[QUOTE=A Priori Tea]
It isn’t abuse by my definition. Here’s the way I look at it: she’s getting what she wants out of this relationship. She allows some things to happen that she doesn’t enjoy, because a) she feels they’re good for the relationship or her personally, b) she has accepted them as a compromise to make her husband happy, c) she has an ambiguous / ambivalent attitude towards these particular activities, and as such has not made them a hard limit, or d) some mixture of some or all of the above.
In my perception, it’s a part of the relationship she doesn’t enjoy, but allows to continue because the relationship as a whole is worth it. It may also be that allowing him to do things to her that are not overtly pleasant makes the relationship more worth it - because she can gain some pleasure from suffering to please him. It sounds like a martyr complex, and it kind of is, but that’s neither inherently unhealthy nor inherently counterproductive. To me, the mating of someone who likes to serve (even unpleasantly) with someone who likes service is ideal, because it gives both parties a chance to express their needs openly, and get them filled.
Yes, there are situations that are abusive where the victim stays because she has convinced herself she is happy. This is pretty clearly not one of those, because she is obviously allowed and encouraged to speak openly, and chooses to volunteer information both private and personal in order to encourage better understanding of her situation. She’s not hiding things, and she’s showing us a very coherent picture of someone who has chosen an unorthodox situation because it is what pleases her. That, to me, is a perfect example of what differentiates BDSM from abuse.
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What I’m getting from what you wrote here is basically that it’s not abuse because it is consensual (and that has been a recurring theme from everyone who is supporting the OP of the linked thread). Shodan linked to some studies showing that children can be psychologically harmed when a parent chooses to stay in an abusive relationship, and some folks responded to say that it’s not the same thing, because this is consensual. So, my question is this…from the perspective of the children, how are the two situations functionally different? If they see a relationship that is inherently unequal and humilating to one of the parties, how does it make it OK in their minds to tell them that this is the way mommy wants it? I have to say that to me, it seems like that would actually be worse…that is, validating bad behavior by saying that the person it’s being perpetrated on likes it. I have to say I agree with Diogenes and Shodan in that it seems potentially damaging to the children. And where is the “consensual” line drawn? If I tell my husband it’s ok to beat the living shit out of me because I enjoy it, should he go ahead and do that?
The thing about the tickling, for example, I found disturbing. She hates it, her husband does it anyway, even though he knows she does, and he gets the children involved in it. I find it in no way analagous to performing oral sex, as VarlosZ suggests. As VarlosZ points out, he does it not because the act itself is so fun for him, but because his partner enjoys it, which makes him happy. That makes sense…we all do some things we don’t particularly enjoy to make our partners happy. In the case of the tickling, she does not enjoy it, and the only possible reason that her husband could therefore get a charge out of it, or even bother to do it at all, is that he knows she hates it…there’s nothing else for him to get out of it. That’s a bit twisted, IMO. And the fact that the children are apparently encouraged to do the same is teaching them a very bad lesson about how they ought to treat their mother, and a future spouse as well.
You’re not the only one with a hold on right and wrong, Dio. I love your ‘sexual psychodramas’ catchphrase, tho - really classy to reconfigure someone’s relationship into such a bite-size value judgment!