Botox as a Bondage and Humiliation Tool?
If you have seen my blog recently you’ll know about the computer problems I have had recently. I’ve also had something of a crisis of enthusiasm and confidence as regarding the work on volume 2 of my book and the continuation of my blog and so whereas I should have been fixing my computer over Christmas I have in fact done absolutely nothing about it (other than drunk too much in the hope of somehow magically gaining inspiration). However I did get around to reading my email on my lapto -: and boy, I’m glad that I did!
There were quite a few messages of encouragement - and then there was a very interesting little thing from a contributor that featured some interesting ideas as regards the imaginative use of Botox - yes Botox, you heard right - as a bondage and humiliation tool. It is an insight of shear genius and together with a stimulating exchange of ideas, regarding institutionalised humiliation, has once again reignited my enthusiasm. Anyway, refreshed by the Xmas layoff and this wonderfully stimulating flood of ideas I have taken my life in my hands and, ignoring its bleating and repeated bleeps of protest, I have once more somehow forced my main machine into action.
I couldn't resist sharing this with you in its entirety; I don’t think I have ever felt so invigorated let alone inspired:
"... As for ideas for volume III, have you considered the many possibilities of botox in controlling the subjects? I can see many applications. The subject need not know that they have been injected, this could be done while they are in a drug induced deep sleep. Botox could be injected on one side of the lower lip to create a mild or more pronounced speech impediment. It could also be injected in the thong for a more dramatic effect before appearing in front of a judge to decide on one’s sanity… It could also be injected in the muscles that control the fingers, the thumb in particular. Of course there are few things worse for self confidence than loosing bladder control, various amounts of botox in the bladder sphincter could produce night incontinence, or night incontinence coupled with dribble incontinence during the day or all out full incontinence. The possibilities are endless; inject muscles in the back to force the wearing of orthopedic corsets or collars or both. Botox lasts about six months so the procedures would have to be repeated..."
Wow! Yes, Yes, Yes!
As you may have noticed; throughout
INSTITUTIONALISED volume 1 both of our favorite subjects have been developing a rather debilitating stammer. As you probably realize; this and their other supposed 'problems' are as much a result of subtle psychological pressure, both before their arrival in the clinic and ongoing since (of which more in volume 2). But wouldn't Botox be a great way of initiating an impediment or perhaps exacerbating one where a girl does not respond quite so well to the power of suggestion.
I generally dislike over-reliance on drugs and technology in story lines but I do like this usage as it can be quite subtle and used to reinforce or initiate the psychological means that I prefer to see used. I particularly liked the idea of applying it to the muscle at the base of the thumbs - perhaps very tiny doses, barely noticeable at first and just inducing a gradually worsening weakness there. At the same time she would be given post-hypnotic suggestions under the guise of therapy that she is 'all thumbs these days' that she is finding the buttons on her dress 'fiddly'.
As per this contributor's induced incontinence ideas; well at the moment Botox injections are used to reduce muscle contractions that cause the sudden, undeniable need to urinate, but I dare say that placed else where the opposite effect could be induced and again paired with post-hypnotic suggestion and/or psychological conditioning to make the effect more permanent. The idea of the use of Botox to enforce the wearing of orthopedic corsets or collars is a master stroke and would fit well with one of the scenarios developing in volume 2. Most of the latter volume is finished and thus it is probably too late for its inclusion there - but I may try to write something along those lines into volume 3 (which is also under construction as we speak).
Plausibility in Setting Choice and The Appropriation of Status Through Label Imposition
The same contributor has also sent me a link to an interesting article based on the real story of a young girl trapped in the insane asylum of 1950’s Quebec
(Click here). Basically, a church-run orphanage, for economic reasons, changed its status, almost overnight it seems, to that of an asylum for the mentally infirm and in so doing the original residents found their status virtually instantly changed to suit, quite legally and officially it would seem, despite being normal in every way. Other than the age of the principle characters at the time - a disappointment I also ran into when reading about the research that was done with the deliberate induction of stammering in the 1930s (
mentioned in an earlier blog entry) - there is much of potential interest here.
In common with the aforementioned stammering study, wherein one participant was 15, there is mention of the involvement of teenagers and thus of young adults, allowing some latitude to the imagination. I am very keen to avoid any connection with paedophilia and also the characters I invoke, both in my private fantasies and more recently in my writing, are of necessity young adults. Sexual maturity is a must if the scenario is to be of any interest to me at all; devoid of any sexual element all one is left with is a disturbingly cold depiction of various forms of torture, both mental and physical. This could be said of all forms of S/M fantasy / writing wherein participation is not necessarily consensual - but in your mind's eye place in either of these situations a deliciously curvaceous and well developed young lady, perhaps a spoiled pouting and pampered princess of a girl, once the apple of her late father's eye and wanting for nothing but now left with the prospect of facing-off against an avaricious jealous young stepmother for every penny...a very clever, very inventive young stepmother.
What really most caught my attention in the article was, firstly, how easily the status of an institution could be changed overnight, from what could easily have been a shelter for young runaways (or - in an earlier era perhaps - a church-run home for young women likely to fall into moral danger) to a mental institution - and solely for financial reasons it seems. Secondly, the way in which, automatically, the way in which the status of an inmate could change along with the institution by default, despite her being perfectly normal in every way, to that of a mental defective or retard and her new status be recorded quite legally - with all the implications that encompasses. And, thirdly, the way an inmate's treatment might change commensurate with that new status, despite her normal disposition and good behavior, as the staff come to view her in a different light (there are possible parallels with the well known Stanford experiment here as regards the effect on the staff's behavior towards their charges). Finally: there is the implied long term psychological effects of the barred windows, sedation, straitjackets, humiliation and punishment; the possibility that an inmate could be changed so as to come to match the status imposed on her - so much easier to control a nice, quite, tamed mental patient.
The latter point echoes the aforementioned
stammering study wherein, in addition to the provision of so-called negative therapy, the staff overseeing the subjects unwittingly reinforced the treatment by changing the way they were treating their charges in their day-to-day life once their status had been reassigned and they had been given the label; stutterer. Partly this was the way the staff had been instructed to behave, but partly it was also a subconscious response to the attached label.
I remember reading years ago about the shooting of the film of The Pride of Miss Jean Brodie (1969). Many of the cast and extras played school girls and had to stay in costume (a gymslip, blouse and tie ensemble) wandering around all day despite only being required on set from time to time. Shooting went on for many weeks and the cast began to notice more and more as time went on how studio staff, canteen staff for example, would treat them as children, despite their being in their late teens or even early twenties in some cases. What is more; they found that rather than complain about such off-handish and sometimes patronizing treatment, as they might ordinarily have done, they found themselves tending to adopt a rather sheepish stance of acceptance, thus reinforcing the staff members viewpoint, and treatment of them, still further, perpetuating the situation.
Hi folks, just a quickie today as I am hard at work on the last bits of INSTITUTIONALISED volume 2 (as I said I would be).
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