BDSM made easy

>> Lots to learn when embarking on a
loving, healthy and exquisitely painful
relationship, says workshop educator

by CHRIS BARRY

Name: Andrea Zanin

Age: 29

Occupation: “Writer/educator”

Bio: When this sexually charged Verdun delight isn’t contributing stories on the queer/gender issues beat to the newspaper you’re currently holding in your hands or earning the big bucks through her translation business, she can be found lecturing on everything from sexual/gender politics to better bondage techniques in both the academic milieu and at the BDSM workshops she conducts at various S&M gatherings, sex shops and the like. The former prez of Gay Line, Andrea, who, among many things, is a bisexual dominatrix, says she was moved to start teaching after being called upon to “sensitize” Gay Line operators to bisexual issues, discovering in the process that she “had a lot to say on sexuality, both the practicalities and politics of it.” For a schedule of her upcoming workshops/lectures, go to sexgeek.wordpress.com.

One workshop Andrea offers: Body Play 101: The Ultimate Thud, where you can learn how to better please your lover with your fists, punching him/her in a no-nonsense yet loving, sexy kind of way, of course.

Since when has anybody ever needed to take a course on slappin’ their women around? “Nobody looking to non-consensually abuse their partner is going to find much information in what I teach. It’s for people into the rougher side of S&M who want to learn how to do this sort of thing more safely. A lot of it is body awareness—like, what parts of the body are meaty enough to absorb the impact of a fist—and basic logic. For example, you don’t want to bend your wrist when hitting somebody or you’re likely to hurt your hand. It’s actually one of the more popular workshops I teach.”

Is there much difference between tormenting a bound, helpless female and a bound, helpless male? “No, it varies greatly from person to person, but I’ve never noticed a specific variance based on gender. It’s not really a person’s package that makes the difference, you know? It’s more what’s between their ears.”

Something chicks tend to be way more into than guys: “Playing with needles and scalpels, cutting, piercing, that type of play.”

Something males are much more into than females: Being sexually humiliated.

Are so-called “lipstick lesbians” more likely to be dominant or submissive? “It makes no difference at all. And politically, that kind of works for me as well. I don’t think femininity has anything particularly to do with submissiveness.”

When she first recognized the “kink” in her: “At birth, but it really became apparent when I first started going to bed with people, and what I wanted to do when I got there, and I got there pretty young—I started dating boys at 12. I suppose one of the first clues was all my boyfriends in early high school said I was like a man in bed.”

Is that because they’d already experienced sex with other men or from her insistence on doing them from behind with a strap-on? Neither. “I wasn’t quite there yet at that time.”

Last book read: Whipping Girl, by Julia Serano.

Musical preferences: Leonard Cohen, Gotan Project, Lesbians on Ecstasy.

Words of wisdom: “Discipline is love.”

Comments: dimwit@hdot.net