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well, i surely don't know as much about protocol as most of you seem to....but to me, it is a dumbass punishment.  most recently my punishment has been two weeks away from Master.    this is day three.  it hurts the most on day one, but by day three, i am feeling....as i am sure he intends, slighted, abandoned a bit, but also in my case, absence does not make the heart grow fonder.  i merely get colder.   it's sad.  perhaps these punishments and subsequent reunions work on the very young.  but now, they just seem stupid.  sorry if i offend anyone.  just the ramblings of an old sub who never did grow up.

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People put a lot of symbolism into things.  I've said it before that I'd like to see what would happen if slaves were ordered not to adorn ANY symbol of their relationship for a week.  I think too often the essence gets put into the symbol, rather than the symbol simply being a symbol.

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ORIGINAL: Evanesce

I rarely wear any symbol of my relationship.  However, the removal of a collar, to me, isn't a physical act, because I almost never wear an actual collar, but a spiritual one.  The meaning of the collar, to us, is such that were He to remove the collar, it means nothing short of an end to the relationship.

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1. I keep hearing the phrase "my collar" being used by slaves/submissives. Doesn't the collar belong to the Master and shouldn't he be "allowed" to do whatever he wishes with it?

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2.  I keep hearing about how a collar is similiar to a wedding band.  How can you possibly compare the two? 

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ORIGINAL: MrThorns

2.  I keep hearing about how a collar is similiar to a wedding band.  How can you possibly compare the two?  The collar, to many people, indicates that they have entered into service/slavery with the collar's owner.  The wedding ring is more symbolic of an egalitarian relationship.  Did you (speaking to dom and sub alike) enter into your D/s relationships to have rights, authority and privledges equal with your Master or slave?  I'm guessing not.

quote:

ORIGINAL: MrThorns

I've been watching this post with a great deal of interest.  Some of the common points that have been made throughout this thread has got me thinking...

1. I keep hearing the phrase "my collar" being used by slaves/submissives. Doesn't the collar belong to the Master and shouldn't he be "allowed" to do whatever he wishes with it? (No offense to the FemDom crowd...I just tend to write in the masculine.)

Everything belongs to the Master.  Sometimes i say "my" as a matter of ease of reference.  Just like i say i'm washing "my" hair, when really every part of me is his, or wearing "my" new shoes...or "my" ass is bruised.  They are all his.  However he also refers to it as "my" collar...."I have your collar slut. It will remain on you always, unless for medical purposes, cleaning purposes, or I release you."  There is no "allow" or "disallow" with him, but it was an understanding he gave me at the time he clasped it on me.

2.  I keep hearing about how a collar is similiar to a wedding band.  How can you possibly compare the two?  The collar, to many people, indicates that they have entered into service/slavery with the collar's owner.  The wedding ring is more symbolic of an egalitarian relationship.  Did you (speaking to dom and sub alike) enter into your D/s relationships to have rights, authority and privledges equal with your Master or slave?  I'm guessing not.

Master and i do not equate marriage with slavery.  In our eyes, a wife has a role, and a slave has a role.  It is my job, duty, privilege and honor to serve him and be used by him.  His wife has different privileges.  i believe people use the comparison of collar to ring because they equate the importance of each, to their respective roles; ring to wife, collar to slave.


3.  "The removal of the collar is the end of the relationship."  Personally, I refuse to allow an object have that much power over my relationships.  A collar, even though it symbolizes many things, is still an inanimate object.  The relationship itself should be more important that any symbol, don't you think?

i can't speak to this, as i have not said that.  i said it would break my heart, however, and i stated why in a previous thread.  It is a privilege to wear.  It it where my hand falls when i insecure or afraid or under stress.  It calms me to meditate on him like this.

4. "Removing a collar as a punishment is cruel, mean and undermines trust...."  Is it mean and cruel?  No more or no less cruel than any other punishment could be, I imagine.  It really depends on how it's done and the desired effect upon the slave.  I think it would be inappropriate to yank a collar off of a girl and throw it across the room because she burned dinner.  Where is the lesson in that? 

