Clarisse Thorn of BDSM Outreach says
So … if BDSMers refer to non-BDSMers as “vanilla” ... does that mean we’re looking down on their sexuality? That we’re saying it’s “not as good”?
I’ve tried thinking about this from the vantages of other alternative sexualities. For instance, if “straight” weren’t such an established term  if it weren’t a word that I’d grown up using  I think I might feel slightly miffed that it’s the word for non-LGBTQ folks. I mean, I may primarily be interested in having sex with men, but must the word for that be “straight”? Am I “straight”? Is all of my beautiful unique snowflake personality a “straight” one? ... How boring!
Obviously “straight” is only a descriptor of my sexual preferences and not my entire personality. But that’s not necessarily how it feels when I hear it. And from that perspective, it’s somewhat understandable that some vanilla people feel insulted when called “vanilla”. No one wants to be “not as good as chocolate”!
Leaving aside that “straight” (with all it’s implications of rightness/correctness) is even more problematic than “vanilla” (which merely implies lack of imagination) I think this is a great point. It’s perfectly possible to be astonishingly bland without being “straight” (see Andrew Sullivan) just as it’s possible for “straight” people to be extravagantly crooked (see Senator Vitter.) Similarly one can be non-vanilla and still barkingly pedestrian. And see also Holly’s take on the fantasy that “kink equals not-boring”
Speaking of Clarisse Thorne though, Guy of Midwest Teen Sex Show says
Chicago sex activist Clarisse Thorn emailed me about a new series she’s curating at the Jane Addams Hull-House Museum here in Chicago. Sex Positive is a free documentary film series for people who like sex.
SEX +++ FILM SERIES
2nd & 4th Tuesdays at 7PM
beginning January 27, 2009
Jane Addams Hull-House Museum
800 South Halsted
312.413.5353
If you’re in the Chicago vicinity you might want to check it out.
Submitted by 2666 (not verified) on Mon, 2009-01-26 20:03.
I actually think vanilla (as in, literally the flavor) is nummy and. underappreciated. So for me it's a good metaphor; some people like vanilla not because they're boring or they don't know what they're missing but because a good French vanilla with little bean flecks is quite a delicious scoop of food analogy.
Submitted by 2666 (not verified) on Mon, 2009-01-26 20:37.
There's also the concept of all of "not-BDSM" getting a single flavor. Even the most reductive paradigm of BDSM grants them two.
I think that's what gets to me - the implication that if I'm not into D/s I'm indistinguishable from a lights-off/missionary/through-a-hole-in-the-sheet prude. (Which therefore means that I'm less desirable even for non-D/s activity.)
No, I don't think the folks who say it actually consciously think that, but they do make other assumptions, such as the idea that, because non-kink/non-queer sex doesn't *require* things like explicit negotiation, that it *can't* include them at all, or as fully.
Submitted by 2666 (not verified) on Tue, 2009-01-27 17:06.
Mmmmmm, vanilla. Best sweet flavor in the universe.
Forget that chocolate nonsense. Pfft.
(captcha for today: ruled systematic)