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Michelle Fegatofi

This past year of blogging has brought many changes to not only my own self, but to our online community as well.

Through contact with literally thousands of people, I have guided, counseled, laughed, cried and helped in many different situations. I have seen some good changes, some bad changes, and a huge movement around the world by moralistic people to get our community confined to sites that either specialize in BDSM or porn.

The Readers

I think I have some of the most supportive readers out there. I have had many chats, discussions, and even debates about different views and ways to practice the Lifestyle. I have learned new techniques, new buzz words in the community, broadened my own view on some of the harsher sides of BDSM that I rarely talk about or practice, and many other things too numerous to get into further.

My fan base has become a mixture of men and women from all walks of life that have many different levels of experience. I love the new people that trust in my writings enough to email me a private question they are to scared to ask out in the open.

Some of the best feelings that I have gotten are from the wonderful feedback and updates from you guys after I have helped or advised you on a problem. I have had some that are so touching and grateful for my help that I literally could not hold back the tears of happiness.

The Separatists

This past year, I have seen some really bad changes within our online communities. It seems that there are groups of people that think it's better to divide the community into what they think of as the "true pages" and the "fakes". I have seen this on many different social sites, but FB is the worst. These types of groups are hunting down pages that either refuse to join in their separatist philosophy or that they just do not like.

I myself have been a victim of these groups and have refused to get involved and even acknowledge their existence for the most part as it just adds fuel to their fire, so to speak. They have tried many different attack approaches such as spreading rumors about me that are untrue and telling all of their new readers that I am a fake. If being in and around the lifestyle for over 21 years, being trained as a Gorean kajira for two years, and living in a 24/7 M/s relationship since August of 2011 makes me a fake, well I guess I need to revamp my kinkionary.

I have always said and will continue to say that we are better off together than separate, especially now that the moralists are after the large online companies to extremely restrict our activities and presence on the internet.

I hope that one day these separatist cliques will decide to rejoin the mainstream BDSM community so that we can show the world that we are united.

The Moralistic Movement

In May of this year, an online Twitter movement was started by right wing activists to get adult content removed from most social media sites like Facebook and Google. They first only said they wanted derogatory and rape images removed and banned from being posted on the sites. But soon, they moved into pictures that are a normal site to those of us that practice a BDSM lifestyle such as a woman getting spanked or in bondage.

In late May, the first wave of page removals started hitting FB. Along with many that were hit in that first round, one of my original pages was taken down. Since then, FB, Yahoo, Google, Twitter, Pinterest and many others have bowed to the pressure these moralistic people have put on them and changed their policies. They are getting so ridiculous in their pursuit that people's accounts are being shut down because someone reported them and stated that they were offended or didn't like something that the person said or posted.

While I agree that images portraying abused women and children should be very much policed and not allowed to be shown, I think there needs to be exceptions for women portrayed in bondage and other BDSM settings since these activities are consensual within our community.

In the Future

I have hope that we will unite together as a community and try to make our presence in the online communities more concrete. There will always be those that condemn us for our beliefs and practice, but at least we can try to present the real and beautiful picture that makes up our lifestyle.

I also hope that those groups that are dividing the online community will stop attacking others that do not subscribe to their way of thinking, being, or doing and try to either mend fences or just let everything coexist in harmony. It's sad when someone that supposedly practices an alternative lifestyle that teaches tolerance can be so intolerant.

Lastly, I hope to continue to bring all of you great info, a different perspective, and hopefully more knowledge about various subjects that is BDSM.

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Michelle Fegatofi

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Michelle Fegatofi

As you all know, so many pages containing BDSM and Adult content were suspended or deleted by FB this past week. While we are fighting to retain the right to be represented on various social media sites, we should also take the time to rebuild a bigger, stronger, and closer nit community.

There are many petty feuds between people and groups because of differing opinions or just personality clashes. Let's all try to put those aside and come together as a real online community of BDSM practitioners to combat those that are trying to dictate their beliefs on how the world should be run and what morals are right. As intelligent and rational adults, I believe we have the right to make that choice ourselves.

Yes, I realize many of you might think my enthusiasm or passion for trying to combat this censorship of Adult Content on the social media sites is futile, maybe even laughable. You may laugh. You may not agree with me at all. Because of my belief in and love for this Lifestyle and being a 24/7 slave to my Padrone, it has become my mission in life to help guide those new to the scene find their own path and way of practicing a BDSM relationship. I can not begin to tell you what a nightmare my life was and how lost I had become before meeting and submitting to Padrone. I truly believe it saved my sanity and my true personality.

BDSM International's appeal was denied and the original page is set to be deleted. So, I made a new page called BDSM International 2.0. I am looking at this as an opportunity to begin anew. We had over 35,200 when FB shut us down, but many of them were not active at all on the site. I am hoping that the new followers will be comprised of a larger, more interactive group so that we can debate, trade ideas, and learn together in a safe environment.

So, if you are thinking of rebuilding your page, think of it as not only a protest against FB in the fact that we just keep rebuilding and refuse to give up our presence on social media sites, but an opportunity to gain a closer, more interactive audience and the grass roots of rebuilding a stronger community.

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Michelle Fegatofi

Have you been on Facebook lately and noticed that many of your favorite pages are missing? Wonder why this happened? Here is a little background history.

Laura Bates, founder of the Everyday Sexism Project, writer and activist Soraya Chemaly and Jaclyn Friedman from Women, Action & the Media joined forces to launch the hashtag Twitter campaign #FBRape in May 2013. The campaign focuses on content that portrays rape and violence against women positively. More than 50,000 have tweeted in support of the FBrape campaign and around 5,000 have emailed brands whose advertising appears around the content.

