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bdsm questions?

  
  

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Regrettable Juvenilia
14:50 / 01.05.07
Yes, I think given DEDI's history Disco's post is far from unprovoked.
 
 
Less searchable M0rd4nt
14:51 / 01.05.07
I find your post above as I have quoted it to be a personal attack unprovoked by DEDI and to be unproductive to this discussion.

Unproductive it may be; however, I would not call it entirely unprovoked. I would suggest that Dedi's own conduct on this board has created an atmosphere in which his posts are likely to be given, shall we say, a less that generous reading. I definately felt that there was more than a whiff of fantasy about the figure of the "natural domina."
 
 
Ticker
15:06 / 01.05.07
Excuse me, perhaps I was unclear. I have no problem with the use of the term Domina, although I would prefer to see it unpacked. Dedi seems to be using it in a certain very specific way to represent a group of traits, which is fine; it's less fine to use it as if we should all know exactly what he means by it.

What I objected to was the use of the phrase "natural Domina" in the context of Dedi's post, which also included the message that using safewords is equivalent to "topping from the bottom." The implication here that a way of interacting that involves safewords is incorrect or inferior. THis is not an appropriate message in a space that by its nature includes people with many different sexualities and ways of expressing them.


I agree with you that 'natural' is problematic in this context as would be 'true'. See the 'True Scotsman' line of debate.

However that said there are people who engage in power exchange along the lines DEDI is presenting and I feel we should be respectful of that form of play until presented with concrete problematic examples.

(I have to say that in general I rather object to any poster who repeatedly makes sweeping statments on strongly charged subjects such as BDSM and repeatedly fails to unpack these even when asked.)

Normally I would also agree with you on this as well but since DEDI has been posting in this thread there seems to be some hostility flying around that IMO is not really encouraging to someone to unpack their bidness.

I dislike DEDI's non engagement/generalizations but I'm also not seeing a whole lot of reason to feel it's okay for ze to go into detail about their sexuality here either.

I'd rather we went on about discussing our perceptions of Domina/Domme/Dominant vs. Tops and other power exchange constructs. I think there's some interesting stuff being mentioned about perceptions of limits and acceptable giving up of personal power.

If anyone can't engage in the discussion productively to converse about respectful exchange of different views regarding these constructs thats something for Policy I suspect?


Back to the more fun stuff...

I have a lot of mixed feelings about safewords. I view them as essential for people just beginning to get a feel for each other and public play spaces. I support the right of private individuals to negotiate their comfort levels of surrendering control and while I personally don't engage in M/s relationships I have faith in them as potentially healthy fucntional spaces for some folks.

My own experiences are so heavy on negotiation that not a lot of action needs to be wrangled mid scene. I don't care to frame feedback during a scene as safeword based because it is much more fluid to me than that. Sensations and physical state are constantly being check in with but I personally find giving my playmate only a cease all stopword is part of being a Dominant and not a Top. That's part of the negotiated agreement and the people I play with know it's more important for them to be checking their internal boundaries than worry about disappointing me because they had to tap out. I also will play to the point of pushing someone to tap out in rare occassions when that's the agreed upon goal.

As a side note, I'd contrast this with my Ordeal work where there can be no safewords at all in any form. I know a good number of people in the BDSM community who operate without safewords as well. It doesn't automaticlaly mean they are playing badly but rather differently.
 
 
Ticker
15:22 / 01.05.07
Yes, I think given DEDI's history Disco's post is far from unprovoked.

That maybe but many of us are not informed of that history and are reading posts in context of this discussion. The rest of Disco's post was an excellent example of dialogue with another poster without attacking the person but rather examining their post.

In the context of this topic why should I feel safe to discuss my personal experience if I maybe subjected to accusations of fantasy life and my reading habits?




Unproductive it may be; however, I would not call it entirely unprovoked. I would suggest that Dedi's own conduct on this board has created an atmosphere in which his posts are likely to be given, shall we say, a less that generous reading. I definately felt that there was more than a whiff of fantasy about the figure of the "natural domina."

If that is the case then it is exceptionally important that any issues are addressed in the posts themselves rather than create a hostile environment for other posters. Let us be clear what we have a problem with which I believe you are saying is the poster's comments in thread. If that is the case then history has nothing to do with it rather current conduct is the focus.

