In the dark of the night, on a corner in downtown Riverside, off of Market Street was a dingy porn store. I’d get up the nerve and walk out of my 1980 rabbit, scurry inside likening myself to PeeWee Herman. Going in for my fix of the latest soft bondage magazine published by Harmony Concepts. “Ding dong” the fucking bell would ring, a super loud and annoying liquor store like ring…”all must pass through ‘The Door.” Spoken in my head as if the Elf Lord Elrond from the Lord of the Rings would say if he stood watch.

All were brothers and sisters (very few), once you got passed the damn door. Leaving that joint was another story all together, black bag in hand…if anyone saw you, they’d know…there’s another pervert….the days of yore.

Those were days where the internet was a fledgling, websites barely dial up, and the idea of social media was M, fucking TV. Today, Rope Bondage is everywhere online. Practiced by all genders, freely expressed online, faces and all. Rope bondage is a way of life, a means to express, for sex, for art, for an emotional fix. There is even a way of it in Japan, called Shibari, enormously popular now in the United States, EU, South America, and AU.

Check out Shape Magazine…https://www.shape.com/lifestyle/sex-and-love/shibari-japanese-rope-bondage

Rope bondage is not just for porn anymore, and we are not in Kansas anymore either, and beyond Oz, it’s Valhalla. Hard to imagine even now as I tie up persons for rope photoshoots, left and right, up and down. Tie-tie-tie. Like, this is for real. I am tying up people and they want to be tied. They ask me literally, through Instagram IM mostly, regularly. I use to dream of finding someone who would understand me, and accept me. Worry of family or friends finding out and having to explain myself. No I am not a killer, and/or a sex addict. Crazy maniacal creepy person….who ties up people, I mean that is kind of hot….maybe that’s just me.

Rope has exploded. Not exactly news anymore-you’re like “we know.” Old news.

So I can’t say when exactly the Super Nova occurred, but I have to think it started with Instagram. Insta has a whopping 1 billion users, that a 1,000 million users! Twitter was there before Insta, it had rope bondage and all levels of pornography, it was still kind of seedy to see it…those who shared on Twitter were still out in the fringes of society. Like me, I was publishing myself tied up since the first days of the 2000’s. What happened? Instagram happened. (I am simplifying this, but this platform made a difference.)

Rope is in pornography still, it’s a mainstay, beyond the niche. If we had a comparison to the past porn store, rope bondage would take up a small room now, not just a shelf in the back. Shit, sometimes, I could barely find a magazine, sometimes not at all, so disappointing. Yet here we are, rope is all over now.

I am no longer a pornographer, in my mind, I am an Artist! Ha!

Yes, I practice rope bondage, and tie up people. It’s not for sexual expression, oh no, it’s for the Aesthetic! Ha! Ha-Ha!

The beauty of a person tied up, bound, and sometimes-rarely, gagged. I am just one of a thousand out there, maybe 20K or 100K (?). These are just the ones who care to share on-line. You can imagine it’s 10x-20x’s as many who tie.

The demographics who are tying or watch on-line are still predominantly male identifying, venturing to say. If I may take directly from my Instagram statistics to back-up my point, 75% who follow me are male, 25% female. A whopping 1/4 female. Pretty cool!

Mind you Insta, likes to watch their platform closely. Too much skin, too racy, and sexually implied, and you’ll be deleted to only come back and say “I got deleted”…awww….”they gave me an F” awww….you got the F! I got an A, I got an F…going off on a tangent as usual….

….at any rate, I share photos of me tying or people tied up, and I do it daily. Wow! For real, rope bondage ain’t just for porn, it’s a way of life! It’s art form, and I care to challenge you that it can’t be. We are creating rope works in our right, our own way, and making it for us to express….

After all, there’s even an App now, Shibari Study! Rope is no longer just for porn…