how does a vanilla girl turn kinky?

[Netzach]

Yes, you're probably right on this.

But the way I see it is that the odds are that there are a lot of people like me out there. I grew up in an environment that is fairly open and healthy regarding sexuality, I've lived in a big urban center for the last 6 years, there's always been a lot of queer people and other sexual outlaws around me, porn has always been of easy access to me, and still, BDSM appeared on my radar and tingled something in me only after 10 years of being sexually active.

So, I agree that converting a vanilla to be a perv is probably bound to fail. But I'm sure there's a lot of potential for pervs in many vanillas out there. That, and I also think that Dan Savage is right about the GGG stuff.

So yeah - you're right. Do I get you to slap me?

I'd rather slap you and agree than go on about biological determinism 101. To swing it back to our OP I think this kind of sexually experimental open ended stuff is probably a valid and a useful thing to think about rather than trying to doom it all with "well he probably needs power exchange" kind of thinking. This kind of thing can often be assimilated as good hot bedroom variation between people without one person always feeling like the onus is on them - it's really reasonable to keep a level 50/50 communicative and compromising attitude going if the relationship is really otherwise healthy.

 

[DeservingBitch]

My Domme friend told me long ago that the problem with sub men was never quantity, but quality. There might be as many sub guys out there as sub women. Maybe more. All I'm saying is there aren't a lot of Domme women out there. It's not hard at all for them to hang a shingle and go pro.

First off, it depends on where you hang out. In my world, there are quite a bit of queer Fdom. Not as many as fsubs, but I also see more gay msubs as gay Mdom.

Also, where do you take those numbers from? As a recent thread here illustrates, msubs are not exactly regarded with admiration in the het world. And everytime the topic of Fdom comes up, someone (usually a male het dom) feels the need to claim that Fdom is against nature. Me think that this may have something to do with why you don't hear a little bit more from msubs and Fdoms.

As for quantity vs. quality, my experience as someone who's in the market for both fsubs and msubs tells me that it is generalizable across the gender spectrum. There are many more 'subs' who are in the market to get their porn fantasy enacted by a walking fetish in heels than there are subs interested in submitting and serving. And there are many more do-me-bottoms than bottoms who give as much as they receive in a scene. It's not about being a man or a woman -- it's about being lazy and expecting the Top to be a prop in their fantasies.

 

[Netzach]

First off, it depends on where you hang out. In my world, there are quite a bit of queer Fdom. Not as many as fsubs, but I also see more gay msubs as gay Mdom.

Also, where do you take those numbers from? As a recent thread here illustrates, msubs are not exactly regarded with admiration in the het world. And everytime the topic of Fdom comes up, someone (usually a male het dom) feels the need to claim that Fdom is against nature. Me think that this may have something to do with why you don't hear a little bit more from msubs and Fdoms.

As for quantity vs. quality, my experience as someone who's in the market for both fsubs and msubs tells me that it is generalizable across the gender spectrum. There are many more 'subs' who are in the market to get their porn fantasy enacted by a walking fetish in heels than there are subs interested in submitting and serving. And there are many more do-me-bottoms than bottoms who give as much as they receive in a scene. It's not about being a man or a woman -- it's about being lazy and expecting the Top to be a prop in their fantasies.

My experience in Leather is the same. Very few gay male tops, they're kind of as elusive as FDoms in het fetish and hugely sought out, and very few exclusively Top women OR men - a lot of hierarchies. A ton of people who are Dominant to one submissive to one or more. More female tops than in the hetero scene.

 

[alexanna]

Female orgasm was pretty much a PATHOLOGY till about 1950something. And then it just didn't really exist.

My understanding is some Doctors used to give women orgasms as a treatment for hysteria. It was never called an orgasm. Wasn't that why vibrators were invented? Doctor's hands were getting tired?

From Wikipedia: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Female_hysteria

"Patients diagnosed with female hysteria would sometimes undergo "pelvic massage" — manual stimulation of the woman's genitals by the doctor to "hysterical paroxysm", which is now recognized as orgasm.[1]"

I think I might be hysterical.

 

[DeservingBitch]

I love me a hysterical girl.

 

[Netzach]

My understanding is some Doctors used to give women orgasms as a treatment for hysteria. It was never called an orgasm. Wasn't that why vibrators were invented? Doctor's hands were getting tired?

