What makes a good/worthy sub?

[BiBunny]

In my opinion, a good and/or worthy sub is one who is actually capable of pleasing the dominant one on a regular basis. (which is different than wanting to please or trying to please)

I suck like whoa, then. I never feel like I'm good enough.

 

[Achlys]

.....

 

[eastern sun]

I suck like whoa, then. I never feel like I'm good enough.

Me, too.

(but we may both be poor judges of our own success. it helps me to trust his judgement over mine)

 

[DirtyPet]

I will admit that I am not a good sub at all. I am very new and was a dominant all my life..not as in Dominant/Master but just a dominant person..I am however a great girlfriend lol

 

[chy_girl]

I will admit that I am not a good sub at all. I am very new and was a dominant all my life..not as in Dominant/Master but just a dominant person..I am however a great girlfriend lol

I don't think being dominant in everyday life means that you aren't a good sub.

In everyday life, I'm responsible for helping my mom, raising a disabled child, being a 'second parent' for 5 nieces and nephews, on top of dealing with multiple state agencies and working in a rather male dominant job. With as much of the decision making and everyday responsibilities fall on my shoulders, there's now way to be submissive and survive.

Though I suppose that makes the times when I can submit and do something to please a Dom all the sweeter.

Welcome to the boards, BTW.

 

[DirtyPet]

No it does not but I find it rather difficult to always be able to let go of the control that I have with every day things, other people etc etc..

Thank you..

 

[LearningSub]

deleted

 

[chy_girl]

Also, as far as it being harder to transition to being submissive to Sir, I don't know.. as soon as I hear His voice, all the control/dominance I exhibit at work goes flying out the window.

QFT - though the guy I sub for IRL is extremely quiet while he's Doming, so all it takes from him is a look and I'm belly up.

 

[LearningSub]

deleted

 

[chy_girl]

haha... thats a good point too, chy girl..

I guess even the thought of him makes me quiver for a moment.. but the voice, the look..

yep. full agreement.

Yes.

Now if I could just figure out how to calm down the whole 'crawl out of my skin because I'm jonesing for that kind of release' thing, it'd be good.

 

[LearningSub]

deleted

 

[Adakgirl]

Dirtygirl is probably not a submissive at all. There is no reason to encourage her to pretend to be something that she apparently isn't. It's perfectly ok for her to develop her Dominant personality in her personal life... if that is the way she is. No one HAS to be a submissive for christsakes.

 

[where]

Yes, but those are fairly mainstream concepts now. Unfortunately, BDSM is still listed rather negatively in the DSM IV. And if it's in the bible, it must be so...

An interesting article about BDSM and mental health

I agree that psychological, sociological and anthropological studies regarding BDSM would come up with a ton of useful and highly interesting results, even if they aren't results one would expect. However, I doubt that getting the subject matter past an ethics review board, or a peer review board, or a funding board while putting forward a hypothesis that BDSM is ok and perhaps not qualified as mental illness/pathology would go over well.

A lot of queer theory would subvert that kind of medical discourse research. I was thinking sociologically I suppose and in terms of sociological ethics, getting it past an ethics committee would depend on the focus.

There could be issues with participant observation, particularly in terms of personal safety, but if the researcher was already in the 'scene' then you could possibly swing it if you had close supervision. A better approach, I think, would be to do a series of in-depth unstructured interviews and take a grounded theory approach. There would be no more issue, ethically with that than any other interview based research project.

As to funding, well most PhDs are self funded anyway. you don't need to put over a hypothesis that BDSM is ok, either, social research is about enquiry, not just proving a personal standpoint.

Most PYL's tell me i am a waste of time because i am not all that submissive nor am i all that obedient and i have a really impertinent tongue that likes to speak uncomfortable truths at the moment they are likely to cause the most psychological discomfort for the receiver. Partly just to see what will happen

I think if i mixed with more Doms, I would get this too. I know my dom has discussed me with others in the scene and they are shocked that he spends any time or effort on me. fortunately, he thinks they are a bit foolish

In my opinion, a good and/or worthy sub is one who is actually capable of pleasing the dominant one on a regular basis. (which is different than wanting to please or trying to please)

bingo. and pleasing takes many forms.

