"Zelophilia," "Stigmatophilia," but no "Obedience"

I spent some time looking at the online resource "BDSM for Dummies."  Essentially it is a glossary of terms.  Presumably, by reading the definitions of these terms, one might get a sense of what one desires when entering the realm of BDSM.

It explains a lot, albeit briefly.  Zelophilia is sexual arousal from jealousy, which I never realized is a thing.  (And of course it must be a thing given how much jealous behaviour there is in the world!) And there's Stigmatophilia, which is sexual arousal from body markings -- tats and piercings and such.  These and many other conditions are in the glossary of BDSM terms, and curiously enough, what's missing?  Obedience!

This is one of the most important words in the BDSM lifestyle, is it not?  Obedience.

Consider words like "control," and "domination," and "mastery," and "sadism."  These words would describe illegal, unconstitutional behaviour without the consenting "obedience" from the other side of that relationship.  Mastery without obedience is just, well, abuse.  Obedience is such an important word!

Consider words like "submission," and "safe words," and "hand cuffs," and "hypophilia" (sexual arousal from breath play):  these words would lack the willing participation of a sub without the inherent desire to obey.  Submission, like obedience, can be forced -- yes it is true.  Forced by another word called "duress" and yet another, "coercion."  However, submission without obedience is the difference between "brat" and "beloved."  Submission without obedience is not how I imagine my submission.  And, obedience without submission is like the Story of O -- obeying a chateau full of men one has not submitted to, intimately and wholly.

Still, the word "obedience" is a crucially-important word: it implies choice.  It says that the submissive has chosen (on some level, even if far removed from the present time and place) to give her power away so that others may use it.  People ask, "Where is the submissive's power? I thought Domination took away all the power."  That power, friends, is in the consent.  Is in the obedience.  Is in the day after day obedience.  Is in the repeated vows of submission that, still, to this day, hold true.  That power is in the consent.  Because without that consent, there is no power surrendered.  Without understanding her dedication to obedience, no Master can dominate the mind and soul and heart of a submissive.

The BDSM glossary has lots of arrows pointed towards sexual stimulation.  I suppose it is a common understanding that the BDSM lifestyle is a sexually-charged lifestyle... but I still maintain that for me it is not.  My submission means other things.

 

Violence and Safety

There is a newspaper article that talks about ten things to end the rape culture -- a culture that we, as a human species, take as granted.  This is a topic that is important to keep top of mind when discussing BDSM and, even more, the fantasy of force.  Often, BDSM and "force fantasy" and "Gorean fantasy" are all conflated in the online gaming community, and it is sometimes difficult to separate the three ideas when such a sexually-charged atmosphere governs each one without apology.

Indeed, often a new submissive will stroll into the community, freshly-decked in 'the right clothes' to attract 'like-minded kinksters' and, as surely as a brand new uniform identifies the young and impressionable in any population, 'She' becomes precisely the target 'He' has been waiting for.  "She wears leather and studs, and she shows a lot of leg and cleavage.  Surely, she must want to be captured, humiliated, and raped," says the unscrupulous predator to himself, and he springs into action.

It is regrettable, actually, that the acronym "BDSM" contributes to this kind of thinking: it is, otherwise, such a handy acronym.  Unfortunately, guilt-by-association:  the B and the D and the S and M are so close together that people conveniently assume consent-for-one means consent-for-all.  In fact, that is not true at all: simply because a person is interested in the B, it does not follow that the person is also interested in the S/m.  And, simply because a person might be interested in some light  or strict or exploratory or conditional S/m, it does not follow that she is interested also in the idea of humiliation -- something not even represented in the acronym at all but, for some reason, people just inflict at will.  (A person can explore masochism without feeling humiliated.  It is faulty thinking to assume one equals the other.)  And, simply because a person might be interested in humiliation, it does not follow that she is necessarily interested in ROPE bondage as opposed to, say, cages or chains or cupcakes.  And ultimately, it is a bad assumption to make about a woman definitely wanting a punishing rape because of what she's wearing that day.  Bad, bad assumption.  Brain-damaged assumption.

Force-fantasy, slavery, humiliation... these are ideas that a very specific few people cherish appropriately, relegated as they may be to the darker side of sexual exploration.  These are ideas that, until one has enthusiastically consented to them (not just an absence of "no" but, rather, an enthusiastic and resounding "Yes, I am positively sure!") there is no consent.  And if there is no consent, there is no earthly reason to practice these things.  There is no right.

