the bdsm lifestyle

Ran across an interesting set of lecture notes from a BDSM talk. While there are things in here I both agree with and disagree with, this resonated enough to want to share:

THE FANTASY: Every dominant, everywhere, must always be addressed deferentially as “Sir” (or “Ma’am,” if she is female), and possibly, obeyed as you would obey someone who actually owns you.

THE REALITY: Some dominants will hit you upside the head if you dare to address them in this way unless you know them really well. Not only does “Sir” assume a certain familiarity or the existence of a power exchange when none is actually there, but honest dominants do not want to be called by such a title unless they have, in your eyes, earned it.

Yes, yes, yes.

I find a lot of the people I’ve run across online in the last few years follow a strange (to me) set of rules for BDSM that just don’t seem to extend to the “real world”, if you will. And while it may be a gross generalization and therefore unfair, when I find someone who plays by these rules online, it generally screams “poser” to me.

My personal pet peeves from online BDSM meeting places (be it personals, chat, forums…) are, in no particular order:

1. The whole h/He s/She capitalization thing. I’m sorry, but I’m not going to lowercase myself and uppercase someone I’ve never even met out of some dimwitted form of unearned respect and trust. When we meet online, you may very well be a dominant person, and I am a submissive person, yes… but I am not yet submissive to you. I’m all for giving proper respect to my dominant partner. But this particular game leaves me with a bad taste in my mouth; I am not a doormat upon which every dominant in the world may walk. I am a person first, as worthy of respect as you are.

2. Kinky sex partners or men who just want sex any old way they can get it. Look, in general, I have no problem with the concept that some guys are willing to do whatever it takes to get laid. But again, have respect for the person who you’re contacting: if they state that they’re into this in a serious way, don’t invent stuff in your head that you think might fall into a BDSM context, just to try to convince them to sleep with you. Have a little more respect for my opinions, choices and time.

3. Self-categorized submissive men who are now so desperate for sex they’re contacting submissive women. This is a special subset of the group from my last point. I’ve been contacted by men who wanted me to dominate them and men who say they’d like to try dominating me. Meanwhile, their entire profile is set up as a submissive. Does that mean I don’t believe people can switch? Absolutely not. There are lots of switches out there. But this type of person, again – you just look like a poser so desperate for sex that you’ll try anything. And that will not get enough respect from anyone to actually get you laid. IMHO.