To be very clear I find critical review of posts in a sexual topic *must* stay focused on what the posts state rather than veer off into personal attacks even with history (which should go to Policy). There are new members joining the board who are reading that it is okay to attack some people when honestly, it should never be okay to attack people only their stated posts.

If a poster is detracting from a discussion that should go to Policy not dissolve into a insult festival and take a thread down with it.

I definately felt that there was more than a whiff of fantasy about the figure of the "natural domina."

I would caution you quite a few things in BDSM are likely to excude that whiff from many of us. Not everything is sourced from IRL exchanges but the constructs we carry in our heads. I'd argue that in this case you are less likely to value the comments because of the conduct of that particular poster. However the Archtype is not unique to the poster in question at all nor is the fantasy focus.
 
 
*
15:49 / 01.05.07
It's no surprise that many tops feel strongly about safewords. To hear a safeword from your bottom can be a frightening and heartwrenching experience. Did I go too far? Did I inflict real harm? Was this thing I just did rape? Fuckinghell. That's a terrible thing to face. But a far better thing to face up to than to simply not know.

But I also know of many instances in which tops have safeworded because they needed out of the scene fast. Sometimes it's because there's something happening with the bottom that they're unaware of—maybe they've suddenly spouted blood from their nose for no apparent reason. Sometimes it's to take care of their own immediate emotional or physical needs. Tops, too, are very vulnerable in scene space. Someone who has never topped, or has never topped in a way that was risky for them personally, may be unaware of this.

My current partner and I don't have a need for a safeword under most circumstances, because he expects me to communicate with him fully and honestly in scene as well as out of it. This doesn't require me to leave role. When I top, if it's pure SM with no roleplay, I don't need safewords, because I respect the bottom's "OWTHATHURTSTOOMUCHergpleasebackoffabitwouldja?" If we are roleplaying, then I find safewords useful. I want to know where the bottom's limits are, and I want them to have the freedom to cry "No! Please sir, don't!" if that's where the fantasy takes them.

I object to the dismissive "topping from the bottom." I bottom from the top, when I top, and that's what works for me. The bottom's experience is what gets me off. I submit that that's a far more common experience than the fantasy of the implacable sadist would lead one to believe. If the bottom isn't having a good ride, neither am I. I like people who give me feedback—and, crucially, let me decide what to do with it. A safeword is feedback that lets me know, clearly and explicitly and over the other kinds of communication that happens within roles, that if I go beyond this point I'll be doing it without the bottom's consent, and that's vital knowledge for me to have.

I would be very disappointed in a bottom who would withhold that knowledge from me. Very disappointed indeed. "Never playing with again" kind of disappointed.
 
 
Less searchable M0rd4nt
15:58 / 01.05.07
I definately felt that there was more than a whiff of fantasy about the figure of the "natural domina."

I would caution you quite a few things in BDSM are likely to excude that whiff from many of us. Not everything is sourced from IRL exchanges but the constructs we carry in our heads. I'd argue that in this case you are less likely to value the comments because of the conduct of that particular poster.

I don't want to derail the thread away from id's contribution back there, but briefly: No, I'm not just uncomfortable with the "natural domina" thing because Dedi said it. I have experience--long, broad and painful experience--of being told "you are not a proper X because you do/don't do Y." You're not a proper perv because you switch. You're not a real Domme because you won't let me kiss your boots in the middle of this non-fetish nightclub. You're not a true sub because you wouldn't let me take your top off in the middle of a crowded tube train. Sometimes this kind of thing is too laughable to be a real problem, but I have actually suffered real emotional harm in the past as my sense of self came under a sustained attack which was modelled along similar lines. Hence my unwillingness to treat it as a relatively minor breach of etiquette.
 
 
Alex's Grandma
20:36 / 01.05.07
Maybe they've suddenly spouted blood from their nose for no apparent reason.

In all seriousness, if this sort of thing is even a vague possibility, then it seems like a hobby best avoided. I can't even begin to imagine what would drive anyone into that kind of (mutually consensual, hopefully, but still ..) relationship, but, whatever, if something went wrong, if one of the parties involved basically wound up in A&E as a result of a Saturday party, the other would presumably have to clean the mess up, explain things to the family, and then deal with the police. And then possibly fifteen to life, I suppose. Which is to say nothing of how the character with the nosebleed might feel, in his or her final moments.