I wondered, when I began my journey over a year ago, why "consent" was such a big deal for the BDSM community -- and thank God, it is a big deal.  It was so unlike Gor to require the consent of another person before inflicting dark fantasy upon her.  Gor is, after all, a gender-based force-fantasy: women are weaker and submissive because of their gender, goes the argument.  There is no reason to seek consent from someone naturally weaker and naturally available to rape, goes the thinking.  They do not ask the cow its consent before slaughtering it for food: why ask the woman her consent before violating her?

The reason, I have long since discovered, consent is such a big deal in the BDSM community is because we live in a rape-culture that we take as granted.  We naturally assume it will be dangerous for women to walk alone at night, and that women do not enjoy the safety in public as they do in their own home (we hope, anyway, that a woman's home is a safe haven).  We also know that there are women in the world for whom violence and force are fantasies, and that there are partners in the world for whom indulging such fantasies is pleasurable.  And these people, when they are allowed to come together in safety, sanity, and consent, may live out their fantasies (a permission that all intelligent, free-minded people ought to enjoy) without inflicting trauma as a consequence.

The Gardener

There is a euphemism in the BDSM community of "The Gardener," referring to the dominant or master -- he or she who tends the garden, provides the food and water, shapes the straightness of the growth of the blossom.  He or she who over-sees. And, by extension, the euphemism includes the tended plant's similarities to the submissive:  he or she who responds to the care, who takes nourishment and grows taller for it.

I note with amusement that this euphemism has nothing whatsoever to do with sex, kinky-sex, sadistic-sex, masochistic-sex, three-way sex, or tied-up sex.  The euphemism involves the practical relations between a dominant and a submissive: the dominant acts, and the submissive reacts (philosophically-speaking).

Of course when people who love each other collide and their wow-factors combust and the engines roar in triumph for having found each other, it is a natural progression in a relationship to explore the thousand playful ways of sexual intercourse.  And, of course, during sexual performance the dominant dominates and the submissive submits just as in other daily life-events.  But even a year later after beginning my journey of learning about real submission and domination, I am still amazed at the sexually-charged atmosphere of the BDSM communities I peek into.

Frankly, I don't see very many gardens.  The J2D sim is the closest I come to there being garden, nature, tree and blossom.  Water.  Growth.  Opportunity and potential.

I know, I know -- birds and bees are everywhere, and they pollinate and cross-pollinate and there is always the yawning genitalia of wide-open flowers just waiting for the penetrating probe of the next insect, everywhere one looks.  The fragrant perfume of such blooms attracts me and changes my state of being.  I love to immerse myself in a beautiful garden, and it is equally pleasing to surround myself with devoted and delighted submissive personalities.  Interested, aware, mannered and cultured, the submissive personality has the potential to achieve the heights of intellectual and emotional bliss.  There are fascinating people with unique experience, in this particular realm.

And yet, it is a rare find, that sweet person devoted to growing taller and shedding thorns.  So often, the submissive feels incomplete without a dominant at the other end of this conversation so that they grow distracted, unsatisfied, unreasonably sexually-charged and nearly violent with anxiety.  It is not another submissive she wants to speak with or to wander through the park and look at birds -- it is a dominant, ready to spank her and then sexually use her, half-clothed, without asking.

This, I am learning, is not a problem of submission and domination: this is a problem with emotional well-being in general.  This is a problem of mental health.  This is a problem of coming-online-only-when-horny, so that we never get to know the real person, sated and in equilibrium.  This is a problem of nymphomania -- a manic need for sex that, for as long as it goes unsatisfied, continues to grow in intensity and perversion.  This, I am learning, has nothing whatsoever to do with domination and submission, and frankly it should!

People cruelly-use other people not because the world is populated by cruelty and evil laughter, but rather because there is an epidemic of uncontrolled, unmastered emotion in the world.  Domination and submission is perfectly -- honestly, ideally -- suited for the self-mastering of emotion that is required to practice safe, sane, consenting performance.  This lifestyle is precisely where it should be (and can be) fixed.

Mastering and self-mastering are words that, outside of the BDSM universe, become diluted with overuse and inaccurate use.  Mastering and self-mastering are sorely needed in the general population so filled with anger and quick-to-judge assumptions.  To follow one who has the ability to discipline and to focus another person's energy into higher learning and higher understanding, zen-like peace and beneficial living habits -- oh how I wish this were a widespread practice among dominants and submissives!  To tend to gardens literally, and to prune and eliminate the weeds, these are behaviours that would make people and the world beautiful.  BDSM must be -- surely, it must be -- more than spanking and seeing how long we can hold our breath.