From Wikipedia: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Female_hysteria

"Patients diagnosed with female hysteria would sometimes undergo "pelvic massage" — manual stimulation of the woman's genitals by the doctor to "hysterical paroxysm", which is now recognized as orgasm.[1]"

I think I might be hysterical.

Indeed.

While this sounds kind of cool (insurance will cover it?) it's basically the pathologizing of the female body. Can you imagine if men were told don't stick your dick in anything, just have doc milk it for you? You're a little agitated today, Ralph, c'mere and let me jack it.

Although to be fair, the same Victorians really fucked boys up too. Horrible things done to men.

 

[midwestyankee]

I love me a hysterical girl.

I like them even better when I've finished treating them for the hysteria.

 

[Mistress-Flame]

I agree! I think either you have kink in you or you do not. It's not something you can wake up one day and say I'm kinky. Also I think how you were raised has alot to do with it

Kink can mean many things, do not limit yourself to the extreme part of BDSM such as crops, whips etc. You could start out by having him worship your feet and progress from there. Start out real slow until you find what you are comfortable with.

good luck to you both.

slave,

Yes for sure, my own started from my love of shoes and this then gently progressed through others worshiping me in my shoes to me, moving closer and closer to becoming a Mistress. I was asked to become a Mistress by one of my online admirers, and I did not know what it entailed. And in fact he trained me as well as me doing my own research on many many subjects, as I would have to study a subject at Uni. Now my repertoire and language grows by the day and things that I would not have considered at the beginnning of my journey are now firm favourites.

So what I am saying is given a taste of lots of different flavours of BDSM, until you find the ones that stimulate you the most ... !! Good Luck

Mistress Flame

 

[Mistress-Flame]

Female orgasm was pretty much a PATHOLOGY till about 1950something. And then it just didn't really exist.

Up until recently femail castration was a pre-requisite prior to marraige, which takes away one of the avenues for orgasm.

So ladies I think we have it pretty good in our "Western Society", we are very priviledged to be born here, we are also privledged to be able to have a say on who governs us. Women fought for that too and not too long ago either.

In my limited (very) experience on Lit, I am being bombarded by pms from young men wanted to be trained. But they have to be sifted from out of which 1/10 are probably going to make a decent slave or sub. The right attitude is what makes a slave or sub, I have never been a sub, so I am only speaking from my own experience. It takes someone very special to be a slave or sub and it takes someone else to pick up the gauntlet and lookafter that slave or sub as best they can. Being a Mistress is hard work, you have to be on your toes all the time and multi-task. Who better for that job than Women ... I love it .... !!

 

[smotherman]

Being a Mistress is hard work, you have to be on your toes all the time and multi-task. Who better for that job than Women ... I love it .... !!

Well said Mistress Flame.

However, I do think women should make an honest effort to be Female Doms and make their partner happy since most men are subs anyway.

 

[DeservingBitch]

Well said Mistress Flame.

However, I do think women should make an honest effort to be Female Doms and make their partner happy since most men are subs anyway.

Yes, of course. And those who don't are just selfish bitches for not catering to men's fantasies of submission.

 

[BiBunny]

Yes, of course. And those who don't are just selfish bitches for not catering to men's fantasies of submission.

*Snort*

And I'm going to re-iterate what Homburg says fairly often--most people, male or female, are submissive by nature. If they weren't, life would always have the problem of too many cowboys and not enough Indians, as it were. So what happens when, as happens pretty regularly, if you judge by the stuff that gets posted here, two submissive people get together? Are both partners jackasses for not going against their own desires for one another? Or is the real lesson here more like Know thyself before you jump into a marriage/long-term relationship?

/Soapbox on a subject that's dear to my heart

 

[smotherman]

Yes, of course. And those who don't are just selfish bitches for not catering to men's fantasies of submission.

Oh, just like Dom men catering to your selfish fantasies.

So many men refuse to make an effort to be Dom for their partner.

 

[Homburg]

Oh, just like Dom men catering to your selfish fantasies.

You, uh, realise that she's not a sub, right?

 

[ecstaticsub]

*Snort*

And I'm going to re-iterate what Homburg says fairly often--most people, male or female, are submissive by nature. If they weren't, life would always have the problem of too many cowboys and not enough Indians, as it were. So what happens when, as happens pretty regularly, if you judge by the stuff that gets posted here, two submissive people get together? Are both partners jackasses for not going against their own desires for one another? Or is the real lesson here more like Know thyself before you jump into a marriage/long-term relationship?

