One of the more sacred phrases in the BDSM lexicon is “hard limit.” Almost as important to some as “safeword,” it represents those areas of play that are verboten, areas on the map of kink labeled “Here be Monsters,” the things that people absolutely will not do. They don’t have to be rational – I know of one woman, for example, who will let her partner(s) beat her, fuck her, stick her with needles, electrify her naughty bits, all in the name of good clean fun – but if you so much as mention her toes, you’re done. Scene over, take-me-home-please. Serious squickage. But above all, if you are a good player, you respect those hard limits – discuss them all you want outside of a scene, but breaking one is just a step below ignoring a safeword, to most of the community.

I say this as a prelude to telling you about the Military Style Bondage workshop that I taught recently at the Chicago Bondage Symposium over at The Studio Chicago. My demo model for that was to be the talented Ava Amnesia, and I knew her to be a really tough demo bottom, having worked with the likes of Dov and Lochai and others. Still, I checked in with her, making sure that there weren’t physical or psychological landmines I might trip over as I did mock-capture, imprisonment, and even a little interrogation.

None were found – in fact, she looked forward to it, and so did I. The class is a fun, audience-participatory one, especially when I’m explaining the military concept of heirarchies and overwhelming force. Of course stripping the prisoner is part of military style bondage; the question is how you strip them. There are several options:

• You could tell them to do it themselves; they may, and may even enjoy it, but you’re giving them the power to say no.
• You could do it yourself, which gives you a bit more power, but still establishes you as the person who has to do all the work, which can also leave them in a “see all the trouble he had to go to?” mindset.
• You could invite the class, as a whole, to descend on the prisoner and strip her bare in a matter of seconds, leaving her with the impression that A) there was no choice and B) she is like a goldfish in a piranha tank.

I usually go with the third option, and it’s a fun way to start the class, establishing the point and, more importantly, increasing the nudity factor of the presentation, something that is essential for good reviews from your students. Well, my students, anyway. Buncha pervs.

But I digress.

One of the participants in the class was the lovely lady C, who was a friend of Sascha’s and a few other people there at the Symposium. They were in town from NYC, in fact, and were staying with Ava – and, I will add, getting along very, very well with her. In the “I want to be kneeling at Ava’s feet while she strokes my hair and tells me what a pretty painslut I am,” kind of way. It was sweet in that con-crush kind of way.

Upon seeing Ava’s ravishment (or, at least, her stripping of all covering) during my class, C apparently felt a little disturbed. At least, as I continued my presentation, I saw out of the corner of my eye her offering water and other things to Ava, my “prisoner.” Never being one to let an opportunity for an object lesson pass by, I cleared my throat.

“C,” I demanded, “Did you just pass Ava something?”

C looked sweet, wide-eyed, and defiant, and nodded.

I sighed. “Then you have just given aid and succor to the enemy. I’m afraid that makes you a prisoner, too.” I gestured to the class. “Ladies and gentlemen, please take the appropriate action.” Suddenly there was another goldfish dropped in the piranha tank, and I had two naked prisoners now in my class.

Which proved to make a very interesting, challenging, and fun class, with them conspiring to escape, dealing with predicament bondage, being two hot naked chicks comforting each other through clamps and spankings and hair pullings and rope and me doing my best to look as if I was in complete control the whole time. Of course, inside I’m thinking “If I’m not careful I’m going to end up hogtied on the floor in my own rope” but I’ll never admit it.

After the class was over, I walked with some of the participants to a nearby coffee shop in search of blood sugar & caffeine. I introduced myself, and upon finding out they were from NYC, I asked if they knew Sascha or C.

“Oh, yes, we’re C’s friends,” one said, a tall lanky man. “We’re here as her bodyguards.”

There was an awkward silence during which all of us reflected, individually, on the many indignities that had just been foisted on C by me in the name of education. Finally, I broke it. “Um…Nice job with that.”

“Oh, yeah, that was amazing,” he said, eagerly. “Especially since before today, public nudity for her was a hard limit.”

I don’t know what I looked like at that moment, but I’m pretty sure I went the same shade as the snow on the ground, with 95% of my psyche going Oh, shit…what did I just do…I didn’t bother to ask about her limits…oh, FUCK…

Some of it must’ve showed on my face, because they both held up their hands. “No, no, we were checking in with her – it was fine, she would have said something if it had been a real problem. It was great, and she said after it was something she was planning on working through anyway.” He grinned again. “Not quite in this way, but it seems to have worked.”

It only took about three more people, including C, telling me that to convince me that yes, it was in fact ok that I’d smashed through her hard limit without so much as a PhilipTheFoole’s worth of negotiation. But even then, I’ve got to admit: I dodged a bullet there. I would like to think that if she had been really averse to having ten people strip her naked “against her will” she would have let me know, and more importantly, that I would have listened. I really do like to think that.

The problem is that last 5%. The bit that, upon hearing that brittle crunching noise that hard limits make when you tromp all over them in military boots, started doing its own little domly dance of joy in the corner while Ride of the Valkyries played in the backround, chanting:

“Took that public nudity cherry! Broke that hard limit! That’s right! Who’s your Dom?!? Who? Oooohhh, yeaaaahhhhh…Graydancer, baby, that’s who. I love the taste of hard limits in the morning!!