WTF is Soft BDSM?

You're listening to the Loving BDSM podcast, episode four sixty two. Kayla Lords here with the one, the only, the I mean, I only have good things to say and nothing snarky for these five minutes to Right. Enjoy it while you can. Jump Brownstone. Yeah. Who knows what the the next five minutes will bring. Right? If you do something silly, I will make a joke out of it. If you do something grumpy and you're over the grumpy and I'm not worried about you being mad at me, I will make a joke out of it.

If you do something foolish slash embarrassing, I will not make a joke out of it until you are also able to laugh about it and are willing to say talk about it in public. And then and then I will make a joke about it. None of those things apply right now, so I got nothing. Let's talk about what we're here for. We're here because I like pissing off some corners of the, Internet by, you know Yeah. Talking about their term, Mhmm. That they hold dear. And, apparently, that's one of my kinks

now. I don't know. It's actually a term I have not been able to stop thinking about since last week when it came up in the Reddit response episode. And then once I tried to, like, do my due diligence, now I really can't stop thinking about it, and it is the term soft BDSM. I'm my current reaction, we haven't talked it through yet, and I, reserve the right to change my mind as, you know, I take in different interpretations and Mhmm. New information.

But right now, my initial thought is what the fuck is that? We'll get into it. Don't worry. Welcome to the Loving BDSM podcast. If this is your first time listening, glad to have you. If you're back for another week, welcome back. Loving BDSM is produced every Monday and Friday for your kinky pleasure in education, and show notes are found at lovingbdsm.net. Come back often and feel free to add the podcast to your favorite podcast app. You can also follow the show on Fetlife at

loving bdsm PC. The PC stands for podcast. On Instagram and technically threads of that handle I will forever fucking hate. It's loving d s and the number one. So at Love ds one, on Blue Sky at lovingbdsm. Blah blah blah, or on YouTube at youtube.com/lovingbdsm, where you can watch us live stream the podcast every Wednesday. All links are in the show notes. Okay. Before we get into the topic, which is very notes heavy, I will be doing a lot of reading. One quick announcement.

The day of recording is Wednesday, November 12. Yes. I got that right. I saw the date on the computer. You have until Saturday, November 15, if you were so inclined to sign up for our holiday cricket special tier in Patreon. When you do, and, yes, you can be international, you don't have to be located in The US, you will receive a kinky holiday card in the mail that I'm hoping to send out very early in of no. Not November. December. And also, you will receive an invite link to our first ever

holiday party over Zoom on December 20. About damn time we had a company party. No. We I don't know that party involves steak. Okay? And at least one adult beverage for at least one of us. Okay? Anyway, the cutoff for that is November 15. It is $20. It's a one time $20 thing even though Patreon will be like, don't you wanna sign up for an annual? No. The fuck you don't. You just the one time and you get the stuff. And then but you also get access to everything else we

do in Patreon. So the Discord server, freebies that are, offered at higher levels, all that good stuff. So if you decide you like it and want to stick around, you can bump yourself down the whatever works for your budget after your holiday cricket. Why cricket? Because the Patreon community is the proud crickets. Why proud crickets? That's part of our lore. And you either know or you don't. And if you don't, I will explain it at another time, but not right now.

Maybe somebody in the comments will help you out with the hell of proud crickets. We do answer that question periodically, so it'll come up again. I'll explain it. But that's our thing. Proud crickets. Anyway, that's the thing. Join us on Patreon. Patreon.com/kaylalords. Look for the holiday cricket tier if you would like to join. If you are a current member, you can do it too. And, also, there's other stuff I've been posting about it pretty

regularly. Yes. I will put reminders up for our Patreon folks so they know they can get in on the fun, all that good stuff. But this is the last time I'm gonna physically say it prior to November 15, which is Saturday, 11:59PM eastern. Actually, quite frankly, some it'll probably it'll probably, leak into November 16 because I'll have to go manually take that one down. So may the odds, be ever in your favor if it's not quite the fifteenth anymore. Okay. Okay. Let's get into this. Let's get into

this. So as part of my notes, because I don't trust my Swiss cheese brain, I also put the important things that always need to be said when we start fucking talking about labels, terms, and things that can be meaningful to others. First is the disclaimer. I don't not quite sure where I'm gonna come down on this term. I kind of know where I'm leaning right now based on what I found. But this is an open conversation. Jamie's going to have a perspective. We're going to get

to talking about it. I might actually get to look at live chat. Opinions are going to infiltrate. I reserve the right to change my mind. But let me just say, if by the end of this episode, I'm not a fan of this term, JB is not a fan of this term, that doesn't mean you can't use the term. We are not, like, in charge of kink terms. We are not invalidating somebody else's preference for term just because

we don't like it. So if in this discussion we are not impressed at all with the concept of soft BDSM but it is very meaningful to you, cool. Nobody is yanking away your term from you. You. Okay? Okay. We all get to have different opinions about different terms. It's about how we treat one another with respect regardless of the terms that we're using. Okay? Okay. Second. And I say this because man, when we did did soft dom, hard dom, people were in their feelings. We did pleasure

dom. Some people were, like, grown ups about it. We just had a discussion and they're like, yeah. I like this term and I can tell you why. And I was like, cool. And that was the end of the conversation. Others. Others had deep deep big big feelings about it and I was like, I'm not your mama and I'm not telling you what you can and can't do. Okay? That's fine. The second thing, as is typical, I have links to things where I found stuff.

But YouTube smacked me on the hand the other day, about a week ago, over a previous episode where I'd had a lot of links because they didn't like one of the links and tried to, like, knock the whole damn video off of YouTube. Think I think it got saved in the end. So in YouTube, there are no links because all of the relevant information was definitely on sites where somebody has shown their tits, ass, or dick. So I can't link in YouTube.

For if you're a podcast listener, all the links will be in the show notes. For YouTube folks, once I have the show notes link ready, I will come back and put it in if you were that interested in the links. You can also always email me about links from, an episode if you're like, I can't find them. I have them. I I have every script note outline for every episode we have ever done. Just saying. So that's a YouTube thing.

Okay. Now let's then go to I would like to also answer the question somebody from the Peanut Gallery is gonna say, but why do labels and terms even matter? Why does it even matter? It doesn't even matter. Well, yeah, the fuck it matters because It may not matter to you, but it does matter to some. Exact that is exactly it. You know, everything, but we're gonna be specific to the BDSM community. In the BDSM community, we are all, like, using a shared language of sorts, right? Shared terminology.

So when one of us says a term, says a label, says a whatever, what we should all want is for anybody else who hears it to be be able to ask what the hell are you talking about or for us to be able to explain what the hell we mean. One is just a member of the community who wants to share information. Maybe you're talking online, maybe you're at the lunch, whatever whatever.

But also any term, any way you describe yourself as a kinkster, any of that, in my opinion, you ought to be able to explain what the hell you mean because if you don't have an explanation of what that means, when you're communicating who you are to another person, how are you giving them full clear communication and potentially, you know, able to consent? Right? If somebody tells me they're a hard dom and I think I know what that means and they're not defining it for me and then I go, oh, okay.

And then like sometime later we're doing a thing and they're doing their hard dom thing, but that their definition does not match my definition. We now might have a problem. So that's why these things matter. You on an individual level get to decide for yourself, does this term mean anything to me? Do I like it? Do I wanna use it? Do I resonate with it? Or Mhmm. Do I not give a fuck and just reject the shit out of it? As an individual,

everybody gets to do that. But as a community, if these terms are being thrown around, then those of us who are interested should have an idea of what the fuck they mean. So that's why this matters before somebody, like, warms up their fingers to start typing furiously at me. You know, I do act very hyperbolic. I act like that's all I get. It's not. But when I get it, it always comes out of nowhere, and I'm like, are you okay? What's going on

on your end of the Internet? Because that feels like it's not about me. That feels like that was you problem and you spit it out through your fingertips into my DMs. Anyway, I am I've only had, like, a third of my Diet Coke and I am punchy. Okay. So here we go. Okay. So as stated last week in the BDSM Reddit response episode, there was a question about soft kink soft BDSM that came from a subreddit I had no idea existed called softer BDSM.

And, for the purposes of trying to define this, because you will see how s how weird this gets, how strange this gets, I'm gonna read that subreddit's definition of what how they define soft BDSM, soft kink. Okay? Okay. I've gotta click the link and hope it opens. I didn't do this ahead of time. Okay. Yes. I know. It's it's, sure. Sure. Sure. Sure. Just let me no. Please go away. This is what I get. Mhmm. There we go. Okay.

What is soft BDSM? A guide. I will have this linked for people who can actually access our links. We use the term soft BDSM as a blanket term over a whole host of play styles. Some people prefer to avoid pain, humiliation or inflicting harm in their play. These are the types who gravitate to softer play styles. Not all soft BDSM require power exchange, but

it is very common. Domination is being in control, directing scenes, and being a presence over another with the goal of bringing intense emotions to a submissive through kinky play. Soft BDSM often prioritizes fun, comfort and connection while maintaining a kinky edge. It's about exploring pleasure and intimacy without a focus on pain or humiliation. DS dynamics are more care and affection based, dominants being patriarchal or matriarchal. Submissives take direction and cues from the dominant.

