Christian Spanking Porn
Christian spanking porn. Not three words I ever expected to string together.
But that’s what this is. It’s not what the creators call it — but there’s no question in my mind, that’s what it is.
And I’m finding it deeply weird.
Let me explain. There’s a subset of spanking fans who are into “domestic discipline.” In domestic discipline, spankings aren’t just hot sex play: they’re used by one partner to punish the other for actual misdeeds (as opposed to fantasy role-play misdeeds). DD relationships can be hetero, lesbian, or gay, and in hetero ones either the man or the woman can wield the authority and the hairbrush. (In some DD relationships, both partners can punish each other.)
Christian Domestic Discipline is a subset of this subset. A CDD marriage is “set up according to Biblical standards; that is, the husband is the authority in the household. The wife is submissive to her husband as is fit in the Lord and her husband loves her as himself . . . He has the authority to spank his wife for punishment . . .” Etc.
There are, of course, websites. And this website (apparently the main one) has advice, information . . . and spanking fiction.
“Romances,” with spankings at the core, labeled for sale by how heavy the spankings are (”contains moderate spanking,” “moderate to slightly severe spanking,” “the spanking in this novel is very mild”).
In other words — spanking porn.
And it creeps me out.
So I’m trying to decide whether that creeped-outedness is fair.
I’ll acknowledge here: I’m a big ol’ atheist. Passionate and outspoken. Almost everything involving fundamentalism creeps me out. And I know that’s affecting my reaction.
But actually, my first reaction to CDD spanking porn was: This is porn. And I’m pro-porn. I have complaints about how porn often plays out in our culture . . . but that’s a complaint about the execution, not the basic idea. The basic idea of porn I’m in favor of.
And the thing that’s interesting? This Christian spanking porn is clearly aimed at women. The curly script and pastel colors of the cover art . . . it’s straight from romance novels. In fact, most of it’s written by women (assuming the pen-names accurately reflect the authors’ genders).
So this is by-women-for-women porn. Independently-produced, non-corporate, by-women-for-women porn.
Which I’m almost always in favor of.
But.
Now we get to the creepy stuff — in the dirty stories, and elsewhere in the CDD writings.
There’s the stuff about how God wants the husband to be the head of the house. In all households. Not just the ones where the couple gets off on it. All of them.
There’s the stuff about how the Bible is the literal, inerrant word of God, valid for all time. Therefore, see above, about how “dominant husband/ submissive wife” is the only acceptable romantic relationship, and everything else — dominant women, homosexuality, ordinary “egalitarian at least in theory” marriage — makes baby Jesus cry.
And there’s the anti-feminist, anti-gay, anti-abortion rhetoric that’s all over this website.
So a part of me is going, “If my kink isn’t okay with them, why the hell should their kink be okay with me?”
That’s not very big of me, though. And when it comes down to it, I think everyone deserves porn that gets them off. Even fundamentalists who think I’m going to hell.
But then we have the weird hypocrisies. The weirdest of which is this: CDD advocates aren’t just against gays and feminists and anyone who’s not a fundie. They’re against porn.
Yup. The Christian spanking porn folks don’t like porn. Their site, they say, is for people who want information about CDD “without having to wade through pornographic or warped practices of what God created for marriage.”
I think they don’t want to admit that they’re spanking freaks. That’d give them too much in common with the perverts and fornicators with whom they share erotic tastes. They’ll admit that spanking is erotic . . . but ultimately, it’s about discipline, and maintaining a Christian household with the man at the head, as God intended.
Bullshit. When you market your stories based on how heavy the spanking is (”contains moderate to slightly severe spanking”), what you’ve got is porn. I don’t care that they don’t include genital sex. The spankings are the core and dramatic climax of the stories, and the tropes — rebellion, resistance, the top’s unshakeable forcefulness, the bottom’s growing contrition and acceptance of the top’s authority, the ecstasy of submission, the obsessive attention to the physical details of the spankings, the classic implements and positions — will be instantly familiar to anyone who reads spanking porn. These aren’t Christian romances. You could find this stuff on the Spanking Blog.
Which bugs me. Hypocrisy always bugs me.
But I could stomach all that, if it weren’t for this.
