I recently started reviewing experiences via the BME experience engine, and was a little disturbed by a thought I noticed popping into my head: If I have to read one more navel or tongue experience written by a friggin 16 year old, I'm gonna do something violent! Half of me couldn't believe I was thinking this, yet I still was.
At A Glance Author Sheena Queen of the Jungle Contact [email protected] IAM Sheena Queen of the Jungle When N/A And I know I am not the only one.
I feel there is a lot of unfair abstract discrimination going on in the bod mod community, and I don't like it, and I don't like that I am subconsciously a part of it.
Once upon a time, I was fifteen, and I desperately wanted an eyebrow ring. Piercing was just beginning to take off in my area around that time, and I wanted to be one of the first, the original, the cool. But as it turned out, by the time my mother decided to let me do it, I had lost interest.
I didn't really think too much about mods (hell, I didn't even know they were called "mods") until my 18th birthday, when my best friend offered to buy me my first tattoo for the occasion. Being na�ve in the whole venture, I picked a piece of flash out of a book at what I know now is a very sketchy place, but that tattoo was important in so many ways. It was my first mark, and no matter how many things I may find wrong with it, I will never have it covered. The tattoo led to BME, which led to a completely new life for me. It was the start of an adventure.
The first piercing I ever got was a standard 14 gauge center tongue piercing when I was 18. It was exactly the kind of experience I am sadly finding so annoying on the experience engine. I was just as excited and thrilled and rushed with adrenaline when I got my tongue pierced as these people, and I need to force myself to remember this. I got that piercing for very similar reasons as these people: it looks really cool and it makes oral sex better for my boyfriend. I still have it, I still love it, and I still find those reasons valid.
I now have half inch ears, various other larger gauge piercings, and have stretched my tongue to an 8ga. Does that make my tongue piercing more meaningful? Does it make me a "better" modded person? Are consequential mod experiences more important or valid because I have many piercings? The answer is a big fat NO. Many have said this before, and it always always bears repeating:
THIS IS NOT A CONTEST.
Stop judging people's worth by how many piercings they have and what they are. A 14 gauge jeweled navel bar is no more or less important, valid, or substantial than a penis bisection. It is simply one person choosing to improve their body in the way they see as fitting best. As long as we all support and respect one another's rights and desires to modify ourselves, we all belong in this community. We are all equal parts. There is no room for hierarchy here.
The second most recent piercing I have gotten is my navel. Prior to this piercing, I have received 6 gunned lobe piercings (stretched to various large gauges), 2 nipple piercings, a tongue piercing, and a 4ga horizontal hood piercing. Only then did I decide to get my navel, and I also decided to have it done at an 8ga with a plain steel barbell. Are people in the mod community going to "respect" me or "admire" me more because of this? Because it's not the "standard" navel? Because I didn't just let some piercer tell me the way it should be done? Probably.
But I don't want that. And this is why: The reason I have been getting irritated with reading so many center tongue and standard navel experiences is that there are so many of them. I have forgotten one vital important fact, and I am going to force myself to remember from now on---
No matter where it is, what size it is, who does it, how long it's been in, or in what order it was done, EACH AND EVERY PIERCING EXPERIENCE IS UNIQUE AND IMPORTANT. Why? Because each and every person is unique and important. Do I sound like a self-help book? Stuart Smalley even? Maybe, but this is what I hold to be true in my own value system.
I am about to dive back into the experience engine. I have 455 to go before I get my free t-shirt. Haha. And know what? I am going to read each and every single 14ga jeweled navel bar story written by a 16 year old, and I am going to appreciate it (unless of course it is all one paragraph or has about a million exclamation points, in which case I probably won't appreciate it as much). I am going to remember getting my first piercing, and smile nostalgically, and hope that the person who wrote this experience feels welcome in the BME community, just as I was.