Taboo Role-Play

As many Kink Weekly readers already know, I am a marriage and family therapist. Part of becoming a licensed therapist is putting in 3,000 hours of client work before taking the exams. The hours must be a combination of individual, joint, family, group and kid therapy. Part of what made up my group hours was the 8 years I worked as a co-therapist for a group of sex offenders. (I stayed on after finishing my hours) This group consisted of offenders who were on probation and therapy was a requirement for the duration of their probation period. The offenses ranged from the 19 year old getting caught with his underage girlfriend to date rape to the molestation of family members and every story in between. These guys (and one female in the 8 years I was there) made very bad decisions and broke the law and were paying for it.

Now that I’ve said all that, let’s move on to the topic of this article: taboo role-play. There is a reason I am linking the two. Role play can be anything. From pretending to be an animal, a celebrity, a pizza delivery person, historical figures, etc. You can use your imagination and get as creative as you’d like! Don’t limit yourself to teacher/student or doctor/nurse. Even just pretending to be strangers and “picking up” on each other at a bar or coffee shop can be fun!

However, there are also many types of role play that fall under a more “taboo” category. Priest/altar boy, nun/parishioner, kidnapping, sleep/drugged play, rape, consensual-non consent, daddy/daughter (or any other combo) molestation play. Some of these taboo role plays are the consensual version of what the sex offenders had done. What’s the difference? Consent and age. You are playing these scenarios out with another consenting adult.

Many people feel guilty for engaging in this type of role play due to the fact that it is not ok if done in the real world with a non-consenting partner. However, I am here to tell you that it’s ok in this circumstance. So long as everyone involved knows what they are getting involved in, is an adult, and is agreeing to it. Can this type of play lead to triggers that someone wasn’t aware would come up? Of course. But triggers can happen with any type of play. (See my article about triggers for more info on how to handle it if this happens.)

The world of kink and BDSM is a great place to explore all those deep dark corners of your fantasies with other people who share in them or who are at the very least willing to join your exploration. There is no need to feel guilty over it. Those guys in the therapy group have things to feel guilty about. In this community we should take responsibility to do it with consenting adults with no purposeful harm. As long as this is the case then all I can say is get your taboo kink on!

Jennifer Masri is a Licensed Marriage and Family Therapist, specializing in Alternative Lifestyles for individual and relationship issues. She also teaches the BDSM 101 class series at Sanctuary LAX in Los Angeles every Monday evening. Read more about Jennifer on her blog, A Kink Shrink.