I ache for the touch of your lips, dear,
But much more for the touch of your whips, dear.
You can raise welts
Like nobody else,
As we dance to the masochism tango. – Tom Lehrer, “The Masochism Tango”
Yesterday we talked about male-dominant BDSM, which as I pointed out is much more common than its opposite; I would think it’s a fairly rare couple in which the husband has never held his wife down, spanked her or otherwise manhandled her during sex. Female sexual biology responds to strong, virile, competent men, so the typical woman is turned off by submission or perceived weakness in men. The result is that, as with every other type of sex, there aren’t enough women who are willing to give it away to take care of all the men who want it, and many if not most heterosexual male submissives must therefore pay for their needs to be taken care of.
A prostitute who specializes in female-dominant BDSM is called a dominatrix (also domme or femdom); the majority of them do not offer any other kind of sex, and indeed most of them do not consider themselves whores and may even be insulted if included in our number. To them I say, “Tough titties, sisters!” BDSM is a form of sexual activity; a woman who provides sex for pay is a prostitute; you provide BDSM for pay; therefore you provide sex for pay, therefore you are a prostitute. Q.E.D. You can call what you do “therapy” or “psychodrama” or whatever else you want, but it’s still sex. What I provided was a form of therapy as well, but I’m still a hooker and so are you. There are professional (male) dominants as well, but as with male prostitutes they make most of their income catering to male clients (though a few do manage to make a living training female slaves for their husbands or lovers).
For the most part men who seek to be dominated go to dominatrices, but a certain percentage seem to prefer getting it from generalists. It’s not that escorts are cheaper, because in my experience the fees are comparable and indeed when I had my agency the dommes were charging a little bit less than we did. It isn’t that they can’t find a specialist; New Orleans had several and yet we still got requests for it. And it isn’t that those who provide both allow mixed sessions; the whore who will allow a man inside her after she has dominated him is a rare thing indeed, as I mentioned in my column of August 16th. I suspect some of them were travelers without computers who were forced to rely on the phone book; others may have wanted it at the spur of the moment, and dommes usually don’t offer appointments on such short notice. Also, most dominatrices prefer to stick to their own “dungeons”, so a man who prefers to be dominated at home may not be able to find one who will fulfill that request. Perhaps some of them are afraid of specialists, and others have been turned down by them for one reason or another, but I’m willing to bet that the most common reason is that (like so many people) they think of whores as “dirty” and debased and therefore find the idea of being dominated by such a lowly creature even more exciting than submitting to a haughty dominatrix!
As the perceptive reader will already have ascertained, I don’t like doing domination. I was what is called a GFE type escort, which means I provided a Girl Friend Experience; I would talk, listen, cuddle, honor most sexual requests and generally give a natural, comfortable sexual session for men who wanted and appreciated such things. And though many men wanted other kinds of sexual experiences that I was also able to provide, I found it too difficult to “switch gears” between being a soft, sweet little sex kitten for one client to becoming a bitch goddess for the next and then back to sex kitten again for a third, all in the space of a single evening. Even a chameleon needs some time to change colors! So, although I would cater to “fetish” calls and light domination, I was more likely to do so in the afternoon or on a slow night when I knew I would have time to recover my energies and readjust my psychic frame of reference before visiting another client. On busy evenings I usually tried to get out of such calls or even turned them down flat, and there were some I simply could not (such as those requiring extensive equipment) or would not (such as the ones who wanted me to use a dildo on them) cater to under any circumstances. And if a man sprang such a request on me after a call was already in progress, I always categorically refused it.
Even when I did perform domination calls, I’m afraid I wasn’t very good at them; I didn’t have a mental script prepared as dominatrices do, and therefore felt at a loss to fill the time in a way which would satisfy the client. I always hated being called “mistress” by a man as I find it creepy, so I demanded they use “my lady” instead because that felt like a natural and proper form of address from a social inferior to a noblewoman. I also strongly suspect that my disgust at seeing a male grovel tended to inspire a bit more unconscious cruelty on my part than was strictly necessary; I’m not sure most of these men wanted to be beaten quite as hard with their belts as I generally ended up beating them. Once I actually triggered a “freakout” in such a client; he became terrified and scrambled to a corner, forgetting his safe word in the process. Fortunately I realized his reaction was genuine and got things back under control, but even so I felt angry at myself for pushing the poor fellow beyond his boundary!
