This continuation is being written in a quite different frame of mind than the first segment posted in mid 2011 (which has been moved to display just below this one). In the months since I've actually gotten to know a few of the members of the bdsm community, heard their stories, observed their lives. The first installment was written from simply observing and analyzing their offerings of art. It was a bit to the intellectual side, somewhat emotionally aloof. This segment is much closer to personal, I now know names and faces and hearts, aloof is an attitude I can no longer maintain on the subject no matter how much more comfortable such an attitude might be. I closed the first installment of this subject with a question I can now take a reasonable guess at answering, at least in part.
Concerning those who are living in "the lifestyle" as the practitioners of bdsm often call it I asked myself "…why these individuals who do indeed seem to be fairly intelligent and a bit introspective would have chosen to reprise the qualities of a culture that in all fact was failing, dying, unable to muster the strength and flexibility to meet the needs of a changing world. I do not know if this was simply naiveté on the part of these youth, or if they were seduced with malice into a misplaced romance with a failed culture to serve some other entities purposes..."
