Best of the kinky rest – 3: “Private kink, public lives”

Next selection: a fabulous post from Insatiabear, following a case in which a police officer who’d posted pictures of himself engaged in kinky activity on Fetlife had landed himself under investigation by his employer.

Apparently, being kinky in this world runs a few dangers. Arguably, it always has. People whose sexual preferences stray away from the domain of ‘vanilla’, missionary-position heterosexual sex have often struggled with the acceptance (by themselves first, by their partners and by society in general) of their sexual preferences…

I am kinky, and have been my whole life. And I have struggled with that identity, for fear that I would be considered weird, abnormal or sick….

Except… I am not alone. Sexuality comes in many forms and flavours. People are gay. People cross-dress. People wear leather, latex or underwear of the opposite sex. People like to be spanked. Or flogged. Or whipped. Or caned. People like to be tied up. To feel helpless. To be infantilized. People fetishize balloons. The panoply of sexual preferences is enormous.

My fetishes are my fetishes. I am coming to terms with owning them. I am blessed with a supportive partner who enjoys and is willing to share them. And whose preferences in return I also share, and respect and enjoy. And even then, I have struggled at times to be truly honest about what I do want, for fear that she will judge me, or mock me, or find me wanting. And yet, what we do in the privacy of our own bedroom is… what we do in the privacy of our own bedroom. I’ve been tied up, spanked and teased, and loved every minute of it. And then I’ve lovingly cuddled my wife and gone to sleep.

The next day, when I get up, shower, dress and go to work, my kink stays in the bedroom. I do, in fact, separate my personal and private sphere, thank you very much. And my submissive tendencies in the bedroom in no way colour my ability to be a successful executive in the boardroom. They do not influence how I negotiate a deal with a customer. They do not change how I interact with my employees.

I am still acutely conscious, however, that not everyone shares my fetishes. And that people (at least, some) probably would judge me were they to be common knowledge. I am concerned about how it would affect my career, my job and my standing in the community. It is that fear, more than anything, that has been the basis of my struggle with myself – because I cannot completely own and be up-front about who I am, because there are scenarios where that is hidden. So my friends do not know. My family does not know. My wife’s family do not know. My colleagues and customers certainly remain ignorant. Being comfortable with me, and being comfortable with the boundaries I set about who I am, and who knows that, is a difficult balance I am still struggling to get right…

The media coverage has made this a much larger issue, however, calling into question whether someone can and should be in a position of responsibility if they are kinky. Can someone be a police officer? Or a teacher? Or a member of the military? Or a politician? I can guarantee you that they are, and anyone not believing that is deluded. Statistics suggest that one in ten people are kinky (although recent studies hypothesize the number is even higher than that) . That suggests that one in ten police officers, and one in ten teachers, and one in ten corporate executives are kinky.

Is a tenth of the workforce wrongly employed? Are we going to preclude people from occupations because of their sexual preferences? Is that a more acceptable form of discrimination than any other form that has been, in the face of bigotry and hatred, fought down? I certainly hope not…

It is sad, on the weekend that gay pride is being celebrated in England – when a group who has been marginalized for so long for their sexual preferences is finally able to now celebrate them openly – that another group has needed to once again start looking over their shoulders.