority 90% heterosexual cispersons, which happen to be, as it were, my natural area of expertise.
=====
There is a highly specialized genre of blog posts on the internet. It concerns itself with the writers' numerous experiences with "male chastity" -- that is to say, "enforced" abstinence of men regarding sex or, more specifically, ejaculation. There are fora for it, there is, as usual, according to rule 34, a plethora of porn about it, and -- equally as usual -- fantasy and reality often dance a very intimate danse macabre in those writings.
One basic narrative goes like this: Guy (heterosexual, white, 25-35 years) cheats on spouse. Spouse catches guy. Spouse purchases a chastity device which the guy is forced to wear. Henceforth, the guy is completely helpless, and the woman gets ever more dominant. Girl gets all the joy, guy does all the chores. BDSM tropes of all (im)possible kinds ensue.
Alternatively, the guy talks his woman into keeping him chaste; she complies more or less out of pity or curiosity, but without any real interest. After a while, she realizes the benefits to the situation (guy's horniness makes him do everything he can for her), and he is now a veritable sorcerer's apprentice who cannot undo what he has done. Again, BDSM tropes ensue. Happiness in slavery.
I will try and do my best to avoid all those cliché-ridden trappings of the aforementioned genre. I want to be as honest as possible.
I was interested in male chastity even before I started out with tantra. Problem was -- as with practically every aspiring male chastity apprentice -- that there was no fitting female partner to be found. Several kinds of experiments with self-locking, online and short-term keyholding *) arrangements, and 8-9 years later, I had given up on the whole thing, had begun exploring tantra and was moving on. The interest spiked a few times over the years, but all in all, it was a closed book.
Now, after 3 years with my current girlfriend, I somehow talked her into giving male chastity a try for a few days. Without going into the boring technical details too much, let me just say that there is no device (aka chastity belt) involved and very little bdsm stuff. She's soo not into being sadistic, it's actually kind of amazing!
It's an arrangement for mutual pleasure where she gets all the orgasms and gets to say when or if I am allowed to come, and I get... well, what I gain from it is to be the topic of the rest of this blog posting.
The most obvious, of course, is permanent, unrelenting horniness. While for many of you, it might not at all be obvious how this can possibly be a boon, for those who already took a peak into western tantra and taoist sex, the advantage of "semen retention" should be obvious (although, as I have expressed early, I do not believe for a second that the tantric explanations of it bear any connection with reality).
As for all the clichés mentioned above, it is definitely true that there is more energy, that I can focus on my partner more clearly and with more mindfulness, and that I now have more of a certain kind of tender feeling towards her. It used to be there before, half-buried below heaps of everyday busy-ness, but now it is way stronger. I guess it is called courtship.
Do you remember the first time you ever fell deeply in love? Did you feel completely and utterly helpless, and strong at the same time?
If you're a guy, you will know what I mean when I say that you would have done everything in your power for the girl of your dreams -- if not just to do her. I don't know how it feels for girls; I guess it's somewhat different, since our biological roles in sex are quite different, regardless of what modern narratives try to promote. **)
It's one of those feelings we all crave basically all our lives, and many of us try and regain that feeling, as soon as we feel its end with our current partner, by moving on to the next.
In many modern relationships, that initial phase of traditional courtship has vanished altogether. So was the case with us. I guess, deep inside, I was missing that phase. There were reasons, of course, and I won't bore you to death with them, but somehow it didn't seem quite right to me -- only, at the time I didn't realize that something was missing.
There is, on top of that, the tantric/taoist thing about having no goal to achieve for myself. Being able to focus on her like that feels nothing short of amazing. In a way, this is, to me, a key to actual real-life tantra.
Where we stand now is that I have this insane desire to please her -- not only under the sheets, but in general -- that I want to do good things for her every day, all day long (and I'm not quite sure how this will play out once I'm back to the office.... sheeeesh!!). It just feels so damn RIGHT. It feels like how this relationship should be. It feels like how I should feel toward her.
I have the feeling that this is a journey of shared self-exploration, of growing as persons and as a couple. For me, anyway, it feels like a huge step of personal development.
I don't entertain for a moment the idea that this will be our future state forevermore. It shall be a game we play for a little while, then another little while, then maybe another, not so little one...