Many soft doms focus on setting rules or guidelines that encourage personal growth and self care for their submissives. These are daddies, mommies, caretakers, some owners and good girls, boys, enbies, littles, middles, pets and some brats. Dominants that are lovers taking control in the scene, driving their submissives crazy with pleasure and it's denial. These are the pleasure doms. Bondage

that looks more like relaxation and pleasure. Submissives artfully restrained and pose for meditative rest, sensory There's dozens more types of play that can fall under the term soft BDSM. Hopefully I can cover as much as in another guide. I didn't go look for the other guide but maybe they did. Many will have layers of some of each of these and possibly some hard play included as well. There isn't a hard line in the sand. It's their play and they can tailor it to their own needs and wants.

I love I still don't quite know how I feel about the term soft BDSM. And as I get into what else I found, maybe you will see why. This to me is a well thought out here's what it means to us. I could semantically pick some things apart just to be a bitch but I'm not gonna I'm gonna go,

okay. This community, this person within this community who I believe is, like, probably the, you know, the main person or whatever, thought about it, tried to put it into words, left some room open for it's not exactly this, it's not prescriptive, but in general here's what it is. I respect this definition, even if I could pick it apart a little bit. I'm not gonna I have other things I could pick apart. I'm gonna respect the fact that that community went, this is what this means to me.

What do you think of that definition? I think it's I'm not sure what to think of it. I'm not sure what to think of it, because you know it's about exploring pleasure and intimacy without a focus on pain or humiliation. To me, you know, not everybody's into pain. Not everyone's Damascus. Not everyone's into humiliation. Mhmm. Okay. So you know, maybe I'm a little old school there, but you know it still sounds like just BDSM. It just sounds like BDSM right now. Okay. I I hear the term soft

BDSM. Mhmm. And and I have this vision of, soft romantic music playing, bringing, you know Sort of the airbrush quality. The filter is very Yeah. You know, supposed to bring flowers and, you know, chocolates, wine. I mean, you can if you won't. I still want you to, like, hurt me at the end. Sure. Sure. You know, I I mean, it it BDSM is about connection. It's about the intimacy. Mhmm. And it doesn't have to be about

pain. Right? Right. To me, and I don't know I'm not gonna put this on this community because like I said, I respect the fact that this community went here's here's who we are. If you vibe with us, then you found your place. If you don't, no worries. Right? Yeah. The thing is is when you have a soft BDSM, that kind of means that the what you're sort of painting yourself as not is hard BDSM.

Right? And all I you know, the way I look at it is okay, if all of this with some room, wiggle room, but if all of this is soft that means everything else is hard. Right? Like isn't that sort of the, you know, if it's not soft, it's hard? And I don't like that either. Yeah. A lot of this describes you and I, and I would never use soft for myself. Here's here's where I think there is a disparity disparity with the terms. Soft BDSM, hard BDSM. BDSM

all comes with risk. Mhmm. What you're doing whatever no matter what you're doing there is a risk to it. Right. So may saying soft BDSM, I think could give some people a false sense of security. Yeah. There's no risk. It's softer than gentle. It's soft. It's just, you know, yeah. Sure. Bring it. Right. None of this will harm me. Eric, that real hard. You know? And and I I yeah. Whatever, you know, anything you do in this

lifestyle has a risk to it. I also and this could be me reaching, but I don't think I'm alone in this. When we call something soft, you know, other words that are gentle, right, kind, easy, and the thing is is and this is me going to an extreme when I say this probably, but how easy would it be for a predator? Predators in BDSM already can hide very easily. They just gotta know a few words and, like, keep their shit together for, like, thirty seconds, you know, in a DM or five

minutes at the coffee meetup. Right? Predators exist everywhere, but how easy is it for a predator to hide as, well, I'm soft. I'm gentle. I'm easy because that implies, for somebody who might not be thinking this way you and I know it doesn't imply shit. But I can see where it would imply, oh, soft BDSM and, like you said, is safer. Air quote that real big, real big. Or it's easier or it's kinder or there's, you know, I don't have to worry as much because this is the softer side of BDSM.

That's I could that be me overthinking it? Sure. Because predators are everywhere and abusers will find whatever they can, blah blah blah. Yeah. But I'm with you. This it gives the sense that first, I could see somebody who comes across it going, oh, this is not that big, bad, mean, all black leather whips and chains BDSM, which is kind of how that gets categorized in other places not here. And it's like, well, first of all, that's not all that BDSM

is. Right. And when you know, it goes back to what I was saying a minute ago for me. When we say there's a soft BDSM, well, BDSM, well, then in direct opposition to that, there must be a hard BDSM. Well, where the fuck does that leave the rest of us in the middle? Because I wouldn't classify anything we do as soft. Others could classify what they see from us as soft. I don't give a fuck. That's you, not me. I don't call us soft, but I'm sure shit

not gonna call us hard. We are just kinky people living our kinky life, and sometimes it's soft and gentle, and sometimes it's kinda hardcore and a little scary. I I think in a way, you know, maybe this is an attempt, you know, I mean, we talk through the years about how BDSM is a spectrum. Okay? You know from from one end to the other and and maybe this is just an attempt to, you know, put a label on the the spectrum.

Mhmm. Maybe. And I you know, that's why I say from no matter how I personally feel about a term, if it resonates with somebody, it fucking resonates with somebody. I want people to be clear on what the fuck they're saying because terms like this are shorthand, and people think they know what something means. And then you actually get to talking about it and both you know, two people might think completely different things about the same same term. Right?

I also I don't love this idea from the outside looking in, not maybe within a community where you know it's pleasure doms, caregivers, this, that, you know, the gentler side. And even that's subjective. My gentle might be your rough. My soft might be your hardcore. Right? That's the other kind of problem I have with some of these terms is because Yeah. What you mean by it and what I mean by it could be completely at odds with one another.

Will I fit into this community if I wanted to be in it I don't would I fit into this community even if I define soft in a different way? Right? Mhmm. So there's that. But there's also this idea and it pops up a lot online and it's gonna come up in the notes, towards the end because that was fascinating. I was like, that made me think thoughts, of sort of this idea of of putting some kinksters putting themselves distinguishing themselves from the big, bad, scary, deviant kinky

people. We do this sweet soft thing over here. Look it up. And I and I don't agree with it, but the question last week of, oh, aren't you just vanilla with sprinkles? That's bullshit. That is complete fucking bullshit. But if that the connection I make then is back to the domestic discipline episode. For the folks who are clearly doing BDSM, They use the language of domestic discipline and then do everything in their power to distance themselves from that yucky, nasty, scary BDSM.

Right? Yeah. And I'm not saying this specific community does it. I'm not saying everybody. But there's there's a layer to that of I need to I wanna distance myself from that scary stuff, that mean stuff, that crazy stuff. Like, it doesn't come across as you know? If you were soft, the implication is somebody is hard. Yeah. If you're the the gentle ones, somebody else is too rough. And and, yes, yes, let's be very clear. There are kinksters who want it rough, like it rough,

define rough Oh, yeah. In their own terms, whatever. But like you said, all of this is a spectrum, and quite frankly, the other thing I don't like about prescriptive terms like this Mhmm. Is that it can box somebody in and either and these are the things I can think

of. There's more reasons. But it either is gonna make somebody reject a part of themselves when it doesn't fit that definition, when they want to be a little rough, when they want to be appear a little angry, you know, let it get air quote heard hard kink. Right? And so they're either gonna think, uh-oh, I'm doing it wrong, or, uh-oh, I don't fit, or, uh-oh, I'm not actually a part of this community, and too many people get real fucking this community.

And too many people get real fucking worried about doing it, quote, the right way. Yes. Yeah. Because they're trying to follow this checklist of if I say I'm this kind of kinkster, this is what it means to be. And that's not true because we all contain multitudes. Some people a 100% will will see this particular definition of soft BDSM go, yep, that's me, and they might live in that space forever.

Others, though, will get new partners who bring different vibes and they want to try new stuff with, will, you know, discover things about themselves regardless of whether they stay with the same partner or get a new partner and want to explore some things. They will, you know, learn about ways to play or see how other people do it and be inspired and it won't fit the tidy little box they're putting themselves in.

And that can create some am I doing kink right moments that don't that are unnecessary. You know? I was thinking about this earlier. It's this is a danger that if I start thinking about my, like, getting into my own thoughts on a topic, I'll forget what they are by the time it's time to talk about it. This one kind of stuck with me because it's a thing I come back to a lot. When I have to describe myself as a kinkster, I don't have a single term I can use. I give you all the terms.

And I'm aware that all those terms can mean different things on any given day. So if I'm describing myself, I usually say submissive, but to be most accurate, I mean, service submissive masochistic baby girl. That's a lot of shit. Right? And that still is just broad strokes because, broadly, most people will understand service admissive to a certain extent. You'll you'll understand masochist. You'll

understand baby girl. Now I can drill down and tell you what that exactly means to me, but kind of we're working in within the same framework. But here's the reality. I am almost never, at the same time, all of those things at once. Right? My service side will come out in various ways and at various times. My masochist side is very tied to my my mental head space, my mental energy, and my

mental health. Right? I can take some pain, you know, when I can actually relax and get my mind to shut up that I can't take if I'm tense and my mind is running nonstop. My baby girl side will sometimes be playful, but she'll sometimes be a a snot nosed little shit too, you know? And so if I tried to say I'm just this, well, whatever there is no single word. If I want I mean, if I wanna say there's a single word, I would just say submissive.