This is my journey, of course.  For those that need a spanking, I am overjoyed when you get it. For me, though, it is a garden that I wish to explore, and to get back to learning of the unique and interesting ways gardeners do their work with the beautiful flowers they labour around. I definitely need to get out more, like I used to.

The Dictionary, Page Eleven

Rendering is the word that begins the new year.  A joyous 2013 requires a joyous space for contemplation and so I have renovated the contemplation space.  It gets me in the mind-set required for "rendering."  What does that word mean?  It has several meanings, depending on the artistic or engineering or food-manufacturing contexts.

To render is to shade and texture something until it becomes the most "itself" it can possibly be.  It could mean the preserving of slight, tiny details that may otherwise be lost in production, thereby making "itself" the most "itself" it can possibly be.  It could also mean separating the "itself" from the layers of indigestible fat, red herring, white noise, grey smoke, invisible demons, and black thoughts that detract "itself" from its real self.

The relevance, then, to my ongoing journey:  it's a sidewinder, so I will try to clarify this for myself and any others who may someday find it interesting.  In a discussion about "pushing someone's limits" I thought very carefully about all the time during my D/s journey that I have spent trying to defend my personal limits against people who insist on pushing them instead of respecting them as I wish them to be.  As I mentioned to my friend in this discussion, it just feels to me like whenever I state a limit, someone is there to try to bust through it -- as though stating a personal limit were the equivalent of painting a bull's eye target on myself.  "But, pushing limits is how people grow," is the argument against.  And, I disagree.  It is not the only way people grow.  It is not the only way people try new things.  And it is not the concrete, definite, be-all-end-all rule that every Dominant or Master must push a submissive to do things that are uncomfortable.  It's written nowhere that this is "the only way" a D/s relationship may successfully exist and thrive in the world.

"But, you will stagnate and grow bored," is the argument against.  And, again, I disagree.  As I meditate on the idea of rendering, I think about the ways in which pain is removed from me -- not inflicted upon me.  As I meditate upon the idea of the getting-to-know, the sharing of imagination, the conversation and processing of the world together, the ways in which Tasdron gets to know me and offers perspectives that I had not thought of, the ways in which I may speak candidly and freely with him and unburden the sealed vaults of festering secrets or unleash the anxious chirping doves that are eager to fly, all the different ways that he takes care to preserve my essence while carving away the excess noise and sludge...  this process of rendering that takes place time after time, day after day, weeks and months on end... this process of rendering (that he would have me believe is mutual, in fact) is a process that does not involve substituting one pain for another but, rather, involves letting the real person come out.

The real person emerges.  And frankly, that's enough of a challenge for me, because it's been a long time since that's been a reality, and I didn't even realize it before.  This process of rendering requires trust and time and closeness and intimacy and care so that mistakes do not happen, of course, just like pushing limits requires.  But instead of pushing limits of endurance, it's a process of removing unnecessary endurance to free the soul and let experience be that much more gratifying.  And, thank you.  The peace is delightful from where I recline.

The Dictionary, Page Eight

Service is the word for today.  A dominant commits to a submissive; and a submissive submits service to the dominant.  The commitment of a dominant is negotiated before the collaring, for years or for months or for as long as it takes to get something you both can live with.  If you've read about Mr Grey and Anastasia in the famous trilogy of highly-contested alternative relationships, you know that it takes a full three novels for the negotiations to complete in Fifty Shades of Grey: this is not something that takes place in a week.  Negotiations take time.  Frankly, in any successful marriage they take the entirety of the couple's lives together.  If my partner ever stops negotiating, in other words, I'll know that we are finished with each other.

What is negotiated?  The service one performs for the other.  The word "service" is a tricky word: the submissive serves the dominant's wishes of course; we look forward to it.  But the dominant also serves the fantasy of the submissive.  The dominant controls a scene so that, from what he has come to learn about his girl, he can create and re-create the right fantasy.  And when not in scene, the dominant serves the greater good of the relationship by learning more, while the submissive serves the greater good of the relationship by opening to new possibilities more.  There is a mutuality of serving in a good relationship between dom and sub.

[This "mutuality" would sound alien to a Gorean master, or to anyone who "owns" the submissive in a 24/7 exchange.  The kinds of relationships where "rights" and "safe words" don't necessarily get discussed.  But those aren't the relationships I concern myself with, here:  here, relationships are mutually beneficial, are mutually rewarding, and are mutually uplifting to a state of higher understanding.  Higher pleasure.  Higher love.  Deeper intimacy.  Harder truths and control over those truths to the safety and benefit of each person.]

