This week, we sat down with Rubber Roswell, self-proclaimed “wannabe villain and wearer of masks,” to discuss the transformative power of character roleplay, masks, and costumes. We also talked about how the pandemic has allowed people to dive deeper into fetish, as well as how quarantine led him to start a kinky Instagram.
Introduction to Roleplay and Mask Fetishes
As always, we started out by asking Roswell about his Radioactive Spider Bite into Kink. His fascination began when he was six or seven and watched the Goosebumps TV show—specifically, “The Haunted Mask” episode (he even owns an exact replica of the mask from the episode). He’s always loved masks, costumes, and Halloween, due to the freedom of getting to play another character for a night. He also watched a lot of Batman and Power Rangers as a kid, and he was intrigued by the costumes.
A big reason that Roswell is into masks is because of the idea that they can bring out a different side of people. For example, in “The Haunted Mask” episode of Goosebumps, the titular mask brings a monstrous personality out of the main character. Dick and Roswell also talk about episodes of The Twilight Zone that feature masks and costumes. Dick is interested in getting into masks, since he’s into fear and horror, but he hasn’t been able to find one that he identifies with yet. Dick also enjoys the angle where a mask is something that destroys the person wearing it, rather than empowering them.
Roswell grew up in a conservative family, so he had to play with masks in secret while growing up. For a long time he thought he was the only person with a sexual interest in masks, and he figured that if it was only his, he would create his own backstories and personas out of his character masks. For example, rather than playing Batman when he wore a Batman mask, he would create his own version. He found this to be more of a turn-on since he made the character his own.
Villain Roleplay
We dive into why Roswell chooses to roleplay darker, more villanous characters, which he says goes back to the idea of having an alter-ego. He likes the idea of flipping your personality, for example, how Bruce Wayne isn’t able to show the same dark side as Batman. Dick brings up how interesting it is that in Batman’s situation, Batman isn’t a mask—Bruce Wayne is a mask for Batman. This relates to Roswell’s life, as he couldn’t be his true self around his family growing up, so his masked persona was more himself than his vanilla identity. He also talks about how everyone has different sides of their personality, and that it’s important to explore and nurture every aspect of yourself.
Roleplay and Relaxation
Gwen brings up how she came from a similar background and also enjoys playing characters, and that it’s not necessarily a sexual thing. For her, things like heavy makeup, wigs, and cosplay are vanilla hobbies that sometimes crossover into sexuality. For Gwen and Roswell, playing a character is a form of relaxation and a break from their vanilla identity more than anything else. Roswell mentions how when he plays a character he’s a totally different person—even his posture and body language changes. Dick relates this to how when you’re topping and bottoming in a scene, even without a costume, these body-language changes tend to happen, meaning that topping and bottoming in general is like playing a role.
Fetish and Social Media During the Pandemic
Next, we move into a conversation about the role of social media in kink during the pandemic. Roswell started his Instagram and Twitter pages right around the start of quarantine, mostly because he had more free-time at work and wanted to see where starting kinky social media would lead. He then noticed that a lot of people from Fetlife were starting Instagram and Twitter accounts around the same time.
Specifically with masks, he slowly began to notice that there are a lot more people than he thought with this fetish. Even though Fetlife already existed, during the pandemic, a lot more people were able to connect about their kinks and fetishes through social media. This really got Roswell to start thinking about the reasons why people are drawn to certain kinks and fetishes, and even got him to consider interests that he was never into in the past.
Finally, we answer listener questions about favorite archetypes in villain characters, favorite types of masks, and how power dynamics play into villain roleplay.
Related Information
Thanks for listening! If you enjoyed this one, you’d probably like episodes 248, 220, 096.
You can find Roswell on Instagram @rubberroswell, and on Twitter @RoswellRubber.
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