.....

one day I'll catch one of your posts before you stealth edit it.

 

[ownedsubgal]

Dirtygirl is probably not a submissive at all. There is no reason to encourage her to pretend to be something that she apparently isn't. It's perfectly ok for her to develop her Dominant personality in her personal life... if that is the way she is. No one HAS to be a submissive for christsakes.

word.

 

[Netzach]

Dirtygirl is probably not a submissive at all. There is no reason to encourage her to pretend to be something that she apparently isn't. It's perfectly ok for her to develop her Dominant personality in her personal life... if that is the way she is. No one HAS to be a submissive for christsakes.

Being not-submissive doesn't mean being Dominant either. Dominance is more than "lack of submissive". I think someone can have a Dominant personality and be a bottom, which is where a lot of people get extremely hung up on things and by a community that's like "you're so bossy you shouldn't want what you want"

 

[BiBunny]

Being not-submissive doesn't mean being Dominant either. Dominance is more than "lack of submissive". I think someone can have a Dominant personality and be a bottom, which is where a lot of people get extremely hung up on things and by a community that's like "you're so bossy you shouldn't want what you want"

Hell, I thought "I'm dominant in every situation, to everyone and everything, BUT this guy I'm screwing" was the current S&M cliche. Maybe I'm behind the times again.

 

[SimonBrooke]

Disclaimer: I have not read the whole thread. If I'm just rehashing what everyone else has said, ignore me.

Specifically, what makes a person - a sub - worthwhile?

In general society tends to see worth in things like the ability to perpetuate our species, to provide food and shelter, to contribute to the economy, to support ourselves and our family and the intellectual capacity to advance our communities, societies, and species. There are also other things that sometimes tend to be overlooked as worthy characteristics: honesty, empathy, loyalty, the ability to respect and love others are some example. Which then, to my submissive mind, brings forth the question of what characteristics make a worthy submissive?

Right, let's stop right there. All of this is teleological.

You thinking about what something is 'worth' by considering what it is 'for'. And, frankly, we're not 'for' anything. Our species if greatly over-perpetuated- the earth cannot possibly sustain the population it has now, let alone the bigger one it's inevitably going to have. So perpetuating the species is the opposite of a measure of worth. Support ourselves? That benefits us, of course. But who else does it benefit? How is that a measure of 'worth'? Life is arbitrary and pointless. We are here on this earth as the result of a cosmic accident; if you want to anthropomorphise, a cosmic joke. But if it's a joke and not an accident, the cosmos has a very black sense of humour.

So step away from teleology, and look at other ways in which we can assign value to people. You might look to ethics, but in my opinion there are as many problems with ethical judgments as with teleological ones.

My personal prejudice is to look at these things from the point of view of aesthetics: is what this person does graceful (in the sense of full of grace)? Is it beautiful? It seems to me that unselfish acts of generosity and kindness are graceful in precisely an aesthetic sense, and are to be valued. They're, in your words, 'worth' something.

To turn the whole question on its head, what possible good is a dom? Doms are, very frequently, selfish. Very frequently, self obsessed. Often bullies. Often emotionally stunted. Often, unable to express their vulnerability, unable to let go. That isn't, of course, universally true. But it is true, in my experience, of the majority of men who self-identify as 'doms' - including, probably, myself.

We see the nurse who dedicates her life to the care of the sick and the disabled as a person of worth. If you take the view that doms are damaged people, then generosity to damaged people is an act of grace. Seen in another way, dom and sub form a balance, a yin and yang. Each meets the needs of the other; each gives what the other needs to receive. On an abstract scale, that's no more than an equitable exchange, fair dealing. It is, like many things in life, neither good nor bad.

In various conversations, in stories and real life, I've seen Doms brag on their subs being obedient, kinky, slutty, liking pain or impact play, being willing to go to an extreme, etc. Nearly all of these things are inherently sexual. Does this mean that a subs worth is based simply on his/her ability to sexually satisfy their Dom?