There is no service without negotiation.  There is no negotiation without curiosity.  There is no curiosity without love.  These ideas are interconnected and travel together like a group of good friends on an adventure.  They take care of each other.  They make sure nobody loses a wallet or forgets a purse, and they make sure you come home with good pictures.  Good memories.  Just precisely, absolutely what you wanted to remember forever, why you embarked upon the trip to begin with.  I am in love; and I am curious about my love; and I ask how best I may please my love; and I see what I can do; and then my service (whether it be to learn, to speak, to remain silent, or to give space; whether it be to bring food, to bring friends, to bring entertainment, or to bring in the bags from the car) comes naturally.  I have a few ideas of how I may serve.  I also have a sense of when it is phoney and when something else is really in order.  I always ask, though, because I want to get it right and the one I serve is going to tell me the right way in the end.

There are minimum requirements, of course.  There is a good sleep.  There is proper food.  There is proper physical activity contributing to good health.  In the vanilla world, people believe they can function (and they do, to low standards) on poor sleep and a poor diet and too much caffeine and alcohol.  In my reality, though, such is impossible.  In my reality, top-notch service from me comes from top-notch self-care, self-love, and self-discipline.  Good health.  A commitment on my part to always give my best, not my compromised.

Decadence, Metaphor, Metamorphosis

Decadence is a word usually associated with over-indulgence, over-satisfying, over-eating, over-feeling.  Too much of a good thing.  The erosion of morality.  The erosion of a sense of what is natural and, therefore, what is right.  The idea of decadence challenges the preconceived ideas of nature and "what God intended."  As if we could know what God intended.  As if we could declare "right" and "wrong" based on earthly nature -- the most varied and sparkling array of colour and celebration on Earth.

I wear Tasdron's collar and it is a big, thick, black, studded, manly awesome phenomenon: it is an over-collar, there is no question.  Obvious and evident, over-satisfying and decadent.  I know a collar doesn't mean much to some people in Second Life, and it is to be expected -- a collar means as much as a person wants it to mean.  It feels incredible when what it means to one is the same as what it means to other.

The collar, to me, is a metaphor -- and more than a metaphor now that I have no power over locking or unlocking it.  A metaphor in literature has two parts: the tenor (the original subject) and the vehicle (that thing you compare the subject to, when you use a metaphor).  "Rose-red lips," is a metaphor, and the tenor is the lip while the vehicle is the red colour of a rose.  It is as if the person does not kiss a pair of lips but, rather, kisses a rose instead.  The vehicle is what we remember in the metaphor, in other words; the vehicle is what lingers.  The metamorphosis is immediate, in language, as immediate as you can command.

My collar means everything to me.  I had put in a request for a particular kind of collar -- I wanted it to be big and bulky, obvious on my slender neck.  Black!  Not something one sees everyday.  And Tasdron got me something beyond my wildest hopes.  We speak the same language, in the heart as well as in the head, and we have the same sense of the too-much, the over-good.  The decadent and how we both move towards it.  In our world, though, decadent means something more.  (Of course it does.)  Decadent brings with it a sense of nature, changes what is natural (read: what is approved by the mainstream) into something super-natural, over-natural, perfectly-for-us natural.  Decadence brings with it art, display, revelation, exploration, curiosity, and the vastness of the never-ending.  Decadence brings with it human potential, different ways of looking at ourselves, different ways to hold a mirror to our expressions of love.  Self-gratification and other-gratification, and new ways of gratification (the way the man can tie a knot is its own religious experience).  Nature changes; the righteous or sinful nature of people being what it is, my collar represents a whole new nature, a whole new righteousness.  I have learned so much of what I wanted to learn, and now I want to put it into practice.  I feel good.

Similarities and differences

A woman asked, recently, in a discussion about submission: what is the difference between BDSM and abuse?  It's a loaded question and there are as many answers as there are practitioners of BDSM.  Here is mine.

I suppose it seems threatening to consider a relationship built upon an architecture of power-exchange and domination/submission.  If there is one person in the relationship who "has more power" then maybe it resembles the beginning of that vague word "abuse".

But, only in an abusive relationship does it resemble the beginning of abuse.  Resemble.  And of course there are, just like in relationships of equality, abusive personalities who enjoy taking advantage.  The online community is populated with all manner of people who call themselves "Doms" and who, instead of mastering a submissive, bully her into compliance or try to tell her to feel grateful for less than she deserves to benefit himself.  Or "submissives" who manipulate and do violence when they are incapable of articulating their deep-rooted needs.  Of course there is going to be abuse: there is abuse everywhere, in any lifestyle, but it is not something to take for granted simply because one is a dominant or a submissive personality by nature, or simply because one may have a predilection for painful pleasure.  Responsible adults know how to do this right.  Right?