The “this is consensual” disclaimer on the CDD website has a “wink wink” quality that’s profoundly disturbing. Unlike every SM advice-and-dirty-stories website I’ve seen, these folks do not say emphatically, “This kind of relationship must be enthusiastically consented to by both parties in order to work, or indeed be remotely ethical.”
Instead they say — direct quote — “Though we believe the Bible gives a husband the authority to use spanking as one tool in enforcing his authority in the home with or without his wife’s permission, in today’s world we recognize the legality that mandates that all CDD must be consensual. Therefore we will do not condone nonconsensual CDD as a rule.” (Emphasis mine. Grammatical error theirs.)
That’s not out of context. It’s on their home page. And this “non-consensual spanking isn’t legal, therefore we’re not endorsing it, even though it’s God’s will, wink wink” sentiment appears more than once in their writings.
That’s beyond my dislike of fundamentalism. That’s implicitly condoning domestic violence — not just as acceptable, but as God’s will. (The dismissive line from their handbook “Christian Domestic Discipline 101″ about how “men are thrown in jail for looking cross-eyed at their wives” gave me chills.) I fail to see much difference between telling women they’ll be beaten up or killed if they don’t submit to their husbands . . . and telling them that if they don’t submit to their husbands they’ll be tortured in hell for eternity.
Which brings me back to why fundamentalism creeps me out.
If people want to be in relationships where one partner submits to the other’s authority — and bare-bottomed spankings — I say knock yourself out. But when you say that consenting to physical punishment is important because it’s legal, not because it’s ethical; when you insist that discipline of wives by husbands is mandated by God for everyone; and when you back up that claim with a contradictory melange of Bronze-age writings, many of which are profoundly fucked-up by any reasonable modern standards . . . then you’ve gone far outside the territory where I have to be nice and tolerant.
Either of your religion or your kink.
This entry was posted on Thursday, 21 June 2007 at 12:00 am and is filed under Culture. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.
on Friday, 22 June 2007 at 2:22 pm Chris S wrote:
Creepy, yes ,
saddening due to the wish to impose their lifestyle on others, yes
quite disturbing due to the begrudging statement about the legal need for consensuality, heck yeah
but in a weird ass way, there’s kind of a “love, or at least kink, will find a way ” moral to this thing.
on Friday, 22 June 2007 at 3:36 pm JohnThreeSixteen wrote:
Corporal punishment has a central role in a lot of supposedly Christian dogma. I grew up with it. They can drag out all kinds of out-of-context biblical quotes to support it. There is one thing about it that is very different from consensual domestic play - it’s about power and control, and has nothing to do with love. This isn’t limited to the extreme Christians. There are plenty of secular examples of people with power and control complexes, that need to assert their will more than they need to experience something with a willing partner.
This is the key - the partner is not a full participant. They are a subject. That makes writing like this propaganda at best, hate crime at worst.
How would you feel about it if it was _secular_ fiction advocating domestic abuse? Don’t be distracted by the religious overtones.
on Friday, 22 June 2007 at 11:43 pm Christian Spanring's Blog wrote:
German name, English named activity
Apparently the spelling of my name is very similar to an English expression for a, in some parts of your society, popular activity. Certainly not my preferred free time activity but popular enough that search engines suggest the term when I do an ego-s…
on Sunday, 24 June 2007 at 8:38 am Friendly Atheist » Christian Domestic Discipline (a.k.a. Very Bad Porn) wrote:
[…] Greta Christina tells us all about how to keep the passion alive in a relationship: Christian Spanking Porn. […]
on Sunday, 24 June 2007 at 4:15 pm one of me » the home of paul turnbull » Blog Archive » links for 2007-06-24 wrote:
[…] Christian Spanking Porn | Blowfish Blog (tags: Porn Christian Spanking Fundamentalism Religion) […]
on Sunday, 24 June 2007 at 5:51 pm Richard Wade wrote:
“Woman, I’m home!”
“Yes, Master, welcome home. (looking down) Master, I have been sinful today.”
(smirking) “Of course you have, woman. What were your sins?”
“Master, forgive me, I had lustful thoughts and I didn’t finish all the ironing.”
“You wicked, sinful woman! Fetch the Holy Handcuffs!”
(brightening) “Yes, Master! Master, shall I also wear the black leather Corset of the Cross, and the crotchless Pantaloons of Piety?”
