Thursday, February 25, 2016

Please, Please (Let Me be Your Slave)

Recently, I was invited to a party organised by vanilla friends of mine. It proved to be a wonderful evening (and night) with good food and nice conversation. Sometime around two or three o'clock in the morning, we ended up watching old music videos which we enjoyed in our youth.

Among them was one by the great German punk band "Die Ärzte" ("The Doctors"), called "Bitte, Bitte" ("Please, Please"). The song is about BDSM, but the video adds another context. It is a clip against prudery, oppressive regimes and censorship, and it is most certainly very kinky. I saw it many years ago and liked both the song and the video, but I had completely forgotten about it until I saw it again that night at the party.

As explained on Wikipedia the song was definitely meant pro BDSM and in one version a dominatrix who was obviously friends with the group explains the meaning of certain fetish and BDSM terms. Watching the video, though, it struck me as ironic that while the band used a lady with a whip to symbolize oppression and censorship, we in the kinky community today have to deal with the censorship of images and videos showing such ladies.

So I decided to share the video as a memory from my youth with you. Two more hints for those of you who don't understand the German language: The ministry the young man walks into is the "Ministerium für Zucht und Ordnung". The correct translation would probably be "ministry of law and order", but "Zucht" can also be translated as "discipline" or "chastity". The inscription of the stamp says "zensiert" which is of course "censored" which is also what the Z on the banners stands for.


Here is a rough translation of the lyrics:

I have a gift for you
I love you, the gift is me
Do not ask me, you know why, starting today I am your property
You're hurting me what more do I want?
I am your servant, thou the Lord
From today I belong to you alone


Please let me, please, please let me
Please, please let me - let me be your slave


Whatever you order, I'll do it
I kiss the top of your shoe
And if you give me the whip
I know that you love me, too
I'm beyond redemption, whip me, put me in chains
From today on I belong to you alone


Please, please let me, please, please let me...
Please, please let me - let me be your slave ...


Please, please let me, when you want, please, please let me, how you want it...

Let's hope that one day, censorship of speech, music and consensual kink will be history. I have to admit that I don't believe this will happen any time soon, though, if at all. As a matter of fact, when I read the news today I am sure that the song is still as relevant as it was at the time of its release 28 years ago.

3 comments:

Bob S said...

Thank you.

Downunder Don said...

I loved the song. It is so reminiscent of the whole machine gun beat, heavy metal, punk/new wave German bands so popular in Oz through the 80's and 90's. So many bands attempted to copy the style but failed...I guess because they had no message to bring. I also hope the band had a little fun making the clip.

Rather than our speech and consentual actions being more free than the 80's the new moral minority, unbrella lady, appears to be much more powerful and vocal these days. I mourn those lost days from then when we all felt more liberated but, in this country at least, we are only now learning about the church and state sanctioned child and racial abuse apparently so wide spread back in those days.

Kaelah said...

@ Bob S:
You're welcome!

@ Downunder Don:
I'm happy that watching the clip brought up good memories! Unfortunately, not all things were good in the past and not all things are good today, either. I guess all we can do is being happy about the things that are good (and indeed there are lots of them, I think in your country as well as in Germany).