ling wrote:
"I feel like a lucky sub to have been given the opportunity to know two great Doms."
It's a great reminder of a pretty obvious (to Me, at least) but often-overlooked fact: There aren't all that many great Ones.
I recall seeing a figure, somewhere, that there are about 7 submissives for every 3 Dominants out there. Let's assume for purposes of this discussion that that figure is more or less accurate, at least on its face.
Dominance is in short supply relative to those wanting to consume it. In any market like that, the reasonable (and sometimes unreasonable) facsmilies will command more attention/interest than they would if the market were more balanced. Intensifying this phenomenon is that fact that most submissives are, by their nature, more, well, submissive, at the very least in the surface aspects of interaction. So they're often less likely to be "educated consumers," as it were.
Long-term, this has a negative effect on the lifestyle overall. Shifting metaphorical gears, it's a phenomenon like a herd. The herd over time becomes weak as a whole if weak herd members proflierate unchecked.
I realize that in terms of one person to another, this matters little. If someone finds their Someone, and the S/someones are happy together, I celebrate and applaud that, vanilla, D/s, or anything in between. But . . .
Since there is no official governing body of D/s, the lifestyle is, in a very real sense, defined by the people who live it. Someone inexperienced but curious about D/s could go Castle Realm or any number of other wonderful websites and read all sorts of thoughtful, insightful articles and guides about D/s, but what is going to stick with them much more strongly is what they observe of the thoughts and actions of people in the lifestyle. So it matters.
The remedy, and this is the tricky part, really lies with the submissive. This gets very complicated and unearths all sorts of potentially troublesome ideas. Which, if nothing else, is grist for the blogging mill -- something I'll grind away on in another entry soon.
4 comments:
Sorry, I don't quite get this. If there are 7 Doms to every 3 subs, isn't it subs not Doms that are in short supply? Or am I missing something?
Where did you get these figures from, btw?
As we have discussed, Lenora, I believe the "true" figure is more like 1.5:1. I once did a 'total' search of bondage.com, and found a 1:1 ratio.
The most oft-quoted asymmetry is, of course, the apochryphal (sp?) mismatch of FemDoms:malesubs at 10:1. As I have mentioned, I think that, in reality, the true FemDom:malesub proportion is more like 1:1. I say that because very few, if any, of my serious, quality Domme friends have found a quality, compatible malesub to collar and own.
But all this notwithstanding, I enjoyed your post. Yes, it's up to the submissive, in effect, to winnow out the "wannabes," because so many unsuccessful vanillas recast themselves as "dominant" to get dates who otherwise would not go near them.
Speaking for myself, I have become far more discerning, and actually initiated the end of the last two significant FemDom relationships in which I was. Oddly, each Domme was apparently willing to limp along in an unsatisfied state for a longer time. I was unfulfilled with giving my submission for inadequate, insensitive "dominance," and chose to leave and look elsewhere.
Allied to this, btw, is a concept that has been growing in my mind recently. That is, rather than the conventional 1-9 stages of "submission," ending in "total slavery," a more realistic notion of submission defined as a joint function of attitude and context. I now believe one can be "slavish," for brief periods, and that may constitute far more meaningful submission than a lesser-devoted, many-limited submissive who is totally available.
to be perfectly honest, i just can't wrap my head around your post today, but i will come back to it when i'm more awake and able to focus better.
i just wanted to peek in and let you know that i've enjoyed reading the last few threads and catching up with you, even if i haven't been commenting very often. thank you for the insight that you leave here for us to come back to.
Roper: My bad, I was thinking it right but worte it wrong. It's 7 submissives for every 3 Dominants (supposedly). I would fire the proofreader but alas, l'etat c'est moi, as it were. Sorry for the confusion.
As for the source, it was in some article I read. Gallup could have a field day, I'm sure, listing the methodoligical challenges in arriving at any accurate ratio.
fucktoy: Thanks. I imagine that the error at the very beginning (see My response to Roper's comment) made it even more difficult. I'm about to fix that error now; the whoe post should as a result be a lot clearer.
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