You can't rape your wife (or batter your BDSM partner)

Further to yesterday's post about beleagured CBC host Jian Ghomeshi, a semi-serious thought of course comes to mind.

As you may recall, Ghomeshi is a self-proclaimed BDSM enthusiast (though he may just enjoy beating up chicks). One of the tenants of the BDSM lifestlye is that the abuse can take place as much as the two mutually agree to. As always with women, their consent is about as fluid as a bucket of water on a rollercoaster: the same girl who's okay with you slapping her ass in the mall the next day doesn't want you rubbing her thigh in her own kitchen. The day after that, she's letting you finger her on the dance floor at Blues on Whyte...while you're fingering her sister with the other hand. For the BDSM crowd, I'm sure the same rules apply: one day he wants to to step on his balls with high heels on, the next day he just wants to be cuddled. The day after that he's cutting your tit open with a box cutter. However you do it.

The point is, BDSM women can change consent on a whim the same as the rest of the crazy bitches do. As I noted about Ghomeshi, when they claim afterwards that they were totally against the sex and/or choking, they get cool physical evidence to show the cops and the rest of the female population doesn't.

So every time you see a woman who is in a BDSM relationship who has been roughed up a little bit but happily with her man, even if she was furious at him and broke up with him yesterday, it's all okay, it's all cool.

So...uh...how is that practically any different than the classic battered housewife?

Is it? From the external observer view, can we really tell the difference? They got into a fight, he hit her, they broke up, now they're back together. Is that really that much different than he hit her, they got into a fight, they broke up, now they're back together? The first one is Rhianna, the second one is lunaKM.

The battered housewife is always assumed to be the victim because she's assaulted. Who would want to be assaulted, goes the logic. In the twenty-first century, that's not a particlarly compelling argument.