Signs and Symbols

Santiago El Grande, Salvadore Dali, 1957

Recently, a friend and I had a chat about the use of symbols and rituals in TTWD (this thing we do) and we found ourselves on the opposite ends of the spectrum. If I'm interpreting his position correctly (and I might be overstating it or just plain wrong on it), he finds much of the ritual aspects of BDSM practices to be a somewhat silly affectation. Sir This, Lady That; he's quick to point out that American citizens are prohibited by some law or another from accepting foreign honours. Canadians are as well. Just ask Lord Snivelpuss of Cross Patch Beaver Harbour, aka Conrad Black. He had to renounce his Canadian citizenship in order to buy his British Lordship – fat lot of good it's doing him now as he serves his jail sentence for fraud in an American jail. If you're looking for a real life example of a silly affectation, Lord Snivelpuss is the poster boy for phenomenon, but I digress.

Equally, my friend finds conventions about capitalization, collars, and the use of honorifics such as Sir, Master to be vaguely ridiculous. And you know what? He's right. And he's wrong. To me, you have to use the right tool for the right job. Since the 1600s, we have had two remarkable inventions brought to us by the development of the science of optics: the microscope and the telescope. One allows you to see things that are very small and close at hand. The other lets you see things that are very large and far away. Don't mix the two up. A telescope will not reveal the internal structure of a plant cell any better than a microscope will show you the mountains of the moon.

To me, there's two ways of looking at something. First and the most prevalent in our current culture is rational consciousness. This is the realm of logic and reason. It's very linear, extremely structured and analytical. It uses words to convey meaning. Alternatively, there is symbolic consciousness. It's not foreign to our Western culture. It was certainly prevalent as early as the medieval period. Arguably although most citizens of Western Europe were not literate in the sense of being able to read printed language, they were almost universally literate in the symbolic language of their culture, be it the rituals of the Church, or heraldry, or the sacred geometry of cathedrals, etc.

Symbolism and ritual speaks very deeply to me. It moves me in ways that the poverty of linear language can never do. Paraphrasing the Britannica Concise Encyclopedia, a symbol is a communication element used to represent or stand for a person, object, or idea. Symbols may be graphic (a red cross for humanitarian relief) or representational (animals in heraldry). Symbols are used to transmit ideas between people sharing a common culture.

Followers of Jungian psychology would take it one step farther. I'm hardly an expert on the subject but my understanding of their premise is that our subconscious minds (the Collective Unconscious) are populated with universal human symbols (archetypes) that are cross-cultural. Examples would be The Great Mother, the Hero, the Sage, etc.

To me, symbolic consciousness really is the stuff of life. It is the lifeblood of communications because it is our direct connection with soul or spirit whereas languages, mere words, are intellectual constructs that sate the mind alone. Largely, our education system reinforces analytical thinking. We're expected to convey meaning through words alone. Logic and rationality are the be all and end all and classes that teach and reinforce the skills of symbolic representation are usually the first ones sacrificed when there's a budget crunch. It's easy for administrators to justify cutting art, drama and music classes in tough times because symbolic consciousness has such little standing in our society.

Trying to understand big concepts without the use of symbolic consciousness becomes a fruitless exercise pretty quickly. You'll be totally missing the point if you try to reduce the Roman Catholic sacrament of the Eucharist to a mid-service snack of bread and wine. Wedding rings are not just decorative metal objects adorning the fourth finger of the left hand. They are symbols of a legal and emotional commitment taken freely between two adults.

All this is a rather circuitous preamble to the point I'd like to make. BDSM rituals and assorted accoutrement don't make sense outside the realm of symbolic transactions. Rationally and logically, the presence of a collar around a woman's neck is well, let's face it, it's just plain weird and vaguely creepy. From a symbolic point of view, it's very rich with meaning. It speaks about connection and commitment and obligation and ownership, and freedom. Feel free to add your own concepts because while there is this big idea of The Collar, each of us carries our own little interpretation of the collar. The point is that at the level of symbolic consciousness, a collar is not a silly affectation because it has been deeply imbued with meaning.

Now, let's be perfectly clear about something. There's no one symbol that's going to speak universally to all of us. A collar, for example, does not do anything for me emotionally. I've worn one in play. It had the same emotional relevance as a bracelet or any other piece of jewelry – basically none. That does not mean that there are no symbolic objects between Michael and me. There is one that has factored into erotic play many times and the fact that I'm reluctant to tell you what it is, tells me that I've imbued this object with symbolic meaning. The fact that I don't want to talk about it other than to state that it exists tells me that it represents some element of the sacred to me. It's deeply personal. In other words, it's no longer merely an object (the realm of rational consciousness) but has become a representation of some element of our relationship (symbolic consciousness).

Looking at this from the perspective of the rational mind, it's all a little ridiculous but if you stop there, you miss the point. The image at the top of this blog is Santiago El Grande, painted by Spanish surrealist Salvadore Dali in 1957. It hangs in the art gallery of my home town (The Beaverbrook Art Gallery). Once a year or so I just need to sit in front of that painting for an hour or more and just soak it in. What is it? It's a very large piece of canvas stretch across a frame with some pigmented paints smeared on it. What does it mean? I've looked at this painting at least annually for the last twenty years. It means something different every time. You know, kind of like BDSM.