Lots of self-disclosure in this blog.... I'm not bragging, I'm just citing my sources.
I am a third year doctoral student in the social sciences. As such, I am also a researcher and and educator. Many say social sciences aren't a real science... well, the statistics software that is currently eating up my computer's memory begs to differ. My work influences public policy and social work practice. I also teach masters level students and have the opportunity to present at national conferences.
In addition, I have over 15 years of practical experience in my field. I've spent in the non-profit and government levels of my area of work, did direct care work, middle management, supervised interns, trained etc. Again, I say this to set up my argument and cite my sources, not to toot my own horn (I'm actually fairly humble about most things... ask Djinni... she'll tell you, errr I think).
I've spent the last two years taking classes giving me theoretical knowledge about my field. I've taken policy courses, theory/philosophy courses, methods courses, stats classes, pedagogy classes, etc. I'm in the process of writing a nastily exhausting 60 page exam proving my competency. I'm happy to talk to you about du Bois, Freire, Crenshaw, Durkheim, Weber, Marx, bell hooks, Judith Butler, etc. Want me to run statistics? Descriptive, inferential, correlations or regressions? I can tell you, using evidence to back up my opinion, why I think that my thoughts work. I can provide grades, offer writing suggestions, design a course, and on and on.
Know what all my mentors and professors say will be my greatest asset as an educator and research is and will be? My practical experience. Praxis (the ability to connect theory/knowledge to practice). The fact that in addition to doing the above, I can share with students what life in our field is really like. Reading can't tell you what it's like to get your first client housed, get screamed at by a person you are trying to help, celebrate with a kid finally away from abusive parents, cry when a client dies. Rote learning can't teach you how to survive in the non-profit industrial complex, balance how much you talk to people outside the field about your work cause they just won't get it, how "self care" isn't just taking a bath or drinking a glass of wine.
What I'm trying to say is, ESPECIALLY in kink, words without experience to back them up are (to me) basically pointless. I am friends with a lot of real-life educators. One of my exes is a national presenter/educator about piercing. He refused to accept this title until he truly mastered his craft. Just like my example above, the basics are fine, but that's all they are. He also takes responsibility for his students. If they screw up, he takes it upon himself to correct their mistakes and own that he may not have taught that. Education requires that you balance self-assurance and humility, and have critical thought about your own pedagogy. I've seen plenty of "educators" in the scene who entered a dungeon 6 months ago try to teach advanced topics and fail miserably. I'm not saying they shouldn't educate, they should just stick to what they know. I've also seen folks with decades in the community fuck up one time and never be able to present again. In real life you are held accountable for your actions, so I sure hope you're not compiling your knowledge from other people's work and chatAI (which is basically a tool for plagirism... it steals from other people's work).
I'm not knocking anyone personally, and again, I'm not saying any of this to brag (frankly I'm not 100% sure I made the right choice to go back to school at 40), I'm sharing my own pedagogical opinions and experience. I want to contribute positively to this community since it's where I met my Beloved (who is probably going to yell at me for taking time out of studying to write this blog) and thus is special to me. Most of the time I try to sit back but there are times I'll jump in because it's something important to me and this is one of those times. In my field we say that those who finish their masters degree are the gatekeepers of the profession. We are the ones responsible for the future generations, and I look at kink in the same way.
(p.s. Figging hurts a lot more if you let it warm up to room temperature after taking the ginger out of the fridge. Caning (or any impact) makes you clench down on it harder. I don't recommend tying a string around the base of it because it can act like a garrote and cut off the base if tied too tightly, and be really careful if you use slivers in places cause they can get lost up there and that sounds fucking miserable).