Let me also say that there is not a moment of "force" there. All these theatrics about the guy being forced into submission seem exceedingly tedious and quite useless to me. Should I ever feel that this gets too much for me, I will simply tell her, and we will decide, as a couple, what to do about it.
And that's it for now. No clever punchline here. Just insane amounts of desire, a lot of joy and great curiosity.
=====
*) "Keyholding", where one person keeps the key to another's chastity device.
**) Hooray for gender diversity! I have no clue how these things feel for trans*persons. In this posting I'm talking about the majority 90% heterosexual cispersons, which happen to be, as it were, my natural area of expertise.
Saturday, July 23, 2016
Experience Report: 2 Weeks On a Raw Vegan Diet
I've been doing a mostly raw vegan diet these last two weeks.
As an interesting side effect, I didn't have any alcohol (except on fridays) and no coffee, though I did cheat a little bit by drinking green tea, and I had maybe 3 or 4 cups of coffee throughout the whole time. The coffee turkey led to some interesting withdrawal symptoms.
After the first week, I decided to reintroduce bread, and I decided not to look extremely closely at the label of hummus and some spelt grain spread, because I developed extreme cravings for those two things and the other option would have been to step down to a cooked vegan diet, which presented no challenge at all, as I already know I can do that.
There were no cravings for sweets (interesting), no cravings for alcohol (very reassuring!), and none for meat (yeah that was pretty neat).
Digestion was not a problem -- to the contrary. If anything, it was better. With a somewhat meaty and fatty diet, I always had some acid reflux issues. On raw vegan, this was gone. As for what came out at the other end... well, let's just say it was shockingly much.
My conclusion is twofold.
One is that this is not sustainable in the long run for me. Too many variations of taste, temperature and consistency go amiss, at least as long as one doesn't buy a desiccation machine and a juicer (which I definitely won't do just for an experiment). Fermentation can make things interesting, but what it all boils down to (haha, pun so intended!) is that everything has extremely strong tastes - either very sour, or very salty, or very sweet. There are no in-betweens. Nothing is mild and gentle. To my surprise, this is exactly the quality that makes meat so tasty - it's good precisely because it doesn't taste like very much.
And also, keeping this kind of diet healthy would require amounts of planning ahead that I am simply not prepare to invest.
One fun and very instructive part: It's incredible how fast raw food will rot. For example, I took raw oatmeal to work, ate a bit at about 8am, and forgot to put it in the fridge. At 1pm I thought I'd have a bite. By that time, the thing had already gone bad. And that, my friends, is why we invented cooking in the first place!
On to the positive: I had been going through a year-long spell of low energy. I came home from work and only wanted to watch a few videos and go to sleep. I put it down to the job, which indeed was quite stressful.
But over these two weeks my energy level improved with every day. It was truly amazing. My gf felt it, too. ;-) I even took up reading, like, actual books, again, which was utterly out of my reach for at least a year. (This might actually be due to drinking no coffee.)
What I take from it is this: I'll dive even more into vegan cooking than I did in the past. I'll have way more raw stuff in my diet. I'll reduce non-vegan options to when I eat at a restaurant or am invited to parties.
But for a long-term diet, raw vegan is completely and utterly unsustainable. You'd have to put in tremendous amounts of planning, reserve lots of time just for eating (a salad just takes way longer to eat than a steak or pasta), and even then you'd have to start supplementing B12 at some point. Not to mention that it is rather expensive, since you'd have to buy organic fruit in large quantities all the time. But for a short spell, just to lose a bit of weight, it's actually a fine option.
As an interesting side effect, I didn't have any alcohol (except on fridays) and no coffee, though I did cheat a little bit by drinking green tea, and I had maybe 3 or 4 cups of coffee throughout the whole time. The coffee turkey led to some interesting withdrawal symptoms.
After the first week, I decided to reintroduce bread, and I decided not to look extremely closely at the label of hummus and some spelt grain spread, because I developed extreme cravings for those two things and the other option would have been to step down to a cooked vegan diet, which presented no challenge at all, as I already know I can do that.
There were no cravings for sweets (interesting), no cravings for alcohol (very reassuring!), and none for meat (yeah that was pretty neat).
Digestion was not a problem -- to the contrary. If anything, it was better. With a somewhat meaty and fatty diet, I always had some acid reflux issues. On raw vegan, this was gone. As for what came out at the other end... well, let's just say it was shockingly much.