Master prefers me to be in need of him and to cling to him.  He prefers me as emotionally close as possible. It satisfies him and eases him to know he has a girl such as that.  We both worked hard to accomplish this goal.  i told him once, when i had erred, that i don't know why he didn't just isolate me for a week, as i did not deserve his attentions.  He said he didn't know what purpose it would serve to remove from me that which he preferred me clinging to.  He felt there were other ways of punishing and disciplining that would not make me feel part of him was stripped of me.  He knows how i meditate on him with my hand on the collar like rosary beads, and he enjoys knowing that (in fact at the recent memorial service for my uncle, a rosary was said.  Everyone had rosary beads, and i fiddled with the collar.)  He prefers when i have screwed up that i reflect on my collar and what it signifies.  He prefers that i am reminded of my servitude to him, and who and what i am.  Knowing a single touch to the collar does that to me, he sees no reason to remove it.
 
Because of what the collar represents to me, he chooses to not be reckless with it.  Would a parent remove an infant's pacifier to keep it from crying?

Does it undermine trust?  Not if the Master is doing exactly what he said he would do. 

Exactly.  And the one who owns me has said he will never remove it unless i am released. He knows when i was groveling on the floor, in tears and begging for it, it was not the piece of metal i was begging for, but what it represented.  He made me work very hard to receive it; He would not yank it off easily.

That's a real trust builder, isn't it?   I trust that my slave will obey, she trusts that I will punish her if she disobeys.

Indeed.  Different Master's have different ways of punishing.  Hopefully a Master knows his slave well enough to know precisely what is effective and what is not, for the purpose he is trying to attain.

I think there should always be a purpose and a desired goal for punishment/discipline. (I'm not going to argue about definitions of punishment vs discipline right now...)  I also think it is good for there to be symbols within relationships.  Symbols, for some reason seem to be more tangible...more real.  We can hold them in our hands, see them with our own eyes... but it's the relationship that is the important thing. 

Symbols are important pieces of most everyone's lives.  A headstone at the cemetary symbolizes someone's passing life.  Religious symbols have special meaning for those of certain spirituality.  Various symbols hold different meanings for different people.  While we should not stake everything on those symbols in our lives, for some of us - going without those symbols that touch us deeply - can be horribly painful.

I think this has been an excellent thread and I look forward to hearing more.

Great questions! 

~Thorns

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ORIGINAL: johnxinxscruz

Since when is marriage an inherently egalitarian relationship? Consider that as little as 100 years ago there were dictionaries where a "wife" was defined as "property" (Jay Leno likes to make that joke, he has a copy of one such dictionary). Do the victorian household and 50's household groups somehow rank less on the M/s scale because they emulate the marriage environments of those times? Becuase that's the meaning I take from your statement. They emulate a time when the typical marriage was more like a D/s relationship ... thus pointing to the comparison.

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I have yet to hear of description for what the collar means (when it's not just a collar worn for play) that does NOT have very strong parallels to what a wedding ring means to most married couples I've spoken to.

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It was one of the first things that struck me when talking to someone about their collar. The language she used to describe her collar was _exactly_ the same as the language my wife and I had used in describing our wedding rings.

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ORIGINAL: MrThorns

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ORIGINAL: johnxinxscruz

I have yet to hear of description for what the collar means (when it's not just a collar worn for play) that does NOT have very strong parallels to what a wedding ring means to most married couples I've spoken to.

A few descriptions come to mind: 
A collar symbolizes ownership to many people.  If you were to ask several (vanilla) married women if they were owned by their husbands, I can virtually guarantee that most will say something along the lines of, "He don't own me!".   Ask a collared slave the same question.

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A collar can be given to multiple people simultaneously.  Does it lose its meaning? A wedding ring is considered by many to say "I'm monogamous!"  Now, granted...there are some people who have given out several wedding rings to various spouses simultaneously...but that's bigomy...and illegal.

