Due to the size of this article, it has been split into four pages. At the bottom of each page will be a text link that says the next page's number (Page Two, or Page Three etc.)

Uncivil behavior is non-consensual
Good manners and general kindness should become the coin of the realm. To do less is to engage someone in a quasi-scene without consent. Gossips and scolds should consider their behavior in terms of the consent of those they are discussing. Subjecting someone to a tongue-lashing or a gossip campaign is really no better than drawing out a flogger and hammering away at them without warning. If being a bastard or a bitch is your thing, and you have people to do that with, hooray for you. But don't be that way to people who haven't agreed to it.

Uncivil behavior is not safe
Cruel, thoughtless behavior can hurt people, deeply and for a long time. Just as humiliation can be more traumatic than physical pain, the emotional harm inflicted from incivility may far exceed even what was intended. Acceptance of incivility sets a poor community standard, where interpersonal nastiness becomes normative. Mature, decent people will simply not remain in our midst. Furthermore small acts of rudeness or disregard can balloon up into clique wars. And if the safety of your intended victim means nothing to you, consider this: people have a way of paying you back, for better AND for worse. Be nice and people will reciprocate. Be a jackass and that's how others will see and speak of you. This is a small world: don't hand someone a motive to get you back later. The leather gods have a way of evening things out. The community is close, memory is long, and paybacks are a bitch.

Uncivil behavior is not even all that sane
For years, many of us felt like freaks before finding this community. To reinforce feelings of rejection in our brothers and sisters by deliberately withholding human decency, or subjecting them to deliberate hardship, is just not defensible. Those who find themselves constantly at war with or inflicting imperious behavior on their scene fellows, would do well to begin some serious soul searching and perhaps seeking out the help of a professional. Three years on the couch did a lot of good for me.

Thirdly, we need to recognize that changing our own behavior is the principal goal. Assholes (and we have a fair share of them) are not looking to change. The gossips, scolds, hypocrites, and Macavells are not going to read this piece, at least not with an eye towards cleaning up their own behavior. We will have to change our own behavior first. We must learn to extend kindness, decency, care and concern beyond our personal circle to members of the community at large. We can't force others to change, so we must strive to make the changes in ourselves. We must hold ourselves to a higher standard and ideally establish higher standards. Make incivility part of how we grade our brothers in leather and ourselves. Even when we feel we have been wronged, we must strive to behave honorably. Mathatman Ghandi said, "We must become the change we wish to see in the world."

But for those who are unconvinced, who feel their behavior should not be constricted by what other adults would describe as common decency, consider this: Even at the most crass, selfish level possible, one reason to refrain from meanness, gossip, and other expressions of incivility is that they frankly don't work as long-term tactics. Even those who hate with all the passion in their hearts have no durable long-term means of persecuting others. Incivility is only effective in the way a nightstick is: it definitely helps to win fights, especially against an unarmed foe. But soon, you run into problems. People don't like getting clubbed. They don't even like others getting clubbed, and once you become known as someone who does it, it starts costing you. While the dictators of history silenced their enemies through murder, torture, or war, not even the most domly of dominants or the haughtiest of scene bureaucrats hold any lasting means of oppression. Oh, people can cut you from party lists, speak unkindly of you, warn potential partners against playing with you and attempt to exclude you from their activities and social circles. But, they can't stop you from speaking out against their unfairness (especially in the age of the internet), from meeting others, starting social circles of your own and throwing your own parties to which they are not invited. Black Rose has endured a few genuine tyrant wanna-bes, but none so powerful that they were able to escape their own inevitable decline and diminished reputations. People who steal from the club coffers, ignore safe words, spread malicious lies, violate trust, or attempt to steal the partners of others - invariably wind up with the reputations they deserve. Long story short, if enough people clean up their own behavior, then, in time, the power players, scene cops, abusers, and gossips, will find their bad behavior increasingly visible and increasingly frowned on. Perhaps, then there may be change.

And lastly, something needs to be said for the power and wisdom of accepting the scene as it is. It's not perfect, nothing in life is. But many situations can be dealt with by calmly deciding to let them rob you of your joy. It isn't necessarily easy, to forgive, forget and move on, not for me anyway. When I feel wronged my reflex inclination is to strike back, to retaliate, to really point out and dwell on the fact that I've been aggrieved. It's always worked out better when I've succeeded in looking past the occasional annoyance, and injustice and made a note to not treat others in ways I haven't liked being treated myself.

So even with the occasionally ugly interpersonal behavior we find in the scene it still has great people and the potential to make a dramatic contribution in your life. It is still an environment where dreams can ands do come true.

Back To Page One

Back To Page Two

Back To Page Three

Back To General BDSM