Well, she finally did it. The blog, the book, the money making scheme. I don’t want to link directly and give her more visits, so here’s a link to Thumper’s rewiev of sorts.
I just don’t care for it. I can’t take a person seriously if they are doing it for the money. I never did anything solely for money. I write – because I have to. It really doesn’t pay that well, sometimes not even enought to go by, but it is what it is. Sharing with the world.
There are things I deem too important to be left unsaid. This blog is for one of them. To liberate, to educate, to open eyes yet unopened, and to share with people who already know. Who have learned the hard way, the psychologically disturbing way, the lonely way. I only write about the things that won’t stay quiet. Things that are still wrong, silenced, beaten down, shamed, stigmatized, marginalized.
The older I grow the more I want to educate. I want to teach about sharing, being emotional and open about it, learning to think for yourself. I wish I had a teacher like me when I was in school. Someone who’d embraced variety, marginals, darkness.
That’s why I won’t have it. You have no right. These things are not yours. I will not stand for yet another shaming, another scheme, another humbling of the already belittled. We deserve love and devotion, actual thoughts and dreams shared. It’s just another puppet pro domme in disguise.
Past the Hurt 
Pingback: I Am Loud « Past the Hurt
I found out about “male chastity lifestyle” via this post. You may be interested in my angry take on this practice calling itself “chastity”.
http://abstinentsexblog.blogspot.com/2010/08/you-dont-get-to-redefine-my-virtues.html
Thanks, Mousie! I never thought about the words used to describe it. I wrote chastity play when I last wrote about it In Thumper’s residence. I wrote earlier here about dabbling with some sort of orgasm denial, and without any implements of bondage, that’s what it is. But I do think “enforced chastity” is a somewhat applicaple term, don’t you? It’s not like words don’t change when something new comes along.
I do think the way used to and supposed to get women interested in this particular kink, in which we aren’t expected to be interested, is kind of the other end of the “porn for women” book’s stereotypical depiction of women. To everyone who doesn’t yet know, the book consisted of pictures of men doing house chores. It’s all very undermining and I guess the hushed tones suggest that women just aren’t game if there’s no gain in it for them. Other than pleasure or pleasuring the other. I do appreciate how Thumper writes about his kink(s) and the enforced chastity play they use as a form of bondage, and I don’t see it as a bad thing at all. Thumper’s changed that with his down to earth writing and honest self doubting put on display. I strongly recommend his blog, especially the beginning.
I do see it, as any kink really, as a two way street, but I think, yeah, that most of the people talking about it in the blogosphere, and all the people trying to profit from it, have taken a twist for the worst. I’d like to be included when the call out is for sexual pleasure, communication and taking SO (and their kinks) into consideration without insinuations of any further motives. Love and pleasure are motives enough for me. I also frown upon sweeping generalisations about gender and sexuality (especially but not exclusively).
And here’s my take on Porn for Women. (This has been going all around the sex positive blogosphere for some time, but it never gets old.)
And to add, what Thumper and Tom are depicting in their blogs – and their lives – seems to be very egalitarian. Just like my own relationship with Wonderboy. Even though we enjoy to play with power exchange or whatever you want to call it, and have tried different methods for it in regards to our bodies and their working together, it is all done out of mutual agreement, respect and love. That’s what I hear Thumper and Tom say, too. They’re equal and that’s why they’re not afraid to play with denial and submission and whatnot.
Is it only the word that bothers you or is it the whole concept?
Some people just kink on being bound and that’s what enforced chastity gives you. It’s not about virtue for being chaste, it’s about… um… well, I dont’ dare to say – beware of the generalisations! I guess it’s more about the play itself. But I am surely no expert.
Well, now I’ve seen two different presentations of the concept. One being Sarah’s, the other Thumper’s.
Sarah’s presentation bothers me exceedingly; the concept, not just the word. I can’t imagine Sarah’s version being attractive to Thumper’s Belle Fille. It is predatory, selfish, and contemptuous; it is not so much a kink as a way to use a kink for manipulation of your partner.
In general, Thumper’s doesn’t bother me, it’s merely a kink that’s unappealing to me personally. Reading just a bit from the beginning, I see many ways in which similar attitudes in he and I produced different kinks. In Thumper’s case his orgasm denial kink is connected to actual chastity; he is influenced by previous unchastity.
There is one thing about Thumper’s version that does bother me. He says he wants “her sexual pleasure and satisfaction to always be before mine”. That bothers me because it’s an attitude that I am now trying to get over; I am trying to teach myself that my pleasure and my partner’s are of equal value. A severe form of the her-first attitude created problems for me, which is one of the first things I wrote about when I started my blog. (Please excuse me for linking myself again, but it’s pretty apropos.)
http://abstinentsexblog.blogspot.com/2010/08/giving-and-mutuality.html
Yep. And the way I see it, is that if it was really meant for the women, which it obviously isn’t because who would these predatory, selfish and contemptuous women be, the tone of voice should perhaps be a little more sincere. Patronizing, anyone? It’s a fantasy rolled into a DIY saran wrap. Because, the fantasy is – for some of the well informed but skewed submissive crowd out there wanking – that women really are like that, at least some of them. It’s better to be subjugated with contempt and for financial gain than not at all. But it’s not an acceptable point of view in my mind. It’s what you say it is, Mousie – enforcing bad behaviour in the coat of something else.
