Excerpt on BDSM & Spirituality from 
Geoff Mains’ recently reissued: 
Urban Aboriginals: A Celebration of Leathersexuality

Urban Aboriginals can be found at www.amazon.com  

Like words and acts of shamans, the spiritual utterances of leathermen can take on special importance to the fellow members of their tribe.  These are men who have put their lives on the line, who have really been there. For any tribe that has been either actively oppressed or is in a marginal social position these words and acts help in building cultural security.

There is something holy in the leather scene- something about which writers such as Kantrowitz, unafraid of the implications of radical sexuality, are emphatic. In a locale such as the Catacombs, there is a friendly caring aura that extends between people, a sort of sharing in the fortune that comes from being blessed. "the needs of the tribe," writes Ludwig, "are met through identification with the entranced person, who not only derives great personal satisfaction from divine possession, but also acts out certain ritualized group conflicts such as the theme of death and resurrection."

The man in the sling at the Catacombs is a symbol to his brothers.  Most of them have been there and all would like to go there. In the raw, powerful beauty of his being fisted, of living that process that only a woman can know as birth, is a fire and joy that binds men together.  In each other's hands and each other's trust, the leathermen enact the very themes of life.                 

 

Read the SCENEprofiles Interview with BDSM legend Mark Thompson, on Geoff Mains’ Urban Aboriginals

Read Sadie's Article/Review on Urban Aboriginals

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Copyright 2003

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Book photograph by Robert Pruzan, reprinted with permission