My conclusion is twofold.
One is that this is not sustainable in the long run for me. Too many variations of taste, temperature and consistency go amiss, at least as long as one doesn't buy a desiccation machine and a juicer (which I definitely won't do just for an experiment). Fermentation can make things interesting, but what it all boils down to (haha, pun so intended!) is that everything has extremely strong tastes - either very sour, or very salty, or very sweet. There are no in-betweens. Nothing is mild and gentle. To my surprise, this is exactly the quality that makes meat so tasty - it's good precisely because it doesn't taste like very much.
And also, keeping this kind of diet healthy would require amounts of planning ahead that I am simply not prepare to invest.
One fun and very instructive part: It's incredible how fast raw food will rot. For example, I took raw oatmeal to work, ate a bit at about 8am, and forgot to put it in the fridge. At 1pm I thought I'd have a bite. By that time, the thing had already gone bad. And that, my friends, is why we invented cooking in the first place!
On to the positive: I had been going through a year-long spell of low energy. I came home from work and only wanted to watch a few videos and go to sleep. I put it down to the job, which indeed was quite stressful.
But over these two weeks my energy level improved with every day. It was truly amazing. My gf felt it, too. ;-) I even took up reading, like, actual books, again, which was utterly out of my reach for at least a year. (This might actually be due to drinking no coffee.)
What I take from it is this: I'll dive even more into vegan cooking than I did in the past. I'll have way more raw stuff in my diet. I'll reduce non-vegan options to when I eat at a restaurant or am invited to parties.
But for a long-term diet, raw vegan is completely and utterly unsustainable. You'd have to put in tremendous amounts of planning, reserve lots of time just for eating (a salad just takes way longer to eat than a steak or pasta), and even then you'd have to start supplementing B12 at some point. Not to mention that it is rather expensive, since you'd have to buy organic fruit in large quantities all the time. But for a short spell, just to lose a bit of weight, it's actually a fine option.
The Road To Vegan World-Domination
If I were a vegan, (which I am not and never will be), and my goal was to convince meat-eaters to become vegan, here's what I should not do:
Tell people that meat is murder, and try to convince them on moral grounds and with all the brute force of my strict, stringent, wonderfully compelling logic.
Here is what I should focus on instead:
Convince people with the glow of my renewed energy. Seduce them with extremely delicious, beautiful food. Add my greens to their barbecue. Actually enjoy my own food and let them see my enjoyment.
You see, I am a not-quite-but-almost-vegan for the simple reason that I enjoy the food I cook for myself. I look forward to that wonderful Koshari, that intensely aromatic Chili Sin Carne, this excellent Curry with tofu and greens. I really like my oatmeal and my smoothie. And I'm truly sorry, but I just don't feel for the poor cows, even though I know I probably should. It's just not there, on an emotional, visceral level. Maybe that makes me a bad person, but the fact is I could not care less even if I tried real hard.
Forget logic and morality. People are rarely ever won over by those. Their experience is that meat tastes yummie and that society won't punish them for their creature comforts. And the simple fact is that experience trumps rational reasoning. It doesn't matter whether that seems unfair or illogical or just plain wrong to you. That's just how humans work. If you actually want to make the world a better place, instead of being comfortable on the moral high ground, you better start working with nature, not against it.
Let's assume that the goal is to reduce suffering. Then, turning 1% of the population into 100% vegans is way less effective than turning 30% of them into people who eat small amounts of meat.
It's also less catchy, of course.
Tell people that meat is murder, and try to convince them on moral grounds and with all the brute force of my strict, stringent, wonderfully compelling logic.
Here is what I should focus on instead:
Convince people with the glow of my renewed energy. Seduce them with extremely delicious, beautiful food. Add my greens to their barbecue. Actually enjoy my own food and let them see my enjoyment.
You see, I am a not-quite-but-almost-vegan for the simple reason that I enjoy the food I cook for myself. I look forward to that wonderful Koshari, that intensely aromatic Chili Sin Carne, this excellent Curry with tofu and greens. I really like my oatmeal and my smoothie. And I'm truly sorry, but I just don't feel for the poor cows, even though I know I probably should. It's just not there, on an emotional, visceral level. Maybe that makes me a bad person, but the fact is I could not care less even if I tried real hard.
