Due to neuroplasticity, we can train ourselves to get our pleasure/pain wires crossed
I find this claim highly suspicious, because the little bit I know about neurobiology tells me that pain and pleasure are controlled by neurotransmitter chemicals, not by synapse connections (wiring), and so it should not be possible to cross them except by genetic defect.
If you deny that a “masochistic” response to unpleasant stimuli can be developed and strengthened over time, we might be too far apart epistemically to have a productive discussion. I’ve seen it happen enough that I consider it a transparent fact.
If you agree that this happens but deny that it’s an effect of neuroplasticity, what do you propose instead?
Does anyone know of any actual case of a sexual masochist having been produced by learning/training/conditioning in which the person definitely was not a masochist to start with? (Begs the question of how, exactly, they ended up undergoing the said conditioning...)
Does anyone know of any actual case of a sexual masochist having been produced by learning/training/conditioning in which the person definitely was not a masochist to start with? (Begs the question of how, exactly, they ended up undergoing the said conditioning...)
Actually, it raises another question, which is, how can you establish that a person was “definitely not a masochist to start with”? After all, if you’ve never tried it, how would you know?
Does it count if the person was curious before you brought up the subject? Expressed an interest in trying it after you brought it up? Had prior rape fantasies?
How would you consider the analagous situation, where somebody’s never tried a spicy food before? How do you know they’re not already predisposed to like or dislike spiciness?
It might be more useful to ask, can you increase a person’s sexual response to pain through learning and conditioning… but of course the answer to that is not just yes, but hell yes. (Same for sexual response to sadism—many people learn to become aroused as dominants or sadists simply through repeated exposure to their partner’s arousal and happiness as the recipient of their attentions.)
I once met someone who claimed to have trained people to be masochists. (It was at a rather weird convention, and he was demonstrating “knife play”—stimulating someone by lightly running knife blades across their skin without cutting them.)
It might be possible to get people who don’t self-identify as masochists to volunteer for such a test. Unfortunately, it would be very difficult to distinguish the actual non-masochists and the people who have weak tendencies in that regard.
With sexual masochism, I think the conditioning generally starts with fantasies. Obviously this is hard to test, but I still like the explanation because of the parsimony with developing a taste for spicy or bitter foods, learning to enjoy frightening experiences, and so on; in those cases the progression from nonenjoyment to enjoyment seems obvious.
Edit: To (hopefully) avoid seeming naively square, I’m not saying these experiences are comparable or that anyone can learn to be sexually masochistic, only that the formation of these preferences could share a common mechanism.
This does not necessarily follow. The neurotransmitter chemicals can remain the same but whole areas of the brain can be rewired such that the area processing the pain can be connected differently to the rest of the brain, including an area which experiences pleasure.
I find this claim highly suspicious, because the little bit I know about neurobiology tells me that pain and pleasure are controlled by neurotransmitter chemicals, not by synapse connections (wiring), and so it should not be possible to cross them except by genetic defect.
If you deny that a “masochistic” response to unpleasant stimuli can be developed and strengthened over time, we might be too far apart epistemically to have a productive discussion. I’ve seen it happen enough that I consider it a transparent fact.
If you agree that this happens but deny that it’s an effect of neuroplasticity, what do you propose instead?
Does anyone know of any actual case of a sexual masochist having been produced by learning/training/conditioning in which the person definitely was not a masochist to start with? (Begs the question of how, exactly, they ended up undergoing the said conditioning...)
Actually, it raises another question, which is, how can you establish that a person was “definitely not a masochist to start with”? After all, if you’ve never tried it, how would you know?
Does it count if the person was curious before you brought up the subject? Expressed an interest in trying it after you brought it up? Had prior rape fantasies?
How would you consider the analagous situation, where somebody’s never tried a spicy food before? How do you know they’re not already predisposed to like or dislike spiciness?
It might be more useful to ask, can you increase a person’s sexual response to pain through learning and conditioning… but of course the answer to that is not just yes, but hell yes. (Same for sexual response to sadism—many people learn to become aroused as dominants or sadists simply through repeated exposure to their partner’s arousal and happiness as the recipient of their attentions.)
Just give me a sec while I get my proposal past the ethics committee...
I once met someone who claimed to have trained people to be masochists. (It was at a rather weird convention, and he was demonstrating “knife play”—stimulating someone by lightly running knife blades across their skin without cutting them.)
Does that hurt? With particularly sharp instruments even actually cutting yourself doesn’t necessarily hurt straight away.
It doesn’t if you’re not afraid, but fear and pain are highly interrelated and both have proximal places on the BDSM spectrum.
It might be possible to get people who don’t self-identify as masochists to volunteer for such a test. Unfortunately, it would be very difficult to distinguish the actual non-masochists and the people who have weak tendencies in that regard.
Sounds ripe for self-experimentation. How curious are you? ;-D
With sexual masochism, I think the conditioning generally starts with fantasies. Obviously this is hard to test, but I still like the explanation because of the parsimony with developing a taste for spicy or bitter foods, learning to enjoy frightening experiences, and so on; in those cases the progression from nonenjoyment to enjoyment seems obvious.
Edit: To (hopefully) avoid seeming naively square, I’m not saying these experiences are comparable or that anyone can learn to be sexually masochistic, only that the formation of these preferences could share a common mechanism.
This does not necessarily follow. The neurotransmitter chemicals can remain the same but whole areas of the brain can be rewired such that the area processing the pain can be connected differently to the rest of the brain, including an area which experiences pleasure.
(This is not an endorsement of the grandparent.)