Flesh Hooks and Suspension.
The Reuters title ran Youngsters dangle from meat hooks for fun but actually, this practice has roots that run deeper than that.
A fusion of body piercing and non secular practice, suspension and flesh hook pulls are slowly returning in alternative communities.
The traditional case laws for this kind of behaviour can be discovered in a selection of northern US Indian clans, or the non secular practices of the Tamil of South Far East. These practices are tied to shamanism, as the effect of the great discomfort and stress on the body causes changed states. The indigenous American Sundance most frequently occurred round the Summer Solstice.
The best documented is the Sioux version, whereby dancers are pierced with wood or bone thru the pectorals, with lines running to a tall pole.
The dancers slowly pull, frequently for 3 or 4 days, till the piercing rips free. The gift of one’s own body is seen as being the best type of sacrifice to the gods. The Tamils of South Far East have piercing practices are a part of their worship of Murugan.
Again you honour the god with your body and your offerings. The massive frameworks of pointed spears, called kavandi, that advocates used to wear have been replaced in more contemporary times with hooks set into the skin of the back. Pulling against ropes, the worshippers walk for multiple miles to the church site, their suffering an offering to the god together with being an indication of their attention. Many also have a thin spike called a vel, symbolical of Murugan’s lance, pierced through both cheeks or the tongue for the function too.
In the 1980s, Australian artist Stelarc did a collection of suspensions in Japan whereby he hung by multiple hooks inserted in his flesh. These were staged at art studios as formal creative performances. One interesting rigging involved rocks as counterbalances, so the artist was suspended in a near-cross-legged position besieged by a circle of floating rocks. These practices have been introduced to a much larger audience through the performances and presentations of Fakir Musafar. Considered the daddy of the Modern Primitive movement this 74-year-old has engaged in almost every sort of body alteration known to humankind, and being a photographer, has well-documented his experiments and experiences over the years. Through his seminal 90s publication bodyplay, Musafar covered not only the history of many of those rites, but showed paths to evolve them for modern neo-pagan spirituality. He has led private and non-private rites, incorporating ball dances, flesh hooks and the activity of bearing kavandi into performances and group rituals around the world.
Dire Stress Discipline has taken hook hangs and pulls and staged performances nationally and worldwide. One of the founding members, Allen Falkner, performed at the San Francisco Fetish Ball in 2003 where I took the photos that go with this article. Chatting with him at the opening party the evening before, he discussed how folk upset with this style of performance had filed legal motions making an attempt to stop the group, but the judge in the case had dominated the performances body art and saw no grounds that would make them illegal.
In the encounter in Islamorada, FL, law officers called to the scene were surprised to discover a group of younger people doing a hook hang through a bamboo tripod erected close to the water’s edge but admitted that no laws were being damaged. One of the finest lines in the article expounded that according to authorities, the girl hanging from the tripod when policeman’s and Coast Guard officials arrived didn’t appear to mind the hooks. For such practices, modern piercing systems are used, and many observers are frequently stunned there’s little or no blood. Regardless of the private challenges of whomever called the police, no laws were being damaged and no citations or legal actions were taken.