Forget logic and morality. People are rarely ever won over by those. Their experience is that meat tastes yummie and that society won't punish them for their creature comforts. And the simple fact is that experience trumps rational reasoning. It doesn't matter whether that seems unfair or illogical or just plain wrong to you. That's just how humans work. If you actually want to make the world a better place, instead of being comfortable on the moral high ground, you better start working with nature, not against it.
Let's assume that the goal is to reduce suffering. Then, turning 1% of the population into 100% vegans is way less effective than turning 30% of them into people who eat small amounts of meat.
It's also less catchy, of course.
Friday, June 17, 2016
People like to confuse ethical "rights" and legal rights
It is amazing how people think that they have "freedom of speech" on some internet site like Quora or youtube.
I won't go on about how this is a false interpretation of the whole right to freedom of speech. That's a separate, albeit important issue.
I think that people often misunderstand the difference between their "rights" in an ethical sense, and "rights" in the sense of written laws.
This misunderstanding goes back to some vagueness in the English (as well as the German) language, at least to some degree. Being / having a "right" denotes logical, ethical and/or legal correctness, depending on grammatical usage and context.
I think we should make an effort to clarify which sense of the word we talk about. Failing to do so just makes a lot of debates, which are already emotionally charged, even less productive.
Coming back to that "freedom of speech" issue, yes it displays a certain relation to other people's opinions when people such as, for example, Robert Barron's team on youtube will block you for having a different opinion. They are perfectly within their legal rights to do so, and youtube as the site owner grants them that right as well as the technical means for its implementation. I still think it's ethically flawed, and it probably suggests a lack of good counter-arguments on their part. I have a certain ethical "right" to speak my mind, and we should voice it as such whenever someone cuts us off for no good reason. But we should not conflate that with a constitutional right.
It simply is a different thing.
I won't go on about how this is a false interpretation of the whole right to freedom of speech. That's a separate, albeit important issue.
I think that people often misunderstand the difference between their "rights" in an ethical sense, and "rights" in the sense of written laws.
This misunderstanding goes back to some vagueness in the English (as well as the German) language, at least to some degree. Being / having a "right" denotes logical, ethical and/or legal correctness, depending on grammatical usage and context.
I think we should make an effort to clarify which sense of the word we talk about. Failing to do so just makes a lot of debates, which are already emotionally charged, even less productive.
Coming back to that "freedom of speech" issue, yes it displays a certain relation to other people's opinions when people such as, for example, Robert Barron's team on youtube will block you for having a different opinion. They are perfectly within their legal rights to do so, and youtube as the site owner grants them that right as well as the technical means for its implementation. I still think it's ethically flawed, and it probably suggests a lack of good counter-arguments on their part. I have a certain ethical "right" to speak my mind, and we should voice it as such whenever someone cuts us off for no good reason. But we should not conflate that with a constitutional right.
It simply is a different thing.
Friday, June 3, 2016
Dog brains
Essentially, dogs all have the same intellectual capacities, regardless of size. But their heads vary enormously in size. So I assume that their brains have different sizes, too. So brain size does not matter.
Good for me, huh?
Good for me, huh?
Saturday, May 28, 2016
The danger of veganism
Over the past few years, I have become convinced that you can eat a vegan diet that is mostly healthy, while minimizing your carbon footprint and contributing less to animal suffering.
So that is a good thing.
Still, I was always a bit uneasy about the whole thing.
The problem is, veganism has a name. A cutesy (though somewhat stupid), easy to remember name.
That makes it incredibly easy and seductive to change your diet (as hard as that is), and then to think, that's it, now I've got that whole ethical lifestyle thing down.
Where there's a name, people like to identify with it. People don't incorporate veganism into their lives - they ARE vegans. That's dangerous business.
Just do a youtube search for veganism and try to determine how many channels there are, just about that one topic.
The truth is, of course, that nutrition is only one part of a much larger set of issues. You will never have that ethics thing down, because that is an ongoing process, and you will always have to weigh the proposed benefits against your convenience, your resources, and your preparedness to actually change yourself.
You will never live a perfectly ethical life. You will never reduce your footprint to absolute zero. As long as you are alive, you will produce suffering.