Because ultimately, yeah, that's probably the broadest term. But based on the way soft BDSM is described in this particular definition, which of what I found is the absolute best, it only goes downhill from here. I would fit that. I mean, until I was like, I'm a need you to make it hurt. I'm gonna need you to make me cry. I'm a right? And that's from on a personal level of how I personally view it, we all get to view it the way we fucking want to. Mhmm. That's why I don't like terms like these.

It boxes us in when it's easy to start out and kink and think, like, think you are one thing or think you check very specific boxes. You know, my experience is the more you explore, the more the deeper the trust goes with a partner. You know, you have time with one another. You can develop things together.

You get comfortable enough and vulnerable enough. You're able to be intimate together, you get comfortable enough and vulnerable enough, you're able to be intimate enough to go outside of, like, you know, the the early boundaries you might have set for yourself in the very beginning. You discover shit about yourself you could not have anticipated. Not at all. And I would pro like, just call it kink, just call it BDSM, just call it powertrain.

Use your broad terms as an understanding of, like, what it is you're doing, and then drill down into the specific terms that encompass you at this moment with an understanding it could and probably will change over time. That to me, from this angle that where we talk about when we try and help people, that to me is the danger of something like a soft BDSM. Because soft BDSM implies there's a hard BDSM, which doesn't make any fucking sense either. And, you know, well, if I'm soft, I

can't be hard. Yeah. What does it mean about my identity if I've I started soft, but now I'm kind of Here's You know what I mean? Here's an interesting thing and and and maybe I just think of things differently. You know, if you really come down to it, it's not the BDSM that is soft or hard or, you know, it's the person. Right. It's the person. What you want, what you, you know, I know somebody said, and I know myself. You know, shit, now I lost my train of thought because damn phone.

No. No. It'll come back to you sometimes. It will. Silent in the the chat uses the word that that I was not I could not get to, but it is yes. It is rigidity. Mhmm. It's rigid thinking. And plenty of people there are plenty of people who are not typically rigid in their thinking, but anybody can be rigid in your thinking. It could be from a need to air quote do this right. It can be a I figured out who I am and I'm I'm done with that work now. I don't have to do

that again. It could be for all kinds of reasons. Right? And I that rigidity and and how we see ourselves and the terms we use, the labels, the identity, that's a problem across the spectrum of kink. It's just easy to pick on soft BDSM because I can I can already see how this could go wrong, You know? Yeah. There was a time when I thought that the most pain I might want would be an over the knee spank bare you know,

bare handed spanking, and that was it. And now I'm you know, I haven't pushed much beyond that, but those kinds of spankings don't have to be, but are often seen as a kinder, gentler spanking than, like, big ass heavy fucking paddle coming down on you with full force. Well Or cane or something. Yeah. You know? Or any toy you hate, but you consent to

anyway. And that's another thing. I think about it in terms of that, and I I think about the nuance, not in terms of soft BDSM specifically, but who I am as a kinkster. Because on one hand there are times I want the actual pain. Right? Pull my hair like you're going to take my scalp off. Hit me on the ass with whatever so hard, like, the neighbors are knocking on the door. Right? There are times when it's the pain that I want and then there are times it's not the pain that I

want, it's the submission that I want. It's the I endured that for you. I understood what I was getting into. I could could I fully consented to it. I understood what was happening. But if you asked me, do I pick that? Is that what I want? No. It's not what I want. But there's another part that I'm getting from that. It's not the sensation that I want. It's the moment with you. And those can look gentle. They can look rough. They can look hard. They can look soft, like, whatever.

And it's understanding the nuances of my own kink play, my own kink identity that makes me very leery of terms like this because they feel somehow both overly broad, like, and not and not and yet not quite enough. Because in order to define it like this particular subreddit community did, which

again I actually respect them. They that's us sitting down and going this is what we mean by this, but it means that people who might actually fall under that definition will think they don't because of this element over here. Mhmm. Or, you know, people who don't see you know, are more worried about, oh, the big scary side of d d BDSM will think, like you said earlier, that you're in a air quote safer zone. Like, it can be kind of misleading. Yeah. And yeah, I'll reiterate from what I said

at the top. On an individual level, these terms can be very meaningful and we get to put our own meaning in them. The reason I I one of the other reasons I care about that and will say that is I want folks to figure out what the hell it means to you once you can share that if somebody ever asked, but too so you are clear to the extent you can be at this moment on who you think you are right now, but without the rigidity of I can never change.

You know? This is who I am and this is who I will remain. No. I mean, I guess yes, but I'm gonna ask five years from now are you actually happy or are you just doing what you think you're supposed to because that's the box you checked five years ago? And that's where I get skeptical. So, let's go. So that I will say was the best actual definition I found. Okay? Now as I was searching, I came across I think it's in the same no. It's in a different, subreddit, but it's a BDSM subreddit.

Somebody was asking how other people define it for themselves. Now this is an old thread. It didn't get a lot of traction, so there's not a lot there. I have linked it where I can put links. The one person's response resonated the most and I did the whole quote because I think the last sentence actually shows the difference of how we, define these things and that how that can be tricky. So what the person said was in, you know, how what does soft or hard BDSM mean to you? How do you

define that for yourself? Which I appreciated that person's question because they understood we all define these things for ourselves. Right? This person said, I think it all depends and can be arbitrary categorization. It can also create a need to prove yourself to be hardcore. Right? Oh, I'm not soft if you reject soft. Well, that means for some people, oh, I I must be hardcore. I'm not

right? But then what they said was, because this is how subjective this shit is, if I had to classify soft versus hard, I would base it on risk. And here's the thing. Yeah. That too has its own subjectivity to it. Right. Because most people will classify risk based on physical harm. Are you going to bleed? Is something going to fall off? Are you going to die? Yeah. Because each person's risk assessment is gonna be different from your Exactly. Risk assessment. And it often this person didn't. I'm

not putting words in this person's mouth. But often when we talk about risk and people are like, oh, that's a lower risk thing, what can often happen is they dismiss the power of emotional and mental risk that cert even what seems like very basic from the outside. You know, an emotion a risk that you have in all types of kink play, but sometimes it's specific types. Is does this thing

become a person's trigger from now on? Is this thing you you plan for it, you try, you thought it was gonna be, like, your everyday scene and now it's a traumatic event in someone's life? Like, you know, I kind of yes. The physical risks are the most obvious and the ones that can lead to actual death or at minimum a trip to the hospital. And yes, we all should be very careful about those, but the mental and emotional risks are can often be, you know, like they last the length of your lifetime

sometimes. Mhmm. They change the trajectory of your life sometimes. Yes. And so to not, you know, to dismiss what I mean is risk also becomes suggestive subjective at that point. My you know, I purposely don't want to play in ways where I'm risking my actual physical health that much. Right? Right. I'm not interested in playing to the point of, oh, you might have to call 911 now. I'm

that's not how I want to play. But I know that there are times where we don't do role play because I don't like that but JB does and I just respond appropriately. He's a one man show and I'm over there going yes daddy, and it works for us. But it is entirely possible he could say a thing or we could do a thing that I mean, I I could be having nightmares for weeks or months. That was not intended. We couldn't have even fucking planned for that, but now we have to live with it.

And based on what it is and and how I respond and what it does to me mentally, well, is that not on some sometimes on the same level as, oopsie now my arm's on a cast. We didn't mean for that to happen. You know what I mean? Yep. So I point that person's response out to say, you know, some people are talking about soft, like the the other community on, oh, well, you're gentle. You're a caregiver. It's about, like, calm, nurturing things and not about the pain. And

this person's like, actually, it's about risk. Well, then what the fuck is it about? Nobody knows. Right? Yeah. Nobody knows. Yeah. But I liked that too. Okay. So here's where we get into the point where I was starting to go, what the fuck? What the fuck? Because here Okay. Here was the problem. Okay? I'm gonna skip my notes to get to the point of why this was a problem. So come across a whole ass community on Reddit of soft BDSM.

I knew it was not the first time I'd heard it, but it's not something I hear all the time. It's not like, you know, fucking the does anybody remember the day caller conversation that had nothing to do with kinksters? They were either trad wives or domestic discipline or something something, and they were like, I have a day caller, and we're all like, what are you saying? Right? It wasn't at that rate of prevalence. It was not trending in the spaces I'm at. So I'm like,

is this being talked about? Let me go. And I went multiple routes. Okay? I was on Evie's YouTube channel going, has she ever talked about this? If she has, I couldn't find it. I was on Instagram looking looking up the tag soft BDSM, softer BDSM. Mhmm. I could find content that either Instagram kinda tagged it that way or they had tagged, but that wasn't what they were their conversation was. Their conversation was communication. It was relationship styles. It

was mental health. And I'm like, what the fuck does this have to do with soft BDSM? Like it's not specific to soft BDSM. I did a Google search, for, for TikToks because those are you can find TikToks on a Google search if you, you know, or look at for them. And I could see people kind of talking about it, but not not from my glance at, like, some great amount because quite frankly, when you search soft BDSM you come up with soft limits, hard limits. I was like, that's a different conversation.

