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Reclamation or masochism?

Ganesh

13:58 / 17.11.01

Stumbled across this snippet in Northbound Leathers' in-house bulletin. Basically, it draws an interesting parallel between the gay tendency to eroticise one's 'oppressors' (according dubious 'icon status' to the likes of Eminem, Mark Wahlberg and, ooh, cops, skinheads and PE teachers everywhere) and the use of certain fetish imagery - Nazi-esque leather jodhpurs, tall boots, Muir caps, etc., etc.

Questions:

1) In the above examples, does being elevated to 'icon status' somehow neutralise the aggressor, or does it represent a masochistic drive to luxuriate in one's own humiliation? Who, ultimately, is served by the 'deify thine enemy and wank thyself dizzy over him' strategy?

2) Many fetish clubs, while operating a fairly open dress code, specifically prohibit the use of Nazi-themed clothing. Does its relatively taboo status reinforce the erotic potential of dressing this way? Where should one draw the line?

3) What 'politically unsound' jerk-off material gets your juices flowing...?

Ganesh

13:59 / 17.11.01

Oh yeah, and

4) Who's Stockwell Day?

15:57 / 17.11.01

Stockwell Day: conservative Canadian politician, "Canada's answer to Jesse Helms."
http://www.canadianalliance.ca/leader/bio.html

and, for an alternate viewpoint...
http://www.stockwelldaysucks.org/

20:29 / 17.11.01

feel free to tell me if i'm ranting but i just found the foucault stuff... probably disturbing to anyone who is old-guard about these kinds of power relations...

quote: what strikes me with regard to S/M is how it differs from social power... the S/M game is very interesting because it is a strategic relation, but is always fluid. of course, there are roles, but everyone knows very well that these roles can be reversed... Or, even when the roles are stabilized, you know it is always a game. Either the rules are transgressed, or there is an agreement, either explicit or tacit, that makes [the participants] aware of certain boundaries. This strategic game as a source of bodily pleasure is very interesting. But I wouldn't say that it is a reproduction, inside the erotic relationship, of the structure of power...

... and ....

quote:... The idea that S/M is related to a deep violence, that S/M is a way of liberating this violence, this aggression, is stupid...

... something to chew on ...

Ganesh

09:27 / 18.11.01

Yeah, I agree with much of that, Medea. The linked article drew a parallel between the gay male tendency (and I'm not particularly thinking SM here) to idolise past 'oppressors' (whether real-life police, skinheads, blah blah or the likes of Eminem) and leather/uniform fetishism. I'm certainly not suggesting such a straightforward link exists - and I agree that the reclamation argument hardly begins to "cover all the bases". In one sense, these individual subjects might have been better discussed in two threads; I thought, however, the article provided a suitably provocative starting-point for discussion.

Gay fetish venues seem increasingly relaxed on the subject of uniforms: while there'd probably still be a moderate outcry if one wore a swastika, say, a more general range of Nazi-esque trappings seems quite acceptable (see BLUF, a whole site devoted to leather breeches!) Out of interest, is anyone aware of current policies in straight fetish clubs?

I wonder if, now the world has a fresher 'evil genius' in its sights, Nazi regalia will lose some of its emotional sting?

Disco is My Class War

09:27 / 18.11.01

I wouldn't explain the whole Eminem and Marky Mark thing as a psychoanalytic 'eroticisation of the oppressor' thing. To me it much more to do with irony, or some weird twisted queer sense of humour. Marky Mark is just beefcake, anyhow. *g* Does he really count as an oppressor?

And I agree with Medea, if I wasn't so tired I might post some chunks frm Saint Foucault here, but of course there's no simple relationship between kink and power. Duh.

(And about what gets my juices flowing, I pass, for once. Someone else can have a turn.)

Mordant Carnival

09:27 / 18.11.01

About the oppressor thing: Isn't there something rather liberating about turning round and metaphorically spooging all over the enemy? Just a thought.

I think we're forgetting that Nazi regalia differs from other "baddie" uniforms in that it was specifically designed to produce a strong emotional response in anyone seeing it. Also, Nazi imagery is ingrained in Western popular culture; look how many books, films, and even computer games feature Nazis. (This is especially true of us Brits, who have never and will never shut up about the war).

As far as "straight" fetish clubs go, I don't think that so many maintain a no-swastika policy. The worst that will happen if you turn up to, for example, the Torture Garden dressed as a Nazi is that everyone will think you're a total and utter prick. (Except for my partner, who will think you're a traffic warden- but that's another story.)

Ganesh

10:00 / 18.11.01

Traffic Wardens... brrr... that is sick.

I think the swastika still packs a pretty huge emotional punch (isn't it one of the most recognised symbols in the Western world or whatever?) and anyone wearing one would pretty much deserve all they got. The actual style of clothing, though, seems to be getting more and more common on the fetish scene: Northbound Leathers is just one of several firms that produce very Germanic-looking riding boots, jodjpurs, greatcoats, etc. specifically for scene use. These 'watered-down' versions don't seem to attract anything like the degree of animosity accorded those wearing a swastika (I guess they don't seem quite as scarily mad either...)

I think it's interesting that whoever designed wartime uniform seemed to know, instinctively, which imagery would most effectively instill fear in The Enemy. A sixtysomething friend of mine recalls that there was a widespread vogue, in 1930s Europe, for 'severe' looking clothing - lots of black, long coats, high boots, etc. Seems the Nazis tapped into that look, exaggerated it and made it their own.

As far as the 'oppressor' thing goes, Mark Wahlberg was pretty well know for making 'faggots should be shot' type comments. 'Course, this was before he became a Calvin Klein underwear model...