So now you don't eat meat. But you drive a car. Or maybe you don't own a car, but you use public transport, and then there's that rare instance when you call a taxi. And that money you have in your bank account? You can be sure that some part of it will be invested in a company (which will invest it in another company, etc), and somehwere down the line it will end up in some field office of the mafia. You can try and buy your clothes from some "fair" company, but good luck checking their actual practices, and better luck not buying any gas or electricity that has any bad impact.
You will always have your hands dirty. It's unavoidable. That is the one catholic teaching that I, strangely, agree with.
So that is a good thing.
Still, I was always a bit uneasy about the whole thing.
The problem is, veganism has a name. A cutesy (though somewhat stupid), easy to remember name.
That makes it incredibly easy and seductive to change your diet (as hard as that is), and then to think, that's it, now I've got that whole ethical lifestyle thing down.
Where there's a name, people like to identify with it. People don't incorporate veganism into their lives - they ARE vegans. That's dangerous business.
Just do a youtube search for veganism and try to determine how many channels there are, just about that one topic.
The truth is, of course, that nutrition is only one part of a much larger set of issues. You will never have that ethics thing down, because that is an ongoing process, and you will always have to weigh the proposed benefits against your convenience, your resources, and your preparedness to actually change yourself.
You will never live a perfectly ethical life. You will never reduce your footprint to absolute zero. As long as you are alive, you will produce suffering.
So now you don't eat meat. But you drive a car. Or maybe you don't own a car, but you use public transport, and then there's that rare instance when you call a taxi. And that money you have in your bank account? You can be sure that some part of it will be invested in a company (which will invest it in another company, etc), and somehwere down the line it will end up in some field office of the mafia. You can try and buy your clothes from some "fair" company, but good luck checking their actual practices, and better luck not buying any gas or electricity that has any bad impact.
You will always have your hands dirty. It's unavoidable. That is the one catholic teaching that I, strangely, agree with.
Thursday, May 26, 2016
A list of short (horror) films
HORROR
=======
Skypemare (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hIFkut11Xpc)
7:09
I really liked that one. It's not your usual slasher story, and I totally didn't see the twist coming.
genre: horror
overall rating: 9 *********
scare factor: 7 *******
acting: 9 *********
plot: Two girlfriends have a video chat on Halloween, while a killer is on the loose...
---
2AM: The Smiling Man (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_u6Tt3PqIfQ)
A really good, short, scary/funny horror film. Well executed and with good atmosphere, and a nice unconventional basic idea.
genre: horror
overall rating: 10 **********
scare factor: 9 *********
acting: 8 ********
plot: A man on a lonely alley has a scary encounter with an uncanny smiling man.
---
Vienna waits for you (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=E_hsU2O_o50)
In Vienna, you don't rent apartment. Apartment rent you.
This is intense, well written, intelligent and quite scary. The only downside is the less-than-optimal SFX, especially towards the end.
genre: horror
overall rating: 9 *********
scare factor: 8 ********
acting: 6 ******
plot: A young woman moves into an old apartment that not only has a will of its own, but also seems to change its tenants.
---
The Cut (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=46BhPSCvnAI)
I clicked on it because I fell for the clickbait. Otherwise it's just indistinct.
genre: horror
scare factor: 4, but that's only because of the music; the video itself is a 0
acting: undecidable due to constant darkness.
plot: A man shaves in his apartment.
---
So pretty (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wwLWAkZCUzM)
It wasn't really scary, but a pretty refreshing take on vampires.
genre: horror
scare factor: 2 **
acting: 9 *********
plot: In the subway, a woman and a man relate over a "Twilight" book.
---
Apartment 41 (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=K_dBw7Npsq8)
6:37
Watchable. The basic idea is quite fine, but the unbelievable twist ruined it, and the topic has been done to death (haha).
genre: horror
overall rating: 6 ******
scare factor: 5 *****
acting: 5 *****
plot: A woman moves into an apartment and gets terrorized by a ghost.
---
Audition (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZwR-3AzzoXE)
14:20
I didn't find this scary, but it has atmosphere and style and is based on a somewhat not-too-bad idea.
genre: horror/thriller
overall rating: 6 ******
scare factor: 2 **
acting: 7 *******
plot: He invites her for an audition, but his intentions are less than noble.