We've had that conversation. I went to FetLife. I'm like, are there groups? Are there I looked under groups. I looked under writing. People would talk about they would use the term soft or softer in their writing, but the topic was not soft BDSM. Not The algorithm or however FetLife's search results work did not pull up anything for me. And I'm like, then where the fuck is this coming from? Other than Reddit Mhmm. And I'm sure there are people, like, in communities and, yep,

clearly the subreddit. You know, somebody's talking about it. But here's where I fucking found it, and here's where I got annoyed. Because some people don't go to FetLife first. If they don't see what they want on their social media platform of choice, they do go to Google. And Google's fucking AI results, which I fucking hate. I hate the AI results. Will do a conglomeration of something from what it thinks the top resources are. And if the resources are shit, then the answer is shit.

And I am personally offended by that, okay? Because here were the fucking answers I got. Some of the sites I found, like, one was a sex toy shop that had a blog element. One was like a an adult, like, online magazine kind of thing photos. I can't link to any of it on YouTube because YouTube will smack my hand. But here are some of the fucking definitions I got. And this is where I

was like, are you fucking kidding me? So from one website, soft BDSM is a lighter, more accessible version of BDSM ideal for beginners who wish to be introduced to this world in a gentle way. In soft BDSM, pain and humiliation are generally limited, and the practices are more sensual and erotic. Hard BDSM, in this particular case, they were like, okay. There's a soft, here's a hard. Hard BDSM, on the other hand, is for the more experienced and thrill seeking individuals.

In hard BDSM, the pain, humiliation, and control are more intense and the practices can be more extreme. I feel like many words were used and yet nothing was fucking said, but that's just me. And then somebody else another website I have two more. From another website, soft BDSM refers to lighter, more approachable BDSM practices that focus on sensuality and connection. Because the harder BDSM, it does not give me a fuck about connection? Anyway, this is where I get annoyed.

Unlike intense scenes in a dungeon, soft BDSM allows couples to experiment with power dynamics, light restraint, light restraint, and sensation play all while staying within their comfort zones. I get to stay in my comfort zone no matter how hardcore we get. Anyway, and then and then this one, this one had me cussing and JB came to look at what I was looking at like, what? What? This was from the sex toy shop that just had a blog component, wanted to come up and search. I get how that works.

Soft kink is just for beginners. And then it goes on to mention, like, several things beginners can do. Now beginners can do whatever. I beg you to do some research first. Start where your kinky heart guides you the most, like, please. But in their beginners list is vloggers and wax play. Now can beginners use that? Yeah? But I I don't categorize anything as soft or hard fucking kink. Yeah. But I'm not sure if I were to that vloggers and hot wax are gonna come under

soft to me. That that unsettles me a bit. Okay? You know, vloggers? I mean, yeah. Vloggers can be gentle. Sure. They can. But you have to know what the fuck you're doing with it. I I I have that small flogger that I use on you sometimes. That's Sure. Like a soft warm up flogger. That's what I use it for. They bring out the bigger stuff. But you know I I don't know if I consider myself lucky that I fell into the community the way I did at the time.

And, and that I I learned things that you know you just don't pick up a flogger and start swinging into somebody. Okay? You know, yeah, it can be fun, but damn it if you do something wrong Mhmm. Okay, there's gonna be some hurt. Right. And it you don't even have to be going that hard. Mm-mm. All you have to do is, like, miss aim a little bit. Miss aim, what do you you know, it's You've act I mean, it doesn't matter how long you've been doing it, anybody can make

mistakes. Anybody can make mistakes. You were slogging me the other night and your aim went weird and we got lucky. Mhmm. Look, I don't we don't flog or do impact on my actual asshole. That's not a thing I wanna do. So when he's flogging me and those very stingy strands of leather or suede or whatever go right up my ass crack. We are both on high alert because that's not the good kind of pain. And he normally avoids it and it happened because the mistake happens. And he and JB went, are you

okay? I was like, we're good. You keep going. Just just watch your name there. And that is somebody who's been flogging. You've been doing vloggers for what? How fifteen to twenty years? Yeah. And it it it can happen. Right. And it was a relatively gentle flogging. Like, it wasn't overly painful, but that was a sensitive spot. Mhmm. And so that was overly painful. So the reason I bring these up is, one, there's no goddamn consensus on

what fucking ever soft BDSM is. The only kinks like, kink informed definition I found was that subreddit on BDSM. Right? Mhmm. Which again, semantically I can pick it all apart, but I respect the fact they went, this is this is our community, this is what I mean. Okay. I get to disagree with it, but they couldn't live their best fucking air quotes off BDSM life and more power to them. But let us be real. People, like, little baby kinksters, they do not

go to fucking FetLife first. They will probably do their social media platform of choice, and then many and I know this because I've had websites for fifteen fucking years now many are going to Google. Right. So what comes up in Google actually matters to like, we have to fucking care a little bit if we I say, well, we on this side of the microphone have to keep because that's where people are getting information. People find their way to Tumblr.

Oh, I have a Tumblr one and Where where, you know, and, you know, they find their way to to porn. You know, written Yes. You know, I mean, and and there is definitely such an unrealistic Yes, very much so. Okay. Now here's what's kind of hilarious. I tried soft BDSM ver like, these are my search terms. Soft BDSM versus hard BDSM. Well, then I got a lot of stuff on limits and I found some stuff, like, the stuff the crap I've been reading out

loud these past few websites. Alright. Then I was like, well let's try soft kink. Kind of the same stuff came up. Then I was like, well hard BDSM? You would not be surprised that the only thing that came up in that search was all hardcore BDSM porn. And I was like, that's not I mean okay, but that's not for what I need. What that kinda tells me is within the community at writ large, this is not a com these are not common terms. That doesn't mean people don't use

them. Maybe it's a social media thing that bled over other places. Maybe, like, there were secret Facebook groups and it kind of branched out from there. I don't know. I don't know where it originates. I can't find anything. I can't even find consistent, like, ways of defining it. But here's what I know about the kind of the generic websites that are just trying to rank for certain terms. You you know, like one was, the site was like playful

something. It was like playful magazine and most of most of what I saw was like photography, like erotic photography. Well, that's actually what they're there for, but they wanna rank for something so people can find it. One, I definitely can't link to on YouTube because they were talking about, like, pro doms that you hire, and if you want the soft BDSM you hire this is how you work with that pro dom. Dom. The hard BDSM. Like, it was very clear we were talking about hiring a professional here.

But, again, you know, I it matters to me because that's how a lot of people are going to go try to learn about a term. Right? Mhmm. And with AI being enmeshed in fucking Google searches, AI compiles from what it considers the top sources the best sources. I don't under I don't know how exactly it picks who it picks. But if that's if you searched soft BDSM and AI actually fucking work because it doesn't always, and the conglomeration of what soft BDSM is is was from those websites

that was like, oh, it's for beginners. Oh, it's for, like, those crap ones, not the subreddit. Then you're poorly misinformed when you're learning about it. But it and then the other thing to understand about content, every one of us has come across this you just might not know you did. So what will often happen is one or two sites they could be they could be major media sites, they can be little rando sites will write about a topic. Okay? And then maybe that trends for a while,

maybe it comes up as a search. Some some other site goes, we want to write about that topic too. We want to rank in Google for that topic. Well they go to Google to do their research. Who do they pull from if they don't have personal lived experience on a thing? They pull from the previous sites

who have written about it. Now if site one and two were completely incorrect in how they categorized it, in my opinion, like the last few websites I just read from, that means sites three, four, five, six, seven just regurgitate. This is very common in online content the misinformation from the original sites you wrote about it. So it just it just proliferates and you never get a real understanding. Well, that's bad for all kinds of things when you're trying to learn about topics, but

I bring it back to kink. That ain't good if a lot of people start with a Google search. Whether you're writing about kink or you're trying to understand a topic or you're like, oh I think that might be the kink I'm into, it's bad information compounded over and over again and then a Google search goes, these are the top ones. This is what it must mean. Kinksters know that's not what it fucking means. Thankfully, Reddit's subreddits still show up in Google.

Quite frankly, I I learned I get a lot of my information these days from different subreddits. You have to be you have to think critically. It's not always right. Sometimes it's absolute trash. But that's that's where as a person who spends her life trying to go, hey, here's a way to think about kinks so that you can have a happy healthy power exchange relationship and also don't pigeonhole yourself into these boxes that might not be right for you, we're combating that kind of information.

And then to find out it's not even really a thing that the community writ large in places I would go, that is where BDSM community lives frequently, can't find it. So one, I'm very interested in where the fuck this term came from. Two, you mentioned Tumblr. Okay? Mhmm. Okay. Uh-oh. Now this one I really fucking liked. Okay. Okay. Okay. So when I did the search for hard BDSM Mhmm. And of course found porn, I also came across a Tumblr post that's from, like, four years ago, 2021.

And it kind of mirrored my own kind of thinking that I was coming to by myself before this and it was really, like, solidifying as we went. And their post said hard kink isn't a term the community tends to use, and the equivalent we might have would be edge play, and it's all subjective. And I was like, yes.

Yeah. Now let's be clear. If hard kink, which we don't usually call it, but I'm sure people do, is actually edge play, and edge play, hard kink, whatever term you want, is subjective, then that means to me automatically you have to understand soft kink, soft BDSM, gentle BDSM, whatever is subjective. But if nobody's talking about it in terms of subjectivity Mhmm. And you have to define these things for yourself and you can't apply, like, a big broad umbrella to it, not easily anyway Mhmm.