/Soapbox on a subject that's dear to my heart

A marriage of two submissive people is not a terrible thing. Both my husband and I tend to be submissive. Out of bed we make decisions together. If we disagree about something we work it out and eventually come to an agreement. In bed...who ever wants sex the most is the most aggressive. Being submissive we try to bring the other pleasure. Yes, it is vanilla...but not unkinky and not boring.

 

[FurryFury]

A marriage of two submissive people is not a terrible thing. Both my husband and I tend to be submissive. Out of bed we make decisions together. If we disagree about something we work it out and eventually come to an agreement. In bed...who ever wants sex the most is the most aggressive. Being submissive we try to bring the other pleasure. Yes, it is vanilla...but not unkinky and not boring.

Well said!

 

[Netzach]

Well said Mistress Flame.

However, I do think women should make an honest effort to be Female Doms and make their partner happy since most men are subs anyway.

It's about making ME happy. My world, he gets to live in it. I love that as a male sub you have a suggestion for what all women of the world SHOULD do, that's pretty awesome.

 

[BiBunny]

A marriage of two submissive people is not a terrible thing. Both my husband and I tend to be submissive. Out of bed we make decisions together. If we disagree about something we work it out and eventually come to an agreement. In bed...who ever wants sex the most is the most aggressive. Being submissive we try to bring the other pleasure. Yes, it is vanilla...but not unkinky and not boring.

I didn't mean that there was something inherently wrong with two submissive people being in a relationship. I was just attempting to drive that reasoning to its ridiculous conclusion. If a woman should be dominant to fulfill her man's submissive fantasies, and a man should be dominant to fulfill his woman's submissive fantasies, then whose fault is it if both parties are submissive? No one's, obviously, but there's no point in making generalizations like "Nobody wants to fulfill my fantasies, whine, whine, whine."

 

[lil_slave_rose]

your are right they are not alike. What he would like me to use and what I am confortable with are very different. We settled on the brush because I was comfortable with it and it gave him the sting he wanted. The ones he looks at on line kinda scare me. I am like you would really find that pleasurable????

*grins* speaking from the submissive side of this..YES! it's pleasurable LOL..but seriously back to your question. i am with furry i don't think you just 'turn' kinky. you either have it in you or you don't. and that is something you need to decide. there are lots of things online you can read, there are lots of books out there i'm sure someone will come along and throw them out there (if they haven't already, i've not read the whole thread yet) i'd say take it slow even before starting with a brush i would have used your hands. build it up over time, you don't have to jump into everything from the start.

as my wise Master says "the lifestyle is a journey not a sprint. There is no set destination, take your time and enjoy the trail." so, good luck to you!

 

[MasterPhoenix]

Wow, this thread has taken an interesting turn. psychosexualsociology of BDSM and gender roles there in. rose delivered my usual sage advice to the OP, and so I will dive into the interesting subplots that have developed over the course of this thread.

I think that deep down a lot of people have the desire for at least some kink either way, but are programmed from day one that to want things other than the missionary position is wrong. Hence the popularity of porn. It appeals to the base puritant desires that exist within most humans. I speak as someone who grew up in a fairly liberal section of the US. (SF bay area) The messages are all over that sex for pleasure is bad. Being out of the mainstream is bad. Desiring to cause or receive pain as part of sexual gratification are bad. Desiring to cede or take control of another person are bad. (Granted, there is a big counter weight to that message in the SF Area, but that general message is everywhere.) Being consistently hammered that those desires are bad, drives those desires deeper into the recesses of the subconscious. Myself, I had the deep seeded desires for Domination and Sadism but didn't know how to channel it, so it faded into near nonexistence until a chance encounter opened this world to me.

There are subtle elements of Ds in much of popular culture, and has been throughout the ages. Much of it in the Western world is male dominated. I am not talking about the overt references like any Nine Inch Nails CD or The Secretary, I am talking about the story of the princess waiting for her prince charming to carry her off on his white horse, or Rhett Butler scooping up Scarlett O'Hara to take her upstairs to take her. (the latter example could be close to date rape by today's standards, but I digress.)