---
Blink (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=F5Ichw5xq44)
12:36
Yeah, well. Whatever
genre: horror
overall rating: 5 *****
scare factor: 4 ****
acting: 8 ********
plot: A man's terrible nightmares invade his real life.
comment: There's really not an awful lot to say. You'll guess the plot twist after 2 minutes.
---
Cougars (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CphvRVK0EpU)
15:00
More funny than scary. Lesson learned: If you don't have a budget, don't try special effects. Some good atmosphere stuff going on in the beginning, but it ultimately builds up to nothing.
genre: horror
overall rating: 5 *****
scare factor: 1 *
acting: 6 ******
plot: Young girl's mother is a cougar. Turns out the daughter ain't much different.
---
OCD (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=H0c_f0bDUJY)
7:09
I'm sure this works great as a piece of narrative, but the off-screen narration ruins the movie, and the acting is mediocre.
genre: horror
overall rating: 5 *****
scare factor: 1 *
acting: 3 ***
plot: Guy with OCD has an incident.
---
now,here (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=74piN4xAdIY)
5:30
A pretty good twist, a neat location and a cute girl... But the production values and bad, bad acting make it stink, sink, and rot.
I wrote a comment on that video on how it might be improved. Find me there... Do you agree with me?
genre: horror:
overall rating: 5 *****
scare factor: 2 **
acting: 2 **
plot: They go to a derelict house for a photo shoot, and bad things ensue.
SCI-FI
=====
Project Arbiter (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3MWQHBsalOM)
As of writing, I haven't even watched this to the end, but it looks pretty darn good.
genre: sci-fi
overall rating: 9 *********
acting: 7 *******
plot: Something about WWII and the Wunderwaffe. Frankly, I didn't pay too much attention because I was so caught up in admiring the visuals. The only annoying thing is when they try to talk german. I'm a german native speaker, so this really took me out of it.
---
ENVOY (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=a3-21AMbFFk)
9:14
Nicely done, to the point and simple.
genre: sci-fi
overall rating: 9 *********
acting: 8 ********
plot: A young boy and his older brother discover something alien lurking in a field.
=======
Skypemare (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hIFkut11Xpc)
7:09
I really liked that one. It's not your usual slasher story, and I totally didn't see the twist coming.
genre: horror
overall rating: 9 *********
scare factor: 7 *******
acting: 9 *********
plot: Two girlfriends have a video chat on Halloween, while a killer is on the loose...
---
2AM: The Smiling Man (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_u6Tt3PqIfQ)
A really good, short, scary/funny horror film. Well executed and with good atmosphere, and a nice unconventional basic idea.
genre: horror
overall rating: 10 **********
scare factor: 9 *********
acting: 8 ********
plot: A man on a lonely alley has a scary encounter with an uncanny smiling man.
---
Vienna waits for you (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=E_hsU2O_o50)
In Vienna, you don't rent apartment. Apartment rent you.
This is intense, well written, intelligent and quite scary. The only downside is the less-than-optimal SFX, especially towards the end.
genre: horror
overall rating: 9 *********
scare factor: 8 ********
acting: 6 ******
plot: A young woman moves into an old apartment that not only has a will of its own, but also seems to change its tenants.
---
The Cut (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=46BhPSCvnAI)
I clicked on it because I fell for the clickbait. Otherwise it's just indistinct.
genre: horror
scare factor: 4, but that's only because of the music; the video itself is a 0
acting: undecidable due to constant darkness.
plot: A man shaves in his apartment.
---
So pretty (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wwLWAkZCUzM)
It wasn't really scary, but a pretty refreshing take on vampires.
genre: horror
scare factor: 2 **
acting: 9 *********
plot: In the subway, a woman and a man relate over a "Twilight" book.
---
Apartment 41 (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=K_dBw7Npsq8)
6:37
Watchable. The basic idea is quite fine, but the unbelievable twist ruined it, and the topic has been done to death (haha).
genre: horror
overall rating: 6 ******
scare factor: 5 *****
acting: 5 *****
plot: A woman moves into an apartment and gets terrorized by a ghost.
---
Audition (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZwR-3AzzoXE)
14:20
I didn't find this scary, but it has atmosphere and style and is based on a somewhat not-too-bad idea.
genre: horror/thriller
overall rating: 6 ******
scare factor: 2 **
acting: 7 *******
plot: He invites her for an audition, but his intentions are less than noble.