Following the week long campaign blitz, at least 15 International companies pulled their ads, including Nissan UK, Nationwide UK, J Street and WestHost. On May 29, 2013, Facebook announced it would update its policies on hate speech, increase accountability of content creators and train staff to be more responsive to complaints, marking a victory for women's rights activists. 

Now, we do support the removal of pictures portraying abused women and children from Facebook. But, there has to be a line drawn when they go overboard with picture removal and start closing legitimate educational BDSM Lifestyle pages. What the general public and FB doesn't seem to understand is that BDSM is a way of living between two or more consenting adults. Yes, it is not mainstream and there are many aspects of it that would be deemed vile or the regression of women's rights because some of us choose to happily and willing submit to a man.

However, BDSM is not only made up of male Dominants and female submissives. There are female Dominants and submissives, male Dominants and submissives, and Transgender Dominants and submissives. We are a wide and diverse community. Our practices are not aimed at harming anyone, nor are they done without consent. During play (a scene) where any form of S&M is involved, the submissive has a safety net of sorts by having the ability to use a safeword for any reason. A safeword is a word that stops all play and the submissive is immediately taken out of any action they may be in and cared for.

There are several feminist groups that support our right to live our lifestyle as we want, but there are also many moralist and feminist groups that deem BDSM as harmful, immoral, and indecent. The reason they think it's wrong is because they do not understand deeply what BDSM really is.

One of the most caring, deep, and honest relationships I have ever witnessed are those that live a BDSM Lifestyle. The core foundations of a true loving D/s relationship is trust, complete honesty, and open, two way communication. 

The fallout of the FBrape campaign has been the trampling of the BDSM Community's rights to have a presence on social media sites. There have been hundreds of legitimate Facebook pages that have been unpublished and deleted since FB's policy changes were introduced. Some pages have put in appeals and have been restored.

It seems like the overall morals of society and the internet companies are suddenly taking a step back in time by bowing to the moralist groups and allowing them to dictate what everyone else's beliefs should be, thus inhibiting the rights of minority groups to have freedom of speech and expression. I realize because of the monetary loss to Facebook's revenue, they may not have a choice but to bow to the moralist beliefs of the Feminist groups pressuring them. But surely, they are a big enough company and believe in the rights of freedom of expression and freedom of speech, to implement changes that would balance the wants of the moralist groups while allowing us to live and express ourselves as we want to.

We understand that parents are worried about what their children see on the internet, but it is not our responsibility to police them. We use the built in page settings to make sure no one under age is allowed to see our pages. Parents have to take responsibility for their own children's actions and learn to monitor their internet usage more.

Facebook should also take off the option that allows your friends to see what content you are linking and change it to people having to allow chosen individuals the option to see their likes. As of today, if you don't like or agree with certain pages or content on FB, you can always choose the option to block that page so you won't ever see their content. To me, this seems like it would be the obvious and adult option to take.

So, where does this leave us as a community? Apparently out in the cold or back in the closet, unless we get an organized campaign together to combat these changes and demand our own rights.

I ask all of you, please tweet, email, call, knock on doors, and contact everyone you can think of that will help us get the word out as well as to come together as a community to demand our equal rights to be seen and heard. Use the hashtag #StopBDSMFBCensorship in all of your protest communications.

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Michelle Fegatofi

There are so many ways to practice the BDSM Lifestyle. There are so many different types of people in the world that they are bound to be clashes at some point. But, we all have to be adult enough to put those clashes aside.

To get anything done and actually make a difference in any of the FB policies, we have to unite together as a united front, beyond our differences, petty arguments, and disagreements. We have to show that we are one community and we are all fighting for the same goal.

If we come at the world like a crazed mob, calling those that disagree with us bad names, sending hate mail, or shouting at the top of our lungs how our way is the right way, we will never get anywhere or be taken seriously.

So, please, if you are doing anything to help us #StopBDSMFBCensorship , then get on board and help us in creative and intelligent ways so we do present a united, intelligent front.

I am part of a group that is growing rapidly and we are working toward the same goal as one unit. If you would like to join, please contact me or comment below.

Thank you and keep up the fight!

Michelle Fegatofi

Below is a list of sites to tweet a message to with the hashtag #StopBDSMFBCensorship . Feel free to send me any suggestions for more people or organizations that will help further our cause. If you know any people in the media or in wide spread organizations, please contact them and let them know of our cause.
Please get out there and spread the word!

Here is an example of some of the tweets that my Padrone has been working on:

@bdsmovementnet Pls help promote the cause against FB shutting down BDSM pages #StopBDSMfbCensorship http://goo.gl/hXlXd

https://twitter.com/FetLife
https://twitter.com/informedconsent
https://twitter.com/AlterNet
https://twitter.com/subguide
https://twitter.com/cnn
https://twitter.com/bbc
https://twitter.com/BBCWorld
https://twitter.com/cbs
https://twitter.com/wikileaks
https://twitter.com/aljazeera
https://twitter.com/abc
https://twitter.com/abcnews
https://twitter.com/Independent_ie
https://twitter.com/time
https://twitter.com/Tweet__News
https://twitter.com/scoopit
https://twitter.com/NCSF

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Michelle Fegatofi

Care about being able to browse what you like on FB and other social media pages? Let people know you will not stand for censorship of our BDSM Lifestyle! Post, share, enlist others help to get the word out!

#stopbdsmfbcensorship

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