I'm a bit uncomfortable (and I never thought I'd say this) with being on a board where discussion of this sort of potential random horror is considered in some way acceptable.
 
 
godhole
20:46 / 01.05.07
Something that might be productively tossed onto the shifting sands of this thread is about the bottoms' use of safewords. (I will not delve into the great but separate strand of D/s versus Top/bottom now.) I cannot say that bottoms using safewords is "topping from the bottom" - I think giving a bottom a safeword can be likened to wearing a seatbelt. It doesn't mean you won't crash, but it makes you feel a bit better during the ride! I am half joking here, but I am someone who doesn't explicitly use safewords except when playing with someone I don't know well, or who is very new and nervous. When I do, I like the red/yellow/green version - there is a way of saying "slow down" without calling an abrupt halt to things.

What we need to remind ourselves is that safewords only work when the bottom uses them, and when sie does that at the right time. Depending on the motivations of the bottom, sie might be unwilling or unable to voice any resistance or input, preferring to please the Top (a motivation conflicting with hir body's pain-in-a-bad-way). When I know or suspect this about a bottom, I will build into the check-in process a framework which brings those conflicting motivations into alignment. It usually takes the form of impressing on the bottom that their body is mine for the next hour or so (employing a D/s dynamic), and that I expect to have clear information being given to me about that body's status. Of course, that is a very different dynamic than an endurance ordeal (whether ritually framed or not) - as I believe XK mentioned above.

Id: I would be very disappointed in a bottom who would withhold that knowledge from me. Very disappointed indeed. "Never playing with again" kind of disappointed.

In those cases, I would try to learn from how I set up the check-in process (whether that uses a safeword or not) to see how I might avoid the issue later. That is not about assigning blame, but there must have been something going on in the bottom's experience for hir to withhold that info. Were they in fact after an interrogation scene? Is there a bratty strand that went un-dealt with?

Id also wrote, "A safeword is feedback that lets me know, clearly and explicitly and over the other kinds of communication that happens within roles, that if I go beyond this point I'll be doing it without the bottom's consent, and that's vital knowledge for me to have.

Very true. And yet, when "seducing consent" (Mr. Rinella's phrase? I forget who said that) is part of a scene, enticing both people a bit into new wonders, out of endlessly negotiated scripts and soft limits - I think it is possible for a bottom's comfort zone (like hir pain tolerance) to expand very temporarily, and spring back rubber-band-like afterwards. It is diseartening to say the least to check in explicitly with someone during a scene, to have no safeword used, and yet then later for them to reframe the experience as a time when they should have safeworded. (Any advice on dealing with those moments is welcome!)

So I personally don't think relying on the use of safewords gets us out of messes, especially when deeper currents are swirling. Rarely in my own life (which includes long real-time experience as a swich-mostly-top in the gay male scene; teaching BDSM workshops, and running men's play parties) have I seen hard play which does not mix elements and motivations which we would rather (in this conversation, at least) having more clarity around.
 
 
godhole
20:52 / 01.05.07
Alex' Grandma wrote In all seriousness, if [suddenly spouting blood from their nose for no apparent reason] is even a vague possibility, then it seems like a hobby best avoided.

Id was referring to a top having a sudden nosebleed, is the way I read it. (Hey, it happens!) Intense emotion, dehydration, meds - there could be a bunch of reasons.

As far as things going wrong and having to take the bottom to the ER, that happens too - and a top has to be ready to do that without shame, and have appropriate first aid skills for things on the way up to those incidents. If they cannot accept that responsibility, I agree with you - perhaps this is not the arena for them.
 
 
Ticker
21:20 / 01.05.07
I'm a bit uncomfortable (and I never thought I'd say this) with being on a board where discussion of this sort of potential random horror is considered in some way acceptable.

I think you could replace 'nosebleed' with 'migraine' in the quote if that helps reframe it for you.


Just a reminder though ths is the same board that discusses nonconsensual horrors all the time. Probably rugby as well if I dig about. Not to sound flippant and I mean this respectfully but how do you view BDSM between consenting adults differently than a rugby match?
 
 
Alex's Grandma
21:29 / 01.05.07
Surely the A&E departments are over-taxed already enough, aren't they?

The last thing they need is to have to deal with some clown who was exploring the limits of their sexuality, perhaps a marital aid too far.
 