---
Blink (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=F5Ichw5xq44)
12:36
Yeah, well. Whatever
genre: horror
overall rating: 5 *****
scare factor: 4 ****
acting: 8 ********
plot: A man's terrible nightmares invade his real life.
comment: There's really not an awful lot to say. You'll guess the plot twist after 2 minutes.
---
Cougars (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CphvRVK0EpU)
15:00
More funny than scary. Lesson learned: If you don't have a budget, don't try special effects. Some good atmosphere stuff going on in the beginning, but it ultimately builds up to nothing.
genre: horror
overall rating: 5 *****
scare factor: 1 *
acting: 6 ******
plot: Young girl's mother is a cougar. Turns out the daughter ain't much different.
---
OCD (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=H0c_f0bDUJY)
7:09
I'm sure this works great as a piece of narrative, but the off-screen narration ruins the movie, and the acting is mediocre.
genre: horror
overall rating: 5 *****
scare factor: 1 *
acting: 3 ***
plot: Guy with OCD has an incident.
---
now,here (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=74piN4xAdIY)
5:30
A pretty good twist, a neat location and a cute girl... But the production values and bad, bad acting make it stink, sink, and rot.
I wrote a comment on that video on how it might be improved. Find me there... Do you agree with me?
genre: horror:
overall rating: 5 *****
scare factor: 2 **
acting: 2 **
plot: They go to a derelict house for a photo shoot, and bad things ensue.
SCI-FI
=====
Project Arbiter (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3MWQHBsalOM)
As of writing, I haven't even watched this to the end, but it looks pretty darn good.
genre: sci-fi
overall rating: 9 *********
acting: 7 *******
plot: Something about WWII and the Wunderwaffe. Frankly, I didn't pay too much attention because I was so caught up in admiring the visuals. The only annoying thing is when they try to talk german. I'm a german native speaker, so this really took me out of it.
---
ENVOY (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=a3-21AMbFFk)
9:14
Nicely done, to the point and simple.
genre: sci-fi
overall rating: 9 *********
acting: 8 ********
plot: A young boy and his older brother discover something alien lurking in a field.
Monday, January 11, 2016
How to be A True Atheist (not funny!)
JP Sears posted a video entitled "How to be an Atheist (funny)" - see below.
Personally, I appreciate a lot, though not all, of his "funny" videos. This one is in-between. Not that it "hurt me as an atheist", or anything like that -- I just thought that his commandments for atheists didn't really hit home. It's certainly not easy to make fun of such a diverse group, though.
So, without further ado, here are about 10 or so commandments that I personally find funny:
Personally, I appreciate a lot, though not all, of his "funny" videos. This one is in-between. Not that it "hurt me as an atheist", or anything like that -- I just thought that his commandments for atheists didn't really hit home. It's certainly not easy to make fun of such a diverse group, though.
So, without further ado, here are about 10 or so commandments that I personally find funny:
- Do not be an agnostic. Agnostics are cowardly, wimpy crybabies. More importantly, they are not True Atheists, and we obviously cannot have that.
- Speaking of which, a True Atheist is a feminist or an antifeminist, (both for purely rational reasons, of course), but never both at the same time, and never none of the two, since that would constitute a form of agnosticism, and (see above).
- Speaking of which, once you have decided whether you are a feminist or an antifeminist, members of the other group shall instantly become lesser atheists to thee, since they do not adhere to the One True Atheism.
- Speaking of which, thou shalt have a True Atheist stance on everything. Remember: your Atheism is not just atheism, but Atheism. Capital A. See?
- Speaking of which, a True Atheist is always skeptical of about 84% of all things.
- Among the 18.3% of things a True Atheist cannot be skeptical of are to be found, in order: God's nonexistence (duh), the superior priority of rationalism above everything else, strictest lipservice to the scientific method, and the fact that Richard Dawkins said it all.
- A True Atheist never attacks the person, but only their moronic ideas. Of course, believing in those implies complete stupidity and a lack of morality on part of the believer, and you can easily let it show by being snide and displaying an unholier-than-though attitude. When questioned, you then revert to being butthurt, all the while repeating your old ideas-not-people sthick, thereby saving your True Atheist Ass.
- When someone talks to god, it's called prayer. When god talks back, it's called psychosis. What is it called when multiple gods talk back to you?
