The Shrieker

[elfs]

Last night, Omaha and I managed to get a babysitter and go out. We had a lovely dinner and then headed over to an S&M party we knew about, where I practiced tying her down and then, well, you can imagine what happened next. Well, you can try.

The remainder of the evening, however, was not so delightful.

Parties are meant to be public, by definition. There aren't that many private spaces, and even the semi-private ones usually allow others to watch, sometimes with limits or restrictions. S&M parties are going to be filled with noise: a giggle, a slap of a hand, the creak of a wooden frame, the clink of a suspension harness, a moan. You go to the party expecting that kind of thing. Sometimes, for a moment, a couple goes way hard and loud with screaming and sobbing. Eventually, it fades.

Back in the 1960s and 1970s it was fashionable to write articles for 'mainstream magazines' about the kinky wildlife going on "somewhere else," and one of the universal phrases found in these articles was that while there were "S-and-M parties" going on somewhere you were not, "nobody ever really inflicts pain on one another during these games. A little slapping, a little tickling, that's about it." That's simply not true, and reading Geoff Mains, who chronicled the S&M scene in the mid-1970s in San Francisco, it was never true.

And when a very heavy pain scene breaks out at a party, there's a rhythm and flow to it that assures onlookers that everything is okay, that both people know what they're doing (or at least getting into).

Last night, though, there was this one couple, man top, woman bottom, and she shrieked at every thing he did. And not in a good way. I mean, full on "I'm being eviscerated please dear god someone stop him help me I'm going to die I'm being murdered!" shrieking. It was horrible. It was the kind of screaming that went on, that reached deep into the ancient lizard part of your brain and shook the alarming ganglia that insisted a member of the tribe was being hurt and you should do something now. It was agonizing being in the same room with them. Every time you'd think they'd reached an end point, that it couldn't possibly get any worse, they'd start right up again.

It was terribly unfair to the rest of the people there. Those two involved the rest of the party in their scene without attendees consent. They ruined other people's scenes. They made mere attendance unpleasant. I spoke with several other people at the party whom I've known a long time ago, and almost universally they agreed.

I complained to one of the party organizers. He shrugged and said, "What can we do? It's an open night. Maybe they come here because she's so loud like that her neighbors hate her."

I mean, it's gotten to the point now where, next time I go to a kinky party around here, I'll have to ask if I can come in for a look-see first and if that couple is attending, I'll leave.

Comments

[urox.livejournal.com]

No "Owners reserve right to refuse entry" clause?

[mouser.livejournal.com]

Sounds like "Owners reserve the right to not get involved."

I'm wondering if anyone talked to them afterward. Did they realize what they were doing to other players? Was there a more private room they could go to next time? Is that what got them off?

[jeriendhal.livejournal.com]

How about "Owner reserves the right to apply ballgags when he deems necessary"?

[aelfie.livejournal.com]

My thought exactly

[pixel39.livejournal.com]

Some people are afraid to be confrontational like that. In this case, I think A) a review and possible change of the rules, and B) growth of a spine are warranted.

[darrelx.livejournal.com]

The various play communities share their thoughts readily (aka: "gossip") about particular parties. Just this one event might cause this host's next party to have a drop in attendance.

A public statement from the hosts apoliogizing for this incident and and reminding people to be considerate to other guests could negate any drop in attendance, though... but if it happens again, they will probably be stuck with a bad rep of either not choosing their guests wisely, or not being able to host an environment that remains fun for most of the attendees.

Incidents like this tend to self-regulate themselves as long as people discuss the issues openly.

I too would like to know if anyone talked to them afterward to find out what that couple was thinking and whether or not they know about the problem their activity caused.

[mrf-arch.livejournal.com]

Word, to all of this.

[technoshaman.livejournal.com]

*grump* suckitude. I mean, that not only ruined your evening, but put a damper on further potential...

At least you got to have *some* quality time first.

[pixel39.livejournal.com]

Happily, the people who creeped me out have been asked by the host to not return, because they were creeping people out. But we haven't had anything like what you describe--this is a good thing in my book.

People like that not only ruin the evening for everyone else, they ruin the next week or so, at least in my experience. Glad you had a chance to play before things went to hell.

[phred1973.livejournal.com]

Damn, what a buzzkill. *sigh*

[omahas.livejournal.com]

Elf forgot to mention that you could hear her above the *very loud* music. He also forgot to mention that this is a members club, so the restrictions might be a little different.

And you'd think that with a scene like that it would involve, like, a single-tail, or knife, or something like that. No, she was being fucked with a dildo. I mean, there better have been spikes on that damn thing for her to have been screeching like that.

[seraphs-folly.livejournal.com]

Way downunder anyone who attends local parties has to first attend an etiquette and safety seminar. We also have patrolling Dungeon Masters - long term scene folk - who make sure nobody is inconsiderate or unsafe. It works and its how it happens even at private parties.

Jeez thats a drag. Party nights are rare enough Id be fit to be tied if someone ruined mine like that.

[blaisepascal]

Id be fit to be tied

Isn't that the point?

[bldrnrpdx.livejournal.com]

DMing seems to swing back and forth in how rules & etiquette are... "enforced". One of the last times I was at SPCC (a few years back), the 'crowd' was about 15 people in addition to a group of about 10-12 Portlanders & Seattlites of which I was one. The DMs that night *way* *over*enforced some rules in the name of 'good modeling for newbies'. I'd thought we as a group were generally polite, respectful, flexible, and fairly well-behaved. But at least two of us got Talked To that night for things like wandering around the playspace. A friend and I were looking at individual stations, deciding which would meet our needs for the scene we wanted to do. We got Talked To for being on the floor and talking, rather than playing. Apparently we were either disturbing the one station in use. The guy busy being sucked off while muttering obscenities to his partner didn't *seem* to mind, but maybe I missed something. Mind you, we were using our Inside Voices and staying out of that one couple's space. But I guess we were disturbing the peace. I don't remember what the other big issue was, but I remember it being about as trivial. Feh.

[hydrolagus.livejournal.com]

When I did my first DM-shadowing there, some of the DMs present had that passive-aggressive pissiness of overenforcers ordered to back off. I suspect a happy medium has yet to be struck in the pool at large. Once my life calms down, I should finish my shadowing and hopefully become a force for non-intrusive but effective DMing.
I hope that shrieker was at an SPCC event I was at a while back: if not, there's two.