Church of BDSM

The sadomasochistic universe is a church which provides solace and contrition to its parishioners. Like every order it has its priests and even popes with their fiats and nuncios. Acolytes or submissives experience ecstasy at the sight of their shrouds (of Turin). The only difference between garter belts and stockings and clerical garb are that one shows and the other hides the flesh. But what's even more significant is the closed universe in which certain sexual and religious rites are performed. A plague or pandemic can be taking place and ghoulish conspiracies like QANon threatening yet that vaunted Southern California stage set (usually a sleazy motel room) with its  stigmata, flagellants and human sacrifice remains as sacrosanct and protected as a monastery or convent. The bawdy tales of Boccaccio's Decameron taking place, as they do, during the plague constitute a kind parallel universe which redefine both sin and redemption.

Read "Why Life Isn't Fair" by Francis Levy, HuffPost

and listen to "Walking on Broken Glass" by Annie Lennox