A little over a decade ago (has it really been 15 years?), Bruce Esinem popularized the phrase “Tying people, not parcels” within the shibari community.
The core idea behind this slogan is simple: beneath those ropes is a person—with feelings, emotions, and a body that’s the only one they’ll ever have.
Handle it with care (to borrow a phrase from the courrier industry).
This isn’t just a casual observation. Many of the techniques used in shibari have roots in the “professional” use of rope.
Some come from tying soft objects, like textiles or agricultural goods; others from securing hard or rigid items, such as in construction; and a few even originate from restraining people for violent purposes.
No merchant wants their goods damaged by a careless carrier, just as no bricklayer wants a load of bricks to fall while being hoisted to the third floor.
That’s why, over time, specific techniques were developed for handling objects and packages.
And those “ancient” techniques, or jutsu, designed for restraining people, didn’t prioritize their well-being or safety.
The phrase “without harming the prisoner” simply meant keeping them functional for forced labor—not ensuring any real sense of well-being by modern standards.
What we do in modern shibari is take traditional techniques, originally functional in their own context, and adapt them for erotic play—infused with contemporary values and principles.
So, when we talk about tying or being tied as an erotic practice, it should be obvious that we’re dealing with people, not objects—no matter how much of an object of desire they (or we) might become.
It should be obvious, but the fact that this phrase is still needed today suggests something’s still amiss.
When we move into shibari practices involving suspensions, we introduce a new set of techniques—and a new dimension of risk for injury or harm.
Unlike object-handling techniques, those used in acrobatics are designed with the human body in mind.
There’s a significant difference—not just because it’s a person, but because of how the body responds to applied forces.
A brick and a bale of clothes react very differently when tied and lifted with rope.
One is hard, the other soft; one’s mass is evenly distributed, the other’s can vary, as can its volume. One can be compressed, the other cannot.
When lifted, the forces on a brick concentrate at a point (or area, if it’s on a pallet) and absorb little energy, while a bale of clothes distributes forces unevenly, tends to deform and compress, and absorbs energy in the process.
When you lift either object off the ground with a rope, you’re simply applying the laws of physics and mechanics.
The object hangs, unable to generate any force to counteract gravity.
With the human body, we see hard parts, soft parts, and—most importantly—moving parts.
This is a crucial difference: unlike inanimate objects, the body can shift its center of gravity and change how forces act upon it.
Here, we’re talking about biomechanics—how, through muscle activation, joint positioning, and neural control, the body dynamically generates, distributes, and manages the forces it experiences.
So, when we correctly apply techniques designed for moving the body in shibari and lift it off the ground with ropes, the body doesn’t just hang like dead weight. It actively generates and manages forces to counteract its own weight (Newton’s third law), allowing it to rise with ease.
This is the key difference between hanging an object or dead weight and suspending a person, whose active management of weight and force makes for a far more dynamic and controlled experience.
That said, unlike techniques for lifting objects, those that allow for the suspension and management of a human body are considerably more complex, and demand much greater physical and cognitive effort.