That was the most accurate thing I feel like I found where I was like, this is what's making sense to me with all of this searching I'm doing. Because pleasure dom? Oh, oh, I found so so much shit. Hard dom, soft dom? Mhmm. I was trying to look for hard and soft BDSM and what kept coming up was hard and soft DOM. Which that makes me wonder, is hard DOM, soft DOM, hard BDSM, soft BDSM, are people using that interchangeably because too many people think the dom just leads the whole BDSM

relationship? So if the dom is soft, then the whole thing you're doing is soft. I didn't find anything where somebody said that, but I feel like that correlation could be made. Mhmm. Right? But this is yeah. Maybe it's because I was a freelance writer for a million years. Maybe it's because I've been writing content for my own fucking websites Mhmm. For a million fucking years. I get really annoyed when the and I don't just personally just rely on first page of a

Google. I'm I'll go 10 pages deep if I think I can find something that's more obscure, wasn't popular enough, but is more correct. Right? Or is another viewpoint that's worth considering. Right? But the it's a it's a almost, but not quite a benign benign kind of misinformation. Mhmm. But it is still misinformation. Soft kink is for beginners. Look. Slow kink is for for everybody,

but for beginners. Yeah. But I'm not gonna say soft kink is for beginners and then give you a laundry list of things that actually I need you to at least read an article or watch a video on before you try this. You know? It's not please please please don't pick up that item and just start using it because somebody labeled it as soft kink for beginners. You know what I mean? Mhmm. And that's the false sense of security people get when they think of it as soft. Exactly. I hate it.

Okay. The I think for going through the notes, what I found Mhmm. Then we can sum up and whatever Yeah. How we feel. I found something and I again, it'll be linked in the show notes and YouTube folks, I'll get the show notes linked as soon as I can. I did go to FetLife, and I was like, let's let's search for these terms if there's a community, if there's people writing about it. I have a feeling people are writing about

these concepts without using these terms. Right? But I came across something that as of the date of recording, November 12, this, piece had only come out five days ago. Okay? This is relatively new. It's not somebody I know. Their handle is Innocent Empath. I don't know anything about them. Mhmm. But their piece on this, that's when I stopped and went, oh, maybe this is what this is about. Bear with me. They their article talked about the watering down of kink.

About how some kinksters are trying to soften the edges of BDSM to make it more palatable and mainstream to show that we're not actually air quote deviance, we're not scary. You don't need to be scared of us. And the article is like I'm not being eloquent. The article was eloquent. Okay? And and that made me stop in my tracks because, you know, we've we talked a few weeks ago about is, you know, is kink being normalized or is it just trending? And it is a lot incorporated.

And there is even there, you can see the softening of that just day color because you're, you know Yeah. You happen to be the wife your heterosexual wife of a man, and you're living that air quote traditional life. Mhmm. What? Like Well, you know, I mean, and and that's why I say, you know, with things like that, and, wasn't there, a thing with a group of people they were unknowingly I believe, but they thought that No Nut September meant something else, and they were kinda going with it.

Vaguely. I think I vaguely remember something about that. Yeah. Because context matters and the Internet flattens everything. Right. Can I say this? I God. Talk about Google search. I I found this stuff, Jeeves. Ask Jeeves. I remember Ask Jeeves. Yeah. So but I don't know. It's it's all man, what's what's I pulled up the article because this person really did say it way better

than I I could. And I you know, I think I don't know, because I haven't sat with it long enough, if I agree with everything this person has has written or if I see it this way completely, but there's enough of it that made me go, is that what this is? Or that's what this started out or is being perpetuated by non kinksters. And some kinksters are making it work for themselves because it resonates, you know. So they start out their article saying, yesterday a slave friend made a comment that made

me pause. She said, I have noticed that BDSM activities are being vilified by many on here. On here must mean FetLife because that's where this article is. And they said, you know, I've noticed it too, it's been bothering me. There's a strange, frustrating contradiction happening right here in our own community. On a site built for people drawn to BDSM, I see the very essence of what makes this lifestyle powerful and appealing, being solely vilified, sanitized, and

watered down. Yeah. Now I don't think that's just what soft BDSM might be doing, but I think it's a symptom of us. I I I think there's a a combination of things with that. Mhmm. You know, let let's be honest, a few years, even FetLife was part of a a a purge. Mhmm. Okay? You know, anything to do with blood plague had to be taken down. Right. And that was about financial stuff. And that was my financial stuff. But it's still frustrating. So it it it is. It's very frustrating.

But I I have been seeing, you know, we have said this on this show many many times. Your kinks not my kink, but your kinks okay. Mhmm. You know? And and that was the big thing about the the BDSM community at one time. You know, we do things differently and, you know, we do not look at what somebody else is doing. Right. Look down on them just because it's something we don't like. Absolutely. You know? And and I think that is happening more and more. Mhmm. I I think that is

happening more and more. I I, you know, totally agree with with what they're saying. You know, So they had three main points of why there might be a shift. Okay. And these are their thoughts, words, opinions. The mainstream gaze. As BDSM has become more visible in popular culture, a new audience has arrived. With them comes an unconscious pressure to prove that we're not the monsters, the deviants, or the abusers that we've been historically painted.

In an effort to be understood and accepted by the outside world, we sometimes start policing our own, making our language softer and our public faces more respectable. We try to make it make sense to them and in doing so we risk losing what made it make sense to us. Now I think some of that is very subjective because some people are into kink for different reasons and want different things out of it, blah blah blah, but this did sort of

resonate with me. The next one is the safety police versus the risk takers. Safety is paramount, but there's a difference between advocating for informed consent and attempting to eliminate all elements of psychological intensity or physical risk. Some of the more most profound moments in this lifestyle live in those gray areas in the headspace of a heavy scene, in the ache of a bruise the next day, in the emotional roller coaster of a strict power

dynamic. You know, when we start framing every intense desire as inherently dangerous or problematic, we pathologize the very experiences people come here to find. Now I'm not saying this is an exact like this is either in opposition to or this is where the idea of soft and hard kink come from, but I think this can play into it. Right? You know, I'm I'm into soft kink. Not that dangerous stuff. Now that stuff that that can hurt you goes

back to what you're saying. The moment you call it soft, there's this emotional and mental thing of, oh, it must be a little bit safer. It's not as dangerous. It's not as scary. And that is also subjective. Ah, this this one this must have been why it came up with my search. So then the third one was the hierarchy of right and wrong BDSM. I see it in the comment sections and forums, a subtle and sometimes not so subtle hierarchy forming. The soft dominant is more enlightened than the strict one.

Now I have not seen that and I would Mhmm. My blood would boil if I had. Certain kinks are deemed more acceptable than others. There's a push for a one size fits all version of BDSM that is perpetually gentle, endlessly negotiated, and never ever messy. They point out our journeys don't all look alike. You know, what's messy for one is good. You know, like, it's all an individualized experience. Yeah. And I have not personally seen that.

No. I do see that people, mostly in social media spaces, are real comfortable calling themselves, like, a soft dom Mhmm. Versus I don't know. I'm sure there are people out there who would call themselves a hard dom, just in direct opposition to a soft dom. But the the folks that if I had to try to, like, classify people Yeah. That I would go, oh, maybe that's a hard dom. They don't usually call themselves that. They're just a dom or they're strangers. I just had a I I just had a

little thought. Mhmm. When I first came into the community, I I talked about how there was always, high protocol was a big thing. Mhmm. Mhmm. Could it just be a term shift? Okay. You know, these, you know, these people practice high protocol. Mhmm. Has now become a hard dom. Dom. Well, to be a semantic bitch, high protocol is subjected in and of itself. Because what's high protocol to one person won't be high protocol to the next. Because there's there's layers to it. It's like how I'm

gonna say strict and strict is subject. Is subjective. It's all fucking subjective, which make you crazy. Like, how strict somebody is, you know, how how strict a dom is, what the the rules they want their Mhmm. Their submissive to follow, the way they want to structure the relationship, you know, I think it's in it's I'm so sorry, y'all. Shades of gray. Shades of gray. And I think if you look hard enough, you'll always find somebody that's a little bit, air quote, harder, stricter, whatever,

more high protocol than somebody else. Like, it's just a a never ending kind of, like, you know Mhmm. There's a word I want. And I think all of these I think all of all everything plays a part. And what I mean by that is, you know, there is the there's also the way that if you want to be on social media, specifically TikTok, because that's where a lot of this started, but it has trickled down into Instagram and Facebook and everywhere else, you know, you have to self censor.

Mhmm. I am literally reading books where we're not on social media. It is not context of you have to self censor, and the and the language being used is unaliving instead of killing or dying. Because that's now become part of of it's Internet language, Internet speaking, so it is, like, everyday speak for

some people. And I'm wondering or curious if maybe some of this or a part of this started with people trying to talk about kink in places that would not allow the words, having to self center and start calling things diff different terms, different names, you know, is it somehow more palatable to the algorithms if you say soft versus hardcore hard edged? Like, and I don't think it's ever it's any of this is not one single thing. It's all kinds of things layered on top of one another.

