Sadomasochism Essay Research Paper Sex plays a

Sadomasochism Essay, Research Paper

Sex plays a major role in today’s society. It seems that all forms of media use sex to help sell their products. From television, radio, music, and advertisements, to video games, the Internet, and even art and pictures, sex rules our society. In addition, many newspapers have recognized the attractiveness of sexual aggression as crime news, and therefore as prime news, lately. Some of these sexual acts are said to promote criminal behavior subconsciously among certain individuals. As rape and sexual assault became a more serious social problem in the 80’s, this prime news story helped many papers to sell more copies in the competitive news market, while creating an impression of responsive and responsible reporting. In the 90’s, sexual acts started to become more relaxed and doors were opening to the public eye. The public was soon seeing variations of sexual activities that seemed to be a little dark and mysterious to the everyday normal human being. Now in the year 2000 and the years to come, some sexual acts might in fact become normal to our everyday living. Everywhere you look nowadays sex is there slapping you in the face, however sexual activities have changed dramatically from that of the past.

In this day and age, sex is a much more talked about topic then it used to be. With all this openness about sex, we have also seen a rise in some of the not so popular sexual activities. However, let’s face it, the perpetuation of life all falls down to one act, the act of sex. There are many different meanings to sex. Sexual intercourse can be exercised through intercourse as a means of procreation, emotionally or for the simple pleasure of the act itself. However, sex can also be performed with different techniques or variations. Sadomasochism is just one of these variations of techniques that a person can use to reach their sexual peak.

Sadomasochism is a term that combines two words, Sadism and Masochism. Sadism has to do with inflicting pain during sexual intercourse and Masochism is the enjoyment of receiving pain during sex. The most striking peculiarity of sadomasochism is the fact that its active and passive forms are regularly encountered together in the same person. He who experiences pleasure by causing pain to others in sexual relations is also able to experience pain inflicted on himself as pleasure as well. A sadist is simultaneously a masochist, though, either the active or

the passive side of the perversion may be more strongly developed and thus represent his dominating sexual activity. The tendency to cause pain to the sexual object, and its opposite, the tendency to seek out and suffer pain from the sexual object, is designated sadism in its active form, and masochism in its passive form. Sadism and Masochism are two terms that you will hear quite often in the upcoming years.

A Sadist is a person who derives sexual satisfaction from experiencing pain. The word sadism, or sadist is derived from the name of the historical character, Marquis de Sad who lived around the time of the French Revolution. “Krafft-Ebing (1900), who first described sadism as “a pathological elaboration of a normal, aggressive component of male sexuality.” (Panken, p.109) However, we cannot confuse sadism as merely a male trait. Females can and have demonstrated their ability to take on this role as well. For men, the sexual act is very similar to that of rape, and thus they can perform domineeringly in such a relationship. With men, the mentality is usually focussed around the concept of destroying the woman. For females, the mentality centers on the same notion, the destruction

of men. Therefore, both males and females can exhibit this sadistic quality in whatever relationship they may hold. In today’s context, it could be more clearly understood as one of the following: the Dominant, Master, Dominatrix, or Mistress. Some other terms have been coined from the underground of this sexual preference. To say that someone is “The Top” is to say that he/she is a sadist.

A Masochist is a person who derives sexual satisfaction from experiencing pain, either by his or her own hand or by the hand of someone else. The term masochism or masochist has its roots from a historical character as well. Leopold von Sacher-Masoch (1836 – 1895) wrote a few books on the subject of masochism, and he himself was a masochist. Richard von Krafft-Ebing actually supplied us with the term masochism to describe the disorder he saw in the work of Sacher-Masoch. Masochism, which is the passive role of a sadomasochist relationship, can be more easily identified as a female trait. However, just as sadistic traits can be found in women, so too can masochistic traits be found in men. Therefore, the basis behind masochism is the desire to be sexually punished by the hand of his or her sadistic partner. Freud’s interpretation of the subject was: “The true masochist, he

wrote, always holds out his cheek wherever he sees a chance of receiving a blow.” (Shainess, p.17) Just as sadism has synonyms that are used today, so too does masochism. The masochist can sometimes be called a Submissive, a Slave, or from the underground, “The Bottom”. These words “Top” and “Bottom”, are also used as verbs, as in “I bottomed to him”, or “I want her to top me”.

Another aspect to be discussed on modern Sadomasochism is the psychodramat