The difference between BDSM and abuse is that BDSM has a fundamental tenet of safety, sanity, and consent.  We emphasize these things (though some may not really understand their meaning until an emergency emerges).  "Abuse" (such a vague term... let us call it "bullying" or "taking advantage of" or "assault" if we want to be specific) is by definition non-consensual.  Insane.  And not safe.

These are the basic differences as I see them.  To put in better context:

Does a BDSM slave strapped to a cross and whipped on his thigh by his Mistress constitute abuse?  Not if he has begged her for this scene or consented to it at her request.  

Does it constitute abuse if he has not consented? I would argue that yes it does.  

Does it constitute abuse if he has given a blanket consent weeks ago that she may do anything she wishes to him without asking, and this is one activity that she will use to test that theory?  It's a grey area, but I would argue that if he has access to a respected safe-word that he may invoke whenever he is uncomfortable (indicating her sanity in respecting the word and his sanity in using it) then it still falls under the jurisdiction of kink-aware awesomeness.

How about a submissive woman wandering through a vanilla club, suddenly harassed by men who declare she is obligated to kneel for them and obligated to strip and dance, obligated because THEY say so, ridiculed for her refusal to comply, and insulted for her inability to submit to them -- does that constitute abuse? It bloody well does.  

What about if she were wandering through a BDSM club, suddenly harassed like that?  It bloody well does there, too.  It's abuse no matter where you go.  And, some people love it!  And some people hate it!  And we can only hope that the people who hate it get the hell out.  Because ultimately this journey is supposed to be exactly -- to the letter -- what you want it to be, not someone else's version.

The difference between BDSM and abuse is like the difference between a swimming pool and a tar-pit: they aren't comparable items at all, existing as they do in entirely different realms of requirement or convenience, but they feel the same kind of wrong if one is being forced into them without consent or regard for safety and sanity.  That wrong exists as frequently in the world of equality as it does in the world of established power-structures.

* * * 
How can a submissive be abused in the world of BDSM?
- Assume she is your 24/7 slave when really she's just a lovely submissive personality wandering her own journey.
- Assume she wants to dedicate her entire life to you without asking her if that's any kind of true.
- Assume she will be satisfied with one third of a commitment when she is entitled to the whole thing.
- Assume the limits that she presents to you are invitations to break them.
- Assume that when she screams out a safe-word she is lying about it.
- Assume that your way is the only right way of doing things, even though she may have opinions to the contrary -- valid and worthy of respect.
- Assume that your way is the only right way of doing things, and if she does not comply then she is simply "not submissive."
- Assume that she wants to be humiliated, beaten, insulted, ignored, or caged even though she hasn't asked for any of it.
- Assume that depriving her of something (food, attention, fresh air, public discourse) is good for her character, and not just a power-display of your own imagination.
- Assume that telling her "you will disappoint me, otherwise" is a healthy motivator.
- Assume that when she says, "I don't think that I can do this," she doesn't mean it.
- Assume that when she says, "I don't think that I want to do this," you don't need to care.
- Assume that, after depriving her of something for several days, she should be grateful to you for finally giving it back to her.

Bad assumptions.  And they are bad assumptions in the real world, too, not just in the virtual world or the D/s world.  Maybe your submissive has already declared her willingness and pledge to do these things or behave in ways that will please you.  Maybe your submissive has already submitted to the fraction of goodness you were prepared to offer.  Maybe, just maybe, the submissive may react with grateful gratitude and with grateful receiving -- maybe.  But if you assume it of every single submissive, and more to the point if you punish her for not reacting so gratefully, congratulations!  You've just abused someone.

There are distinctions to make.  They require thought, care, communication, questions, time, lots more time, and many many many more questions.  Make these distinctions.  Think about them and talk about them.  YOU can tell YOUR OWN difference between abuse and BDSM at the end of it.

Shame, Part One

The reason why it is so easy to associate "shame" with "submission" (and, therefore, one reason why submissive personalities are often so vulnerable to unexpected bullying) is that the idea of shame depends upon the victimization of one's character -- the lowering of a person's self-esteem and the fragmentation of a person's ego.  It strips away the person's self-pride.  When used as a weapon by a bully (or a dominant personality who also happens to be a bully) the potential for long-term damage is enormous.  The submissive is at risk because this imbalance of power resembles power-exchange (in the same way that Cinderella in her ballroom gown resembles her evil sisters in their ballroom gowns).  A person who does not have the critical thinking skills to see this -- that power imbalance is not the same thing as power exchange -- will not see the damage, or the potential for damage, or even the problem in general.

