tamarind

“People overcoming their suffering by becoming it, like riding the tiger. Or rather, becoming the wild beast. I may suffer, says the sadist, but I shall not suffer passively, or alone. One way or another there will be others to share it with me. I’ll make sure of that! Above all, sadomasochism is about fusion, and confusion: identification with the victim’s suffering so profound that the victim must be destroyed in order to protect the sadist’s existence. Wonder at the intimacy of the sadistic relationship, a contact across boundaries which can only be called autistic-contiguous, like a vampire sucking blood. […] Identification with the victim puts it too weakly; becoming the victim is more like it. But only for a moment. To stick to the other who now contains one’s doom is hardly a solution. Shared doom is still doom. A violent separation is necessary, sadism a scratch across the autistic-contiguous surface to separate the parties, damaging the other so as to know who really has the power, who really contains the doom, and who’s in charge. The other’s suffering is evidence of that, the position of victimizer the only position in which one’s separateness can be known. Sadism is a blemish on the mirror, distinguishing the image from the reflecting surface. […] In the sadistic act, the sadist seals his dread in the body of the victim, the victim becomes coffin, the victim’s suffering the sadist’s testament to his will to survive his pain. Why sadism is properly called sadomasochism is apparent; identification with the victim is central to the act, without which it would be pointless.”