The "kink" community is not happy with former New York Attorney General Eric Schneiderman (D.) after he responded to accusations he assaulted past girlfriends by admitting to "role-playing" in sexual relationships.
Schneiderman claimed in a statement following an initial New Yorker story, which detailed allegations from former girlfriends they were choked and slapped by the state attorney general, that he had participated in "role-playing and other consensual sexual activity."
"In the privacy of intimate relationships, I have engaged in role-playing and other consensual sexual activity. I have not assaulted anyone. I have never engaged in nonconsensual sex, which is a line I would not cross," he said in the New Yorker report released hours before he resigned.
But that excuse attracted the ire of the BDSM community, reports the Associated Press' David Crary, who referenced several individuals with knowledge of the community.
"Just as sex without consent is rape, kink without consent doesn’t exist - that’s assault," emailed Jillian Keenan, author of the BDSM memoir Sex with Shakespeare.
Sex columnist Ej Dickson told the AP that the kink community stresses consent. "It is one of the very basic tenets of BDSM. Often, sex acts will be negotiated beforehand in the form of contracts, and either way, anyone practicing BDSM responsibly will implement a ‘safe word’ to make it clear if they are uncomfortable with anything happening."
"Using kink and BDSM to justify his allegedly vicious attacks on women shows an astounding degree of entitlement on Schneiderman’s part," wrote NY Magazine's Madeleine Aggeler. "Not only an entitlement to women’s bodies and sexual experience, but an entitlement to a narrative in which he remains the liberal knight in shining armor — an open-minded, sexually adventurous ally."