The following is not designed to be any kind of critique on anyone’s use of certain English words. It’s more of an opportunity for Your Humble Narrator to impart some teachings … I do not condemn or cast disdain about current opportunities and discussions … But I make no apologies for making editorial comment in regards to a past exchange of unpleasantries …

Continued discussion on potentially new and exciting events took a bit of an alarming side exit towards the end today … and rather than continue to extend the length of that particular topic, I thought it might be a good idea to start an entirely new, but somewhat related, discussion.

Someone suggested in Toronto recently it would be a good idea for a new “fetish event” to have a “board” consisting of certain demographics within our ‘community’, mainly consisting of a Dominant man and woman and a submissive man and woman, responsible for making all key decisions.

This is starting to sound a little bit too much along the same lines as the “rules” of a GTA area “group” that, in my opinion (amongst many others) has thankfully DIED a wretched and deserved DEATH.

That group had, as its leader, the installment of a person who seemed to insist upon being recognized as a “queen”. While that particular person and her ‘minions’ thankfully seemed to have faded from view, it is a bit alarming that some of those conventions have managed to work their way, by way of casual mention, into this mostly positive and enthusiastic discussion. I am quite certain every large “SM Community” in the larger Western Civilization cities have experienced similar, if not the exact same, problem.

For the record, I won’t entertain angry banter between former members any of that imperialistic kind of  ”group” and myself. It is fairly well remembered in Toronto that I personally found this one particular group quite pedantic and only worthy of open and continuous ridicule, while I was told by more than one person “in confidence” that I was Public Enemy Number One in their collective eyes for pretty much their entire existence. This isn’t designed as a “kicking when they’re dead” attack on this group of people, but more to draw attention to one of their misappropriated conventions that, sadly, seems to be hanging around a little far too much for my liking, or the collective GOOD of our proclivity …

“Protocol” is a badly – BADLY – misused term in our peculiar predilection. “Protocol” refers to, by definition, diplomatic agreements including treaties and trade arrangements; an imperical and internationally standardized set of rules for medical research and the publishing of papers; a published statement relating or reporting on scientific observation and verification; and an international computer language, again with universal standards, in which machines can communicate with each other.

When used as a verb, “Protocol” refers to the the issuance of any of the above nouns.

Just because so many people use the word doesn’t mean its usage is correct.

I didn’t start hearing the use of the word “protocol” in am SM related sense until I started reading some of the (eye-rolling) posts that was being offered out by that aforementioned deceased tiny group. I’ve since seen it virally spiral and disseminate through the internet in other major centres as “acceptable terminology”. Now, I really don’t care who started using the word “protocol” first in an SM sense, however: the truth is, its WRONG.

Is there difficulty with using the terminology we SHOULD be using? How about the words “ritual” and “etiquette”, which both actually fit FAR better as proper terminology for a procedural SM setting?

I have always thought the insistance of the use of the word “protocol” stemmed from a very poorly written but over-popularized series of books by a certain popular “vampire” authoress: she created a fantasy ‘Kingdom’ and environment with fantastical, ‘regal’ people – and a recently silenced ‘queen’ started making claims that people in SM subculture “world wide” used that term when referring to the code of conduct that took place at their gatherings. That claim was a farce – but it seems to continue to propagate … I could go into a long dissertation about the many, many misused examples of the English tongue in the Gorean “life” … but I don’t really feel like having the “tarns” and “sleens” of the Gorean “masters” unleashed on my formerly-fat ass in retribution …

At least, not tonight …

Could we possibly have a discussion about this and perhaps make a committed effort to actually stop propagating the illusion that we are deserving of some kind of “Kingdom” status – which would somehow justify the use of the word “Protocol” in a diplomatic sense?

I know – it’s very hard to stop a runaway train. But I can at least try and throw some switches to force it off the tracks …

Kardynyl SynysTyr

“… If the English language made any sense, a catastrophe would be an apostrophe with fur …” ~ Doug Larson