Fairly frequently, I get emails from all over asking me ‘What is a Leather Family?’. I’ve thought for months now that writing it out here and just having a link to give people would be a better solution than trying to explain it each time. Sounds easy enough. It’s been an oddly drawn out process. I’ve started writings that were very personal, some that were very academic and fourteen other flavours and just couldn’t seem to strike the right tone. Now I’m deciding to revert back to what my former preacher used to say: ‘Start at the beginning and when you come to the end.. stop’ (I know its been said by many others as well, but his is the voice I hear when I say it to myself). So, back to the beginning it is….
What IS a Leather Family?
At its most basic and simple, a Leather Family is nothing more than a group of people who identify as kinky in some way and wish to be known as part of a specific grouping.
Sounds simple right? Well it is, and it isn’t. Consider the following:
- Each one is unique, no one will look completely like another.
- The number of people involved can range from 2 to 200. There is no minimum or maximum.
- Sometimes there is a D/s or M/s dynamic to some or all of the members involved. Sometimes there is no stated power structure at all.
- Sometimes there is a sexual component to the relationships between some or all of the members of the group. Sometimes there is no sex at all.
- Sometimes there is a service aspect present between some or all members. Sometimes there is no service aspect at all.
- There are no hard & fast rules as to what constitutes a Leather Family (other than ones the members of an individual family mutually agrees upon, which often times never occurs)
After reading the above, you may be thinking ‘Well that sounds an awful lot like ‘Family of Choice’ or ‘Urban Tribe’ type stuff to me..’ And you’d be right! That’s exactly what it is. It’s just that when you add the ‘Leather Lifestyle’, ‘BDSM’, or ‘kink’ labels into the equation, the words change slightly. It basically means you & your closest pals are kinky,the relationships between you feels more familial than friendly and rather than just have this affinity go unnamed, you choose to place a label on it so that it’s easily understood that these people are very meaningful to you.
Like I said above, no two are alike. There are some with very structured hierarchies, some actually have members assigned to traditional familial labels (Daddy, sister, etc..) and some are a loose collection of people with shared interests. Some are little more than people who see each other at events and some have more rigid systems that may even include all members living in one house and following a strict set of rules regarding play, sex, finances, decision-making, etc. None of these is ‘more right’ or better than another. Basically it is what you feel, say, think it is.
Since it’s the only one I can speak to, I’ll give you the rundown on my very own ‘Leather Family’.
I live with my primary partner. He is also my Dominant. We are very blessed to have alot of fantastic people in our lives. Some are casual friendships, some are much closer. We play with lots of other people. We have sex with some but very few. My primary and I have our own power structure that does not extend to anyone else. We have people who are closer to us than others and it’s those in this intangible, rather undefinable ‘closer’ areas that we consider family.
On Fetlife a few of these people are marked as ‘in a Leather Family’. This was/is due to circumstance, a little bit of in-joking, and a little bit of seriousness over a very specific situation. It means that the people listed there are very dear to us. What it does NOT mean is that those NOT listed there are NOT dear to us. If I were to list every single person I consider family under my ‘in relationships with’ heading on Fetlife, John Baku himself would email me to let me know that his FL server is only so large and can’t contain my proclamations for all those I adore. There are people not listed there that I wouldnt hesitate to jump out of bed at 3am and drive 8 hours just to give them a hug if they needed me. They would do the same for me. That, to me, is family. Fetlife label or no Fetlife label.
The kinky people who I know and that I feel would be there for me no matter what and I’d do the same for them, those are my Leather Family members. And I have alot of them. I cant quantify what makes them family to me, except how I feel about them. My Leather Family doesn’t look like anyone else’s. It’s more structured than some and not nearly as structured as others. I may not call them Daddy or sister or brother or Mistress, but I am bound to them from a place of shared interest and mutual affinity. They are precious to me in a way that historically only those bound by blood have been, and that’s what makes them family. The fact that I met and fell in love with them because of kink is what makes it Leather (to me).
And now we come to the end where we will stop, and the closing thought is this:
A Leather Family can be whatever you wish for it to be. There is no ‘one true way’. Its nothing more than you and the people you are close to and how you decide to define yourselves. Just to further the point, I’ll leave you with this bit from someone who said it much more poignantly than I as to what a Leather Family is:
Those very select few that i find solace, comfort, information, strength, and closeness with are the ones i consider my Leather Family. Those i have listed in my Leather Family on my profile are the ones i turn to for guidance, a shoulder to cry on, an ear to bend, assistance with situations i feel lost in, friendship, conversation, enjoyment, company, etc. There are a great many things i deal with in regards to my BDSM involvement that i cannot talk to my biological family about as they do not have an understanding or do not wish to be included.
i respect, adore, love, and relish my Leather Family, they are an extension of me. i would hope that i am there for them in the same manner that they are for me. i would give my life for them in the same manner that i would exchange my life for the One I give myself to completely. My Leather Family is exactly that, my family. I got to choose my family members this go around, and i think i have the bestest family ever!
http://www.tsrnetwork.com/blogs/entry/Leather-Family
~kim
Kink In Motion
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1. Family of Choice – a group of people who choose one another and whose bonds often mimic that of a birth family
2. Urban Tribe – a group of individuals that form communities or smaller grouping with bonds to provide the emotional support of an extended family.
3. Leather (as in the lifestyle) – for lack of a better definition (which I am happy to add should one be made available to me) the term ‘leather lifestyle’ is a very large term that can encompass ‘Old Guard’ practices/protocols/ hierarchies to those who engage in BDSM to simply people who enjoy wearing leather. There is alot of debate about who has the right to claim which terms. These are debates I am not prepared nor qualified to engage in. Ergo, the term ‘Leather Lifestyle’ is used here simply as a means of conveying a group of people who claim the term as applicable to them in some way.
4. BDSM – those who engage in some form of Bondage/Discipline/Domination/Submission/Sadism/Masochism.
5. Kink – those who view themselves as ‘set apart from the norm’ by way of their sexual or recreational proclivities, often with some BDSM leanings.