Shame, I have been researching, results in the erasure of the self.  Shame is what makes us go away.  Shame is what makes us turn away.  Shame is what makes us want to remove, erase, eliminate, sever, bury, camouflage and mask something we believe to be wrong for us personally or as a species.  Shame is the button "go" that releases behaviours we cannot otherwise explain.

Shame emerges from the self, or shame is inflicted by a third party onto the self.  I may accept the gift of shame from another just as another accepts the gift of my submission.  In that case, if I accept his shame, then I accept the consequences of his shame.  It is a condition often expected of a submissive and results in many otherwise-inexplicable punishments (according to my interviews).  And because submission resembles victimization in the same way that Dominance resembles victory to the inexperienced and very vulnerable, too often the new submissive gets the foul end of things.

Domination by bullying; the victimization of character and ego; the perceived judgment of others... there are so many reasons why it is a good idea for a submissive (and a Dom, for the love of God) to take a mentor when first exploring the D/s lifestyle.  In Second Life, it is made so simple to do.

Everybody's Version of Paga Servin'

I'm dreaming of water.  I would really like to be wandering through a shallow stream right now.  Instead, the guru that I follow has put me in secluded shackles for three days, but that is another story.  So here I sit, far from prying eyes, way up high in the sky.  People come and go down below, while I sit here, and so I open up their profiles and I read.  And I get to see (sometimes) how they prefer things, how they do things.  I get to see "other."

One profile in particular struck me as interesting, and it involves the negotiation process in surrendering oneself to a man's collar.  He says in his profile that the submissive's consent happens when she puts the collar on, and then anything thereafter is taken for granted.  There is no need to negotiate or consent after that:  once the collar is on, the man's word goes, full stop.  And his profile was very lucid and common-sense up until that point.  Obviously he is a man who knows what he is looking for, and what he is looking for is a slave.  More specifically, a slave who is content to abandon all her rights with that one word of consent.

Another profile in particular struck me as interesting: a woman who says, quite clearly, that the negotiation process is ongoing for the entire duration of the relationship with her ideal man.  Her ideal man is submissive (and not stupid); her ideal man can think for himself but chooses to let her make all the important decisions, and in fact begs her to make all the important decisions; her ideal man enjoys her sense of humour and her sense of sadism; and her ideal man will not crumble if she does not log in for 2 days, because they always know when they will meet next.  She didn't call him a slave; and the man's profile above did not call his "ideal" submissive a slave either; but I wonder now at the word "submissive" in this lifestyle.  It is not a word anybody can take for granted.

People can't take for granted that "their way" is THE way.  There is no such thing as THE way to dominate, or THE way to submit, anyway.  There is simply the way we want when it comes to relationships -- and finding someone who wants the same thing that you do.  D/s is a very specialized architecture for relations between people: and, as one person said in a discussion recently, D/s is a power exchange, not a hostile takeover.  In other words, both partners get something out of it.  That guy who believes that consent comes with wearing the collar and there's no more need for negotiation?  He can probably find someone to buy in to those conditions, sure -- but that's not everybody's idea of submission.  The lady who wants the man to beg for all important decisions to be made by her but who can still retain a measure of his own independence?  She'll find what she's looking for, too, no doubt; but that's not everybody's idea of submission.  Neither one practices "the right way" to do things.  In the D/s world (like in the mainstream, vanilla, everyday world) if you don't beg, you don't get.

I want to take you for granted

I sat back today and considered a few things.  There are words that we speak but people do not understand them.  Or, people put their own spin on them.  Or, people mis-hear them.  Or, people forget that we spoke them.  Or a hundred other ways that people may mis-communicate.  And it occurs to me that a solid relationship is not just about finding someone whose interests match, whose temper matches, whose sense of humour (or sense of the macabre!) matches.  It's also about finding someone who communicates in the same way -- and who understands communication in the same way.  I think about all the different ways a person can understand the term, "to take for granted" and I shudder at all the different ways such a phrase can turn sour.  "To take as granted," or "to feel as though it is simply granted, no waiting, no request," or "to take without asking," or "to assume based on a history of past decisions."  When I think about You, I imagine the sentence as the latter definition.  A history of past decisions, of past consistencies, of past agreements, of past affirmations, of past pleasures, of past anticipations, that history between us makes me take You for granted.  Makes You able to take me for granted.  Willingly.