 
*
21:37 / 01.05.07
AG, people's blood pressure does sometimes fluctuate, depending on what it is they are doing at the time. Sometimes this results in spontaneous nosebleeds; sometimes bleeding from the nose happens due to changes in humidity; sometimes this happens from trauma. I've known someone to develop a nosebleed from perfectly non-BDSM sex, and while it was not a real cause for concern in that instance it did necessitate a pause in the action while we figured out what had caused it and if it was safe to continue. In a BDSM scene, it could conceivably require cessation of the scene, and could cause the top to be the one safewording as ze is likely to be the first person to notice it.

I don't think it's a good enough reason to bar people who are prone to nosebleeds, as a good percentage of the population is, from engaging in their preferred form of sexual activity, whatever that may be. You are of course the only proper arbiter of what kind of sex (or hobby) is good for you, yourself. If the risk of getting a nosebleed is worrisome, there are a list of hobbies I could suggest you avoid, among them mountain-climbing.
 
 
*
21:38 / 01.05.07
godhole, actually I was thinking of the bottom getting a nosebleed and not noticing, but thank you for clarifying. I am sorry I was so unclear.
 
 
godhole
21:40 / 01.05.07
Oopsie - rereading Id's hypothetical discussion I see I had the incorrect nosebleeder. Please forgive me. Still - I would say that basic first aid skills are required, along with any other more specialized bodies of knowledge.

Just as if I hurt myself woodworking and had to go to [the] hospital, why should I be ashamed at having something go awry when being sexually active? And even if the situation was brought about by the top's mistake, that doesn't alter the fact that they are responsible for the bottom. In my mind those possibilities are always there.

In my experience, they have not always been possibilities - I once had a gentleman briefly pass out from a combination of age, heat, and perhaps medical factors - as I had allowed in the original set-up for the possible need to get him down in a hurry, shifting him to the floor was no problem. Nor was it a scene stopper, after taking a bit of a pause and assessing where he was at. He had a great time, and perhaps more importantly (for a man in his 70's) he was left with the knowledge that he was not frail, or too old to play with, or undesireable. A challenge became a blessing.
 
 
This Sunday
21:48 / 01.05.07
The last thing they need is to have to deal with some clown who was exploring the limits of their sexuality, perhaps a marital aid too far.

Well, that could be said of people who injure themselves or are injured by others in situations that could be, ostensibly avoided entirely. Someone twists an ankle on the field, or whatever. Seriously. I remember working in an office with a long hall, which had electric slidy-open doors off to one side, which led out to a concrete bridge and a very steep drop on either end, usually fenced. Some coworkers were using an office chair to spin people around real fast and then rocket them down the hall. Because it was fun. And almost a dozen people were really getting into it, taking turns, et cet. And then, somehow, the chair spun awkwardly, and as it approached the end of the hall, doing a little eccentric wobble thing, went outside, and over the edge of the bridge, which had part of its fence removed for replacement. Stunning workers rushing out, stunned workers outside with the fence, and one very injured person and a broken chair below.

But I can't, honetly, get furious at the ankle-twister, the chair-spinners, or somebody who likes having cloverstyle clamps bite into delicate bits and say they, in case of injury, are wasting money and time.

Slapping a knife repeatedly on a bet and losing a finger as a result is one thing. Getting a bit too into the moment and somebody catching a bit of brick overhang and getting more injured than is expected while being tossed about in some roleplaying scenario is no different than hitting your head while being tossed about for calm, passionless doing-the-job lie-back-and-think-of-kittens sex, or just hitting your head.

Intentional injury, like the idiots who put breath-mint strips on their eyeball and then go to the hospital? Or who grab a bottle and them punch a wall to show how badass they are? Or, I dunno, carve a reproduction of a Monkeys album cover into another person's back and then tell them they can't clean it out or touch it, so it goes septic... there's the people ire should be directed at. And possibly extra your-an-idiot taxes.

I'm personally way too lazy for the whole lifestyle scene (and have issues with the 'lifestyle' marker, as it's a bit pretentious, yeah?) but in the end, BDSM informs our lives, all our lives, in a billion little ways. It's what makes Justine or the Electoral College so funny and so disturbing all at once.
 
 
Alex's Grandma
21:49 / 01.05.07
Not to sound flippant and I mean this respectfully but how do you view BDSM between consenting adults differently than a rugby match?