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Finally, one of the things that I see the most of....  You will see a married slave or master accept or offer a collar when they are married to someone else and their spouse has no knowledge of their external relationship.  I have yet to see a significant number of people discard a collar in order to accept or offer a wedding ring.

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Welcome to the boards...

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I'm not sure where these fingers will take me as i type this, hang in there with me a moment. I have read all the posts, i actually agree with alot of them, there are even more with very strong feelings/emotions on this subject....with good cause i may add.
I am going to share something with y'all that made me stop and think about this. I have been a smoker now for more years than i care to say. In December i saw an commercial on tv about smoking that said: "Are you a slave to cigarettes?" I was overcome by this feeling of shame and hurt. I was afterall a slave to Thorns, it never occured to me being a slave to anything else. I aked Him for help in quitting smoking. I had a rough day at work a few weeks later, i actually went out and bought a pack of cigarettes, i came home and even told Him what i did. This is what happened.
He told me to grab the pack of smokes and meet Him in the Dungeon. I did as He told me, He told me to kneel and said i would not like this. Thorns removed the collar from around my neck, set the collar and the cigarettes on the bench, told me that i had 5 minutes alone in there and to decide who i was going to serve...Him or the cigarettes. I could not be a slave to Him AND cigarettes. My emotions ran high, i was pissed, i was sad, i felt lost, i thought that the collar obviously did not mean as much to Him as it did to me. I was wrong of course.
I chose His collar, came out of the Dungeon and applogised for my actions. I did ask Him for His help in this. Was it punishment? it felt like it to me...but what i learned from this was a lesson. I had a choice. I have always wanted to serve Him, i don't want to be a slave to anything/anyone else. It was a hard lesson learned, but an effective one.

While i do understand what y'all have posted, this was just one slave's story and the choices at hand.

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ORIGINAL: MyCaptainsPet

In a group on Yahoo they are discussing the removal of collars as a form of punishment.

i don't know, this just disturbs me... My collar is a symbol of US and of what we are together. 

Anyone have any thoughts on this????

quote:

ORIGINAL: MrThorns

I've been watching this post with a great deal of interest.  Some of the common points that have been made throughout this thread has got me thinking...

1. I keep hearing the phrase "my collar" being used by slaves/submissives. Doesn't the collar belong to the Master and shouldn't he be "allowed" to do whatever he wishes with it? (No offense to the FemDom crowd...I just tend to write in the masculine.)

2.  I keep hearing about how a collar is similiar to a wedding band.  How can you possibly compare the two?  The collar, to many people, indicates that they have entered into service/slavery with the collar's owner.  The wedding ring is more symbolic of an egalitarian relationship.  Did you (speaking to dom and sub alike) enter into your D/s relationships to have rights, authority and privledges equal with your Master or slave?  I'm guessing not.

3.  "The removal of the collar is the end of the relationship."  Personally, I refuse to allow an object have that much power over my relationships.  A collar, even though it symbolizes many things, is still an inanimate object.  The relationship itself should be more important that any symbol, don't you think?

4. "Removing a collar as a punishment is cruel, mean and undermines trust...."  Is it mean and cruel?  No more or no less cruel than any other punishment could be, I imagine.  It really depends on how it's done and the desired effect upon the slave.  I think it would be inappropriate to yank a collar off of a girl and throw it across the room because she burned dinner.  Where is the lesson in that? 

Does it undermine trust?  Not if the Master is doing exactly what he said he would do.  That's a real trust builder, isn't it?   I trust that my slave will obey, she trusts that I will punish her if she disobeys.

I think there should always be a purpose and a desired goal for punishment/discipline. (I'm not going to argue about definitions of punishment vs discipline right now...)  I also think it is good for there to be symbols within relationships.  Symbols, for some reason seem to be more tangible...more real.  We can hold them in our hands, see them with our own eyes... but it's the relationship that is the important thing. 

I think this has been an excellent thread and I look forward to hearing more.

~Thorns