Something in other news, related only by language:
I read today some passages about erotic humiliation.  No reason; I simply wished to see how the other half lives, I suppose.  It amused me to see, "Require permission to do anything" as listed in the erotic humiliation category.  And then I had to sit back and start considering a few things, which spawned this post.  "Derogatory words like slut and whore" and "use as a piece of furniture" are erotic humiliation just as is "requiring permission to do anything."  Then it exploded like a giant, fiery dawn at the break of day:  so many of the online BDSM attitudes in Second Life involve the erotic humiliation of submissives, whether they wish it or not.  Even beyond BDSM, the Gorean enslavement of women online is predicated upon this theory (i.e a Gorean slave is trained to ask permission for every minute thing, feel comfortable wearing the title "slut" and feel comfortable serving as furniture without the respect due humans-- a sexy enough fantasy with the right practitioners).  No wonder there is such confusion and lack of clarity in the world: people take it for granted that this one way is the established way, never question it or interrogate it or challenge it (because it goes against erotic humiliation for a submissive to exercise a challenge function) and the online community of BDSM continues to be full of libraries that propagate erotic humiliation of submissives -- whether the submissive wants it or not.  It was quite a eureka, this idea of what we take for granted.  What we want to take for granted.  What we do take for granted without even realizing it.  I'm not sure I need to ask permission for every single thing.  And, I'm not sure I need humiliating words like "slut" and "whore" to feel stimulated into arousal.  That's just me, though.  The "place him or her in a cage" part of erotic humiliation most definitely has a place in my vocabulary, under the right circumstances.  And, well, "naked in public" feeds more than a simple desire for display that I am, apparently, cultivating.

Demystifying Submission

I never get tired of consulting A Master's Viewpoint by Mr Najee.  Today's point of interest: the process of submission.  At a discussion not so long ago, I listened with interest as a lady posed a question to the Domme who was speaking.  "At what point," she asked, "is it a good idea for me to agree to wear someone's collar?"   This, incidentally, is why I haven't ventured into facilitating discussions of my own... How on earth does a person begin to approach a question like that?   I would have asked more questions until the core question framed itself (or until I beat it into a shape that could be considered meaningfully!), but that might have taken hours.  I'm still not sure what question the journeyer was asking.  "How will I know if he really loves me?"  or, "I'm not sure if I'm submissive, so when is it okay to wear a collar to try to find out?"  or, "Is there a set time, in your fantasy world that I'd like to play in, for people to agree to court before broaching the subject of collars?"  or, "I know that I'm submissive; I am simply not sure if he's dominant. Should I still go through with this?  Is there a safe way out?"   My busy mind hears so many questions embedded in that one vague question, and I'm really not sure which is being asked.  (I was not privy to the answer, either, so I cannot comment further.)

This post talks about what it's like when submission meets its proper domination, and vice versa.  "Finally," Mr. Najee writes, "the couple gets to the point where they decide they are going to be together.  I find that the submission process happens naturally.  There is no one moment in time when she offers it and he accepts it.  Instead, it is something that they move toward on a daily basis (with the occasional moving away from when pitfalls are encountered).  The people involved in the relationship, due to their communication, know what is happening."   For the most part, I dig that passage.  Especially how the submission process happens naturally.  The whole article explains what even vanilla relationships undergo in the process of development and intensifying.  Two people talk a lot.  Two people get to know each other.  Whether or not they have a submissive or a dominant character, their own personalities must mesh first and foremost.   (A submissive won't submit to just any dom.  A dominant won't accept the submission of every single sub that kneels at his feet.  It's impossible.  We have to gel.  We have to fit.  It's not a contest, nor a competition... it's just meeting someone you want to be with, in the quirky kind of structure that you dream of inhabiting, and finding that person wants the same thing.)  When we fit, when we gel, when we have talked so much that we know we just need to keep talking, and keep touching, and keep working for the other, it's a foregone conclusion that the relationship will continue on the forward trajectory.  Submission and domination have happened already because nature wanted it so.

"The answer is to interact like a human being," says our Mr Najee.  It's as if he had heard the question!  But seriously... now that I think about it, that's a good answer to many questions.  "How will I know that he really loves me?"  The answer is to interact like a human being.  "How will I know that my submission is what he's looking for?"  The answer is to interact like a human being.  "How will I know that when I reach out, he will reach for me also?"  The answer is to interact like a human being.  "How will I know that it's alright to trust this person, that he won't try to abuse me or take advantage of me?"  The answer is to interact like a human being.  "How will I know that he is competent enough to dominate me?"  The answer is to interact like a human being.  "How will I know that he has the self-esteem I expect in a dom?"  The answer is to interact like a human being.  "What happens when I am overcome with need and it feels like my need will overpower everything and everybody?"  The answer is to interact like a human being.