- The sky is empty. Been there, done that, got the vertigo.
- Attendance at SkeptiCon is not optional.
- Screaming discussions on youtube channels with lots of CAPITALS and exclamation MARKS are NOT OPTIONAL!!!!!!!!1111!
- Meditation, however, IS optional.
- Don't get caught.
P.S.: I think the problem of JP's video boils down to Poe's Law. Satirical humor doesn't work when the satirized content might just as well comprise everything in the satire. Or in other words, if your target is indistinguishable from its own parody, then satire makes no sense.
Sunday, January 10, 2016
Questions we had after watching "Star Wars: The Force Awakens"
SPOILER ALERT! DO NOT READ BELOW THIS POINT IF YOU HAVEN'T SEEN THE MOVIE YET!
These are some questions and remarks that came up when I discussed The Force Awakens with my girlfriend, straight after we watched it. We were really saddened by the fact that so much was left unexplained, and that the movie seemed to have no regard whatsoever for its protagonists, and was more concerned with imitating episode 4 (plus bigger bangs and booms) than with creating a good story and memorable characters. It's way ahead of the abominable prequel trilogy, and it has a fair bit of humor, which is nice - but it still has miles to go towards anything resembling a good movie.
- How can two people fit into that teeny tiny TIE fighter?
- Why would a scavenger sell spare parts to a local dealer for meagre food rations? In an economy that spans a whole galaxy, there should be something like competition, and money. At the very least, there should be some explanation why that local dealer has so much power.
- Why was a traitor needed in the fortress, after Han Solo had declared that he had somehow found the Millennium Falcon, and that the First Order can do the same thing at any time?
- How did that finding the MF thing work, anyway?
- Why was the fortress' owner (weird eye lady) pictured as completely trustworthy? A shady but somewhat likable character would have made for much more drama.
- That whole lightsaber scene, where Rey hears a baby cry, touches the lightsaber and has some visions felt like it had potential, but that potential was never explored. She's in an area she has no business being, gets trapped in a room, the house owner follows her... only to then have said proprietor preach a bit and hand her the lightsaber. What??
- How did Leia Organa shed maybe 3 tiny tears after the death of her (I suppose) long time partner, the father of her son, and a life long friend?
- What really happened between Han Solo and Leia Organa?
- Why was there basically no interaction between the two, apart from some dramatic staring into each other's eyes?
- How much money did Mark Hamill make just by staring intently at the camera for 30 seconds?
- Who came up with that terrible name "Snoke" for the Supreme Leader?
- Is Gollum the Supreme Leader?
- Why did me and my girlfriend both struggle to remember the names of the protagonists?
- If weird-eye-lady has held her fortress literally for millennia, as Han seemed to suggest, then how does she not have the connections to avoid its destruction at the hands of the *cough*Empire*cough*FO in just one instance, because of one shady spaceship?
- Why does the *cough*Empire*cough*FO put so much emphasis on one lonely remaining Jedi, who has essentially exiled himself from the galaxy?
- How did weird-eye-lady simply accept the fact that her whole shiny fortress was destroyed within seconds?
- How did the *cough*Empire*cough*FO come to be?
- The location of a person is basically a coordinate tuple with 3 numbers. How does one need a two-part map, with one part cut out from the rest in a weird shape, in order to find Luke?
- Why did Ren (or was it Ben? or Ken?) kill Han Solo within a minute or so? Wouldn't it have made for much better storytelling to have him succumb to his father's strength, try to redeem himself, but ultimately fail?
- RenBenKen thinks his father is weak? Seriously?? You do know who you're talking about, right?
- Apropos: I do not believe for a second that RenBenKen boy is able to face up to his father in that way. The guy is essentially a coward hiding behind a stupid mask. His father is the Badass Who Shot First. Sorry, I'm not buying it. It's not possible.
- Just how did this RenKenBen guy end up where he now is, anyway? Did he ramble the galaxy with his father, but then somehow decide it's time for some dark-sidey business?
- Why does BenRenKen boy wear a stupid mask, anyway?
- How did Han Solo end up with his new spaceship?
- Yes, we know that Renkenbenny will show up in the next movie. But it would have been nice to get at least some evidence of his escape to make it at least a little bit believable.
- How does a sanitary man take part in an offensive with blaster guns and all?
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