“Yes, you wicked, lustful, sinful woman, and as I smite you for your sinful ways, your ankles shall also endure the Restraints of Repentance! Affix your hands to the rafter in a gesture of supplication and when I am done smiting you, you shall worship the Mighty Member of the Maker!”
“Oh thank you Master! I mean, oh have mercy, Master!”
“And now that your soul is laid bare to me, sinful woman, you shall know the true meaning of the laying on of the hands!” (swat!)
“Yes, Master! (swat!) Yes! (SWAT!) Yeeeessssss!!”
…
Human sexuality is amazingly diverse and inventive. For any of it to be healthy only takes honesty and respect. The only “obscene” act is the act of hypocrisy, of pretending that something is not what it really is. It’s not perversion but pretension that deserves ridicule.
As for the professed philosophy of the Christian home being dominated by the male, I’m never going to accept that. I supported the women’s rights movement all through the ’70’s and ’80’s only to see it fall almost all the way back in the last 15 years. I’m sad for my wife and daughter, as well as for all women because we have lost so much ground. This idiocy is degrading to men as well.
I’ve been in a marriage of complete equality for 35 years and I have the scars to prove it.
on Tuesday, 26 June 2007 at 1:11 am Greta Christina wrote:
“How would you feel about it if it was _secular_ fiction advocating domestic abuse?”
Actually, I read, watch, and look at secular porn that depicts non-consensual sex all the time. I even write it sometimes. That includes (although it certainly isn’t limited to) depictions of non-consensual, punitive SM and forced sex in marriages or relationships. It doesn’t look very much like real domestic abuse, but if it were really happening in a real relationship, it certainly would be abusive. (”Hot English Punishment” leaps to mind.)
And I feel pretty okay about it. Fantasies are fantasies. They’re often immoral. They often aren’t pretty or nice. Porn fiction isn’t necessarily “advocating” any sort of behavior in real life. Porn fiction is fantasy fodder.
That’s why my big problem with the CDD stuff really isn’t the fiction. It’s the non-fiction, where they proselytize about how God wants everyone to have this kind of relationship, and strongly imply that consent isn’t really necessary or important. That’s what makes it cross the line from “this is weird, and I think it’s kind of unhealthy, but whatever” to “this is potentially abusive and profoundly fucked-up.”
on Tuesday, 26 June 2007 at 6:44 am AveN wrote:
to have too much faith in something others wrote/said/etc. never was a good idea…
but using it as an alibi is even worse…
WKR AveN
on Tuesday, 26 June 2007 at 3:22 pm SuzanneSF wrote:
Okay, this is beyond weird. Reality once again provides something that wildest imagine couldn’t devise, and wouldn’t be believable if presented as fiction.
Willingly engaging in portrayals of non-consensual activity is entirely different from being subjected to non-consensual activity.
I’m with you, Greta - this is just screwed up.
Suzanne
on Tuesday, 26 June 2007 at 6:49 pm Brian 3000 wrote:
http://christiandomesticdiscipline.com/historical.html
this might be the weirdest thing on the site. Why is how Paul Bunyan, a nythical charcter of folklore treats his wife considered “gleanings from history”. I guess relisous types have a different definition of “hisSTORY”.
atheist
on Tuesday, 26 June 2007 at 7:06 pm David wrote:
Thanks! I needed a good laugh before bed!
on Thursday, 28 June 2007 at 11:17 am Greta Christina wrote:
“Why is how Paul Bunyan, a nythical charcter of folklore treats his wife considered ‘gleanings from history’.”
OMG. I hadn’t even noticed that. And the really funny thing is: They got it wrong. When you click through the links to the writings of “Paul Bunyan,” you see that they were actually written by John Bunyan, author of “Pilgrim’s Progress.”