Here is where I may get myself in some trouble here, but this is my view. I think that much of the desire for women to be submissive comes from a combination of generations of past social conditioning as well as biological factors. In fact, much of how Dominance and submission is practiced when you strip away the kink is what our parents and grandparents called marriage. The man is the king of the castle and his word rules. It wasn't until WWII when women started working outside the home for the first time that this paradigm even began to be challenged. The daughters of these WWII wives formed the backbone of the women's liberation movement which sought to turn the old paradigm on its head. It became the 'accepted' idea that both partners in the relationship had equal power. Fast forward to the late 80s early 90s and it became the norm for women to share in the breadwinning duty with their husbands as double income households became the standard and an economic necessity. I think that many fem subs are taking on that role because of an ingrown desire for the old order where being the wife meant "Love, honour, and obey." I am not saying that they want the 18th amendment repealed or necessarily the laws returned to the days when a wife was legally her husband's property, but they want that traditional role.

If it seems like I am completely in left field on this assertion, they why is it one of the stock plot in drug store romance novels that the strong man comes in and fixes things and they live happily ever after. Why is it that in these romance novels that its extremely rare that the strong woman is saving a weak man and they live happily ever after.

In fact, I recall a conversation a while back with a female friend and coworker, and she is NOT a lifestyle submissive, nor does she have an overly submissive personality but she was telling me about one of the guys who would always try to flirt with the girls in her work center. She told me that he was too wishy-washy and too much of a "modern man" and the world wasn't ready for him. Basically mocking him for not having at least some of a Dominant streak.

I can understand the desire for a male to want to submit. I don't have that desire, but I understand it. With all the pressures of work and life, I can see the desire to be able to surrender that control and let someone else run things. That can also be true of submissive women, in addition to my earlier assertion. It makes sense to me as a concept.

I definitely understand the desire for Dominance. That courses through my veins with a raging torrent of need. I believe that a lot of male Dominance, much like female submission comes from ties to the old days. My father, while to the best of my knowledge is not lifestyle, is someone I see definite submissive tendencies from. In fact, I have seen him walked on by my step mother quite a bit. I think that part of my Dominant desire comes from not wanting to be like that.

But again, I digress. I can understand a female having that need for control. I can see that it would be a less popular because it is swimming against most of the cultural norms.

In summation, I think that many more people fantasize about some kind of kink than will actually try it and find they get off on "something bizarre". I think that much of the surge in popularity of Mf Dominance and submission is a reaction to the wholesale change in family structure over the last half century.

 

[BiBunny]

I'm still going with the theory that most people--male and female--are basically submissive (the adjective) in most situations. Also, people mistake self-confidence for dominance, which is certainly an erroneous belief. Sure, most women don't want little pussy-ass men they can walk all over, but most men don't want a timid doormat, either. Self-confidence--not to be confused with dominance--is usually equally attractive to all sexes and orientations.

 

[DeservingBitch]

Oh, just like Dom men catering to your selfish fantasies.

Leaving aside the fact that Mdoms are at the bottom of the hierarchy in terms of who I'd be looking for to cater to my fantasies, you seem to be missing a crucial point here.

Which is that Fdoms aren't there to cater to msubs needs and fantasies but to get their own needs, wants, and desires catered to. Shocking I know.

 

[DeservingBitch]

It wasn't until WWII when women started working outside the home for the first time that this paradigm even began to be challenged. The daughters of these WWII wives formed the backbone of the women's liberation movement which sought to turn the old paradigm on its head. It became the 'accepted' idea that both partners in the relationship had equal power. Fast forward to the late 80s early 90s and it became the norm for women to share in the breadwinning duty with their husbands as double income households became the standard and an economic necessity. I think that many fem subs are taking on that role because of an ingrown desire for the old order where being the wife meant "Love, honour, and obey." I am not saying that they want the 18th amendment repealed or necessarily the laws returned to the days when a wife was legally her husband's property, but they want that traditional role.

What you are talking about is generally true for the white middle/upper-middle class, but it ends there. Women of color have always been working outside of the home, as slave, domestic workers, nannies, factory workers, field workers, prostitutes, etc. Poor women have also always been working outside the house. Non-married women have been working as well.

And while it is certainly true that western society has for the longest time recognized men as the only and sole authority in the private sphere and gave men more power and privilege accordingly (in terms of land title, property, marriage and divorce laws, inheritance laws, access to credit, etc.), this shouldn't be taken to mean that women were passive and submissive subject to male authority in the day to day reality of domestic/private life. Women certainly didn't have (and still don't have) the structural power and control over their life that men did - but to suggest that this made most women actually submissive to their husband in the running of the household is a misreading of history. This reading becomes even more problematic when you look outside of the white middle class/bourgois population.

