This interview was originally published on Il Piccole Magazine
Are you tired of living sex without much fantasy? Do you want to discover something that goes beyond the simple, sometimes predictable foreplay and to make your erotic life more intriguing? If you answered ‘yes!’ to these questions, read on: we lifted the veil on the spicy world of “uncommon” sex for you, interviewing Ayzad, one of the leading kink and BDSM experts in Italy. Let the journey begin…
Tell us about you a bit, who you are, what you do…
My name has been Ayzad for about fifteen years now, and I work with unusual sexualities. I research them, write books and articles analyzing them, I hold workshops and lectures on this topic and, as a personal coach, I help those who experience some issue with these forms of eroticism. I admit I previously had another name and I have been what you’d call a “traditional” journalist, but it looks like I am fully recovered now.
Where did your interest in the world of BDSM begin?
First and foremost from a personal passion born, as it often happens with these things, rather randomly. One of the most fascinating characteristics of extreme eroticism however is its extent, so I began studying it… and here I am still, learning some new facet every day. Also, each unusual aspect of sexuality ends up revealing further connections to interesting sides of everyday life and honing critical thinking – so you enjoy intellectual pleasure in addition to the purely physical one. Not bad, isn’t it?
How does a country like Italy deal with “extreme” subjects like BDSM, in your opinion?
Quite well, as a matter of fact. Reading the newspapers and watching TV you always get the impression of living in a nation held in the Church’s grip and by a brainless far right, but the reality is that we get by rather like the rest of the world when it gets to these topics. Of course the openness of minds is different between large cities and provinces, between the north and the south, and yet “scandals” are mostly the fruit of political exploitation. Especially after Fifty Shades of Grey made kink popular-ish, the most common approach is «do whatever you please, just don’t come bothering me» – which, after all, has always been the most sensible way to treat others.
What eroticism is for you?
Having the courage of appreciating those details that most people leave unnoticed – and of letting yourself be touched by the sentiments they invoke.
Which is the same definition for ‘poetry’, come to think of it. Odd, isn’t it?
What arouses Italians the most, in your experience?
Giving a statistically factual answer is easy, since there are precise surveys on the subject. The three most common erotic fantasies are: partners over 26; very young girls; women over 35 – a rather schizoid approach largely caused by the high average age of the population. Talking about so-called unusual practices the top position is held by bondage and BDSM (desired by one person in six and acted in one form or another by one in ten), followed by threesomes or more, pissing games and… hentai fantasies, which are a big hit only among those who first encountered porn online.
You are a prolific author. Who would you suggest your books to?
If I said «to everyone» I’d risk sounding overly like an ad, so let’s limit the field to anyone fed up of considering sex just like a mechanical back-and-forth, and harboring a sane curiosity about a slightly wider conception of sexuality. I maintain that you don’t necessarily have to do strange things… but it is always better to have information and choose not to use it than needing it and not knowing where to find it.
Tell us about your personal coaching work
It is something that spontaneously evolved from how my fame as an unusual sex expert led more and more people to ask me for solutions to their problems with kink. Personal coaching isn’t a therapy, but offering the experience I built over thirty years to help whoever needs it to better identify the issue and to study a strategy together to solve it. Without revealing the details, let’s say that it allowed many people to realize their dreams and needs without suffering over winding paths that would involve serious disappointments as they took them.
What do you like the most about your job?
How it leads to discover never-ending new things and to appreciate the wonderful variety of the human nature. Not to mention the satisfaction of receiving literally thousands of thanks from those who, thanks to my writing or teaching, found their happiness or managed to save their endangered relationships.
What do you like the least about your job?
Having to occasionally face the vilest sides of people too, from those entirely alien to the concept of consent to the victims of their own prejudices. All of that is the result of a lack of a true education to sexuality, spawning monsters like violence against diversity, the manipulation of fragile persons, but also a general dangerous ignorance of eroticism in general.
What collaboration gave you the most pleasure, professionally speaking?
Throughout the years I had the pleasure and privilege of meeting many people working very fascinating jobs, but it would be hard for me to rank them. A great aspect of dealing in this field is in fact discovering how each one of us can contribute with very personal experiences and viewpoints. Just in the last few weeks, for example, I encountered an attorney trying to revaluate how eroticism is perceived within family law, a philosophy professor who identified the source of many issues with contemporary sexuality with neoliberalism; a research team working on redefining sexual assistance for disabled persons; a twenty-years old girl who is exploring her erotic identity following revolutionary trajectories. Each one of them enriched my world view in different ways.
Do you participate in BDSM or fetish parties in Italy and abroad? If you do, which one are the most interesting for you?
Of course: I follow those events both out of passion and for my work. This is another case where suggesting one or another is pretty hard, for different people can have very different tastes and needs. Some time ago, however, I wrote an article to help my readers get their bearings with these nights. And in the meantime I keep organizing the Sadistique parties in Milano, which are a kinky classic since 2005.
Who would you like to work with in the future?
I’ve got rather peculiar personal heroes, like Cindy Gallop, fighting to clarify the difference between porn and sexuality; lawyer Miles Jackman who for years has been practically alone opposing a repressive legal view of sexuality, or the uber-activist Dan Savage, who managed to contain several dangerous drifts in American politics. For my website I interviewed many interesting people, and who knows how many more I am going to meet!
Where do you see yourself in a few years from now? Which are your future goals?
A few months ago the first international edition of my best-selling BDSM – A Guide for Explorers of Extreme Eroticism was published globally. The professional borders are kinda tight in Italy, so I hope that book and a series of further activities will give me more opportunities to reach abroad. Then there is of course a thousand projects I am slowly pushing through countless obstacles… but the goal remains the same: helping people to feel good with themselves and with their sexuality, whatever it is – and having fun doing that.
Tell me of a really curious or singular episode in your life.
I can mention an especially baffling case: a beautiful girl who, with much embarrassment, asked me to help her procuring a refrigerated autopsy table. It turned out that her erotic fantasy was based on pseudo-necrophiliac scenarios where she played the part of the abused corpse, so she had to be properly cold.
If we also count people I haven’t met in person, however, I’d say nothing compares to the daikon-molesting hacker.
On closing this interview, give me a free thought about whatever I didn’t ask.
You actually touched a lot of interesting points. I might reveal the most important thing I learned during my erotic explorations… but you can actually read that in yet another article.