FetLife

What is FetLife?

FetLife (a brand name, used unchanged) is a social network for people with an interest in BDSM, fetish and kink. FetLife expressly presents itself not as a dating site but as a social network: profiles, groups that work as a forum, and event announcements. The site belongs to the Canadian company BitLove and has existed since 2008.

How FetLife is used in the Netherlands

Mostly as an address book. Dutch and Flemish users find the regional groups there, the announcements of fetish parties and munches, and the people who rent out a play space.

That last part is more concrete than it sounds. In my overview of play spaces in the Netherlands, Belgium and Germany, for over half of the addresses “via Fetlife” is the only contact channel. No website, no booking system, only a profile. Anyone who searches without an account does not see that part of what is on offer.

The ordering works from the bottom up. In their analysis of the European part of FetLife, Fay and colleagues describe that membership of one geographic area is required, usually at the level of a municipality or region. Above that sit the topic groups: 35,153 of them in their dataset.

How FetLife works and where it comes from

From frustration. John Kopanas, a software developer in Montreal, could not manage to find women with the same preferences as him, built a site called FriendsWithFetishes in 2007, and relaunched it on 3 January 2008 as FetLife.

A profile consists of your age, gender, orientation, role and a list of fetishes you are curious about. On top of that you can list relationships with other members, and those are shown openly: Fay and colleagues note that listed relationships are readable by all members.

The search function is limited on purpose. You cannot search by age or gender, and blog posts can only be found through the writer’s tags. That makes the site less usable as a catalog, and that is exactly the intention.

Why people use FetLife

Because it is the only place where the whole scene of a region is gathered in one spot.

The pull sits not in the network itself but in what hangs off it: a calendar of real evenings, groups about technique and limits, and the chance to read someone for months first.

• For someone new, the gain is that you can read along without joining in: a group about rope work costs nothing and commits you to nothing.
• For someone looking for something, FetLife is the only register of parties, workshops and play spaces in your own region.
• For a couple, it is useful for looking together at what exists, without a conversation with a third person.

As for the division of roles, it is less one-sided than people expect. Fay and colleagues found that the dominant roles (Dom, Domme, Mistress, Master) fill 23.39 percent of the roles and the submissive roles (Sub, Slave) 25.15 percent, which they call a remarkable balance.

FetLife is a notice board and not a matchmaker. There is no screening, no verification of who someone says they are, and no one watching over what happens offline afterward.

What FetLife is not

“FetLife is a dating site.” The site expressly distances itself from that, and the setup shows it: the search function is too limited to select people by their characteristics. Fay and colleagues describe FetLife as a network in which the social is primary and the partner market secondary.

“What you put there stays inside.” Not just like that. Early in 2014 researchers collected data on every single member of the European part of the site, starting from the area codes. They left names, photos and messages alone, but the reachability of half a million profiles in a row was demonstrated with it.

“There is always a button to report abuse.” In 2012 a dispute arose over the rule that members may not make criminal accusations against other members in public. Users felt that this stops victims of assault from warning others; FetLife cited the risk of defamation.

“Sites like that are just there.” Also not. In January 2017 FetLife removed hundreds of groups and temporarily halted the creation of new groups, under pressure from its payment processor. The Electronic Frontier Foundation called that censorship and described how a credit card network closed both of FetLife’s business accounts, backed by complaints about “blood, needles, and vampirism” and further “illegal or immoral reasons”.

What I see of it myself

I am Victor, a gigolo, twenty-five years in BDSM and trained as a psychotherapist. I use FetLife myself, and not as a shop window: I post writing there, and the discussion that follows is sharper than what I hear elsewhere. When I put up a piece about BDSM gigolos, it went straight to aftercare, and that question sharpened my own way of working.

Something predictable happens to women who are new there: an empty profile with a female gender brings a mailbox full of messages within a day. A woman who reads along in groups for a few weeks first, before filling in a profile, is troubled by that much less.

What to watch for

• Do not enter a hometown precise enough to find you by, and keep it to the region the site asks for.
• Do not put a photo on your profile that appears elsewhere under your name, because a reverse image search is the gap where most privacy leaks out.
• Assume that your role and the relationships you list are readable by every logged-in user, including people you would later rather not know anymore.
• Read along in a group first before you fill in a profile completely, so you know how people write in your region.
• Do not expect screening. FetLife does not check who someone is, so everything you know about meeting safely applies there in full.

More about FetLife

On this site there is the overview of play spaces where you can see how many addresses are reachable only via FetLife, and the podcast interview is about, among other things, a discussion that arose there. For the evenings announced on it, fetish party is the way in.

Beyond this site, the study by Fay and colleagues is the only one to map the scene on this scale, and the Electronic Frontier Foundation explains why a site like this depends on its payment processor.

Where this fits on this site

If FetLife gives you the idea to try something you would rather not do with someone you know, then a conversation is the first step. The page on the BDSM date explains how such an evening is prepared, without a profile or account.

Sources

• An exploration of fetish social networks and communities. Fay, Haddadi, Seto, Wang & Kling, arXiv:1511.01436, 2015 (Bournemouth University, Queen Mary University of London, The Royal Ottawa Mental Health Centre, NUI Galway, GESIS Cologne). Supplies the 504,416 European profiles with 1,912,196 connections and 35,153 groups from early 2014, the required membership of one geographic area, the role division of 23.39 percent dominant against 25.15 percent submissive roles, that listed relationships are visible to all members, and the description of FetLife as a network in which the social is primary.
• Payment Processors are Still Policing Your Sex Life, and the Latest Victim is FetLife. Jeremy Malcolm, Electronic Frontier Foundation, 15 March 2017. Supplies that FetLife lost its credit card payments in 2017, that a credit card network closed both business accounts with complaints about “blood, needles, and vampirism” and about “illegal or immoral reasons”, and that the site had already been without a payment processor once in 2013 for similar reasons.
• FetLife. Wikipedia. Supplies the founding on 3 January 2008 by John Kopanas in Montreal, the predecessor FriendsWithFetishes, the parent company BitLove, the number of registered accounts, the makeup of profiles and groups, the deliberately limited search function, the removal of hundreds of groups in January 2017 after pressure from the payment processor, and the 2012 dispute over the rule against public criminal accusations.

Related terms

• BDSM. The umbrella that FetLife is the social network of, with the practices included.
• Fetish party. The evenings that are announced on it, with the house rules that apply.
• Fetish. The preference itself, which sits on FetLife as a list on your profile.
• DM. The dungeon monitor, the oversight that exists at a party and not online.
• Kink. The concept the FetLife profiles are built around.
• Kinkster. The person behind such a profile, and what the label means for whoever takes it on.
• Munch. The gathering announced on FetLife where you meet the people behind the profiles.
• Outing. What happens when someone takes the content of such a profile outside the scene.
• Scene name. Where the name on such a profile comes from and what it does and does not shield.
• Scene. The community that FetLife is the address book of.
• Play party. What the events on this platform are most often about.