As I mentioned yesterday, there are many different kinks under the wide umbrella we call BDSM, and the stereotyped mistress/slave, spanking and bootlicking session is only one of them. I’ve already discussed the infantilist we called “Diaper Man” in my column of August 12th, and I’ll reserve one broad type for tomorrow’s column because it certainly deserves one of its own, but today I want to describe one of the most unusual regulars we ever had. I say “we” because he was a service regular rather than mine; there was no way I could have provided what he was looking for. He started out, in fact, as Grace’s regular, the only one she ever had with our service. Grace was an escort in late 1980s Atlanta and because of her height specialized in domination and fetish calls, but like many women of American Indian blood had not aged well and had grown a bit thick. Though she was only in her early forties she was no longer interested in escorting, so I was rather surprised when Doug called one day and said he had a call for her!
The client, he said, wanted a woman to wrestle with, and though he was a slender man he still needed a woman large and strong enough to legitimately beat him; apparently it was only exciting to him if his partner won fair and square! Grace is 5’10” tall (178 centimeters) and at the time weighed about 180# (82kg); the client was not much shorter, but was easily forty pounds lighter. Since a man is a man I was unwilling to risk that situation without supervision; their first few sessions were therefore incalls, with me in attendance nearby. Grace later told me that he wasn’t easy to beat, but had poor leverage so she was able to use her weight to pin him.
After that, he called about once a month, but grew ever more tiresome; first he wanted calls early on Saturday morning (when we most needed our sleep to prepare for the longest night of the week), then he started quibbling about the price, and then he decided he didn’t like me there and so wanted Grace to meet him at a cheap, nasty little hotel. When she got back and told me he had subtracted the cost of the room from her already-low ($200) fee, I declared we would no longer accept his business, and told him so the next time he called. But there weren’t many women who could give him what he wanted, so he eventually started calling us again and I offered him to Jeanette (the kickboxer), warning her of his bad traits in the process. She accepted the call and he saw her for a while, but I think she must have defeated him a little too easily because he eventually stopped calling!
I don’t think this client’s sexuality was all that different from that of the ones who need to be dominated by a mistress; he just wanted to be dominated more literally and physically than most. But the clients we’ll discuss tomorrow are quite another matter entirely, and I warn you in advance that you may find it a bit difficult to read.
Some men like to be hit in the nuts. It turns them on. I’ve been hit in the nuts. It didn’t turn me on.
Of course, it wasn’t a woman and it wasn’t a sex thing. It was another guy and he just wanted to win. But it is one thing I’ve never asked a woman for. The men who like taking it in the nuts are free to do so, as far as I’m concerned.
I would think it’s a fairly rare couple in which the husband has never held his wife down, spanked her or otherwise manhandled her during sex.
Well, I have never done this to my wife; I’ve asked her, and she’s never had any interest in submission or masochism in any form. And even though a number of my former girlfriends were into submission (at least as far as spanking), they were not the majority: more than half said ‘thanks, but no, thanks.’ (It’s only my personal experience, though, I hasten to add.)
I’m not sure about the numbers of BDSM kinks in men; do you have any numbers? I remember having done a quick count of BDSM-Femdom sites (which cater to submissive men) against BDSM-Maledom sites (which cater to dominant men); as I recall, the former were more numerous. Also, considering by the frequent appearances of ‘the dominant woman’ in the mainstream media (many a female supervillain uniform makes her look like a dominatrix; a number of scenes in action movies with female lead characters seem to come directly out of a dominatrix’ dungeon; and a number of scenes involving prostitutes in movies I’ve watched suggest exactly Femdom). I wonder if this particular fetish doesn’t titillate more men than one might at first imagine…
Of course the femdom sites are more numerous! Male domination is accepted by our culture, so most sexually dominant men feel no need to make up sites about it! And there’s plenty of male-dominant porn material on general porn sites. You are completely ignoring the fact that low-level male-dominant imagery is culturally innocuous, while any female-dominant imagery stands out like a coal pile in a ballroom.
A good point, Maggie. I hadn’t thought about that.
Still, the fact is that femdom imagery is coming up more and more frequently — and I don’t think this is just feminism in action, but also popular demand. There may be a bigger market for it that meets the eye. And that also does mean something about men… and women.
No, it just means that A) men who go that way are more comfortable admitting it, and B) cultural emasculation is having its effects.
