Do you believe in references?

[Primalex]

How do you feel about references, as in... a PYL or pyl recommending another specific PYL or pyl for someone else?

(I'm specifically not referring to pure knowledge-based recommendations, like:"If you want to know about bondage, Homburg might be able to answer more specific questions.", but along the lines of:"You should contact XYZ if you seek a PYL/pyl, (s)he is awesome." or:"XYZ is a good guy/gal, you should play with him/her")

 

[ToPleaseHim]

To an extent, yes...but caution is warranted. I recently commented on a personal that one of the respondents was a good person to talk to. He’s real and was in a sea of HNGs and an oddly aggressive poster. I think it’s hard to navigate here, especially when getting a barrage of responses like that.

But, people do change and people can be much different with different partners. We don’t always know people as well as we think we do and we should be careful about recommending people to others. I’ve read some really odd recommendations here, too, some I’ve suspected were assigned by a PYL, which is hardly genuine.

ETA: Homburg’s voice is one that is very much missing from the forum.

 

[IrisAlthea]

It’s a tricky question.

Unless it is a recommendation for some special skill as you described or for something limited in time and scope, it is hard to both give and take references.

In part it can be like matchmaking and that is something I try to avoid. I did realize it would come back to bite me but I wasn’t smart enough not to let myself get talked into it anyway a couple of times. It didn’t work well and I’m glad it didn’t hurt my relationships with the people involved.
My taste in men was deemed questionable though. The men were more like ”Oh well, it was worth a try.”.

It’s also a bit like giving and taking references professionally. I do both a fair bit for work.
I find it works best when I know the person giving or taking the reference very well. In lieu of that, I think the best route is to describe the person and what they bring to the table or ask questions to get that info. It’s always difficult to decide how open to be and to guess how open they are.

Given that experience, I might be willing to be a reference for someone if they asked me to and I truly felt they were ok with me being very open about things
I’m less prone to give out recommendations to someone looking for a partner. If I do it will be to someone who knows me rather well and who understands that their experience might be different than mine, though the other person is the same.

Would I ask recomnendations/take references for a partner?
I might, but I would be well aware that it can only be part of the decision process and that the relative worth of it to me would depend a lot on the person giving it.

 

[seela]

How do you feel about references, as in... a PYL or pyl recommending another specific PYL or pyl for someone else?

(I'm specifically not referring to pure knowledge-based recommendations, like:"If you want to know about bondage, Homburg might be able to answer more specific questions.", but along the lines of:"You should contact XYZ if you seek a PYL/pyl, (s)he is awesome." or:"XYZ is a good guy/gal, you should play with him/her")

I'd feel very weird if I someone offered me a reference like "contact X, they can vouch for me" or if someone told me that I should contact Y for reason Z. I'd also feel very weird if I was asked to be the person to give a reference for someone.

If I knew someone had recommended me and that was the reason the person approached me. Well... Very mixed feelings. I think I'd get a weird objectification kick out of it, but otherwise I don't think I'd like it. I'd probably think that if the person didn't find me interesting enough on their own without a reference from a third party, then it's not worth pursuing.

I feel the same way about people warning against someone. Don't care, won't do it myself.

I've seen mentions of there being a network of women on Lit who tell each other who's trustworthy and who isn't and I've always found it super odd. In all my years on Lit I can remember that happening to me exactly once, so it's not exactly a thing that concerns me so whatever. I'm off the grid.

 

[IrisAlthea]

I'd feel very weird if I someone offered me a reference like "contact X, they can vouch for me" or if someone told me that I should contact Y for reason Z. I'd also feel very weird if I was asked to be the person to give a reference for someone.

If I knew someone had recommended me and that was the reason the person approached me. Well... Very mixed feelings. I think I'd get a weird objectification kick out of it, but otherwise I don't think I'd like it. I'd probably think that if the person didn't find me interesting enough on their own without a reference from a third party, then it's not worth pursuing.

I feel the same way about people warning against someone. Don't care, won't do it myself.

I've seen mentions of there being a network of women on Lit who tell each other who's trustworthy and who isn't and I've always found it super odd. In all my years on Lit I can remember that happening to me exactly once, so it's not exactly a thing that concerns me so whatever. I'm off the grid.

I’ve be been offered references once when talking to a very strange man on a local forum years ago. No reference in the world could have helped him.

I’ve heard about references from people that hung out in the party/scene crowd in the mid 00s. I think it was partly to get around a rather horrible rumor mill. A bit like the network you talked about.
And yes, I heard about the network too. There was some man you were supposed to be warned about if he was getting too close. I never got how that was supposed to work?!

 

[lisaharlot]

Sure, with a pillar of salt.

 

[ultramarineblue]

Like many have said, it is a tricky thing. To me it is more tricky if it's more matchmaking than if it's that someone is good at a particular skill like rope or electro play. When I attended munches and a few events, it was really easy to figure out who knew what they were doing with rope or a violet wand, etc. I did go to another group's event and my group vetted me so I could attend without having to go to a couple of munches. I had gotten to know several in the my group pretty well before that or they wouldn't have been able to vet me.

 

[cookiecat]

When I was new in the community, references were a thing. As I met men, they'd say "I can give you references" like I was interviewing them for a job. I thought it was odd.

I mean, aren't you going to line up references of folks who like you?

After a time, I realized the community here was actually fairly small and everyone had pretty much either played with, dated, fucked, monkeyed around or went to lunch with someone we all knew. Not much was secret.

As others have stated, references seem more applicable for skills. Who's good at a thing I want to experience?

I'm not sure why, but asking for references when seeking out an emotional connection seems off. I wonder why? Maybe a lot of my poor judgements would be side stepped if I got references!

 

[Blase]

I'm not nearly as active here on Lit as some, and that sort of situation has never really come up. Perhaps if would have if my posts numbered in the tens of thousands.

I do remember once talking to a sub who, when it looked like things weren't going to go anywhere between us, asked if I'd like her to bump my personal ad. Now, one or two ladies have in fact done that over the years, but I didn't take this particular offer up. I didn't want to be the type of person who thinks Well, perhaps you can be of some use to me, anyway.

 

[IrisAlthea]

How do you feel about references, as in... a PYL or pyl recommending another specific PYL or pyl for someone else?

(I'm specifically not referring to pure knowledge-based recommendations, like:"If you want to know about bondage, Homburg might be able to answer more specific questions.", but along the lines of:"You should contact XYZ if you seek a PYL/pyl, (s)he is awesome." or:"XYZ is a good guy/gal, you should play with him/her")

Something made me think about this thread again. Something that kind of borders on references, that I have done and seen done more than references in this setting, is helping people describe themselves and perhaps point out things about themselves that they might otherwise miss.

How do you yourself feel about references?

 

[JamieJ424]

I’m mixed on them. There was a guy in Connecticut, a rope top. He regularly held court at play spaces, presented himself as a knowledgeable person, and had people who would vouch for him.

Anyway his MO was to get a female volunteer in rope at one of these things and then grope her without consent in front of an audience.

When I was new and dumb, he once messaged me to ask if he could work with my sub as co presenter at a workshop. He offered references. I kept my own counsel, and sent him a one word reply. I later learned about the other stuff.

Conversely, the man who would become my rope mentor approached me and said he was doing a six week intensive for a handful of couples, liked my work and creativity, and invited me. Never met the guy before. But a few questions was enough to prove he knew his shit, his submissive was outgoing and happy, and subsequently my sub and I learned more from him about rope and dominance/submission than I can put into words here.

There’s no magic bullet when it comes to knowing and trusting people. Pieces of shit have friends too, and good people are sometimes loners.