Metro Vancouver Kink Newsletter

July 2008

Introduction

Volunteering 

Unlike the other BDSM organizations of Vancouver for the past decade or so, MVK is an open society with a formally elected board, a constitution, bylaws, board meetings open to the public and publicly available board meeting minutes. We believe in being accountable and transparent to our community.

What this means is, this is your organization too. If you want something changed at our parties, please talk to one of the board members with the name cards. If you have a cool idea for an event or a workshop, drop us an email. If you want to start a support group for some particular niche, we can promote it and help you find a space. If you have some insanely great idea that we never would have thought of, attend one of our board meetings and bring it up in new business.

This also means that we need volunteers, or rather, more volunteers, as that's what MVK runs on. We offer reduced or free admission to certain events, plus the chance to be an integral part of a new and growing organization. The more people who help out, the easier the jobs are and the better MVK is for everybody.

Communications Group

• Help distribute flyers and posters around town

Logistics Group

• Drivers with large cars who can help drive other volunteers home from events

Party Group

Educational Group

• Drivers and billets for out of town guests and presenters

Social Group

• Outreach officer: drop off flyers and answer people's questions

Volunteer Group

• Deputy volunteer coordinators

If you're interested, please email volunteer@metrovancouverkink.com

Monthly Party

July 5: Play Parties 101: Etiquette and Diversity

Metro Vancouver Kink presents an introduction to play parties. Learn how to behave and make sure that you and everybody else has a good time. Presented by Vancouver scene veteran Arli

Time: Saturday, July 5th, 3:00pm - 4:00pm

Location: Capri Hall, 3925 Fraser and E.24th, Vancouver BC.

Admission by donation. $5 suggested, but no one will be turned away for lack of funds.

July 5: Vancouver Dungeon workshop and play party

MVK presents Vancouver Dungeon workshop and play party on July 5th, 2008. Featuring the Red Light Room and the Cuddle Puddle!

Location: Capri Hall (wheelchair accessible)

3925 Fraser Street @ E.24th, Vancouver, BC

Workshop: “BDSM Negotiation with Elaine Miller”, 7:30 pm - 9:00 pm.

Play party with fully equipped dungeon, 9:00 pm - 1 am Party Rules

For Facebook users, install the Facebook Carpooling application from http://www.zimride.com/. You will be able to arrange rides with other attendees, once you have the event in your list.

Transit:

#8 and #25 buses will bring you there. After the regular buses stop, N8 still runs!

Please check Translink for details

The last scheduled bus, at the nearest timing points are:

8 Northbound: 1.07am

N8 Northbound: 2.48am (every 30min)

8 Southbound: 2.00am

N8 Southbound: 3.33am (every 30min)

Pride Parade

Munches

The BDSM community has traditionally held casual dinner gatherings for people interested in BDSM to socialize in a low-key manner. Come out and meet the community. All open-minded people welcome.

Vancouver West Munch:

Location: Boston Pizza, 190-1333 West Broadway, Vancouver, BC.

Time: 6:30PM - 8:30PM, July 2nd and the first Wednesday of each month.

Vancouver East Munch:

Location: The End Cafe, 2360 Commercial Drive, Vancouver, BC.

Time: 6:30PM - 8:30PM, July 16th and the third Wednesday of every month.

Meetings

MVK's board meetings are open to the public. Our next meeting is 6:30PM-8:30PM on Wednesday, July 2nd, in the meeting room at the Firehall Library, 1455 West 10th (@ Granville), Vancouver, BC

News

Toronto pro-domme challenges federal bawdy house laws

Terri Jean Bedford, alias "Madame de Sade" of the Thornhill bondage bed and breakfast, is part of a constitutional challenge to Canada's criminal laws which prohibit legal brothels. Alan Young, an Osgood Hall attorney who prepared the challenge, argues that certain sections of the Criminal Code violate the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms.

Link

Leatherman's Handbook author sues distributor

Larry Townsend, author of the classic Leatherman's Handbook (1972), is entangled in a lawsuit with his distributor, the Nazca Plains corporation, over alleged copyright infringement and unpaid fees owed. This copyright suit has also involved the booksellers who unwittingly carried Townsend's books.

Link

Max Hardcore convicted of obscenity

Paul F. Little, alias notorious video porn producer and performer Max Hardcore, was convicted in a Tampa, Florida federal court on June 5th of 10 counts of selling obscene material on the Internet and 10 counts of shipping it to Tampa through the U.S. mail.

Link

Editorial

The Taste for Meat

I eat meat, and I doubt I'll ever stop. I know there are a lot of arguments in favor of vegetarianism, ranging from the ethical to the religious to the ecological to the medical, and I don't think I could ever kill an animal, or at least not a mammal. And yet, it doesn't feel like a meal for me if there isn't a little flesh of a once living being in it.

I also don't get the point of meat substitutes. If vegetarianism is justified in terms of health benefits or reducing cruelty to animals, then meat analogs make sense. Why deny yourself the pleasure if you don't have to? From a moral or spiritual position, however, meat analogs require different rationales. If harming or killing an animal is morally and spiritually wrong, it is not only wrong because of what it does to the animal, but what it does to the consumer. From that reasoning, it would follow that giving up food that tastes like meat is necessary sacrifice. Eating food that looks, smells and tastes like meat would defeat the spiritual purpose of vegetarianism. No animal is harmed, but arguably the act of killing exists within the eater's mind.

Actually, not necessarily. In Asia, there are traditional cuisines for devout Buddhists that include meat substitutes like wheat gluten, soy or agar prepared to look, smell and taste like the real thing. A Mahayana Buddhist can have a hot plate of General Tso's Chicken without violating his or her faith, known as "discipline or purification cuisine".

BDSM comes from our cultural heritage of violence and exploitation, of the human body and mind pushed to extremes. We have an ancient appeitite for that, stronger for some people than others. Do we deny it, and live a life of without flavor? Do we abandon ourselves to it, and become the eater or the eaten? Or do we attain a compromise, developing a way to have the taste of a living being in our mouth without actually hurting or violating anything? In the Pali canon of Theravada Buddhism, the Buddha talks about a middle path, between overinduldgence and asceticism. The adamant refusal to eat meat in any way can be as problematic as killing for food. In between, there are compromises and ways of satiating appetites without doing harm, e.g. eating meat substitutes, or practising consensual BDSM. You can have your juicy hamburger and eat it too.

Masthead 

Editor: Peter Tupper, president. Contributions by other MVK Board Members. Published monthly by Metro Vancouver Kink Society.

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