Rugby seems to be about people facing up to each other with an uncertain goal in mind - they might win, they might lose, but there's going to be a result, either way. Whereas in BDSM, who knows?
 
 
*
22:00 / 01.05.07
godhole, I think you've reframed things very productively. The issue with "seducing consent" in particular could use further discussion. I haven't encountered that kind of situation myself (although I've often bottomed and come out of scene with a half-exhilerated, half-terrified "What the hell was I thinking?!" resounding in my brain, further exploration has thus far always demonstrated that whatever it was that I'd been experiencing, I didn't regret it in the least). Some further clarification: My comment about being disappointed in a bottom who didn't safeword when they felt like they needed to was intended to be facetious. I was referring to situations where a safeword is negotiated beforehand, with clear instructions to the bottom to use it, and they did not out of fear of disappointing the top. (The 'irony' is that it is often the failure to communicate that disappoints, rather than the lack thereof.) And if I never played again with someone who had failed to safeword when they needed to, after safewords had been negotiated in advance, it wouldn't be out of blame but in reality out of concern that they would again be unable to safeword and I would again fail to understand their other forms of communication (such as ceasing to communicate).

It was for a time characteristic of my bottomspace that I would be unable to communicate while in that space, and it's required a Dominant top who has clearly instructed me to communicate fully at all times to begin to break me of that habit. So I couldn't in seriousness blame someone who couldn't safeword when they needed to.
 
 
Disco is My Class War
02:43 / 02.05.07
XK, I'm sorry you think I was engaging in a personal attack. It was personal, yes. And I will not apologise for saying what I said. I'd probably say precisely the same thing to someone who expressed statements like DEDI's in real time. People who have such incredibly highflown opinions about BDSM should not be supported. They should be told in no uncertain terms that their assumptions won't fly in the real world, unless they want to pay someone, and even then, they're not going to get much love from the exchange.

Also, I refer everyone to "You're a male, athletic, muscular....." which was posted to this thread. In my opinion, that post provides all the provocation required to support a refusal to take DEDI seriously. But if it needs saying, I'm very happy to listen to anyone else who wants information and needs support in this thread without sarcasm. As long as they comport themselves in a way that doesn't immediately scream 'idiot'.

For what it's worth, I also have an instant squick at the vision of the 'natural Domina'. There is no such thing. And DEDI's vision is so relentlessly heteronormative it makes me want to puke. I am serious: it makes me want to vomit. It's like he's been reading Gor novels, but I know he hasn't. To my mind it's pretty much the same thing, just with the terms reversed. That also provokes quite a strong reaction.

Sorry, I'll let everyone get back to discussing safewords and nosebleeds, shall I? And Alex's Grandma, just a quick word: drinking a lot of alcohol could be criticised for the precisely the same potential for harm, and/or 'useless' waste of hospital resources. And yet I don't see you telling anyone not to drink alcohol. Perhaps we could all just let each other enjoy our preferred pastimes, and leave it at that.
 
 
godhole
02:50 / 02.05.07
Id wrote I was referring to situations where a safeword is negotiated beforehand, with clear instructions to the bottom to use it, and they did not out of fear of disappointing the top.

This is what I mean by the top needing to frame the feedback in a way that is consonant with the bottom's motivations, which may be conflicting. Bottom wants to relieve numbness (for example) - yet bottom has a deeper motivation to please the top, so does not speak - or in sub-space, cannot. In my opinion, it is the top's job to understand this about the way the bottom works (as much as is possible), and to contruct a system where the bottom can give appropriate feedback. So for me, I often use the construct that "bottom is top's [temporary] property, requiring accurate reporting" - thus building into smooth communication an additional motivation and chance for the bottom to prove hirself. It is a useful 'general order' that I have found to work well even when I am not deeply familiar with the bottom's motivations.

Of course, within an ongoing relationship, shifting the bottom's habits in the way that you mentioned - in other words, transforming or expanding the subspace, or segmenting some of it off into a minimal "witness consciousness" or monitor - is another perfectly acceptable way of doing things. Different headspaces will work for different people, depending on the goal at hand.
 
 
Ex
10:36 / 02.05.07
Rugby seems to be about people facing up to each other with an uncertain goal in mind - they might win, they might lose, but there's going to be a result, either way. Whereas in BDSM, who knows?