There's no single path to how we got to soft BDSM versus hard BDSM or any of this stuff. But I I can't help wondering how much that might play a role as well because we as a social media society have in some spaces I forget that I don't have to censor myself when I'm on blue sky or in FetLife. Wow. And I'm using emojis because I was like, I can't use the word. I can't even use the fucking word. It's ubiquitous of all kinds of topics, and certainly not

just kink. Okay. First, I just wanna say, Rama, thank you. She made she brought a point that the, blood plate was did not have to be taken down. It just, has to be viewed as only friends only. Oh, okay. So it's not open to the Gotcha. Gotcha. To the whole wide world. You know, I I As as someone who was part of the evolution and saw the evolution of the interwebs. Mhmm. The interwebs is a great place to go and look for information. Mhmm. K?

On the other side of that, the Internet is a horrible place to look for information. You drink it from a fire hose. Okay. You know, and, not gonna go into it too deeply, but, you know, social media, I'm sorry folks. I think people need to pay less attention to social media in so many ways. You know, because everybody has a voice, which is not a bad

thing. Right. Okay. You know, everybody should have their voice, but what come down to is, you know, you use one term, that person uses another term, and and everybody and you know what? Let's go talk to the go into the community, and you get something totally different. Everywhere you go. Yeah. You know?

So it it's everywhere you go, and it's it's -Here's the thing: that is a challenge of any community is that everywhere you go in different pockets of the community, which is why there are some people who say there is not one community, there's like 10,000,000 communities, and I don't disagree with that, But every pocket of the community, every space, whether created purposely or just accidental, people might

use different terms. Right. That is okay. I don't have a problem with that, but the the problem that comes into it is that folks either haven't learned yet Mhmm. Aren't thinking about it, or somehow thinks I don't know. I don't know what the nuance is. Instead of getting comfortable with going, okay. What does that mean to you? How do you define that? Right?

You know, somebody starts a term, somebody picks up, you know, terms, hashtags, whatever whatever can get picked up because people like them, and then they go viral, and then they become the norm because, like, two years ago it was it went viral. It's like talking about the trad wife thing. The term trad wife, five years old. Mhmm. The concept, I mean Low low dreams. At least as old as the Bible, I guess. I mean, it's not just a Christian thing, as somebody, like, angrily, responded.

Obviously it's not, but, you know, the the terms we use for concepts, those are changing, but we're not also keeping up with the idea that, wait, you use a term and I use a term, but we don't have the same definitions. And that is one of many. One of the problems of the Internet is because if everybody is using their voice, like JB said, people are using terms that

Mhmm. They made up a whole cloth or they heard somebody else say but they didn't get context for it, and now we're sharing all this and nobody is now talking about the same thing, which is frustrating. It does leave room for creativity and for you to get new terms, and new terms are not a bad thing. -No. I just think that we as, you know, humans can be very imprecise with the words we use, and and sometimes that's cool that leaves some, like, leaves some

space to, like, do something. But when we're talking about risk assessment and mitigation, when we're talking about what kink can be, I think we have a duty to be more careful with our words. It matters. Mhmm. But, you know, you you mentioned the shades. I mean Okay. That book ruined that fucking expression. Okay. It's a good expression. But Damn book. Yeah. Well, you know. I mean,

you know, when that think about it. When that book came out, and it hit the popularity that it did, okay, the community we were in at the time, West Pasco. The community leader had a plan. You had to. Had a plan to in place because all these people are gonna be coming into the community with you know, ideas that Sure. Aren't Right. Because it's because kink is not a mainstream thing, and it Right. It's still not mainstream. Some of the language of kink has Become printed and gone mainstream.

And I think that goes back to innocent empath's post, which is by doing that, the meaning can get stripped out of it. We were talking about that when we were talking about normalization versus trending. The context and the meaning go away, and then by the time humanity, like, juggles it around and passes it back and forth, now it seems to have a completely different meaning that is not only not useful for the kink community it's kinda supposed to serve, can be actively fucking harmful.

Do I think soft BDSM is actively harmful? Probably not. But it certainly has the potential. And it's imprecise to the point of being kind of unhelpful because I think many kinksters, not all of course, but depending on how long you've been kinky, where you go to get your community fixed, like what spaces you're in. You know, there's plenty of us who are like soft, hard? What are you it.

Yeah. Partly because there are plenty of people that in some forms of play you'd probably call it hard, you'd certainly call it edge play, but in other ways that they play it's definitely a gentler approach. It's softer, it's less about this intensity and more about this, you know, like, we it's why I look at it and go, I no. I'm yeah. Technically, by that definition, I guess I'm soft, but I'm not. I don't it doesn't it's not right. You

know? Or you know, even more, is this part of a shift now in in the community, in in the lifestyle maybe, as the younger people are coming up, and and they're, you know, taking it as their own, as as they should, as they will. Right. That's the the way it works. Of course. I mean, you know, let let's look back to the, oh God, the, the old guard. Old guard. Old guard. Most people don't even know what the hell that means anymore. What that is anymore. But that's where it all you know, where

a lot of this began. Mhmm. And it looks nothing like that anymore. No. There are pockets of it. People are like, I wanna keep this going. Sure. Like, there are so many different ways to express There there there are, you know, and yes, there are there are people who still trend to that, but it it has branched in so many ways. And and maybe this, you know, is is just that that shift of growth that it's it's, you know, moving into something else now. I don't know if I can be heard this far

Your dog was I know. She was she was a wooing. I heard. I heard. So here's the thing. I agree with you completely. Mhmm. Newer younger generations coming up, people who are newer to kink and are learning from different aspects will bring in new language, new terms, have every right to do that. This all shifts all the time. Yeah. And I have enough humility to say that sometimes, yeah, it's probably me being curmudgeonly about a term.

Pleasure dom is is one of them. I still don't like it, but I'm never gonna tell somebody they can't or shouldn't use it. That's a personal thing. Same with soft and hard dom and tile. The thing is is just because a younger generation or a newer generation or, you know, people who are new to kink bring in new stuff. Not all of that is worth keeping. Right? True. Because sometimes the stuff being brought in is coming in from a lack of experience, lack of knowledge,

lack of context. They just learned bad fucking information on the Internet or read something in a book or watched it in a movie, went, well try it and then everybody's in the fucking ER. Right? There's a reason that there were plenty of communities online and in person that both for the the publication of the 50 Shades books and the the release of the movies, they were setting up, like, newbie workshops and spaces to explain. Yeah. All that shit you just saw I mean,

yeah. I guess you can, but no. That's not how this works. This is how this works. Because, of course, all those people were coming in with preconceived notions based on this one thing that they had seen. Yeah. So, yes, the language we use, the meanings of things, the way we do things have to shift and change over time to some extent. It is why safe, sane, and consensual is, like, not a popular thing, and we are now on to

so many new things. I don't even I can't remember the newest, like, acronym anymore because it evolves. It's supposed to evolve. We are supposed to get better at this. Mhmm. I'm gonna, like, be an old lady who wants everybody to get off my fucking lawn on terms that I think are too imprecise and or do a disservice, Right? Soft Right? Soft what is the what is the purpose of soft versus hard? Right? Is it to help people

find, you know, their path? Maybe. But we personally have come across in this line of work for a fucking decade, too many people who cannot just fit one path, one lane, one box. That is, I think, probably not a scientist, I don't have the data but I'm just guessing. That is probably a more normal, you know, variation that we all contain multitudes and little bits and pieces of different things

are going to intrigue us. If what we're saying is the new way is to start yourself off on this lane, whether it's because you're a beginner or that's just how, you know, that's where you feel comfortable with, One, you have the ability to other other kinksters. It's already happening in real time always. But when somebody says, oh, I'm into soft kink and this is what that means, my brain goes, is this your version of one true way? There's a way to be a kinkster. There's a way to

be a soft kinkster. Yeah. I I really don't fucking love that word because then I go back to my thoughts are jumbled. I know y'all are shocked by that. Then I go back to are we fucking watering down kink? Kink is transgressive. Kink is supposed to be a little bit from the outside looking in, deviant, fucking scary. We many of us do shit that would get the cops called on us if a stranger saw it. I mean, it didn't have

context. Quite frankly, sometimes we still do get the cops called on us and they don't even care about the context. Right. You know, that not all kink is exactly that, but that is the trope of kink. The fact many of us, not all, but enough, have been raised to the idea that no man nope. No woman should be submissive to a man just because she's a woman. That is fucking true always. But how many female subs have to go through the, like, mental hoops and twisting turning ourselves inside out to

go Mhmm. Oh my god. I'm breaking everything my mother ever taught me about what it means to be a woman. I'm setting back feminism fifty years. Why? Because even that is a little bit transgressive. The whole rise of trad wives does not help. It doesn't feel that, transgressive in TV. So it's not just a specific type of play, a specific attitude. It's it It's all of it. Yeah. All of it. The reason it's not vanilla is because it's not the societal accepted air quote this is all subjective

air quote norm. Mhmm. Right? So why are we gonna act like within that, we still need to separate out? It's all fucking kink. It's all kink, and it's all our personal playground. Right? We figure out who we are and what we like and, you know, what we're interested in and what we don't like and what sensations we like and sometimes they're real intense. You can get real intense pleasure to the point of pain, but that gets forgotten when we talk about

certain types of sensation. Is it soft if I'm crying from all of the orgasms I've just gotten? I don't know. Doesn't feel soft in the moment. Yeah. And that's that's where I come down on certain terms. Not all. Not all. And maybe I said this I think either the pleasure dome or the soft and the hard hard dome. I can't remember which. Maybe this is a thing where the community over time needs to refine