I guess Thumper’s (and I do feel weird about talking about him in here like this) take on Belle Fille’s pleasure always coming first has been affected by previously taking his own needs into concideration before anyone else’s. And it goes with the kink of submission, too. I think it’s what you make of it, more or less. For you, it might sound intimidating because maybe you’ve done it to such an extent that you don’t really know what you want anymore. What’s you. (Just a quick browse in your blog, so I might be completely of base here.) And that’s the main purpose for this here Past the hurt, too. To figure out what I am made of.
And all this doesn’t even consider women as the submissice and chastised. Because men, they are the bad bunch, always cheating and never doing any chores or – ugh – helping. (Cleaning up for yourself or taking care of your children – somehow still not considered an adult responsibility.)
Yes, I started my blog for the same purpose. To explore what’s me, outside of my largely unconscious and often misguided and counterproductive reshaping of my sexual self for my separated wife. It’s helping, I hope yours is helping you too.
Yours is helping me see it’s acceptable for me, a man, to be a switch. Helping me see that I don’t have to suppress my dominant side, that I can be dominant sometimes and it doesn’t automatically make me mean or contemptuous.
Really? I’m happy if I am helping you with your dominant side but not sure how. Is it because I want to be submissive and dominated by Wonderboy, and don’t feel there’s anything really repressing in the mix, either?
**
Yes, this has been extremely helpful, and continues to be. I need to shape my thought by bringing them into words. I’ve been lost so long. I rarely write anything I haven’t “known”, but when I write it – in real writing, in letters, which stay here for others to read and understand, and shape their image of me by – I have to face it. It shapes me. It changes me. I become me through the act of writing. And through the act of revealing myself to someone. It’s not a secret anymore. It’s not just a fantasy I soon erase after I’ve come.
It’s real.
That’s what’s changed.
I have to add that I don’t see the act of being playful with submission as a way to reconcile past bad behaviour, though. More like, the bad behaviour had stemmed from being unappreciated and unfulfilled regarding those exact needs (by no one’s fault, really, just society’s I guess).
Is it because I want to be submissive and dominated by Wonderboy, and don’t feel there’s anything really repressing in the mix, either?
It is that. To try to keep it short: as you know, being dominant as a male has a stigma attached. My now-separated wife didn’t like to talk about sex, so I didn’t get the extensive positive reinforcement that my partner is emotionally and intellectually OK with the domination that I need to overcome that stigma; just consent and positive physical reaction is insufficient for me. For that, and for other reasons, I suppressed that part of myself and felt ashamed of it.
Reading the thoughts of responsible, aware women who enjoy being dominated by men as part of a loving relationship frees me to feel that with the right woman, under the right circumstances (which need extra care and consideration), it is a fine thing to do, the right thing to do.
I am really sad that you didn’t talk about it while you were married. But then again, some people don’t have the strength (yet?) to face different kinds of needs, even in themselves. I think loads of people go through life succeeding and failing in sex accidently. Those are probably the same people who end up cheating, when the first thrill wanes and they have no tools to make it as good as it was. I always feel a little frustrated when I hear people have not discussed the important stuff. It’s impossible to just know what the other one wants and then deliver. I guess your case proves it as well as mine.
I am exceedingly happy if my blog can be of any help to you. I can truly relate to being ashamed and repressing that side, because the response from the society was too much to handle. I’m at the other end of the rope, though, and feel that as a dominant man (even as a part-time dominant) it must be such a taboo to overcome. I’d wager it impossible to write about rape fantasies and ever, ever get a date again, if you’re a man.
Even though women as a class have been, and are, oppressed in our society(ies), my submitting is not really what they were asking for. I carry a stigma of being mentally unbalanced for claiming to want these things, and radical feminists even state that I don’t get a say in the matter, because of my perceived unbalancedness. So, either way, I cannot choose this. Only the dominating (man) can, and so they are to blame. This way of thinking completely overrides my basic human rights. Only because I like some intense sensations and playing in a way I think most kids are – somehow representing the power imbalances of the world in a way that’s culturally moderated.
You (mandoms) are only seen as basic evil bastards, I’m seen as a lunatic. It’s not pretty for either of us.
Just a note, I’m a switch; I like both dominant and submissive play. I felt ashamed of the dominant side because of all the reasons you listed, and gradually focused only on the submissive.
Reading about the stigma of being a submissive woman has been fascinating; I could infer there would be a stigma, but not all the consequences and emotional effects.
Oh, I knew you were a switch. I read your blog some while I was idle. That’s why I put in the “part-time dom” thing. That probably made things easier for you. You had a place to escape to. On the other side of the fence, no less.
And now I re-read the comments and realized that you mentioned being a switch there too. 🙂
Pingback: Money or Emotional Honesty « Past the Hurt