Sheesh. They can’t even get the names of their own admired heroes right.
on Saturday, 7 July 2007 at 10:05 pm Friendly Atheist » Carnival of the Godless #70 wrote:
[…] And we haven’t even gotten into the Christian Domestic Discipline. Darn. […]
on Monday, 9 July 2007 at 3:49 pm Trish Lewis wrote:
I hate to say it (nah, I don’t mind really…) but when you dig deeper, you often find out that the people that buy into this are *gasp* trailer trash! No wonder they “design” their website like a labrynth, and misquote right and left…
on Thursday, 19 July 2007 at 7:28 pm Joy wrote:
Agreed. I can’t think of anything more to add that you haven’t already said. I do have to spread the disgust, however. Just as I get on the rant-wagon when I read bad fiction, I do the same with this kind of thing. Thanks for pointing it out. If there’s an addition to the definitions of evil, I think is one of them.
on Saturday, 4 August 2007 at 6:42 am MAlcolm wrote:
I don’t think the folk who indulge in Christian Domestic Discipline would bother looking for Biblical justification for their activities if it weren’t that spanking is erotic. I have been a member of one such site: mostly it’s the women who are trying to get their husbands to spank them and anything will do for an excuse. Sometimes they are successful and live happily ever after; sometimes they are not and vent their frustrations in a yahoo group. For me, reliance on the Bible, or any other piece of writing, for rules on how to run one’s life is a mistake. I like spanking, and don’t need to bring the Bible or God’s will into it. There were some good discussions on that group; but insisting (as the owners of that group did) that the Bible is “God’s inerrant Word” and must not be called into question is so far removed from common sense, or any kind of sense, that my tolerance was eventually stretched too far and I had to unsubscribe. It constantly amazes me that people who in other ways are sensible, productive members of society can subscribe to that view, but fundamentalist religion is like that: a form of lunacy, really, to me.
Spanking, though, I can understand! For many, it’s important that the spanking not be just for fun, but that it should be real punishment. It’s the punishment aspect that is erotic. I understand that, too. What could be more erotic than spanking a female who comes to you and says with sincerity that she needs to be punished for such-and-such a transgression, and would you please do it? And then loves you for doing it? A very close bond is formed in this way.
Many a rocky relationship has been set straight by introducing some form of “spanking for punishment”, in play or for real. Whether it is the male or the female that does the spanking does not apparently matter, so long as one is the boss and is prepared to show it in the manner under discussion.
Rather than complaining, let’s celebrate the infinite variety of humanity!
on Thursday, 23 August 2007 at 9:56 pm gb wrote:
I am a male in a relationship with a female who had great difficulty reconciling her christian beliefs with her BDSM cravings until I showed her the CDD site. She is still wrestling with her strong bi tendencies …and the fact that we are having premarital sex.
on Monday, 27 August 2007 at 5:58 am Bogus War Party Propaganda wrote:
[…] Noticed in this ScienceBlogs roundup that, with varying degrees of outrage and squirm, Hemant, Greta Christina and Infidelis Maximus have been posting about Christian Domestic Discipline, the practice of Christian men spanking their wives to keep them in a state of submission. […]
on Monday, 27 August 2007 at 12:48 pm Just a bit of Security wrote:
[…] Noticed in this ScienceBlogs roundup that, with varying degrees of outrage and squirm, Hemant, Greta Christina and Infidelis Maximus have been posting about Christian Domestic Discipline, the practice of Christian men spanking their wives to keep them in a state of submission. […]
on Monday, 27 August 2007 at 4:15 pm FTC shuts down prepaid debit card vendors with hidden fees wrote:
[…] Noticed in this ScienceBlogs roundup that, with varying degrees of outrage and squirm, Hemant, Greta Christina and Infidelis Maximus have been posting about Christian Domestic Discipline, the practice of Christian men spanking their wives to keep them in a state of submission. […]
on Monday, 27 August 2007 at 5:59 pm Hideous kinky Christians wrote:
[…] Noticed in this ScienceBlogs roundup that, with varying degrees of outrage and squirm, Hemant, Greta Christina and Infidelis Maximus have been posting about Christian Domestic Discipline, the practice of Christian men spanking their wives to keep them in a state of submission. […]
on Monday, 27 August 2007 at 7:02 pm Internet criminals stealing information from job sites isn’t anything new! wrote:
[…] Noticed in this ScienceBlogs roundup that, with varying degrees of outrage and squirm, Hemant, Greta Christina and Infidelis Maximus have been posting about Christian Domestic Discipline, the practice of Christian men spanking their wives to keep them in a state of submission. […]