the terms and or the definitions. Because right now it's either so new or it's so unused within the broader kink community that I found one place that found a definition that didn't make me want to gouge my eyeballs out. One. Now now see, you know, like Eva said, she she found the books entertaining. Oh, well, we know plenty of people who do. And I read I read all the books, and I looked at them as erotica. Sure. I did not look at it as a how to. But you didn't

need it for that. Right. You didn't have your kink awakening while reading those. Exactly. You know, I I got it a different way, and I knew enough that I'm I'm reading that book, I've read enough erotica and and other, you know. Yeah. It's pretty cool, but it's not the real deal. Sure. And too many people took it

as a real deal. Part of that is because then, now, God knows thirty, forty years ago and beyond, it BDSM is not as mainstream as it social media will make you think things are mainstream. They're still not. Okay? I have I gotta, like, get my shit together in this, but I got a whole, like, rant episode of some of the ways I'm very tired of how BDSM is portrayed in some of these movies. It's probably the same thing we've always said, but there's just some things watching these

movies lately. I'm just like, are you fucking kidding me? So even when BDSM gets a little bit of airplay, it's not usually sometimes it is, but usually it's not exact it doesn't exactly do us justice. Right? So if you read or watch something like 50 Shades of Grey and go holy shit, I'm really turned on, and I'm like I'm down for that, and I want to try that, but you have never come across this in your life in a way that doesn't make you go, I think that's actually assault, and is what?

What is happening in this movie? Right? Sidebar. Movie night through our Discord that we do every other month. There have been many times I'm in the text chat because we're not gonna interrupt my voice chat, interrupt the movie with voice chat. I'm like you know that'd be really sexy if there'd been consent there. That kind of stuff, right? If you're first erotic or interesting or this is not this doesn't make me feel bad as a human. Peek into kink is a book is a movie.

I don't like it but I understand why people go okay I'll try that because that's the thing that turned me on. That's the thing, you know, I want to try because that's the thing I was introduced to. Because it's not like you can you can as a, you know, somebody who doesn't know anything about kink, non kinkster with no community, just go to your Facebook page and go, hey, does anybody know about this bondage thing? Like, you're not most people are not gonna fucking do that, right?

So, you know, the lack of mainstreaming of kink in a way that's actually healthy and helpful. It makes sense why people read a book and then think that's the thing I'm gonna do. And Yeah. Anybody's like, what the hell is that noise? Ella is, sniffing and, getting very close to the microphone. So as always, there's a shit ton of nuance to this.

I think I think I can currently come down on the not a fan of soft kink, hard kink, those those divisions because I think for majority of people they're kind they're meaningless because one person soft is another person's hard, one person's hard is another person soft. Intensity of player sensation, man, that's really subjective and could change from scene to scene, day to day, mood to mood. Right? Some days I want it soft and fucking gentle and just, like, be nice and rub my ass, daddy.

Sometimes I'm like, look. I want to question if you actually like me. Okay? And I know I'm not alone in that. I know that from observation. I know that from all these years talking to all of y'all over time. You know? So I'm not a fan of the term. I don't think currently it's a term that the larger BDSM community has adopted yet. If you vibe with the term,

that's your right to fucking do that. I would request in an effort to communicate clearly, to know yourself very well, that you define it for yourself as clearly as you can. But also I beg of you, I beg of anybody who picks a term or a label or whatever, to understand that none of us you are not required to twist yourself into knots to fit the fucking label. The label has to fit you, and if it doesn't fit then don't use it, right?

Don't pigeonhole yourself into something and then somehow feel guilty or bad or like you're doing kink wrong when you sanitization, the the sanit sanitization, the mainstreaming, the watering down so that we can talk about it on non in non kink spaces of these terms of kink that bleeds into all of this in some way. I don't have any direct correlations. I don't have any, like, grand answers for how, but I think that has something to do with it a little bit. Mhmm. You know? Because

I agree. We have entire platforms where you cannot say or type certain words without getting banned or blocked or kicked off or no more monetization for you or whatever whatever whatever. And that does change how we speak as the general we. Right? And how we communicate these things then trickles down to people who are just

discovering it. And if that's their first introduction to kink and it's resonating with them, but they're using words that the actual kink community who's living the fucking life on some level is like, what the fuck does this even mean? It's unhelpful, but that that's playing a part because which came first, the chicken or the egg? Which came first? The term soft BDSM that somebody resonated with and then went, shit. That doesn't actually mean anything. Let me come up with a definition.

Or was that kind of grouping of ways of being kinky out there and there was just no term for it. Which one was it? If it is somebody used a term that resonated but there was no actual definition and people are now trying to make a definition, that's gonna be imprecise until a greater part of the community kind of goes actually maybe that's not the right word, maybe we switch that term, let's tweak the definition, whatever whatever. You know what I mean? I just

That I think it's complicated. I'm not a fan. For all the semantic reasons, I can always bitch about. You know, one person's this is another person's that, blah blah blah blah. You put yourself into a box. It's not gonna fit eventually, and then you're gonna be all like, what am I even really? Then you're gonna be in my inbox and I'm gonna do the, don't worry. It's fine. We contain multitudes. You know? You don't have to keep the label you picked on day one of kink. Like, most

many of us don't. Some people do, but many of us really don't. It shifts it more. It's kind of supposed to. Yep. Good lord. If kink was all if the kink life I was trying to live today was what I first discovered on the Internet in 2010, first of all, I think I'd have a lot more kinky sex. But I'm pretty sure I'd be fucking miserable because that version of kink I was finding and resonating with had no sass, had no, playfulness,

nobody was giggling. There was a lot of sort of quiet, unquestioning obedience. Is anybody surprised? That's not quite my jam. Right? That's all I'm fucking saying. Yeah. Any parting thoughts? I ranted so hard my cheeks are really hot right now. Got them rolling. They're very red. I know. Yeah. I kinda think I have rosacea, but I don't know that for a fact because, health insurance does not cover those kinds of dermatology appointments, and I don't care enough to come

back home. But I think I might. Anyway, that has nothing to do with this. No. So, you get to decide for yourself what you think of soft BDSM. Yeah. I know. Do you have a a a final thought on the punctuation at the end of the sentence on soft BDSM? No. Is it a yeah what she said kind of deal? It can be if you want it to be. I mean, you know, it it it kinda is what it is. I You don't kinda care that much, do you? No. Yeah. No. I'm I'm the word girl

who thinks blah blah blah blah. And I get very heated over these I mean, like like I said, I I think it, you know, from from my point of view, how I see it, you know, I I think it gives a some can give people a false Yes. Perception of what it is. Mhmm. Mhmm. I agree. So anyhow Okay. K? Yeah. I'm sure somebody's pissed off at me. It'll be okay. I'm I'm when I'm prepped for it, it doesn't bother me when it happens. So when I'm surprised by somebody's anger, then I'm like, what?

So yeah. We can that's that on that, and we can hoop on a section. Okay. So are we good? I don't know. I don't know. Keep it kinky, y'all. And we'll see you next week. Howdy. Yes, baby girl. Can I talk to the crickets? Sure. Tayceu said, is this episode an attempt for Kayla to keep her inbox clear? You know, yes and no. Like, I have a very weird, like, way of looking at this. On one hand hopefully I can articulate

this. On one hand, I believe that part of the journey of all this is to the extent that you do like are, you know, mitigate risk and are still alive at the end of it, people are gonna walk through this journey and you it's on the job training when it comes to kink. You're learning as you go, and that tends to have the lessons that stick the best. Right? I'm also the type of person that's like, I cannot protect everybody from themselves. It's just

impossible. Right? And yet also I am desperate sometimes to reach the person who has tied up their sense of self worth and value as a kinkster into what other people tell them kink is supposed to be. Right? Or what other people say is the real way, the right way, the true way. You know, here's this one simple term they aren't they won't tell you about. You know, you're kinky. Like that kind of

bullshit. Like I'm desperate to kind of like find get to those people and go, look, look, woah, woah, you get to make this whatever the fuck you want it to be. I can't tell you what this is because I don't know you and live your life. Like, that's the other thing. When we talk about this with many of y'all who are you know, many of you have plenty of experience of kink. You're very solid in your kink life. You're, like, you're not looking to do a lot of, like, big changes or whatever.