Sorry, I'm not sure what 'result' you'd want from sex that would be equivalent to this. The 'uncertain goal' of sex is to have an experience you both enjoy.

I went through a spell of having nosebleeds quite regularly, sexy or otherwise, abotu five years ago. It didn't signify anything, as far as I and my doctor could tell, and it stopped after about six months. I think I'd just damaged the skin in my nose through a series of colds and it was regrowing.

And as Disco notes, people on this board get up to a lot of things I'd never dream of attempting in terms of personal safety. There's a regular front-page thread about having drunk so much you've physically injured yourself, there are threads on drugs and different kinds of unusual bodywork. The NHS support of such activities is an interesting debate, but aone that is largely irrelevant to people like me who've been kiny for years and never needed medical treatment - the worst thing I've done during rudeness so far is kneel on someone's elbow, I think, and that was just during routine friskiness.

I'm at a difficult spot here, because I'd invite you to discuss what you feel makes bdsm different from rugby, booze or anything else that doesn't make you want to dissasociate yourself from Barbelith. I think dialogue's a good thing and it might be good for posters who have 'done' bdsm to offer a viewpoint.
However, I also feel as though there are quite a few 'myth-busting' sites online about bdsm, and I don't know if this is the place to invite people to discuss in detail their concerns about the intrinsic inadvisability of the whole effort - I'd rather keep the space exploratory rather than defensive, and I think it might tip that way. So, I'm always open to discussion - but I can't check in as much because of computer use restrictions, and I don't want to upset people who have a lot of problematic stuff chucked their way in the first place. I'll usually respond, but I'll not pursue. Entirely up to you.
 
 
Ex
11:24 / 02.05.07
Or you might just have been bored.
 
 
*
14:26 / 02.05.07
Key, I think, is the understanding that discussing BDSM doesn't have to mean advocating it for people who aren't interested. For some folks, not doing BDSM is not much of an option. For others, doing BDSM is not much of an option. That's fine. The world doesn't need everyone to be into tying each other up and sensation play. The world doesn't need every BDSM player to use safewords, or not to use them in order to be "real" in someone else's judgment. One of the best uses of this thread I can think of is to talk about the variety of BDSM experience without labeling any of it less authentic, or "bad" without good objective reason. Folks who want to talk about the variety of non-BDSM experience have other threads to do that in, and welcome.
 
 
Ticker
14:41 / 02.05.07
godhole mentioned exploring the various dynamics and differences around Top/bottom Dominant/submissive etc.

I'd be excited to hear people discuss how they experience these as different things or similar.
 
 
*
15:17 / 02.05.07
For me, that's a fairly confusing dynamic. I'll try to make clear how it functions for me, but in trying to clarify I may oversimplify.

When I think of the distinctions between top/bottom and dominant/submissive*: I think of bottoming as being the recipient of sensation created by a top, and topping as a person who creates sensation for a bottom. A dominant I think of as someone who is in charge of an experience that the dominant and the submissive create, each by playing a role. That experience is "for" the submissive in the sense that the submissive is the one who isn't deciding what will happen next, and in fact may not know what will happen next, like an audience in a theatre—but the submissive likewise has a role to play, work to do, whether that work is holding still and imagining hirself into helplessness, or cleaning house from ceiling to floor.

(* I periodically bow to what I think of as scenerthanthou conventions about capitalization, but generally speaking I find it silly)

Now, how this works for me: I like bottoming to sensation I enjoy. (who doesn't?) I will also bottom to sensation I do not enjoy, in order to more fully enter a submissive role that I do enjoy. I like topping to create sensations my bottom will enjoy. I will dominate in order to enable my bottom to enter a submissive headspace in which they can more fully enjoy the sensations they want to receive from me. It feels perfectly natural to me to top, while it doesn't feel natural to me to dominate. (Yes, this means that if there is such a thing as a "natural dominant," I am not one. Extra points not given to clever dicks who point this out.) I am not naturally a service submissive, either—that is, one who does things for a dominant—but I'm learning to be, and I have the potential to be quite good at it if I keep working hard to improve.

