On SSC and RACK

Via the Carnival of Kinky Feminists, this is a response in part to some points raised by Pharoah Katt @ Something More Than Sides, in a post called The Nature of Consent, Part One: SSC vs. RACK.

PK writes that, "There are currently two schools of thought regarding consent in kinky sexuality. They are defined by the acronyms SSC and RACK." I tend to disagree that these are two schools of thought, but rather that they are two different ways of trying to describe the same concepts around BDSM informed consent. They tend to emphasise different parts of the ideal.

What I want to talk about in particular is PK's passage on the term "sane" and some ideas about that. Here's what PK wrote:

The other thing that really shits me about SSC is the word "Sane". Guess what! I'm not sane. I don't identify as sane. There are some days when I am more sane than others, but what about when I'm in the midst of a manic episode and really, really want sex? Should I just say no? Or what if I don't know if this is the beginnings of mania or I'm just really happy? Where is the line drawn? To demand that all kinky participants be sane is, quite frankly, ableist. And I won't have any part in that.

I have to agree that the term "sane" in this context is problematic as PK describes here, as potentially ableist language. There is, of course, a standard ablesplaining [see the CFK posting policy for an explanation of this term] response to this, and to make my point I'm going to repeat it WITHOUT endorsing it. My point will be to explain why different, non-ableist, language could be used instead.

The kinky ablesplainer says, effectively, "But we don't mean you! We mean the really mad people!" The argument would probably go that "mild" things like depression, OCD, BPD and so on, don't "count" as "not sane". That it's really about making sure people are capable of making their own decisions. This last sentence, of course, is only digging a deeper hole for the ablesplainer, but bear with me. Sayeth the ablesplainer: "What about someone who's suicidal? You wouldn't accept their consent to REALLY REALLY RISKY stuff, would you!?"

Sifting through the ablesplainers' arguments, I feel, I can discern a concept that is less problematic but still expresses the valid concern that was originally expressed using the term "sane". It is this term that I think could be used instead. The term is "competent".

Wrapped up in this term are several other ideas, as there are in "safe" and in "consensual". Indeed, there is some overlap between "competent" and "safe" in that one of the ways competent can be interpreted is that the participants are competently skilled to perform the acts that have been agreed. Using the knifeplay example from PK's post, I know that I am not competent as a top to engage in any cutting play - my knowledge of anatomy is insufficient to be sure that I could cut someone without a great deal of risk to their health and safety.

Similarly, I am very much against playing when under the influence of drugs or alcohol, because to my mind these impair one's competence (both as top and as bottom).

"Competent" also ties in with the concept of informed consent. To be competent to make a decision, one must have the information on which to assess the options. Similarly, in BDSM, being well-informed when giving consent is considered to be very important.

But the crunch point is what the term means in respect to the term I suggest it replaces. That is, to replace "sane". Well, we can talk about mental competence, or emotional competence, in those terms. What would those terms require in BDSM terms?

Well, the first things I think of in terms of mental competence are skills and knowledge, of the types already discussed. "Do I know what I'm doing?" "Do I know what to do if it goes wrong?" "Do I know how to recognise when I'm/my partner's in trouble?" "Have alcohol, drugs or other influences impaired my judgement about what we're doing?"

Emotional competence is closer to the original intent, but has some of the same problems. In PK's original post, the comment "...what if I don't know if this is the beginnings of mania or I'm just really happy?" highlights this. My usual thoughts on these lines are related to immediate emotions that might make consent or control questionable: for instance, as a top, I feel that playing when angry should be a no-no (I have, once, done so and it was very intense but the risk-aware element was impaired - thankfully, no harm was actually done). Similarly, emotions of guilt or or obligation could sometimes be argued as weighing against a bottom's valid consent because that bottom feels zie should ignore hir own body or emotional responses to events during play, leading to poor communication and, potentially, risk for the bottom. However, I think that talking about emotional competence in these terms is setting up an impossible ideal, and not a realistic standard for practice (people are human, after all, and emotional creatures). For that reason, I would not talk about emotional competence as a part of the standard of consent. I would say that most of the main concerns that lead to "sane" being included in the SSC formulation are in fact covered by the "mental competence" points I already mentioned. [ETA: I found a post I wrote about a year and a half ago that covers my feelings on "emotional competence": Crazy Sex]

Although I prefer the RACK formulation, I do feel that "risk-aware" as a term does not really capture the concerns that I've highlighted in talking about "competence". While it talks about being well-informed ("aware"), it does not really talk about being competent in other ways, such as being competently skilled, or not being affected by alcohol/drugs, or knowing what's going on for you/your partner.

SSC (or SCC if we take my formulation!) focusses on responsibilities first. RACK focusses on informed consent first. Both talk about the same ideal of consent, but with different emphasis.