 

[DeservingBitch]

If it seems like I am completely in left field on this assertion, they why is it one of the stock plot in drug store romance novels that the strong man comes in and fixes things and they live happily ever after. Why is it that in these romance novels that its extremely rare that the strong woman is saving a weak man and they live happily ever after.

'Cause pop culture is one of the main site where the status quo is being reproduced, legitimized, and valorized.

I also don't see a lot of drug store romance novels involving dykes or gay men. And I don't think it's a coincidence either that the characters in those novels are all white, thin, tall, beautiful, rich (well, the men are at least), etc. And I'm still waiting for one of those novels to describe sex that involves something else than penis-in-vagina.

I don't know about you, but I don't really take drug store romance novels as the best and most representative illustration of people's fantasies and desires. Porn does a much better job at it. And I see quite a bit of Fdom/msub porn out there.

 

[Netzach]

'Cause pop culture is one of the main site where the status quo is being reproduced, legitimized, and valorized.

I also don't see a lot of drug store romance novels involving dykes or gay men. And I don't think it's a coincidence either that the characters in those novels are all white, thin, tall, beautiful, rich (well, the men are at least), etc. And I'm still waiting for one of those novels to describe sex that involves something else than penis-in-vagina.

I don't know about you, but I don't really take drug store romance novels as the best and most representative illustration of people's fantasies and desires. Porn does a much better job at it. And I see quite a bit of Fdom/msub porn out there.

Oh I read a great analysis of these that I'm sticking to.

A lot of the appeal has to do with that swept away happy ever after part of the narrative, right? When do people REALLY have someone else to solve their problems for 'em--- when Mom does.

I read a brilliant analysis of the Romance genre which I had minimal patience with because I don't care for the genre much in the first place, but the author had some really compelling evidence that the hero in fairly conventional romance, down to the improbable pecs all over the cover - is basically Mom in drag. The resistance, melting into acceptance of her wisdom and her ways, the fact that even when identities are mistaken and you are spitting in her face Mommy never gives up on you. It's a great escape, really. Who doesn't want their Mommy in times of trouble, no matter how crap ass a Mommy you had in real life and then even more - better yet if she's virile and dashing, but that's just putting an erotic package on a very real, human, escapist flight.

A lot of men read espionage novels as escape too, I don't think it means they really ought to go work on listening posts, or want to be shot at.

I do take my lifetime disinterest in Happy Ever After narrative and Gone With the Wind style triangles (pussy but apropos suitor thrown over for asshole suitor) as evidence of my wiring. Fortunately I had other things to read. The Velveteen Rabbit and Charlotte's Web worked for me, because I didn't think the Fairy Tale princes worked hard enough for it, in retrospect. Wuthering Heights was cool because Heathcliff is psychotic and tormented enough to be interesting to a young sadist. I wanted not to civilize him, but to wander off onto the moors with him and terrorize animals together.


Also MP, you're failing to imagine what a hetero FDom romance would look like. A strong woman would save a strong man. A strong woman would be in charge of a whole bunch of strong men and one would emerge as more desireable and better than the others. A man would bleed his fingers to the bone to be with the heroine and get to. Those are all narratives which pop in from time to time in our imagination too, probably left over from the high middle ages and myth. The narrative leaves off when he "wins" her, not when he's pounded her into drudgery and browbeaten her unless you are Shakespeare.

Not "a strong woman would rescue and protect a weak man" because it's not just a reversal of status quo to be a hetero FDom (or one who likes penised toys among others)
I'm not THAT much of "a middle finger to 2000 years of culture" that I find a little helplessness appealing without a little femininity to sweeten it up in my meat. It's not what I find appealing about a submissive who still flags masculine - then it's not about helplessness but usefulness. I'm still part of this culture, my desires aren't totally off the map to the point where I want the most pussy-ass-milquetost wuss I can find for my partner (Jesus!)

I think people are interested in sexual submission at all time highs now because of capitalism fatigue sometimes. Not all the time, but sometimes - for men AND women who find submission "a simplification" and "a relaxing escape."

I think the appeal is stronger for women because we're generally more capitalistically fatigued because we're still expected to do most of the house/kid crap on top of the other crap. For the men who go there, there's usually a really psycho job stressor, a job the necessitates more "on" time than a lot of other jobs. So I don't think it's about longing for the old order out of biology, but out of the perception of benefit built into it for women or the same kind of benefit for submissive men.

Not every sub feels that way about their submission though.