You may think that says something about subs. I don't. I think it says something about doms. Specifically, that they're (in general) selfish, immature, and sexually focussed. The fact that the dom sees (or says he sees, which is a slightly different matter) his sub in purely sexual terms says nothing about the sub and everything about his limited ability to understand and appreciate her.

So I ask you, friends and neighbors on the BDSM block, what is it that makes a good sub? Is it a set of personality characteristics, sexual characteristics, the potential of the person, or is it simply a crapshoot based on how the individual desires of the Dom mesh with individual subs?

And I realize that there will be some variation depending on the person because we're all unique in our tastes and desires, but generally speaking... What makes a good/worthwhile sub?

What is this 'good' of which you speak?

What makes a sub a sub boils down to two things: courage and generosity. Courage, to allow herself to be vulnerable. Generosity, to offer that vulnerability to another. Those are not unworthy characteristics. Doms, by and large, have neither of them.

 

[ataxia.girl]

You said "teleological"

lol

 

[Adakgirl]

Being not-submissive doesn't mean being Dominant either. Dominance is more than "lack of submissive". I think someone can have a Dominant personality and be a bottom, which is where a lot of people get extremely hung up on things and by a community that's like "you're so bossy you shouldn't want what you want"

I mean to imply that I thought she was a Dominant ...not at all, I agree, what I said was this

"perfectly ok for her to develop her Dominant personality in her personal life... if that is the way she is."

 

[Homburg]

A good sub? Well, my current favourite starts with flatbread, salami, pepperoni, and black forest ham, toasted of course. Then a solid layer of shredded lettuce, sliced cucumbers, blacks olives, and a bit of oil and vinegar and some black pepper. Very tasty.

Oh, a good submissive? Right then...

Well, to give the explanation I've given before "Just do as you're fucking told." Anything else is relationship-specific I'd say. Hell, even that part may be too relationship-specific for some.

 

[subish2009]

A good sub? Well, my current favourite starts with flatbread, salami, pepperoni, and black forest ham, toasted of course. Then a solid layer of shredded lettuce, sliced cucumbers, blacks olives, and a bit of oil and vinegar and some black pepper. Very tasty.

Oh, a good submissive? Right then...

Well, to give the explanation I've given before "Just do as you're fucking told." Anything else is relationship-specific I'd say. Hell, even that part may be too relationship-specific for some.

Indeed. My gut reaction to these questions is always to draw from my own experience, which, according to most of what I see on this board, seems to be far from the BDSM "norm" (wherein "norm" = something like mode), and that is offering a humble reminder that some Doms prefer their subs to "do as their fucking told" after a bit of coercion from the Dom.

In other words, it's all relationship-specific.

A good sub is whatever her Dom wants her to be, which is, ideally, herself.

That's what I try to be for my Doms anyway and they're always happiest with me when I am my most authentic me, however that may express itself.

 

[ZRT]

That's what I try to be for my Doms anyway and they're always happiest with me when I am my most authentic me, however that may express itself.

Yup.

Not into renovation. I either like 'em or don't like 'em, but I'm not going to rebuild 'em.

Tinker about, maybe.

So it comes down to chemistry.

And doing what the fuck you're told.

 

[subish2009]

<snip>
"Just do as you're fucking told."
<snip>

<snip>
And doing what the fuck you're told.

Is it me, or is it getting warm in here?

 

[00Syd]

Indeed. My gut reaction to these questions is always to draw from my own experience, which, according to most of what I see on this board, seems to be far from the BDSM "norm" (wherein "norm" = something like mode), and that is offering a humble reminder that some Doms prefer their subs to "do as their fucking told" after a bit of coercion from the Dom.

In other words, it's all relationship-specific.

A good sub is whatever her Dom wants her to be, which is, ideally, herself.

That's what I try to be for my Doms anyway and they're always happiest with me when I am my most authentic me, however that may express itself.

Perfectly put.

 

[subish2009]

Perfectly put.

Aw, thanks, Syd!