In a certain sense, standard missionary is a man holding her down, with his weight if nothing else. Add holding her legs up, pulling her hips backward into me in rear entry, etc. and I think I see what you mean, Maggie; although my relationship with my wife has never been really BDSM, I am certainly the dominant one and sometimes physically “arrange” her, I guess I’d put it, to suit us both.
Oh look, a very old post. Quick! I must comment on it to add to the months-dead conversation!
I doubt it’s cultural emasculation (or is that effemination? I love how those two antonyms are used to describe lack of masculinity in men but there’s nothing to describe lack of femininity in women).
I’m a switch (albeit a relatively inexperienced) and I find that topping and bottoming have feminine and masculine aspects, if you consider strong empathy and selflessness to be feminine, and selfishness to be masculine.
The most selfish thing you can do in the BDSM community is be a skilled masochist – the kind that is able to reach a real endorphin high and “fly”, and letting your sadist worry about your needs and well-being while you hog all the painkilling pleasure.
Even submission has to be inherent both selfish and selfless, give and take just as domination has to be (if you want your partner to like you and play with you again, that is). Both have things that interest them and negotiate to have their needs met. Subs would not see doms to do things they hate or feel indifferent about (unless they get paid), or else what would be the point? They get “forced” to do things they want to do. Doms, unless they’re seeing pro subs, won’t always be able to do things only they like to do either.
Sadism itself is a selfess, altruistic act in many ways as you don’t get as much pleasure, you need strong empathy or you’ll get bored eventually, and you have to be responsible for your bottom’s well-being. You also need to acquire a great deal of technical skill so there’s a learning curve of sorts in addition to all that.
You can also be a submissive and have a real dominant personality – the whole “natural submissive/dominant” thing is an annoying myth, possibly perpetuated by newbies who read too much BDSM fiction, subs with low self-esteem and tops who are natural assholes. How many people can really neatly fit into those categories for most of their lives?
I believe professionals are more likely to believe this because they might only see one side of their clients and of how weird male submissive clients can be compared to lifestyle/non-pro BDSM’ers (I’ve heard numerous people say this – paying subs tend to all have around the same types of kink, they’re selfish when they see a lifestyle domme and don’t understand they need to offer something in return, they have a hard time distinguishing fantasy from reality)
Also, the same act can mean different things for different people…
If a man takes sexuality seriously and educates himself, learns some good cunnilingus technique and learns enough about the underlying principles behind sex for pleasure that he is able to receive honest feedback on his munching skills because he genuinely wants to make women come as hard or as many times as possible, just for the fun of it, does that make him submissive? more feminine? emasculated? He is serving, he is being stereotypically feminine by being selfless. Some people would seriously consider this kind of guy to be a submissive. Then again there’s something quite powerful about being able to make someone pant, scream and turn to mush.
What if he expects a good blowjob (perhaps with some prostate stimulation for a more intense orgasm) in return? Does that make him dominant for suddenly only caring about his pleasure? Or maybe he’s emasculated from a cultural standpoint since straight men aren’t supposed to use the backdoor, ever, regardless of pleasure potential? Then again there’s something quite vulnerable in losing yourself in an orgasm.
What if a guy wants to play submissive just to blow off steam, shut down his brain and let someone else take care of things for a change?
The degree of intensity also affects how we both view this issue. A male sub who always wants to act that way is different than one who roleplays it occasionally, and there are different levels of submission; from SAM to sub to slave. If you only deal with 24/7 types of slaves you’ll obviously have a different perspective. As you can see by my lack of unnecessary capitalizations I don’t take these rles quite as seriously as others do.
“would not (such as the ones who wanted me to use a dildo on them) cater to under any circumstances.”
May I ask why, or have you answered this in another post? Mostly I’m wondering if this is a personal distaste of yours, or if it’s a liability thing, from a professional perspective?
Severe personal distaste. I understand some guys like that and some women like doing it, and I respect their preferences; I just don’t want to watch or participate. Just like I think it’s fine if other people eat spinach, but I find it revolting in the extreme.
Interesting discussion. Personally I would never have sex outside of marriage, but eventually I asked my wife to spank me. I tried to culture her into receiving also but had to admit she was never going to naturally enjoy it. I don’t think a man is necessarily a submissive because they find that being spanked is erotic. I can’t explain the attraction but know that I am not a submissive and that my wife never dominates. She is comfortable with it but I would never let her dominate me. I tend to be the dominate one and take the lead in our marriage.