Fascism, Submission, and Art

My favorite part of Second Life is the art.  There is an art display right now called A Rusted Development which is a new exhibit built by Haveit Neox, which featuring work by Rose Borchovski, Claudia222 Jewell, Bryn Oh, and many other fine SL artists.  Claudia Jewell is my friend and I love her work, so I go see whatever she does.   EDIT:  you can see a catalogue of the display and biographies of all the artists, curator, and conjurer here (great idea, such wonderful creators!)  I was new to Rose's work, though, and I feature one of the displays here in the picture.  This segment  also features an audio component that I cannot demonstrate here in this post.  But as well as the stepping stones that tell the unfortunate soul what she cannot do, there is also the disembodied voice that tells the unfortunate soul the same thing.  "You are not allowed to read," is a block that nearly broke my heart.  "You are not allowed to think."  "You are not allowed to fish."  "You are not allowed in this market."  "You are not allowed to go to the cinema."  At first I thought it was an exercise, an exhibit, in censorship (the great enemy of art).  Then I realized it was an exhibit of fascism*, an exhibit showing what it was like to be racially marked with a yellow ribbon and segregated.  Rose's display is very powerful -- the audio as well as the visual.  The whole artistic melange is gorgeous.  It changes my state to walk among the displays.

But, taken out of context.  This path of "you are not allowed" stones reminds me of all the reasons I am afraid of submitting to someone.  When it's the wrong person, these "you are not alloweds" weigh heavily.  They are a life-sentence.  When it's the wrong person, every step along the path seems like it is branded with a "thou shalt not" of some kind.  When it's the wrong person, everything feels wrong -- and a body can feel not just helpless but also hopeless.  Put back into context, undesired submission is a fascist state of misery.  The art speaks to me.

And, when it is the right person, there's nothing bad written on the steps.  The "you are not alloweds" become "guess what you get to do for the one you serve!"  When it is the right person, the whole world looks different: the whole world looks clean.  Smells fresh.  Tastes savoury.  Perfection, dreamy, erotic, moving, wanted. Wanted.  Wanted.

*"Fascism" used here: a tendency toward or actual exercise of strong autocratic or dictatorial control, or the effects of such a government of a body population.

Submission, Rights, and Ethics

One more from Miss Steel's private chamber, since I've been studying today with great interest.

This article is about negotiating.  "Many submissives," it says, "long to vacate all their rights, and they express the desire to do whatever the Dominant tells them.  Some even feel that if they are in any way non-submissive they will no longer be desirable to the Dominant.  This concept of 'non-submissive' is growing in popularity and is often identified as a submissive who is forthright, honest, and open in her opinion or beliefs.  Some believe that a submissive should never disagree with 'any' person identified to them as a Dominant, that such behaviour of disagreement is indicative of a poorly-behaved non-submissive."  Ye gods.  "This type of catch-22 ideology," it goes on to say, "encourages people to return to policies of silence by intimidation or judgment, or the non-truthful communication so prevalent in vanilla society -- policies most within the BDSM communities have attempted to overcome."


I think I understand pretty clearly, now, the difference between a roleplay slave and a BDSM submissive.  I think it's pretty clear that I should be forthright about my values, not my limits, the next time I enter into negotiations.   Values are a good thing to consider right now.

Values:
- I value bone-dry honesty, blurting before thinking.
- I value examination of that honesty, taking time to consider what we're saying really.
- I value eye-contact and facetime, undistracted.  Not 100% of every day -- in fact, not even close.  I can't handle all that attention.  But when it's "us time", nobody else intrudes.
- I value my solitude so that I can process things.  I can't be in a constant state of receiving: I need processing and output time.
- I value my privacy, your privacy, and our shared time.
- I value the time I have invested in learning about respect, honesty and integrity; the differences between Play and Reality; the differences between Submission and Slavery; the differences between Doms and Masters; and the differences between my submission and everybody else's submission.
- I value the time I have invested preparing myself so that I will be worthy.
- I value a man's honour (whatever it is that makes a man thoughtful, considerate, polite, chivalrous, clean, talented, skilled, and disciplined).
- I value my own practiced ethics.

Bondage Part Three: Display

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