on Tuesday, 28 August 2007 at 12:01 am Orange County processing traffic citations in Mexico outrages citizens wrote:
[…] Noticed in this ScienceBlogs roundup that, with varying degrees of outrage and squirm, Hemant, Greta Christina and Infidelis Maximus have been posting about Christian Domestic Discipline, the practice of Christian men spanking their wives to keep them in a state of submission. […]
on Tuesday, 28 August 2007 at 8:20 am High-flying Rumours wrote:
[…] Noticed in this ScienceBlogs roundup that, with varying degrees of outrage and squirm, Hemant, Greta Christina and Infidelis Maximus have been posting about Christian Domestic Discipline, the practice of Christian men spanking their wives to keep them in a state of submission. […]
on Tuesday, 28 August 2007 at 1:34 pm 15-Jun-07: “It was supposed to be different” wrote:
[…] Noticed in this ScienceBlogs roundup that, with varying degrees of outrage and squirm, Hemant, Greta Christina and Infidelis Maximus have been posting about Christian Domestic Discipline, the practice of Christian men spanking their wives to keep them in a state of submission. […]
on Tuesday, 28 August 2007 at 3:57 pm We won wrote:
[…] Noticed in this ScienceBlogs roundup that, with varying degrees of outrage and squirm, Hemant, Greta Christina and Infidelis Maximus have been posting about Christian Domestic Discipline, the practice of Christian men spanking their wives to keep them in a state of submission. […]
on Tuesday, 28 August 2007 at 4:54 pm Because I don’t get enough angry email wrote:
[…] Noticed in this ScienceBlogs roundup that, with varying degrees of outrage and squirm, Hemant, Greta Christina and Infidelis Maximus have been posting about Christian Domestic Discipline, the practice of Christian men spanking their wives to keep them in a state of submission. […]
on Friday, 31 August 2007 at 8:00 pm Joe Castron wrote:
Spanking? Hardly as bad as the killing, slavery, and rape commanded by God in the Old Testament and with Jesus saying, “The Father and I are one” is it any wonder they are practicing this absurdity?
on Monday, 10 September 2007 at 11:33 am Xandra wrote:
There is another part of CDD. Maintenance spankings (scheduled weekly,daily etc.as the husband deems necessary) and Punishment spankings should not include pleasure for the disobedient wife. The husband should be thanked with oral sex from his submissive wife after she finishes her corner time unless the Punishment spanking/beating ends with anal sex supposedly to further punish the bad wife. Then he forgives and cuddles his properly chastened wife before he puts her to bed for the night.
Birth control is a sin and you should only have vaginal intercourse for procreation. So it’s a wife’s duty to satisfy her husband in other ways. I believe that some of these guys use these rules because they don’t enjoy sex with women and think it’s a sin to be with the men they desire.
I met a woman on a chat board who married a fundamentalist with teen daughters that he had straddle his thigh bare ass
for their frequent punishments. She witnessed this before the marriage but their minister approved so she accepted it.
On their wedding night she got the same punishment for her misdeeds that she had committed before the wedding. She found it erotic so didn’t protest the daily hand spankings she received until he felt her debts were paid. Maintenance spankings became bi-weekly and increased in severity. After a year he instituted a Sat. punishment when the girls were at a teen church group.
She had to get naked and arrange herself on her knees over pillows on the bed, legs spread, ass raised and wait for her husband. He would enter the eoom remove his heavy belt and beat her with it as he lectured her on shortcomings as a wife. He never stopped until she was covered with welts from waist to knee including her inner thighs. When he thought.she wasn’t contrite enough he fallowed this with a rubber paddle. It ended with him sodomizing her. Then she was forgiven and put to bed.
This treatment caused her great shame and it took her months to talk about it. I immediately advised her to leave him. He found out and made her e-mail me that she deserved and freely accepted all punishment. She was put on daily spankings plus the Sat beatings. She chose to stay with him as God’s will even though the pleasure has been replaced with pain.and guilt. i think they have an S&M relationship cloaked in the bible.
It’s very sad. I enjoy erotic spanking no CDD, DD or master just hot sex. with my husband. She was and probally still is being beaten, Some woman stay because they believe they’ll go to hell if they leave. I believe they are in hell now.
on Saturday, 29 September 2007 at 6:54 am Paul Crowley wrote:
Xandra: exactly. The difference between this and SM is incredibly simple: in an SM relationship the bottom can say “these spankings aren’t working out for me right now, can we give it a break?” without fear they’ll be told they’re contravening God’s will.