I don't wanna tell you how I think you should think about something. I wanna give you the concept or the question that maybe you had not thought about before. I'll give you my thoughts all day every damn day. But mostly what I want those folks to walk away from this with is, oh, well, what do I think about that? Sometimes the answer is I actually don't give a fuck and that's valid. But sometimes it's, oh, I never thought of

it that way. Let me go off and think about it, have a conversation with my community or my partner or my whoever, and then that's how people get to decide for their fucking selves what these things mean to them. That's what I ultimately want for everybody, but there is a part of me that is desperate to get to those people and to validate those people and to calm the fears of those people who are like I'm doing it all wrong. You're not. You're

not. Are you are you clearly communicating to the best of your current abilities? Are, you know, is consent informed and enthusiastic and clear? Do you know that there are risks associated what with what you're doing and how you're gonna try your best to avoid them? After that, you're fine. You're fine. You're fine. Just find your own fucking path, whatever it is. I don't want anybody to copy me. I don't know my own path. Some days some days I'm like, I would like to

have this kink fantasy in my head. And then I'm like, actually, no. I just want that to stay right there, up there in the noggin. I don't need that out in real life. And some days I'm like, I wanna be a sassy little baby girl. And sometimes I'm like, I want you to make me cry. Who am I to tell you what your King Clive should be? I don't know. Anyway, so all that said no. I'm not trying to keep my inbox clear because it's gonna be in the Monday podcast, but I think I should tell him myself

because of the inbox clear comment. Should I tell him myself? Your kinky friend Kayla Lords is a dumbass. Just put that on a shirt somewhere. You made a mistake. It's not the mistake. The mistake is fine. It's what I put myself through. We came off of hiatus for the Q and A episodes. We did one and then I'm sure if anybody actually listens or watches those, you're like, where'd they go? We weren't

getting questions. We weren't getting questions. I was like, I know that email inbox I'm using is a little janky but I I've been getting emails. I know it works on that. I can't send from that email account. It's very annoying. It's a mystery. Anyway. So but no emails are coming through. And I'm like, I'm not gonna force it. If we don't have emails, we just don't record a video that week or record a podcast

episode. It's fine. It's fine. But after a few weeks I was like, does nobody want to ask us questions anymore? I mean I'm a little sad about that. Is are we should I not focus on Q and As? Is that not working for us? Do people not want them? And then because I am who I am, do they not like us anymore, y'all? I know. It's a problem. And then I'm in the back end of the Loving BDSM website and I'm like, why does this thing have 59 notifications? I'm like, what the fuck is this?

It's not a part of the site I look at very often. I go. I click. And first of all, the 59 was deceptive because there were duplicates of a lot of things. I was like, what the fuck is this about? It was all of the messages y'all have been sending through our contact page for a month. And there were many. There were several. And I went, Oh. We are liked. Okay. People do so and ask us questions. Why do I like bottle up my own sense of self worth in that? I have theories. It's whatever. It is a

problem. I know. But then I also felt bad. I was like, man, we haven't been recording Q and A episodes. There are people going, when are you gonna get to my fucking question? You think you don't have questions? I sent a question in. I found them. If you were that person going, why aren't they doing questions? I sent a question in. I found it. We recorded one for next Monday. It's fine.

Oopsie. So I mentioned it in the Monday episode, and Silent, on my long rant said from before this rant, that was a very long complicated way to say you do you, boo. Look, if I'm not making a simple explanation longer, complicated, windier, and also like more chaotic, is it really me? And Are You at the Loving BDSM podcast? I don't think you are. And I don't think it is. I think it's like somebody else. Somebody who does this way better than I do.

Silent asked, does that mean we have a super mega three hour Q and A episode coming up? Nope. Nope. Okay. But we I do not have that kind of patience. We get weekly short episodes again. Look, one, I like to do this because we can answer more questions and we I can practice being concise. Thank God for editing.

Two, it's because I know new people are not gonna most new people are not gonna take a chance on an hour and a half episode when they don't know who the fuck we are or if they care about our topic. But they might take a chance on a ten to fifteen minute video. So anyway. That was my oopsie and also my, lack of self esteem was showing apparently. I did this is way inside baseball kind of thing. Why do I use sports metaphors when I don't know shit about sportball?

Ball? I read an article recently about people individuals they were talking about, but in our case it's like the two of us, who make your brand, your content, your whatever about you as the person when you were the brand, what that means is in the typical dips of like engagement or views or whatever whatever or when, things aren't flowing as easily for you in terms of ideas and and content and what and whatever, then when you make the brand about you personally, often, not always,

often means that when things aren't going well or it's slowing down or it's difficult, instead of saying, oh, let me tweak the content. Let me see what's going on externally, you internalize that you were the problem. Now JB, does he do it? Probably not. Maybe a little bit. I don't know. Me? All the time. All the time. All the time. I cannot tell you the amount of times I've gone, oh my god nobody actually cared about that. And not every idea you can have is gonna be a good one. But I'm like,

wow nobody cared about that. And then I go back later and go, oh it didn't actually publish. Okay. So maybe I should not assume I'm the prop. I am the problem if it didn't publish, but it's a different kind of situation. Oh, god. It's yeah. Shit. I don't know if I need to be medicated or just have a therapist. Probably both. So what would what do you have for the bonus section as I've run away with it as usual? I I don't know at this point. I don't know. What do we have coming up, going on?

What do we have coming up going on? I don't I don't know. I mean, next week, the oldest has a concert Yes. We'll go to. I think that'll be before next week's, live stream. I think it's, like, Tuesday. I think. Don't quote me on that. We are having a nontraditional Thanksgiving, which we will definitely talk about later in the month, but I'm in the process of planning it now. Yeah. Are we breaking out the smoker? Basically gonna be like a barbecue.

And when I say barbecue, I do not mean, oh, we drag the grill out and put some hamburgers and hot dogs. That's a cookout. Barbecue is something that's smoked, seared, something. It's probably been in a brine or it's been coated in something, whatever. It's gonna cook for hours upon hours until it melts in your hand. That's a barbecue. Homemade or jarred barbecue sauce is usually involved. That's barbecue. Anything else? That's a cookout. But you're doing a smoked pork what part

of the pork is that? The part of the pig that is? Shoulder, I believe. Right. Until it, like, falls apart. I then went, you know, I could keep it simple, or I could lose my fucking mind. I have, a list and a chart of all the sides I wanna do, mostly because and I told Debbie this. I wanna cook once and then get, like, three or four days off where we just eat in leftovers or you make yourself a peanut butter and jelly sandwich because I'm done. But also the oldest is has confirmed that

he is it's not confirmation. He said most likely coming home for Thanksgiving and bringing, his girlfriend. So then I'm like, oh, guest in house? We must do the most and be so extra so that I look like I know how to interact with strangers and be a hostess. I don't. I don't. I don't. But my mama did teach me from the cradle that when you have company, you feed them. Nobody leaves that place hungry. I do have to ask about allergies. That's the one thing I keep forgetting. So yeah.

And and are we gonna do that as we're prepping for Black Friday, except will it be a Black Friday? Because there's, you know, chatter online about, blackout. Blackout, which Shopping blackout. Shopping blackout, which I get and I respect, but also I'm like, but we're just a small business trying to pay our markets. And and depends on who you hear talking about it. Yeah. You know, some people are saying, oh, total blackout of spending and, you know, others are saying, you

know, block out the corporations. Just the big corporations. Right? So local shop small. Please shop small this holiday season. Not just I mean, you might not need a kink toy. I get that, but if you have the choice, the small businesses were drowning over here. Y'all were drowning. So yeah. That's you know, it it it depends who you see who's promoting it. So

Yeah. And I have not my algorithm has not been feeding it to me a lot lately, so I'm sure it's out there, but we all literally have our own version of the Internet depending on the app you use and the algorithm you're on. Right. So who knows? Who knows? Anyhoo, are we about done? I mean, you know me. Once I get started, I can keep going. I don't know. I don't know. I was hoping maybe the muscles are getting a little tired tired. My cheeks are on fire. They they are so hot, they hurt.

And I do have to use the restroom because did I get the extra large diet coke with lime from Wawa with my points? Didn't pay a penny. Yes. I did. Yes. I did. I need to jump in the shower. But I did finish all of it while sitting here. Clean my neck up. As long as it's just your neck. Just my neck. Mhmm. You know I know. We've had the conversation. That beard lives there. You're allowed to trim it? I'll trim it. One time he trimmed it too short and I was like, Red.

Red. Andre asked, instead of candles, would you do the wax in blocks? I wore mine in jars in the crock pot. I have been thinking about doing different ways of our wax play, wax. The only thing that stopped me is that I want to if we offer it, I was hoping to offer a way for people who do not have something already to use. I was thinking, like, off brand mini crock pots, if if I could find those and, like, people could buy that as a kit if they did not already have it. Because I so here's why.

It wasn't a block I was thinking of. I was looking at wax melts, and I was also looking at the fun shapes you can like the silicone molds. I was like, what if I can make cute little things and you pour those cute little things in and and I over I'm overthinking this, aren't you? I'm overthinking it. Yeah. Oh goodness. But, anyway. Yep. So, yeah, we had our we had our, apparently, we broke records with the cold weather we've had here. Mhmm. But I think most of the country has.

Yeah. I I think most of the country was part of that arctic blast, or were there some parts that were not? I don't know. On and on. I just know I was cold and I was so happy about it. Mhmm. I've been a different woman. Pastor I was I was actually gonna light a fire in the backyard last night, but it was way too windy for that. Yeah. I know. Maybe, maybe tonight. Is it cold enough to warrant that?

The way I feel about cold air is the way JB feels about getting to legitimately just light a fire just because not because he's trying to burn wood, like, for the burn barrel situation. Anyway. Nothing like sitting watching a good fire. Okay. I support you in that endeavor. Thank you. We should probably go. Yeah. Yeah. Because I have I have drunk this Diet Coke, and now the Diet Coke is like, hello? I'm ready to I'll race you. I'm not above knocking an older adult down when necessary.

Anyway Just remember there'd be re repercussions. We're going now. Yep. Okay. Thanks for being here. Yep. Especially on the bitter end. Mhmm. That's all I got. Okay. Bye. Thanks, y'all. Bye.