Flyswatter

What is a flyswatter?

A flyswatter (Dutch: vliegenmepper) is a household object with a springy handle and a broad, flat blade, made for swatting insects. In BDSM that same object is used as a cheap impact tool for impact play. It gives a sharp, surface tap and almost no depth.

Why a flyswatter works as an impact tool

Because the handle does the work and the blade weighs almost nothing.

The Algemeen Nederlands Woordenboek describes the object as a springy handle with a broad flat blade at the top. Those two properties explain the sensation. The handle bends and catapults the blade, so a small movement of your wrist runs fast at the tip while there is barely any mass behind it. Fast and light on a broad surface gives a sharp tap that stays on the skin. Heavy and slow gives a thud you feel in the tissue. On impact play that difference is worked out, along with the distinction between sharp and dull pain.

In practice this is the object people start with. Not because it works best, but because it is already in the house, costs nothing, and you do not have to carry it past a checkout where someone looks. That is the honest reason it is on this list.

The electric flyswatter is a different device

That one does not belong in this row, and not because it is too fierce.

An electric one is a racket with a metal mesh that burns an insect, and there is a risk to it that people do not see coming. In Annals of Burns and Fire Disasters Ioannidis and colleagues show that the flame of a burning insect can ignite alcohol on the skin, and that the mesh stays hot enough after use to start a fire. The manuals warn about it themselves: do not lay it on flammable surfaces and let it cool. So for use on a body, only the ordinary, non-electric swatter is suitable.

In a playroom there is disinfectant alcohol, lube, and sometimes candles. If you want to feel current, use tools that are built for it and whose strength you can control, as described on electroplay.

Where this fits on this site

I work with tools I know, and honestly a flyswatter is not one of them. What does fit is the feeling people reach for it for: light, fast, and stinging. How a sequence like that is built up and what we talk about beforehand is on the page about the BDSM date.

Sources

• vliegenmepper. Algemeen Nederlands Woordenboek, Instituut voor de Nederlandse Taal. Provides the description of the object as a springy handle with a broad flat blade at the top, used to swat flies, mosquitoes, and other insects, plus the only synonym the dictionary lists, vliegenklapper, with the note that this form is used mainly in Suriname.
• Electric fly swatter. Potentially harmful not only for insects?. S. Ioannidis, G.A. Spyropoulou, L. Pavlidis, D. Dionyssiou & E. Demiri, Annals of Burns and Fire Disasters 27(3), 130-131, 2014 (PMID 26170790, PMC4441306, full text read). Only initials known via Europe PMC, so no first names filled in. Provides the finding that the flame of the burning insect ignited the alcohol and she suffered second-degree burns over 15 percent of her body surface, with fifteen days of admission; and the note that the manuals for these devices instruct not to lay the metal mesh on flammable surfaces and to let it cool sufficiently.
• Major Flame Burn Caused by Electric Fly-Swatter. P. Muangman, J.R. Scott & K. Keorochana, Journal of Burns and Wounds 6, e3, 2007 (PMID 17342199, PMC1804254). Only initials known via Europe PMC. Provides the first reported case: a two-year-old boy with burns over 25 percent of the body surface, because the still-hot mesh of the device was laid on a floor coated with flammable shoe glue.

Related terms

A flyswatter is a tool for impact play, and that page has the rules that apply to every impact tool.

• Impact play. The practice itself, with what may and may not be struck.
• Paddle. The heavy, broad opposite: deep instead of surface.
• Slapper. The leather instrument that sounds harder than it lands, another object that reassures beginners.
• Plak. The Dutch school implement from the same family of flat blades.
• Electroplay. Where you go if you want to feel current, with tools made for it.
• Warm-up. The order in which a light object goes first.