In the world of kink, we have the opportunity and ability to let go and explore while exchanging power dynamics. Despite race, gender or class, we can share commonality in our desires, enjoy each other’s company and time through a sacred connection I call BDSM. But despite our best efforts, the hierarchies and biases of the world outside of our bedroom and dungeon walls do still exist and often bleed into BDSM for everyone involved. There can be harmful and limiting stereotypes and ideas for all identities of people that can lead to folks feeling trapped or limited in their self-expression. For Black kink providers, especially Black Dominants (but not excluding Black submissives), navigating this space means challenging the harmful stereotypes and limits bestowed upon you, while creating a more inclusive environment where we can be seen in all our complexity, strength, and beauty. No matter who we are.
Historically, Black women and femmes have been marginalized in both mainstream society and in sex work – which has a cascading effect in the kink community. Marginalized sex workers are often reduced to simplistic and harmful stereotypes that strip away their individuality, their authority, and autonomy. I have seen this happen to people all across the spectrum of identity, which leads many sex workers, of all backgrounds, to feel pressured into embracing stereotypes and identity markers, while sex workers of color will adapt and fawn to a more apolitical and “colorblind” approach to explain and cope with their experiences. Just look at the industry’s use of the word ‘Ebony’. I for one, hate the term vehemently, but have used it in marketing in the past – to great success. A world like ‘ebony’ can be so dehumanizing, however, its SEO rankings continue to grow and expand because of mainstream porn sites and companies that popularized the term. When things like this happen, you can feel like you are at a crossroads between your morality and your well-being and survival in this work. Another example of this contortion is how I perform more overtly feminine while working, despite being a tomboy non-binary femme off the clock. Because that performance of femininity pays.
The hierarchies and biases of the world outside
of our bedroom and dungeon walls do still exist
and often bleed into BDSM for everyone involved.
Reclaiming narratives within BDSM can lead us to truly challenge these ideas and confront the pressures of how we are supposed to show up in sex work for ourselves and our clients. As someone who was a sex worker in my 20s and returned now in my 30s, I see a significant divide between ideologies – one I am still currently unpacking. There is one ideology that says we must maintain and perform patriarchal, often harmful, racial standards to succeed in this job. The other is about personal empowerment, challenging societal expectations, creating space for authentic representation, and dismantling harmful perceptions about race, gender, and sexuality. There are more and more of us choosing to be authentic, in our fullness, and choosing to attract clients that way, while others are doing what they need for survival. I see the drive to survive in both paths. I have no judgment on either approach. We do what we can and we do what we must.
In mainstream culture, Black women and femmes have long been subjected to hypersexualized and dehumanizing portrayals like the ‘angry Black woman’ trope, the ‘welfare queen,’ and the ‘exotic’ or ‘fetishized’ Black body. These reductive portrayals often emphasize physicality over personality, positioning Black women as objects of desire without regard for their full humanity or agency. But this is not unique to us. As sex workers, we all experience reductive portrayals based on our jobs and how we look – so to also experience these racist and stereotypical biases is to add yet more challenges to our day-to-day navigation. We are all constantly pushing back against negative portrayals of who we are and what we do, so adding more assumptions regarding race, class, gender or sexuality is to add more unnecessary pressures and struggles on sex workers. Because of negative portrayals of Black femme anger, I have wrestled previously with this concept and initially struggled with tapping into my sadistic power.
In mainstream culture, Black women and femmes
have long been subjected to hypersexualized and dehumanizing portrayals...
Within BDSM and kink communities, these stereotypes can manifest in subtleties. Black women in dominant roles are sometimes viewed through lenses that reduce their complexity to a one-dimensional narrative of power and submission. These harmful ideas deny us the freedom to express our full range of identities, whether that means vulnerability, authority, sensuality, or compassion. Black women in kink, particularly in dominant roles, can be treated as outliers, as though their dominance is somehow unnatural, foreign, or unrealistic. These misperceptions contribute to a lack of nuanced representation, and this is where the need for reclamation becomes essential. There is no one way a Black Domme will show up – or an Asian Domme, a White Domme, A Latinx Domme, etc. We all are each individually unique and should be celebrated for our special qualities separately. We deserve to be acknowledged for who we are and what we offer, not what we are assumed to be based on fantasies.
Reclaiming narratives like this is an act of resistance against these historical and ongoing stereotypes. It is about insisting on a space where we as marginalized sex workers are seen not as an exotic fetish, but as complex individuals with unique identities and multifaceted expressions of power. When you book an Asian Domme you won’t automatically assume meekness, or the opposite when booking a Black one. You will truly judge each provider based on their offer and skills. Reclaiming the narrative also means reimagining what dominance looks like, particularly for those who have been excluded from traditional representations of power in kink. We can go beyond biases and work through these things within kink in a healthy way – just as we help heal and empower one another by exploring wants, needs, and desires together through our sacred connection.
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