And yeah, there is something liberating/disarming about turning a hate figure into a camped-up beefcake icon. When he's all over Attitude it's relatively easy to cum in Eminem's face.

[ 18-11-2001: Message edited by: Ganesh ]

18:37 / 19.11.01

quote:According to a recent press release issued by the group, "The Marshall Masters LP, the newest release from hip-hop artist Eminem, carries the warning 'Explicit Lyrics.' That is an understatement.

Ain't it *Mathers*, anyway??

quote:The whole point is: What gets attention? I make fun of it. It's more like [the Mel Brooks musical number] Springtime for Hitler.

That's along the same lines.

There was this animal-studies model that I think Deleuze & Guattari used about creatures who defend themselves by taking on the superficial characteristics of their predators - sort of learning to succeed by *seeming like* their natural enemies.

Seems like a similar mode, here.

I'm also (see above) no big fan of Eminem - I'm barely aware of him - but I think there's something to this, from what I've heard:

quote:While he isn't the only rapper to use anti-gay language, what makes Eminem stick out, says Ric, is that he's the only one "that goes into salacious sexual detail at a level of obsessiveness, and it makes you think: Is he into this?" Ric says the only musicians to use gay imagery as sexually explicit as Eminem's are the gay rock group Pansy Division.

Ganesh

19:26 / 19.11.01

Sure, the little blond bitch wants it baaad...

(Ahem.)

19:04 / 20.11.01

the amount of power culturally invested in these kinds of uniforms and the symbolic power/violence thing is huge. this is why its sexy. yeah, its totally ironic, and its totally fun. dress-ups for big kids. and it definitely plays into some kind of queer aesthetic about appropriation, about fucking up given power dynamics, and maybe this *is* about reclamation - but that word scares me.

maybe we should think about it this way - why is the uniform fetish thing such a big kink for a lot of people [i know you're out there..]? and why do people react to it so badly? - and i'm thinking here of all the people who freak out equally, whether someone's in cop gear or nazi drag. because for some it immediately implies a totally non-con, crazy-arse power dynamic which is very uncool.

... grant said ...

quote: also think there's something to finding pleasure in the unpleasant that's terribly subversive. I mean, the uniform is supposed to intimidate you/turn you off, not turn you on. And that would kind of piss you off, if you're aiming at intimidation.

absolutely. ideal for the smart-assed-masochist who *doesn't* want to be broken ... and i think there's something about levels here - it immediately makes play/sex/fantasy more complex, somehow, because of that whole revulsion/attraction relation to those symbols and otherwise, as grant points out, 2D constructions of power. the intimidation works, anyway; if someone wants you, how much power do you have? and the other way: how do you intimidate someone who's salivating over your truncheon/jackboots/swastika? what happens to that power dynamic when we eroticise it?

06:54 / 22.11.01

quote:Originally posted by Ganesh:
And yeah, there is something liberating/disarming about turning a hate figure into a camped-up beefcake icon. When he's all over Attitude it's relatively easy to cum in Eminem's face.

Isn't there something going on there about taking the hate figures seriously - but in a way that they would (and have) explicitly repudiated? I'm slightly dubious about the "little blond bitch wants it baad" direction - and I know you were joking, Ganesh, but I think the idea that lusting over someone/coming in their face, etc somehow degrades them is fairly dodgy in light of the past thirty years of feminist
insights. It's like "A-ha! You can slag me off - but I can fuck you!" - and as medea zero & others have pointed out, the relation between fucking & power is (or should be made) more complex than that. Otherwise there is no hope.

Ahem. Anyway, I'd rather see it as a process of 'reading against the grain'. That is, by claiming Marky Mark (etc) as a lust-object, you insist on reading particular codes in his behaviour/dress/built-body queerly, and drawing attention to the queer semiotics (if I mean semiotics) in which he is involved - privileging that over his proclaimed homophobia.

The Nazi stuff - I don't know. It gets done all the time in mainstream culture anyway, so I guess at least I prefer it to be done knowingly. Cf Schindler's List, where Spielberg was simultaneously proclaiming the eeevil of Nazis and producing Ralph Fiennes in uniform for us all to drool over - a deeply uncomfortable moment, and not in a good way.

Incidentally, any news on dykes reclaiming their female oppressors? (I don't really want to talk about the straight-woman 'Osama bin Laden' syndrome, but I suppose that would be interesting too.)

19:27 / 26.11.01

I suspect it's bad etiquette to revive this thread, seeing as I was the one who killed it some days ago, but I read this and thought of you, Ganesh:

"S/M... is an organized subculture shaped around the ritual exercise of social risk and social transformation...

"The paraphernalia of S/M (boots, whips, chains, uniforms) is the paraphernalia of state power, public punishment converted to private pleasure. S/M plays social power backward, visibly and outrageously staging hierarchy, difference and power, the irrational, ecstasy or alienation of the body, placing these ideas at the centre of Western reason. S/M thus reveals the imperial logic of individualism and refuses it as fate...

"Hence the paradox of S/M. On one hand, S/M parades a slavish obedience to conventions of power... As theater, S/M borrows its decor, props and costumery (bonds, chains, ropes, blindfolds) and its scenes (bedrooms, kitchens, dungeons, convents, prisons, empire) from the everyday cultures of power. At the same time, with its exaggerated emphasis on costumery, script and scene, S/M reveals that social order is unnatural, scripted and invented... S/M presents social power as sanctioned, neither by nature, fate nor God, but by artifice and convention and thus as radically open to historical change."

Just liked it because it's the first thing I've seen addressing the relationship between state power and private pleasure. It's from Anne McClintock's book 'Imperial Leather: Race, Gender and Sexuality in the Colonial Contest'.