Hooked Up and Tied Down: The Neurological Consequences of Sadomasochism

By: American Decency Staff

Fifteen years ago, in an essay titled “Hooking Up: What Life was Like at the End of the Second Millennium,” the novelist Tom Wolfe asked: what will future generations think about us when they looked back on our strange day and age?

He noted that by the year 2000, “dating,” that ritual in which a boy asked a girl out for the evening and took her to dinner, was dead. Drawing on the old use of baseball terminology to describe romantic encounters, Wolf writes:

In the year 2000, in the era of hooking up, “first base” meant deep kissing (which was now known as “tonsil hockey”), and the groping, and the fondling; “second base” meant oral sex; “third base” meant going all the way; and “home plate” meant . . . learning each other’s names. Getting to home plate was relatively rare, however.

This captures the gist of the semi-anonymous, emotionally detached, uncommitted sexual encounter so typical on college campuses today.

Another strange sign of our age appeared more recently, with the enormous popularity of Fifty Shades of Grey, which has sold an astonishing 100 million copies, and set a record in the UK as the fastest-selling paperback of all time. The story depicts a young female ingénue who is gradually initiated by a wealthy and powerful man into a BDSM sexual arrangement—Bondage, Discipline, Dominance, Submission, Sadism and Masochism— in which she acts as his “submissive.” The heavily marketed movie version of 50 Shades of Grey was released on Valentine’s Day, raking in $94 million over its opening weekend.

Tom Wolfe’s observations suggest that the random impersonal sexual encounter is a defining feature of our day and age. Likewise, the enormous popularity of Fifty Shades suggests that interest in the world of BDSM may be another. What should we make of this? Is there any cause for concern here?

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