Positions: angle, stability and the body

People spend hours choosing an implement and about four seconds deciding where the receiver will be. That is the wrong way round. Position changes the meaning of a scene more than the implement does, and it changes the target area more than the swing does.

Consenting adults only. Everything on this page is about adults over 18 who have freely agreed to it.

Written from first-hand experience or extensive research by the editor.

Everything here is between consenting adults over 18. Two things are going on at once. There is the geometry, which decides what part of the body is presented, how close the bone is to the surface and whether the person swinging can actually see what they are aiming at. And there is the meaning, which decides what the whole thing is about.

The second one is stronger. A hand across a bed and a hand over a table are the same physical event and two entirely different evenings.

The geometry, briefly

The safe target is the lower half of the buttocks, the fleshy part above the crease where the leg starts. Everything above that gets closer to the tailbone and the lower back. See where it is safe to strike for the detail.

What position does is move that target around. Standing more or less upright presents the fuller, meatier upper curve and tucks the sit spot away.

Bending right over at the hips does the opposite: it stretches the skin, flattens the upper curve and presents the sit spot, which is the most sensitive area on the body for this and the one closest to the bone underneath. That is why the same stroke delivered to someone bent double feels considerably sharper than it does to someone standing.

Legs together protects. Legs apart exposes, and it is a thing to have agreed beforehand rather than an instruction to spring on someone mid-scene.

Over the knee

The oldest one and the one everybody pictures. The receiver lies across the thighs of a seated top, hips over one leg, upper body and legs hanging down on either side.

Technically it is limited. The reach is short and the angle is awkward, so it is a hand position, and at a push a hairbrush. Nothing with length belongs anywhere near it. The presented area is small and the far side of it is hard to reach without leaning, which is where accidental hip contact comes from.

Emotionally it is the strongest position on this page. There is constant contact, an arm across the back, the other person's body taking the receiver's weight, and no eye contact in either direction.

It is close, warm and unmistakably humbling, and for a good number of people that is exactly the point and also exactly what makes it hard to ask for. If humiliation is part of what you are after, this is the position that produces it without anybody having to say a word.

The practical problem is the body. The head is below the heart, one arm is usually trapped underneath, and the ribs are pressed against a thigh. Twenty minutes is plenty. Longer than that and people get dizzy, get pins and needles in the trapped arm, and find their breathing restricted in a way they will not mention because they do not want to break the mood. Get up slowly afterwards.

Over the arm of a sofa or a chair

My default, and the one I would suggest to anybody starting out. The receiver bends over a padded arm with the hips supported on it, kneeling or standing at the end of the sofa, upper body resting on the seat cushions.

It gets the geometry right almost by accident. The hips are pushed out and up, the target sits at a sensible height, the lower back is not arched or strained, and the padded arm supports the pelvis so the whole thing can be held for a long time. It is stable enough to use a strap or a cane, and the top can stand where they can see the far side of the body.

The register is neutral, which is a feature. It does not suggest any particular setting. It is simply an efficient way to have a long session, and most of the ones I have enjoyed most have happened here.

Bent over a table or a desk

Formal. Ceremonial, even. The receiver stands, bends forward at the hips and puts hands or forearms flat on the surface, feet apart, back long.

This is the caning position and it is the one that carries the most institutional weight. An office, a formal appointment, a judicial staging. It is distancing in a way over the knee is not: nobody is touching, the top stands away and behind, and the receiver is holding herself in position by her own effort. That effort is part of what the position means. You are being required to stay there rather than being held there.

Geometrically it is the most exposing and the least forgiving. Full bend stretches the skin tight over the sit spot, and tight skin splits more easily than loose skin. It presents the target cleanly at a good height, which is why it suits a cane, and it means every stroke lands on the sharpest available area.

The joint problem is the table height. Too high and the shoulders take strain and the feet come off the floor. Too low and the lower back rounds badly. Roughly hip height with the feet flat is right. Locked knees are the other hazard, and they are how people faint. Tell the receiver to keep a soft bend in the knees, and if the position is held for more than a few minutes, let her stand up between rounds.

Standing against a wall

Hands flat on the wall, feet back from it, weight forward. Sometimes elbows and forearms instead.

The least stable position on the page and the one where accuracy is hardest, because there is nothing supporting the hips and the receiver can and will shift. Anything long is a bad idea here, since a moving target plus a swinging tip is how people get caught on the hip. It works well for a hand and reasonably for a short strap.

What it is good at is exposure and waiting. Facing a wall, unable to see anything, told to stay there, is a punitive image and it has a strong effect on people who respond to that. Corner time and the pause before anything starts are what this position is really for.

Watch for overbalancing. Someone who has been standing braced against a wall for twenty minutes has tired arms, and if she drops she has no hands free.

Lying across a bed

Face down, hips raised on a pillow or two. Safest, most stable, easiest to hold for a long time, and the position I would choose for anything sustained or anything at the harder end.

The pillow matters. Flat on a mattress, the buttocks spread and flatten and the tailbone sits high and unprotected. A pillow under the hips lifts and rounds the target and drops the tailbone out of the firing line. Arms up, head turned to the side rather than buried, so speech still works.

The register is private and soft and closer to the bedroom than the office. It is also the position where the receiver can most easily go quiet and internal, which is lovely and is exactly why the top has to check in more often than feels necessary. A face pressed into a duvet tells you nothing.

Choosing one on purpose

The useful habit is to pick the position for what you want the scene to mean and then let it constrain the implement, rather than picking a cane and then finding somewhere to use it. If the evening is meant to be tender, an intimidating table is working against you. If it is meant to be a formal punishment, being cuddled over a knee will undercut it however hard anybody swings.

Position is also worth putting in the negotiation. People have strong reactions to being put over a knee and to being made to stand facing a wall, and those reactions have nothing to do with pain tolerance. Ask.