Wednesday 7 March 2018

hypnosis and control

Recently I came across a some adult oriented videos about hypnosis. In several of them the hypnotist brought the subject to orgasm just through the power of suggestion. The subjects all seemed to have enjoyed themselves (some of them very much so!)

There was one site I cam across though where the hypnotist was promoting private videos he had made with a number of women where they were hypnotised to orgasm, many of them in a bdsm type of context. Interestingly he used some of the techniques of a Dom - such as saying "good girl" etc, though he was trying to create a D/s context.

It might just be because I found him slightly sleezy that I was a little uncomfortable about the videos. Some years ago I was at a performance where one of the acts was a hypnotist. There was nothing adult about this performance but again I found myself a bit uncomfortable about it. All the participants were volunteers but I did not like the way that they were being made foolish. For instance one man was asked to say something special to his girlfriend. He got down on one knee and proposed marriage to her. At this she was very shocked and clearly unhappy about his proposal! In some of the adult videos the hypnotist encouraged (tricked?) the subjects into intimate contact with him. I am sure parameters will have been discussed beforehand and if the subjects had been unhappy with the final product no doubt he would not have wanted to publish it. He was also using techniques to encourage women to orgasm that helped him get past their natural reticence. For some this may have been great - and was in some achieving a quality of orgasm they said they had not experienced before. I can imagine it might be brilliant to help some women achieve orgasm who may not have been able previously for psychological reasons.

There is a but though...

... or maybe it is just a question.

D/s and much BDSM is about different levels of control. It can be about giving oneself completely into the control of another. It is what "power exchange" is all about. This level of hypnosis seemed to be the ultimate in 'control'. The subject has consented to be hypnotised so where is the problem? I think it is that however much it is discussed beforehand the subject cannot know fully all that is going to be done. Once under hypnosis there is no safe-word. Once hypnotised one can no longer give or retract consent. I think given this, some of his actions could have been regarded as sexual assault.

I wonder if I am just being too over the top about this. After all If a sub allows herself to be bound and gagged by her Dom to be used by him in a scene then surely this is no different?

Any thoughts???

8 comments:

Jz said...

No... I agree with you. That feels pretty hinky to me.
There are two big reasons I don't drink. One is simply that I don't like the taste of most alcohols but even more important is the fact that, if I'm going to behave uninhibitedly (and possibly foolishly,) I want it to be a deliberate, conscious action.
Same with my kink.
Do I trust my dom? Yes. But there should be no need for him to put me in an impaired state of sorts in order for him to get his kicks, either.
The suggestion would throw up all kinds of red flags for me...

olivia said...

I agree with you too - giving consent to be hypnotised doesn't mean giving consent to be touched - unless he has some sort of discussion about that ahead of time. And even if a Dom has bound and gagged their sub, there is probably some way the sub can signal that they're not ok. At least, if you're going to be safe I think that would be important. The hypnosis thing sounds shady to me, and could definitely be considered a kind of assault.

Pygar said...

Thanks Jz and olivia. I'm glad it's not just me!

Another thing that disturbed me perhaps even more in researching the post was to find on an article just about studying hypnosis that a talented hypnotist can hypnotise many strangers almost immediately with certain techniques. One described the assessment after an advanced training course included going out and finding six strangers that they were able to hypnotise immediately! It's getting scary!

P xx

Lea said...

I like the idea of hypnosis - as a fantasy. But I wouldn't subject myself to it with someone I didn't know/trust very very well. If my current Dom was into this and had the skill to do so, I'd go all in with him, because I trust him. But with some other person? No.

The only other way I could MAYBE see something like this working, is if I had a non-hypnotized advocate in the room on my behalf. Even then though; the fact that I would find that necessary makes me uncomfortable.

Pygar said...

Thanks Lea. Yes, I guess with ones present Dom the trust is there to engage in such activities as with many others.

The idea of a non-hypnotised advocate sounds a good one - and in my opinion pretty essential if one was going to enter into this with anyone other than one with whom one already had a strong relationship of trust.

P xx

neriche said...

I was told by one Dom, whom I was getting to know online, that hypnosis is a trance-like state that doesn't work on everyone -- even when they want it to. The subject has to be willing and wanting to relinquish control and even then, it may not fully work. That seemed agreeable and within the realm of a safe, sane, consensual interaction. Right? Wrong. This same Dom proceeded to time our discussions for bed time, when I was most suggestive, even when I eschewed doing so. On more than one occasion he mistook this for being hypnotized and attempted to program me with "trigger words" that, when spoken while wide awake by him, would immediately put me into a trance-like receptive state and at his disposal for his control. More over, he tried to program me to not remember that he was programming me with a trigger word.

In spite of being so compatible in a vanilla context, our D/s styles were in different universes. I had to end it (before agreeing to meet him in person). Hypnosis will never, ever get another shot with me. But I do see where it has merit in the recovery of victims, or in consent-non-consent situations.

Pygar said...

Thank you neriche. It is fascinating to hear about this from someone who has some experience of it. I think you were sensible and fortunate not to have let it go any further.

I was surprised and interested to read recently that hypnosis fetish is a popular and growing part of the BDSM scene. I hadn't come across it before. I must have a search on Fetlife and see if there are many members who reference it.

P xx

Pygar said...

I received an email today from a journalist and author specializing in alternative sexualities.

The email was about an unrelated matter but I visited his website and found there an article about erotic hypnosis. It follows up some of the issues in the discussion above in an interesting way. You can read the article here.

P