Feelings of competence and incompetence are big hangups for me in my life in general, and thus, I'm rediscovering as I write this, important in my BDSM practice/play. I want to feel competent, but my default state is feeling incompetent and terrified of making mistakes. When I bottom while submissive, I can be completely free of feeling either competent or incompetent—I just lie there and receive. If I start worrying about how much sensation I should be able to take, or whether this amount of feedback is enough, or should I be yelling louder or sobbing more quietly, then I've slipped out of scene, and a mess follows. Lately I'm pretty good at not doing that (see, I can't avoid the language of competence even talking about this!). When I am submissive and not bottoming, however, I often have things I must do, things that I could potentially get wrong. (Panic ensues.) The fear of incompetence can be good, because it can focus my attention on what I'm doing and improve my performance, and it can be good because it can further enhance my feeling of submission, itself something of a relief from fears of incompetence. Too much of it, though, just makes me a shivering wreck, not much good for anything. So playing with these feelings has been a focus for me and my partner, although we haven't really framed it as such. Proving myself able to do some tasks to his satisfaction helps me manage this kind of anxiety.
 
 
Disco is My Class War
04:25 / 03.05.07
Well, according to 'commonsense' definitions, the key difference between topping/bottoming and dominance/submission is supposed to be whether the goal of play is pure physical sensation or emotional power exchange. Ie, when it comes to the crunch, a bottom should be able to direct the scene, in terms of what ze wants to feel physically, while a submissive permits the top/dominant to stage manage what happens in the scene and submits to that plan.

The play I do tends to sit somewhere between those two. Pure sensation play can be fun, as long as the sensation is intense enough, but as a bottom I probably wouldn't want to direct a top, apart from asking for things. I'm a pain hog. A while back, I formed a relationship in which I agreed to perform a purist form of submission, and where intense pain was not guaranteed every time we played. It wasn't successful, in the end: my desire for pain was more pressing than the desire to forego pain -- indeed, many desires -- as a form of service. Now I'm pretty upfront about liking pain, but am less forthcoming with prospective playmates about my propensity for submission. If I play as a bottom, the thing I'm happiest with is something informal, in between top/bottom and dominance/submission.

But topping is a whole different story. I don't just 'top', if the definition of topping is providing physical sensation and nothing else. The pleasure that comes from topping is being able to help a bottom to a point of safe vulnerability -- through sensation, maybe, but also through words, and through all the possible languages of the body, performance/costume, and sex. That vocabulary is different for everyone, and one uses a different set of tools every time.

I've never been comfortable describing myself as a submissive or a dominant. Actually, I can't really describe myself as a bottom or a top: neither would be accurate. And you'll notice that I don't capitalise anything, because like id, I find it slightly scenier-than-thou. And I have little respect for formality. Although that's not to say capitalisations are wrong; just not my cup of tea.

Sometimes I wonder what the point of making a distinction between topping/bottoming and dominance/submission is. Is it really true that most people have a distinct preference for either? What's the importance of definition, for people to whom that definition is important?
 
 
Katherine
17:40 / 09.05.07
When I bottom/sub I see the results of reacting to my partner’s work, after all it wouldn’t be enjoyable for my partner if I just lay/stand/etc there and just let things run over me (maybe for someone is would be good but that hasn’t happened in my experience). My reaction to what is happening is a big part of the whole thing as is what my partner is doing to get that reaction.

Sometimes there are sensations or experiences I don’t really enjoy but they are something my partner really enjoys and the following result, I find this balances out in the end to something which works really well for us at that time. Going back to safewords, there have been times when confronted with something new I have wanted to safeword straight away, but at this point I know that my partner knows my ‘limits’ and knows what he is doing to push them. I tend only use a safeword now if something has gone wrong like the example of twisting a joint and I can’t sort it out, a favourite of mine unfortunately and it is not pain I can cope with.

Sometimes I wonder what the point of making a distinction between topping/bottoming and dominance/submission is. Is it really true that most people have a distinct preference for either? What's the importance of definition, for people to whom that definition is important

Other than a good debate, I guess it’s because it’s easier to have distinctions. From the above examples of top & dom or bottom & sub, I don’t think the relationship I have experienced fall purely into either, more a mixture of the two slightly more towards to d & s. Would it matter to us? Well….no, but would it be easier to explain to other people the relationship dynamic? Yes and that’s why I think some people do have these types of discussions on just what these distinctions mean. It helps when you have a conversation if everyone knows the same terms and meanings. Then the discussion (in theory) shouldn't be peppered with misunderstandings.
 
  

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