Why is it that...

...just because you say you like to be beaten so many people assume that you like being made to crawl around on you knees on the end of a leash?

/rant on

Ok, I know, vast over-exageration there, but it does none-the-less sum up basically what has happened to me on a fair few occasions. I am very masochistic (and love every second of that side of things), but just because I like S&M this does not mean that I like the D/s. Yes, to some degree being masochistic means that you are submitting, but it seems that too many people assume that being masochistic means you in turn must be a submissive as well. I know this does not work the other way, subs are not assumed to love pain and the bite of a crop in their most sensitive places. Why is this, or is it just that I have been very unlucky in the Dom's I have met?

/rant off

Just wondered what everyone else thought about this...it is a real irritation of mine if you couldn't all tell.

katzeyez

While it isn't a rant I share with you, it is all about stereo types.

Stereotypes are found within the lifestyle as well as outside the lifestyle.

How each of us interprates our needs, our sexuality is very individualistic, but sometimes that piece is forgotten.

Subs do this....

Dom/mes do that....

Switches are this.....

etc .

I read this the other day and had to think about your rant, kat...

We are what we are... each lives within a definition of their own...

I recently met someone who likes to be restrained to their bed in order to sleep... they also want to wear what I consider extreme bondage gear to sleep in... like a lace up posture collar... I am trying to understand this need they have...

I am trying to understand the need they have to be owned... I just don't get it... not really...

I am trying to understand the difference between training and abuse... and what I consider abuse others just consider training.... there is such a diversity here in the BDSM lifestyle...

If you are kept caged for days on end is that training or is that abuse... where do you draw the line?

.

Common sense again !!

I would just like to 'second' that nice , clear piece of sanity from willfulbrat !! <<<stands and applauds !>>>

I would never get into a scene with anyone without that communication thing !!! KNOW the likes/dislikes and limits.....and always respect them !

I hear you, but from the opposite side of things. Why is it that just because I like d/s, people want to beat me and hurt me?

I know all the answers...but just to share my little rant

Each of us should "write", for lack a better word, our experience. If you are into the BD part of the lifestyle the SM part would be felt as abuse and vice versa. Healthy communication, as others have said is the key. I do not enjoy verbal humiliation but love to be "made" to have sex in places where we may be caught. The fear of the humiliation of being caught does it for me. So much of what we do in the lifestyle is about what happens between our ears and not striped on our rears.

Pay it forward.

I think that the vast majority of people walking the streets of any city anywhere on the Earth have no concept at all about what BDSM D/s is. They don't have a clue what it means to us, the people who do this.

They understand what the sterotypes have told them through time. They understand the movie versions of BDSM. They understand the words "sadistic killer of co-eds sentenced to death" emblazoned across newspaper headlines. They know what a whip is for. They know how they feel when someone hits them.

Most people think that all submissives crave a beating because that's what they've been told, that's what all the stereotypes lead them to believe, that's what is easy to understand. Most people in the lifestyle, however, do not think that all submissives crave pain and all Dominants are sadistic bastards, though, do we?

It's because we've educated ourselves on what's real with regard to our lifestyle.

It's all about education and communication.
Everything.
Always.

Be patient with those who don't know. Teach them. Bring them to some understanding of the fact that we're just like them but for our expression of some of our sexual/emotional needs.

We've always done this, we who've hid in the BDSM shadows through time. We've always taught those who don't know and don't understand. It's a part of our cultural inheritance, so to speak, we BDSM'ers.

wow, what a great response. in my opinion it's fine to talk about educating ourselves and communication, but there are times when i think things just plain get out of control and that is what scares me. i want to do for my Master what He wants, when He wants, yet sometimes in order for Him to have a great orgasm i
go further than i ever thought possible. Then He tells me that it was something buried in me that i really love to do anyway...and then it becomes part of our sessions... i fear going further and further and further...losing myself in the process. but i love being submisssive and His slave and don't want to stop.

Your questions might be better suited to thier own thread, cyn.