I have two or three friends who belong to an organization called The Eulenspiegel Society, or TES. It's the country's oldest and largest sadomasochism organization, dedicated to promoting the safe and sane practice of said kink among those who gravitate to it.
After much cajoling, my friends finally talked me into attending a meeting. It was quite interesting—the demonstration that night was on fire play—but I've come away with a better idea of where I stand on the ol' S&M issue. Where I stand is, I don't want to hurt anyone or be hurt, and I don't want to clean the bathroom wearing only a dog collar or subject anyone else to the same degradation. All I'm really interested in is a little light bondage. Yup, I want a woman to tie me up and fuck me.
And in one of those blinding moments of insight which seem to be flying around so thick and fast these days, I've figured out why that probably is.
You probably know by now that I grew up Mormon. To Mormons, there are three sins that are worse than all others. The worst sin there is is to deny the Holy Ghost after having received an undeniable witness of the Truth. It is the only sin punishable by banishment to Outer Darkness for all of eternity. It is not one you and I really need to worry about committing, since it involves seeing God. (Pass those mushrooms.)
The next worst sin is, of course, the shedding of innocent blood. I would say that the phrase "shedding of innocent blood" permits rather too much leeway—who is innocent, after all, and how many of us does this give the Danites leave to eighty-six?—but for all practical purposes we're talking about simple murder. In Mormonism, full repentence means restoring what you've taken, and obviously this is not possible in the case of murder. Therefore, it's the second worst sin, though those guilty of it are still able to enter the Telestial Kingdom after a season roasting in hell.
And the third worst sin, next only to murder and denying a personal witness of God, is sexual intercourse outside the bonds of marriage. It's worse than theft or lying, meanness or ignorance. It's worse than cheating on your taxes, or testing poisons on small animals. It's worse than polluting the environment, or watching The Faces of Death. It is the third worst sin you can possibly commit.
And when you're a teenager (and for many years afterward), it's the only thing on your mind.
It was certainly my top obsession as a teen, and many of my most cherished fantasies involved schemes for getting laid without acquiring any soul-coal. Well, really they weren't schemes, because schemes would have implied volition on my part, which would have implied complicity in my own deflowering, which would have meant I had committed the Third Worst Sin You Can Possibly Commit. So really what I had were only wishes, and what I wished was this:
I wished a woman would kidnap me, tie me up, and fuck me.
And that's about it. If I were taken by surprise and forced to perform, then I could hardly be blamed for the loss of my own virginity. Of course, I really wouldn't have much leeway to actually enjoy the act, because that would probably be a sin too, but at least it wouldn't be as bad a sin as willfully throwing away my cherry.
The idea is still damn attractive. Those adolescent fantasies certainly have power. One of these days (probably in The Road to Apostasy), I'll describe how perilously close I came to getting that fantasy fulfilled about three months before I was supposed to leave on my mission, an experience which no doubt helped imprint this primal fantasy even more indelibly on my brain. But for now, if you're female and have a pair of those quick-release handcuffs, well . . . come on over.
